(riceviamo da una cara amica e volentieri pubblichiamo)
Nancy Bracken Garson nlbg@aol.com
Dear Overseas Friends,
I have had a number of letters from you recently asking my
view on what just happened in the US election.
So I thought that perhaps I should put my thoughts together, as well as
possible, and send out a general letter.The symptoms, dynamics and outcome of our election are
complicated to understand, even to someone like me, who has spent a number of
years in the active practice of politics.
But here, I shall give you the simplest answer I can: We had a Brexit
vote, and those in England who are discontent with the present socio-economic
system, including the arrival of new immigrants, are the same ones here
who voted for Trump: the majority being white men with high school educations.We all understand that we are living in the midst of a huge
economic and social revolution caused by the development of the internet,
robotics, social media and international trade. I’m sure with 50 years’
distance we will be able to see it more clearly. But presently, we are caught in a period
where many less educated members of our country’s workforce have been displaced
by obsolete businesses, and by competing cheaper labor from developing nations
that close manufacturing companies here.So there are many in this country who
have been trained for jobs that no longer exist, and often they do not have the
skills to enter the “new” job market.Additionally, as Europe is well aware, when political
crises occur in other countries, like the Middle East and Northern Africa, it
is very difficult to stop the influx of humanity, seeking stability, peace for
their children, and who own GPS systems, from finding their way to other
nations. It has been so for the US for a
number of decades now, from most of the Spanish-speaking countries of Central
and South America, to the south of our borders. We also encourage the best and
brightest youth from around the world to study at our universities, and many of
them from India, Pakistan and China, end up staying here after their education,
either legally or illegally. In about 30 years, the US will no longer be a
white majority country. This is
difficult for many who understand their country through traditional history and
churches. While all of our inhabitants
are immigrants from somewhere originally (outside of the Native Americans),
from our founding until the 1960s, they were predominantly from Great Britain
North, Central & Southern Europe, and Russia, with the exception of the
black slaves who were brought from Africa in the first 200 years and some
Chinese who emigrated to California in the 1850s and onward.And then there is the political system.In a plan devised by our Founding Fathers to
withstand the onslaught of ‘mob” voting, and to better balance the outcome less
in favor of the larger populated more “industrial” states, there developed this
system known as the Electoral College.It is way too complicated to try to explain here, but one of the
(intended?) consequences, is that in 2 of our recent elections—the 2000 Bush
vs. Gore, and 2016 Trump vs. Clinton—both Republicans won the Electoral number
required to win the presidency, even though THE DIRECT VOTE of the population
was both in favor of the Democrats, for Gore by a million votes, and for
Clinton, by over 2 million votes.It is also important to understand that for whatever
reason, the US traditionally has had a very low registered voter election
turnout rate, (unlike Europe), generally in the 48-53% range. And of all the registered voters only about
53% have indicated a party preference - about 24% Republican and 32% Democrat,
with an infinitesimal number for a few minor third parties.But that means that only about ½ of the voter
population participates in the primaries which pre-select the party candidates!And then there is the general anger amongst most of the
population about the poor way the Congress has carried out their mission the
last 8 years of passing legislation for the benefit of the country.They have
been mostly obstructionist, and more interested in attacking individuals than
in passing annual budgets and dealing with crisis from the Zika virus to the
pollution of our air and water.So the voters have said “enough”.And while the “uneducated white men” are
responsible for Trump’s win, so are the liberal millennials who supported
Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primary, but who would not come out to
vote for Hillary for their own idealistic reasons; the same with the black vote
which did not come out in the same numbers as they did for Obama.Both groups will now reap the negative
results of their failure to come out and vote.And lastly, we have the personalities, careers and
political philosophies of our 2 candidates: Clinton and Trump. Never before in
our voting history have we had the 2 presidential candidates with such high
“disapproval” ratings.Never before has
such an inexperienced, uneducated candidate for political office been a
representative of one of the 2 major parties.Never before have the “official”
politicos and journalists so misread the underlying sentiment of many of the
American people during the primaries or the general election.I am in shock, as are half the people in this country that
such a person as Donald Trump, a misogynist, racist, outright liar, and someone
inflaming all the “hate” sentiment in this country, should represent our
nation.Psychologically, he is unstable
and “trigger-happy”. He seems to have no
“core”, no moral or political philosophy, has no ethical concerns about his
many business and family “conflicts of interest”.He seems to be totally unaware of the
responsibility and seriousness of the office, displaying his “television”
personality even in choosing his cabinet members (many of him are completely
unqualified in the details of their department).My only hope is that Trump does something so unethical,
that even some of the Republicans in Congress will vote for his “impeachment”,
or that maybe after a year, even Trump will realize that the job is too
difficult for him and resign.I am so fearful for my country and the world,
Nancy
