The Fall of Democracy

The Fall of Democracy

By: Erreh Svaia

“Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt

It seems that the Fall is getting here well ahead of its time, at least in my hometown, just as the skies start getting grey and rain suddenly starts falling in an almost daily basis, the world keeps changing, yes, it seems that globally, also the skies are grey, we are still facing really complex situations all around the world, and geopolitics changes seem to be going thru its deepest transformations since the days of the Cold War, first it was the Spring, which gets things a little bit agitated always, then came the Summer of Hate, with lots of drastic events happening in July, so what’s next for us? It doesn’t look pretty, I must say, democracy and freedom are suddenly being considered as tools of trade for security, for stability and for prosperity, honestly; Apart from Lee Kwan Yeh, the hardline authoritarian leader of Singapore, who took the small and poor island and turned into a global economic phenomenon, I don’t think any other authoritarian ruler had pushed any other country into economic heights, it worked for Singapore, Yeh was an advocate of meritocracy, but I seriously doubt it can be replicated so easily.

Accordingly to some recent surveys I have been reading, among other things, Millennials don't believe much in democracy, they are not interested in politics at all, they prefer to look for a "strong man" to take control of the government and let him take all the decisions, so they can evade responsibility for their choices within a democracy, that's a quite surprising scenario considering that it is in a way a step backwards in the story of humanity, as young boys and girls are not considering past history, and hard fought freedom and democracy, they mean nothing anymore to them, world wars, communism, cold war, are unknown to them, as the days pass by, we are getting closer to the year's end, and if July and August were turbulent months, we could be getting closer to a very difficult Fall with freedom and democracy in danger, perhaps it could be conformism, it doesn´t matter anymore who is in power, the scenario is getting ready for some “new wave of totalitarianism”, once the summer of hate is over.

After the summer of hate which peaked in so many events in July, comes the fall of democracy, we could be facing another complex period here, on the way to November, with the USA elections and the possible coalition of Eurasian countries and Middle East ones; Donald Trump, presidential candidate for the Republican party of the USA,  one of Summer of Hate's main protagonists, sees how his presidential career is imploding, accusations of Russian infiltration are no exaggerations, as Putin´s shadow keeps lurking in other countries elections all over Europe, pushing parties towards the far right, some may think that Trump has gone too far, but the worst is yet to come, as his former campaign manager Paul Manafort gets dismissed in the middle of accusations of financial backing by Pro Russian parties in Ukraine, and then substituting him with an even more dangerous man, Stephen Bannon, known as the “Leni Riefenstahl” of the American far right wing, a man who once expressed his desire to “destroy the stat”, it looks that finally, Trump´s perilous populist campaign would be injected with a heavy dose of right wing extremism.    After the last Trump quote, "suggesting" that in order to stop Hillary Clinton, her rival from the Democratic party, from acting against the Second Amendment, “somebody must do something", and that is a shameful and irresponsible remark considering that it was a call for action,  in the middle of a scared society menaced by shootings, irresponsible gun control laws and the constant intervention of the National Rifle Association, which by the way, is a strong supporter of Trump, and as if that wasn’t enough, Trump also accused Obama and Hillary of founding the Islamic State, just to later recapitulate and call is accusations “just sarcasm…”

Trump's curse becomes a serious threat to democracy in North America, but it also seems like trouble is rearing its ugly head in other part of the world, The European Union seems to be under severe tension coming both from the outside and from the inside, the lack of economic growth, within the region, performance stagnated since 2008 with the EU main motors, Germany and France low economic performances, the refugee crisis, with thousands of refugees arriving at Europe, putting to the test the capabilities of the EU to receive them and assimilate them, the terrorist menace, with bloody attacks by lone wolves in France, Belgium and Germany instigated by fundamentalism and the crumbling Islamic State, the so called Brexit, that recently showed us what British Machiavellian politics were all about, and the continuous rise of Nationalistic Populism, a kind of political syndrome coming from Russia, and slowly becoming popular in Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Austria, becoming a serious threat to free countries.

A couple of days ago Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan reunited with Russian president Vladimir Putin, it's a little bit shocking to see both of these presidents reunited, considered the furious declarations previously interchanged between both of them, Putin accusing Erdogan of helping Isis, and then Turkey attacking a Russian plane, buy now, in the aftermath of Turkey's failed coup, a self-coup I presume, Russia was quick to offer help to Erdogan, a help and support that came before the West's support, and it seems that the Eurasian geopolitical landscape is in quick transformation, considering that other countries, like Israel, who is also willing to reconsider its relationship with both Russia and Turkey, all this, while Putin is also tightening relations with Iran and Azerbaijan, perhaps setting the foundations for a major Union to oppose not only NATO, but the European Union.

But not only Eurasia is getting closer in a strange union, but also two countries from the so called emergent Europe, both of them legendary fighters against communism under the infamous iron curtain, the Poland of Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the ultraconservative right wing party Law and Justice, is starting getting close to the Hungary of Viktor Orban, a self-confessed admirer of Trump, is taking his country along his party Fidesz, closer to the dark specter of nationalistic populism, following the lead of Trump, supporting laws to reject migrants from Hungary, publicly supporting Trump, who is not too far removed from a Russian oligarch, along with Putin, who seems to be more than just a role model for Orban, is still a little strange how these two countries, once brave fighters against the totalitarianism of communism, and starts of the post-communist days, are falling under the spell of a new form of totalitarianism, “Putinism”, precisely a mix of nationalism and right wing populism, is almost scandalous that Kaczynski, an apparent Russia phobic is getting so close to it, by changing Poland´s Constitution, by diminishing civil rights and promising stability and security by getting close to the supposed enemy? To Putin who sees former Soviet Nations as republics, Estonia, Lithuania, Estonia, rightfully belonging to Russia? It is not going to take so much time for Russia to start a major offensive in Ukraine, as tensions in this part of the world are quickly rising, the increasing proximity to the now isolated government of the United Kingdom, and being a hidden influence behind Trump in the USA elections.

Major terrorist attacks continue in Turkey, it seems that someone need urgently to tighten the knot in Eurasia, Russia already is getting closer to Iran, in it´s supposed fight against terrorism in Iraq and Libya, while in America, Nicaragua says goodbye to democracy thanks to Daniel Noriega, a former revolutionary fighter, much in style of Fidel Castro, who just like Fidel Castro, fought against a dictatorship in order to establish a new one, following the path of the Jung Un family in North Korea, Ortega seems to be getting ready to impose his own one in the Central America country, all this while Venezuela sank deeper into chaos, and Fidel´s, one of the world’s longest living dictators is looking for new “host” to keep his parasite project afloat, perhaps Andrés López´ “70s-PRI retro politics” could help Castro create some sort of a new “Venezuela” in México, I hope not, closer to the “empire”?