SOME REFLECTIONS ON ELECTION 2020

by External Media Posts · 11/04/2020

BY HENRY-LOUIS TAYLOR, JR.

Cast away your illusions. The U.S. presidential election hangs in the balance, but the nation has already written the story about election 2020. This is Donald Trump’s America.

Millions of Americans turned out to elect this neoliberal, racist, narcissist, misogynist, bully, and demagogue as the 46th President of the United States. The election is not over, and Joe Biden can still win. However, a Biden win or loss, notwithstanding, the widespread presence of virulent racism and complicity to exploitation and injustice is the ugly American reality that we must face.

The deep divide in this country is an ideological one rooted in differing visions of the type of nation we want to build. This division is not going away. It has been here since 1619, and it remains anchored and animated in the South—where the ghost of the Confederacy stalks the landscape. This racist Trump American will not unite with the progressive forces in this country. And the progressive forces in this country cannot unite Trump America. That is an ugly reality we must accept.

Another ugly reality is that the liberal wing of the Democratic Party is not our answer. They offer no American vision that inspires or ignites hope. For progressives, Election 2020 was a fight to dispose of Trump and not a battle for Biden’s dream of the United States. The sentiment among many progressives was “Get Rid of Trump and March on Biden.”

Cast away your illusions.

The good news is that millions of Americans reject both Trump and Biden’s vision of America. Regardless of how Election 2020 turns out, we must not be encapsulated in the politics of normalcy, but continue our fight to build a nation and society based on fairness, justice, cultural plurality, participatory democracy, and racial and social class inclusion.