by Ramin Mazaheri and cross posted with PressTV
Politics is life or death (for the barest illustration of this reality just look at medicine sanctions on Iran, Cuba, etc.), so it’s hard for many of us to get too worked up over Joe Biden telling Donald Trump that he was a “clown” who should “shut up” at their first presidential debate, which is now known as the worst debate ever.
However, in the United States such things truly cause more domestic shock than any footage of the latest US bombing of a wedding party in Afghanistan.
Yes, the most violent and imperialistic society paradoxically has these informal codes which actually demand a rigorous politeness: one does not talk politics or religion in well-mannered society here, but when they are cornered into honestly discussing their moral outlooks a Queen Elizabeth-level formality is de rigueur.
Trump, with the buffoon-sized ego required of anyone who applies to go on a reality show, upended this expectation four years ago and many middle-class Americans still nearly faint at his unthinkable lack of a “presidential demeanour”. This lack, one regularly hears from the countless talk-show idiots in the US, was enough for an impeachment by itself. The underlying cry is, “Won’t anyone think of the children?!” Not dead Afghan children, of course.
That’s what makes the first debate so vital: Trump was not the only clown on the stage, and that is not how it used to be in US politics.
Trump has obviously altered the expectations for how American politicians can behave – it is now a circus of buffoons who rudely steamroll anyone to get their way, whereas they used to be characterised by an unflappable and deadly focus: ice queen Hillary Clinton, smooth-faced and infamously unemotional Obama, ex-CIA ringleader George Bush I, etc. Even rural/southern/Texan presidents – Bill Clinton and Dubya Bush – quickly knocked off the folksy shenanigans, straightened up and actually started reading something for a change.
Buffoonery is not a competition, we should remember: we might laugh at one clown more than others, but when we go to a circus we laugh at all the clowns, just as the world laughed at the first presidential debate. There could not have been a more urgent illustration of what it will mean to follow the lead of Washington from 2020 to 2024: amid a corona pandemic, a once-in-a-century domestic economic catastrophe, a never-ending pandemic of police bullets finding Black backs, widespread rebellions and less-widespread looting – this is the apex choice of American leadership?
If anything, it’s a case for even more indirect democracy safeguards – politics is life or death, and we need serious, responsible people with established moral, society-first codes making these excruciating decisions.
But there’s a better alternative – any democracy except “democracy with US characteristics”. This requires honestly discussing the structural underpinnings of the American system: imperialism, the most rightwing form of capitalism, cultural arrogance, a tolerance for public depravity that is only exceeded by a tolerance for shocking inequality amid enormous wealth, and – above all – total freedom and irresponsibility for those who can afford to pay for such things.
I don’t think we should give up on them so easily, but perhaps we should consider this reality: is that the system the average American wants, and was Trump the first to grasp this? Maybe the average American does truly want what Trump offers – buffoonery and spectacle instead of serious and responsible politics – and this explains why Biden willingly degraded himself down to Trump’s level at the debate: Biden felt that he had to emulate Trump in order to win votes.
What other conclusion could we logically draw? That Biden just took leave of his senses repeatedly?
Everybody knew the debate would be full of Trumpian off-the-cuff observations/outbursts, but Biden willingly played Trump’s game and for that he has totally lost global respect, by all foreign media accounts. Here in the US Democrat supporters – who never saw an Afghan wedding party bombing they were outraged about (mainly because, via the same smothering informal censorship and faux-sensitivity which produces fainting at “shut up”, bloody photos of American war crimes are never published by US media) – are willing to excuse anything Biden does because it’s allegedly “not as bad as Trump”, but this myopic hypocrisy only plays domestically.
Biden looked terrible to the world’s eyes – he could not master himself, nor master the situation. He is not much of a leader – that is the best-case scenario. Contrarily, as I assert, Biden decided to copy Trump’s behavior because he saw that Trumpian buffoonery gets one elected.
This reality that Biden is going to happily carry the torch of Trumpism was illustrated in a recent editorial from the extremely popular and openly anti-Trump website Politico: The Trump foreign policies Biden might keep.
It’s a pretty staggering douse of cold water to anyone who expects major changes from Washington and the Pentagon if the Democrats win in November: Expect the same policies regarding Jerusalem al-Quds, Venezuela, China, Russia, and – yes – Iran.
But the author goes even further, explicitly asserting that Trump’s brazenness has given Biden new latitude to boss around NATO, the World Health Organisation, the World Trade Organisation, the United Nations Human Rights Council and the UN Security Council.
“Trump’s overt hostility toward multilateral institutions could present Biden with an opportunity to push through reforms to some international bodies.”
“While Biden is not likely to be so crude, don’t be surprised if he at times takes a more forceful position toward both allies and adversaries than he did when he served as Barack Obama’s vice president.” Translation: Biden won’t openly tell other people to “shut up”, but he will do so privately.
Trump has revealed to US leaders that brashly and unilaterally throwing their weight around in order to get what they want works, so not even the anti-Trump Politico expects Biden to inaugurate a new policy of mutually-beneficial cooperation. Above all, naked Trumpian self-interest works to win a US government post in domestic elections – that is the essence and importance of Trump’s victory, which pulled the sheet off an American fascism (which is not only about racism, but more about aligning corporate power with individual power, as opposed to grassroots democratic power structures) which Biden will continue to apply in foreign policy, even if he takes down a few domestic statues of Confederate generals and Columbus.
Biden was not pulled down to Trump’s level at the first debate – he willingly jumped down.
Maybe he doesn’t have age-related dementia after all, because Trump’s success indicates it’s a savvy domestic election move which could win him some voters who view him as weak.
That view must be the case over here: Immediately after the election US televisions were full of Trump-sponsored ads (disgustingly) trumpeting the assassination of Iranian anti-terror hero Qasem Soleimani. The point of the ad was openly accuse Biden of being “weak”. Biden clearly sought to pre-empt these accusations and perceptions by “standing up” to Trump in a “show of strength” in the debate, no?
“Strongman” politics – this is what Americans want, or so their leaders just told the world via their actions at the debate, no?
The recent first debate showed that Democrats agree: Trumpism works. After four years of faux-fainting at Trump’s crude behavior what did Democrats do when they were finally confronted with him face to face? They joined him, even perhaps seeking to outdo Trump.
Non-Americans should take note. Even with a Biden victory we should not expect a rollback of Trump’s foreign policy – we should expect even further encroachments on national and international dignities and human rights.
However, historians have already taken copious notes and are not surprised by Politico’s admission that Biden will do what Trump did – try to dominate the whole world via (an allegedly new) Trumpian self-interest, as this is just a repeat of Dubya Bush’s “US versus the world” approach following 9/11.
That was a repeat of Ronald Reagan’s “leader of the free world (and we’ll attack/blockade if you aren’t free enough to our tastes), which was a repeat of the continent-dominating concept of “Manifest Destiny”, which was a repeat of the South America-dominating “Monroe Doctrine”, and – noticing a pattern, yet?
To answer a previous question: I don’t think the average American wants what Trump offers – I think they elected Trump as a protest against the structural corruption of the establishment “Swamp”. It was both a desperate move as well as a furiously empowered demand for major change. What Politico is telling us is that Joe Biden took all the wrong lessons from the election of Trump, which we also saw on display at the first debate, and apply them globally.
The underlying ideology of buffoons and clowns is that nothing matters or deserves seriousness. All that truly matters is that they get what they want – clowns and buffoons usually just want attention and laughs, but US leaders want power and control. Biden just proved to the world how low he is willing to go to get it – down to the level of Trump, after four years of decrying such behaviours.
Ramin Mazaheri is currently covering the US elections. He is the chief correspondent in Paris for PressTV and has lived in France since 2009. He has been a daily newspaper reporter in the US, and has reported from Iran, Cuba, Egypt, Tunisia, South Korea and elsewhere. He is the author of ‘Socialism’s Ignored Success: Iranian Islamic Socialism’ as well as ‘I’ll Ruin Everything You Are: Ending Western Propaganda on Red China’, which is also available in simplified and traditional Chinese.
(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)
A country founded on individualism, Calvinist predestination, libertarianism, the self-made man, the Wild West etc meets its logical outcome… but most of the Western system was built on this.
Now how do we get out of it?
Iyy
What you have written holds a lot of truth. However, even though American culture and traditions are based on European, it was of course impossible for North American settlers to replicate everything European in new surroundings. Changes were introduced in European cultural inheritance, including the introduction of innovations. And the chief two American weaknesses ? The first one is that the various ethnic groups could not fully assimilate, and it’s debatable if such a thing is possible. The second weakness is the “winner take all mentality”, which has, from the social point of view, reduced America to a feudal state, frightening even the elite, which has for years been buying real estate outside the US, just in case the modern peasants start an uprising. Can America be changed ? I don’t think so.
During the final stages of the Roman Empire it was the Praetorian Guard who was the real power behind the throne, I’m sure that Trump – like all US Presidents before him and Roman Emperors in past history had ‘the talk’.
What I do appreciate about Trump is the bare, open faced, manner in which he displays American exceptionalism. I sometimes wonder if it’s all an act to hasten destruction of the chains of imperialism. For those who have not done so, I commend an excellent read – People of the Abyss by Jack London.
All true enough micro-points, Ramin, as far as they go from a foreigner’s perspective.
However the MACRO-points that may escape many foreigners are LARGER….and therefore worth more reflection, starting with the smallest of the bigger points than any reviews of Clown (the CIA’s own chosen word for their own deadly strategic deceptions methodology) Shows.
What you may have missed, that is actually MORE important…..because only Americans are supposed to vote Nov 3:
The Debate was NOT Trump versus Biden.
It was Trump versus the entire Empire -which is FAR more than the USA, being a “globalist” Oligarch’s Empire (which he is not an integral part of, despite being American…..a plain FACT many here have yet to grasp……….that motivates the most extraordinary International and “American” Coup Efforts to depose him….in US History) but for reasons of space and “optics” was limited Tuesday night to those Minions of Empire that could literally be fit onto the stage, physically (namely Biden…the least capable….AND Chris Wallace …..The Empire Ringleader of that particular circus who spent 5 minutes PERSONALLY attempting to wrangle the President, pinning him to the Empire Mat……namely the # 1 Axiomatic requirement of the Empire for eliminating national sovereignty……the “Paris Accords” Anthropomorphic Global Warming bull shit.
What was also fit onto the debate stage, ELECTRONICALLY, was an Empire TEAM of probably at least 20-30 “assistant coaches” under Chris Wallace’s direction………… one of whom communicated “Proud Boys” into Sleepy Joe’s fading brain at a key moment in the Clown (CIA run) Show “Debate”.
And that’s just for starters.
As screwed up as Clown Show America may appear to foreigners there IS a huge difference between Clown (CIA run) Biden and “Clown” (in quotes because he is NON-CIA run…..which is where his troubles begin ) Trump.
What should matter most to the entire planet is whether enough Americans can discern the difference between the MIC minion Biden……and the Anti MIC Trump……not their own snickering over American lack of more civil debate decorum.
That’s just the clown (CIA) make up.
You have to remember, Ramin, that Biden was the fall-back candidate for the Dems who decided early on that someone like Sanders was too radical, too socialistic, and most of all, way too anti-Zionist despite the fact that he is unabashedly Jewish. The Likudniks who surround Trump, I’m sure, breathed a sigh of relief when Bernie was screwed once again in the primaries. He wouldn’t have just sat there like a dumb ass in that debate like Biden did. And, he certainly wouldn’t have dissed Russia, blaming them for all the Dems failures.
Russiagate was BS from day one, ever since Clinton decided to blame someone other than herself for her shambles of a presidential campaign in 2016. It’s all speculation now, with Trump testing positive for COVID-19 (a dose of his own medicine?) and the election thrown into chaos. May Heaven help us all in the USA. We’re f-cked any way you look at it.
Your ZIO-Calibrated (and they LOVE it when they are given such SUPER-inflated billing, mind you!) glasses in practical effect blind you, Tommy……… to The Bigger Picture..
There is far more to the Earth;s Geo-Political Spectrum than that ridiculously limited narrow Zio-bandwidth.
Peripheral vision enhancing exercises could help develop more varied and adjustable perspectives required to focus on solutions rather than the endless kvetching they wish you to remain mired in.
Bro, you resort to ad hominem attacks way too much. It undercuts your arguments, especially when you can’t seem to see the elephant in the room of US politics, Israel and Zionism. To ignore that influence on both major parties ignores the major push to war in the Middle East especially since 9/11. That horrible false-flag event was done not for oil or to boost the MIC, it was done by and for, Israel. Your Proud Boy, Trump, even admits that.
Sheldon Adelson was the single biggest contributor to Republican campaign coffers in 2016. Do you seriously think he was throwing “thirty pieces of silver”, especially at Trump, at politicians for the good of the USA? Of course not, it was all for the sake of Israel. He made a deal with Trump to kill the Iran nuclear deal. That is what has led to us being on the verge of WWIII with Iran and Russia to this very day. Do you really think that this was just to benefit the MIC? Seriously?
Tread carefully Tommy… as Mr twain once said…when you argue with someone like this you are very much in danger of being dragged down to their level and being beaten by experience.
Cheers
Col
It’s more like being bitten to death by a duck.
narrow Zio-bandwith…………………dude, you miss the Epstein debacle? You do know how peerage works? Their stinky fingers are everywhere, globally. ‘ Sometimes, cancer, is cancer, and a very malignant global one at that. I do understand though that most hosts are fully unaware they are being ‘sucked’ dry. Even refusing to accept the inevidable. Blind allegance to mammonn can do that?
Cheers, M
Some endlessly kvetch, others seek excuses for the unexcusable.
Merchant of Vice: From the Merchant of Venice to the Merchant of Vice. A video that looks at Epstein Island and its many visitors. Was this all an intelligence operation by Mossad, Wexford and the US deep state or was it merely a diversion for the sensational media? Will we ever know? https://youtu.be/TKwofXANYWU http://www.cowdisley.com/videos/vice.mp4
OMG am I the only one to see that Biden is used up?! It is about his vice-president becoming president very soon, she will take over and watch her hands: who will be the vice-president afterwards? You guess.
I suppose Joe is Covid positive too. Donald and Melania will survive. There will be no more TV debate, democrats will take care of it.
Of course Biden is used up. That’s why the Dems rigged the primaries to put him up against Trump. Just like Clinton, he was the worst possible candidate available. They would rather throw the election than put up a candidate that would change everything, like a new Franklin Roosevelt. Instead, we’ll get a new Hitler, who’ll declare a “national emergency” and invoke near-dictatorial powers under the USA Patriot Act. This, from the Atlantic…
“The moment the president declares a “national emergency”—a decision that is entirely within his discretion—more than 100 special provisions become available to him. While many of these tee up reasonable responses to genuine emergencies, some appear dangerously suited to a leader bent on amassing or retaining power”
What did Trump get that he’d previously said he wanted?
Attempts by individuals that demand silence on policy are likely to be individuals that do not have your best interests in mind and are more interested in controlling you and silencing you so that they can set policy or continue with policy that is destroying you, society, and the world unabated. These individuals obviously do not care about you, society, or the world, and only care about themselves and it is better not to waste your time associating with them.
The cost of silence on policy boils into madness and rage and spills over into society explosively as if in a pressure cooker as seen by Gillete Jauns.
The cost of silence on policy has seen the world falsely imprisoned in their homes, masked, distanced, bankrupted, evicted, and destitute.
The cost of silence on policy has resulted in the barbarity in the treatment of the Palestinans and Yemenis as well as countless others.
In my opinion, there is too much silence on policy.
The Sound of Silence / Simon & Garfunkel
Hello darkness, my old friend I’ve come to talk with you again Because a vision softly creeping Left its seeds while I was sleeping And the vision that was planted in my brain Still remains Within the sound of silence In restless dreams I walked alone Narrow streets of cobblestone ‘Neath the halo of a street lamp I turned my collar to the cold and damp When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light That split the night And touched the sound of silence And in the naked light I saw Ten thousand people, maybe more People talking without speaking People hearing without listening People writing songs that voices never share And no one dared Disturb the sound of silence “Fools” said I, “You do not know Silence like a cancer grows Hear my words that I might teach you Take my arms that I might reach you” But my words like silent raindrops fell And echoed in the wells of silence Within the sound of silence
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Paul Simon The Sound of Silence lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Andrea Iravani
Have people forgotten what crooks Biden and his son Hunter are? Both are scumbags. Of course they are willing to debase themselves for power and money. Have people forgotten the role of Biden in the Iraq war?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/feb/17/joe-biden-role-iraq-war
https://theintercept.com/2020/01/07/joe-biden-iraq-war-history/
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/10/15/20849072/joe-biden-iraq-history-democrats-election-2020
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/20/joe-biden-corruption-donald-trump
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/remember-biden%E2%80%99s-role-promoting-iraq-war-bloodbath
What I see is a “Massada” repeat “2020-2025?” whit the modern “Sicaires” in real trouble with nowhere to hide”. Who are the “Romans” today?
We Americans need to start and finish scheming to replace this two-party system. With all the imagination we have, and all the fury for “change”, why don’t we come up with something better? How about every voter has to vote for 10 different people, then the top 1000 people are chosen between based on poverty, percentage of wealth given in charity, math test scores, and a humanities competition where 50% of the votes are from the people, 50% from the 1000 candidates? Just throwing ideas out there, which are not obviously crazier than the current system.
People need a king. A true king feels the same way about his people and his land that a gardener feels about his garden, which is not the same as how a politician elected for a few years feels about his country.
It was the Zionists that removed all kings from power and replaced them with corrupt politicians that they could easily manipulate.
A true king will fight to the death before he lets Zionist bankers take over printing money in his country. A politician will take a bribe and help make it happen.
Whoever manages to liberate the US from the yoke of Zion will be the rightful king. The same goes for every country.
Khomeini liberated Iran, so he was by all accounts the divinely appointed king, and his successor Khamenei has proven himself worthy as well. It seems to be working for Iran, it can work anywhere.
Khamenei oversees the Presidency and Parliament and makes sure they don’t turn into the US Presidency and Congress.
That President Biden would, in his own way, be belligerent at home and abroad… simple but astute observations.
America is a gangster nation from the White House to Main Street USA–albeit a gangster nation that tries to disguise itself as a Land of the Free or Beacon of Liberty.
Trump is a thug–albeit a cowardly thug–as reflective of the Americans who support him.
Biden is also a thug–albeit a senile thug–as reflective of the Americans who support him.
So of course the Democrats will imitate the Republicans, as they are only different factions of the same political party: the American Evil Empire party .
For non-Americans, particularly those nations on America’s hit-list, you should have no illusions as to the true nature of the United Snakes of America and the clear and present threat that it represents.
And treat this America Threat accordingly.
Nonsensical oversimplification.
Everyone will follow their self-interest as they perceive it correctly…..(as they should!) or misperceive it (as they too often do).
And you misperceive yours. Sad.
Because what do you offer by way of positive alternative??
Ans: Absolutely nothing.
American oligarchs are a liability that we as a nation cannot afford to defend. Their criminal history and global rapacity has destroyed our nation. Who is willing to die for the new Rockefellers? The Silicon Psychos, Bill Gates in particular? The United States government has neglected its moral and fiduciary obligation to the overwhelming majority of its citizens.
Many globalists would like the “Great Reset” to just blame the entire United States citizenry on all of the world’s problems, even though those individuals are from nations that requested U.S. assistance, military involvement, and U.S. global participation. The cost of cooperating with people that have corrupt agendas is being blamed for the corrupt agendas. It is also a liability that America cannot afford. Michel Chossudovsky blames the United States alone for all problems in the world. I am not willing to defend the actions taken by the U.S. government, but I can’t help but point to the irony that Chossudovsky is from Switzerland that is never neutral since it has not merely financed every war, but has had a secret banking history protecting the most corrupt individuals in modern history with sworn secrecy and also the head of internation rapacious banking with
the Bank for I ternational Settlements in Geneva Switizerland, as well as the home of the Davos World Economic Forum in which the “always neutral” Swiss government protects and hosts the psychopaths that are controlling the world with armed batallions, and the Swiss military air force! That is apparently not a factor though.
Andrea Iravani
https://www.globalresearch.ca/global-war-on-humanity-americas-unceasing-pursuit-of-hegemony/5698569
Yes. very humanitarian and peaceful to just blame the Inited States alone for things that your own governments requested the United States to do in the majority of instances. Now in Canafa, Chrystia Freeland that created The Lima Grouo and made it her personal goal to remove Juan Guaido is not included, nor is the KXL pipeline from Canada, that runs through Native American lands as well as the Ogallala Aquifer that supplies all of the farming industry in the upper North Western plain farming regions with water that most citizens in our country objected to mentioned. Fact inconvenient!
Andrea Iravani
Meant to say to remove Maduro and install Juan Guaido.
Actually, the destruction that she has caused to all of Europe including Germany with the mandating of extremely weird policies in addition to economic measures and political measures that appear to be designed to destroy all countries in the EU is really a crime. I think that Merkel was so brain washed into submission which might be characteristic of a women of her post-Nazi era. Women are generally more prone to such tactics and the political environment within the political system itself is the most brutal environment for these control tactics. Collective narcissism is the norm in politics and those that do not toe the line are brow beaten into submission or they leave on their own accord. The EU was relatively new when Merkel took office. I thought and still think that it is a terrible idea as well as the Euro because Europe is filled with many cultures, languages, customs, economies, societies that have historically been at war with eachother long before America was ever even a country, which is why there are so many people in America of European descent. The Europeans are now blaming America for all of the world’s problems, but they forgot that we chose to leave Europe because of its problems. Trying to force people and countries that have been trigger happy to go to war into cooperating with eachother and then imposing harsh measures on those countries that find the rules to be in contrast to their best interests is asking for trouble. Since the EU is filled with many countries and many leaders all answerable to their citizens, it was a plan destined to fail from the start. The EU would be unlikely to ever have a single centralized fair source of government for all of Europe because it is unlikely that the leaders of nations would collectively agree to give up control and it is also unlikely that the citizens of European countries would ever agree to just have a single government for all of Europe. This is in stark contrast to the United States or Canada that have had centralized Federal governmemts with states or provinces that also have rights for hundreds of years as well as a unifying culture and history. Americans that support Brexit are being accused of trying to dis-empower Europe, rather than trying to empower the individual countries of the relatively new EU and the critics of Brexit act on the false premise that the EU is a long established institution.
America is also being told to remain in NATO, WHO, and other international institutions and get out at the same time. Obviously what they really mean is just shut up and do what you are told to do by us. America left WHO and wants to leave NATO. I think that we should. I oppose these institutions and everything that they represent. They no longer even follow their charters, and the same with the UN.
Andrea Iravani
A coup d’état consists of the infiltration of a small but critical segment of the state apparatus, which is then used to displace the government from its control of the remainder.
Thus, by gaining control over a few carefully selected pivotal points of power within government bureaucracy, the plotters of the coup effectively gain control over the entire “machine” of state.
During a presidential election, the key pivot points proved to be few in number, not to mention patently obvious.