American politics is a messy, polarizing topic, globally known for being completely insane. In reference to politics, many Americans keep calling for the return of “the good old days” before everything fell into its current rhythm of disaster. But when were the “good old days,” exactly?
Politics used to be civil, at least from what I hear. I have been told mystical tales of bipartisanship, of people in vehement opposition shaking hands with a cordial smile. Of course, it feels like this is unachievable now. Donald Trump was one of only six presidents to boycott their successor’s inauguration. However, this doesn’t signify a permanent departure from civility between opponents. It didn’t then, and it doesn’t have to know. The intrigue lies in how we’ve gotten to a point where someone like Donald Trump can even be elected president and where political debates turn into ad-hominem brawls.
There have been, by my account, no “good” presidents. Either they’ve been actively harmful to minority communities, or they were neutral and ineffective. But American time drags these consequences, both the harmful and the ineffective, forward into whichever administration happens to be in power. The “good old days” weren’t that good. From the early era of slaveholders and anti-abolitionists to imperialists and isolationists, the capitalists, and our modern extremists, there have been very few ‘good’ presidents. The American longing for the “good old days,” even in liberal circles, can lead to a dangerous glorification of an imperfect past.
We have been carried through to here, where we are now, by a lower and middle class that has been frightened by the specter of communism. The thought of what little they have being taken away by rich people has caused miseducated working-class people to become bigoted. According to ethical philosophy, the decisions that people make are merely a result of their genetics and their environment. Nothing is truly random, every event is the result of the past. Our current political environment did not rise from the “good old days”, rather, the existence of that flawed past pushes us continuously into a flawed future that needs to be fixed.
