The Future of American Politics: Moving Beyond Party Lines
I woke up yesterday morning in my bed in Southeast England. I realized the country of my birth has elected Donald Trump again. I wrote this post in 2016 talking about the many reasons the Democrats lost to Donald Trump. Over the four years after the election, many individuals were blamed. Yet, the blame did not fall on the Democratic National Committee. Today I'm already seeing the blame laid at the feet of black/Latino men, Arab-Americans, and third-party voters. The blame is being laid anywhere but at the feet of those who run the campaigns.
The Democrats have not addressed the material conditions Americans are facing. This is the biggest issue over the past three election cycles. This is a significant concern, yet Democrats continue to play the “I'm not the other guy” card.
Ronald Reagan asked in the 1980 election, “are you better off than you were four years ago?”. Most Americans consistently have said no. Saying you're not Trump isn't going to put food on the table. It's not going to lower the price of ($3.00 a dozen) eggs, or a pound of bacon ($7.00).
A seesaw of power between parties will continue every four years for the foreseeable future. Both the Republican and Democratic parties use distraction, rather than point to policy change. How they distract is different. Republicans focus on social issues. Democrats focus on how bad the Republican candidate is. Nonetheless, the outcome is the same.
The electorate will continue to vote for the change candidate until people feel like their lives are improving.
A user on TikTok called @simkern said in this video that there are essentially four choices you have going ahead:
- Continue your current level of political engagement
- Fix the Democratic Party from within
- Work really hard between now and the next midterm election to try to build third-party power
- Try to build power outside the political system.
If I had to pick two, it would definitely be the last two. If I had to pick one, though, it would be number four. This is something that the anarchist YouTuber Anark has talked about quite extensively, especially in this video:
He elaborates about a dual power strategy in this video. It really hits at the reality of number four in the above choices. This idea isn't something really all that new. The Black Panther Party (BPP) had the People’s Free Food Program that fed the hungry children breakfast. They also provided healthcare through the Peoples’ Free Medical Clinics. What the BPP did can be built upon to include worker run cooperatives, mutual aid organizations, reading groups, etc.
This is what I am going to focus on in the years ahead. There's a lot of work to be done that doesn't center US politics as a team sport. Building community, building dual power, is the way ahead that makes sense to me.
