Today, the mid-term elections are coming to an end, in which a third of the members of the Senate, all the members of the House of Representatives and dozens of senior officials, headed by governors, are replaced.
Seemingly, there is nothing new about these elections: they have always been a test of the Baqa Valley for the ruling party.
Usually, after a short period of euphoria that follows the inauguration of the president, an inevitable regression occurs - the dream erodes, and an unbridgeable gap emerges between the election promises and the actual gray reality.
Therefore, it is not surprising that after a brief rise in the popularity of President Biden at the beginning of the summer, the level of support for him has returned and waned in recent months.
He is expected, therefore, to suffer a certain discrimination in the House of Representatives, and it is possible (although not certain) that his Democratic Party will become the minority party in the Senate as well.
Senate candidate John Peterman in the state of Pennsylvania, photo: AFP
Despite this, it seems that going to the polls this time holds more than a routine upheaval in American political history, and the reason for this is that in the not too distant past the differences between the two parties were not so great.
In other words: a democratic president who faced two houses with a republican majority, still managed to function and pass a rich and diverse legislative tract.
In a more relaxed and consensual era, the American political system was anchored in the principles of pluralism, moderation and tolerance, and the science of politics was the science of "getting by somehow", and building inter-party coalitions on a wide range of specific legislative issues.
In those days the ideological dimension remained in the background, while the stage of the political game was inter-party and intra-party bargaining over the "sharing of the pie" and its size.
At times, even the intra-factional struggles were much more intense than the conflicts that separated the Republican and Democratic camps.
Today the circumstances have completely changed.
In an atmosphere of gog and gog war between the parties on ideological, value, political, social, economic and even constitutional grounds, the potential for compromise and agreement is diminishing - something that could lead to paralysis in legislation and government activity.
No longer a political game
The American nation is in a situation where it is no longer a political game, but a struggle without limits and limitations, which even includes the very validity of the last elections.
The consequences of Biden's almost certain failure to maintain the Democratic majority, at least in the House of Representatives, could be devastating for the American economy and society, and cause a long-term freeze of the ambitious legislative initiatives from the White House.
The severe inflation that reared its head recently, the generous aid packages for Ukraine that became unpopular, the issue of illegal immigrants - these are just some of the things that clouded the record of the Supreme Court's decision to cancel a woman's right to have an abortion, a decision that severely hurt the soft Republican camp.
Trump // Photo: Reuters,
In view of the possibility that former President Trump will announce next week his renewed candidacy for the position, and in light of Benjamin Netanyahu's confirmation as Prime Minister of Israel for another term, a series of fascinating questions surface.
How will the new government function against the "lame duck" Biden, when Trump takes center stage?
A question derived from this: will Israel have a wider room for maneuver than before, between a weak president and a powerful and dominant Republican party in both houses of Congress?
Is there even a slight chance of any political move in the Palestinian arena, against the background of the formation of the new government and in view of the alliance that has been tightening in recent years between the Republican camp and the Israeli right?
And most important of all: Will the weakened government be able to prevent Israel from initiating powerful forceful measures against the Iranian nuclear when the strategic circumstances will require it from its perspective?
time will tell.
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