Joe Biden is now about to take over as president of the United States, and certainly without the view of the outgoing president to “Make America Great Again”.
Yet, he has the moral obligation “to make America democratic again”. The more so because his party is the “Democratic Party”, unless it is euphemistically “Democratic”, in which case further reading of this article is useless.
The shelf-life of both traditional parties in the US has expired and it is up to the American people and their president to meticulously safeguard their Constitution in the long process of a peaceful restoration democracy. It is not easy, believe me, as all behavioral indications of the aged American rulers, starting with the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, suggest the opposite.
The bottom line, however, is that the restoration of democracy in America is in the hands of a president who will have to prove that besides being a faithful party Democrat, that he is also a real democrat.
President Biden has two most urgent issues to address, one before and one immediately after January 20 when he is officially sworn-in.
Pelosi is planning to bring a new article of impeachment to the House aimed at removing Trump from the presidency days before the end of his term and replace him with Vice President Mike Pence. And, if he refuses, replace Trump with herself, as it is stipulated by the US Constitution. Then grant a presidential pardon to Trump and his family, and thinking that the issue will be over, the pardoned ex-president will be politically neutralised forever, and the heavily shackled by “bucolic” Trump establishment will turn back to be happy family.
However, it is rather unlikely that the Pelosi plan will work that way, because if Trump is impeached and removed, it is improbable that he will be able to accept the pardon. In this case, somebody will have to order his arrest, and I do not see who will take the initiative to trigger a new civil war. Therefore, Trump will be free and although impeached, will rule America from Mar-a-Lago, in parallel with the White House.
This potentiality will turn the American dream of democracy into a nightmare for the Democrats.
Consequently, in a damage minimisation attempt, Pelosi should find an excuse to resign, given her age, while President-elect Biden will take advantage of a smooth succession to the White House and try to unite the American people again.
Uniting the American people again will be the last political act of his career and he may be remembered for that. However, he has not much time, as his early retirement seems to have been already orchestrated, and what is missing from the puzzle is the last piece. The resignation of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and her replacement by Hillary Clinton. The recipe worked perfectly for the first time in 1974. At that time, President Richard Nixon was removed after being impeached for the Watergate scandal and was succeeded by Gerald Ford who was appointed as vice president days before Nixon’s removal and after Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned.
Under the circumstances, the first task of the president-elect, before he assumes his official duties officially, will be to tame his 81-year-old Speaker of the House and send her home to rest, as the House of Representatives is a “Res Publica”, not a “Thermopolium”.
The other first task of the new president should be a tribute to American democracy by defending free speech, which was grotesquely violated by Twitter after it banned Trump for life. Democrats certainly do not agree with what Trump says, but real democrats, despite their disagreements, must fight for Trump’s right to free speech. This is not my belief, but that of the great political philosopher Voltaire claims.
By asking the Attorney General of the United States to refer to the Justice Department Twitter and its executives for their part in an attempted coup against the democratic government of the United States, which is a criminal offense and constitutes high treason, Biden will contribute to the restoration of democracy in his country. He will also politically “check mate” Trump by displaying an unprecedented magnanimity, which is a must for the leader of the Western world.
Twitter’s attack against Trump is, however, a very convenient excuse as half of Americans hate Trump and, in their enthusiasm, they neither paid attention to what Twitter did nor have they bothered to wonder why it was done and what may follow.
In this venture, Twitter is not alone. It has the backing of all social media giants that would love to take the power of the world into their hands. Before the Internet, and for almost a century, the real political power in the Western world was exclusively in the hands of a few print newspaper publishers – not more than a dozen titles which were present all over the planet.
Millions of newspapers were sold every day and a small number of publishers were dictating the political agenda of the day with no resistance or objections. The ability to destroy, in no time, the reputation of any politician with a “character assassination” practice was enough for the Western world to be dominated by these newspaper moguls. Needless to say, radio and TV never had any major leverage in the political order as their orientation has always been entertainment and not the exercise of political influence.
Influencing tittles were very few for a simple reason. Distribution. Newspaper distribution to the final points of sale was exclusively done by a few distribution agencies, which were controlled by the big publishers who kept the newspaper distribution under strict control.
This limited number of publishers together with the few distribution agencies under their control were unionized under a trade association that had two purposes – they kept the market closed to any newcomer and set newspaper prices, commission levels and other terms of the retailers. The head offices of the association, named Distripress were purposely located in Switzerland, where the European Commission did not have the authority to investigate competition law violations, and everybody was happy.
With the arrival of the Internet, news distribution became suddenly free to all and political power begun gradually returning to the hands of the politicians. The attempt of Twitter to silence Trump is the first step for a return of political power back into the hands of a few billionaires, this time instead of newspaper owners, social media owners.
In this context if social media owners secure their right to exert content censorship under their rules, the next step will be to limit news distribution on the Internet.
Freedom of expression is the democratic right of free people and the law is very clear and sufficient to stop any abusers. Should President-elect Biden officialize the right of privates to censor politicians, it will be the last nail in the coffin of American democracy.
