اقرأ باللغة العربية The year 2016, that of the last US presidential elections, will go down in history as the year in which the US changed. This is not because it was the year in which driverless cars appeared in the streets in US cities, or because the fourth industrial revolution had become a concrete reality. Rather, it is because that was the year in which the American people elected Donald Trump as their president. With that event, the world's sole remaining superpower was no longer the country with which the world had grown familiar and used to dealing with. It was now an entirely different kettle of fish. Trump, himself, put his finger on the underlying cause when he observed that the elections were not about the traditional rivalry between Republicans and Democrats, but rather between the “establishment” of which both parties are a part, and those outside the establishment. He claimed leadership of the latter, which included a large base of public opinion that voted for him precisely because they wanted a “different America”. In the course of championing this cause, Trump had to tread on a lot of toes on the Republican side of the establishment during that party's preliminaries in which 17 nominees were competing. After he had knocked aside his competitors there and became the Republican Party candidate, he had to overcome one of the brightest stars of the “establishment”, whether Republican or Democratic: Hillary Rodham Clinton. Clinton's memoirs of those campaigns have just appeared, less than a year later, with the title What Happened. Her motivation was not just the royalties from the sales to a large segment of the reading public eager to understand what exactly happened after she seemed a near certain shoo-in for the White House. The fact is, the 2016 battle is not over yet. After reviewing a number of likely causes of her defeat (even though she won the popular vote, Trump prevailed in the Electoral College vote), she homed in on what she believed to be the two real reasons. The first was the American people's ardent desire for “change”. Americans do not like to keep either of the two major parties in power for more than one presidential cycle (two terms, eight years). The second was that then FBI director James Comey had given her the axe when, 10 days before Americans went to the polls, he notified Congress that he had reopened the investigations into Hillary Clinton's emails at the time she had served as US secretary of state. Effectively, this cast the glare of suspicion on her again and although she was cleared two days before the elections the damage had already been done. Couching the elections in these terms makes the first cause seem a matter of form rather than substance, as though “change” involved a kind of sociological maths as opposed to the need to probe what conditions in the US might give rise to the demand for change and how Trump catered to this demand. The second cause, in the context of the book, becomes less a part of the 2016 electoral battle and more a part of the battle that is still being waged. Although Comey has since been dismissed from his post by President Trump, Hillary accuses him of covering up the investigations the FBI is conducting into the relationship between members of the Trump campaign team and President Vladimir Putin's campaign to bring about Clinton's defeat in the elections. Clearly, the former Democratic Party candidate is no longer just the establishment's spearhead; she has also become the leader of Donald Trump's opponents in both parties. In one way or another, the “establishment” is reasserting itself in full force, with the goal of ousting Trump and/or undermining his policies. Despite some essential differences between the Republican and Democratic parties, the two, together, have so far succeeded in thwarting attempts to produce an alternative to the healthcare policies introduced by former president Obama. They have also blocked the new president's legislative agenda with regard to the barrier wall with Mexico or his immigration policies. Although Trump has taken considerable pains to remain true to his electoral base which, for the most part, continues to remain true to him, the current alliances between the two parties have, to some extent, succeeded in eroding the president's popularity through daily media clashes between him and an array of political leaders. In all events, the Democrats' plan is obvious. Indeed, in the last part of her book, Hillary spared no effort in order to explain how she is working to mobilise her party preparatory to the midterm legislative elections in the hope of winning a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives. Under the US Constitution, the House votes on a resolution to impeach a president while the Senate conducts the hearings that effectively constitute the trial which, in this case, could possibly lead to Trump's impeachment in 2019. Trump, for his part, is determined to press ahead with the items on his electoral platform, such as his “America first” strategy, the fight against terrorism or his pledge to stop Iran from taking advantage of the nuclear agreement in order to penetrate the Middle East. Meanwhile, he is trying to circumvent the “establishment's” media siege by using social networking instruments, such as Twitter, around the clock. At the same time, applying the principle of “offence is the best defense,” he continues to lash out at major news outlets, especially CNN and such liberal newspapers as The New York Times and The Washington Post. For the first time, to my knowledge, there is a US president who has the courage (some call it foolhardiness) to describe national media as a network of “fake news” and, again for the first time, threaten to revoke broadcasting licences. The political battle that occupied the last quarter of 2016 has stretched into the last quarter of 2017 and now extends from the media to Congress, both the major political parties, state governors and to the streets where questions of racism are hot and palpable. In addition, more recently, it has reached the narrow circles around the president. Michael Flynn, Trump's national security adviser, was the first victim of the case involving alleged Russian tampering in the US elections. His resignation was soon followed by that of Trump's senior strategic adviser Steve Bannon, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, and others. Now the crosshairs are fixed on another key circle of Trump administration figures: Secretary of State Tillerson, Secretary of Defense Mattis and National Security Adviser McMaster. These three figures, together with CIA Director Mike Pompeo plus the president, form the pillars of Washington's foreign and national security policy. In sum, US “establishment” has either refused to recognise the results of last year's elections or it wants to overturn those results in spite of how they reflect an actual change that has taken place in US society. The battle may seem like an American concern. But, in fact, it concerns the whole world as well. The writer is chairman of the board, CEO and director of the Regional Centre for Strategic Studies.
