We Were Better Off against Trump

Two months have passed since the inauguration of Joe Biden-Kamala Harris and I already miss Donald Trump. I miss the smell of napalm in the morning, as happened to Lt. Colonel Bill Kilgore, Robert Duvall’s character in “Apocalypse Now;” the feeling that, at any moment, everything was going to blow up. The attack on the Capitol by a mob of neo-Nazis, deniers and cuckolds in disguise proved to us that democracy is in danger.

The U.S. was miraculously saved by the determination of a handful of officials who did their job in key states, and did it with heroic impartiality, rising above their political affiliation. After that turbulent Jan. 6, Biden arrived and the noise magically disappeared, leaving us in doubt about whether what we experienced under Trumpism was real or a collective fantasy.

The man who suggested injecting disinfectants, taking hydroxychloroquine or sunbathing does not appear to be the best scientific advertisement for changing the minds of half of his voters, who still reject COVID-19 vaccines. Trump briefly emerged from his exile in Florida — where he mulls over his revenge — to say, “It’s a great vaccine and it’s a safe vaccine, and it’s something that works.” However, he got vaccinated in secret, no pictures taken. True to himself, he was sympathetic to those who rejected it. That is his style, claiming both one thing and its opposite in order to be able to say, “I told you so.”

In Formaldehyde

We owe it to Twitter that the former president does not spend all day long on the media scene. Twitter is keeping him in formaldehyde, as he is seen as a dangerous source of misinformation. His muteness is not permanent, but merely a break. The situation of his businesses under investigation is tricky, and moreover, there is the matter of his (non-) tax returns. And yet, in this post-truth world, nothing seems to harm him.

His plan is to stay in the Republican Party as long as he can control it, and we will learn if this is the case on Nov. 8, 2022, when the entire House of Representatives is up for reelection, as well as one-third of the Senate and 36 governors, whose power is key in a federal state, as we saw in the last presidential election.

Trump aspires to manage the use of big donor funds, deciding whether to back those candidates seeking reelection or other candidates with whom he has a greater affinity. This determines the rhetoric and actions of those whose positions are at risk and who are afraid of upsetting the big boss. The midterms will show whether he has enough kick left to run for the White House or if the supremacist world supporting him moves on to a younger candidate. In the U.S., democracy is still in danger. The assault is no longer violent (at least for the time being). The Republican plan is to hinder the voting rights of minorities, whom they assume are pro-Democrat.

Window of Legislative Opportunity

Biden seeks to establish some political distance from Trump. Not only is his style more polite, but his first decisions reveal a politician who is more liberal than he really is. There is a window of legislative opportunity until the fall of 2022. Harris, who also presides over the upper chamber, breaks the tie in the Senate (50-50). The Democrats are able to pass legislation that may not be possible two years from now if Republicans take back legislative power. Behind these games of petty politics stands the reality of a virus that has killed more than half a million Americans and has damaged the economy.

In the midst of this change in style, in the return to traditional democracy in the Middle East, in seeking to build bridges with Iran without renouncing a show of military muscle, it is a surprise that Biden has called Vladimir Putin a killer. It seems more like an anti-Trump proclamation than a political shift. After a four-year period of hibernation, Biden returns to a different world than the one he left with Barack Obama. The strategic rival of the U.S. is now China. Putin is struggling to keep himself at the center of the stage, but still has great destabilizing power, especially in Europe. The United Kingdom has announced a 40% increase in its nuclear weapon stockpile to protect itself in the post-Brexit era.

Meanwhile in the U.S., where a less tense language is taking over and the media are seeking their space in the hectic world of social media, foreign policy is still dominated by the unspeakable interests of the great powers, and by theatrical gestures. Even North Korea has learned its lesson and is prepared to modernize its nuclear weapon stockpile. We will get out alive from this pandemic, but nothing guarantees our survival in a world that has not learned the crucial lesson: that of the vulnerability of our species.