There is now a deep undercurrent of despair in the USA. Forty-three million people (2014), accounting for 15 per cent of the population of the country, live in poverty. The figure is 2.3 percentage points higher than what it was in 2007. Bernie Sanders has given these people a ray of hope by promising to address the poverty issue. No other candidate on the Democratic side, including Mrs Clinton whose very close relations with the Wall Street tycoons are well known, did so. The fundamental question remains: can he do what he has promised such as universal health care, free higher education, a higher level of minimum wage and a range of other things? Has he worked out how he will interact with the Congress? Many of his own party members in the Congress, not speak of the Republican ones, are on the conservative side.
Bernie Sanders' self-declaration as a socialist is difficult to fathom if one looks at his economic and political agenda. It covers a wide spectrum of policy initiatives ranging from economic, social, political and environmental issues. It looks more like a vast reform agenda. Once one goes through it carefully, it will be clear he is no socialist - he is just a New Deal man. Neither is he a Jeremy Corby; he is more in the tradition of Franklin Roosevelt or even Eisenhower. Then Mr Sanders should also be knowing it very well that it was not so much the New Deal that got USA out of its very difficult economic times but the involvement of the USA in the second world war that finally got the country out its economic depression and eventually opening up the era of economic prosperity for the country up to the very late 1960s.
Getting elected is one thing, and carrying out the reform agenda is another thing. The issue is money: from where it is coming from? It is estimated that tax dodgers in the USA fail to declare about US$ 2.0 trillion which constitute a little less than 20 per cent of reportable income. This costs the US treasury about US$500 billion in revenue loss. Tax dodgers still call the shots in Washington D.C. These tax dodgers include not only the very powerful individuals connected to the Wall Street but also very large multinational corporations. These people together constitute the financial oligarchy that exerts enormous power over public office holders in Washington D.C.
Mr Sanders must remember that "needs are unlimited but means are limited". Therefore, it is all about prioritising the needs within the limited means. But the means which are gradually shrinking with tax-cuts, generous hand-outs to large corporations and banks. This has created an environment which can be best described as "socialism for the very rich and the free market for the very poor". Now the question is: can Sanders do it? There are already deeply entrenched vested interest groups which have eked out their claims already. Some of them like the armed forces and the national security apparatus are clamouring for even more. Very difficult tasks are ahead for Mr Sanders if he gets elected.
DONALD TRUMP: It would be patently unfair and uncharitable on my part if Donald Trump, the potential presidential candidate from the other side of politics, the Republican Party, is not mentioned. The Republican Party has now veered so far to the extreme right that it, according to Chomsky, has ceased to be a normal political party; it has become a radical insurgency. Some initially considered Mr Trump a maverick or a sort of loose cannon. The Republican establishment has always looked on him very wearily. But he is neither of that; he knows what he is after. His anti-immigrant rhetoric, especially against the Hispanics, is directed towards economically and socially disenfranchised white Americans to attract their support. They have been having a very rough time for a long time. They think that offshoring their production facilities and service provisions, the American multinationals are causing deterioration of their plight and creating jobs overseas at their expense. Rapid technological changes in the USA are not helping them either as these are not labour-intensive rather in many instances labour-replacing or require very high levels of skills. These people have missed out on all counts. Therefore, anti-immigrant rhetoric is quite appealing to them because they believe that the immigrants are taking away their jobs.
Moreover, a large segment of these people constitute the core of what in American jargon refers to as "Red Necks", the racial bigots. They in the past were poor white farm labourers in the American South. They used to work in the sun for long hours. Between the hat and the shirt collar a part of the neck used to remain exposed to the sun. This exposed skin used to get sun-burnt and red. They thus came to be known as 'Red Necks'. These poor white farm labourers were very racially prejudiced given that American South has had a very long history of racial bigotry.
The new age Red Necks have a lot of complaints to make about their lot but the American establishment does not seem to care about them. At last they have found their voice in Mr Trump. He very successfully packaged both their economic and social plights and their racial bigotry by targeting immigrants, in particular Hispanics. They think their plight will be over once Mr Trump comfortably sits in the Oval Office.
But the reality is very different and nobody, including Mr Trump, tells them that. More importantly, Hispanics (Mexicans in particular) have historical rights to be in many states such as Texas, Utah, Arizona, Nevada and California as their fore-bearers lived there for centuries.
Mr Trump's another target audience is the American Christian Right. One quarter of Americans profess to be Christian fundamentalist. They are mostly aligned with the Christian Right. This is a group made up of white evangelical Protestants. This Christian right, according to the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and author Chris Hedges, constitutes the American fascists. Mr Trump's outbursts of Islamophobia are directed at them. They possibly are not aware that Mr Trump has significant investments in real estates in the Arab Gulf States. This is also reminiscent of the Christian Right's campaign to restrict Catholic immigration to the USA in the 19th Century. Oddly enough, it now appears that the Catholic extreme right-wing conservatives are also aligning with this group. Strange times make strange bed fellows.
Despite all their differences in their politics, their support base, policy actions and of their personalities, there are surprisingly many similarities between Mr Sanders and Mr Trump. Both of them claim that they are not beholden to any interest group as far as their campaign funds are concerned. Mr Sanders' campaign funds largely come from small donors, each contributing about US$ 20-50. As for Mr Trump, it is all his own money. Both have made a history by eschewing large individual and corporate donors who always have been the source of election campaign funds at all levels of government in the USA. And that has been the principal factor enabling big donors to get access to the powerful political figures, including the president, who have their own vested interest agenda.
Both Sanders and Trump are economic populists and populists always can ride high on the waves of popular discontent. The problem is that does not always result in good economic policy being proposed or enacted. If either one of them is elected, it would be an interesting time for all, but for very different reasons.
The writer is an independent
economic and political analyst. muhammad. mahmood47@gmail.com
Interesting time for all, but for different reasons
writes Muhammad Mahmood concluding his two-part article on US presidential race, 2016 | Published: February 24, 2016 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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