I Alone Can Fix It

Yes, Trump said that!

I don’t know if it was an ad-lib, or part of his written text, but he said it, and it’s memorialized in the video record, in his convention speech. Apparently it was after he said: the powerful “beat up on people that cannot defend themselves;” and the system was “rigged against our citizens.”

Hubris? What is he running for? Emperor, perhaps? King Arthur? Maybe, King Arthur.

He’s not running for what most Americans have recognized as President.

Truman, in an interview in the Oval Office, before Ike was inaugurated, remarked: “Poor Ike!” He explained that being President was not like being a General. “He’ll order this, he’ll order that—and nothing will happen!” (quotation approximate).

Presidents cannot control Congress, unless they have an overwhelming majority, and even then, not for long, as LBJ demonstrated. Presidents can’t even control the sprawling bureaucracy of the Executive branch, although they try; they can’t control the Supreme Court, even one they appoint, and they certainly can’t control the States. So, how is the Donald going to do what he says he’s going to do? Establish law and order within days of his inauguration?

The states control police powers.

Detain and expel 11.5 million “illegal aliens?” The legal problems facing such a program are nearly insurmountable, unless he’s determined to completely circumvent all Constitutional protections for non-citizens.

And then, would certain citizens, someone outspoken, like me, be denied Constitutional rights as well, because we are, well, you know…?

If he has a friendly Congress, he might be able to start building a wall, but it would be a massive undertaking; would cost more than any other government building program ever has, and probably would founder in disputes about where to get the money, even if a lot of it ended up in the hands of Trump & Co. The first $100 billion President.

But he’s also going to completely revamp the military and cut taxes. How? Maybe by doing what Hitler did in part: seize all property and wealth belonging to aliens for the State, i.e. the Federal Government. That would be quite a haul.

If he cuts taxes, according to his statements and the Republican platform, he’ll cut taxes for the wealthy and for corporations. Tax cuts for ordinary people would have to be minimal, and probably would have to be replaced by higher sales taxes, excise taxes and value added taxes, all of which would increase ordinary people’s tax burden, but not that of the wealthy, or corporations. Taxes would be less visible, however.

If, that is, he could get any taxes through Congress beyond the tax cuts popular with business, so an enormous deficit could be the result. And then a recession, at least.

He says he’s for peace, but he excoriated Obama for not acting on his Syrian “red line,” which could very well have ended up involving the US in the horrific Syrian civil war even more directly, and possibly in direct confrontation with Russia.

Can we predict a peaceful Trump Presidency, given his thin-skinned vulnerability to criticism? Can you really imagine him negotiating a deal with Assad, or Putin? And what about his inflammatory statements on the Iran nuclear treaty? We could well end up in a greater war in the Middle East: against IS, Iran, Assad, you name it. Maybe all of them combined!

His claims or promises do remind me of Hitler, and of Roman Emperors, although his symbolism is more like King Arthur, the original British nationalist, if you consider the lighting that made him golden, instead of orange, that figure approaching through the mist, suddenly revealed, and certainly his children’s stories of Trump generosity, concern for all his workers, his secret charitable aid to them. It’s all a mythology, being spun by story-tellers—with an agenda.

Consider the heroic story of his rescue of the city skating rink outside his office window. His children’s story is that it was interminably under construction, over budget and never finished. So, he took it over, finished the construction in record time and under budget. Dad’s free enterprise triumphs, demonstrates the superiority of capitalism over the state.

A participant in that story told me that the public rink was doing fine, had full enrollment in all sorts of programs and was heavily used. But it was old, so Trump somehow took it over (she didn’t tell me how that happened) and closed it. After two weeks trying to work with him, my informant told him he was an asshole, to his face, and then quit. The refurbished rink may be swankier, she said, but now it costs too much for ordinary people to afford, so, it’s not heavily used.

This shows what class politics can do, and what side Trump is on, as well. King Arthur may have been a popular hero, but consider: slaves, serfs and despotic aristocracy were normal, the peasantry, or yeomanry, had a hard life, the former with high rents—just better than the other guys, those slaves and serfs.

Is that what Trump means, when he says he’ll fight for us? King Arthur and his knights fought for the privileged damsels, and lords, not the peasantry, or the serfs and slaves.

Where would you fit in Trump’s Royal Court? Or outside it?

African Americans, Hispanics, Asians: none of them would likely find a place, except as loyal servants—or serfs and slaves.

A Free-market Solution to Mideast Crises

American interventions in the Mideast have been little short of disastrous: starting with the CIA coup in Iran in 1953, which led to the Islamic Revolution and the current Islamic state. Further, Iraq had a relatively stable, if murderous, regime that provided drinking water and predictable electric power, roads, security, jobs. and kept out Islamic extremists. The current regime may be more democratic, but chaos rules and Saddam's amenities, mentioned above, are no longer predictable, or even possible.

The conflicts in Syria and Iraq, where Islamic State momentarily controls swathes of both, are part of a larger Middle Eastern conflict: between Sunni and Shia. While the main Shia state is not Arab, Iraq, with a Shiite majority is Arab, as are Shiite majorities or large minorities in many Arab countries. The conflict is not between Persians and Arabs; it's far broader than that. In Iraq, it's between a once-dominant Sunni minority and a now dominant Shia majority; in Syria a Shiite-allied minority rules and a Sunni majority rebels--militarily dominated by Sunni extremists. Sunni Arabia opposes Shiite Iran. Both have many clients: Hezbollah, the PLO, al Qaeda, IS….

The conflict's closest historical analogue is hardly encouraging: Protestant versus Catholic in Europe's Hundred Years War.

One thing this conflict is Not: central to American interests.

Either will sell us oil; they need the money. Oil is sold at international prices and the US is now producing more of its own than is good for the planet: we need less Arab oil, anyway.

The current success of IS, or ISIS, is due to the colossal blunder of the US in going into Iraq in the first place, then strewing its modern weapons all over it. We assumed, wrongly, that the established government would be able to hold onto them. We made the same mistake in Vietnam, where American arms found their way to the Viet Cong. But IS is not another Nazi Germany, nor the Viet Cong, however much it might want to be--albeit with Muslim symbolism. Germany was an advanced industrial state: the Viet Cong had a government sponsor: North Vietnam. Those governments were well established, and Germany had the know-how to rebuild a defense industry. IS has none of these things. It lucked out when the Iraqi army turned tail, and dropped all the American high tech weaponry we'd given them.

IS may be able to terrorize millions for a short while, but how can it supply its army with modern arms and ammunition? It can't produce them. It can buy some on the Black Market, financed by oil and looting, but that can become prohibitively expensive, especially if the US did something uncharacteristically intelligent like embargo arms sales.

IS is against the interests of almost every established Muslim state, secular or non, Sunni or Shiite. Do Arabs want to live under the IS regime, where executions are daily, taxes are high, and codes of conduct are stifling. Some think they do--until they experience it. IS's power is ephemeral, unless the US gives it credibility by making their movement the equivalent of Nazi Germany, against which a mighty alliance (led by the US), would march into battle--strewing expensive weapons. IS tries to incite intervention with its videoed beheadings; it's their resupply and recruitment strategy.

We'd be intervening on the side of Shiites, when Sunnis are rising against the murderous Syrian Assad regime, and against blatant discrimination by the Iraqi Shiite government we installed. Shiite Iran is stable, has democratic elements, but is hostile to the US. Sunni Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf kingdoms are hardly democratic. Egypt, our most important Sunni client, is a brutal, repressive military regime. All these Sunni states are supposedly US friends.

So, why intervene on either side, especially when this conflict has been going on since Mohammed's death in 632 and the ensuing battle for succession?

I have a better solution: don't take sides and don't intervene. Sell arms only to stable states, profit from the regional conflict, but don't try to control it: the US can't, and shouldn't try. Defense industries could make money from it, however, without costing US lives or increased US debts.

A Fatal False Issue

There is something fundamentally wrong with what's going on in Washington. A false issue--the debt and debt ceiling--could trigger economic apocalypse, while the real economic issue--jobs and the housing market--are brushed aside.

The extreme right, true-believer "tea party" Republicans, the new guys on the block, are the tail wagging the dog.

Neither Obama, nor Democrats, nor the Republican leadership want to risk default. Also, Democrats know, at least, that Americans support them on not cutting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. But they also believe Americans want them to be reasonable, so if Republicans refuse to budge until the last minute, Democrats and Obama may compromise even on cuts to the big three--in order to avoid a default.

Such a compromise may be in the works between Senate Majority Leader Reid, and Minority Leader McConnell. Reportedly, it would cut $1.5 trillion, contains no new revenue, and is only short-term. You can bet that cuts won't be in subsidies to oil and coal, or more than token Defense cuts. That leaves the big three.

Also, there emerged the "gang of six" Senators: three from each party, who have now proposed a sweeping plan that would cut $4 trillion in ten years, while also dramatically lowering taxes for the wealthy, more so than for anyone else, but cruelly slashing funding for programs and transfer payments that help people, rather than corporations--and cutting Medicare and Medicaid.

Why can't Obama and Democrats stand up, and fight for the issues they believe in, issues supported overwhelmingly by the American public. Are Democrats in Congress and the Whitehouse as scared of the extremist fringe as German moderates were of Hitler? Moderate German politicians thought they could compromise with him, especially since Nazi (NSDAP) strength in the Reichstag was far from a majority. Yet, in less than a year, Hitler gained virtual control over all Germany.

Could it happen here? Crisis breeds authoritarianism, but Obama seems an unlikely Diocletian; he was the Emperor who took military power, and then turned the whole empire into a totalitarian state to avoid more civil war. Nevertheless, Obama's actions in Libya and the drone war confirm the tug of the imperial Presidency.

If Republican back-benchers refuse compromise on the debt ceiling, the economy could collapse with the default. American anger might explode. Either Obama emerges in 2012 as a new Diocletian who will set things right, or an extremist like Bachman will triumph; she has all the answers.

Given America's rightward turn, an imperial, Diocletian-type totalitarianism, or a fascist takeover seems more likely than a popular revolution, but either would take over a fast failing empire. We'll no longer be able to borrow to maintain it.

Do our Roman Senators, the extremely rich, think they will survive the apocalypse? They do think so, which is a big part of the problem. The Roman Senators of old did not survive, despite their huge caches of gold.

Angry, Not Just Tea Partiers

People are angry, and have good reason to be. But right-wing commentators and media like Fox are successfully diverting their ire. Meanwhile, would-be reformers find little support for substantive reform in policy areas in which there are substantial vested interests.

Health reform had to be limited to get past insurance company and provider interests, hence no "public option," and no negotiated Pharma prices.

Financial reform has to pass muster with banks, which are again riding roughshod over the economy: posting huge gambling profits, foreclosing on homeowners and ignoring mortgage re-negotiation programs, instituting new credit card fees, borrowing from the Fed at virtually no cost, and using the money to speculate, instead of loaning to businesses.

Republicans make the false claim that finance reform proposals will perpetuate public bailouts, so any reform must be killed. Meanwhile, Democrats are too craven to re-establish the needed boundaries between depositors and gamblers (like the repealed Glass-Steagall law), or to create a consumer protection agency that isn't answerable to the bankers first.

Why? Because banks and bankers have bought the GOP and enough of the Democrats to forestall meaningful reform.

Tea Party activists are angry, and others, too, but instead of venting their ire against the corporations exporting their jobs for profits, or against bankers, or AIG, they rant against "socialistic" Obama, Muslim, foreigner, against illegal aliens and against "those people" who don't pay income taxes (they pay as much in other taxes).

Noam Chomsky noted the similarities between the violent rhetoric of right-wing Americans and the Nazis before Hitler's takeover, and pointed out that the Nazis had only negligible support two years before they took control (through a democratic election).

The Weimar Republic was democratic, moderate and ineffectual; its reformers were pusillanimous. Nazis boasted they knew what to do. Germany's largest corporations supported them. The fascist system Nazis instituted, merged the power of the state with that of big business. The military in Nazi Germany was fused with both. Is that where we're headed?

Can moderate, centrist, half-reforms mollify enough of the people, stabilize the economy, prevent dangerous climate change, establish peace and maintain democracy? Given the violent response of the crazies, the power of the status quo institutions, and the military's interest in pursuing "the long war," it doesn't seem likely.

I take the Tea Party seriously. They may have all the facts wrong, they may be as ignorant as Sarah Palin, but they have energy. Faced with right-wing populists like Father Coughlin, FDR campaigned against "the economic royalists of our time." He won big for reform in 1936.

Our democracy needs an FDR, or Obama to become one, if it is to survive. Otherwise, we'll face the twilight of empire, like Diocletian's, more totalitarian than Hitler's, but declining nonetheless--before climate change destroys civilization as we know it.