IN SUSPENSE

On this Ides of March America finds itself in a time and state of suspense. So many balls are up in the air, keeping the nation on pins and needles:

Winter has yet to turn into spring.

We are awaiting the outcome of the NY State grand jury investigation of the former US President in the case of the hush money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels.

We are awaiting the findings of the Georgia State special grand jury investigating whether the former President and his allies committed any crimes while trying to overturn his 2020 election loss.

We are awaiting the findings of special counsel Jack Smith in the Department of Justice probe into the former President’s handling of highly sensitive classified documents he retained at his Florida resort Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House in January 2021 and his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election's results, including a plot to submit phony slates of electors to block Congress from certifying Democrat Joe Biden's victory.

The Supreme Court will decide before this summer whether the theory of ‘independent state legislature’ is supported by the US Constitution and, if it does, confer on state legislatures plenary, exclusive power to redraw congressional districts for federal elections and appoint state electors who cast the votes for President and Vice President on behalf of, but not necessarily in concert with, the voters of the states.

A US District Judge in Amarillo, TX , appointed by the former President, is expected to issue a ruling any day now that may impose a nationwide injunction on the distribution of the abortion pill mifepristone.

The civil suit issued by Dominion Voting Systems against the Fox News Channel will either come to trial in April or be settled between the parties. The suit, if it proceeds, will determine if the media channel can, with impunity, misinform the viewing public if it wants to conform its news reporting to the prevailing biases of its audience and thus protect its viewership and ratings.

The nation keeps teetering at the brink of a recession as the Federal Reserve tries to figure out if it can bring inflation under control without bringing the economy to a dead stop and exacerbating the financial crisis that torpedoed the Silicon Valley Bank and now threatens contagion.

The acrimony between the two political parties has risen to the level where it looks uncertain if Congress will be able to raise the debt ceiling as required to avoid a default on the national debt, which is predicted to happen sometime this summer if a political compromise is not enacted upon. The American public has good reasons to be on edge as the consequences of a national default are unimaginably dire.

In the meantime, the nation is gearing up for the primary campaigns for the 2024 Presidential election at least at the Republican side (with the Democrats holding their powder try until the current President decides if he will run for a second term.) For the time being, the former President is still the front runner on the Republican side, but it is very early in the game and his legal challenges may ultimately have an impact on the outcome of the primary contests which will not play out until the spring of next year.

The uncertainty caused by all of these pending matters is ‘sans pareil’, without equal. What we are watching is not simply a contest between a progressive and a conservative approach to the future governance of the nation as it has been for all of our lifetime. For the first time in recent history a populist, anti-democratic, movement, triggered and espoused by a former President, is challenging the tenets of the republican democracy and the Republican Party, so far, is refusing to deny it safe harbor.

Our democratic experiment that started in 1776 is in jeopardy of institutional breakdown by a politization of the judiciary and an errant ideology infused in one of its two parties in its legislature. America is holding its breath to find out how the crisis will unfold, and the world watches us in bewilderment and with trepidation.

What is hanging in the balance with all this uncertainty is America’s power to guide and influence world affairs. The concept of ‘America First’ is not entirely misguided. Geopolitics has not developed in a way that the world can safely afford to do without American leadership. But it will prove impossible for America to exhibit global leadership and be accepted in that role by the world community, if it cannot put its own house in order. At a time when America is still the indispensable force to guarantee the charters of the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization it cannot fail in asserting its own republican democratic governance system. It cannot allow the ‘full faith and credit’ of its sovereign debt to be placed in doubt. And it cannot show its adversaries any internal division about its support of nations whose territorial integrity and sovereign existence is placed under attack by hostile neighbors.

The nation will be in suspense for several more months until each of these pending matters will have been decided, for better or for worse, with monumental consequences for the future of America and the world.