The Main Problem of the US

What’s right? Image by AFGE, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Mr. Trump is still one of the main newsmakers in the United States.

Finally, a jury of 12 Americans officially found Mr. Trump guilty on all 34 counts in the case of hush money paid to porn actress Stormy Daniels. Now the jury officially confirmed what has generally been clear for a long time: Mr. Trump is a felon.

Thus, the American “Deep State” continues its fight against Mr. Trump and on July 11, 2024 the court will determine the punishment for the former president, which can range from probation to 4 years in prison. This gives some hope for the restoration of justice in this country, which has been greatly shaken (at least for me) after everything that Mr. Trump has done over the past 5-8 years. I understand perfectly well that any American, being charged with any of Mr. Trump’s 4 criminal cases, would have been in prison a long time ago like hundreds of his gullible assistants who participated in the seizure of the Capitol on January 6, 2021 were.

Deep State is hitting Trump where it hurts most: money. These courts have no effect on Mr. Trump’s popularity with his voters, but they do have a significant impact on his wallet—lawyers in the US are quite expensive.


I think that in the end the judge will opt for probation, taking into account the old age of the defendant and the fact that Mr. Trump has not previously been convicted. Maybe they will come up with some other mitigating circumstances, especially taking into account the large number of Mr. Trump’s supporters...

I personally would be very much interested to see Mr. Trump (as elected president and being sentenced to serve time in prison) governing the country from a prison cell, and not from the White House. He would hold press conferences there, meet ambassadors and delegations from other countries... The entire presidential administration would need to be relocated there to increase the efficiency of governance of the country... No democratic state has ever reached such heights of the democracy.
The Americans have a chance to become the first ones in the world, but it’s just a beautiful dream of mine ...

The main problem of the US is not Mr. Trump. He is simply testing the strength of the US «Deep State» with his natural ambitions.

Liberals and Democrats now see Mr. Trump as the main problem of the US and democracy. They even invented a special term - Trumpism. Unfortunately, they do not see the other side of the same coin: Mr. Trump’s electoral base is the same Americans and they are very dissatisfied with the Democrats if they support Mr. Trump no matter what.

Mr. Trump's followers see him as the solution to all their problems. Many Republicans consider him very popular among the people, help him lie about the stolen 2020 elections and protect him from any legal prosecution because they hope to win the 2024 presidential election with his help.
For several years, the Americans have been watching the fight between the “Deep State” and Mr. Trump in which the “Deep State” is trying to prove to America and the whole world that the justice exists in the US and everyone (even the untouchable Mr. Trump!) is equal before the law.
Frankly, it’s not very much convincing so far.

Anyway, now this is the main conflict in the political life of the US, splitting the country approximately in half. However, the becoming of Mr. Trump the president is not the main problem/achievement of the country, despite both opposing parties and their followers think otherwise. Nothing will be changed/improved in the US after November 2024; the stagnation and degradation of the country will continue regardless of who of those two old men wins the next election.

So is the US «System» broken?

I once read an article by the famous New York Times journalist T. Friedman «Trump Thrives in a Broken System. He’ll Get Us There Soon», which, as I understood, summarized the opinion of concerned liberals about the situation in the country. The article received 2,300 comments and then the discussion was closed. The author expressed a partially correct thought, but could not (didn’t want?) to go further.
The thought was: «Trump is like a drug dealer who thrives in a broken neighborhood, getting everyone hooked on his warped values», i.e. “bad” Trump thrives in our basically good democratic System, which, however, turns out to have already been broken by someone.
In this case, as for me, the focus should be more on the “broken System”, but the author consciously or subconsciously shifts the emphasis to the “bad” Trump.

By the term “System,” as I understand it, the author means the country’s established system of values, relationships, public (Constitution and laws) and unspoken (application of the Constitution and laws) rules of life. I will add from myself — and also myths. For example, belief of majority of the Americans that the US is a rich country, democracy is the only correct and effective way for existing of the society, politicians are elected by the people and work for the benefit of the entire nation, justice in the US exists and it is determined by honest and incorruptible courts, capitalism and free competition exist in the US and this is also the only correct and effective type of economic organization, etc.
It is this “System” that the author of the article supports.


I immediately had questions for the author and other liberals about the “broken neighborhood”.
1. So the System turns out to be broken? The author does not explain how it happened, but the Americans and many people in the world believe that the US is still rich, democratic, fair, big and beautiful dream country with No. 1 economy.

2. And when has the System been broken? Did this happened recently or a long time ago? And why and how did Mr. Friedman and other liberals notice that only now?

3. What was the purpose of breaking the System and who did that?
Apparently, the author believes that this has been done by the Republicans, but that’s not true. The US government always consists of representatives of both Democratic and Republican parties almost equally, and the US President is now a Democrat ... Do American liberals really believe that after the coming of Democrats to power at all levels, all the problems of the US will immediately go away? And inflation or illegal immigration, too?
Similarly, Mr. Trump accuses Mr. Biden and the Democrats of «destroying our democracy». It's funny get to know that Mr. Trump is also a democrat. And will all problems related to economy/abortion/LGBT/guns be immediately resolved if Republicans take all the main positions in the US?

4. Has the System really been broken by Mr. Trump alone during 4 years of his presidency? Then he is simply a genius of destruction, and the system itself is weak and unviable (and not at all “a rich, democratic, fair, big and beautiful dream country with the No. 1 economy”), if “drug dealer” Trump single-handedly managed to break it so quickly.

5. And one more interesting question: if the system is so “bad” and “weak”, maybe is it worth to break it then? So that's exactly what Mr. Trump is doing now. Surely something more viable will grow from the wreckage according to Charles Darwin’s law of natural selection. It works for the entire planet and is applicable to any “neighborhood” of people, including the states.

After answering these questions for myself, I come to the conclusion that the Americans (like many other democratic nations) have created actually aristocratic model (or System) of governance in their country under the guidance of their essentially democratic Constitution. Then two parts of the American aristocratic elite - Democrats and Republicans - broke the democratic System of the US and now they are generally at odds with each other. This hostility is really happening due to Mr. Trump (he provoked the confrontation) and the stupidity of both parties, because before they got along well with no loud conflicts.

The people, too, are divided into 2 camps due to their blindness, and each one votes for “their” party, not understanding that any aristocracy works only for itself and thus against the people and therefore one part of it is no better than the other.

There are no complaints about the US economy; the politics is doing bad.

In any country there are only two components: the people who create the national wealth (economy) of the country and the elite (politics) who write the laws, implement them and distribute the national wealth created by the people for the common good (at least it is assumed).

The people of the US work well since the Gross Domestic Product is the highest in the world. For example, in 2023 it was almost $27 trillion ($26,954 billion), so there are no questions to the country’s economy (the people).

There are complaints about the US elite (politics) though.
US politicians are doing a bad job because they drive the country into debt and the nation is getting poorer. In the same 2023, the federal debt amounted to $33.2 trillion, i.e. it exceeded GDP by 6.2 trillion. This is called a budget deficit. Now the difference is even bigger.

This means that US politicians spend the people's money faster than the people earn it, so they need to constantly borrow extra money. The people don’t see that despite the fact it’s their money. It looks like a business owner hired two careless managers who run the business in such a way that despite the best income in the world it brings only losses, and this has been happening for quite a long time.
Such managers need to be driven out (both!), but the Americans keep listening and voting for them.

Look at this chart and you will see that the country began to fall into debt in 1989 when the Republican George H. W. Bush became the president. Since then, the US has lived beyond its means under all subsequent Democratic and Republican presidents and has been steadily deteriorating. And this mechanism of impoverishing the nation was not launched by D. Trump. Everything was ready for him long before.

Inflation and corruption are two more powerful tools adopted by the elites for their enrichment and the consequent impoverishment of their people.


The US is stagnating because the elites (Republicans and Democrats) poorly manage the economy, and now they are also at war with each other. They pull the country in different directions, constantly lie to the people about inflation and their fight against corruption, the source of which they are themselves, and do not want any change, because financially (this is the main thing) everything is fine with them.

For the people of the US, everything may seem to be better financially than before, they earn more, but a couple of the Americans I know complained that they work more, but can afford less than 10-15 years ago. This happens because they cannot keep up with the inflation. The Americans really work hard, but that brings little pleasure, because the inflation depreciates their money and eats up their savings. In addition, most of the earnings are taken away by the elites through rising taxes, prices for medicine, medications, education, etc. People become poorer and cannot understand why this is happening to them (everything is being done according to the Constitution, right?), they got angry with each other and pour out their anger on opponents of “their” party. Democrats and Republicans shift the people’s attention, blaming each other for all the problems of the country. Mr. Trump adds the fuel to the fire and moves full steam ahead to his second presidency despite all his criminal cases, which horrifies all democrats and even some Republicans.

About the main problem of the US (and not only the US).

The main problem not only for Americans, but also for the people of many other countries is that they 1) do not know what they want for their relative happiness, and therefore they cannot 2) formulate this to their elites, 3) demand that the elites carry out their will and 4) check the result of execution of their demand (because they don’t know what they want to get, what it’s called and how it looks like).

It is easy to manipulate the ignorant people. That is why a large number of populists have appeared in the last 20-30 years, proposing to quickly create everything out of nothing, and blaming everything on the machinations of political opponents while failed. For all of them, the main thing is to stay in politics as long as possible, receive a handsome salary, respect, various bonuses and be responsible for nothing. Politics is a very profitable and safe business.

The elected representatives of the people in all representative democracies offer thousands of options for improving life, and it is really very difficult to choose the main thing and even evaluate something. Thus, one big goal called the “national well-being” is fragmented into thousands of small and incomprehensible aspects and completely dissolves in them. Americans do not have time and desire to understand “what’s right” for them, so they choose who is “better” (Democrats or Republicans) and follow “their” party line. Parties preach opposing (and often extreme) points of view on the same issues and thus the nation divides into parts.

Really, what is right - allowing or banning guns/abortion/immigration/marijuana/LGBT rights/forgiving debts or some actions of the police/teachers/doctors/students/politicians/judges/presidents? This is often unclear, although the answer is on the surface: sometimes Democrats are right, sometimes Republicans are right, but basically the truth is in the middle. However…

Both parties are wrong about the most important things, and the people of the US have not yet determined what is right for them. And the people will not determine that because they see only the part of the truth that their party shows them, and they have neither desire nor time to figure everything out on their own.

It was not “bad” Trump who broke the “good” system, but the broken system has created a rare moral monster.

Democrat and liberal T. Friedman wrote a misleading article since he placed the accents in it incorrectly. It is not important that Mr. Trump thrives in the current "broken" system. The important thing is that the broken system has degenerated so much that it finally created a real moral monster - liar, boor, scoundrel and traitor and now yet a criminal - who is destroying it.
However, perhaps this kind of evolution through degradation and decay is what America needs.

The System seems irrevocably corrupted by 2 parasites: the Republican and Democratic parties which have been in power for many years. The prospect of another representative of the annoying aristocratic Clinton family becoming the president after Mr. Obama's impotent reign has so much frightened the US voters in 2016 that Americans would probably vote for the devil (I wrote a separate article about that in September 2020).

And this devil appeared - D. Trump.
So the existing US corrupt political system created Mr. Trump (you must agree that liar, boor, scoundrel and traitor could come to power only in a broken system) and now he wants to turn everything his own way. And he succeeds, because both US main parties have also degenerated. They can offer nothing except their fruitless political struggle for their illusions that is boring to everyone (for Democrats it is free immigration and LGBT, for example, for Republicans it is a ban on abortion and LGBT).

Mr. Trump looks very charismatic against this background, since many people no longer care what is said (because everyone says something), but how it was said. And he wins over an ignorant public. This can be called the “Goebbels effect” - a trap into which the intelligent, talented and hard-working German people once were entrapped and paid several million lives for their blind faith in the illusions of their “Führer ” and all Nazi experiment.


P.S. Mr. Trump is certainly here to challenge the current US System.

There are two ways to fight “Trumpism” — to keep Mr. Trump out of power (what the Democrats are trying to do now) or repair the system. However, in order to repair the system, you need to see and admit that it is faulty, while the majority of Americans (both elite and people) believe that there is no better system in the world. The patient will not begin treatment until he knows that he is sick.

Therefore, keeping Mr. Trump out of power is, of course, easier, although the only alternative so far is the Democrats who are disliked by many Americans for their wealth and elitism.


The article is updated on July 2, 2024:
I thought too good of the US justice system. It is as corrupt as such systems in many other countries. The American Themis also constantly peeks from under the blindfold, and the Americans don't see that or pretend not to see that. Anyway, they don't want (and can't, by the way) to do anything about that.
On July 2, 2024, the judge of Manhattan Supreme Court Juan Merchan delayed the sentencing date for Mr. Trump in his criminal hush money case by more than two months after July 1, 2024 scandal Supreme Court’s ruling about “presumptive immunity” that former presidents are entitled to for all official acts they performed while being in office.

That's how countries fall apart and the Americans have to see that. Injustice destroys any union - state, business or family. The process is similar to the rusting of a metal. What's left is a red, worthless rot.