The cheapening of America

It’s a sad little word ‘tawdry’. Dictionaries, my own old-fashioned print variety and the online version all concur — cheap shoddy and tasteless they say. I got 90 minutes of full-on tawdry last Monday morning when I grumped before the TV set with my cereal and the first cuppa of the day to watch the second debate of three that is a part of the endless American presidential process.

The previous weekend had seen assorted media platforms go into meltdown mode with the release of a tape that showed Donald Trump having his least-finest moment. No need to re-hash the details here, it was hashed over in the debate which was a thing of purest vitriol. Two people that detest the very sight of each other trapped in a cycle of endless confrontation. Trump prowled behind Clinton in a manner that even the most forgiving of his sympathisers could only see as predatory. Clinton had that faux-smile that she does so well and was as relaxed as a watchspring. Both of them tore bleeding chunks off each other. Trump did better than on his last outing, Clinton did no worse and some called it a draw when the gore and fragments of body parts had been hosed off the stage-set.

But what it was — was tawdry. It was a cheapening of Brand America. One of the people in front of the cameras is going to be the next President of the United States of America. Both are deeply flawed if in different ways. To the best of my knowledge Mrs Clinton has never been accused of unseemly behaviour — other than in the case of emails and Benghazi, that is — whereas Mr Trump has any number of women seemingly queuing up to have their 15 minutes of fame at his expense. There are Wikileaks tumbling out of the woodwork for Mrs Clinton and hints of more tapes to come for Mr Trump.

The Republican Party is in considerable disarray and at the time of writing. Mrs Clinton has a nine-point lead over Mr Trump which if the polls are correct — and recent times have demonstrated starkly just how unreliable polls can be — then she ought to be on her way to a landslide victory.

Meanwhile back in the White House the twilight days of the Obama administration play out. There has never been a hint of scandal in the eight years since the Obama family walked slightly amazed down Constitution Avenue. The Obama marriage has allegedly had its ups and downs in that period, but there were no accusations of infidelity by either party and their two children seem to have survived with their sanity relatively intact. Let’s leave it to history to be the judge of whether Obama was a good or bad President shall we?

The Obamas have brought grace and dignity to the Presidency, something even their sternest detractors would agree on. Neither Mr Trump nor Mrs Clinton is going to do either coming as they do with mountains of malodorous baggage that is in the public domain there to be picked over by the carrion-crows of the Fourth Estate. Make no mistake, the portable cesspits that both carry with them is going to be emptied in coming days and years with sickening regularity.

The Dirty Genie is well and truly out of the bottle and never likely to be put back. Brand America has taken a hammering, and will take further blows in the days before the poll on November 8^th that are going to be remembered for time immemorial. Those memories of the campaign are going to play as the backdrop to however the winner — and loser — comports themselves in future. They will be exhumed on talk-shows, memorialised and serialised in print, become best-sellers and embedded forever as a part of the American narrative. Less than a generation down the line Hollywood will probably have a crack at them.

‘Stronger together’ says Mrs Clinton. ‘Let’s make America great again’ says Mr Trump. America is more divided than it ever was and the greatness — and it undoubtedly was — is forever tarnished by the tawdry mantle that this election has settled on its shoulders. Tawdry… such a little word.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 14^th, 2016.

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