No amount of folksiness or razzmatazz,however,can conceal how presidential campaigns have come to serve up a negative version of American exceptionalism. They showcase how its politics has become uniquely crazed.
For those who fear for the future of US democracy,it has been disquieting to see so many voters in so many states yearn for the return of an indicted presidential insurrectionist. But America’s problems extend beyond Donald Trump. His political strength has always been a symptom of a broader malaise.
With the November election set to become a Trump/Biden rematch,US politics not only looks deranged but tired and frail. Joe Biden is a good and decent man. His State of the Union address this week was unusually energetic. Fired-up “Fighting Joe”. But Americans have never elected a presidential candidate who has celebrated his 80th birthday,and polls routinely show a majority of voters believes he has done his dash.
And it is not just Biden who makes America’s political class look like a gerontocracy. Trump is 77. The independent candidate Robert Kennedy Jr,the most prominent scion of a dynasty we normally associate with youthfulness and elan,is 70. So,too,is another independent,the academic Cornell West,who has been touring campuses trying to fire up the disaffected young. Jill Stein,the likely Green Party candidate,is 73.
Loading
The fact that the 2024 election has turned into a legal battle as well as an electoral contest highlights another weakness:the politicisation of America’s judiciary and criminal justice system. Republicans bemoan what they perceive as a partisan witch-hunt mounted against Trump by Democratic prosecutors. Democrats fear that the 6-3 conservative majority on the Supreme Court – which includes three right-wing jurists appointed by Trump – grants him an advantage.
Late last month,theSupreme Court handed him a victory of sorts by agreeing to consider his claim of presidential immunity from criminal prosecution. Though the Supreme Court is expected to dismiss his appeal,merely taking up the case will slow the wheels of justice,and assist Trump’s legal strategy of delaying his criminal trials as long as possible.