Temptation of the Worst

The gangrene of American finance has led to a global economic crisis with well-known results: Massive job losses, the bankruptcy of millions of homeowners and the decline of social welfare. Yet five years later, due to a singular paradox, no one can quite rule out the arrival of a man at the White House, Willard Mitt Romney, who owes his immense fortune to speculative finance, the outsourcing of jobs and the fiscal charms of the Cayman Islands.

His choice of Representative Paul Ryan as the Republican vice presidential candidate provides a glimpse of what the U.S. might look like this coming November 6 if voters yield to the temptation of the worst. While Barack Obama has already agreed to a plan to reduce the budget deficit by reducing social spending without raising the abnormally low tax level on the highest incomes (SEE HERE), Ryan has judged this democratic concession to be completely insufficient. His plan, which Romney rallied around and the House of Representatives — mostly Republican — has already approved, would further reduce taxes by 20 percent, bringing the maximum rate to 25 percent — a low not seen since 1931. It would simultaneously increase military spending, and he would accomplish everything by dividing the budget deficit in the U.S. gross domestic product by ten. How does Ryan hope to achieve such a performance? By abandoning the essential civil missions of the state to private insurance or charity. Thus, the budget for medical coverage for those in need would be reduced by 78 percent (SEE HERE).

Since the beginning of last year, Obama has implemented a policy of austerity as ineffective and cruel in the U.S. as it has been elsewhere. Sometimes he welcomes — rare — good economic news which he then bears as a credit to his presidency; sometimes he attributes the bad news — such as the employment situation — to the Republican filibuster. Such dialectic is unlikely to re-engage the electorate; the U.S. president expects that the fear of his opponent’s right-wing radicalism will ensure him a second term. Although, what would he do after squandering the promise of his first term and when it seems certain that the Congress elected next November will be more right than the one he found upon entering the White House?

Once again, a system locked by two parties vying for favors granted to the business world will force millions of Americans, discouraged by the weakness of their president to vote for him again nonetheless. So, as per usual in the U.S., they accept the choice between bad and worse. The verdict, however, will not be without consequences elsewhere: The victory of a Republican Party determined to destroy the welfare state, outraged by “charity,” firmly hooked on the towline of Christian fundamentalists and brought to paranoia by hatred of Islam would galvanize a European right already enticed by such temptations.