The 20 20 begins with storm clouds on the horizon and a thick fog that does not even see the fundamental political question of this year: who is the person who is most likely to avoid Trump’s re-election at the Electoral College?
Impossible to deny the historical relevance of the impeachment process against the president of the United States. Senators of the Republican party will have to lower themselves to the extreme end of partisan discipline – ignominy – to pretend that their president did not threaten and blackmail Ukraine, a small country militarily harassed by Russia, in order to obtain “evidence” on the alleged corruption of the son of one of his opponents.
While the internal process of the Democratic Party slowly moves towards three central figures – Senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden -, the main narrative in public opinion continues to be driven by the powerful propaganda machine headed directly by Donald Trump with his rhetoric of sowing winds and lies to turn the political dispute into the freak circus that seems so much to enjoy.
With the main merit of having concentrated in the financial markets the main measure of an ideological project in which extreme wealth at the expense of everything and everyone is the main social virtue, President Trump has dedicated all his time in the White House to maintain the support of the most racist, misogynist and extremist Christian segments of American society.
For them the carts of insults to the “bad hombres”, xenophobia, religious intolerance and their hallucination of a “great wall” thousands of miles long that separates the rest of the world from the imaginary “Great America” of his childhood from over 70 years ago. Those ones, in John McCain words, known as “the crazies”.
They are not a majority – they were not in 2016 – but Trump’s bet is that they will be enough again – probably with a new help from the extreme manipulation of social media -, to allow him to take advantage of the baroque electoral system of democracy American hint and return to get a majority of votes within the Electoral College.
And while the dominant vision inside The Beltway is that Joe Biden, vice president during Barack Obama’s term, is the natural option to attract undecided voters and moderator who would guarantee Trump’s defeat, it is also true that among those same corridors of the political class fears that Biden could have a crystal jaw. That is, that Trump’s enormous capabilities for fighting in the mud of vulgarity, lies and all kinds of dirt are too many for the Delaware senator.
Therefore, in part, the Democratic forces themselves do not end up opting for the most viable, versus the most desirable, candidacy, at least for their progressive base.
Everything seems to indicate that the election of the first Tuesday of November will be defined – like the last disputes of this century – in a handful of states with a solid presence in the Electoral College. In a very likely scenario in which the largest and most prosperous states in the country – such as California and New York – will continue to vote Democrat and the southern states and the so-called Bible-bell – such as Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas – will vote Republican, experts say that the key will be in the candidacy that has the ability to take the victory in entities such as Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida and Ohio.
It is certainly the same “experts” who until mid-afternoon on Tuesday, November 8, 2016, said that Hillary Clinton would be the first woman president in the history of the United States.
The truth is that the analysis seems to make sense. In a scenario of extreme polarization, it is foreseeable that the Democratic candidate with the best chance of stopping Trump is the one who manages to build a narrative that thrills his young, ethnically diverse and middle-class base and at the same time has the ability to win over who consider themselves victims of economic globalization and especially female electorate, the great social force of the current historical moment that we have to live.
The final decision will be taken at the National Democratic Convention, to be held from July 13 to 16 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a city that loves Calatrava cheese, beer and architecture. Located just over an hour’s drive north of Chicago and overlooking Lake Michigan, it will be where the candidacy is formalized with the best chance of defeating the guy of orange toupee.
