What is missing in the political and social discourse in the USA, and why?

The USA leads the world in having the most extensive discourse on political and social issues, supported by the world’s most famous media outlets, think tanks and academic institutes, by the most impressive database and opinion polls.

Despite this, it is increasingly clear that perhaps the most important issues do not get the proper attention in this discourse, so that the most important reforms and changes that are needed in the political system, in society and economy are also neglected, or simply ignored.

What the USA needs more than anything else, from the point of view of the welfare of its own people as well as the entire world, is a sincere, honest agenda based on justice, peace, real democracy and protection of environment and democracy, and this is what has been either most neglected, or else only highly distorted versions, often deliberately distorted, have been able to get some sort of attention in the discourse.

One reason is that the main discourse tends often to be polarized around the two main political parties, both criticizing the stand taken by each other in strong terms, giving the appearance of a big democratic debate but in fact being a very shallow discourse as both the political parties are not even taking up for consideration the changes or reforms that are most needed.

Ironically, while appearing to be engaged in such heated debates, the two leading political parties are actually united in keeping their agenda within the limits set by the deep state, thereby keeping themselves away from the sincere and honest agenda of peace, justice, real democracy and environment protection that is really needed. In the absence of such an agenda being in the discourse at all, all sort of manipulative talk is used to win over supporters and voters leading to the kind of shallow electoral campaigns—delinked strongly from  real reform and change actually needed–that have been seen repeatedly.

In the middle of a huge lot of research being done and a mass of data being generated, there is simultaneously a strong tendency not to interpret the emerging facts in a way that lead to the kind of strongly reasoned exposures and interpretations which can make a very pressing case for systemic change or very basic changes in favor of peace, justice, real democracy and environment protection.

So in the context of several problems ranging from evictions, substance abuse and mental health crisis to forever wars, increase in military or covert interventions and political corruption, we see a strange situation. Reports after reports tell us serious, deeply worrying facts, make some recommendations to solve or reduce problems, but after some years it is seen that the situation has remained as bad as before, if it has not aggravated.

This is bound to happen if the analysis does not go deep enough into the real causes of the problems, in fact is deliberately discouraged from doing so. The entire exercise is aimed clearly at not really disturbing or changing the existing system with all its corruptions and strong vested interests.

To give just one example, the mental health crisis in the USA is clearly very serious as has been brought out in a lot of surveys and studies. Any proper analysis of this would try to find out the very serious problems that exist in the USA society that have led to this crisis, and this in turn would be able to make a strong case for making very basic changes in society.

However instead the trend is to try to explain this in terms of reductionist, one-sided explanations like increase in social media. This is convenient, because it draws away attention from deeper factors and need for systemic change.

This writer made a strong plea for linking the mental health crisis to wider issues (kindly refer to my article titled ‘ Can a better understanding of mental health crisis help the cause of peace’ published in Countercurrents.org dated July 8 2023). This was done with the strong belief, which opens up new hope, that an agenda of reducing internal distress in the USA can get strongly linked to foreign policy based on peace. Justice and peace are inherently linked, and so is environment protection with both peace and justice. Unfortunately such linkages and the agenda based on them does not get adequate attention. However exploring possibilities of linking internal and external reform can be very useful and cam open up new pathways (in this context kindly refer to my article ‘High levels of distress and stress in the USA emphasize need for linking external and internal reform’, published in Countercurrents.org April 24, 2023).  

Bharat Dogra is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now. His recent books include Protecting Earth for Children, Planet in Peril, A Day in 2071, Earth without Borders and Man over Machine—The Path to Peace.