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Baku's InterContinental hotel has a suspicious history. When the land around the hotel was put up for auction, the details of the land's address and size were purposefully blacked out.

Momentum in Washington to cut or eliminate U.S. funding for a United Nations agency that aids Palestinians is moving forward almost entirely unchecked. But it's based on unproven allegations — largely uncritically amplified by U.S. media — that the agency's staff had links to Hamas's Oct. 7 attack on Israel. The allegations are contained in an Israeli government dossier claiming that 13 employees (one of which was not identified), out of a total of 13,000, at the United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA) either took part or assisted in the Hamas-led atrocities. Israel notified UNRWA of the allegations early last month and authorities at the U.N. agency immediately fired the 12 employees without conducting an investigation. News of the allegations broke soon thereafter which opened the floodgates of knee-jerk reactions, including donor countries pausing their funding for UNRWA — which could result in millions of Palestinians in Gaza stranded without aid amid a humanitarian crisis —and efforts in Washington to cut UNRWA's funding entirely and forever.Meanwhile, these debates have been buttressed by inaccurate media coverage of Israel's allegations. More specifically, many major U.S. news outlets have been leaving out one key detail when reporting on the Israeli dossier: while the Israelis make a number of claims and accusations that they say are based on intelligence and other source data, the document itself contains no direct evidence that these 12 identified UNRWA employees participated in or assisted the Oct. 7 attack. Some outlets at least tried to make this point clear in wider stories or segments on the saga. For example, the Associated Press has noted that the Israelis provided no evidence. CBS News's Debora Patta noted on the network's Nightly News program on January 29 that in the document, "Israel accuses 12 UNRWA employees of being involved in the October 7 Hamas attack, including the kidnapping of Israeli citizens," adding, "But they have yet to provide evidence substantiating these claims."CNN reported that the network "has not seen the intelligence that underlies the summary of allegations" and that that summary "does not provide evidence to support its claims." CNN anchor Anna Coren asked Ophir Falk, an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhu, to provide evidence — which he could not — and wondered why the alleged perpetrators haven't been arrested. "Well the first step is for them to be fired," Falk said. Outside of the AP, CBS, and CNN, major U.S. media reporting on this issue has largely accepted the Israeli claims or have even gone further as to advance the Israeli narrative on UNRWA. The New York Times, for example, has published several stories on the UNRWA saga, and none of them have mentioned that the Israeli dossier has no specific evidence (it's probably worth noting here that one of the reporters covering this issue for the Times once served in the Israeli Defense Forces).The Wall Street Journal published a lengthy article giving credence to the Israeli allegations and in another, reported that the dossier "is the most detailed look yet at the widespread links between the UNRWA employees and militants." Another Journal article said the allegations are "a blow" to UNRWA without telling readers the dossier provides no evidence. Meanwhile, ABC World News Tonight's report on the dossier not only failed to tell its viewers it contains no specific evidence, but it went a step further reporting that "the U.N. has not denied the claims."Others like NBC Nightly News and the Washington Post provided lengthy coverage of the Israeli allegations and mention only in passing that the outlets have not independently verified the claims. Conversely, some non-traditional media outlets have been more forceful in their coverage of the dossier, making the lack of evidence a key feature of their reporting. For example, Breaking Points' Krystal Ball this week took the Israeli claims to task. "It is literally just a[n] evidence-free list of allegations, …no actual evidence is provided," she said, adding, "Now maybe they did participate and maybe they didn't. I can tell you there is definitely not enough that has been provided to say anything about this. Again, zero evidence provided."Most of the mainstream reports also omit key contextual information, like for example, that UNRWA routinely provides the Israeli government with a list of the names of its employees, or that many on the right in Israel, and their allies in the United States, have been trying to shut down UNRWA for decades because they believe the U.N. agency legitimizes Palestinians' claims to land they say was stolen by Israel. "There has been a long standing aim for Republicans and some Democrats in Congress to defund UNRWA long before Oct. 7, as they see the agency as responsible for enabling the right of return to be an ever growing final status issue," Joel Braunold, managing director of the S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, told RS. Indeed, the Biden administration worked with Senate leaders this week on an aid bill that would bar any funding from going to UNRWA and prevent any funding going to the agency that has already been allocated to it. And the House is now considering a bill that would permanently block U.S. funds to UNRWA."While the bipartisan consensus is not where the House is currently, the Overton window has shifted closer to those wishing for congressional cut off to the agency," Braunold said. Meanwhile, UNRWA says it will run out of money by the end of February if donor countries like the United States continue to withhold their funding. Top U.N. officials are pleading with donors to keep the agency funded. "Our humanitarian operation, on which 2 million people depend as a lifeline in Gaza, is collapsing," UNRWA Commissioner-General Phillipe Lazzarini said in a statement posted on X, formerly Twitter. "Palestinians in Gaza did not need this additional collective punishment."Former UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness is asking wealthy countries in the region to underwrite the aid agency should its funding collapse at the end of the month. "Some of the most desperate people in the Middle East are now facing starvation, they're facing famine, and the Arab states need to step up to the plate," he said.It appears that the Biden administration agrees with that sentiment. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby even suggested recently that the administration would support UNRWA even if a formal investigation finds that the 12 employees assisted Hamas's attack. "I do think it's important to remember that UNRWA does important work across the region, certainly in Gaza," he said last week on NBC's Today Show. "They have helped save thousands of lives and we shouldn't impugn the good work of a whole agency because of the terrible allegations lobbied against just a small number of their employees."

On this episode, Bethany and Luigi discuss the recent release of the "Twitter Files" – a collection of internal Twitter documents released publicly by new CEO Elon Musk that reveal the company's internal processes and policies for dealing with controversial content, including contentious public health information and political revelations.

Despite the potential significance of these documents, they have received relatively little coverage from the mainstream media. Our hosts debate and discuss potential reasons behind this, the possible implications at the intersection of social media, politics, and the mainstream media, as well as offer solutions to the underlying democratic issues at stake.

Daniel Raisbeck


Less than a year ago, I wrote of the almost certain regret that awaited the prosperous, urban, multiple‐​degree‐​holding types who voted for Gustavo Petro, Colombia's Chavista president. They thought they had supported a Nordic‐​style social democrat—failing to notice that they had helped to elect a tropical socialist who, given his past as a guerrilla group member and Hugo Chávez supporter, was also a potential autocrat. Caveat emptor (or rather suffragator) indeed. But I never thought that voter's remorse would set in so quickly. Or so extremely.
According to poll data from June 1, 2023, only 26 percent of Colombian citizens approved of Petro's performance as president. And this was before the scandal that shook the country's political scene last Sunday evening, when Semana magazine released a series of WhatsApp audio files sent by Armando Benedetti, Petro's former ambassador in Caracas, to Laura Sarabia, the president's former chief of staff.
Among the least bombastic revelations is Benedetti's claim that Alfonso Prada, Petro's former interior minister, "stole the whole ministry with his wife." This implies massive levels of corruption around Petro, who came to power with an anti‐​corruption agenda (quite cynically given his disreputable political alliances). Prada proceeded to sue Benedetti for libel.
Petro's dwindling number of supporters may dismiss this as a politician's petty slander against a rival in the cabinet. Far more concerning for them—and for Petro—is Benedetti's matter‐​of‐​fact assertion to Sarabia that he himself obtained COP $15 billion (around USD $3.58 million at today's exchange rate) for Petro's 2022 presidential campaign, during which he served as the former candidate's right‐​hand‐​man and main political handler. Petro's campaign did not officially report any donation nearly as large. Its declared funds consisted mostly a series of bank loans, which were meant to be paid with the "reimbursement" sum that the Colombian state guarantees to candidates for each vote received in an election.
In many countries, an insider's admission of how millions of undeclared dollars flowed into the president's campaign coffers would bring down the government. Alas, Colombia is not one of them. This is not due to a lack of unashamedly corrupt presidents; as I wrote recently in The Wall Street Journal, the opposite has been the case. Rather, since the 1950's, the Colombian elite's idiosyncratic approach to presidential corruption has followed the maxim, attributed to journalist Hernando Santos (1922–1999), that the trouble with overthrowing a president is that he may fall upon those doing the toppling.
Already in Petro's case, the three‐​member House of Representatives commission created to investigate Benedetti's statements includes two members of the president's own party. The enquiry will be a charade, which is a pity since the source of the undeclared campaign money is as important as the sum itself. In an interview, Benedetti told Semana that the money "did not come from entrepreneurs," meaning the legal business community. Suspicion has fallen on the Marxist guerrilla groups and other drug trafficking organizations, but also on the Venezuelan regime of Nicolás Maduro. Anonymous, the hacker group, claims that Maduro financed "part of the campaign of the current president of Colombia," but has not published evidence hitherto.
What is certain is that, in regional terms, the Maduro regime has been the principal beneficiary of Petro's election. To begin with, Colombia recognized Maduro's presidency after a three‐​and‐​a‐​half‐​year hiatus, and Petro himself has met Maduro four times since his inauguration. His government, which opposes any future hydrocarbon exploration in Colombia despite dwindling reserves, has promoted the idea of importing Venezuelan natural gas.
While Petro wages a political war against Colombia's key petroleum industry—crude oil has been the country's main legal export for decades—he lobbied President Joe Biden to end American sanctions against the Maduro regime. This would imply renewed Venezuelan oil exports to the U.S. market (even if socialism devastated Venezuela's oil industry well beyond immediate or even medium term repair). Petro's "shoot yourself in the foot / prosper‐​thy‐​neighbor" policy is devoid of any rationality. Unless, of course, Colombia's increasingly authoritarian president is somehow subject to the Venezuelan tyrant.
Petro's eco‐​fanatical crusade against the hydrocarbon industry is but one example of how his government is bent on destroying the few areas of the Colombian economy that are functional. Other examples include his plans to put the state in charge of centralized funding for the healthcare and pension systems, both of which are efficient—although certainly not perfect—thanks to private sector involvement and some degree of consumer choice. Where things are already problematic, Petro's policies would make them worse. For instance, he wants to make a rigid, overregulated labor market even less flexible and more hostile to businesses.
Then there is the matter of rising insecurity, an old problem that, until recently, appeared mostly solved, only to resurface dangerously in the last year. Under Petro, illegal armed groups have expanded their power as they launch constant, deadly attacks against the armed forces and police. It all brings to mind the dark era of the late 1990's, when Colombia was on the verge of becoming a failed state as it came under siege from the FARC guerrillas, which are still up in arms despite the much‐​touted "peace" agreement of 2016.
Usually, a crisis in government breeds economic instability. Under Colombia's current government, however, the opposite has been the case. Since the Benedetti scandal broke, the peso rallied to reach its highest value against the dollar since mid‐​2022, when Petro was about to win the presidential election. In October, two months after he took office, the peso reached an all‐​time low against the dollar. Amid the current political turmoil, forward‐​looking markets are anticipating the failure of Petro's legislative initiatives in health care, pensions, and labor law. Which is to say, there is speculation that Colombia's institutional framework has already survived Petro's statist onslaught. The weaker his position, the thinking goes, the less likely it is that non‐​leftist parties will lend him their support, which he needs to obtain congressional majorities.
I fear, however, that markets may be getting ahead of themselves. The Colombian congress is minimally ideological and highly transactional. There is still a good chance that, issue by issue, Petro's government can negotiate just enough votes to have his "reforms" approved, in which case only the courts will stand in the way of his agenda.
Not that Petro is respectful of any check or balance. This week, he propounded the theory that, since he was elected, his government represents "the will of the people," meaning that any opposition to his political project—including from the news media—is part of an illegitimate, "soft coup." The onslaught, in other words, is far from over.
In my view, the worst part about Petro's election victory is that, at this time last year, Colombia was in need of radical reforms. Above all, a chronically sluggish economy required budget discipline, public spending cuts, drastic debt reduction, a strong currency (ideally through dollarization), far lower taxes, labor market deregulation, subsoil privatization, school choice, and an end to non‐​tariff barriers. By electing Petro, however, voters decided to do precisely the opposite on all fronts. As warned, most already regret it.

We revisit our 2017 Axe Files episode with Oscar-winning actor Tom Hanks, who joins David to talk about how he parlayed an early love of drama into a career, his most memorable roles, sexual harassment scandals in Hollywood, Trump's relationship with the media, and more.
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Explosive assassination claims made over seven weeks ago by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have thrust India-Canada relations into crisis. Despite the two countries' shared position on the Israel-Hamas war and caution by Canada's key allies, the downward spiral between Ottawa and New Delhi has continued unabated.Trudeau accused the Indian government in September of complicity in the killing of prominent Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar on Canadian soil. Nijjar, an outspoken proponent of the Khalistan separatist movement for the establishment of an independent state in India's northern Punjab region, was previously labeled a "terrorist" by Indian authorities. The government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi denounced Trudeau's allegations as "absurd and motivated," reiterating its long-standing grievances over what it describes as Canada's continued sheltering of Khalistani terrorists and extremists.The bombshell allegations have brought the India-Canada relationship to what experts have described as its lowest point ever. A massive trade deal that both sides hoped would be inked by the end of 2023 has been frozen indefinitely. Canada responded by expelling Indian diplomat Pavan Kumar Rai, prompting India's expulsion of a Canadian diplomat in a mirror response. New Delhi took the diplomatic tit-for-tat game to a new level in October, reportedly ordering Canada to recall over half —41 of 62 — of its diplomats in India. Trudeau neither confirmed the expulsions nor suggested that Canada is planning a proportionate response. "Obviously, we are going through an extremely challenging time with India right now, but that's why it is so important for us to have diplomats on the ground working with the Indian government and there to support Canadians and Canadian families," he said, according to AP. Trudeau's recent attempts to contain, if not to dial down, tensions with India come amid growing apprehensions by Canada's key allies. The Biden administration has made it a foreign policy priority to court India as a critical regional counterweight to China. The White House reportedly privately believes Canada's assassination claims, but worries that the dispute may spill over into a more serious confrontation with deleterious consequences for its Indo-Pacific strategy. "When Washington has to decide between New Delhi and Ottawa, given the current global geopolitical situation, it's going to side with New Delhi," Andrew Latham, Professor of International Relations and Political Theory at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Peace & Diplomacy, told RS. The Trudeau government faces substantial domestic pressure as it navigates the Nijjar incident, Latham observed. "I think, in one sense, both sides would like this to go away because the largest diaspora in Canada is Indian. The Trudeau government is no position to alienate the large Sikh community in and around Vancouver and in and around Toronto," he said, highlighting the salience of electoral politics to Trudeau's thinking. "And then you factor into that the fact that right now, it [Trudeau's Liberal Party] is in a coalition government, more or less, with the New Democratic Party which is headed by Jagmeet Singh, who is also a Sikh. You can see that there is some partisan electoral dynamic at work here which is pushing the Trudeau government not to let this issue go away," Latham added.Singh, who was denied a visa by India in 2013 reportedly over his statements on the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in India, has taken a more strident stance on the Nijjar killing than Trudeau himself. "I will leave no stone unturned in the pursuit of justice, including holding Narendra Modi accountable," he wrote on social media.The Nijjar scandal was quickly overtaken, at least in international media headlines, by the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war after October 7. A vast swathe of the global south has either criticized Israel or offered equivocal messages lamenting the loss of life and urging an end to hostilities. Modi, by stark contrast, has taken a robust pro-Israel position much closer to the views of Canadian and most Western leaders. "Deeply shocked by the news of terrorist attacks in Israel. Our thoughts and prayers are with the innocent victims and their families. We stand in solidarity with Israel at this difficult hour," the Indian Prime Minister wrote on the X social media platform X following the October 7 Hamas attacks. India also abstained from a Oct. 27 vote in the UN General Assembly which called for a " humanitarian truce" in Gaza. The measure was opposed by the U.S. and Israel and 12 other countries. The Modi government took such a stance partly because it believes it is confronted with similar types of threats on its homeland, experts say. India "faces a number of secessionist threats and the prospect of, broadly framed, Islamic terrorism, which it likens to what Israel is facing. India and Israel have had a good relationship for a while and this is a continuation of it," Latham noted. Yet their shared pro-Israel position has proven not to be a mitigating factor in the cratering relations between Ottawa and New Delhi. "The old adage, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, actually doesn't work here. I don't think their common antipathy towards Hamas is sufficient to bridge the differences," said Latham. "Think about what's at stake for the Canadian government: some foreign government, if this is all true, sent their agents into Canada to assassinate a Canadian citizen expressing views that are protected under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. And on the Modi side, here is the parallel: Israel has a long history of assassinating people beyond [Israel's borders] who are enemies of the state of Israel, Modi is simply doing that," Latham said. "I think that, over time, this will abate, but in the short to medium term, it's just too raw at the moment, and not even this common position around Israel is sufficient to calm tempers."Though there are no signs of reconciliation anywhere on the horizon, both sides — as well as the deeply influential external stakeholder that is the Biden administration — have at least an implicit interest in ensuring that the Canada-India confrontation does not careen down the path of uncontrollable escalation.Time will tell if that will be enough to prevent lasting damage to the bilateral relationship.

The Biden White House is reportedly trying to rein in the U.S. ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, whose social media trolling of the Chinese government in recent weeks has become increasingly combative. According to NBC News, Biden aides have asked Emanuel to stop mocking Xi Jinping online over China's economic woes and the removal of several high-profile officials. As one anonymous White House official drily put it, the tweets were "not in keeping with the message coming out of this building." Emanuel's sarcastic criticism of the Chinese government and Xi has predictably irritated Beijing, and that has been undermining the administration's efforts to stabilize the deteriorating U.S.-Chinese relationship. As one administration official said, "It just fights what we are doing there in the region." A former administration official quoted in the report was blunter: "They're trying to calm things down and to have the ambassador to Japan attack the Chinese? It's stupid."Emanuel was always a curious choice for a prominent diplomatic post, given his record as a crude, knife-fighting political operative, but in recent weeks he outdid himself with his trolling comments about China. When the then-defense minister, Li Shangfu, had not been seen in public for several weeks, Emanuel tweeted a mocking reference to Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None" as he called attention to the growing list of top Chinese officials removed from their positions over the last few months. This briefly earned the ambassador some favorable coverage back home, including a report in The Wall Street Journal last week that billed him as a "warrior diplomat," but like the so-called wolf warrior tactics that Emanuel has been imitating it ended up backfiring on him.The ambassador's social media antics have done nothing to advance U.S. interests, and it is hard to see how it benefits Japan or the U.S.-Japanese relationship to have our ambassador in Tokyo flinging insults at a neighboring country. As the NBC News report said, a "second administration official said for Emanuel to make these comments makes no sense and does not advance U.S. strategic goals with China or with the Asia-Pacific region." The U.S. doesn't send its ambassadors abroad so that they can play at being the ugly American for online clout, but lately that seems to be what Emanuel thinks his job is. It was a mistake to appoint Emanuel as an ambassador, and it was even worse to send him to a region where tensions are already high enough without having a top U.S. official throwing rhetorical bombs every week. Diplomats don't have to be quiet or boring, but they do need to be professional and responsible in what they say because they aren't just speaking for themselves. The White House is right to get Emanuel back in line. It remains to be seen if he will stay there. Emanuel's public attacks on China illustrate the limited utility of aggressive, hawkish posturing. Mocking Xi and the Chinese government over their current difficulties is juvenile at best, and to the extent that it contributes to further mistrust and hostility it can have real consequences for the bilateral relationship that can undercut U.S. policies and cause damage to U.S. and allied interests. While Emanuel may not take his responsibility seriously, representing the U.S. overseas is not a game. Especially when it concerns powerful rival states, diplomats need to take extra care in what they say, how they say it, and where they say it. They certainly shouldn't be freelancing with pointed public attacks on the rival's leadership because it amuses them.Making playground taunts of foreign leaders may seem harmless enough, but such slights help to erode goodwill between governments and provide fodder to hardliners in the other country that thrive on contempt and anger. Emanuel may imagine that he is boldly "calling out" the Chinese government for its failures, but it doesn't hurt their government to have an obnoxious foreign diplomat attacking them in public. If anything, it is useful to their propagandists to have someone like Emanuel as a foil. All that it does it make the work of real U.S. diplomats that much harder, and ultimately that means that the U.S. ends up absorbing higher costs down the road.When U.S. diplomacy is successful, it secures U.S. interests in other parts of the world at the lowest possible cost. It can be challenging and sometimes dangerous work, and it is almost never glamorous, but when it is done right it can achieve far more through negotiation and compromise than can be achieved by force, threats, and denunciations. Emanuel is the product of a political culture that prizes the latter and hates the former, and so it isn't surprising that he is not suited at all to the task of being a diplomat. One of the weaknesses of U.S. diplomacy is the selection of unqualified political appointees for ambassadorial roles. No other major government hands out ambassadorial posts on the basis of political cronyism and donations. As a result, they typically avoid the embarrassments and scandals that come from being represented by people that have no training or aptitude for diplomatic work. There may sometimes be some value in having political allies of the president in a foreign capital, but most of the time it does little to help advance U.S. interests. In some cases, it can work against them. It is good that the Biden administration is trying to get one of its loose cannons under control, but it would be much better if we had a system in which only career diplomats served as our ambassadors in every country.There is a legitimate role for criticism of other governments in the practice of U.S. diplomacy, but it has to be part of a coordinated policy aimed at securing real benefits for the American people. Trolling the Chinese leadership over their internal problems just antagonizes their government and achieves nothing of value. Before sounding off in public, an ambassador or any other U.S. official needs to ask what purpose is being served by the criticism and whether that is the smartest way to respond. Does a public attack bring the U.S. closer to advancing its interests, or does it create an additional obstacle that makes that more difficult? Obviously, Emanuel didn't bother to ask those questions.

The Biden administration recently established a new system for responding to incidents in which a U.S. arms recipient is suspected of using American-made weapons to injure or kill civilians. The policy represents the first systematic approach to monitoring when and where U.S. arms sales cause civilian casualties and aligns well with the Biden administration's Conventional Arms Transfer (CAT) policy. But an executive order is not enough to durably improve oversight of U.S. arms transfers. Congress should codify the new system into law, ensuring that it receives the resources and attention it needs to make an impact and making it impossible for a future president to end the program on a whim. Losing this policy, or otherwise allowing it to languish, would mean eliminating the first process for tracking and punishing those who harm civilians with U.S. weapons. Having such a system in place is important because the United States itself has a terrible track record of harming civilians. And until now, the government did not appear to care about how many more were harmed by U.S. weapons in the hands of others.The policy, known as Civilian Harm Incident Response Guidance (CHIRG), compels State Department officials to investigate and potentially penalize reported abuses of U.S. weapons abroad. Under this system, U.S. government officials will examine allegations of abuse reported by diplomatic or intelligence officials, the United Nations, international media, or civil society groups. If investigators deem a report valid, they will recommend a course of action that could include intensifying military training and education to shore up issues, curbing future arms sales until the recipient addresses its human rights problems, or other authorized diplomatic responses.There are multiple security and humanitarian reasons to institutionalize such a policy. For example, there is evidence that U.S. national security is threatened when it sends arms to nations that frequently violate human rights. These risks include American-made weapons threatening U.S. troops, strengthening relations between autocrats and terrorist or criminal groups, and preventing less risky and strategically important partners like Taiwan from getting the weapons that they need.The Cato Institute's 2022 Arms Sales Risk Index analyzes the risks presented by every U.S. weapons recipient. While this year's index shows that the Biden administration has thus far sold weapons to a less risky portfolio of clients than its two most recent predecessors, the White House continues to dole out significant numbers of weapons to some of the world's riskiest countries, like Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt.Furthermore, the CHIRG allows the administration to finally put actions to its words. Biden's CAT policy claims that the United States will strive to "prevent arms transfers that risk facilitating or otherwise contributing to violations of human rights or international humanitarian law." Nonetheless, the White House continues approving massive weapons sales to some of the worst human rights abusers, including a recent deal to give 31 advanced drones to India despite concerns about the actions of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. A new policy analyzing civilian harm will at least force U.S. officials to confront the consequences of their decisions.In fact, the CHIRG should reduce the risk of civilian casualties from problematic clients. The new system would theoretically impose some degree of punishment — including potentially delaying or ending weapons transfers — against countries like Saudi Arabia if, for example, Riyadh continues to use U.S. weapons to intentionally target civilians in Yemen.Nonetheless, the CHIRG does contain potential pitfalls, similar to those found in the Leahy Laws. The Leahy Laws focus on preventing the president from providing U.S. security assistance to military units that have committed a gross violation of human rights. This vetting process often lacks any real bite because there is little guidance as to how to document instances of human rights abuses, vague definitions of what constitutes "civilian harm," a reporting system that is difficult to use, and a lack of transparency. The CHIRG will likely face similar problems. Moreover, the CHIRG does not currently specify the exact consequences of violations, nor the resources required to undertake such an initiative.Despite the problems associated with the Leahy Laws, Congress did codify them after more than a decade of yearly reauthorizations. This means that, to end the Leahy Laws, a president would need Congress to pass new legislation — no small feat in a gridlocked legislature.The lack of codification for the CHIRG means that, at any point, a presidential administration can undo this policy. Absent congressional action to codify the CHIRG, it will likely be undone by a future administration that wants to sell more weapons to risky countries like Saudi Arabia.Fortunately, Congress can codify this legislation. In fact, recent research shows that Congress has a good opportunity of successfully doing so in the near future. Even the Leahy Laws — named for democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, initially passed under President Bill Clinton, and codified under President Barack Obama — passed with the support of a Republican-controlled Congress. The key was framing the legislation as a way to publicly restrict Clinton's foreign policy authority following arms transfer scandals in Colombia. The timing is also ripe to codify the CHIRG according to new findings about how lawmakers develop foreign policy, which show that the legislature tends to pass measures to restrict presidential authority abroad during bipartisan congresses.The CHIRG is a positive step forward for reducing risk in arms sales, but without congressional codification to clarify the ambiguities, it will create only moderate improvements — like the Leahy Laws — until a new president decides to end the policy.

On March 8, a Manhattan federal court found Juan Orlando Hernández, president of Honduras from 2014 to 2022, guilty of conspiracy to import large amounts of cocaine into the United States over nearly two decades. Mainstream U.S. media generally framed the ex-president's trial and conviction as a triumph of justice, a service rendered by the impartial U.S. justice system to the people of Honduras.The great majority of such accounts, however, ignored and obscured context crucial for understanding Hernández's rise and rule; in particular, how Washington contributed to both. Though the mainstream narrative around the ex-president rightly connects his tenure in office with massive emigration from Honduras, it has elided the degree to which U.S. influence enabled Hernández's career and thus partially drove the migration that arose in response. For roughly two centuries, Honduras, the original "banana republic," has suffered a deeply unequal relationship with the far more powerful United States. One of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere, Honduras and its people have endured frequent American military interventions, U.S.-backed coups, and a corrupt, rapacious local oligarchy closely tied to U.S. corporate interests.Despite Hernández's ultimate conviction on U.S. soil, he served Washington for many years as a loyal client. The single most important event in the ex-president's political career was a 2009 coup, which overthrew center-left president Manuel Zelaya (whose wife, Xiomara Castro, won election in 2021 and currently occupies the presidency). Zelaya raised the minimum wage, subsidized small farmers, and authorized the morning-after pill, infuriating the country's business elite and, in the last case, ultra-conservative religious leaders. Moreover, to Washington's consternation, he made overtures toward Hugo Chavez's socialist Venezuela and sought to convert a crucial U.S. airbase entirely to civilian use.Joint action by Honduras' military and judiciary — in a manner the U.S. ambassador called "clearly illegal" and "totally illegitimate" at the time — forced Zelaya to pay for these sins in late June 2009. While the White House's reaction to the coup initially appeared confused, Washington soon recovered its footing. Even as huge protests raged, the Obama administration played a key role in ultimately compelling Honduras' people and the region's governments to acquiesce to the regime change as a fait accompli. Despite widespread repression by the post-coup de facto government, accounts of fraud, and the condemnation of many countries and international organizations (including the normally deferential Organization of American States), U.S.-endorsed elections in November 2009 received Washington's imprimatur. In her memoirs (the passage excised from the book's paperback edition with no explanation), then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton explained that the U.S. sought to "render the question of Zelaya moot and give the Honduran people a chance to choose their own future."It was in this context that Hernández catapulted into power. After Porfirio Lobo won the 2009 presidential race, Hernández became President of the National Congress as a member of Lobo's National Party — an institution historically closely linked to U.S. agribusiness. Lobo was Hernández's mentor and groomed his protege to succeed him. But while Hernández enjoyed success, the coup's consequences constituted disaster for ordinary Hondurans.Political violence and repression became routine. The murder rate, much of it due to cartel-related gang violence, soared — it was the world's highest for three years running. As the economic situation also deteriorated, and Lobo and his son allied with major narcotics syndicates, a huge surge of emigration swelled out of Honduras, with desperate citizens flooding northward. The total number of Hondurans apprehended at the U.S. border exploded — from less than 25,000 in 2009 to nearly 100,000 in 2014 — reaching 250,000 by 2020. In Washington's eyes, however, such concerns took a back seat to longstanding strategic needs: above all, Honduras' openness to foreign investment and its role as a base for American military power. And, as head of the National Congress, Hernandez was seen as particularly amenable to U.S. desires. "The State Department loved Hernandez," according to Dana Frank, an expert on Honduras at UC Santa Cruz. As Lobo's heir apparent, "he was young and could stay in power for a long time." Frank cites a 2010 cable from the U.S. embassy in Tegucigalpa asserting that "He has consistently supported U.S. interests."The depth of American support for Hernández became clear after his 2013 election to the presidency. Despite credible reports of fraud, his National Party's control over the counting process, and a wave of threats and sometimes lethal violence against opposition candidates and activists during the campaign, the State Department commended the election as "transparent, free, and fair." In 2015, a major corruption scandal centered on the misappropriation of funds from Honduras' Social Security Institute exploded, prompting unprecedented popular demonstrations against Hernandez and calling for his resignation, "There was a real sense that Hernández could fall," according to Alexander Main, a Latin America expert at the Washington-based Center for Economic and Policy Research. Fortunately for Hernández, however, the U.S. swooped in, helping to defuse the unrest by prodding the OAS to organize a local anti-corruption body known as MACCIH. In that same year, according to Frank, Washington gave an "official green light" to a "completely criminal" power grab by Hernández whereby his hand-picked Supreme Court ruled that he was eligible to run for a second term in clear violation of Honduras' constitution. Washington's complacent reaction — "It is up to the Honduran people to determine their political future" — stood in remarkable contrast to 2009, when Zelaya's mere suggestion that the constitution might be amended to permit a second term served as the pretext for the coup that the U.S. subsequently legitimized. In Hernández's 2017 reelection bid, the fraud was so blatant and widespread that even the generally conservative OAS declared the incumbent's victory an example of "extreme statistical improbability" and called for new elections. The State Department, however, stood by Hernández, prodding Mexico and other OAS members to recognize the results, even as security forces suppressed massive and prolonged protests with live ammunition.Indeed, U.S. training and funding also proved crucial in the creation of the brutal special operations units Hernández's government used to terrorize opposition and environmental activists. Particularly significant in the military sphere was the role of U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), the American combatant command responsible for Latin America. Hernández was a particular favorite of John Kelly, SOUTHCOM's head during Obama's second term (and then White House chief of staff for Donald Trump), who, as Dana Frank noted, once referred to the convicted drug trafficker as a "great guy" and "good friend."Considering the U.S. relationship with Hernández, it is perhaps unsurprising that U.S. officials seemingly turned a blind eye to his deep involvement in narcotics trafficking. As both Hernández's recent trial — during which a witness claimed Hernandez had privately vowed to "stuff drugs up the noses of the gringos" — and that of his brother in 2019 showed, the drug trade's reach into the Honduran government was unmistakable, with numerous high-ranking security officials repeatedly implicated. CEPR's Main argues that it was "highly unlikely American officials were unaware" of Hernández's criminality. Indeed, as a document from his brother's trial revealed, the DEA began investigating the ex-president as early as 2013. As noted in Hernández's trial, just weeks after his inauguration in 2014, the agency reportedly obtained video evidence indicating his involvement with major drug traffickers. Even after his brother's 2019 conviction, when it became apparent that millions of dollars in drug money helped underwrite Hernández's political career, President Donald Trump publicly praised him for "working with the United States very closely" and for his help in "stopping drugs at a level that has never happened."Given all this, the U.S. media's failure to probe the influence of American policy on Hernández's career begins to look less like an anomalous oversight and more like a manifestation of structural dynamics that tend to reinforce the notion of American innocence. We can see the same logic apply to the frenzied media accounts detailing "caravans" of Central American migrants headed to the U.S. While mainstream news outlets rightly note the relationship between Hernández's presidency and increased migration from Honduras, they nevertheless fail to connect the two to the impact of U.S. policymaking. Without Washington's complicity and assistance, Hernandez might have spent 2014 to 2022 in prison, rather than the presidency. Unfortunately, it was the Honduran people who paid the price.

 Institut
d'Estudis Nord-americans  Blog 

Josep
M. Colomer: "The current political polarization of the United States originates
in its institutional system."

General newsPhotography: Alicia Colomer



By Marc Amat

On January 6, 2021, a mob of Donald
Trump supporters stormed the United States Capitol to get Vice President Mike
Pence and Congress to reject President-elect Joe Biden. This shocking event was
the result of a crescendo of political hostility that, for decades, had eroded
the institutional system of the United States. This is how prestigious
political scientist and economist Josep M. Colomer reads the situation in his
latest book La polarización política en Estados Unidos (Debate,
2023). In its pages, Colomer points out the institutional design of this North
American country – with the separation of powers between Congress and the
Presidency and only two parties – as being responsible for the constant
emergence of bitter political and territorial rivalries.

With a comprehensive tone and rhythmic
pace, Colomer weaves a lucid essay on how the deterioration of the
effectiveness of government can end up generating growing tensions in the
political scene. To do so, he draws on his long academic and professional
career. Currently, he is a professor of political science at Georgetown
University, in Washington D.C., and an associate researcher at the l'Institut
de Ciències Polítiques i Socials in Barcelona. How should we interpret the
assault on the Capitol? What symptoms of dysfunction exist in the U.S.
institutional system? What changes could be made to improve it? To analyze
these issues, this month we interview Josep M. Colomer.

On January 6, 2021, images of the assault on the United
States Capitol swept the world. How do you explain that occurrence?

It's been repeated many times in the
media that what we experienced was an unprecedented situation. However,
throughout history, the U.S. has faced several episodes of institutional
violence. If we look beyond the recent past, between 1830 and 1860 there was a
great escalation of tension and violence, even among the congressmen
themselves. With the abolition of slavery as a core issue, this dynamic led to
a bloody civil war, with 750,000 people dead, a figure that represented 2.5% of
the population of the United States at the time. Now, for almost three decades,
we've been experiencing another continuous increase in tension in American
domestic politics. This time it will not lead to a civil war, but it is
paralyzing politics. There are problems in approving budgets; in the recent
past there have been four impeachments, when there had only been one in the
19th century; it's extremely difficult to move forward with legislature…

Can we understand Donald Trump's rhetoric and the assault
on the Capitol as a culmination of this escalation?

It is a consequence. We have to look
for the beginning of the tensions in the mid-1990s. In 1994, the Republicans
won a majority in Congress after many years without it. From day one, they
acted to create a climate of political hostility against President Clinton.
They tried to overrule him, they dug up scandals… Today, this behavior still
continues: Republicans adopt a position of boycott towards institutions they do
not control.

And this causes the institutional system to falter.

It's not that the Republicans are
worse or more combative people: the problem lies in the country's own
institutional design, which creates incentives for this to happen. That's my
thesis.

So this is a problem with a long past. In fact, it originates
in the constitution itself.

In the 18th century, when the United
States approved its Magna Carta, they were undertaking an experiment: to
establish a republic in a large country. This did not exist anywhere, and in a
way, it could be said that the U.S. has had to pay for the novelty of this
undertaking. They drew up a constitution very much intended to defend
themselves against the British, French and Spanish armies, which still had
colonies at their borders. Therefore, foreign policy was the core element. With
the creation of the United States, the newly independent states that were part
of it wanted to have a firmer government. Throughout the centuries, foreign
policy has remained the axis of the American system. We saw this, for example,
during the Second World War or the Cold War. Now, with Russia and China there
is some nostalgia to relive times like the Cold War, though the present
situation is not comparable. When there is a clear and threatening enemy,
foreign policy takes over and the whole country pulls together to face the
threat. On the other hand, when the enemy is more abstract, a lot of internal
issues surface that have never been resolved.

Such as?

There are many of them. Obama's health
care program, which didn't quite work; issues related to education; border
control and the wave of immigrants who want to enter the country; the use of
firearms; abortion; legislation on transgender people; the constant racial
tensions… These are internal issues that have never been addressed. With the American
institutional system, resolving these conflicts through two institutions ruled
by two different parties blocking each other is very complicated. The parties
being unable to solve problems has led to the appearance of social movements
such as Me Too or Black Lives Matter, but also the Tea Party or the
anti-vaccine movement.



Has political polarization translated into growing social
polarization?

In some previous conflicts, such as
the years of the Cold War, the government tried to create a certain climate of
fear among the population. They were encouraged to build atomic shelters in
their homes, there were drills in schools… Most people, however, moved away
from the hysteria and led a normal life. In fact, in the 1950s, society
progressed a lot, with the massification of automobiles, the entry of television
and appliances into the household, Coca-Cola, Hollywood… Similarly, the current
polarization is much stronger politically than socially. In fact, the
polarization is inflammatory and a spectacle, but the vast majority of people
are not polarized. Only 2% of voters go to Donald Trump's rallies, for example.
He demonizes immigrants, but there is no news of civil conflict with
immigrants.

In your book, you often remind us that America is huge.

One of the things I least expected to
find in the country when I went to live there was the great territorial
fragmentation. This is not the United States of America: it is the Disunited
States of America. I can identify at least six different countries within its
borders, such as the East Coast, the Midwest, Texas, California, the South…
There are territories with great differences and certain sentiments towards
others, but they have built the nation based on sharing a flag, a currency and
a language.



Has the size of the country also conditioned the
effectiveness of the institutional system?

When they made the Constitution, the delegates were very
inspired by Montesquieu. In fact, the French thinker is the most cited author
in the deliberations of the Americans. The author could not speak English, but
he had visited England to analyze its political system and be able to describe
it in a chapter of the book The Spirit of the Laws (1748). In
the United States, they took this as a reference. The problem was that, in
reality, the British system that the intellectual described had been out of
date for over a century. The person who instructed him during the visit was a
monarchist who had been expelled years ago from the House of Lords for
conspiring to restore the absolute monarchy, had gone into exile in France and
spoke French. He explained Britain's medieval monarchy to Montesquieu,
Montesquieu reproduced it in his book and in Philadelphia, the delegates took
inspiration from it, replacing the king with an executive president with many
powers. The result was the creation of a republic in a huge country. It was
unprecedented. The model is still unique in the world, the Americans themselves
did not even implement it in other countries, such as Germany or Japan, after
the Second World War.

What measures do you think should be incorporated into the
system to combat the malfunction you describe?

I dedicate the last chapter of the
book to this. I make suggestions for institutional reforms, but I don't propose
a new constitution. I try to identify real examples that are already moving in
the right direction, such as the reform of the electoral system that already
works at the local and state levels in some states, with elections with a
second round. Cooperation should increase between Congress and the president.
Currently, there are already some department secretaries who periodically visit
Congress to report back. Cooperation between Washington and the states still
has much room for improvement. That role should be played by the Senate, but
it's too partisan. There is a way to go, and the Constitution would not need to
be changed much to move towards a more parliamentary system. But confrontational
partisanship makes institutional reforms very difficult.

Personal website: www.josepcolomer.com




La polarización política en Estados Unidos

Orígenes
y actualidad de un conflicto permanente

Josep
M. Colomer

Saber más

Josep M.
ColomerComing soon in English:CLICK - Taylor & Francis - Routledge

 

#MeToo – nach über fünf Jahren ist dieser Hashtag immer noch nahezu jeder Person ein Begriff. Der Aufschrei über sexualisierte Gewalt und Machtmissbrauch im Jahr 2017 war groß. Frauen auf der ganzen Welt solidarisierten sich mit den Opfern von sexualisierter Gewalt oder teilten ihre eigenen Geschichten. Und heute? Wie hat sich #MeToo entwickelt? Endete die Thematik in genervtem Kopfschütteln? Gilt die Debatte als beendet? Fünf Jahre nach dem ersten Aufschrei stellt sich nun die Frage: Hat sich etwas verändert und das spürbar für die breite Öffentlichkeit?Eines kann klar gesagt werden: Die Medien beschäftigen sich auch heute noch mit dem Thema des Machtmissbrauchs, des Machtungleichgewichts und mit sexualisierter Gewalt. Diese Thematik und der damit stark verbundene Feminismus sind in aller Munde. Ist dies ein Verdienst der #MeToo-Debatte aus dem Jahr 2017? Oder war die Debatte ein reines Internetphänomen, das folgenlos im Sand verlief?Diese Fragen standen im Zentrum der Recherche zu dieser Ausarbeitung. Ich möchte mich der Frage widmen, ob #MeToo mehr als folgenloser Klicktivismus war. Hierfür beginne ich mit einigen Begriffsdefinitionen, die inhaltlich wichtig sind für die Fragestellung, um anschließend Ursprung und Entwicklung der Bewegung zu betrachten. Zusätzlich wird auf die Kritik an der #MeToo-Debatte eingegangen, um einige der Kritikpunkte zu entschärfen. Die Veränderungen, die #MeToo eventuell erzielen konnte, werden im Anschluss beschrieben und zwar in Bezug auf Hollywood sowie auf die allgemeine Öffentlichkeit insbesondere in Deutschland.Sexismus, sexuelle Belästigung und sexuelle GewaltIn dieser Seminararbeit wird häufig über diese Begriffe gesprochen, weshalb diese einer Definition bedürfen, um Unklarheiten vorzubeugen.Sexismus ist eine voreingenommene, vorurteilsbehaftete Verhaltensweise, die Menschen aufgrund ihres Geschlechtes diskriminiert. Dies kann auch durch Menschen des gleichen Geschlechtes erfolgen. Meist beruht Sexismus auf einem ungleichen Machtverhältnis.Sexuelle Belästigung kann aufgrund von vorherrschendem Sexismus entstehen. Als sexuelle Belästigung werden unter anderem sexuelle Anspielungen sowie ungewollte Berührungen gezählt. Sexuelle Belästigung führt bei den Betroffenen zu einem Zustand des Unwohlseins.Sexuelle Gewalt (dazu zählt auch sexueller Missbrauch) ist ein Übergriff, der durch körperliche Gewalt erfolgt. Dieser kann auch zu ungewolltem Geschlechtsverkehr führen (vgl. Krassnig-Plass 2020, S. 13ff.).Soziale MedienDa das Thema dieser Seminararbeit ihre Anfänge in den Sozialen Medien nahm, bedarf es auch hier einer Begriffsbestimmung. "Soziale Medien" ist ein inflationär genutzter Begriff. Doch was genau sind "Soziale Medien"? Und warum werden sie als "soziale" Medien beschrieben (Scheffler 2014)?Als Soziale Medien oder "social media" werden Massenmedien bezeichnet, die ausschließlich im Internet präsent sind. Als "sozial" werden diese Medien bezeichnet, da sie die Nutzer*Innen verknüpfen. Über die Plattformen können Meinungen, Informationen und Erfahrungen auf schnellem und direktem Wege ausgetauscht werden. Jede*r Nutzer*In kann selbst Inhalte erstellen oder auf bereits vorhandene Inhalte reagieren. Dies kann durch Texte, Audios, Videos oder Bilder geschehen. Meist verschwimmen die Grenzen zwischen Konsument*Innen und Produzent*Innen. Soziale Medien können sowohl bekannte als auch fremde Menschen miteinander vernetzen.Soziale Medien stehen ihren Nutzer*Innen meist kostenlos zur Verfügung. Um sich zu finanzieren, sammeln sie in der Regel Daten der Nutzer*Innen, um gezielte Werbung oder Inhalte zu schalten, die für diese interessant sein könnten.Ein wichtiger Aspekt der sozialen Medien ist also die Partizipation, das Mitwirken und Teilnehmen an Diskussionen des gesellschaftlichen Lebens. Durch die Mitwirkung und Teilnahme in den Sozialen Medien steigt das gesellschaftliche Engagement. Feministischer AktivismusFeminismus bezeichnet eine Bewegung, die Diskriminierung von Frauen beseitigen möchte und eine Gleichstellung der Geschlechter in allen Lebensbereichen anstrebt (vgl. bpb 2021). Aktivismus bedeutet, dass sich Bürger*Innen aktiv für einen Wandel einsetzen. Es gibt sehr vielfältige Möglichkeiten, Aktivismus zu betreiben. Aktivismus ist eine Art Protest und stellt bestehende Regeln in Frage. Diese bestehenden Regeln werden im Aktivismus manchmal vorsätzlich gebrochen, um den gesellschaftlichen Wandel voranzutreiben.Die Fridays for Future-Bewegung ist ein Beispiel für Aktivismus. Schüler*Innen protestierten während der Schulzeit, um auf die Klimakrise aufmerksam zu machen. Hierbei wurde die Schulpflicht ignoriert und somit eine bestehende Regel gebrochen. Aktivismus kann durch Gruppen oder auch Einzelpersonen ausgeführt werden. Meist erfolgt Aktivismus, um Einfluss auf Politik und Entscheidungsträger*Innen zu nehmen (vgl. Hamer 2020).Feministischer Aktivismus ist ein zusammengesetzter Begriff. Hier setzen sich Feminist*Innen aktiv ein und streben einen Wandel in der Gesellschaft an. Dieser Wandel soll die Ungerechtigkeit zwischen den Geschlechtern beenden. Auch Männer können Feministen sein, wenn sie sich für das Ausräumen der Ungerechtigkeiten einsetzen.Es gibt verschiedene Arten von Aktivismus. Bei der #MeToo-Bewegung handelt es sich um einen feministischen Aktivismus, der im Internet stattfand und der auch oftmals als "Klicktivismus" bezeichnet wird.KlicktivismusDie Sozialen Medien bieten vielseitige Möglichkeiten zur Partizipation. Durch die digitalen Angebote kann die Gesellschaft mitgestaltet werden. Der Begriff "Klicktivismus" bezeichnet hierbei eine Beteiligung, vorwiegend zu politischen Themen, die durch die Nutzung digitaler Inhalte in den digitalen Medien entsteht, beispielsweise durch Petitionen im Netz, Geld sammeln oder auch durch Ankündigung von Demonstrationen. Es werden somit viele Menschen gleichzeitig erreicht. Es können Beiträge kommentiert oder geteilt werden. "Klicktivismus" setzt sich aus den beiden Begriffen "klicken" und "Aktivismus" zusammen. Klicken beschreibt hierbei, dass es sich um ein reines Phänomen im Internet handelt (vgl. bpb 2022).Diese spezielle Form des Aktivismus kann zu neuen politischen und gesellschaftlichen Diskursen führen oder bestehende Diskurse verändern. Allerdings neigt der Klicktivismus dazu, schwächer zu sein als realer Aktivismus. Dies wird dadurch begründet, dass es eines geringeren Aufwands bedarf, eine Petition zu unterschreiben oder einen Beitrag zu teilen, als aktiv zu einer Demonstration zu gehen. Die Hemmschwelle ist eine viel niedrigere. Aus diesem Grund gibt es häufiger eine größere Gruppe von Menschen im Internet, die an dem Online-Aktivismus teilnehmen, jedoch nicht bereit sind, an einer Demonstration teilzunehmen. Dies schwächt den Klicktivismus deutlich ab. Aktivismus im realen Leben erzielt meist eine größere Wirkung.Hashtag-AktivismusBei der #MeToo-Debatte handelt es sich um einen Aktivismus, der im Internet seinen Ursprung hatte. Ein Hinweis darauf ist unter anderem das Rautensymbol, das für diese Bewegung gleich zu Beginn benutzt wurde. Dieses Rautensymbol wird in den sozialen Plattformen, wie beispielsweise Instagram oder Twitter, als Hashtag bezeichnet. Hashtags werden benutzt, um Schlagwörter in einem Post, einem Artikel oder ähnlichem einzubauen. Eingeführt wurde dieses Symbol durch Twitter, um inhaltliche Verknüpfungen zu schaffen.Ein Begriff, der mir bei der Recherche häufig begegnet ist, ist der Begriff des "Hashtag-Aktivismus". Bei dieser Form des Aktivismus wird ein bestimmtes Schlagwort hinter dem Rautensymbol eingefügt. Unter diesem Hashtag können dann beispielweise, wie bei #MeToo, persönliche Geschichten und Meinungen geteilt werden. Dies kann auch für sozialen Protest genutzt werden. Auch die #MeToo-Bewegung entstand durch einen Hashtag (vgl. Hochschule der Medien, o.D.).Die Sozialen Medien können aufmerksam machen auf Themen, die in der Politik keinen oder zu wenig Raum finden, und es kann den Diskurs in der Politik sowie in der Gesellschaft entfachen und verändern. Konnte die #MeToo-Bewegung dies erreichen? Oder war die Bewegung ein folgenloser Klicktivismus? Im Folgenden wird die #MeToo-Debatte näher betrachtet.#MeToo-BewegungBewegungen entstehen aufgrund von gesellschaftlichen Konflikten. Sie reagieren auf Missstände und durch die Bewegungen werden gezielt Veränderungen angestrebt. Dies kann auch durch Protest geschehen (vgl. bpb 2021b). Meist werden im Zuge von sozialen Bewegungen Debatten geführt oder sie liegen sozialen Bewegungen zugrunde. Debatten sind öffentliche Streitgespräche.Bei der Thematik #MeToo wird oft von einer Debatte oder einer Bewegung gesprochen, da #MeToo Züge beider Phänomene aufweist. Bei #MeToo wird auf gezielte Veränderungen gesetzt, wie es bei einer (sozialen) Bewegung der Fall ist, und es werden öffentliche Streitgespräche über weitere Vorgehensweisen geführt. Die Trennlinie der beiden Begriffe ist in dieser Thematik unscharf.Ursprung der BewegungIm Oktober 2017 erlangte das Hashtag #MeToo große Aufmerksamkeit. Seinen Anfang nahm der Hashtag auf Twitter und innerhalb weniger Tage und Wochen wurde er auch auf anderen Plattformen verwendet. Bereits innerhalb weniger Wochen wurden unter dem Hashtag 12 Millionen Bilder, Geschichten und Erlebnisse öffentlich geteilt.Doch was bedeutet dieser Hashtag eigentlich genau? Und wie kam es zu diesem Hashtag? Der Ausspruch "Me too" hat bereits über zwei Jahrzehnte vor der weltweiten Aufmerksamkeit seinen Ursprung. Die Aktivistin Tarana Burke gilt als Begründerin des Ausdrucks. Seit Tarana 14 Jahre alt ist, setzte sie sich vor allem für dunkelhäutige Frauen ein, die Opfer von sexueller Gewalt geworden waren.Auch Tarana Burke selbst wurde Opfer von sexueller Gewalt. Als sie sich an ein lokales Zentrum für Opfer von sexueller Gewalt wandte, um Hilfe zu bekommen, wurde sie abgewiesen. Hilfe konnte ihr nur angeboten werden, wenn zuvor die Polizei eingeschaltet wurde. Daraufhin arbeitete sie an einem Programm, das Opfer sexualisierter Gewalt unterstützen sollte. Dies ermöglichte sie mithilfe von Bürgerorganisationen, Workshops und später auch durch die Sozialen Medien.Tarana Burke begann an Schulen in den USA Workshops zum Thema sexualisierte Gewalt zu geben. Im Rahmen eines Workshops in einer High-School in Alabama sollten die Mädchen, wenn sie Hilfe brauchten, einen Zettel mit den Worten "Me too" (deutsch: ich auch) schreiben. Dies war der Moment, in dem #MeToo ins Leben gerufen wurde. Tarana beschrieb ihre Arbeit wie folgt:"I knew when you exchange empathy with somebody, there's an immediate connection you make with a person by saying 'me too'. That's what the work is about. It's about survivors talking to each other" (Amnesty International 2021).Skandal um Harvey WeinsteinHarvey Weinstein ist ein US-amerikanischer Filmproduzent mit eigenen Produktionsfirmen in Hollywood. Vielen Schauspieler*Innen konnte er über mehrere Jahrzehnte hinweg zu Bekanntheit verhelfen. Gerüchte über seinen sexistischen Umgang mit Frauen gab es schon lange, weshalb Jodi Kantor und Megan Twohey diesen auf den Grund gehen wollten. Zusätzlich wurden sie dadurch angetrieben, dass Frauen zwar mittlerweile über mehr Macht verfügten, jedoch immer noch sexueller Belästigung ausgesetzt waren. Die Frauen, die Opfer von sexualisierter Gewalt wurden, litten häufig im Verborgenen, während die Täter ungestört Karriere machen konnten.Im Jahr 2017 begannen die beiden Journalistinnen für die New York Times über Harvey Weinstein zu recherchieren. Sie kontaktierten Schauspielerinnen, die mit Harvey Weinstein zusammenarbeiteten. In den wenigen Fällen, in denen es ihnen gelang, mit einer Schauspielerin zu sprechen, fielen die Gespräche sehr kurz aus. Zu groß war die Scham und auch die Angst, mit ihrer Geschichte an die Öffentlichkeit zu gehen. Viele lebten in großer Diskretion, um ihre Privatsphäre so gut wie möglich vor der Öffentlichkeit zu schützen. Einige der Schauspielerinnen hatten außerdem Verschwiegenheitserklärungen unterschrieben und fürchteten sich vor den rechtlichen Konsequenzen. Einfacher war es, mit ehemaligen Angestellten Weinsteins zu sprechen. Aber auch diese verharmlosten sein Verhalten oftmals (vgl. Kantor et al. 2020).Die erste Schauspielerin, die ihr Schweigen brach und mit den beiden Journalistinnen in Kontakt trat, war Rose McGowan. Sie erzählte, wie sie 1997 von Harvey Weinstein sexuell missbraucht wurde, nachdem sie sich zu einem Gespräch über einen bevorstehenden Film verabredet hatten. Sie beschuldigte jedoch nicht nur Weinstein, sondern die ganze männlich dominierte Filmindustrie in Hollywood."Das Problem geht weit über Weinstein hinaus, […]. Hollywood [ist] ein organisiertes System für den Missbrauch von Frauen (vgl. Kantor et al. 2020, S. 24)."Daraufhin brachen unter anderem eine ehemalige Assistentin Weinsteins und weitere Schauspielerinnen ihr Schweigen und berichteten über sexuelle Übergriffe durch Weinstein. Zelda Perkins, eine Londoner Produzentin, brach ihr Schweigen trotz einer unterschriebenen Verschwiegenheitserklärung. Auch ein ehemaliger männlicher Mitarbeiter Weinsteins, der sein Wissen immer mehr als Belastung empfand, half dabei, den Machtmissbrauch durch Weinstein aufzudecken (vgl. Kantor et al. 2020). Am 5. Oktober 2017 veröffentlichten sie dann ihre Recherchen über die mutmaßlichen sexuellen Belästigungen und Übergriffe durch Harvey Weinstein.Ausgelöst durch die Berichtserstattung ermutigte Alyssa Milano, eine US-amerikanische Schauspielerin, Frauen dazu, ihre Erfahrungen mit sexueller Belästigung öffentlich zu teilen. Dies geschah, indem Frauen ihren Twitter-Posts unter dem Hashtag #MeToo veröffentlichten (vgl. DER SPIEGEL 2017). Die journalistischen Veröffentlichungen sowie der Post von Alyssa Milano legten den Grundstein für einen öffentlichen Diskurs über Machtmissbrauch und sexuellen Missbrauch von Männern an Frauen (vgl. Kurtulgil 2020).Kritik an #MeTooEin besonders häufig angesprochener Kritikpunkt während der Debatte war, dass viele Frauen unglaubwürdig zu sein schienen. Viele zweifelten an der Glaubwürdigkeit der Frauen, die ihre Geschichte unter dem Hashtag #MeToo teilten und Zweifel gab es vor allem auch an den Frauen, die ihre Erfahrung mit sexueller Gewalt im Hinblick auf Harvey Weinstein äußerten. Es wurde in Frage gestellt, weshalb sich die Frauen erst Jahre, teilweise auch erst Jahrzehnte nach den Taten äußerten. Kritisiert wurde auch, ob nicht einige Aussagen überdramatisiert wurden.Laut Experten ist es jedoch üblich, dass sich Opfer von sexualisierter Gewalt erst sehr spät oder gar nicht melden. Als Grund wird ein Scham- und Angstgefühl der Betroffenen genannt. Auch befinden sich einige Opfer noch in den bestehenden Machtverhältnissen und können diesen nicht oder nur schwer entkommen. Die Dunkelziffer dieser Taten schätzen einige Experten als sehr hoch ein (vgl. ZDF 2021).Auch wird #MeToo oft für ein vermehrtes Auftreten von Unsicherheiten im Umgang mit Annäherungsversuchen seitens männlicher Personen kritisiert. Beklagt wird, dass die Debatte eine Verbotskultur entstehen ließe. Flirten fühle sich an wie eine Straftat und zerstöre somit Annäherungsversuche. Diesem Kritikpunkt kann entgegengesetzt werden, dass jedoch auch die Chance entsteht, dass die klassischen Geschlechterrollen aufgebrochen werden. Die Rolle des "aktiven Mannes" und der "passiven Frau" könnte dadurch entstigmatisiert werden (vgl. Braun 2021). Des Weiteren kann dieses Argument entkräftet werden, indem bewusst gemacht wird, dass Annäherungen einvernehmlich geschehen müssen. Es kann zu einer Sensibilisierung führen, sodass ein "Nein" auch als "Nein" gewertet wird.Kritik wird zudem daran geäußert, dass sexuelle Belästigung, sexuelle Gewalt und sexueller Missbrauch nichts mit der Ungleichheit zwischen Männern und Frauen zu tun hat. Diesem Argument kann entgegengesetzt werden, dass vor allem in den USA häufig die Machtposition von Männern missbraucht wurde, um Frauen sexuell zu belästigen (vgl. Krassnig-Plass 2020).Anknüpfend an den vorherigen Kritikpunkt ist der Folgende: es wird kaum bis gar nicht über sexuelle Gewalt und sexuellen Missbrauch durch Frauen gesprochen. Frauen werden in die Opferrolle gedrängt. Laut einer Studie sind jedoch 75 bis 90 Prozent der Sexualstraftäter Männer. Was nicht bedeutet, dass es diese Fälle nicht gibt, doch die Gefahr, sexuelle Gewalt als Frau durch einen Mann zu erfahren, ist laut Statistik deutlich höher (vgl. UBSKM).Als sehr wichtiger Kritikpunkt, gerade im Hinblick auf diese Ausarbeitung, wird oft genannt, dass die #MeToo-Debatte eben nur ein öffentliches Streitgespräch darstelle und keine spürbare Veränderung in der Gesellschaft bewirke, da es nur online stattfand und es nicht schaffte, einen Bogen zur Realität zu schlagen. Ob dieses Argument berechtigt oder haltlos ist, wird im nächsten Punkt betrachtet. Es wird beschrieben, ob und welche Veränderungen es durch die #MeToo-Bewegung in Hollywood und in der breiten Öffentlichkeit gab (vgl. Toyka-Seid 2022a).Veränderungen durch #MeToo in HollywoodNachdem die Anschuldigungen am 5. Oktober 2017 veröffentlicht wurden, entschuldigte sich Weinstein, da er sich offenbar falsch gegenüber einigen Kolleginnen verhalten habe, stritt jedoch ab, sexuell übergriffig geworden zu sein. Den Opfern warf er vor, mental instabil zu sein. Den Journalistinnen wurde mit einer Anzeige wegen Verleumdung und einer Schadensersatzforderung von 100 Millionen Dollar gedroht.Am 6. Oktober, einen Tag nach der Veröffentlichung, meldeten sich weitere Frauen bei den Journalistinnen, um ihnen von ihrem Missbrauch durch Weinstein zu erzählen. In den folgenden Tagen gaben mehrere Mitarbeiter*Innen Weinsteins ihren Job auf. Weinstein wurde infolge der Veröffentlichungen aus seiner Produktionsfirma "The Weinstein Company" entlassen. Ein halbes Jahr später meldete die Firma Insolvenz an und wurde im Juli 2018 verkauft (vgl. Kantor et al. 2020).Am 13. Oktober wurden in der Zeitung "New Yorker" 13 Opfer Weinsteins zitiert. Drei davon warfen ihm Vergewaltigung vor. Im Februar 2020 hatten fast einhundert Frauen ihre Erfahrungen mit Harvey Weinstein öffentlich gemacht. Die Anschuldigungen reichten von sexueller Belästigung bis hin zur Vergewaltigung. Viele dieser Vergehen waren allerdings bis zu dem Prozess 2020 schon verjährt oder erfüllten nicht den Tatbestand eines Strafdeliktes. 2020 wurde Harvey Weinstein in einem Prozess schuldig gesprochen und zu einer Haftstrafe von 23 Jahren verurteilt. 2022 stand er nochmals vor Gericht und wurde in weiteren Anklagepunkten schuldig gesprochen. Ihm drohen weitere 24 Jahre Haft (vgl. Tagesschau 2022).Nach dem Skandal stieg die Zahl der Regisseurinnen in Hollywood an. Weibliche Regisseurinnen schufen eine respektvollere Arbeitsumgebung. Außerdem zeigte die #MeToo-Debatte generell das Problem der Unterrepräsentation von Frauen in Führungspositionen in Hollywood auf (vgl. Luo, Zhang 2020).Verändert hat sich das Bewusstsein, dass sexuelle Belästigung und sexuelle Übergriffe nicht unbestraft bleiben können. Zahllose Männer, die in der Öffentlichkeit standen, mussten sich ihrem Verhalten stellen. Die Taten vieler Männer blieben somit nicht mehr unbestraft und Frauen begannen, ihr Schweigen zu brechen. Laut der New York Times verloren rund 200 Männer im Zuge der #MeToo-Debatte ihren Job. Rund die Hälfte dieser Jobs wurde anschließend von Frauen besetzt (vgl. Carlsen et al. 2018).Veränderungen durch #MeToo in der ÖffentlichkeitBereits eine Woche nach dem Aufruf von Alyssa Milano wurde der Hashtag #MeToo bereits millionenfach genutzt. Nicht nur über Twitter, sondern auch über andere Plattformen wie beispielsweise Instagram oder Facebook. Unterstützung bekam sie zudem von bekannten Schauspielerinnen, die bereit waren, ihre Erfahrungen mit sexueller Belästigung oder sexuellem Missbrauch öffentlich zu teilen. Dadurch gelang es, das Thema sexuelle Belästigung in den Fokus der breiten Öffentlichkeit zu rücken und es beschränkte sich nicht mehr nur auf die Filmbranche.Bald wurde außerdem deutlich, dass sexuelle Belästigungen nahezu alle Bereiche des Lebens betreffen. In allen Branchen, in denen es Machtpositionen gibt, wurden diese ausgenutzt und Frauen sexuell belästigt. Weltweit wurde daraufhin gefordert, dass sich das Machtgefälle zwischen den Geschlechtern ändern müsse. Es entstanden zudem weitere Debatten, die sich in einem breiten Themenfeld bewegten, es ging um Geschlechterdiskriminierung oder auch "Catcalling" (verbale sexuelle Belästigung, die keinen eigenen Strafbestand darstellt) (vgl. ZEIT ONLINE, o. D.). 2020 wurde deshalb im Zuge einer Online-Petition gefordert, dass verbale sexuelle Belästigung als Ordnungswidrigkeit geahndet werden sollte.In Großbritannien veranlasste die mediale Aufmerksamkeit Frauen dazu, über sexuelle Übergriffe von britischen Abgeordneten zu sprechen. Daraufhin wurde unter anderem der Verteidigungsminister Michael Fallon aus seinem Amt entlassen (vgl. Kantor et al. 2020).Eines hat die #MeToo-Debatte jedoch besonders deutlich gemacht. Sexuelle Gewalt und Machtmissbrauch sind keine individuellen Probleme, sondern betreffen eine Vielzahl an Menschen. Frauen wurde bewusst gemacht, dass sie nicht die Schuld an sexueller Gewalt tragen. Die wesentliche Stärke der Bewegung stellte den gesellschaftlichen Rückhalt, die Unterstützung dar. Das Bewusst-machen und Enttabuisieren dieser wichtigen Thematik führte zu einem Anstieg an geforderten Beratungsgesprächen über sexualisierte Gewalt. Es wurde Frauen die Angst genommen, sich zu äußern, ihre eigenen Grenzen zu kennen und diese zu wahren (vgl. Krassnig-Plass 2020).Die Bewegung sorgte also für eine nachhaltige Sensibilisierung im Hinblick auf sexualisierte Gewalt. Gerade bei der Organisation Weisser Ring e.V. melden sich seit 2017 immer mehr Menschen, um Hilfe nach einer Vergewaltigung oder bei Stalking zu bekommen.Die #MeToo-Bewegung machte außerdem deutlich, dass es immer noch ein Machtgefälle zwischen Männern und Frauen gibt und dadurch Sexismus und sexualisierte Gewalt entsteht. Es signalisiert, dass die Gesellschaft noch immer nicht bei der Gleichberechtigung angelangt ist. Die Debatte kann also als Indikator für die noch bestehende Kluft zwischen Männern und Frauen in nahezu allen beruflichen Branchen und Bereichen des alltäglichen Lebens gewertet werden. Das größte Verdienst hat die #MeToo-Bewegung also in der Öffentlichkeit gehabt, indem das öffentliche Denken angeregt wurde und existierende Unterschiede zwischen Männern und Frauen bewusst und öffentlich gemacht wurden.Feminismus ist in der breiten Masse der Bevölkerung angekommen und wird mehr denn je thematisiert und unterstützt. Feminismus generell verläuft in Wellen. Seit #MeToo und durch die Nutzung digitaler Medien wird von der vierten Welle des Feminismus gesprochen. #MeToo könnte einen Beitrag zur Entstehung dieser Welle geleistet haben (vgl. Schwarzkopf 2019).FazitDie #MeToo-Debatte entwickelte sich zu einer sehr wichtigen Bewegung, über die bis weit in die breite Öffentlichkeit hinein gesprochen wurde. Doch konnten wirklich spürbare Veränderungen hervorgerufen werden oder handelt es sich nur um folgenlosen Klicktivismus?In der vorliegenden Arbeit wurde beschrieben wie #MeToo entstand, wie es sich im Netz entwickelte und welche Veränderungen die Bewegung in der Realität hervorgerufen hat. Dabei wurde aufgezeigt, dass #MeToo seinen Anfang im realen Leben nahm, dann über das Internet an weltweite Öffentlichkeit gelangte und dort eine wichtige Debatte auslöste. Dies geschah sowohl online als auch in der realen Gesellschaft.#MeToo ist eine der größten medialen Bewegungen der letzten Jahre und steht für das Bewusst-machen von noch bestehenden Ungleichheiten zwischen Männern und Frauen. Sexualisierte Gewalt wurde enttabuisiert und mehr Frauen wurden dazu gebracht, über ihre Erfahrungen zu sprechen. Anfangs wurde Hilfe im Netz in Anspruch genommen und dann bei dafür spezialisierten Organisationen in der Realität.#MeToo legte einen wichtigen Grundstein für weitere feministische Entwicklungen im Netz und der Realität. Längst wird #MeToo nicht mehr nur als Internetphänomen gesehen. Harvey Weinstein und viele andere Männer, die ihre Machtpositionen ausnutzten, wurden angeklagt und aus ihren Ämtern entlassen. Dies zeigt einen Erfolg der Bewegung, der außerhalb des Internet messbar ist.Auch arbeiten deutlich mehr Frauen in früher hauptsächlich von Männern besetzten Berufen. Auch dies ist ein spürbarer Erfolg. Aber vor allem hat #MeToo den öffentlichen Diskurs über sexuelle Gewalt, Machtmissbrauch und Ungleichheit zwischen Männern und Frauen verändert. Welche Veränderungen es zusätzlich in den nächsten Jahren geben wird, wird sich zeigen. Den Grundstein für Veränderungen hat die Debatte jedoch durch Bewusstmachung des Problems gelegt.#MeToo hat gezeigt, dass Veränderungen auch durch das Internet und die Sozialen Medien geschehen können. Es hat eine neue Form aufgezeigt, um für Rechte einzustehen. Bewusst gemacht hat es außerdem, dass ein "Internetphänomen" auch in gesellschaftliche Strukturen eingreifen kann und die Macht hat, diese nachhaltig zu verändern.Abschließend kann die Frage, ob es sich bei der #MeToo-Debatte um folgenlosen Klicktivismus handelt, mit Nein beantwortet werden. Einzelne Ereignisse, wie das Entlassen von mehr als 200 Männern in Machtpositionen oder der Prozess gegen Harvey Weinstein sind Erfolge, die sich messen lassen und auf #MeToo zurückzuführen sind. Es handelt sich nicht nur um ein Phänomen, das im Internet entstanden ist und dort geblieben ist. Es ging über die Sozialen Medien hinaus bis weit in die Gesellschaft hinein und veränderte den öffentlichen Diskurs.Literatur Amnesty International. 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der Strasse sexualisiert". ZEIT ONLINE. Abgerufen am 31. Januar 2023, https://www.zeit.de/zustimmung?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zeit.de%2Fcampus%2F2020-10%2Fcatcalling-sexuelle-belaestigung-frauen-sexismus Kantor,
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Quotes from Josep Colomer:Constitutional Polarization. A Critical Review of the U.S. Political SystemRoutledge, 2023.  CLICK to purchaseA collection of 6 posts. 1 - Why a Federation? The aim of the Convention in Philadelphia was not to experiment with democracy in a large territory, but to create a "stronger", "firmer" government able to defend the new independent states from the British and other foreign troops still over the continent. The priority was to create a standing army, to pay the debt for the War for Independence, and to introduce the subsequent federal taxes. The basic institutions were the states-appointed Senate and the mighty President with war powers.Some delegates warned that in the new and independent United States, people would not accept, again, taxation without representation. That's why the House of Representatives was embodied as the democratic component of the government. Then, the delegates responded to its perils by designing a series of "filters" and "checks" to prevent the House from prevailing over the other components. The separation of powers and their institutional checks were a cap, intended to tame and temper democracy. NOT A DEMOCRACYMadison warned against "the amazing violence and turbulence of the democratic spirit," and stated, "democratic communities may be unsteady, and be led to action by the impulse of the moment." Later, in the campaign to ratify the Constitution in New York, he would hold that, in the past, democracies "have ever been found spectacles of turbulence and contention … and as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths."Alexander Hamilton would allege that "the zeal for the rights of the people has been a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government." In his view, democracies are manipulated by people who "commence as demagogues and end being tyrants."Gouverneur Morris was an influential delegate from Pennsylvania who is credited as the main redactor of the final text of the Constitution. He also cautioned against "the turbulence, the precipitation, changeableness, and excess" of democratic assemblies.Other delegates in the Convention referred to "the fury" and "the folly" of democracy. One confessed, "It's the anarchy, or rather worse than anarchy of a pure democracy, which I fear." Another simply stated, "democracy, the worst of all political evils." DIVINE HANDAbout the divine hand guiding the constituents, see, for example:     "America felt that the hand of providence was on the young republic … There can be little question that the hand of providence has been on a nation which finds a Washington, a Lincoln or a Roosevelt when it needs him," Seymour M. Lipset, American Exceptionalism, W. W. Norton, 1997, pp. 13–14.    "I can't wait to go to Heaven and meet the Framers and tell them the work that you did in putting together our Constitution is a work of genius. Thank you. It was divinely inspired," Mike Pence, Vice-President of the United States in December 2020. Reported by Gregory Jacob, Counselor of the Vice-President, to the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol, June 16, 2022. 2- An elected MonarchyMONTESQUIEUIn the imaginary Constitution of England described by Montesquieu, the powers of the three institutions were so challenged and limited by mutual checks that the most likely result would be governmental paralysis. He held that in order to prevent abuses, "Power should stop ["arrête" in French] power"; brake, not just "check" as it was sloppily translated. In Montesquieu's words, with these rules, "these three powers should naturally form a state of repose or inaction." In the perhaps unlikely or infrequent case that public affairs required some action, he conceded that the three powers should be "forced to move, but still in concert." Madison would only ambiguously paraphrase, "Ambition must be made to counteract ambition."   There was a problem: Montesquieu had misunderstood how the British system actually worked. What he described was closer to an old-fashioned, outdated model that, in the best of cases, could be identified with a transitory, provisional past period in England's history. It did not correspond with the political system in motion when he visited London, and even less with practices contemporary to the Framers gathered in Philadelphia several decades later. By following Montesquieu's obsolete account, the authors of the US Constitution misunderstood the source.MONARCHYThe monarchical proposal was most explicitly presented by Alexander Hamilton. He did not attend most of the Convention sessions, but on June 18, he showed up, took the floor, and delivered a prepared speech for more than five hours, no break for lunch, that left the delegates flabbergasted. Hamilton proposed a president that would be chosen by electors and serve for life. Such an "elective Monarch" would appoint the state governors and could veto state laws. At the federal level, the president would also be the arbiter for expected regular conflict between the Senate also appointed for life and the popular House: "This check is a Monarch," he suggested, "capable of resisting the popular current." The president, with absolute veto over congressional legislation, would be "a salutary check upon the legislative body." According to Ron Chernow, his biographer, Hamilton had written in his personal notes for his Convention speech that the president would not only be appointed for life but also "ought to be hereditary and to have so much power that it will not be his interest to risk much to acquire more." Yet, probably sensing the audience's reluctance to his already delivered proposals, he skipped that part.    Adams, who would become the US' first vice president and the second president, was suspected of having monarchist leanings. He would propose calling George Washington "His Majesty the President," thought hereditary rule inevitable, and, after Washington's childless tenure prevented it, he would be the first to make his son run for president.3-The Founders' Portraits in WashingtonWhat one can see and guess about these characters by looking at eight portraits,  the first five by Gilbert Stuart and the next two by John Trumbull at the National Gallery of Art, and the eighth by Joseph Siffred Duplessis at the National Portrait Gallery.             4- How the System Actually Works CHECKS AND GRIEVANCESAlexander Hamilton clearly lay on the side of scant congressional legislation. He said, "The injury that may possibly be done by defecting a few good laws will be amply compensated by the advantages of preventing a number of bad ones." It was like fasting for the sake of not being poisoned; the result is anemia, not good political health.In practice, there are checks but no balances. The existing blockingmechanisms in the US constitutional system do not produce balances in favor of a few good laws. They are largely unbalanced in favor of the Presidency and its powers, which is aggravated by the biases of the presidential elections.The US constitutional plan, instead of relying upon positive institutionalincentives, such as the expectation of sharing power in the Cabinet, countedon politicians' virtuous behavior. Yet, absent our better angels' motivations, the system of negative checks becomes a machine for sustained conflict. PRESIDENTIALISMThe greatest increase in presidential power has derived from wars. From General George Washington, leader of the Revolutionary War for Independence, through Theodore Roosevelt, a high-level combatant in the Spanish-American War in the Caribbean, eleven of the first twenty-five presidents were war men. Whether as generals, national heroes, or upper-echelon military officers, Andrew Jackson, William Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Franklin Pierce, Ulysses Grant, Rutherford Hayes, James Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, and William McKinley fought in the wars against the British, the Indians, the Mexicans, or, in the Civil War, other Americans, and their military feats helped them to be elected.Alexander Hamilton had already identified the management of foreign affairs as the main way to expand executive powers: "It is of the nature of war to increase the executive, at the expense of the legislative authority." Discussing rates of presidents, historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. observed that war "made it easier for a president to achieve greatness.            5- No Parties, But PolarizationNO PARTIESThe Framers were confident about the future of the republic because they miscalculated that in a great, expanding, and diverse Union with multiple institutional checks, it would be unlikely that nationwide parties could be created. They expected that the best individuals with "enlightened views and virtuous sentiments" would lead the new politics against "the pestilential influence of party animosities" and "the pestilential breath of faction," as scorned by both James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, respectively. Currently, the two major political parties in the US encompass a range of policy proposals and ideological orientations comparable to the typical European system with multiple parties: There are liberals and socialists within the Democratic Party, and conservatives and populists within the Republican Party, with the minor Greens and Libertarians flanking each side. However, the political competition is polarized by two parties or candidates because of the electoral system and the election of the president.POLITICAL, NO SOCIAL POLARIZATION The polarization of parties and candidates is more politically consequential than the polarization of voters. Generally, parties can lead and carry voters in their direction, either to closeness or to distance from each other, but to a limited extent. That is because it is less difficult to coordinate and mobilize a few thousand politicians than millions of voters. If parties and political leaders move to radicalize their positions and provoke polarization, voters may follow and become more polarized in their preferences, but usually less than the politicians and parties come to be. If, conversely, parties moderate and converge in their positions, voters may also moderate themselves but less than the partisan politicians do.FEAR AND NATIONAL FERVOR During the Cold War, many citizens developed a sense of unity, love of patriotic values, and pride in the American way of life. They trusted the rulers, who appeared as their protectors and providers of security. Challenging the government in the middle of a war would have been regarded as treason. In parallel, the ruling officials were able to keep many state secrets, their policy performances were not seriously evaluated, they enjoyed discrete privacy from the media, and gained support and devotion from the public.After the Cold War, without the threat of a nuclear war, the public lost their fear. There was a new openness to indiscretion and transgression. The new political atmosphere became the opposite of the previous period: a general mistrust of government, close scrutiny of corrupt practices, leaks of confidential plans and messages, frequent scandals about politicians' business or private affairs, and loud calls for more transparency and accountability. After the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the "peace dividend" that appeared to be a potential source of domestic progress led instead to domestic mayhem. With just a little exaggeration, one could say that, over the years, the international Cold War was replaced with a domestic cold war.          6- Towards the 2024 ElectionPRIMARIESThe primaries mechanism is a substitute for the formation of multiple parties. To build a majority, in Europe and other democracies, a coalition of multiple parties must be formed after the election; in the US, a coalition of multiple factions within a party must be formed before the election. In European parliamentary systems with multiple parties, the mess comes after the election; sometimes, the formation of a coalition in parliament for the choice of a prime minister takes months. In the US, the mess is before the election; the process of simplifying the pluralistic setting to only two major presidential candidates starts more than a year before Election Day. These alternative experiences both confirm that, in the absence of a traditional monarch, simplifying a complex society to one single executive leader is always a challenging endeavor.The main drawback of the system of partisan primaries is that it may not produce a majority in support for the winning candidate but it can result in the nomination of an extreme or unqualified demagogue who would be rejected by a majority of voters.The turnout in the presidential primaries has increased to nearly 50% of the party voters in the general election since the 2010s. However, the number of primary candidates within each party has also increased, up to double digits in recent seasons, which reduced the support for the winner. In 2016, Donald Trump was voted in the primaries by only 22% of his voters in the general election; Hillary Clinton, by 26% of her votes in the general election; and in 2020, Joe Biden by only 23%.SPLITTING CANDIDATESIf popular participation increases, partisanship becomes more compact, and the potential political pluralism of the country is not well articulated by the party system, third and further candidates reappear. They indirectly made a winner by splitting partisan support in at least four of the first eight presidential elections after the Cold War. The independent Ross Perot split Republican voters twice, in 1992 and 1996, and twice produced a Democratic winner with a minority of popular votes. The other way around, the Green Party's Ralph Nader split Democratic voters in 2000 and produced a Republican winner with a minority of popular votes. Also, the Greens and other candidacies absorbed potential Democratic voters in 2016 and helped make a Republican candidate the winner with a minority of popular votes.CAN TRUMP RETURN?There are also precedents of traitors who persisted in politics, ran for office, were elected, and provoked further turmoil. At least two former presidents joined the Confederacy during the Civil War. Former Whig President John Tyler, who had replaced William Harrison at his death one month after entering office, was first elected to and chaired the Virginia Secession Convention, and during the Civil War, he was elected first to the Provisional Confederation Congress and then to the Confederate House of Representatives. Former Democratic President Franklin Pierce collaborated closely with Confederacy President Jefferson Davis. Also, former President Andrew Johnson was elected senator on an anti-Reconstruction platform.Collection:1- Why a Federation2- An Elected Monarchy3- Psychological Portraits of the Founders and Framers4– How the System Actually Works5- No Parties, But Polarization6- Towards the 2024 Election