I’ve been back from vacation for a few days now, but I’m not feeling entirely ready to re-engage with reality just yet, what with the thoroughly depressing state of the world right now. Any optimism I felt after the UK election, or the setback for the far-right in France, has evaporated as more considered analysis has led to the inescapable conclusion that neither event represented a popular swing to the left. In the former case a deeply unenthusiastic electorate chose a promise of basic competence over an incumbent government that had descended into chaos, while across the channel the hastily-assembled anti-fascist alliance has little to unite it other than distaste for the RN, which remains a significant force.
Still, I can’t stop thinking about politics forever, so I guess I will have to try to process the recent events in the US, with the election there due in a little over three months.
Surprisingly, the most dramatic development, the near-assassination of Donald Trump, looks like it may have the least impact on the final result. The fact that someone decided to take a shot at him, while clearly regrettable, was not, in the context of the aggressively confrontational tone of political discourse that Trump and his allies have fostered, much of a shock, and won’t have changed what people think about him. Trump was presented with a golden opportunity to occupy the moral high ground, but characteristically failed to grasp it, instead using his RNC acceptance speech to air his usual litany of semi-coherent grievances. More significant perhaps was his choice of J.D. Vance as a running mate, signalling a focus on the White Christian Nationalist core of GOP support, and indicating that things may get very unpleasant indeed should they, one way or another, come out on top in November.
On the Democratic side there are at least some signs that the party hierarchy is belatedly realising that Joe Biden may be not the candidate best placed to beat Trump. Whether this insight will translate into action is another question of course, but it’s not inconceivable that Joe will be persuaded to step aside for a younger nominee, in theory allowing the Democrats to reframe the narrative and once again present themselves as agents of progressive change.
Whatever happens with either candidate, it’s difficult to believe that the rhetoric will become more temperate as the campaign goes on, and even harder to imagine the country coming together in peace and harmony after the votes have been counted.
I’m getting too old to worry about this shit, so for the sake of avoiding excessive stress I should probably just avert my eyes for the next 100 days, though it seems unlikely that I’ll be able to insulate myself from the news entirely. Perhaps good sense will break out, everyone will step back from the brink, and I’ll be able to start planning my next trip back to the US safe in the knowledge that it will still be there.
Second Life Shrink 