One could wonder whether the USA is going to become a dysfunctional state like authoritarian and anti-democratic states, with voters supporting corrupt politicians or ideologues engaging in harmful policies, as Trump did in the case of coronavirus-policies.
The Republican party currently is the representative of our dissociated
personality parts in politics. Lloyd DeMause, founder of the Psychogenic Theory
of History, called these dissociated personalities “social alters”. [1]
Trump may have had a lot of trouble with opposition from the Democrats. Obama however encountered much more with the Tea-Party.
He experienced fierce opposition from the newly formed Tea Party since his second year in office. It was a violent, never tiring opposition, driven by a strong angry reflex against the Democratic government and knowing how to do harm to reasonable democratic politicians. Such an anger reflex is almost completely absent in the current Democratic opposition towards Trump and the Republicans in Senate.
Within democrats, the reasonable main personality can hold its ground better than within Republicans. But a reflex of real positive feelings towards Democracy and rule of law nevertheless does not develop within the reasonable camp. For them, the stabilization of democracy is not as big a goal as the destabilization of the democracy is for the Republicans.
This unconscious goal of destabilization of democracy is carried by a purposeful, angry, overwhelming popular movement which is masterfully implemented by Trump. He promises salvation by reenacting early prenatal traumatic experiences and connected apocalyptic fantasies through its politics.
Our dissociated personality parts appreciate it when deepest traumatic
feelings from early experiences are warded off by being acted out on a political
level. This happens, for example, through wars willfully torn off, such as the
2nd Iraq War by the G.W. Bush. Administration. Or today, by the Trump
administration’s malicious health
policies which have resulted until now in
192,316 deaths to date, September 5, 2020, compared to 58,209 American victims
of the Vietnam War.[1]
Or our traumatic experiences are unconsciously acted out by collapses of the
overall economy after manias in the financial markets. Or by endangering our
nurturing environment, the foundations of democracy and the rule of law.
Since the ideological, neoliberal turn of the late 1980s, the Democrats generally have been engaged on the side of reason. Trump and our alter egos on the other side support political strategies that are diametrically opposed to our real existential needs. Through his unlimited claims to power, such as that he may change the election date and openly imply that he might not accept an unfavorable election results in November, he relieves us from the pressure of our alter egos and weakens the strength of our rational parts of our personality over our alter egos.
Is the USA particularly bad compared to other nations? I think we should have more comprehension. They were the Herculesses who paid the highest political price for the reasonable world order that was built after World War II. They were the democratic leading power worldwide. They carried more burdens and responsibilities than any other democratic nation, because they were not only a member but the guarantor of this order. They had to identify themselves with more reasonable goals than any other democratic nation. They also had more duties and responsibilities, e.g. world policeman. Seen from that point of view, I don’t want to say that they are worse. In any case, they were better for a long time, taking on more tasks and responsibilities and political costs than other democratic nations.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_military_casualties_of_war
[1] Lloyd DeMause, The Emotional Life of Nations, Karnac & Other Press, New York 2002. Ch. 5 – The Psychogenic Theory of History.