THE STRANGE MULTIPLICATION OF "DIVISION"
In 2018, it seems weekly we have another report or op-ed hitting home how "America is so divided" and "never been so divided." I read their words but each time I'm left unsatisfied. Actually, I think this idea is silly if you go and look at any specifics or recall any history (and you don't need to bring up anything from the distant past like slavery or the Civil War.)
I ask you, for instance, did anything unique occur during the last election? Was that election cycle a diversion from the status quo in any meaningful way? People said so, and hourly across a dozen networks, but the evidence for that seems slim, and even then fuzzy. Even the division that emerged in the Republican party felt to me, a foreign onlooker, less significant than what occurred when Clinton faced off against Obama for the leadership of the Democratic party. Didn't it? I mean, gender was pitted against race! Don’t you remember that? Clinton's vitriol against her Democrat opponent in 2008 was at least, if not more, potent then as it was against her recent Republican one. (So quickly we forget these things. If you have, I encourage you to go search YouTube.)
And then there's Trump's run. Not only has Trump been talking about the presidency very publicly since the late '80s but Roger Stone (the man behind Trump and every terrible thing in US politics since Nixon) has even used Trump for his political ends before, like in 2000 when he had Trump run to sink the Pat Buchanan and the Reform Party. Even the fact of Trump's celebrity doesn't make his election unusual. Celebrities have been elected to many different offices, and all over the country, too – dozens of them. Americans have sent comedians and wrestling stars to the Senate, made a bodybuilder and action hero Governor, voted in musicians as mayors, and even put an actor in the White House before. By now this sort of thing is the norm and makes Trump more of a typical candidate than an atypical one.
Even as a president, really, how different does Donald J Trump seem from the previous Republican president, George W Bush? When contrasting these two, and viewed against the full spectrum of variables present among the vast mosaic of American citizenry, these guys appear clones. Don't they? I think so. They actually seem more similar than some of the fraternal twins I know. I mean, they're even the same age, born just weeks apart. Too, the entire Bush clan has forever been wound up in a vast network of shady partnerships and international metals, oil, and arms dealings – typically with those America is allied against. And some appear willing to argue that the Bush ties to Germany, Saudi, Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan were less problematic or somehow different than the Trump clan maintaining and expanding their real estate holdings or their history of laundering money for Russians. Well, I guess you can make that argument if you'd like. Myself, all I see is sameness.
But then there's the election numbers. The same voter turnout occurred in 2016, between fifty and sixty percent, as has happened for every US federal election going back to 1904. And folks voted in the same manner they have for decades, too. Most elections, right back to 1828, have had a fairly similar political split to what we saw this time with Hillary vs Donald. There really are very few outliers. In fact, you can't point to an election in which most voters turned out and most of them chose the same candidate; because, of course, it hasn't ever happened and that isn't even how the US electoral system is designed to operate. In this way, the only thing that looks vaguely like political unity in America is when the dominant majority of the population (typically 70%+) does not vote in support of the person who takes office. That's some unity.
If you find none of the above convincing, and you think the divisions run deeper than who ran for election or who people voted for, then I would point to the early 1970s for comparison. There you’ll find an eighteen month stretch that makes all the Nazi marches and Antifa violence we've seen to date look like a kindergarten playground drama. In '71 and '72, lest we forget, more than 2,500 domestic bombings rang out across America. (That's five per day, people!) And these thousands of bombings were delivered by Leftist extremists, largely the Weather Underground, and copycats, who argued that “[i]f all Americans were compliant [with regard to Vietnam], then everyone is a target. There are no innocents.” But these weren't merely random anti-war bombings they were strategic terrorist attacks carried out by radical ideologues who followed up with a call for the birth of “a revolutionary Communist party ... to lead the struggle, give coherence and direction to the fight, seize power and build a new society.” How's that for divisive? And, please recall, this political violence came just fifteen years after one of the most notorious decades in US history: the anti-Communist “Red Scare” of the McCarthy-era. That wasn't divisive at all. What, all of government and media actively pitting neighbours, co-workers, and families against one another, creating a nation-wide culture of fear and suspicion, calling into question everyone's loyalty along with their rights as citizens, and doing all of this on little or no evidence? For anything like that you'd need Nazis plus Antifa multiplied by #MeToo to the power of Colin Kaepernick. (N+A)MK
These examples (the characters involved in the election, results from previous elections, the '70s bombings, and the witch-hunts of the McCarthy-era – accompanied by all the history some of us haven't yet chosen to disregard) makes me feel that this kind of apolitical and ahistorical thinking is exactly what gets you “Make America Great Again.” It makes me feel one must be kidding themself to suggest America was ever even a vaguely cohesive entity. I’d be happy to argue that the only time America comes close to being unified is when it’s merely divided cleanly in two.
But then add to this picture the fact that much of the nation is connected and accessible to one another (through the internet generally and more directly via email, social media, and podcasts) in a profoundly novel, interesting, and deeply intimate way. And also notice that people everywhere seem uncommonly aware, concerned about, and motivated to amend the worst features of society – most of which are already dramatically better than they were just a generation ago.
