(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Very Small Thing That Seems to Have Saved American Democracy (Op/Ed) [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-08-13 This piece is appearing as a newspaper op/ed in my very red congressional district (VA-06). It’s title in the newspapers is “For Want of a Nail … The Kingdom was Lost.” ***************************** A little proverb penned by Ben Franklin reads, “For the want of a nail the shoe was lost,/ For the want of a shoe the horse was lost, /For the want of a horse the rider was lost, / For the want of a rider the battle was lost, For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost, /And all for the want of a horseshoe-nail.” The point being that very little causes can have very large effects. (That was the point also of a previous piece of mine here, a year ago, “When History Seems Governed by Chance.”) Until now, the example from our times that has most dramatically illustrated this phenomenon – in which something seemingly small changed the course of history – was from the U.S. presidential election of 2000. (That’s the one in which a razor-thin margin in Florida made George W. Bush, rather than Al Gore, president.) In that bit of history, the equivalent of “for the want of a nail” was this: “because of the confusing design of the ballots in Palm Beach Florida…the United States invaded Iraq.” (With all of the major consequences for the United States and the international order that resulted from that disastrous presidential choice.) Now we Americans have just witnessed another most dramatic illustration of how the destiny of whole nations – and the larger course of history – can be altered by some seemingly inconsequential decision. Of course, we can’t run experiments proving any “what if” alternative history. But we can see how the probable future of America looked a month ago, and compare it with what looks probable now. A month ago, the polls and the futures markets foretold a likely victory of Donald Trump. And, it is widely understood, Trump’s regaining the powers of the presidency would have profound consequences: a major transformation of the American order from the one created by the nation’s founders. (Meaning: a change from a constitutional democracy with the Rule of Law to an authoritarian regime in which the ruler wields unchecked powers. Not to mention what Trump’s election would mean to “the free world.”) It looked as though the widespread perception in the American electorate that Trump’s opponent, President Biden, was unfit for a second term -- because of how his capabilities were seen as having been diminished by age – would likely outweigh the negatives in how the public perceives Trump. (One man from a focus group, interviewed on TV, declared, “I’d vote for Biden even if he were dead.” The idea was that – when the nation faced a battle between Democracy and Fascism -- anything that promised the continuation of our constitutional order was preferable to its termination. (But it seemed that for enough voters, that issue of “fitness” – the basic human powers to fulfill that important presidential function – would swing enough voters to the man who’d incited an insurrection, and had been convicted of crimes.) And so it looked as though the United States would soon choose a path into a dark future. Then came Biden’s disastrous June 27 debate. In the wake of Biden’s almost comatose performance, fully 72% of Americans judged him “unfit.” That debate threw the Democratic world into a tailspin, a crisis of epic proportions that went on for more than three weeks. Finally, President Biden announced that he would step aside, and passed the torch to his Vice President, Kamala Harris. Immediately, the American political landscape shifted dramatically, with an upsurgence of positive passion behind Kamala Harris has so far been maintained. The polls and the futures markets now point toward a significantly different path, where the forces of the Rule of Law prevail over the forces of lawless authoritarianism. Of course, the future remains, as it always is, uncertain. But the destiny of the nation now looks quite different — and all because of the repercussion of the June 27 debate. Which is where the small-things-with-huge-consequences comes in. None of this would have happened but for the decision of the Biden campaign to call for an unprecedentedly early debate. (The Biden people wanted the debate to be so early because they wanted to “reset” the election, to break out of what looked like a disadvantageous status quo.) Imagine how different things would be if what happened in June had instead happened instead at the usual time for a first debate-- in September! Then it would have been too late to pass the torch to another candidate. Heading into the election, American Democracy would have been on the ropes. The huge consequence of that relatively small matter -- of an unprecedentedly early debate -- is that American Democracy will likely survive. And that the United States will remain “the leader of the free world,” that NATO will remain intact, and that Putin’s aggression in Ukraine continue to be punished. In that earlier piece, I indicated that my life’s work has been about identifying the Big (systemic) Forces that shape human history. (E.g. the force that explains why wherever civilization arose freshly, i.e. not transplanted – Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, China, Mesoamerica, Peru -- it took much the same shape of the tyranny of a few over an exploited many.) But here, because of (not much more than) a horseshoe nail, the kingdom was (likely) saved. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/8/13/2262833/-The-Very-Small-Thing-That-Seems-to-Have-Saved-American-Democracy-Op-Ed?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/