Biden's Failure to Unite the Contending Forces Inside the U.S.
In Warsaw, Biden attempted to use a conception of democracy which no longer exists and is no longer seen to exist. "And [Ukraine's] brave resistance is part of a larger fight for essential democratic principles that unite all free people: the rule of law; free and fair elections; the freedom to speak, to write, and to assemble; the freedom to worship as one chooses; freedom of the press," he said.
The fact is that U.S. elections have been discredited in the eyes of the people as undemocratic and unfair. They do not ensure a peaceful transition of power by resolving conflicts among the rulers -- as the continuing battle over the Trump coup attempt on January 6, 2021 shows. He is also speaking just after the Ukraine government on March 20 banned 11 political parties, not allowing them to speak or participate in elections. Ukraine, like the U.S., is also notorious for its corruption.
Failure of U.S. Constitutional Arrangements
Biden was chosen by the ruling circles to be President of the United States in large part because he was seen as a unifier, that he could contend with the vying factions and preserve the Union in conditions where open civil war threatens. He had a long history in the Senate of achieving agreements among the vying factions. He promised to first deal with issues at home, including COVID and "systemic racism," and has failed on both counts. He was also thought to have standing in terms of foreign relations. Instead, he has already had three major foreign policy failures, in Venezuela, Afghanistan and Cuba. Rallying all in support of Ukraine was to overcome these failures, but it now threatens to become another of them.
Biden came to power representing those forces that think by resurrecting the appearance of respect for the Constitution and building alliances, the government of police powers that now exists could overcome its dysfunction and the broad dissatisfaction among the people.
Instead, most recently, Biden failed to unite forces, even among those who support him, so his main legislation "Build Back Better" did not pass. A massive budget that greatly increased funding for the Pentagon and the hated Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) did pass in the name of supporting Ukraine. That same budget completely eliminated funding for COVID, along with facilities providing free testing and vaccines, and Medicaid health care assistance for an estimated 15 million people as a result of the cuts.
All of this has increased the broad anti-war sentiment across the country and the great anger that the U.S. is bent on more war while conditions at home deteriorate, with homelessness, poverty and insecurity of all kinds increasing. This too is a failure of Biden -- to convince the people to follow him. They are instead stepping up resistance, including through strike struggles, and increasingly concluding that all those in power are unfit to rule. Calls for an anti-war government and peace economy are resonating.
Biden attempted to spread more disinformation, defending U.S./NATO actions as "right." He could not help but reflect the civil war conditions in the U.S., choosing to quote Abraham Lincoln, president during the U.S. Civil War from 1860-65. Saying it is Putin who believes that "Might Makes Right," Biden said, "In my own country, a former president named Abraham Lincoln voiced the opposing spirit to save our Union in the midst of a civil war. He said, 'Let us have faith that right makes might.' Right makes might." Lincoln did not prevent the civil war and only resolved the conflict, among the rulers, between the two labour systems -- one based on slave labour and the other on "free" labour -- through violent war.
It was not Lincoln who emancipated the people enslaved. It was they themselves who did so, together with workers and farmers south and north. It is also they who gave rise to a flowering of democracy, brutally crushed by the government, all in the name of "saving the Union."
Threat of Open Civil War Increasing
It is worth noting that far from succeeding in uniting the contending forces inside the U.S., the threat of open civil war has increased. The contention over January 6 persists, with many Biden supporters pushing for charges against Trump and many others saying this would trigger violent conflict. This includes those on the House Committee investigating January 6, which is testing the waters for leveling charges against Trump and those in the Justice Department who have yet to bring charges but leave open the possibility to do so.
On March 28, a federal judge in a case brought by the House Committee ruled that Trump "more likely than not" broke the law and "corruptly attempted to obstruct" Congress in his attempts to overturn the 2020 election results. Also reflecting state and federal conflicts, in New York, a State Supreme Court Judge has now said Trump and his two older children, Donald Jr. and Ivanka must testify. The case is a civil suit involving Trump's business and financial dealings. The Manhattan District Attorney is also pursuing criminal charges for tax fraud. Some consider that guilty verdicts could prevent Trump from running, others that charges should be dropped, all hoping to stave off violent conflict.
In addition, those with presidential ambitions are also openly opposing Biden's actions, in Ukraine and elsewhere. Senators Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida are among those doing so. Cruz has been allied with Trump and joined with him for the January 6 coup attempt. Rubio did not and voted for certification of the election. However, he has been endorsed by Trump for re-election to the Senate in November.
Both are providing themselves with a national profile for potential runs for the presidency in 2024, facing off first against Trump. Both have long been associated with the mafia forces linked to U.S. intelligence agencies that foment assassinations and counterrevolutions within the U.S. and abroad. These include efforts to secure regime change in Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and other countries of the Americas and Caribbean, as well as spearheading the Iran-Contra affair, the use of certain paid warlords and mujahadeen against the Soviets in Afghanistan and the crimes committed by mercenary pro-Nazi forces in the former Yugoslavia. Both Florida and Texas are their watering holes.
Senator Rubio, vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, for example, called for the U.S. to find a way to send fighter jets to Ukraine, right while Biden and the Pentagon said this was not going to happen. Rubio was also among those that did not condemn a tweet by Senator Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina, that someone should assassinate Russian President Vladimir Putin and "take this guy out."
Rubio, in an op-ed in the Washington Post, urged Biden to take more action against China. The editorial especially targets the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and calls for punishing China now. "Instead of cooperating with Beijing, the United States must act to prevent it from strengthening Putin and undermining freedom," Rubio said. "To protect our national and economic security, we must ensure that [China's President] Xi and the CCP pay a price for that partnership," with Russia, he said. He introduced a bill that would impose sanctions on any Chinese bank that attempts to deal with Russia. While Biden has also warned China, Rubio is inciting far harsher immediate actions. He also reflects the concern that China, together with Russia, India and others, will create a financial architecture independent of the U.S. dollar -- a main weapon for U.S. dominance.
Such demands defy Biden's role as head of the executive power with prerogative powers over foreign affairs and as Commander-in-Chief. They reflect the dysfunction of Congress and its contention with the presidency. Speaking in public against the President and Commander-in-Chief has become commonplace amongst ranking military forces and the civil bureaucracy, including diplomatic people. This is another indication that while war funding was secured from Congress for funding the Pentagon and Ukraine, Biden's hope to unify the contending forces, in Congress and the military and civilian bureaucracy, is not succeeding.
The civil war conditions are also evident in the conflicts within Republican ranks, especially as contention for the presidency increases. Senator Rick Scott, also of Florida, is the campaign chief for Senate Republicans in the upcoming November elections. He is allied with Trump and is in direct contention with current Senate Republican head Mitch McConnell.
Scott openly compares himself to Civil War General Ulysses S. Grant. He likens his situation in battling fellow Republicans to Grant at Vicksburg, where Grant ordered multiple bloody assaults on the Confederate stronghold and eventually took it over. "I think of myself more like Grant taking Vicksburg, and I think as a result of that, I'm always going to be perceived as an outsider," Scott said in an interview. "I'm going to keep doing what I believe in whether everybody agrees with me or not."
The dysfunction of existing institutions, the increasingly open and hostile conflicts, the inability of Biden and Trump, Obama and Clinton before him to unite the contending forces and unite the people, both at home and abroad, behind the U.S. presidency reflect a failed governing system with obsolete constitutional arrangements. The U.S. Constitution with its arrangements of inequality and keeping the rich in power and the people out is not modern or democratic.
Biden's failures also come from the fact that the huge human productive powers that now exist are not in the control of the rulers. What they cannot control, they destroy, including through their wars of destruction. These immense powers created by human beings can be brought under control if power resides with the people and serves their interests while protecting Mother Nature.
At present the ensemble of human relations, all the relations between humans and humans and humans and nature, are such that the need for empowering the people is both a reality and a necessity. Conditions are demanding it, as the threats of greater war and intensifying conflicts also make clear.
The peoples worldwide have strong anti-war stands, have strong desires for fraternal relations among the peoples, relations of mutual benefit and respect. The U.S. and its striving for world domination are the main force standing in the way of such relations -- of organizing to harmonize relations and developing the modern democracies of people's empowerment required.
This article was published in
Volume 52 Number 4 - April 3, 2022
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/Tmlm2022/Articles/M520045.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca