Trump’s political suicide and Machiavelli’s lesson on riots: what if they gave birth to good corrections to the US system?

8 January 20213 years ago babelfish

Once, speaking here on Atlantico Quotidiano of a book by the great Victor Davis Hanson, "The Case for Trump", I said of the outgoing president who is a sort of classic "tragic hero", which America desperately needs but which will never be appreciated as it deserves in one's own country. The events of last night in the American capital are somehow the best confirmation. In fact, as the director of this magazine also hinted in his piece yesterday , The Donald , with the line of behavior adopted in recent days and hours, in particular with that "we will never give up" addressed to fellow citizens shortly before if everything started, he basically committed suicide politically. And the chosen modality (consciously or unconsciously) seems to be that of a hero from a Homeric poem or from Greek mythology.

Another, in any case, is the speech to be made on the consequences of the president's "insane gesture", that is, on the thousands of angry citizens who have decided to set out and then break into the sancta santorum of democracy (not only American ), i.e. the United States Congress building. Here, in fact, if we want to say things as they are, the news ends and history begins. As some brilliant commentators have underlined in these hours, primarily Daniele Capezzone, Maria Giovanna Maglie and Vittorio Sgarbi, the insurrection cannot be liquidated with a few contemptuous words of condemnation, in a display of obvious considerations and self-evident statements of principle – it is obvious that violence is never justified, and that the electoral verdict must always be respected, and that democracy is sacred, etc., etc …

In passing , the comment that Sgarbi posted on Facebook leaves little room for rhetoric: “As many as 4 Trump supporters died. If this is the balance of the assault on the congress, it seems clear that it was the demonstrators who suffered the violence. " Obviously, however, the current narrative is of a completely different sign. And above all, little or nothing is said about what happened before, about the "context". On the shadow that weighs on the elections, "stolen" or at least considered as such by a good slice of Americans (not just Trump's followers), it is overlooked as if they were fantasies and delusions of persecution. In this regard, it must be remembered that according to authoritative polls, not only the majority of Republican voters, but also 31 percent of independent ones, and even 17 percent of Democrats are convinced that there has been fraud and that these heavily influenced the election result. With just as much intellectual dishonesty, many are careful not to mention the game to the delegitimization of opponents (and their voters), practiced since time immemorial by the Dems, or of the Russiagate hoax in 2016, when it was theorized and practiced (I quote from the aforementioned editorial by Federico Punzi) "an attempt – this yes coup, implemented from within the institutions – to overthrow or at least lame the Trump presidency". Not to mention the horrors of "cultural Marxism" we talked about a few weeks ago. And it could go on and on.

But all this has more to do with the chronicle than with history – even if, in truth, if put together and organized according to the right criteria, all these circumstances take on a meaning and rise to an almost philosophical coherence, so much so that one is inclined to rethink everything in a particular, vaguely apocalyptic key… Luckily, there are the classics, as Victor Davis Hanson teaches us, to bring us back to earth. And among these a classic of our own, the immense Niccolò Machiavelli, who, more or less five centuries ago, showed us with almost absolute precision how we can – and must, in my opinion – interpret the events in Washington. Or at least how can we avoid getting lost in a sea of banality and obviousness …

“… So that good examples arise from good education, good education, good laws; and good laws, from those tumults that many inconsiderately damn: because, whoever examines their end well, will not find that they have given birth to any exile or violence to the detriment of the common good, but laws and orders for the benefit of public freedom . " ( Discourses on the first decade of Titus Livy , Book one, Chapter 4)

If the riots of the day of the Epiphany will serve to ensure that "good laws" amend gaps and errors and sensational errors in the American system, as well as do justice to unacceptable attitudes from all points of view by the establishment of the greatest democracy of the world, an extraordinary and epochal result will be obtained. We should always be grateful to the protagonists, and above all to the four victims, of a historic day.

The post Trump's political suicide and Machiavelli's lesson on riots: what if they gave birth to good corrections to the US system? appeared first on Atlantico Quotidiano .

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/rubriche/il-suicidio-politico-di-trump-e-la-lezione-di-machiavelli-sui-tumulti-e-se-partorissero-buoni-correttivi-al-sistema-usa/ on Fri, 08 Jan 2021 04:57:00 +0000.