As it seems from the early reports, Trump is very likely to leave the WH. Barring the theatrics, and despite being antithetical to the antics, i saw him as a bold effective leader, someone who could realize the polity and the dynamics and just not call a spade a spade, but a spade a dagger.
To be true, the Muslim Terrorism problem was a global anathema, an intimidation that was grotesquely growing its clout, only in medieval times did any religion negatively influenced the polity. In a complex society as ours, it is a complex decision to contain and control the nefarious tentacles of religion but banning, or intending to ban Muslims countries with high potential for egress of terrorism, and a target country going through a mesh of legal quagmire, made no sense. I believe, it was not a Muslim Ban, it was a ban against those Muslim nations from where terrorism had a high chance of landing on the US soil. Every sovereign nation has a right to safeguard its interests and its first duty is to protect its citizenry.
China – my favorite topic for over a decade now, is a menace to manage. Initially, it was focused on the currency and the IP. However, that was from the national interests. However, eventually, China (CPC) started revealing its real face across multiple facet of life equipments that were vulnerable to adulterated foods and ill composed drugs. 5G is a notorious example of Chinese hegemony over the electronics sector.
What most countries haven’t yet realized is the value drain from planned obsolescence. I got a feel of it when some of my equipment’s, that I bought earlier, started breakdown within 2-3 years of use, whereas similar products manufactured in other countries lasted long enough. That, i call it value safeguard. Globally, We lost significant while China amassed huge swath. Just imagine you buy a ounce of gold to realize, one tenth remained after few years. That’s value erosion.
IMF, Imperialism and Global Monetary system – Agreed, None if the western nations or first world economies are doling out largesse to poor countries. Yes, they are influencing better order as a precondition to loans or grants. However, none of these countries gobbled up land on lease for a century from any of these poor countries. International funding was always conditioned to the appetite for repaying. That’s why until China funded anything in these poor african countries, we never saw outstanding bridges and railways unseen in Europe being built in Zambia, Ghana or other striving economies such as Sri Lanka.
NAFTA, NATO and the SE Alliances – Sometimes, we get hard wired to think in a set order, never realizing there can be an alternate option or not having enough commitment to explore alternate order. Such was the case of NAFTA, a north american free trade association. It was time to revisit those as the original was drafted under different circumstances.
NATO – Yes, the US was policing the world to safeguard its allied interests. It was an imbalance where lopsided load was shared by the US. It was important to offset that imbalance.
Alliances with Japan and SE Asia – After the WW II, Japan had no army as the US took to onus to guard the defeated. Irrespective of the reason, Japan never had to pay for an active army and the US took most of the brunt. As of now, Japan has invested over 2 trillion dollar in building an ultra modern army, navy, airforce. Taiwan too bought almost equal amount of investment to rejig its military. If we would have continued the status quo, the US would have
Continued investing and all it would have got would be garlands and accolades.
Atleast, as we stand now, we have a standing army not alone from the Quads but Taiwan, Indonesia and others.
Sunni Shia Rift and integration of Israel into global polity. For long, Israel was considered a pariah state. Holocaust was real, genocide was real and under such circumstances, it wasn’t wrong if Israel demanded a land in their ancestral origin. The world did not concede and it was a massive rift, a chasm wide open. However, we have realized how those jews have painstakingly and with shrewdness, built a home for their own brethrens. Only recently, the Sunni’s have welcome the Jews. Of course, Iran still considers Israel as an anathema that needs to be wiped out, a xenophobia indeed.
The Axis of the Evil – Russia, China, Pakistan (my ethnic brother), North Korea, Iran and the new entrant, Turkey are all inciting a nuclear button, Why? Who would tame the monkeys (or call it bell the cat)? It required a brute and blunt decision maker. Pakistan is an impoverished nation and Iran’s economy is struggling. Russia, is in somnambulance while North Korea is comatose. Their only source to sustenance is a nuclear trigger. I believe, symbolic though, stepping into North Korea, dismantled that fear. Apart from journalism, i never realized any decisions being influenced by Russia. Iran was given a blanket cheque to develop nuclear arms in 10 years. I am not against sovereign nations having the rights to protect themselves but we saw what happened when Pakistan became a nuclear power. It was right to avoid that from happening.
Can Biden Presidency bring that effectiveness without the theatrics? The US is looking forward to that.
Sources:
https://www.pewresearch.org/topics/2020-election/
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/10/09/the-trump-biden-presidential-contest/
https://www.morganstanley.com/ideas/2020-election-forecast-market-outlook
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/10/09/amid-campaign-turmoil-biden-holds-wide-leads-on-coronavirus-unifying-the-country/
https://www.npr.org/2020/10/18/924182086/early-voting-analysis-historic-turnout-drives-long-lines-administrative-errors
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/10/21/large-shares-of-voters-plan-to-vote-a-straight-party-ticket-for-president-senate-and-house/
https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/10/17/maines-senate-race-and-the-extinction-of-new-england-republicanism
https://trends.google.com/trends/story/US_cu_b4fsy3IBAADxzM_en
https://www.forbes.com/sites/waynerash/2020/09/29/new-big-data-sentiment-analysis-show-potential-biden-election-landslide/#2f7cb179f0b6
https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/campaigns/elections/
https://democracy.candid.org/dashboard/category/campaigns-and-elections/
mymilieu.org 