Sep 8, 2020
What’s at stake in 2020
If the ultimate battle of the future is between open and closed societies, a Trump victory in 2020 would be a critical turning point.
This is a prologue of sorts to Don’t Blink, a lightly fictionalized account of how a disputed election result between Joe Biden and Donald Trump could get resolved (or not), which I’m publishing in serialized form on Medium.
The stakes in the election are perceived to be extremely high by both sides. At least some Republicans believe that defeating Joe Biden, of all people, is critical to the preservation of America as they know it. A significant percentage of Democrats believe that a second term for Donald Trump would occasion the introduction of authoritarian government and the end of democracy.
The Republican concerns in this regard are silly and don’t merit any comment but, in the final analysis aren’t the more extreme claims of the Democrats also a tad hyperbolic? Democrats have their own media bubbles and the singular presence in our national life of Donald Trump makes it difficult to maintain perspective about many things. The national conversation has degraded considerably, no question about it. The country has become far too inured to outrageous behavior and we seem to be losing our capacity to share any commonly held set of facts. All information is relegated to FAKE NEWS.
Otherwise, though, is the situation really so dire? Trump has been a caricature of himself in his public response to COVID but after taking everything into account, including the roll-out of a vaccine, will historians really find that his ineptitude had the high cost now being attributed to him?, Aside from tax cuts and a stalling out of the regulatory apparatus, has there been any change in government policy with a broad impact on society? The FBI isn’t spying on us, we have a President who has a bias against engaging us in armed conflicts, and the social and cultural power of the educated elite leading the opposition to Trump is as robust as ever. Trump attacks the FAKE NEWS but he’s also constantly taking questions from and sparring with reporters that detest him, an activity that Obama would have shunned. It’s a long way from putting the Trump name on the White House or his face on Mt. Rushmore, to the ambitions of a Hitler, Stalin, or Mao. Certainly, the Republican leaders who have made their peace with him, and who chuckle about “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” would say that the Democrats are likewise being silly in talking about a second Trump term as ushering in authoritarian government.
At certain pivotal points in my story, the “wise counselors” of the political center (think: opinion section of the Economist) may remind us of these realities and perhaps advise us to stand down from a confrontation which will threaten the “Rule of Law” and respect for the venerable political processes enshrined in our Constitution. It will be a “plague on both of your houses” message that won’t exactly equate what Trump and the Republicans are doing with what the Democrats are doing so long as the latter continue to “go high” while the Republicans “go low.” But at some point the Democrats could begin to take the position that the post-election legal skirmishing has become a farce, that it should be enough that Biden clearly won an overwhelming victory on the national level, and that issues about the electoral college are all about naked voter suppression. At that point, according to the “wise counselors,” the fact that the country is at an impasse, and is perhaps descending into civil unrest, will be as much on the Democrats as on Trump. The Democrats will be exhorted to hold their heads high, to follow and accept the twists and turns of the processes of the “law,” and abide by the ultimate result.
When that happens, don’t buy it. Whatever the merits of this take, it is misreading the situation to think that this could ultimately just be another one of those short term Republican power grabs whose significance will prove manageable in a sweep of history that favors the Democrats. The implications of a post-election “constitutional crisis” will be qualitatively different from prior contested elections. And it will be qualitatively worse even than what we’ve seen thus far in the Trump era, as bad as that has been. In contrast to Bush v. Gore, a post-election crisis involving Donald Trump will be a defining moment in our history. The structures, the rituals, and the cant of democracy will survive a second Trump term. However, assuming a healthy Biden win in the national vote, a Trump “win” in the electoral college through some combination of voter suppression and Republican control of the critical levers of power, and in particular, the courts, would leave our government institutions in a shambles and threaten the American project as we know it.
A Trump “win” in the electoral college…would leave our government institutions in a shambles and threaten the American project as we know it.
This will partly be because we’re talking about Donald Trump, not George Bush. (I can’t believe I’m saying this.) But more fundamentally, it will be because the sheer brazenness of insisting on and forcing a second term for a man so manifestly unfit for office after an election that he will so obviously have lost will destroy confidence in our democratic institutions, particularly among the young.
And it will be accompanied by a major and likely long-lasting alteration in the balance of political power. Votes suppressed in the Presidential election will also be votes suppressed in the elections for the Senate. A Republican victory could solidify their control of the Senate for at least a decade and usher in a still longer term control of the federal courts. Together with the continuing skewing of the electoral college in favor of the Republicans, these developments will effectively block implementation of any Democratic policy initiatives, whether radical or incremental, for the foreseeable future.
Democrats press to address climate change, inequality of wealth and opportunity, and persistent racial disparities whereas neither Trump nor the Republicans can be said to have a meaningful policy agenda at all. It’s just about negative partisanship and power. “We’re here and they’re not.” Donald Trump is not the reductio ad absurdum of the Republican project. He is the person exposing the absurdity and the nihilism that has characterized it for some time now.
Donald Trump is not the reductio ad absurdum of the Republican project. He is the person exposing the absurdity and the nihilism that has characterized it for some time now.
Democrats live in cities among people who can’t really imagine that a government addressing the pressing problems of the country and the planet is not in prospect in the relatively short term. Everybody is clamoring for it! But a defeat in a post-election conflict that gives us a second term for Donald Trump will be a bitter wake-up call. Many will be radicalized but no mechanisms will exist for them to effect change on the national level. Others, perhaps most, will lose heart and (if something can be done to get Donald Trump out of their faces) be tempted to come to terms with the political status quo. American society may retain its dynamism but the sense that we have true political agency will have been lost.
In such an environment, flush from having prevailed against the Democrats after an election that Trump lost, Republicans won’t be able to resist the temptation of Trump’s inexorable authoritarian project in a second term. The “deep state” could slowly become an instrument, not a hindrance to the prevailing political power structure. We would not be Russia, let alone China. No dissidents will get poisoned, at least not with actual poison. There will still be free speech, but it will just be largely disconnected from political agency. The mechanisms of democracy will persist but most of us, and perhaps much of Europe following our example, will no longer believe that it matters.
Republicans won’t be able to resist the temptation of Trump’s inexorable authoritarian project in a second term.
Once one tries to get very specific about what would follow a Donald Trump and Republican Senatorial win after a post-election conflict, it’s mostly just rank speculation. Obviously, the guardrails, such as they would have existed up to that point, would be considerably weakened. Trump, having slayed the dragon of his post-petition defeat, would be largely unbound in terms of what he will at least attempt. He would still be giving the Republicans Supreme Court appointments and regulatory relief for their donors, so one would expect little pushback against all but the most extreme things he might attempt. The jury is out, for example, as to what would happen if, as expected, he begins to try to withdraw the United States from NATO. But if there’s true pushback on something like that, he’ll probably realize that he should beat a strategic retreat and bide his time. It’ll be another episode that won’t affect the big picture.
Otherwise, impeachment-proof and already in control of the Justice Department, his personal corruption and wanton attacks on people he believes have crossed him will clearly be more brazen than ever. He’ll be in hyper-payback mode and aides primarily tasked with administering the payback and removing obstacles to his control of whatever needs to be controlled will be the ones who will wield the power.
More specifically, one could imagine such things as the following: Inspector generals could all be loyalists and, regardless of what the law says, protection of whistleblowers could become a thing of the past. There could be systematic disregard of statutes concerning preservation of government records and freedom of information requests. The independence of government statistics, approvals of pharmaceuticals, protections against insider trading, and many other vital government functions, could come under attack. Government security forces could be restructured at all levels to bolster loyalty. Certain key agencies, such as the FBI and the CIA, could be radically transformed. Leakers will continue to be pursued mercilessly and surreptitious surveillance of journalists could be undertaken to identify their sources. One can even imagine a return to surveillance of Democratic leaders and other public figures, including Republicans whose loyalty is suspect. Even if such abuses are relatively rare, their effect could be an across-the-board chilling of any activity one is not prepared to disclose publicly. Certainly, under such circumstances, the state-of-the-art in surveillance technology would render “Deep Throats” impossible. Tech companies who in any way thwart Trump’s (and Putin’s) access to the tools of social media manipulation will be intimidated and kept on a short leash. Trump could attempt to elevate perceived loyalists to commanding positions in the military. This would be controversial and engender push-back, but you could expect Trump to stick with the project.
Republican leadership would stand idly by while the man they still regard as a maniac attempts such things?
Republican leadership would stand idly by while the man they still regard as a maniac attempts such things? The self-respecting members of the Federalist Society on the Courts would countenance such abuse? As I said, I am at this point engaged in rank speculation, but I don’t think any of these possibilities are preposterous.
As for the Democrats, one would expect a generational changing of the guard. Now led by AOC and her supporters, they would understandably demand not just the Green New Deal but fundamental constitutional changes, neither of which would be within reach under the current structures of our government. There would be talk of secession, tax compliance boycotts, etc. Large portions of the older intelligentsia and middle class, inclusive of a significant percentage of Latinos and even African-Americans, would be severely demoralized and even tempted to make their peace with the status quo. Only the continued ubiquitous presence of Donald Trump and the sense that he’s more dangerous than ever would keep people engaged. To appease and distract the left, the Republicans might stand by while the Democrats seek to realize their dreams on the local level. Superficial emblems of a Green New Deal might permeate California or New York, much as we have cannabis supermarkets in California while the sale of marijuana remains a felony on the federal level. But any such initiatives would be starved for cash and meaningful reach. Overall, the Democrats, as motivated as they may continue to be, would not be able to find traction in any direction. For so many years they would have been deceived by their control of the upper reaches of media, academia, and the professions to believe that change, while a challenge, was attainable. Whereas, as they would now realize, it isn’t. There would be much angry talk and learned articles about the inexorable decline of an open society coupled with a sense of futility.
The New York Times, etc. would continue to publish. “Free speech,” rationality, science, and empirical observation would continue as before and the intellectual elite would continue to thrive, but much as classical music continues to thrive. From a social and political perspective, they would be on the margins. Technology would continue to be populated by free-thinking members of this intelligentsia but the direction of technology itself would proceed according to its own imperatives and dynamics. Except in China, the ability of government to intervene or restrain it for the perceived “common good” would effectively be non-existent.
All this would be happening as the power of AI would continue to make manipulation of public opinion and privacy intrusions so much more effective. Shared realities will recede and everything will be about the reality you opt into — or are induced to inhabit — and the conspiracies that threaten it.
If the ultimate battle of the future is between open and closed societies, a Trump victory in 2020 would be a critical turning point.
Trump will continue to posture the U.S. as competing with and containing China but not as an alternative to its political repression and mind control. China will begin to displace the U.S. in providing leadership on such matters as climate control and the maintenance of an open trading system. Populist authoritarians in the Trump/Putin mold will continue to gain ground worldwide, including in Europe, and China’s ability to keep its economy and society dynamic in spite of enveloping social control will begin to present itself as a genuine if still politically incorrect alternative to the social chaos and political turmoil afflicting the U.S. and Europe. If the ultimate battle of the future is between open and closed societies, a Trump victory in 2020 would be a critical turning point.
Of course, at some point, and maybe just when his second term would be over, Donald Trump would exit the scene and the noxious drama would be over. We would all heave a sigh of relief and a mentality of “enjoy your life and your virtual reality, and stop worrying about who’s in charge” could become the default take on our society.
