Michael McGuire: The task of saving America is beyond Joe Biden - or anyone
Trump is a disaster and the task of piecing together what’s left of America is a job that is beyond anyone, writes Michael McGuire.
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Back in 1996, just before he was about to be tipped out as prime minister, Paul Keating warned: “When the government changes, the country changes.’’
In many ways, that’s a statement of the obvious. Part of the reason people vote to change government is that they actively want the country to change.
And while the Keating aphorism may have been applicable back then – John Howard certainly changed the country – it’s more difficult to see that today’s US election is going to change very much at all about how that country operates.
Even the name of the country feels like a mockery these days. The United States of America.
Anyone expecting Democrat nominee Joe Biden to put the US back together again after the past four years of chaos and destruction under Donald Trump is likely to be severely disappointed.
For a start, Biden is a weak candidate. It’s still astonishing that he is the best the Democrats thought they could offer the American people. If he wins, he will be 78 when he is sworn in. His best days are well behind him as a politician.
He often appears confused and muddled. His only attribute in the eyes of many is that he is not Donald Trump. And that may be enough. Biden is a strong favourite but we have been down this path before and writing Trump off at this late stage would be foolish.
But it’s possible that the task of piecing back together what’s left of the US is a job that is beyond any single politician. It’s a broken country. Maybe beyond saving.
A country that has lost its natural authority on the global stage, its democratic norms under siege from within and without.
The past four years of Trump have hardened the divide within the US. He provokes such extreme reactions from both the Left and the Right that both have been pushed even further into their respective corners, leaving a yawning, seemingly unbridgeable gap in the middle.
No matter the result, there are going to be millions of Americans who won’t want to accept the verdict. A poll released last month found more than 60 per cent of Americans were worried about the possibility of a second civil war.
That’s a terrifying thought in a nation with as many guns as the US.
And Trump stokes these tensions. Even before the 2016 election, he was talking about rigged elections and phony ballots. It’s a line of argument he has never given up, even though he won that election.
Now he says that the only way he could lose is if the election is rigged. This may be to protect his own incredibly fragile ego, which couldn’t handle losing to Biden, but it’s a message that will resonate with his supporters.
Trump is actively undermining people’s faith in democracy. He won’t guarantee he will leave the White House if defeated. He encourages heavily armed inadequates to patrol polling booths. He tells far-Right racists to “stand by”.
What’s going to happen if Trump loses? Will he appeal for calm? Show a little dignity in defeat?
Given everything we have seen for the past four years, that’s not going to happen. If he loses, he will ramp up the whining and whingeing. Tell ever more outrageous lies.
Everyone will be to blame except him. Just as he takes no responsibility for his disastrous handing of COVID-19, any election loss will be the fault of dark forces.
The US is spiralling out of control. Racial tensions are rising, class tensions are rising. Conspiracy theories are everywhere. Mind-bending lunacy promoted by the QAnon lot are now part of everyday conversation.
Trump has a solid claim to be the worst president in the history of the US. But if he’s not the worst, he’s certainly the most dangerous.
All his predecessors at least made a pretence that the fate of the nation was their driving force.
Trump has privatised the White House. The only thing he cares about is himself.
If Trump is elected again, it will only become worse. But if Biden is elected, it’s unlikely to become any better.
Originally published as Michael McGuire: The task of saving America is beyond Joe Biden - or anyone