The Politics of the USA are Unreal

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Dear Dave,

Over here in Europe we’ve been almost saturated with news about the USA presidential election and its aftermath to date, and I think it’s fair to say that a great many of us have looked on with various degrees of alarm and/or gloomy resignation. A bit like watching an inevitable car crash. There have been newspaper articles and TV programmes aplenty on how the phenomenon of Trump came to be, but from my point of view what I’ve missed is a really personal view. From a level-headed USA citizen with wide experience. Your own account of how it came to pass that the United States of America voted in Donald Trump. A kind of “Letter from the USA”.

Here in Europe we (at least some of us) have viewed the results of USA foreign policy – both through direct and covert action, with great alarm – knowing we’re directly in the firing line should various conflicts be escalated beyond their current regional boundaries. We wonder whether foreign matters have much effect in presidential elections? (This is a loaded question perhaps; most people are concerned with domestic matters first and foremost, short-sighted as that may be.)

I wonder if the fact that in the USA people are presented with a strictly binary choice in presidential elections narrows people’s focus somewhat – one side of the other, that’s your lot–and if neither matches your expectations or philosophy, that’s just tough. In other nations (where voting is a reality) there’s usually more on offer – the opportunity to at least cast a protest vote – even if all you end up proving is that there are other opinions out there.

Does the binary choice in the USA, plus all the showmanship, restrict real political engagement?

As one who takes all the mainstream media’s output with an enormous pinch of salt, I’d be
really grateful for your take on this!

Best wishes,

Paul

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Dear Paul,

I may be the worst person to ask what’s going on in America, as I’m as detached from the social culture as I can get and still hear some live blues. But maybe that’s not a valid disqualifier. My personal reaction has been disappointment, this election was a deal breaker for me. I had always given America the benefit of the doubt. We’ve done some heinous things, but I believed that there was an underlying societal desire to do better, to do good. To be more. No longer.

My view now is that middle-class America is generally more interested in their many distractions than in their government, with the exception of two extremes. The very rich, who want to keep all their money and scheme to make more, and the very poor who want to eat today and have a safe place to sleep tonight. The rich need the poor to serve them, but they don’t want them to be able to amass enough capital to join them. That friction creates a struggle, and the struggle creates the government, which is created to struggle. The problem is when winning the struggle becomes more important than any goals foreseen in case of victory.

We’re there. Ajahn Sumedho related something near this; “Ajahn Chah pays no attention to politics. They are not real.” Politicians don’t want consensus, the struggle is what pays their bills.

Have you seen Osho’s take on religious and political leaders? Devastating! Everybody between the very rich and the very poor has a long list of distractions; work, commuting, kids, school, music lessons, shopping, budgets, health issues and the screens. Screens with news, sports, weather, music, hopes, dreams, fears, lies . . . wall screens, desk screens, phone screens, wrist screens. As if they don’t realize what they’re watching is real. Or maybe they don’t want to deal with where they are now. Forty-odd years ago the late, great Dr. Jimmy Tanaka told me this; “Japan has a culture of focus, America has a culture of distraction. Do something.”

I thought I understood him then, but I didn’t grasp the depth of the difference until decades later. America has been fat enough for the last two centuries to evolve into a society with a majority of casual watchers and commenters, with the richest paying just enough to people to do something to be watched and commented on. And the watchers, of course. Trevanian’s “Wad”: “Generalization is flawed thinking only when applied to individuals. It is the most accurate way to describe the mass, the Wad. And yours is a democracy, a dictatorship of the Wad.” Shibumi, 1979

America is both the world’s biggest producer and biggest consumer of entertainment. Dr. Tanaka’s distraction. This is cogent: “When your brain is full of sports, there isn’t room for much else.” – Skip Bayliss, 2023 The People look at government the same way they look at ball sports. Somebody has to win, and somebody has to lose. What the fight is about, if it’s productive or even necessary at all, isn’t as important as the winning and losing, and being on the winning side. Sports have generally replaced culture, and now gambling is taking over sports. What could go wrong?

What are the common, everyday people thinking? They’re not, and that’s the problem. As far as the political chaos goes, Mr. Trump, who I have nicknamed Bonehead, the Destroyer, seems to think being elected President gave him free rein to rule by fiat, and I believe he truly doesn’t know how the government works, or cares. He definitely doesn’t know what a tariff does, and to whom. He never paid any attention to rules and regulations in his business dealings over five decades, and doesn’t seem to grasp the need to learn anything about the operation of government. Hopefully the Federal courts will educate him in regard to the rules.

One thing is for sure, everyone is afraid of him, which I don’t get. He’s a fat, elderly, out of shape ignoramus who was never required to clean up after himself. He behaves like a four year old who wants what he wants, now, and will shriek and throw things until he gets them. An alpha bully from the chrysalis of a spoiled brat. He campaigned on bringing food prices down “on day one”. Eggs seem to be the central focus of the Boobgeois. Since 2022, approximately 138.7 million commercial egg-laying chickens have had to be destroyed due to avian flu outbreaks. Where he’s going to get that many chickens on short notice eludes me.

This carries over to all of his promises, but his minions are most likely to give him the Mussolini treatment over their groceries. The opposition seems to have gone into seclusion either out of fear or a lack of ideas. They have no clear leadership that I can identify. “Stunned” may be a real possibility. They apparently didn’t have any contingency plan for if he won. They put all of their eggs in the win basket. Some spotty resistance is beginning to speak out. People like Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) in the House, and Senator Patty Murray, (D-Washington) in the Senate, are two exceptions that I see. Standing firm, stepping up, and calmly dealing with the reality, speaking truth to deranged power. Taking action.

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez turned 35 in October. I’d run a 2028 ticket with the two of them in either order. What will happen? I don’t know. I don’t trust our government or the media’s explanations of why America does things, and I haven’t for a long time. Americans don’t know the true motivations for our country’s actions. They think we got involved in Vietnam to save the people of S.E. Asia from Communism, when in fact it was primarily to secure cheap labor for our tennis shoes, soccer balls and clothing, and to make sure they didn’t make Chinese tennis shoes, soccer balls and clothing.

In history class they don’t mention the U.S. Merchant Marine striking to protest America helping France re-colonize Vietnam, in a deal with the French government to make them look tough on Communism both domestically and internationally. That’s not long before they kicked the PCF out of the government for supporting union workers at Peugeot. Does this world view support Democracy, or Capitalism? I went to North Ontario with some friends the summer before our numbers would come up in the draft. If I would have known then what I know now about the truth of America’s involvement in Vietnam I might have stayed there.

Right now what’s going on here is unfathomable for me. Will the midterms reduce his power? Will there be midterms? Is White Nationalism so strong that the 49.9% who voted for him will starve for it? Ten years ago when I heard Trump was running for President I laughed. It’s not so funny now. The Biden Administration was bad enough, now we have to rely on Trump for the story of our motivations in the Ukraine and Gaza situations, and worry about his impulses to look heroic at enormous cost to the rest of us.

The number of Americans that DIDN’T vote (90 million) is greater than the number who voted for either Trump or Harris. If God is on the side of the big battalions, Hybris seems to be on the side of Trump, although the use of the word “resistance” is starting to blossom in the media, which is nice. Keep an eye on a screen near you, I think I’m going to try to let it go. I do wish Hunter Thompson were here.

Pardon the ramble.

Cheers!

Dave

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Dave Blazer is a retired financial securities industry manager and technical expert with a life long interest in Asian philosophy and martial arts. He is also a struggling left handed Blues Guitarist. He served as a cryptographic and systems management technician in the U.S. Navy for nine years, and attended the Dominican College of San Rafael, CA. He was involved with the securities industry for nearly 30 years.

Paul Halas, the Arts and Lifestyle Editor of Ars Notoria and co-founder of AN Editions, is a writer of Jewish heritage whose escape from 1970s hippidom was the discovery that he could invent stories. He spent forty years contributing to various Disney magazines and books, as well as a variety of non-Disney comics, books and animated films. He has recently finished the second edition of his book The Rights of Man and Fish which will be launched at the Chapel Market Tavern On March 6th. Halas is a self-described Humane Socialist.