A DARK CLOUD DESCENDS OVER AMERICA: THE 21ST CENTURY DECLINE OF A GREAT NATION

An unusually dark storm cloud began to descend on the United States two years ago, with the bizarre election of Donald J. Trump as President of our nation. Many observers anticipated his presidency would be highly problematic, that he was in fact unfit and totally unprepared for the office, others hoped for the best, that he would rise to meet the responsibilities of the office with some grace, integrity, and stature. After two years in office, it is fair to say that the worst fears have been realized, and any optimistic hopes were dead on arrival.  But it would be very unfair to say that the dark clouds began with the arrival of Donald Trump onto the political scene, or that blue skies will reemerge with his departure. The storm has been brewing for decades, and the component factors in the turmoil that now exist are numerous, some deep-seeded.  Let's look for a moment at the recent history of  the United States as an optimally strong nation, both in its domestic strength and in its role as a major world leader.

In reviewing our nation's political, economic, and international strength over the last 70 years, we were at the height of our strength in the 1950's and 1960's. The nation was functioning as a relatively united community of citizens, recovering from the trauma of World War 2, Industry was booming with defense mobilization converting to domestic  peacetime production, and federal support was being giving generously to veterans for their education, public school improvement was emphasized, and infrastructure upgrading and expansion was underway. Jobs were plentiful and our middle class was growing rapidly in numbers and economic well-being. We were the clearly recognized leaders of the free world, the Marshall Plan to help war-depleted allies recover from the ruins of the recent war solidified our world leadership, and the Cold War with the Soviet Union made our involvement in world affairs  indispensable. The nation began to fracture domestically in the late 1960's over the continuation and expansion  of the Vietnamese War, which was mistakenly seen by our policy makers as a domino theory example of the Soviet Union fostering a civil war to put another nation under their Communist rule, rather than as primarily a homegrown rebellion of Vietnamese struggling to establish their own independence after centuries of colonial domination by Western nations.

The 1970's were highly contentious, not only because of the often violent protests to end the Vietnamese War but also as society itself was experiencing major changes, with the younger people who matured with the free expression which was rampant in the 1960's actively reacting against many of the ways of older, more established factions of society. Not only in domestic politics, and especially in the participation in a war they felt was poorly conceived and deceitfully begun and conducted, but also in regard to music and many social mores, such as those dealing with sex and language. Added to the societal dissension and the reality of the US being involved, for the first time, in a foreign war that it was losing, was the downfall of the Nixon administration, due to the illegal activities that Nixon was found to be directly responsible for, in his striving to remain in power in spite of his growing unpopularity. Ethics and honesty still did matter to the nation, and to their credit, many members of Nixon's own party were ready to vote against him, necessitating that he resign to avoid the travails of an Impeachment trial. In spite of the battling between parties and the fractionating of the country on some issues, a degree of integrity was, during this episode, seen as essential for a government to remain functional. When the nation arrives into the 2000's, integrity may not have as significant a role in the nation's political life, as the value of winning, through any means,  often came to outweigh the role of integrity.


The election of Ronald Reagan allowed a temporary respite in some of the open domestic division, as he was a relatively popular president.  His tax reductions were well-received, but ultimately significantly damaged the economic well-being of the middle class, the people that comprised his major voting base, as the tax reductions primarily helped the more wealthy classes, and the percentage of the nation's wealth in the hands of the middle class began to decline, as did their numbers. More people slipped into impoverished circumstances, as less money became available for the nation's social service and safety net, with public school funding and welfare needs becoming  under-funded.  The Cold War began to wind down, a very positive development, as the Soviet Union weakened itself economically through its attempt to impose its own government upon Afghanistan and defeat some rebellious movements within is own borders, and its new leader, Gorbachev, was able to negotiate an end to the Cold War and a breakup of the Soviet Union into separate independent nations. There was a chance for a more peaceful world, but would it materialize?

 The 1990's began with guarded optimism. There was a chance of a "peace dividend" due to the end of the Cold War, but there were major trouble signs in the Middle East. There was fighting between Iraq and Kuwait, which involved our intervention. The long-standing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians over the creation of the state of Israel and the need to establish a homeland for the Palestinians begged for  resolution. Shia and Sunni Arab nations have never found a solution to their differences, and anti-colonial anger still enraged the region over the many decades of Western domination and continuing interference.  In short, the region was a smoldering hotbed, waiting for the next outbreak of violence. Clinton tried to make a difference, but his attempts to ease tensions had little success.  He also worked with Yeltsin to create a free enterprise economic society in Russia, but Yeltsin was a weak, ineffective leader, Russia reverted to a more autocratic leader when Putin became president there. And Clinton greatly weakened his own domestic agenda with his Lewinski affair. He also  allowed the financial regulations stipulated by the long-standing Glass-Steagall act to lapse, playing a role in the economic collapse that later occurred in 2008, and Clinton's difficulties served to strengthen the Republican party's likelihood of winning the 2000 election.

The contentious events of the 2000's needn't be fully itemized. A highly contested election, decided in essence by the Supreme Court, the 9-11 al Qaeda attacks on our nation, war against al Qaeda in Afghanistan leading to a misguided, deceitfully-initiated war against Iraq by the Bush-Cheney administration, remnants of Iraq's defeated Sunni population became world-wide terrorists, known as ISIS, becoming active in Western aligned nations as well as establishing major footholds within Iraq and also increasingly in Syria. The economic collapse of 2008 added to the turmoil.  The election of Barack Obama brought a note of positive promise to the scene, but it was not to be fulfilled, as his presidency was met with a solid wall of opposition by Republicans in congress, and his attempts to ameliorate Middle East initiated well-intended Arab Spring activities, which however initially well-received, fell upon a region not yet at all ready for such optimistic changes. An attempted reset with Russia also never really got off the ground. A basic suspiciousness of Russia was deep-seated, many in the State Department were still Neocons, believing the US should, and could, retain sole world power and leadership, and with the US still taking actions which threatened Russia, Putin responded in kind. Domestically the US was essentially in a state of gridlock during the Obama years. After the passage of Obama's Affordable Care Act, Republicans tightened their defenses against the passage of any other major legislation. The middle and lower classes never recovered economically from the fall of 2008, their wages remained stagnant although the wealth of more wealthy people recovered rapidly from the sharp 2008 decline. While the Dow-Jones average rose to all-time heights, middle class well-being still suffered.  The trickle down theory was clearly not at all working.

Such was the situation when the dark cloud, in the person of Donald Trump, was elected. His personal abrasive nature, his political biases, typically self-serving and uninformed, greatly magnified the divisiveness, the anger, and the political polarization that already existed in the country. He has antagonized our Western allies, seemingly acted like a buddy cohort with the dictators and oligarchs of the world,  and has filled his cabinet and administration only with those who do his bidding, and fires those who don't.  He rejects science, and his own FBI, CIA, and State Department reports. He has a terrible relationship with the mainstream media, with the exception of the one network and a few right-wing pundits who support and parrot his views.  He holds firm to this nationalistic "Make America Great Again" views, which translate into a take America way back to how it used to be, racist, white supremacist, intolerant of forward progress, desiring to reverse all the positive changes that have been fought for and won over the past decades. In short, he is breaking down the very things that have served to make America great.  His anti-immigrant obsession forgets, of course, that from its outset our nation has been a nation of immigrants. He does, unfortunately have a base of apparently like-minded people, and, opportunist that he is, caters to their views. Establishment Republicans have typically been reluctant to risk his wrath by opposing him. His ever-increasing opposition suggests many of his actions and policies are anathema to a majority of American citizens, but under our system, removing a damaging and dangerously unfit president takes time, through impeachment, 25th amendment, election loss, or other legal means. Such is the situation our nation now faces. 

There is hope, certainly, that the dark cloud will lift in the not unforeseeable future. Democratic congressional gains in the recent election are a positive indication of things to come. Women, and younger voters are more engaged in politics than ever before, and are strongly opposed to many of Trump's actions and policies. Environmental threats are ignored by the Trump administration, as are the threats of renewed nuclear proliferation and international hostilities. People interested in the well-being of future generations are especially incensed by Trump's many biases, including his ignoring these major threats.  His total lack of integrity, demonstrated in his daily erratic, contradictory pronouncements, models a direction which would be peril for our society to follow, not to mention his volatile anger, and impulsive, self-serving, egotistical behaviors.  If the current investigations by Mueller and/or congressional committees don't bear fruit, and lead to a lifting of the dark cloud of Trump, increased voter turnout in  2020, especially by women and young people, may well provide the ray of sunshine that will break through the dark cloud, and remove the disaster that has resulted from the election of Trump.  Only then can steps again be taken towards realizing the great potential that our founding fathers had for our nation, but knew that it could be reached only through a prolonged work-in-progress. For all of our well-being, that progress must be resumed.