Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/689748
maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 8 JUNE 2016 10 Opinion P rint deadlines can be awkward things. Last Sunday, I observed that the 'new party' promised by Marlene Farrugia had not been launched by Thursday, as earlier indicated. What I didn't observe, however, was that it would be launched (to some extent, at any rate) on Saturday: i.e., the day after I wrote the article, and the day before it actually appeared in print. Ah, well. I concede I may have shot from the hip there. Turns out that Marlene's party was only two days late in the end. Heck, I've waited longer than that for a plate of pasta at a busy restaurant… To be honest, though, not much about that article actually needs any revision. The only thing I would add, with the hindsight of this new information, is that the new party has also chosen a name – the Democratic Party – to go with the colour. As with the choice of orange, I must say the nomenclature is extremely helpful. At a glance, it immediately distinguishes the new party from all the ones that identify themselves as 'The Malta Dictatorial Party'… here and there varying to 'Autocratic', 'Plutocratic', 'Oligarchic', 'Despotic', 'Totalitarian', and so on. And let's face it: why would you want to vote for any of those, when you can always get the same thing by voting for a party with a nicer name? Oh, and another thing we learnt is that there is more life on this mysterious planet than merely Marlene Farrugia herself. Of the few other names mentioned, the ones I recognised made for interesting reading. The Malta Democratic Party seems to have made inroads with more than just disgruntled PN supporters, as attested by our recent surveys. At administration level, it seems to have attracted former AD people, too. Insofar as an actual political identity is concerned, however, it looks like we shall have to wait a while longer. But in any case: coming back to the intrinsic problem posed by print deadlines to columnists, today's article risks another misfiring political prediction for exactly the same reason. For today (Tuesday) is when the Democrats in the United States of America get to finally choose their candidate for the coming Presidential election. Or to put it another way, when the rest of the world finally gets to know who will be running the race against Donald Trump. OK, I admit I don't really understand the American electoral system at all. It doesn't even look much like an electoral system to me. There is no slamming on the Perspex, no painstaking task of subdividing votes into little pigeon-holes – over, and over, and over again – and not even any policemen turning up on your doorstep with your voting documents, after you'd been automatically entered into the electoral register (without your consent). Oh, no. Instead, America expects its voters to actually take the trouble of getting themselves registered: as if a 'vote' is a matter of choice for the individual citizen, instead of a civic duty to be performed for the benefit of your party (as it is in Malta, and every other 'real' democracy…) Even so, it seems to me that something can't be right with an electoral system whereby you are suddenly faced with a choice of two vastly different candidates, both representing the same party, with only five months to go before the election. That is roughly the dilemma now facing the Democratic Party. Today, we will know which of the two incomparable candidates – Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders – has won a majority of States, and (more importantly still) a majority of 'super-delegate' supporters. (Note: Strangely, for a country that sets such store by 'democracy', it is actually the latter that clinches the deal). Well, I'm guessing that Hillary Clinton will emerge as tonight's winner. It's not the result I myself would vote for, if I were a registered Democratic voter in the USA today… but it's what I'd put my money on with the bookies. It is also the result that has been (prematurely) called by several international news outlets. Clinton has, in fact, already won the required majority of super-delegates; the only thing that stops her from declaring victory outright is Bernie Sanders's refusal to do what she did for Obama in 2008, and withdraw from the race. Should he withdraw? Heck, no. There remains a chance – unlikely, but not altogether unrealistic – of a last-minute swing in Sanders's favour. If, as some expect, he pulls off dramatic majorities in all six remaining states (including super-delegate capital California), it is conceivable that enough supreme head-honchos would switch sides to earn him the nomination. But this is where the trouble lies. Whatever the choice, massive chunks of the Democratic voter base are going to come away disillusioned. Some (i.e, a few million) have already declared they won't vote at all unless their preferred candidate wins. That is perhaps inevitable, when a political party becomes so formless and shapeless, that it can be led by either of two utterly dissimilar candidates with seemingly antithetical views. And if Sanders wins a majority of states but not super- delegates, it would become a straight choice between the democratic will of the people, and the power wielded by an inner party core. This one's harder to call, but going on personal experience with similar decisions taken locally, my guess is that the inner core will prevail, and the decision will be taken on the basis of its own survival (and to hell with what the people want). This is, in fact, the choice the 2016 American election has come to represent. Trump's ascendancy and Sanders's unexpected surge both attest to a groundswell mood of disgruntlement across the entire political spectrum. In different ways, both represent a threat to the status quo. And the desperate, unrelenting media drives against both Trump and Sanders are indicative of how fiercely the current establishment is fighting for its own survival. The circumstances are vastly different, but something similar seems to be happening in Malta right now. Our most recent poll shows quite clearly that both Labour and PN (the local equivalents of Democrats and Republicans, at least in terms of political power… though it's hard to say which is correlative for which) are experiencing significant voter fallout. Labour is losing support at a faster rate – understandably enough, as it is when in government that you are likeliest to piss people off – but the castaways are not, as one would normally expect, getting picked up by any Nationalist life-rafts. It seems that a sizeable sub-demographic of the Maltese electorate would rather set itself adrift as 'floating voters', than take the traditional option of climbing aboard one of the two largest political ships. This brings us back rather nicely to where we began: with the Orange Democracy Party. The same MaltaToday polls also indicate that its support levels are already large enough to be picked up in a sample of 1,000 phone-calls. So Marlene's party has clearly succeeded in picking up at least a few of those castaways, while AD has rescued even more: practically doubling its support levels in the last year alone. Admittedly, neither party is quite a match for Donald Trump – or even Bernie Sanders – in terms of being misfits within their own political environment. Marlene Farrugia might be considered a 'maverick', but only from the perspective of a committed PN or PL voter. Her actual views on most things are every bit as predictable as those of the two parties she has hopped between. AD is even less outlandish; it may have been 'radical' 20 years ago… when the idea of anything at all apart from Labour and PN was almost heretical… but times have changed since then; and even if they do occasionally depart from the traditional script, AD officials today are now as much part of the establishment furniture as a dusty set of green curtains. Nonetheless, our surveys only point towards one thing, really... and it's as true for Malta as it is for the United States. People are clearly recognising that the 'political mainstream' has done nothing but perpetuate a grossly flawed and unjust system… in different ways, granted… and are turning to alternatives by the multitude. In America, Sanders's campaign slogan even doubled up as a passable term for this phenomenon: 'Feeling the Bern'. What remains to be seen is if the 'political mainstream' will also 'feel the Bern'... or at least, respond to 'the Bern felt by others'. In the case of the US Democrats, something tells me they won't. With an overwhelming majority of Americans on both sides calling for change, I reckon they will choose a candidate who represents continuity instead: a former Vice President, a past Secretary of state, part of an established political dynasty… someone who can be relied on to maintain the status quo. By the same token, I reckon neither Labour nor the PN will come to terms with the real reason so many people now refuse the call of tribal political allegiance. They are still at a stage where they see nothing wrong with themselves at all… even worse, where they put themselves forward as 'solutions' to Malta's problems. Just imagine how long it will take them to reach the stage so many politically uncommitted people are now at: the stage where they finally recognise that they are far from being a 'solution' to those problems. They are actually the cause. Raphael Vassallo Feeling the Bern, anyone?