They Don’t Want To

The United States is gearing up these days for the congressional midterm election campaigns scheduled for next November. Yet the world’s attention invariably remains fixed on the U.S. presidential election, almost as though the entire world were itself part of the race. Interest in the presidential contest often rivals — and at times surpasses — attention paid to other major events around the globe.

In the “American Dream,” it can happen that a candidate emerges from the deepest reaches of obscurity, enters the race, and suddenly sees their name reverberate around the world — only to lose and sink just as quickly into the depths of oblivion.

Kamala Harris was a lawyer of Indian and Caribbean heritage who became Vice President under Joe Biden, then a serious contender for the presidency. She lost, stepped away from the spotlight, and faded from public attention. The “American Dream” can be a dream — or a nightmare.

Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska, once seemed to ask: Why not the White House?

The answer might just as easily have been: Why the White House?

Yet the otherwise ordinary homemaker emerged from the political contest bearing the stature of a national candidate and as the author of a memoir that sold a million copies.

A million copies of memoirs about almost nothing, by almost no one?

Yes.

This is America.

Then an African American man with tightly curled hair and dark skin reached — or stormed — the White House. Yet a woman has still failed to do so.

Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State and carried the prestige of that title around the world. Dressed strikingly in red, she strode through Cairo’s Tahrir Square, representing her president, Barack Obama, and standing against Egypt’s president, Hosni Mubarak. Eventually, however, she quietly withdrew into that vast American realm of forgotten figures.

It was a realm Jeffrey Epstein could not endure. He took his own life.

This, if you will, is the American narrative.

An unfolding drama.

“Dallas,” with its endless chapters, its cast of characters, and its domineering, ruthless J.R. — a man who would allow nothing to stand between him and his interests.

America is the image of the “New World,” only written in bold relief.

It is now 250 years old.

But what is a quarter of a millennium compared with the ancient empires?

Can you not see how they are all attempting to return?

Sometimes under the same names, in the same places, and through the same wars.

China. Russia. Greece. Persia. And the lost lands of conquest — all suspended somewhere between the struggle of nations and the struggle of history.

Amid this conflict, at once absurd and terrifying, the owner of towering skyscrapers looks around at his fellow leaders of the Group of Seven and says with a smile:

“I am the president.”

The president of the world, that is — almost.

A seat must still be left for China.

And for Russia — apologies.

Russia is now searching for mercenaries and volunteers. The Tsar himself admits that it is in trouble.

How much better it would have been had he never embarked on a war that no one wants.

If only he had read Britain’s The Times: out of roughly 500,000 potential recruits, only 3,000 answered the call.