New president, same old game
Donald Trump’s election, welcomed by many, will not be able to eliminate the fundamental flaws in the US power system.
Trump or Harris — this alternative was hyped up as a fateful election in which two fundamentally different political styles would battle it out for supremacy. The conservative “old white man” and the younger woman standing for diversity and wokeness seemed as incompatible as fire and water. Many who lean toward the Trump camp now harbor hopes for a political change of era. However, the authors try to dampen expectations in this regard. In many essential respects, Herbert Grönemeyer’s slogan is likely to apply to the US: “Everything stays the same.” Even under Donald Trump, the United States will remain a country of violence — both externally and internally. Civil rights are likely to be further curtailed in favor of an intrusive state, and the American president will increasingly resemble a dictator in his powers.
by Manova’s World Editorial Team
By John W. and Nisha Whitehead
[This article posted on 11/16/2024 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.manova.news/artikel/neuer–prasident–altes–spiel.]
“If elections could ever change anything, they’d be illegal.” — Thorne in “Land of the Blind” from 2006.
After months of hand-wringing, mudslinging, and fearmongering, the die is finally cast and the result is clear: the Deep State has won.
Despite the billions spent on creating the illusion of an election, culminating in the ritualistic reassurance of a choice between Donald Trump or Kamala Harris, not much will change when it comes to the big issues that keep us in thrall to authoritarian rulers.
Despite all the effort that has been expended to make us believe that things will change if we just elect the “right” political savior, everything will remain the same for the unelected bureaucracy on the day a new president is sworn in.
The war will continue. The drone killings will continue. The surveillance will continue. The censorship of anyone who criticizes the government will continue. The government’s efforts to label regime critics as extremists and terrorists will continue. There will continue to be police shootings. There will continue to be SWAT team raids. There will continue to be highway robberies carried out by government officials. The corrupt government will continue. There will continue to be for-profit prisons. And the militarization of the police will continue.
These problems have persisted in recent years under both Republican and Democratic administrations, often increasing. The outcome of this year’s election will not change that.
Indeed, when we look at the programs and policies that the 2024 presidential election will have no impact on, we can more clearly see the government’s priorities, which have less to do with representing taxpayers than with accumulating money, power, and control.
The undermining of the Constitution will continue unabated. The US’s so-called “war on terror,” which it has waged relentlessly since September 11, has hollowed out our freedoms, destroyed our Constitution, and turned our nation into a battlefield — thanks in large part to subversive laws such as the USA Patriot Act and the National Defense Authorization Act. These laws—which undermine the rule of law and the fundamental rights of US citizens and reshape our legal framework so that instead of the rule of law (our Constitution), martial law becomes the map by which we orient our lives in the United States—will continue to be enforced.
The government’s war against the US people will continue unabated. “We the people” are no longer protected by the rule of law.
While the First Amendment, which gives us a voice, is being muzzled, the Fourth Amendment — which protects us from being harassed, harassed, beaten, broken, and spied on by government officials — is being gutted. Thus, to be treated like a criminal in the US, one no longer needs to be poor, black, or guilty. In the US police state, it is enough to belong to the class of suspects, i.e., the citizens. As a de facto member of the so-called criminal class, every US citizen is now guilty until proven innocent. Oppression and injustice — whether in the form of shootings, surveillance, fines, asset seizures, prison sentences, roadside searches, and so on — will eventually affect us all if we do nothing about it.
The shadow government, also known as the “deep state,” “police state,” “military-industrial complex,” “surveillance state complex,” will continue unabated. The corporatist, militarized, entrenched bureaucracy, fully functional and staffed by unelected officials, will continue to call the shots in Washington, D.C., regardless of who sits in the White House or controls Congress. By “government,” I do not mean the highly partisan two-party bureaucracy of Republicans and Democrats, but rather a government in the sense of a deeply entrenched Deep State that is immune to elections and populist movements and has placed itself beyond the reach of the law.
The government’s manipulation of national crises to expand its own powers will continue. “We, the people” have been subjected to an “emergency state” that justifies all manner of government tyranny and power grabs in the name of so-called national security.
Whatever the so-called threat to the nation may be, the government tends to capitalize on the heated emotions, confusion, and fear of the country to expand the powers of the police state. In fact, the government’s response to every problem is simply more government—at the expense of taxpayers—and less individual freedom.
Endless wars that enrich the military-industrial complex will continue unabated. At a rate of $93 million per hour — $920 billion per year — the US military empire is bleeding the country dry. It’s incredible: although the US accounts for only 5 percent of the world’s population, it accounts for 40 percent of global military spending, spending more on its military than the next nine nations combined.
Government corruption will continue unabated. The government is not our friend. Nor does it work for “us, the people.” Americans understand this instinctively. When asked about the nation’s biggest problems, Americans of all political persuasions cite the government as problem number one. In fact, nearly three-quarters of Americans surveyed believe the government is corrupt. Our so-called government representatives do not truly represent us, the citizens. We are now ruled by an oligarchic elite of state and corporate interests whose primary interest is in maintaining power and control.
Governmental tyranny under the rule of an imperial president will continue unabated. The Constitution provides the president with very specific, limited powers. Yet, in recent years, US presidents have armed themselves with the power to wage war, kill Americans on their own authority, torture detainees, strip citizens of their rights, arrest and detain citizens indefinitely, spy on Americans without a warrant, and establish their own secret shadow government.
The powers accumulated by each past president and inherited by subsequent presidents—powers that, taken together, constitute a toolbox of terror for an imperial ruler—empower whoever sits in the Oval Office to act like a dictator: above the law and beyond any real accountability.
The grim reality we must face is that the US government has become a greater threat to the life, liberty, and property of its citizens than any of the so-called dangers the government claims to protect us from.
As I make clear in my book, “Battlefield America: The War on the American People” and its fictional counterpart, “The Erik Blair Diaries,” this state of affairs has become the status quo — regardless of which party is in power.
Editorial note: This text first appeared under the title “Post-Election Truths: The Things That Won’t Change. No Matter Who Wins.” at Global Research. It was translated by Gabriele Herb on a voluntary basis and edited by the volunteer Manova proofreading team.