AMERICA'S PECULIAR CRISIS

America is in crisis as everyone knows. In just the last week, two major events occurred which greatly deepened this crisis, President Biden's disastrous "debate," and the U.S. Supreme Court's enthronement of the president as an elected king (or queen).

Regular readers of this blog will know what I am going to say first, the big picture. We are witnessing the colossal clash between the forces of revolutionary democracy and the forces of reactionary anti-democracy, i.e. fascism. In the upcoming election one party represents one side and the other party the other. The winners will decide the fate of America for the foreseeable future. The stakes could not be higher.

As a lifelong (I am 81 years old) student of history, my first impulse is to look back into the past for guidance on what to do now. For the big picture, the first case that jumps to my mind is the transition of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. For 500 years, Rome had been a republic where the people had governed themselves in a complicated system that can best be described as quasi-democracy. It was not pure democracy but it came close. Then, after five centuries, Rome turned into a monarchy under a dictatorial emperor. In a nutshell, what brought this on was the growing and enormous disparity between the rich and the poor in Rome as a result of the spectacular growth of a vast empire. In short, the rich got a lot richer and the poor got a lot poorer. The Second and First centuries BCE saw a huge clash between these forces. Fearing the loss of order and control, the propertied classes rallied around a dictator that then became an emperor (27 BCE).

We see a similar situation in America today in that there is a vast and growing gulf between the rich and the poor. This has been going on for at least the last forty years. The propertied classes in America, who control a great deal of power, are resolved to keep this going. However, the method of doing this is not overt economics. It is the culture war in which the old social elements that controlled society are feeling that they are being overwhelmed by a multi-racial and multi-cultural society. The upcoming election has been framed in the terms of the culture war and not the scarcely veiled push of the super rich to make themselves and their corporations even richer. A cry for "Law and order" brought the end of the Roman Republic just as it may well do in 2024 America. The SCOTUS decision of this week has moved our country much closer to being an fascist empire and not a democratic republic.

Nevertheless, this is not what people are talking about today even though it should be. The topic of the day is whether Joe Biden is too old for a second round as president. So what about age and political power? Is a person over the age of 80 too old to govern well?

Thinking back at cases in history of political leaders in their 80's, three names jump immediately into mind, Konrad Adenauer, Paul von Hindenburg, and Philippe Pétain. All of them played major roles in history in their 80's. One was brilliant. The other two were disastrous.

Adenauer was Chancellor of West Germany from 1949 to 1963 when he left at the age of 87. His nickname was "the Old One." The consensus is that he was by far the greatest leader in Germany after the Second World War. In short, he led a country that was literally in ruins to become the leading country in Europe. This is often called "the German miracle." He is the best example I can think of who was as sharp and capable to the end. (He died in 1967 at age 91). At the time was no question about his abilities.

Then, I can think of two cases that were the opposite. These were men who made disastrous, to catastrophic, decisions that were related to their ages. Hindenburg was the greatest hero in Germany at the end of the First World War. He was highly revered. He was elected President of Germany (the Weimar Republic) in 1925 and served until 1934 when he died at age 86. Slow, befuddled, and confused, he appointed Adolf Hitler as Chancellor in 1933, not because he wanted to but because he did not know what else to do. He despised Hitler but did not have the strength to do anything about it. Age was a huge factor in arguably the worst political decision in all of human history. When Hindenburg died in 1934, Hitler combined the offices of President and Chancellor, and the rest is history.

Philippe Pétain was also too old for the crisis at hand. Coming out of the First World War, he was one of the great heroes in France. When the French army collapsed in June of 1940, Pétain was there to turn over the keys of the country to the Nazis. He made a humiliating peace with Germany and then headed the puppet Nazi regime in the southern half of the country called Vichy. He was Prime Minister of Vichy from 1940 to 1944, aged 84 to 88. He did everything he could to help the Nazis. He simply did not know what else to do. At the end of the war he was tried for treason, found guilty, and sentenced to death. The death sentence was later changed to life in prison because of his advanced age. He died in 1951 at age 95. He is remembered today as the great collaborator with the enemy.

So, my point is that age alone should not determine whether we entrust power to one. It is the physical and mental condition of the person in question. That was what was so shocking about Biden's appearance last week. He shuffled along and mumbled words that often made no sense. Sorry to say, I do not see an Adenauer here. Of course, Donald Trump is only three years younger than Biden and he has shown over and over that his mental and emotional acuity is equally in doubt. He just held it together in the debate.

The Democrats are now in a quandary about what to do. Should Biden remain as the nominee, or should he be replaced by another, and younger, person? This is a very complicated situation an analogy to which I cannot recall in American history. In 1944, people close to President FD Roosevelt knew that he was very sick and probably would not make it through another (# 4) term. This was hidden from the public, who did not even know he was in a wheelchair. However, at the time, military leaders believed the war would go on for another three years or so (the atom bomb was not ready). Sure enough, a month after his fourth inauguration, FDR died, leaving Harry Truman to wrap up the war. 

Time is of the essence for the Democrats, and the forces of evolving democracy in America. There is precious little time before the people go to the polls. The Dems will have to decide soon on whether to keep Biden or replace him. 

Tomorrow is the Fourth of July. Let's all take a moment to remember who we are as a people and why we are where we are. The founding fathers, two hundred and fifty years ago, were resolute to create a country where everyone was under the law and the people could govern themselves. No kings here. A century later the country tore itself apart to decide on the battlefield whether the founding principles were true: a nation of the people, by the people, and for the people.

We Americans are now faced with a peculiar crisis unlike anything in our past. How we get through this will test our mettle to the maximum. Will we live up to the our responsibilities as the heirs of the greatest nation-state in the history of the world? Will we be true to the principles of democracy that built tis great country? We shall see.