By Richard Mellor in California
I have stated many times that Trump is many things. He is a racist, a misogynist a pathological liar, not to mention a narcissist. Trump embraces fascist and white nationalist organizations and their philosophy.
Despite all of the vicious, anti-social comments and attacks he has made against people and groups, his opposition focuses primarily on such issues as his tax returns and whether or not he had violated campaign financing laws. That even carried over to his use of prostitutes and buying their silence. His vile diatribes have often been referred to in the capitalist mass media as bullying, controversial and other such adjectives. Racist or misogynist is hardly, if ever used yet it is clear he is both.
While this is a problem for the capitalist class to which Trump belongs, albeit an unstable maverick among them, it is not the main problem. Initially, they hoped they could control him. They liked his corporate welfare program and his tearing down of already feeble regulatory controls on capital rights and business. Some liked his protectionist rhetoric, although the more strategic among them correctly fear the consequences of such policies, which can only lead to increased conflict, functioning as they do in a world economy. They are well aware of the results of Smoot-Hawley tariffs. They also weren’t convinced that his racist comments would embolden the white nationalist and fascist elements that have always been here and force them more in to the open.
Unable to control him and two years down the road, the pimple has become a festering boil. The madness continues and profit-making is not helped, never being sure what the commander-in-chief may say next. A stock market that rises and falls daily with each blubbering remark, when a year’s gains can be wiped out in a day – and this happens almost daily – is not fertile ground for investors and the owners of capital in general.
While this treacherous terrain has been a problem for the capitalists it is not the main problem. The real danger here for US capitalism and the unelected clique that control the levers of power in society, is Trump’s undermining of the institutions of capitalism and capitalist democracy itself.
I remind readers of the collective gasp from the capitalist media and the politicians in both parties (aside from the evangelicals, or the American Taliban, which is a better description) when Trump hinted during the debate with Hillary Clinton that he might not abide by the election results if he lost.
Undemocratic nature of the Senate
This was a direct assault on what the media refers to as ‘democracy’. Our elections are sacrosanct: government by the people for the people and all that nonsense. I mean, when was the last time we saw an industrial worker or nurse in the White House? Workers don’t even have a political party of their own. And it’s important to note that Trump doesn’t attack the Senate too much. Not so much because he has more power there, but because that power is possible in the undemocratic Senate because it is set up as a counter weight to the influence of the more populous, urban-centred working class. The smaller, less-populated rural states have the same representation in the Senate as the larger more populous ones, which means that a state like Alaska, with under a million people, has the same number of Senators as California with over 30 million. In the mid-terms, Democrats had some 10 million more votes than Republicans, but that didn’t help them undermine Trump in the Senate.
Trump has attacked sacred institutions relentlessly: the media, the universities, which are capitalist think-tanks, and so on. This follows on the heels of his support for Kavanaugh, Roy Moore before that and other either ultra-religious or racist figures. This is causing some concern even among the capitalist class.
The so-called Supreme Court, which is almost portrayed as a divine body, has been undermined through the Kavanaugh affair and other assaults on it by Trump. From the point of view of the US ruling class this cannot go on. If Trump can disparage such institutions, then so can the rest of us. Millions of Americans have already lost faith in the US political system and the two parties in particular. And we all know justice is served if you have the money to pay for it.
Hoping he would go away, members of the judiciary and the Supreme Court have kept quiet for fear of validating Trump’s claims that the courts, including the Supreme Court, are political institutions and have a political bias. Trump is right of course: after all, the Supreme Court is just a bunch of lawyers and judges whose job it is to protect the very institutions and system Trump is undermining. But this doesn’t have to be broadcast to the rest of us from such a revered source as the US presidency.
Chief Justice John Roberts has reached a limit it seems, chiding Trump for claiming that federal judges that rule against him are motivated by politics. The Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals, which is based in San Francisco ruled against Trump’s attempt to stop immigrants from seeking asylum “if they do not enter the US at designated locations”. Trump referred to the judge in question as an “Obama judge” adding that “….I’ll tell you what, this is not going to happen anymore,” and that the decision is “a disgrace”
Although we all know it’s not, the judiciary is supposed to be impartial and independent, as one of the three departments of the federal government structure, and Trump’s accusations are dangerous from his class colleagues’ point of view. Trump responded to Roberts with a tweet: “Judge Gonzalo Curiel, the Mexican”. Trump has called other judges names as well. He called one a “so-called” judge and another judge who is of Latino or Hispanic heritage a, “hater” and a “Mexican”.
It appears that the majority of Trump’s class colleagues are giving up on him and it seems inevitable, dare I say it, he will be removed somehow. As I say, it’s not that he is wrong in his description of the body politic and its institutions, but it is how it undermines them in the mind of the millions of US workers that is the problem.
The dominant ideology is capitalist ideology
Things are already shaky. From our point of view, it is a positive side of Trump’s activity as an understanding of the real nature of capitalist institutions need to be grasped from a class point of view. While ideas and therefore consciousness has a material base, the dominant ideology or ideas in class society is the ideology of the class that rules society and causes conflict and confusion about how the world functions.
The head of the American Bar Association, Bob Carlson, made that abundantly clear in response to Trump’s irresponsible retorts: “Disagreeing with a court’s decision is everyone’s right, but when government officials question a court’s motives, mock its legitimacy or threaten retaliation due to an unfavourable ruling, they intend to erode the court’s standing and hinder the courts from performing their constitutional duties,”. He is actually stressing the need for class solidarity without using this terminology.
And those constitutional duties do not include defending the rights of workers. When we force them to make laws that benefit us, a court can interpret challenges to them. But we have never won any of the major gains we have today relying on the courts, Supreme Court or otherwise. And if we forced the courts to defend us against the interests of the 1%, this ruling class would resort to calling in the military against its own people if necessary. It is nothing new.
The system of government we have, an historically progressive step forward as it relates to British rule and a breaking from it, was set up to protect the interests of the rising colonial capitalist class from the potential power of the continent’s immigrant workers, the native population, slaves and all the labour that was brought in to the colony in one way or another.
As far as the spat between Trump and the judges is concerned, disagreements between these three branches of government are OK on a minor level.
But Trump is treading on dangerous ground.
November 26, 2018
First published on the US socialist blogsite, Facts For Working People:
https://weknowwhatsup.blogspot.com/
