THE ELECTION THAT WILL CHANGE THE WORLD
By Tony Lopez
The outcome of the Nov. 5, 2024 American presidential election will surely change the world. For better. Or for worse.
The world will be a better place to live in if Democratic presidential candidate Kamala D. Harris, 59, is the elected United States president.
The globe could be in a worse or deeper sinkhole than it is already in if Donald J. Trump, 78, gets back to the White House.
The conventional wisdom is that America, the only superpower, influences major events that happen on earth. The world’s greatest democracy is the beacon of hope, freedom, and democracy for all freedom-loving peoples of the world.
Deteriorating human freedom
“Human freedom is a social concept that recognizes the dignity of individuals and is defined here as negative liberty or the absence of coercive constraint. Because freedom is inherently valuable and plays a role in human progress,” says the Cato Institute. “Human freedom globally is deteriorating,” according to Cato. Global freedom is at its lowest in two decades. Two-thirds of the world live in countries where freedom is limited. In the Human Freedom Index, the US is only 17th, not in the Top Ten—Switzerland, New Zealand, Denmark, Ireland, Estonia and Sweden (tied at 5), Iceland, Luxembourg, Finland, and Norway.
Better chance than Biden
The first Black woman and the first South Asian-American to seek the presidency, Harris stands a better chance of winning, than the incumbent Joseph Biden, 81, who has shown signs of old age and deterioration of mental acuity.
Harris stands for democratic values, a break from the past (meaning Trump), and opportunity for everyone to rise, regardless of color, age, gender and political persuasion.
What Trump stands for
Trump, on the other hand, stands for autocracy, authoritarianism, abuse of power by the state, and perfidy in high office.
In a nation which immigrants helped to build and prosper, the former president hates immigrants, ironic considering his immigrant roots.
“Donald Trump is unfit to lead,” the New York Times declared in a stinging editorial. “His words and actions demonstrate a disregard for basic right and wrong and a clear lack of moral fitness for the responsibilities of the presidency,” the influential daily said.
A danger to US interests and security at home
The Times stressed:
“To vest such a person with the vast powers of the presidency is to endanger American interests and security at home as well as abroad. The nation’s commander in chief must uphold the oath to ‘preserve, protect and defend the Constitution’.”
“He (Trump) he has said that undocumented immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country,” and his advisers say he would aim to round them up in mass detention camps and end birthright citizenship. He has indicated that, if faced with episodes of rioting or crime surges, he would unilaterally send troops into American cities. He has asked aides if the United States could shoot migrants below the waist to slow them down, and he has said that he would use the Insurrection Act to deploy the military against protesters,” the Times related.
Crucially, “the Supreme Court, with its ruling on July 1 granting presidents “absolute immunity” for official acts, has removed an obstacle to Mr. Trump’s worst impulses: the threat of legal consequences. What remains is his own sense of right and wrong. Our country’s future is too precious to rely on such a broken moral compass,” warned the Times.
Trump admires dictators
Trump is an admirer of dictators –Vladimir Putin of Russia, Xi Jin Ping of China, Erdogan of Turkey. He wants to be a dictator himself. He has said so, repeatedly.
If given a second term, the former president has vowed vengeance, retribution, an unprecedented expansion of executive power, unparalleled interference in the justice system, and a massive purge of civil servants. He would set free violent extremists who assaulted those law enforcement officers at the Capitol.
“In many ways, Donald Trump is an unserious man. But the consequences — but the consequences of putting Donald Trump back in the White House are extremely serious,” sneered Kamala Harris when she accepted the Democratic nomination as their presidential candidate.
Harris opens the way forward
Meanwhile, Harris declared during her Aug. 22 Democratic nomination: “With this election, our nation — our nation, with this election, has a precious, fleeting opportunity to move past the bitterness, cynicism and divisive battles of the past, a chance to chart a new way forward. Not as members of any one party or faction, but as Americans. And let me say, I know there are people of various political views watching tonight. And I want you to know, I promise to be a president for all Americans. You can always trust me to put country above party and self. To hold sacred America’s fundamental principles, from the rule of law, to free and fair elections, to the peaceful transfer of power.”
“I will be a president who unites us around our highest aspirations. A president who leads and listens; who is realistic, practical and has common sense; and always fights for the American people. From the courthouse to the White House, that has been my life’s work,” the former prosecutor and California attorney general thundered.
Harris ahead in the polls
Latest national polls show Harris seven percentage points ahead of Trump.
Per the pre-Democratic convention Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll of Aug. 18, 2024, she holds a narrow lead, 49% to 45%, over former president Trump, “a notable improvement for Democrats in a contest that a little more than a month ago showed President Joe Biden and Trump in a dead heat.” Reported the Washington Post: “The new Post-ABC-Ipsos poll continues to point to a tight election in November, when seven swing states — Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada — are likely to determine who wins in the electoral college. Other public polls have indicated that Harris has gained ground in most if not all those swing states since Biden left the race, but they, too, show the race in most of those states as being within the range of a normal polling error.”