America and Turbulent Democracy Look for Change
- Written by Mahboob A. Khawaja, PhD.
The Unthinkable Insurrection on America Powerhouse
America and its politics find itself at the tyranny of reason of which it appears to be unconscious either by design or by choice. The living thought of American political harmony does not seem to exhibit an ideal scenario of democracy as acclaimed by its political proponents. The perplexities and despotic character are rooted in the making of modern democracy. American constitutional sense of liberty, freedom and justice appear tainted and dislodged by individualistic Trump’s cult and the planned mob violence against the epicenter of political governance in Washington. D.C. on January 6 -Wednesday. It exposed an ugly and forbidden truth about the American political thought, values and plastic configuration of piety of democratic values. The gangsters upsurge denied the normal functional of the working seat of political governance to verify the results of the 2020 presidential election won by Democrat Joe Biden. The seditious crowd chanted “Hang Pence” against the Vice President, “take hostage” the enemy of Trump victory, the election was “fraudulent” and “ Trump won” the election, the encompassing chaos echoes the worst upcoming epoch in contemporary American history. In all rational observations, it was an authoritarian sponsored coup against We, the People who had systematically elected Joe Biden- President Elect in November 2020. There were silenced pleas and indifference by Republican top leadership who shared the Trump belligerent stance on the outcomes of the presidential election. Is it a wake-up call for rethinking of the American emotional outburst or an opportunity to reflect intelligently as to what went wrong on that historic day? Rowan Wolf (https://www.uncommonthought.com/mtblog/archives/2021/01/06/if-you-think-that-trump-will-not-continue-to-push-a-coup-then-think-again.php: 1/06/21) highlights the following facts:
It is critical that we take seriously the impact of the lies, propaganda, and actual coup attempt that is occurring. Trump and the GOP have colluded in creating a narrative that has left a large portion of our population believing that 1) there has been significant fraud in the vote; 2) that the Biden win is illegitimate; 3) that the actions taken by Trump and the GOP are legal, legitimate, and “saving” our democracy. The truth is the obverse of this. In fact, we have a larger portion of the people and virtually the whole of the GOP throwing democracy and the Constitution into the ditch in order to establish an oligarchy, a dictatorship. They are attempting to throw out the votes of tens of millions of people in a coup.
The mob violence and killing of five American signaled deficient security arrangements to safeguard the sanctity of the Capitol complex, members of Congress and Senate who were discharging their legal duties to address the agenda of verification of the election results. It represented lack of planning and distorted image of American official planning on security and protection of human lives. If there were responsible and rational officials, the security plan should have met the challenge of the day but there was nothing to stabilize a trivial emerging security catastrophic emergency. Strangely enough, few weeks, The Black Lives Matter protest was met with police brutality, rubber bullets and cordon off the Capitol premise. President Trump incited the mob for an appalling way forward to undo the congressional verification of the President Elect, Joe Biden. Would President Trump be held accountable for his insurrection and violation of the tenets of the US Constitution? Or would he go unpunished for the next ten days?
Responding to this formidable challenge, Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House is calling for “impeachment” of President Trump and demands invocation of the 25th Amendment of the US Constitution to dismiss Trump from his office. The time and opportunity for a reasoned dialogue was lost by Trump and the Republican Party leadership. The followers of Trump’s cult performed the stage the drama to appease the emperor and his complicit supporters. Cynicism about American politicians is endemic across the board. Could the present American leadership restore a sense of political normalcy in a highly turbulent crisis that engulfed the nation to greater risk of insecurity and survival for a sustainable political future? This author noted the following observations in “American Presidential Election and Democracy Look for Change, Moral and Intellectual Leadership.” (UncommonThought: 11/19/2020.): To glance ahead, America and its claim to a working democracy will haunt future generations with suspicion and extended discard. Trump and his coercive puppies could not think of America as part of the global community except as conforming to their own fantasies, phobias, prejudices, policies, practices and preferences, favoring Israel and Netanyahu and nothing else for the pandemic entrenched people of America. History will tell of this time when Trump plagued the body politic with the deliberate misinterpretation of the election and outrageous futuristic hypotheses leading nowhere in a civilized society. The sudden and inexplicable democratic plunge into self-geared wickedness must be catastrophic for future generations
Did America’s War Abroad Generate the Evolution of Domestic Terrorism?
Is there a connection to America’s global warmongering and the domestic “terrorism” advanced by the Trump cult? In every political culture there is peculiar psychology to see its own pros and nothing else. If America and its democracy will ignore the imperatives of living Time, its articulation of futuristic Time will be totally unlike its own – a contradiction covered by adroit instinct. Could America and its political leadership see the mirror and do some soul-searching? “There are the times that try men’s soul”, noted Thomas Paine in his famous “Common Sense”, the lifeline to American independence.
For two decades, the continued American led bogus War on Terrorism had wide ranging impacts on the America political and intellectual psyche. Americans are in the frontline of terrorizing the global mankind, not searching for strategic rethinking - what went wrong with one of the most cultured and intellectually enriched nations of the world. We the People continued to witness countless emerging catastrophic developments both man- made and natural to impact the Living Earth and human lives. According to Sherwood Ross: “US Sponsored Genocide against Iraq 1990-2012 killed 3.3 million including 750,000 children.” (Global Research: 12/06/2012). During The Bush-Obama administrations, US drone massacred some 25-30 thousand innocent Pakistani civilians in Northwest tribal belt of Pakistan adjacent to Afghanistan under a false pretext of “war on terrorism.” It is estimated that more than million Afghan civilians were killed and forcibly displaced enlarging the scope of forgotten graveyards.
If America cannot deal with its own domestic problems of unusual violence, killings of the innocents, and fear-mongering politics, how could it be helpful to others in the globe. One wonders, what went wrong with America? William Boardman (“A Country At War With An Illusion.” Information Clearing House), spells out that America is at war with itself: “We are waging war on terrorism even as we embody terrorism. …No wonder we seem sometimes to be at war with ourselves, and have been for most of the 21st century….No American Under 12 Has Lived In A Country At Peace….America’s Main Enemy Is Nameless, Shapeless, “Associated Forces”… The American Enemies List Is Decided Anonymously and Secretly.
Could America Look for New Ideals in a Changing World?
True wisdom needs soul searching and tranquility of human behavior – the manifestations of true wisdom. If Americans are intelligent, they should listen to voices of Reason and Wisdom before it is too late. Its pains, horrors and cruelty are within itself. America and its democratic manifestations are prone to change under conditions of time, space and waking consciousness. The primacy of imperative is Reason. Those entrusted with power and responsibilities within the Republican Party echelon do not appear to understand the need of change, time and interest of the masses. View it a conjectural or cautious optimism, leadership in the Republican Party is exploited by Trump and his supporters and the powerhouse is close to anarchy than reasoned dialogue. The Divine messages of the Qur’an and Holy Bible REMIND to Man - the Chief Creation of God on Earth that continuous wars, greed, killings and man-made disasters are prelude to staunch punishment from God - so be accountable and do not transgress in the lands. If you go thousands of miles away and commit massacres and destroy the God-given human habitats with your feeble minds and machinery, do you think, this trespassing will not usher dire consequences for you?
We reside on a living Earth that sustains life and a living Universe that takes account of all human deeds- our history making is intricately linked to our knowledge data and the Nature of Things - Man’s history and the Self, and be aware that in every ideal of the Self, there is both conjecture of man and his action and how all visible and invisible events shape our thoughts, wisdom or future in waiting. It is a time and an opportunity out of the American crises to look into the known and unknown conscious experience for a comprehensive picture in a mirror- who they were and where they are the underlying rational purpose for a navigational change to elucidate the path of fair and systematic change for We, the People future making.
Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja specializes in international affairs-global security, peace and conflict resolution with keen interests in Islamic-Western comparative cultures and civilizations, and author of several publications including the latest: One Humanity and the Remaking of Global Peace, Security and Conflict Resolution. Lambert Academic Publications, Germany, 12/2019.
