Col. Lawrence Wilkerson and Paul Jay analyze Trump's 2024 victory, attributing Harris's failure in part to a campaign that avoided progressive policies that would lower the cost of living - to please billionaire donors.

Wilkerson warns of a climate catastrophe and a draconian Trump administration that leads to the collapse of American society. Jay argues Harris's defeat creates an opening for a broad democratic, independent movement that takes control of the Democratic Party at state and local levels.

Both emphasize organizing in major cities in Democratic-controlled states, focusing on mobilizing the working poor, urban and rural, who usually don't vote - a potentially game-changing constituency the Democratic establishment has ignored.

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Paul Jay

Hi, welcome to theAnalysis.news. I'm Paul Jay. As you'll notice, I'm in my brand new artificial intelligence studio. In the last interview I did with Larry Wilkerson, I got so many complaints about how everything looked. Justly so. I did something about it, so I hope this is at least an improvement. Joining me in just a few seconds will be Larry Wilkerson. We're going to talk about the election results.

Don't forget, there's a donation button you can click. If you'rae on YouTube, please subscribe. Although most of our subscribers are constantly complaining that YouTube never notifies them of a new video and continues to try to suppress what we do. The best way to watch us is on the website at theAnalysis.news. If YouTube takes down any of our videos, which they have done in the past, we have other ways to feed the website. You'll always get to see us there. We'll be back in a few seconds with Larry Wilkerson.

Now, joining us to talk about the election results in the United States, which is the beginning of a new era of a return- was that back to the future? Now, joining us is Larry, who doesn't need any introduction to our normal viewers and to most people who follow the news. Thanks for joining us, Larry.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

Good to be with you, Paul. By the way, did you get my cheque?

Paul Jay

No.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

I mailed it about 10 days ago, so it should be getting there.

Paul Jay

Oh, well, thank you. Yeah, that's terrific. If people want to donate, that'd be great. All right, so let's talk about what happened. I'm blown away at what an awful campaign the leadership of the Democratic Party conducted. It wasn't something I said once I saw the results. I was saying it all through the campaign. Kamala Harris simply would not answer in any straightforward way almost any real question, but particularly the most important economic question. She would not answer why inflation is coming down, but the cost of living is not on the whole, especially food, rent, and other basic necessities. She never answered why that's happening, and she never said what she would do about it. There's some talk about price gouging, but she actually never said how she would stop that and more or less stopped talking about that as the campaign came to its conclusion.

The most important things that need to be talked about, i.e., the existential threats facing America and the world, the climate crisis, almost not a word, and the issue of the threat of nuclear war. In fact, the only person to mention it at all, really, was Trump, and only when he's talking about his crazy Iron Dome proposal to create a new anti-ballistic missile system, which we'll talk about as we get into the interview.

In the course of this, let's talk about these three things I'd like to talk about. But first, just your basic reaction, and then we can get into these three areas.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

Frankly, I was stunned by the results, and not because I wasn't watching the polls. I was, but I don't trust the polls anymore. They're too much aligned with interests that back them. I was stunned by the fact that so many Americans are apparently so dissatisfied with their country and with everything that's happening around them that they're willing to go to the polls and vote for a chief executive who is clearly, obviously, without any doubt whatsoever, even in the stupidest person's mind, a crook and more. That's what stunned me most of all, was that the margin was significant in my view, given the polls and given what I thought was going to happen. Significant enough to where there will be, I don't think, any debate or any real court cases or anything. Trump has won both the Electoral College and the popular vote. That's shocking to me.

I knew America was in trouble. I knew we were having enormous domestic problems. I knew those problems were translating into foreign policy and foreign policy into domestic problems. They feed each other. I knew we were at a point where, as I've said many times, the empire was looking very shoddy, as if it were approaching some denouement. Some end. I didn't think we'd come to the point where we'd elect Donald Trump as President again, and we did.

Paul Jay

The campaign made a strategic decision, unlike Biden when he ran. Sanders had had such a strong primary campaign, Biden created a platform committee or working group with Bernie Sanders and ran to the left-of-center and beat Trump with a campaign somewhat to the left-of-center. The Harris campaign hated the Left, really, and spent all its focus on trying to shave off Republican votes or center-right votes, and barely mentioned the climate crisis. They had mealy-mouthed responses on economic questions and lost. What do you make of that? The campaign had no substantive guts to it. 

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

I would say that probably right now, knowing myself personally, how spiteful Joe Biden can be and thinking that in his elder years, he's become even more so, that he's crowing right now about her being so defeated. That's his first and personal reaction. His professional and political reaction is, "Oh, God, what did we do?" he's probably thinking, "If I'd stayed the candidate, this wouldn't have happened." There might be some evidence for that. Nonetheless, it's happened. I think, as I said before, as I tried to imply anyway, I think this is more a comment on America and the state of the empire than it is a comment on either candidate, party, or the political process in general, though they aided and abetted this denouement.

I think we're in trouble, Paul. I think we're in deep trouble economically, financially, and culturally. I think we are poised on the brink of a potential domestic collapse as well as a foreign policy collapse, if you will. That's a recipe for, in our world, I think; we aren't the British. We aren't the people who can absorb this loss over a 70-year period and come out of it on the other end, still clicking somewhat. We're the people that go down catastrophically. We're the kind of empire that goes down catastrophically. I'm seeing the signs, and I'm seeing the telltale indications that we have seen our day in the sun.

Unlike previous empires of similar wealth, breadth, and power who managed to hold on for 100 years after clearly the rot had set in, I don't think we're going to hold on that long. Not just because of the decay that's happened but also because of the conditions around us that are making this happen externally. They aren't going away. They're going to deepen, they're going to widen, and they're going to become more powerful. Of course, we're throwing fuel into that deepening, widening, and becoming more powerful against us. We're actually helping it. So, this could be very sudden, very traumatic, and very destabilizing. Nationally destabilizing.

Paul Jay

The fundamental structural issue is the incredible concentration of wealth that's happened over the last few decades. Now, this election, I think more than any previous, the billionaires [crosstalk 00:09:21]. 

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

Before you get away from that, let me say, wealth that doesn't necessarily like us.

Paul Jay

The billionaire class came out so openly in this election, particularly on the Republican side, with Musk and people like Peter Thiel and others. Of course, the Democrats have their own billionaires. The billionaire class overtly fought each other, decided who would be the president, and elected- talking about a new king, I think it's better to say a new Emperor. I was reading somewhere they've elected Nero. This is the guy who's going to fiddle as the Earth burns. The billionaires have just decided that they're in this crazy metaphysical space. Whether it's Peter Thiel and the far-right Christians who are doing God's work and want to start a new crusade to save Judeo-Christian civilization or you have Musk who wants to start a civilization on Mars. These guys are living in crazy cuckoo land, and the most critical issue of the climate crisis and the threat of nuclear war is not even being talked about.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson

If you want to really be shocked, I started about a year ago collecting everything I could get my hands on; I have some people helping me with this, on the climate crisis. Every kind of scientific article. I've got headings like hurricanes, tornados, rain, and all of the pieces that have come out. Scientific journals and such, and The New York Times, the Washington Post, and others occasionally in there. I've now got over a thousand articles in it. When I go over it and look at the headings alone, like, for example, geoengineering, and go down through geoengineering and see the crazy-ass things that are going on right now, funded by many of these billionaires, inadvertently or indirectly, I should say, or directly, and threaten us as much as the climate crisis. It's going off.

Maybe the LA Times will pick it up if it's happening in California. Maybe The New York Times will pick it up if it's happening on the East Coast.