U.S. Presidential Election
Hopeless Rhetoric about Peaceful
Transition of Power
A feature of the U.S. presidential election campaign is the concern that the election will not give rise to a peaceful transition of power in the United States. Providing a peaceful transition of power is a mainstay on which the legitimacy of the liberal democratic institutions rests. But this is precisely what eludes the United States which is wracked in factional fights among the narrow private interests holding power, for which elections no longer provide a reprieve. The insurrection of January 6, 2021 provided the proof of this at a time foreign wars were no longer a sufficient distraction.
Far from
elections being a method to reach a temporary truce among
the
rulers,
to be followed with deal making within the Congress and
other
fora,
they have become a platform to engage in the factional
fighting
in a
manner which is tantamount to a civil war, but not yet a
violent
one on
a
national scale -- something the rulers hope to avoid.
The factions vying to seize the presidential power in the November election both speak in the name of "the people" but their aim is to seize the Office of the President so as to concentrate even more power in their hands. Presidential power is to control the opposing factions while attempting to keep a U.S.-dominated international "rules-based order" in place and repress resistance in the U.S. and worldwide.
Opposing factions exist within the military and civilian bureaucracy and within and between the narrow private business interests, as well as between and within the federal and state governments, federal police and intelligence agencies and those on the state level. This is evident as retired generals and admirals line up behind Trump or Harris and battles with the states rage over refugees and abortion. Significantly, the factions include what is classified as the largest faction -- that comprised of the peoples of the United States, altogether left out of the arrangements which wield that state power.
While the election occurs November 5, the president is not sworn into office until January of 2025 and only after Congress certifies the votes of the Electoral College. Kamala Harris, as vice president, presides over the certification, just as Mike Pence did in 2020.
As events during the last election show, it is not only during elections that the factional fighting is evident but after it takes place and before the inauguration. That is when having a peaceful transition of power faces direct challenges. Already Donald Trump on the campaign trail repeatedly raises his narrative about not respecting the results of the vote if he does not win. In part in response to this, on October 4 President Biden said of the election, "I'm confident it will be free and fair," but "I don't know whether it will be peaceful."
The issue of the transition of power also came up during the debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris held on September 10, and again in the vice-presidential debate between Ohio Senator J.D. Vance and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz held on October 2. It is referred to repeatedly in campaign speeches as well, especially those of Harris whose entire campaign is imbued with the claim that to restore the functioning of the democratic institutions and ensure a peaceful transition of power, it is necessary to vote for her and defeat Trump.
The comments are often limited to references to January 6, 2021, when the Trump forces organized to not recognize the results of the federal election which declared Joe Biden to be the winner. The January 6 attempted coup and insurrection was organized against the Congress on the day it was certifying the vote in favor of Biden, with Trump's Vice President Mike Pence presiding.
To this day Trump repeats that he did not lose that election and he continues to defend the January 6 protesters and his own role in inciting them for which he claims presidential immunity. For her part, Harris calls January 6 the "worst attack on democracy" since the Civil War.
Missing Information
Three main problems get left out of the discourse on the need for peaceful transition. One is the fact that the existing institutions, including elections, are dysfunctional and beyond repair. The peoples of the United States and the entire world recognize this.
Another main problem is that the massive military and civilian bureaucracies are divided and the means used thus far to unite them are failing to do so.
The third is the role of the people in a situation where many are rejecting the failed system and organizing alternatives. They will not so easily line up behind either Trump or Harris in a situation where transition is in doubt. As the largest faction, their pursuit of an independent political path is greatly feared by the rulers. Harris is being brought forward in large part to divert this direction and quell any revolt. This attempt has already been rejected by many.
Protest
in Kenosha, September 16 "No Votes for Genocide"
In terms of uniting the military bureaucracy, one means to do so are foreign wars to rally the troops behind the commander-in-chief. One foreign war after the other has been waged since the collapse of the former Soviet Union to secure U.S. world hegemony. Far from uniting the bureaucracy, the contradictions have sharpened. One U.S. administration after the other has failed to achieve such unity. This is due to the complete takeover of the state power by narrow private interests which by definition wage turf wars without let up. It also comes from serious differences on the strategic and geo-political policies the U.S. should adopt which, more often than not, also have the concerns and aims of narrow private interests behind them.
A contributing factor is the alternative alliances striving to make headway, such as BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and others) which make the U.S. wheeling and dealing to subject nations to its dictate an ever more difficult and complicated process.
Far from uniting the military and civilian bureaucracies, how the U.S. is conducting itself in foreign affairs has thus far isolated it further, and further eroded the credibility and legitimacy of its institutions and values it claims are democratic and superior to those of all others. The wars of destruction it resorts to are acts of desperation to control the human productive forces which are out of the control of the narrow private interests which favour the U.S. striving for global hegemony. The U.S./Zionist genocide in Gaza and now Lebanon are the most destructive of all, despite the unprecedented levels of crimes committed in previous wars. This is partly because they are conducted for all the world to see.
U.S. claims that the U.S. is the "indispensable nation" in the world which dictates all matters related to war and peace are not accepted by any other country, even those subject to its control as in the case of the members of the European Union. In Canada, despite the subjugation of the Canadian state and ruling class, the people do not agree with such things.
Far from uniting the massive civilian and military bureaucracies, the U.S. wars and refusal to sort out any problem on a political basis using diplomatic channels have damaged the reputation of the U.S. and its democratic credentials beyond repair. The U.S. is broadly considered to be responsible for causing millions of lives lost, refugee and humanitarian crises of unprecedented proportions, the worsening of the environmental crises as well as the commission of war crimes and crimes of genocide.
The U.S. and its Genocide Cartel of countries which tout its so-called rules-based international order violate the international rule of law with impunity and are desperate to make impunity the new normal which no people anywhere concede. On the contrary, as in Palestine, the people are waging a life and death battle to settle scores with the U.S. democracy under whose aegis all the crimes against humanity are being committed.
The ability of the U.S. to impose its "rules-based international order," where its rules are the basis for the order, is a main concern at present. The growing resistance by the Palestinians, those supporting Palestine like Lebanon, Yemen and Iraq, and including Iran's independent stand, contention from China and Russia, various international moves to remove the dollar as world currency for trade, all point to this difficulty. Failure to secure a peaceful transition would further weaken U.S. efforts at domination.
At present it appears the rulers are favoring Harris as best able to avert open civil war and maintain their "rules-based order." She is working to rally the divided forces under the banner of defending the Constitution against "enemies foreign and domestic," while also holding the people hostage to the notion that she can bring change.
But her success is far from a done deal. The absence of a peaceful transition of power through elections means the many military, intelligence and policing agencies -- federal, state, and local, all highly armed -- could divide their loyalties if their candidate is not the next Commander-in-Chief. Given the possibility of open violent civil war among the factions, these divisions put in doubt how the military and policing agencies will line up, posing grave dangers to the peoples at home and abroad.
It also provides an opening for the peoples to advance their solutions, strengthen their independent organizing and refuse to conciliate with the rulers, their genocide and destruction. It is the ensemble of human relations, humans to humans and humans to nature and what they reveal that determines the existing order, not U.S. rules. And it is these relations the peoples have the ability and necessity to change by creating new structures based on recognizing that all members of the polity are equal as are all countries in the world, big or small. Their sovereign right to determine their own present and future must be respected on the basis of a process which involves them in making decisions on all matters pertaining to the direction of the economy, war and peace, crime and punishment.
This article was published in
Volume 54 Number 43 - October 14, 2024
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/Tmlm2024/Articles/TS54434.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca