Boston University’s Andrew Bacevich in The Guardian:
If Trump secures the Republican nomination, now an increasingly imaginable prospect, the party is likely to implode. Whatever rump organization survives will have forfeited any remaining claim to represent principled conservatism.
None of this will matter to Trump, however. He is no conservative and Trumpism requires no party. Even if some new institutional alternative to conventional liberalism eventually emerges, the two-party system that has long defined the landscape of American politics will be gone for good.
Should Trump or a Trump mini-me ultimately succeed in capturing the presidency, a possibility that can no longer be dismissed out of hand, the effects will be even more profound. In all but name, the United States will cease to be a constitutional republic. Once President Trump inevitably declares that he alone expresses the popular will, Americans will find that they have traded the rule of law for a version of caudillismo. Trump’s Washington could come to resemble Buenos Aires in the days of Juan Perón, with Melania a suitably glamorous stand-in for Evita, and plebiscites suitably glamorous stand-ins for elections.
That a considerable number of Americans appear to welcome this prospect may seem inexplicable. Yet reason enough exists for their disenchantment.
American democracy has been decaying for decades. The people know that they are no longer truly sovereign. They know that the apparatus of power, both public and private, does not promote the common good, itself a concept that has become obsolete. They have had their fill of irresponsibility, lack of accountability, incompetence, and the bad times that increasingly seem to go with them.
So in disturbingly large numbers they have turned to Trump to strip bare the body politic, willing to take a chance that he will come up with something that, if not better, will at least be more entertaining. As Argentinians and others who have trusted their fate to demagogues have discovered, such expectations are doomed to disappointment.
Overwrought and alarmist? Clear-sighted and accurate? Is it true to say that “The people know that they are no longer truly sovereign.”
not diminish it.
Her call for love and kindness to break ALL the barriers that divide us is the only rational antidote to Trumpism.
Fred Rich LaRiccia
A trump win seems more likely to bust up the Republican party and send it away with the Whigs, than it is to end the Republic outright.
This is a reason I wish the “fascist” talk would stop. He isn’t. He is an American Berlusconi, even if he wins in NOvember.
When they asked who that was and what I meant, I said “imagine a billionaire Charlie Sheen running the government.” I thought that was pithy.
and Trump’s recent bromance with Mussolini proves it. ” Better to live one day as a lion than a lifetime as a sheep.” What BS !
As a direct descendent of anti-fascist Italian immigrants, I’ll just leave you with this ‘pithy’ quote from Il Duce defining Fascism : ” Fascism is the merger of state and corporate power.”
Wake up, America ! The barbarians are at the gate.
Fred Rich LaRiccia
Down to the bunga bunga rooms. But this is the United States of America. Even our worst presidents have had more dignity and commanded more world respect than that. I really can’t imagine Trump with the nuclear codes, but I’m worried about how effective those attacks will be in the general if they’ve failed in the primary. Hillary has her work cut out for her, it’ll be a delicate dance but I want her to beat the shit out of him.
Bacevich is a great analyst on international politics, his analysis here is a little alarmist and overwrought and he makes cultural references that are obsolete. I do think the two party system died last night, I’m just not sure how nor can I figure out what replaces it. But we are in the midst of a serious political realignment on par with 1932 and 1968.
that at least one major party has already proven itself incapable of performing the essential function of political parties.
The Democratic Party would have no way to cope with him either. Not sure Ezra is the right guy to do this analysis either. The GOP has been challenged in the electoral college department anyway (and losing the national vote 5 out of the last 6), so not sure it as big a deal as people make out. Jan 2017 Republicans most likely still control Congress.
And did a hostile takeover of an existing party, his problem is that his base is quite narrow. Not too many socially liberal, pro environment, anti-soda health nuts who support deregulating Wall Street outside the C Suites of corporate America. It’s been difficult enough starting a new statewide party from scratch, his 50 state scenario would be really difficult to pull off even with his deep pockets.
Or do you mean in 2020? Too far away to know, but he’s not a very appealing candidate.
Experience suggest that aspects of the American system make 2 parties the norm.
Sometimes things fall apart, but the dynamics of the system reassert after a realignment.
The question is, who is likely to split or turn into what?
There may be a realignment, but any absence of two obvious major parties will be temporary.
I think Bacevich nailed it. Without hyperbole or exaggeration.
The people know that they are no longer sovereign. They know that they will never get what their leaders perpetually promise and that they have no choice in the matter. And that has angered them, and made them reckless, and infantalized them.
High-minded appeals will cut no ice with this crowd; it will be dismissed as more of the same. Failure to recognize that will mean great failure indeed.