The Day Before . . .

When I was a new Second Lieutenant in West Germany (1983), manning the NATO frontier during the Cold War, a very self-important TV movie appeared:

Seizing on the angst produced by the media in the wake of Ronald Reagan’s (Ronald Ray-guns, get it?) election, the movie sought to bring home the horrors of nuclear war to the general public, less the new President be inclined to start one (didn’t I say self-important?). It was interesting as a movie, with good special effects for its pre-digital age, but terribly preachy.

The opening scenes were unusual: people in small-town America going about their business, all the while news reports on radios or televisions playing in the background clearly reported on a gathering international storm. Folks remained oblivious, so much so that as the missiles launch from the corn fields, people are still wondering whether it’s just an exercise!

Twenty years later, climate activists cheered on a second disaster flick with much the same title and message, much better special effects, much worse plot, even more preachiness. This one took a few liberties with climate science, but did so in service of a greater good (always the case, no?). A sudden collapse of the Gulf Stream (actually the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC) leads to Arctic hurricanes and an overnight ice age for most of the northern hemisphere. Again, people are going about their business and unaware until the ocean over-spills Manhattan.

These are not those times.

In a few days, we’ll have an election in the United States, and a new (or renewed) President. Both sides have assured us that if their opponents win there will be a fascist dictatorship or total criminal anarchy, runaway inflation or a ruined dollar, the real handmaid’s tale or abortion vans patrolling our streets (at least at the Democratic National Convention, that last one was true). While all things are possible, none of these are likely.

First off, while both sides claim that “the people” are unaware of how truly awful the other side is, they are wrong. Nobody is unaware of the candidates, the parties, or the policies (to the extent they are stated). Both sides are keenly aware and on the watch for the worst, which is in itself a check on the system.

Second, the US governmental system is designed specifically for such circumstances. Power is diffused, shared, with checks and balances. While a single party may control both Houses of Congress and the Presidency, there are still the courts (ask President Trump how his control of the Supreme Court has been working!). There is the filibuster in the Senate, unless of course the party worried most about democracy decides it is inconvenient. The margins are so close that either party’s majority in the Houses is likely to be single-digit, thus empowering even the smallest factions within the party to grind things to a halt.

Third, there is the simple fact of culture and its momentum. It’s easy to wave your hand and say “let it be so,” but that doesn’t change anything in the end. Border walls proved to be very hard for President Trump to build; likewise it was easy for President Biden to overturn Trump’s executive orders on the border, but not to deal with the consequences. Pro-lifers learned that overturning Roe v. Wade simply made the nation open for a conversation about abortion (you can’t argue much about fundamental rights), but that didn’t mean most people now wanted a nation-wide abortion ban. Culture changes slowly, despite the wishes of activists. Just ask all those electric car proponents.

Finally, despite all the doom-n-gloom talk, things are looking up (more detailed blog posts coming on the reasons why). Believe it or not, inflation has been largely tamed. Yes, there’s still a significant affordability problem (housing, rent, groceries) but that’s a different problem requiring different solutions. Inflation is insidious and more threatening, and we should all be happy it is under control. The US economy is out-performing every other national economy on almost every measure, and all the trend lines are for more of the same. Violent crime is down, even if other crimes of disorder are up and the data are very general. It will take real effort to screw things up, although perhaps the next administration will be up to the task (there’s my pessimistic side butting in).

Other reasons I’m optimistic? Social media is all talk. People tend to forget that. “I’m moving from the US if X is elected” is nonsense, as are most other social media claims. There will be claims and counter claims about the election, regardless of outcome. I expect if former President Trump wins, some progressive somewhere will literally self-immolate. If Vice President Harris wins, some group will threaten to march on the Capitol. Good luck with that. As the January 6th rioters (and plotters) learned, you can’t stop the process. You can get shot in the face.

President Trump is not a fascist; I doubt he could spell it if you spotted him an “f” and an “a.” He is rude, crass, and lacking in normal inhibitions. And he talks too much, exaggerates too much, promises too much. Vice President Harris was born in Oakland, and after much thought, I have decided she is the living embodiment of Gertrude Stein’s immortal put-down of that city (Oakland): “there is no there, there.” She is a vacant vessel, an empty pants suit as it were. She is not a Communist, nor a Socialist, not even a Democratic Socialist (wherever that is). She is probably not even a Progressive, but she could play one on TV, if it suited the election vibes (see her brief 2020 campaign). Like her opponent, she cannot summon the support to fundamentally alter the system, nor does she have the conviction to do so.

Americans all want the same thing: to get on with life. We’re too busy living to be holding a grudge, regardless of what we post. It’s part of our genius. We fought the British a couple of times, but ended up loving their royalty, their accents, and Downton Abbey. We regularly invoked the French as haughty and evil, and fought world wars to save them. We depicted the Germans and the Japanese as inhuman savages, burnt their countries to the ground, rebuilt them, and now we love driving Mercedes and Lexus. We fought a bloody civil war and almost immediately said “let bygones be bygones” (too soon for the slaves we emancipated). It’s our way.

I’m not saying things won’t get rough. You can’t go this far down the road of divisive rhetoric and simply do an about-face and double back to civility. There will be protests, lawsuits, recriminations, probably even some violence. But it will only go further if both sides insist that it does. And while social media (and some mainstream outlets) will convince you you’re part of a vast army ready to respond, you’re not. You don’t agree with everything the parties and candidates say, you don’t want to fight it out in the streets.

Yes, right now we’re deeply divided. And we have deep problems (immigration, affordability, national debt, education, population decline) to confront. But ask any economist, any politician, any citizen anywhere if they would trade places with America, and they would.

So take a deep breath. Be concerned if your side lost, and watch what the other side does “like a hawk.” Don’t contribute to the noise by trying to “pwn” the other side with memes on social media. If you do, don’t complain when they do the same; you’re both equally contributing to divisiveness. You can’t ask someone to listen to the better angels of their nature while telling them they’re a Nazi (or a Communist, or . . . )

And look at the bright side: the post-Trump era will start soon, either in two months, or in four years!