OPINION - US election: Can it get worse than this?

by Adam McConnel

- The writer teaches Turkish history at Sabanci University in Istanbul. He holds an MA and PhD in History from the same university.

ISTANBUL (AA) - The entire world has watched the American presidential election unfold over the past year with a mixture of awe and disgust. Especially the Republican campaigns in the past several elections had not been exercises in democratic enlightenment, but the emergence of Donald Trump, and the exhibitions of amorality and arrogance that he has provided throughout his campaign, have disturbed around the world. The revelations about his character have left people everywhere aghast.

What is happening to the United States and its democracy? How is it possible that such a person became a candidate for the most important political position in the world?

The first thing that should be stated is that, despite the hysteria surrounding the FBI director James Comey’s extremely questionable statements at the end of last week, a Trump victory is still unlikely. As of Thursday, Nov. 3 -- that is, five days until Election Day-- betting and statistics sites such as Nate Silver’s fivethirtyeight.com or predictwise.com still project Clinton with a 70 percent or better chance of winning the election. Polls in the past few days suggest a closer race, but statistical forecasts have proven to be stronger and more accurate predictors of recent U.S. elections.

In fact, a key element of Tuesday’s election will be voter turnout. If the turnout is high, Trump has no chance at all. But if Democratic Party voters decide that the election’s conclusion is foregone and decide not to go to the polls, the election may be much closer than expected.

Going forward after this unnerving display of political depravity, the overwhelming issue will be whether U.S. politics can regain some of its former decorum in the coming years. The United States remains the world’s predominant economic, military, and political force, but its democratic image has been badly tarnished by this and the previous several elections. Beginning with the controversial 2000 Presidential election, continuing with the again controversial 2004 presidential election, and then through the Republican candidates (McCain-Palin in 2008, Romney-Ryan in 2012) offered to the voters in the previous two elections, U.S. presidential politics seems to have entered an extended decline.

The immediate future of U.S. presidential politics seems to hinge on events within the Republican Party. The Republican Party has, since the Democratic Party appropriated the mantle of progressive socio-political causes in the 1930s and 1940s, depended on an unstable alliance between powerful corporate and financial interests, which led and funded the party, and the conservative, populist cultural values espoused mostly by rural white American voters. Over the past 60-plus years, that voting bloc’s influence has steadily shrunk despite a political resurgence experienced in the 1970s and 1980s.

Donald Trump’s candidacy represents the assertion of that traditional Republican voting bloc’s values over the party’s traditional leadership; in other words, roles have been reversed. Despite being a proud member of the U.S.’s ultra-elite, Trump has latched onto the Republican Party’s populist base for his political rhetoric and votes. Previous Republican Party candidates were careful to signal to their voters indirectly, using what is referred to as “dog whistles” in American political parlance [1]. The racism, bigotry, and chauvinism was always present in Republican Party rhetoric, but not flaunted. Trump has not just embraced the ugliest aspects of the Republican base’s cultural worldview -- he wears them on his sleeve, and is unapologetic. Thus, his campaign has turned into a grotesque spectacle.

In the coming years analysts will be closely watching whether the old elite leadership of the “Grand Old Party” can reassert control over political developments within the party. If not, the party may fragment because U.S. politics are a politics of the center. Whichever party can capture the center of the political spectrum, where the vast majority of voters are, has the best chance of winning elections, especially national elections. But if the Republican Party’s right-wing extremists take complete control over the organization, then it will only be able to win elections at the local level where there are large concentrations of like-minded conservative whites.

What people in countries around the world should be aware of is that U.S. society is changing. Slowly but surely, it is embracing values different than those the Republican Party has espoused for decades. Environmental causes and issues important to women and to the LGBTQ community have gained prominence. Important demographic blocs, such as Latinos and immigrant groups, and the issues that are important to them, have eroded the old Republican white, conservative, populist voting bloc’s influence. The United States is now an urban society, and the old rural ethos no longer dominates the political discourse.

These changes mean that political parties have to adapt and, since WWII, the Democratic Party has shown itself much more able to adjust its policy platform to the changing realities of U.S. society. The Republican Party emerged in the 1850s because a previous party, the Whig Party, disintegrated. Now the Republican Party seems in danger of suffering the same fate as the Whigs, but what might replace it is not at all clear.

The Democratic Party leadership also faces a challenge from within its own voting bloc. Bernie Sanders’s campaign represented a similar trend on the left side of the U.S. political spectrum to that of Trump’s on the right side. Sanders supporters are the more radical wing of the Democratic Party and, despite cries of foul play, clearly did not win over the majority of Democratic voters. The Democratic Party’s leadership will have to respond to Sanders’s challenge in the upcoming years, and find ways to adapt and co-opt policy demands from that side of the party to the central platform. Otherwise, the Democratic Party risks developing an internal fissure similar to that currently affecting the Republican Party.

Even though it is unlikely that the world will wake up to a Trump U.S. Presidency on Nov. 9, the trends currently driving American politics will continue to force changes upon the Republican and Democratic parties. Whichever party can adapt most effectively to the dynamic realities of U.S. society will emerge victorious from the coming elections in 2020 and 2024. And, hopefully, those elections will be accompanied by the reappearance of a more polite and civil political discourse.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/14/opinion/trump-is-no-accident.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fpaul-krugman&action=click&contentCollection=opinion®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection

- Opinions expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Anadolu Agency's editorial policy.