Biden v. Trump: WTF?

Biden v. Trump: WTF?

Peter Schultz

            Given that both the Biden campaign and the Trump campaign are hollow, are empty of almost any substance, I feel compelled to ask: What’s really going on? Is there anything going on at all?

            Whatever it is, it can’t have anything to do with partisan politics because the candidates agree about the major issues. To wit: Both want to keep or make America great, meaning that the both support US imperialism generally and the overthrow of governments not to their liking specifically. [Venezuela and Syria] They both support further distribution of the wealth to the wealthy via tax policies and humongous “defense” budgets. Both oppose “Medicare For All” and both want to “reform” policies of mass incarceration, “reforms” that are meant not undermine but to fortify mass incarceration. And the list goes on.

            So what is all the “fire and brimstone” generated by the campaigns about? Russia? China? Hardly, because despite superficial differences, both campaigns agree that the US must confront both nations. Moreover, both parties want Assange dealt with harshly, along with Snowden if that could be arranged.

            It all seems so odd.  So much to do about so little – and trying to make that little look like a lot. So something is afoot while being disguised as something else. What could it be?

            While I am pretty sure I don’t’ know, I am sure that this has happened before and even with some frequency. I felt this way in 2000 when I would joke that the choice was between “Bore and Gush,” as if it were difficult to tell distinguish between Bush and Gore. Although I didn’t feel this way at the time, I have come to see the Bush v. Clinton election in 1992 the same way. Regarding that election, I feel it’s a good bet Bush threw the election to Clinton in order to protect himself and his kind of politics from being exposed and undermined as illegitimate in a constitutional republic insofar as it was about to become clear that as Vice President, Bush was up to his eyeballs in Iran-Contra and that Iran-Contra was about much more than its public billing allowed. Reagan and Bush had been dealing with, allying with jihadists and other radicals, often Islamic, in order to help fund and maintain US imperialism. And this had to be hidden, even at the cost of George Bush, Sr., taking a dive. His loss also allowed him to pardon without consequence those who could have blown the whistle on his and Reagan’s policy of relying on extremists, something Caspar Weinberger threatened to do.

            Could the same game being played now? That is, could it be that the US has found it still necessary to deal with jihadists as allies, as partners in order to successfully maintain and fortify its imperialistic world order? Doesn’t the destruction of Libya suggest or even confirm this? And, of course, all the fire and brimstone surrounding Hillary’s role in that destruction conceals what was actually going on, does it not? Blaming Hillary hid the more important issue of whether our elites should be in bed with jihadist extremists. How else explain the situation in Syria, where the US openly relies on jihadists – labeled “moderates” of course – to accomplish its goals there, and to maintain US dominance? What of US support of alleged “democrats” in Venezuela, for example, “democrats” that are more accurately described as right-wing extremists? And of course the US is rather openly siding with right-wing extremists in Ukraine and Belarus. Again, the uproar about Trump’s allegedly threatening phone calls to some in Ukraine served to hide what is actually going on, viz., the necessity for US elites to rely on, to ally with extremists to maintain and fortify the American imperialistic world order. And so while mocking Trump, the Democrats are not mocking his appeals to greatness, while the fact that this greatness now requires relying on extremists goes unacknowledged.

            As Barry Goldwater once said: “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” Of course, it remains a question – largely unasked now – whether extremism can ever protect or maintain liberty. Several revolutions suggest rather strongly that the answer to that question is “No.” And recall, if you would, that even the American Revolution did not lead to liberty for several million human beings, both black and native. It could be, as I suspected long ago, that Goldwater was wrong. And this could prove quite important insofar as our elites are embracing extremism to maintain the American empire. They may maintain that empire but they will sacrifice liberty in the process.