Monday 14 November 2016

Trump’s unenviable task of reviving a nation in decline ….

..genesis of anti-establishment

Strange are the ways socio economic compulsions work. During the 60s when i was in my teens… there was an overpowering anti establishment wave in the US… it was the age of revolution.. grass.. woodstock… rock n roll… dylan.. stones..india… nepal… youth revolted against the existing mores of society...wars in korea...vietnam...mccarthyism..america policing the world...lies which the government told its citizens...we in india also went through this tumultuous anti-establishment phase..with the birth of naxalites…

The 60s and the 70s were rocked by the flower power movement of a sizeable part of the youth in america..the spock generation started rebelling against the overarching establishment which felt it was their bounden duty to police the world and fight wars against the so called evils of communism...it was true that communist regimes were were muzzling the freedom of their people...had dictators as their heads...like in the erstwhile soviet union, china and a handful of other regimes…

But the 60s rebellion whimpered out...the pothead generation grew up and gradually integrated with mainstream america...took jobs...became successful...liked to wave their liberal and left leaning credentials...formed part of the democratic bulwark and the establishment...all of us idolised the kennedys...camelot...their martyrdom lent a hallow to the kennedys...only later we became critical and it became common knowledge that the kennedys were a royalty with special privileges...cavorting with nymphs in the white house pools...with marilyn monroe… scions of a wealthy kennedy family which had created wealth through the armaments industry...as establishment as the rockefellers..only they were not part of the GOP… they were democratic…

This 60s liberal generation also spawned the clintons...his famous line “i did not inhale it” when asked whether he smoked cannabis… this talented family took over usa in 1992...after the 80s reagan years… they more or less continued in the footsteps of the reagan's GOP policies...since the reagans… who lowered taxes.. inequalities in US started soaring… violence too.. all these intensified through the bush..clinton..bush...obama years… crony capitalism prospered to new heights… the economic bubble expanded..first signs of imbalances surfaced when enron and worldcom collapsed in the early 2000s…(pl see my blogpost on newgrammaroflife.blogpost.com dated 15-5-2014 which was written in 2002 titled MILLENIUM MUSINGS: Pressures of Modern Civilisation) ...these were brushed off as minor blips…

..too much debt

Giant corporations leveraged higher and higher and also several economies...wall street too leveraged to stratospheric levels of debt-equity ...sometimes to insane levels of above 30 … other exotic weapons of mass destruction called derivatives and collateral backed securities also proliferated.. aided and abetted by the FED, SEC, credit raters...then came the financial meltdown of 2008.. came along obama..and all he did was to give a lifeline to these scheming get-rich bankers from tax payers money.. once these evil monsters revived a bit...they relapsed back to their devious ways of crooking the usa and rest of the world...now several banks like deutsche bank etc are drowning in derivatives and are in deep coma in the icu..on govt ventilators…

Migrants crisis has rocked europe and usa… unemployment rocketing higher… it is at this juncture that donald trump has arrived like a white messiah to save the american people from the crony obama-clinton-goldman sachs-wall street grip...ironically under the flag of the conservative republicans...while the so called left liberal clintons are in bed with the crony bankers...all the more ironical because donald’s own party apparatchiks had all but abandoned him during the run up to the elections.. he was treated like a pariah..

Sad even sanders … was bought over by the clintons..even the obamas did about 40 rallies for the failing clinton campaign...which was unprecedented in history..in a rigged election where clintons with their money power from special interests and superior election machinery ...took busloads of voters from their homes to poll centers for early voting… apart from other help of the state machinery sanctioned by obama...even 80% of media shut out trump...looked as it was an election in india’s notorious backward states where there is rampant poll rigging sometimes….

In the end donald outwitted hillary ...even after spending a fraction on the election compared to hillary ...who was supported by the entire corporate america, it titans of silicon valley...truth prevailed...and unlikely donald..the joker of the pack.. not even supported by his own GOP fully….pulled off the impossible ….

But trump faces a near impossible task of reviving a nation which sadly is in deep comatose state on life support systems...even a hillary win would not have helped one jot ….crippling debt which has more than doubled during obama...highest ever inequalities...soaring levels of people under food stamps, 45 mn below poverty line, searing inner cities violence, heroin addiction, record illegal immigrants pouring in through open borders, refugees from isis infested syria, homegrown terror, lowest levels of labour participation rates, stubborn unemployment, crumbling healthcare, ever increasing gun violence, climate change induced extreme weather events ...which the GOP does not believe in.. rising mental illness...obesity.. crumbling infrastructure..79k bridges in urgent need of repairs...potholes in roads...stuck in meaningless wars abroad.. Isis expanding footprint...russia flexing its muscles...chinese dragon breathing fire over south china seas…

Rest of the world is also in crisis mode...europe is in tatters...only the brics and other emerging markets are in growth mode...but overall global gloom and doom...growth rates are at all time lows...rising protectionism and autarky… europe under siege of migrants...climate change threatening to change economic geography of huge swathes of the world...isis spreading to 30 countries...

Indeed a daunting task trying to pull US out of this morass...a nation riddled with contradictions...high labour costs which has made it unprofitable to manufacture in usa...hence reviving manufacturing profitably in usa seems to be contradictory with high labour costs...again to prop up profits...several companies have outsourced their back offices to low cost countries...deep nexus between health insurance companies, hospitals, doctors, pharmaceutical companies, FDA, diagnostic providers, surgeons… similarly in the food industry nexus between FDA, food research, agriculture, food industry, hotels, restaurants….

..indeed surreal times like flogging a dead horse..will be most interesting how this story spins out.. the trump reality show… sit back… take out the popcorn… and watch the next four years and decade unfold...not only usa but the rest of the world since we live on an interdependent planet…...societal decline and sickness… mounting economic woes .. finally the biggest game changer will be climate collapse…. with mother earth gasping for breath as the anthropocene acts of humans are increasing exponentially….



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Swami Sarvapriyanda

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