American midterms don’t normally grip us. Wake us up when you choose another president.
But these should, and for all the wrong reasons. Anyone who has covered some of them knows that this year they are very different.
The atmosphere is dark in America. There is a sense of fear for the future. And if Americans are afraid, we should be too. Here the reverse Vegas rule applies. What happens in America doesn’t stay in America.
Those who thought the Donald Trump years in which an aberration will take a shock. Look at the candidates.
Nearly 300 have been approved by Trump. Two hundred of them peddled his undemocratic lie about whether he had won the last election or that his results were grossly flawed.
Some are supporters of Q Anon to boot, joining a movement that believes a pedophile cabal runs the US government.
Donald Trump is he should announce his candidacy soon after these midterms. Looking at the polls, its second coming seems increasingly likely, with all that it means for the world we live in.
An atmosphere of fear
The atmosphere during the election campaign is one of fear, among voters telling you that this great country, an ally, and the inspiration for the whole free world is, to put it bluntly, on the verge.
It is not just fear that the other side wins. It’s more powerful, more visceral than that.
Democrats are terrified that US democracy is about to be subverted. People who claim the electoral system is rigged are running for key positions that will give them power over that system. And Democrats fear they’ll use that power next time to twist the votes in their favor.
A president we now know has taken seriously the idea of hijacking voting machines and tried to bully officials to overturn the outcome of free and fair elections could be the favorite to win back the White House next time. time.
Think about it.
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Could the red wave hit New York?
America tears itself apart
If he doesn’t do it fairly next time, he will now have allies in place like governors or state officials who could help him do it in other ways, should they win as seems likely in this week’s votes.
But Republican voters are equally passionate in their fear of the country being taken in the wrong direction by elites who are unaware of how much the ordinary American is suffering.
Voters of all kinds fear recession, inflation, crime and rising costs and see a government not doing enough to help.
But fear is more existential than that. America, the country and the idea, the voters will tell you, is threatened and is being destroyed.
Americans have stopped doing what they have always done best, talking to themselves and listening. They retreated to opposite camps, getting lost in echo chambers to the left and right.
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Like a lie it consumed a nation
“It’s on the verge of disaster”
A mother in a New York state town summed it up like this: “She is divided, angry, hostile and corrupt, and she’s on the verge of disaster, I think.
“I think it’s incredibly disheartening. People believe what they want to believe and there are no changes of opinion, and I don’t even know how we’re ever going to go back.”
She wasn’t a conspiracy theorist, just a middle-class mother who took pizza for her children.
Visit the United States nowadays and friends will tell you they believe violence or unrest is on the way.
Reasonable sober-minded people speak honestly about showdowns, riots, and even civil war.
In better times, the mid-term elections were a carnival of democracy.
From the highest governor to the city’s dog catcher, people can choose who runs their lives in a system that since childhood they have been told is the best form of government the world has ever known.
But this time there is no sense of celebration.
The mood turned sour. Entrenched in polarized corners, Americans are suspicious of each other’s intentions and filled with forebodings about what is to come next. This should worry us all.
