What they sow

The date is June 7, 2016, Hillary Clinton claims the Nomination for Democratic presidential candidate.

And so the die is cast for an election for the most powerful political office in the world where half the electorate is voting not for, but against a candidate. For decades the parties have abandoned their traditional ideologies in favor of ‘we’re against whatever it is they say’, and it should come as no surprise that now, even when party affiliations are almost entirely irrelevant, the rhetoric has remained the same.

The Republican party has already been deeply fractured by this election. Should Trump win there will be many establishment Republicans in other branches of government who will continue their hostile boycott of any and all executive decisions, much as they have done for the past 8 years.

Similarly, Bernie Sanders continues to fight, against the interests of the Democratic party, not because he is convinced he can win the presidency, but because he knows that in order for his movement to achieve its goals, he needs to create a similar fracture in his own party.

The problems the US (and indeed the world) faces are so large, and occur at such a rapid rate, that the bipartisan system, entrenched as it is after all those centuries, has become unable to address them. A government gridlocked, lacking vision and agency, no longer benefits anyone. Even those plutocrats and warmongers who gain the most from a paralyzed government devoid of oversight will eventually deem it a failure when that same government is unable to protect them and their families from a new French revolution, global war, or the consequences of climate change.

Bernie, Trump, you, and I, are aware of this. Whether expressed in specific rage, citing names and dates, actions and consequences, or a general rage at ‘things getting worse’ and the scapegoat du jour, we are all aware that the “establishment”, bipartisan society, no longer reflects our diverse, connected, and global society, no longer operates at the speed our lives do, and no longer represents any interests but its own. The more we divide our numbers, the less we can hope to achieve.

So this is the election where America has sowed, where the dividing have become the divided and the outcome will matter less than any election before it. For years to come we will witness the disgusting, shameful, embarrassing, death rattles of a political class fighting for survival and burning to the ground all that threaten it until it immolates itself in the process.

Hopefully America will reap from the ashes of what remains the realization that beneath the hollow slogans, the empty rhetoric, and the pandering appeals to historical fiction, we were all on the same side. That we all desired the same dignity, empowerment, security, and agency for ourselves and our communities, that we were never truly divided in our hopes for ourselves or our children, and that all these ideals have been within reach for decades.

For the only thing fundamentally wrong about the American dream, is that it was never unique to America.

-
Thank you, dear reader. Consider this my hat.