America and the Rule of Law

I read this amusing, informative, cynical and analytical post by Pranay Kotasthane on the US primaries to decide the opponent against Biden. The latest charges against Trump go to the very heart of the democratic process:

“That when you lose an election as an incumbent, you transfer power to the winner.”

 

And yet, Trump is still the lead runner among the Republicans. And he is not polling too badly against Biden either. Which would suggest:

“(The) danger doesn’t seem to matter to the Trump supporters and maybe to American voters too.”

The prosecution only makes him come across as the persecuted one. And so Kotasthan writes only half tongue in cheek:

“We must be ready for a scenario where Trump runs his campaign from a prison and wins. And then pardons himself.”

 

Then he makes an interesting point about criminals in governance:

“We Indians have had a long experience of voting for politicians indicted for crimes.”

But none of our criminals break one particular rule of democracy - those who lose an election must step down. Not even in Bihar.

“These criminals might get the votes because of their wealth, caste or maybe the State has gone absent for citizens, and they have become the de facto state in the areas that they lord over; whatever the reason, it has never been enough for them to gang up and overthrow the government. Criminals get elected, they lose, they switch parties, they go to jail, and they win again. Democracy goes on.”

 

In America though, Trump did violate that critical rule. Imagine if he got re-elected. In a polarized world with social media to fan the flames:

“If it becomes acceptable that people’s beliefs and passions should override the rule of law, you will soon have the state vacate its monopoly over violence that forms the basis for law and order because it is afraid it will inflame people.”

Not just the right, America is heading in that direction from the other side of the spectrum too. An increasingly large number of common folks, including the liberal left, want certain crimes to go unpunished:

“(The state) is actually drafting laws to ‘tolerate’ a certain level of lawlessness in the name of inequality… that seem to have support among the liberals (see the proposed California bill on tolerating shoplifting up to $1000).”

 

From both sides then, says Kotasthane, America seems to be determined on ending the rule of law – the right on the very purpose of a democratic process, and the left on petty crimes. Who’d have thought we’d see such things?