No good citizen in their right mind would want to see democracy further eroded in the United States of America. Cold cash and mercantilist in all levels of political process have lowered – shall we say Trumped – how the United States is perceived internationally. President Biden set out his thoughts for the world to consider yesterday.
Making all the right moves, yesterday also he sent a letter to Prime Minister Ardern congratulating New Zealand about Waitangi Day.
New Zealand is one of our closest friends and partners. The unbreakable bond we share was established when the first US Consul to New Zealand was on hand to witness the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi on February 6, 1840.”
Sure, it’s optics. But optics is the most powerful currency in trade within this political economy.
And there is so much to rebuild. Post-Trump politics is never going to reward virtue and diplomatic niceties – his impact will stretch for years and years. Instead, publicity will remain its own political reward. While Joe Biden has had a seamless rollout, Republicans have continued making a political virtue of publicity and outrage.
Star performer is Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. She’s called for the executions of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, and multiple other head-explosions. For that she has been stripped by fellow elected members of her committee titles, but she has also been fulsomely supported by the great majority of the Republican base. Politics has no patience for those who expect success to just arrive: Greene has a 10+ rating among Republicans. Half-sensible ones like Liz Cheney are on a -28% rating. She is making her case to be the heir-apparent to Trump’s inferno: outrage is the petrol to her fire.
The Never Trump republicans muscling into the Trumpworld lane even in the post-Trump Washington have a very good chance of being run down flat. The Republican base still adore him.
Even if there’s no breakaway party or media empire formed in Trump’s wake, he will remain a revolution within the Party.
Perhaps Trump’s supernova will set behind the moon of Fox News and both will decline. We all waited for some peak to arrive as if Karma was real. It ain’t.
Perhaps Pelosi and Harris will get the full big stimulus through, and Pelosi will be even more trenchant in how her political muscle is flexed.
Perhaps Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy will continue to substitute spectacle and outrage for substance.
For the Republicans at least, it’s certainly enough for now.
There is absolutely no reason that Biden’s sensible and substantial politics will rise above Republican anomie and bombast. All he can do is start, and work harder than he ever has in his life.
But Biden’s signal to Ardern shows he is seeking to rebuild a United States politics that had been supplanted for four years. They are so low that even a country as otherwise internationally insignificant as ours is worth paying real attention to.
Sure some dignity that befits its commercial and cultural power will take more than the one term that Biden offers. But his footing so far is bold, generous, and faultless.
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