{"id":1145,"date":"2020-10-29T10:48:18","date_gmt":"2020-10-29T09:48:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/boell.com\/en\/?p=1145"},"modified":"2020-10-29T10:48:18","modified_gmt":"2020-10-29T09:48:18","slug":"quo-vadis-usa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/boell.com\/en\/blog\/quo-vadis-usa\/","title":{"rendered":"Quo vadis, USA?"},"content":{"rendered":"

a commentary 4 days before the election<\/h2>\n

With just a few more days before the election of the next US president<\/strong>, I wonder, how still now many people can not recognize the doom they are marching towards, when giving the \u201cbig loser\u201d a second time a vote – even as he did not really win<\/strong> the first time around either.<\/p>\n

\"USA
Photo by Koshu Kunii on Unsplash<\/a><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My own audio recording from 2016 (when I heard the news in the morning) is a 10 min. rage full of explicit words, as I knew then already, what many did not want to believe, but know now also – that this clown is dangerous, that his neurotic narcissism has no boundaries, that he only knows one goal: his own advantage and that his entourage will use him to cement an ultra-conservative, right-wing agenda.<\/p>\n

Four years later, I repeat my \u201cI told you so\u201d with no joy – but rather with a vague hope, that maybe this time really ALL democratic thinking voters in the USA will rally behind \u201cthe other candidate\u201d – especially in the swing states.<\/p>\n

In an election like this, there is no place for \u201cprotest votes\u201d or not voting, only because a voter may not like Joe Biden. When the democracy itself is on the line, as it IS this time, a voter needs to vote >against< the terrible choice of \u201c4 more years\u201d, as it would be catastrophic not only for the USA, but for much of the Western world and its alliances.<\/p>\n

In 2002 in France 40+% of (left & liberal) voters were grinding the teeth and voted for the conservative candidate Jacques Chirac in the French presidential election<\/a> >against< the right-wing \/ fascist LePen. They knew, they had to support a candidate, which was standing firm to democracy, beside his own affairs and shortcomings.<\/p>\n

Yet even, when this will happen in high numbers this time in this US election, I fear, it may not be enough. When a candidate with almost 3 Million less votes (2,864,974 to be exact<\/a>) can win (2016), then the system is wrong. And this happened before in the year 2000, with half a million votes.<\/p>\n

The US election system is antiquated and severely damaged and not fit for the new millennium. 40 Million voters (in California) are represented by 2 senators, when the same amount of people in 7 different (rural) states come to 14 senators. When you add to this \u201cgerrymandering<\/a>\u201d and \u201cvoter suppression<\/a>\u201d, the outcome of this election may be still unclear even when the numbers >against< \u201cthe orange man” are higher than 2016.<\/p>\n

“Hope dies last\u201d goes the old saying – yet when it dies, the USA will slide further down the hill into a totalitarian autocracy, destroyed by a narcisstic-idiotic maniac and his fascistic entourage, who are all only looking out for their own pockets and power, and who do not really care for America at all.<\/p>\n

~~~
\nPS: I have written this commentary with a bleeding heart towards a country, where I have lived and worked between 1994 – 2006 and where 3 of my children were born.<\/em><\/p>\n

~~~<\/p>\n

The electoral college is a constitutional relic of a fundamentally different nation, one with 13 states and a potential electorate of 2.5 million citizens, slashed dramatically by restrictions that limited the franchise to white, land-owning Protestant men.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(from The Guardian, 2016<\/a>)<\/p>\n

~~~<\/p>\n

(This commentary was published in October 2020)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

a commentary 4 days before the election With just a few more days before the election of the next US president, I wonder, how still now many people can not recognize the doom they are marching towards, when giving the \u201cbig loser\u201d a second time a vote – even as he did not really win…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":1146,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,23],"tags":[151,82,88,95],"yoast_head":"\nQuo vadis, USA? - BOELL<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A brief overview of Apps in crisis-times like Corona: In these extreme times we can (re-) discover how to stay in touch with relatives via video-calls.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/boell.com\/en\/blog\/quo-vadis-usa\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Quo vadis, USA? 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