aroonwithaview

Inside America are two wolves. Depending on the zeitgeist, one of the two wolves comes out of hibernation to snap its powerful jaws around the public’s neck. The evil wolf bites in the name of the powerful – Andrew Jackson, Richard Nixon, Donald Trump – while the good wolf bites in the name of the weak – Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D Roosevelt, Lyndon B Johnson. But regardless of which wolf wakes up, a monstrous exercise of power and coercion is inevitable.

Surprisingly, some have claimed that whatever Trump has been doing for the past year has been un-American. In my understanding of this country’s history, whatever he has been doing is exceptionally America; in fact, he may as well be following an unwritten script (subconsiously, of course – I doubt he has the mental capacity to read even a written script). From Jackson’s Manifest Destiny to Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation to Bush’s Iraq Invasion, the American President has claimed singular and unbounded power to impose his will on the people. Some weak attempts are made by feckless institutions to check and balance these powers, but at no decisive moment have any of these checks or balances truly been effective. And yet, Trump’s exercise of this power to impose his own peculiar will (and not just his will itself) is seen as anomalous.

I think this cognitive dissonance comes for the complete mismatch between the theory of America and the practice of America. In theory, America was founded as a rebellion against the unchecked power of one man to change ordinary people’s lives. This necessitated a national myth that portrays America as a bastion of freedom and rights. But in practice, the American president has power over the nation that even some kings and dictators would envy. A true megalomaniac (as most candidates for the presidency inevitably are) can bend the nation and its institutions completely to his will, with nothing to be done by anyone to prevent or stop the process.

My sense is that Trump’s completely ordinary exercise of presidential power for his extraordinary desires will continue, until the next narcissist takes over in 2029. If we’re lucky, that person will suffocate the public in the name of more widely useful ends.