Our current president, pictured above, is described in a New York Times opinion column as "a 79-year-old strongman nostalgic for the past." The column, by Ben Rhodes, is focused on the topic of "short-term thinking," which Rhodes believes is "destroying America." Here's a sample of Rhodes' basic argument:
The second Trump administration has binged on short-term “wins” at the expense of the future. It has created trillions of dollars in prospective debt, bullied every country on earth, deregulated the spread of A.I. and denied the scientific reality of global warming. It has ignored the math that doesn’t add up, the wars that don’t end on Trump deadlines, the C.E.O.s forecasting what could amount to huge job losses if A.I. transforms our economy and the catastrophic floods, which are harbingers of a changing climate. Mr. Trump declares victory. The camera focuses on the next shiny object. Negative consequences can be obfuscated today, blamed on others tomorrow.
According to Rhodes, Mr. Trump is not the sole cause of this kind of short-term perspective on public policy. Here is his analysis:
This crisis of short-termism has been building for a long time.
In the decades after World War II, the Cold War was a disciplining force. Competition with the Soviets compelled both parties to support — or at least accept — initiatives as diverse as the national security state, basic research, higher education, international development and civil rights. Despite partisan differences, there was a long-term consensus around the nation’s purpose.
With the end of the Cold War, politics descended into partisan political combat over seemingly small things — from manufactured scandals to culture wars. This spiral was suspended, briefly, to launch the war on terror — the last major bipartisan effort to remake government to serve a long-term objective, in this case a dubious one: waging a forever war abroad while securitizing much of American life at home.
By the time Barack Obama took office, a destabilizing asymmetry had taken hold. Democrats acquiesced to the war on terror, and Republicans never accepted the legitimacy of reforms like Obamacare or a clean-energy transition. Citizens United v. F.E.C. led to a flood of money in politics, incentivizing the constant courting of donors more intent on preventing government action than encouraging it. The courts were increasingly politicized. The internet-driven fracturing of media rewarded spectacle and conspiracy theory in place of context and cooperation. Since 2010, the only venue for major legislation has been large tax and spending bills that brought vertiginous swings through the first Trump and the Biden administrations.
Rhodes was a former Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications and Speechwriting under President Barack Obama. He wants the Democratic Party to try to get the public to focus on "long term" objectives, and on long term dangers, too. I think a good way to do that might be to start involving the public in efforts that could properly be described as "utopian."
I like to say that I "majored in Utopia" during my undergraduate career in college, and I have been known to tout "utopian politics." I haven't changed my mind on that, but while I continue to suggest that "utopia" is still an appropriate focus for our politics, I think we probably need to acknowledge that the "utopian" ideas that can motivate us today are, more and more, "despair driven" visions. In other words, "utopian" visions of our future are not just "nice," "positive" ideas that are worthy of serious consideration. They are essential goals which we must actually achieve.
Global warming and massive environmental pollution should make clear to all of us that we need a near-total transformation of how we organize our economy and society. We need a "Small is Beautiful" utopian vision as the only thing that will save us from our destructive pursuit of economic growth over all other objectives.
We need to start imaging "world peace," too, and not as some idealistic but impractical concept, but as a practical and achievable goal. "No more war," and "world peace" are "utopian," to be sure. But do you really think that there is any alternative that doesn't lead us directly to a future nuclear holocaust?
Economic, social, and racial justice? Are these "utopian" ideas? Well, sure, but they must be our real objectives, and they must be achieved. We have allowed our guilded billionaires to take charge, and what the administration of our current president shows us is that continuing to pursue the aspirations of a "strongman nostalgic for the past," will bring down to nothing everything we have celebrated and worked for, over generations, starting with the vision of democratic self-government outlined in the Declaration of Independence.
I don't think the choice, ultimately, is between "short-term" and "long-term" ideas. The choice is between (1) dedicating ourselves to achieving what many would call "utopian" ideas or (2) deciding to call it quits, and to accept the other alternative: the actual end of the world as we have known it.
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