This post was originally published on this site.
The 2024 presidential election cycle has been trapped in the throes of chaos. From President Joe Biden’s debate debacle to the assassination attempt on the former president, Donald Trump, the narrative of this election cycle reads like a sensational airport novel, except it is not so easy to read and it seems prepared to elude any predictive index. On Sunday, July 21 at 1:46 p.m., Biden made a stunning announcement.
“I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term.”
Headlines in the wake of the first presidential debate in this cycle were riddled with chaotic invocations. Weeks ago the Biden Campaign argued that if the president dropped out of the race there would be chaos. And there was, for a few hours. But the weeks since the debate have been as chaotic as any presidential campaign in recent history.Â
As the list of those calling for the president to step down grew by the hour, some of the most progressive elected democrats continued to back the president. U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez warned that there would be “enormous peril” if those who were pressuring the president to stand down were successful in their efforts. It is worth it to hear her in her own words on these issues. In her remarks, Ocasio-Cortez chastised her colleagues for not identifying themselves on the record with their reservations and recommendations. They answered this charge.
Fewer people were offering concrete pathways for what would happen when Biden heeded the warnings of these officials in the Democratic party. Over the course of the last few weeks, we witnessed a level of intra-party, political chaos that was – in and of itself – more detrimental than the president’s debate performance. The steady drumbeat for Biden to drop out became more and more chaotic. We are mere weeks away from the Democratic convention and months away from the election.
The term “chaos” is derived from the Greek word “χάος” (chaos). Its original meaning is “void” or a vast “chasm” It was used to describe the pre-structural form of the universe.  In the Epic poem, “Theogony,” Chaos is the first primordial deity, a symbol of the abyss from which the cosmos and the first mythological gods emerged. The term’s English etymology dates back to the late 14th century when it was consistent with its original meaning as a formless or unordered state.
These days, “chaos” is defined as a state of complete disorder and confusion, but in this chaotic moment, the term also retains some of its early etymology. Our state is unordered. And the future of our nation felt formless in the face of the presidential options that were before us – before Sunday. Now, Vice-President Harris is poised to assume the mantle of the Democratic nominee for President of the United States. The energy around this seismic shift in the political terrain has been electric and yes, a bit chaotic. There has been a frenzy of fundraising to match this energy.
The god of chaos has not spared the other side of the political aisle either. “Has anyone seen Silence of the Lambs?” asked Trump in his 90-minute acceptance speech that concluded the Republican convention. For those keeping score in the abyss, Hannibal Lecter is a fictional character, a serial killer, who consistently (and craftily) evaded the law, and consumed all of his victims. Trump has invoked Lecter as a specter for anti-immigration fear-mongering without an ounce of appreciation for how this invocation figuratively reflects his own brand of political chaos.
In July, a 20-year-old white man attempted to assassinate the former president in Butler, Pennsylvania, during one of his rallies. He was a registered Republican. But the social media memes and the conspiracy theories were almost instant. Some people believe the failures of the Secret Service were orchestrated by the Biden administration. Some believe it was staged by the Trump campaign to bolster support for him before the RNC. Some just don’t believe it was real at all. The director of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle resigned.
This is where we are. We live in a nation where the evidentiary nature of truth has been critically undermined by anti-institutional forces. Assassination attempts always breed conspiracy theories, but the pervasive incredulous response to this recent act of political violence reflects the chaotic nature ingrained in this election cycle.
Any Game of Thrones fan will remember Lord Baelish’s (a.k.a. Littlefinger) comments about chaos. In a conversation with one of his political rivals (Varys), Baelish chafes at Varys’s suggestion that chaos is a pit. Varys, schemes throughout the series, but he claims that he schemes for the “good of the realm.” For Baelish, this is almost foolish. Baelish believes that chaos is not a pit, but a ladder. Baelish, either creates or deliberately takes advantage of chaos to access and/or grasp political power – by all means necessary. The fates of both of these characters in the series reflect just how chaotic any political schema can ultimately be – in the world of fantasy.
In the real world, chaos may still be a ladder for some – a ladder that opportunists will climb, or a ladder that political opponents might exploit, or a ladder for a historic candidate to emerge and galvanize a Democratic coalition. The climbers and exploiters are often easy to identify. They are generally operating in bad faith. But beyond the opportunists and the opponents are real people, citizens of this nation, and maybe a real candidate – a leader who understands the critical moment within which many of us are left wondering as we wander through all of the despondency. For us, there is no ladder. For us, there is no pit. There is only the formlessness found in our political processes.
Our only hope now is that a Black woman might save us (again).