Power Establishment May Be Hoist On Its Own Petard In Iowa

For decades, the U.S. media, propaganda arms of the power structure, has set two early tests for the "viability" of candidates for president. Would-be presidents of the U.S. (a role like chief executive officer of U.S. Imperialism Inc.) have to do well in two very white, rural, reactionary states, Iowa and New Hampshire. Both have small populations and are unrepresentative of the U.S.

These initial filters obviously are designed to eliminate progressives and force candidates to the right. (New Hampshire has changed some in recent years, but Iowa is if anything even more reactionary now than formerly. But New Hampshire's main newspaper is still the rabidly reactionary New Hampshire Union-Leader.)

Well, it looks like Donald Trump is set to win or at least come in second in Iowa.

The power establishment has made no secret of its disdain for Trump. This is because he is a loose cannon, with no fixed ideological positions and no commitment to making himself subservient to the U.S. national security state. This doesn't mean he's an anti-imperialist. But he isn't someone under the control of the Council on Foreign Relations, or the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on domestic policy.

Trump swings wildly between diametrically opposite sentiments (it overly dignified the verbal stream that spews from his maw to call them "positions"). One day he doesn't care about ISIS, the next day he'll smash them to pieces and bar all Muslims from the U.S. And horror of horrors, for a day he and Putin had a little mutual admiration society thing going between them.

Trump of course is a narcissistic personality who has degenerated into demagogy. He would be an "irresponsible," and unpredictable, president. Which frankly I would find entertaining. And only people who worship U.S. power should fret that he might "damage" America. Unfortunately it appears that America has to be damaged if it is ever going to be forced to reform itself.