Revolution!

I have been struggling to try to back away from the day-to-day political cat fights and understand the larger historical context of the current revolution in America.  And revolution it is.

I wonder sometimes if the wealthy French aristocrats were as clueless when their revolution started as our current political elites seem to be today. Or if King George and the aristocrats around him were as clueless when the American revolution was brewing. Certainly the Washington political establishment and the captive media and wealthy donors and powerful industry and union supporters, in both political parties, all seem to be bewildered right now.

How is it that the leading candidates in both parties, Clinton and Trump, are both sociopaths in the true clinical sense (manipulative, and willing to do anything to advance their own causes unconstrained by conscious or shame – the definition of a sociopath). And the runners-up are just as flawed; Sanders, an aging self-proclaimed socialist who wasn’t even a Democrat until this election cycle started, and Cruz and Rubio, a pair of far-right evangelical wingnuts.  How did we come to this?

The American public, taken as a whole, aren’t really very smart.  They are gullible, easily swayed by emotion, and poorly educated in history, economics, and science. But they are shrewd in their own short-term self-interest, and they certainly know when they have been royally screwed! And screwed they have been.

The economy is stagnant.  Middle-class and working class wages are flat or dropping while upper class income is skyrocketing. Jobs are disappearing all across the country. Inequality is rising. The federal government is increasingly intrusive in their lives. They can see that corruption is rampant: Washington insiders get special treatment; bankers get their federally-protected bonuses even when their greed brings the market to its knees; government employees retire to plush six-figure jobs in corporations or lobbying firms. Corporations and unions and special interest groups seemingly can buy whatever legislation they want. Unelected bureaucrats in federal agencies promulgate masses of regulations and laws that burden – if not outright destroy – businesses and lives. Agencies from the Veterans Administration to the IRS to the Secret Service to the NSA are mired in scandal and abuses of power.  It has taken several decades, but the public is finally coming to a boil about all of this – hence the current revolution.

Now the thing about revolutions, as anyone who has read history knows, is that they are almost always disastrous. Look at the “Arab Spring” to get a good idea of what usually – not always, but usually – happens.  The leaders get removed, beheaded, shot, whatever, but the people who replace them are even more incompetent. This revolution looks likely to follow the same path.

Hillary Clinton, if she manages to evade indictment, will be more of the same, enriching herself through “donations” to the Clinton Foundation, the families’ slush fund. And the fact that she can evade indictment will just stir the pot more, proving again that Washington insiders are above the law.  If she is indicted, on the other hand, Democrats, who have had their heads in the sand about how serious this is, apparently have no Plan B.

I have no idea what a Trump presidency would be like; he changes positions daily. Some of his ideas, though boorishly expressed, are not all that unreasonable.  Others are patently illegal and unconstitutional. I suppose it depends on who he picks for his advisors, and how much he is willing to listen and be guided by his advisors. He is truly a wild card here.

A political revolution is coming. It may happen in this election, or it may not break until the next election or the one after that.  But the momentum is there and growing.  The discontent is driven in part by fundamental structural changes in the workplace – automation, outsourcing, free trade agreements and the like. It is clear neither party has any idea how to address these issues, or perhaps even recognizes them.  That will lead to revolution of one sort or another – if not gunfights in the streets then at least a major realignment of political powers in this nation.