recently read an article by Bernard-Henri Levy in the New Republic on the financial crisis, which I highly recommend. There was one part I found highly affecting, which was the quotation, from a French historian, that “History is tragic.”
The American Dream consists of a long, drawn-out rejection of this idea. When we look at the two presidential candidates, we see two men telling us that America is in trouble but that the government can redeem us. Elect me, and I can lead us into a new era of peace and prosperity. Neither warns, except in the vaguest terms, of the depth of the economic crisis we will have to address, or of the grave international challenges facing us, more serious than the war in Iraq. Straight talk this is not.
Let us proceed from the axiom that history is tragic.
America is a nation with its fingers in every pie, with troops across the globe, fighting two wars that are unsustainable given the current size of our military and unaffordable given the fiscal health of government. Undiscussed is the fact that much of our military expenses in Iraq go to fuel; our war is financing our worst enemies. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the American people have been paying to police the global order, and it’s not cheap. Our military-industrial complex successfully resists efforts to trim it and is currently preparing a request for massive new spending, billions upon billions of dollars, to be sprung upon the new President in his first weeks in office. Our policies have become locked into militarism, and there’s no clear way out.
This is not without precedent. The Roman Empire eventually became insolvent due to the ever-increasing demands of its military. It was forced to slowly cannibalize its wealth in order to feed the military machine. The army’s accumulation of money and power enabled it to accumulate more money and power, which in turn…well, you can guess how this ends.
Rome didn’t fall with the barbarians at the gates, because it had ripped itself apart long before that. At some point, it essentially lost the ability to govern itself. Even before, during the Republic, it had become crippled as its citizenry turned against each other. As Americans become more and more polarized, genuine political consensus recedes from the realm of possibility, and the status quo becomes dangerously ossified into our politics. Our only hope for a change of course now is a true electoral mandate, not a victory on points. Without a clear signal from the electorate, obstructionists will be able to stop meaningful reform. Indeed, they almost always have.
American politics is oddly divorced from the reality that if we’re not vigilant, very bad things can happen. At the turn of the last century, leaders worldwide believed we had entered a new age of peace, integration, and endlessly-increasing wealth. This proved inaccurate. American leadership has failed us dramatically for the last eight years. If it continues to fail, there are very real consequences that are hardly outside the realm of possibility.
Let’s consider not what a good president could do, but what a bad one could do: Race war. Class war. Global war. Nuclear war. Destruction of modern capitalism. Destruction of the environment. A Venusian Earth. Those are the stakes.
When you vote, think of the American story as it might be told in the history books of the next civilization. History has not judged kindly those leaders unwilling or unable to change course in the face of catastrophe; think Nero, or the Tsars. Whatever one might say about the virtues of John McCain’s policies, his candidacy represents traditional American values and politics. This might be seen as a good thing; but American tradition has gotten us where we are today.
On the other hand, history has a pretty standard verdict on reformers of a failing empire: too little, too late. I can only hope someone bucks the trend.
-Alex Copulsky, Books & Arts Editor
