Both 2020 Presidential candidates were old men who are authoritarian by nature. And though Biden's authoritarianism dwarfs that of Trump, it is still there. It is there and it is fueled by purpose and position.
Biden's authoritarianism can be found in his lack of collaboration with reasonable Republicans in the stimulus relief package he is promoting. Yes, he listened; but did he collaborate to any significant degree? For what good is listening when there is no collaboration?
Biden's authoritarianism is also exhibited by his the military strike on Iranian militia groups in Syria. The strikes were said to be in retaliation for attacks on US forces in Iraq. But how are we to know? Suppose some nation bombed a group of Russians in the US. How would we interpret such actions? To whom are we accountable for bombing another nation?
Biden has set himself up for hubris by promising to both restore US leadership in the world and personally undoing the considerable damage President Trump caused at home. But those promises can easily become licenses for trying too hard, for overreaching, and for abuse of power. The US strike on Iranian militia groups in Syria provides a key example.
To whom is the US accountable to for its actions in the world? The answer is no one but the President and the rest of our own government. So the recent US military response is self-certifying. For there is no world court or international judicial body that the US is going submit its case to and wait for approval from before acting. Nor is there any international court or body that the US will make itself accountable to. In fact, the bombing was in response to our military presence in Iraq which has its roots in President Bush's invasion of Iraq. And in that case, to whom did President Bush believe that the US was accountable to? We have to realize that we are the biggest foreign presence in Iraq.
The Middle East is a mess in large part because we have relied on the rule of force there. And we do so because we can. As a result, some of our allies imitate us in doing the same. One only has to look at Israel's treatment of the Palestinians or Saudi Arabia's war on Yemen to understand the reliance on the rule of force by the US and its allies.
One can also learn about our reliance on the rule of force by examining our history in the Middle East. Here, one only needs to look at long list of regime changes where we replaced uncooperative governments with tyrants .
Yes, Trump is a wannabe dictator. He wants to be the CEO of the nation and many of his Christian supporters want him to have the powers of a king and be able to overrule Congress and the Courts when they disagree.
And yes, Biden is not the wannabe dictator that Trump is. But Biden is a wannabe hero who rescues America and the world. In being such, his position allows him him to presume the power of being the ultimate judge over over others in his foreign policies. And in presuming such, he becomes like Trump in that he relies on no external reference points to judge any actions he wants to take--a traditional approach followed by his predecessors. His domestic approach however is more accepting of the judgments of the Courts than Trump's approach was.
This desire to be a wannabe hero and the power to act like one makes Biden a different kind of authoritarian leader than Trump is. But it still makes him an authoritarian leader. And it is the authoritarian part that we should resist. For it is authoritarianism that helps fuel hubris and its after effects.
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