The US Election: American Voters between the devil and the deep blue sea!

Counting down to the US elections...

As we approach the final days of campaigns before the inevitable polling day on the 8^th of November for the elections that will usher in the 45^th president of the United States of America, I cannot but comment that this has to be toughest election in that country’s history, and it’s tough, not for the candidates, but for the hapless American voters. They are stuck between a Trump they are mostly afraid of and the Hilary that they really don’t like.

Please note that I accept that these two candidates have their own die hard supporters but there are not a lot of them. What they have instead are die hard party people (republicans and democrats alike), who will close their eyes and vote either of these candidates into power not caring whether they meant good for America or not.

Trump is the more easily criticized candidate. People say he does not know anything about politics; he is not rational; he is a bigoted male chauvinist; a formerly bankrupt billionaire (strange how a man can still be a billionaire after being bankrupt?). Okay let me clear that; I don’t like Donald Trump that much. I don’t hate his ability to make money or to stay on top of scandals and all that, I just don’t personally see him as a man of integrity, even though the truth is that most businessmen have integrity issues. Let me also be clear. Donald Trump has never declared personal bankruptcy. What he did was to declare four of his companies bankrupt at separate times, but according to him, he still came out great and rich., meaning that the bankruptcy was to provide maximum financial benefits to him, whatever else happens to the other stakeholders in the business. That does not seem like a man of integrity to me, but that is my personal opinion.

Then there is Hilary Rodham Clinton; for some reasons, people also do not like her. Some of these reasons I have found out included her support of the 2003 Iraq invasion; her ties to big banks; her misfortune (or fortunes of having been married to a randy former President Bill Clinton); her long ties with politics and power (been there since their governor days in Arkansas); her flip flopping on issues (she never seemed to be able to hold onto a position for long); and maybe even for her recklessness in using a private email server for government work. The fact is that people just hate her, and they kinda enjoy hating her, maybe even because of her fortunes in politics and her wealth.

Anyway, the above summarises the character of the people, one of whom, Americans have to choose as president for the next 4 years. The proposition for most Americans and even most citizens of the world is scary, perhaps the more for what would happen if Donald Trump becomes the US president. Having bankrupted 4 companies for gain, it remains to be seen if given the opportunity, he will not bankrupt America for his gain; he is already cosying up to Putin of Russia. A lot of people point to his business success, but I look more to his integrity, or lack of it, in business. Bankrupting four companies for gain looks like shafting someone else of their hard earned money and that says to me this man can’t be trusted.

For Hilary Clinton, the worst that can happen with her being president is that nothing will really happen. With her being president, America and the world is safe, but maybe not better. The Fed will still continue to tinker with interest rates and inflation figures to give the perception of a positive economic outlook, the stock exchange will continue to be propped up by tax payers sweat; Obamacare will still continue to be fought and hated by the rich and loved by the poor; and America will still continue to print dollars to pay for her debts; America’s foreign policy will still be the way it has always being, with the US putting motherland above any other interest. Hilary is old and tired in my opinion, and will just see out her presidency, enjoying the fruit of her labour, and if you can risk saying it, it is probably a second Bill Clinton presidency as he will back in the saddle by proxy. At least one thing we can say is that with her winning the presidency, another political dynasty would have been born in the US, after the ‘Bushes’, and maybe someday Chelsea Clinton will be running for presidency.

My concern is not really with the American election, but with the way the business of politics have now gone all over the world. American elections used to showcase the hallmarks of democracy, and the screening system had always ensured that the right candidates were always thrown up by the primaries and the conventions. This year’s election has shown us that there is a ugly, but covered side to America’s politics. We saw it first in 2000, when George Bush Jnr won against a better prepared Al Gore, that the election was ‘rigged’ in Bush’s favour. That fact was so clear to everyone but America and Americans wanted to protect the sanctity of their elections. Now, 16 years later, the world, including the US, is a different place, and in this new world, the person is now placed above the state. Donald Trump has declared that he may not accept the result of the elections unless he wins! This used to be sacrilege in America, but somehow the people, and mostly his supporters, are not seeing it as a red flag anymore.

The way elections in America has been run is almost similar to how it is in Nigeria. You either have to be thrown up by the party machine and godfathers, or you have to have tonnes of money to buy up everybody (or use the money to make the loudest noise so that you can’t be ignored). Donald Trump didn’t really buy up the people but he made the loudest noises of all, and he managed to con republican voters, speaking the very words that they always wanted to hear but could not speak out themselves. He fanned the embers of class, religious and ethnic divisions that American’s tolerance and bashfulness does not like to utter, and the people who liked it supported him in droves.

This is the only election that was not fought based on ideology, manifesto, or programmes. Every one of the three presidential debate was a total waste of time as the two candidates went for each other’s jugular, and threw up such dirt that no person aspiring for the highest office in the world should utter, even in their sleep. I was ashamed for America. Are these candidates the best it can offer the world? Of course not, but the politics of money, ‘godfatherism’ and party machinery throws up the oddest candidates.

Same thing in Nigeria; the good people can’t get there because they either don’t have the money to spend or they don’t belong to the right setting. If you looked at the elections in Nigeria, you wonder most times who to vote for, and for the good ones amongst us, we look for and vote for the lesser of the several evils that we have been presented with. We have a democracy that is engineered to give us the wrong candidates all the time because the people who run it have mastered how to not allow the right person to emerge. There is no mistake in their game anymore; they have mastered the art. If a seemingly good person manages to get there, then all fangs are out to stifle the person to get him to tow a path whereby he cannot rock the boat.

As it is in the U.S, you would see that the party apparatus and the thugs ruling us in Nigeria would never truly give up their hold on power. During the US primaries, all the good people who came out either were extinguished or they ran out of money or influence or both. The result is a Trump and a Hilary; and comical at best is the sight of them.

The die is cast now; the world will have to reckon with one of them come January 2017 when they take office. What type of world will they bequeath us when we look back after their 4 years or God forbid their 8 years? I can only hold my breath.