i am beginning to realise how much of my world view until now depended on the assumption that the us is, at least by intention, a benign influence. in spite of questioning iraq, i confess that i still believed it at the visceral level. errors felt like aberrations. poor decisions felt like policy mistakes rather than a systemic failure. in the end, george bush was a decent and honest man way out of his depth. if he had a bit more of a historical perspective, he wouldn't have done what he did.
under trump, i wonder if that will still be true.
this is a man whose common purpose appears to be to dismantle institutions. this is the theme of nearly every appointment he has made to the us government. an epa head who doesn't care for the climate. an energy head who wants to close the department. an ambassador to israel whose primary loyalty is to israel and not the us and who treats palestinians as cattle. a director of intelligence who believes in conspiracy theories. a head of labor who despises and mistreats working people. a secretary of education who wants to undermine the public system. a head of homeland security who sounds like he wants to abandon the constraints of civility. a head of health who wants to destroy the health system but who has no plan of anything to replace it with. a secretary of state who is the friend of dictators. a top counselor who is a white supremacist.
when he talks internationally, the expressions of the new president are across the board destructive as well. get rid of essential trading treaties. set aside ancient relationships with democracies in favour of dictatorships. adopt war-mongering as a negotiating position. where are the reasonable, benign and constructive elements to be found?
it's the end of an era. the remaining hope is that he will allow himself to be replaced in four years. that is, if he respects the popular system and its constraints, of which there's no sign. but by then, it looks like he will have destroyed whatever a majority of americans think america is.
if there is a next president, he or she will inherit ashes.
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