美国总统选举会发生“连环意外”吗？
Club点评：当地时间18日，美国前总统特朗普再度被共和党提名为总统候选人。同时，据《纽约时报》等报道，包括前总统奥巴马、前众议长佩罗西等多名民主党大佬都认为拜登无法获胜，正在幕后力劝其让位；21日，拜登屈服，正式宣布放弃连任。
过去几周内，两人选情均面临史无前例的挑战：拜登辩论表现糟糕，特朗普遭暗杀得分。7月17日，北京对话助理研究员李泽西在香港南华早报发表题为"Trump or Biden? Perhaps it shouldn’t matter so much"（《特朗普还是拜登？也许不是那么重要》）的评论。
作者认为，发生在这两个年迈老人身上的任何事情都在产生深远的政治影响，这证明美国总统权力过大。从制度层面看来，当前局面极其脆弱，不发生意外才是意外，而任何意外都可能在世界范围产生造成灾难性后果。因此，美国总统权力需合理限制，以推动更健康的政治生态。在总统大选面临巨大不确定性之际，这愈发重要。
在特朗普和拜登分获各自党派的总统提名前夕，两人的选情都受到了极大的冲击：拜登在6月底辩论中表现糟糕，使得各方密切关注他的一言一行，越来越多的民主党人士希望能有一位更具活力的候选人——相关“密谋”一直霸占了过去两周的头版新闻，直到特朗普遇刺才彻底刷新版面。
（截至原文发布的7月17日）各方似乎认为，这至少能让拜登获得几天的喘息，甚至可能帮助他平息这次党内“叛乱”；与此同时，民主党似乎已经输掉了年底的大选。特朗普挥舞拳头、满脸鲜血、身后美国国旗飘扬的画面很可能会被载入史册。
特朗普遇袭（图源：美媒）
即使在这次暗杀未遂事件之前，美国未来政治都面临“韩国化”的威胁：即大多数总统在任期结束后都锒铛入狱；特朗普本人已被定罪，他并誓言向政治对手实施“报复”。在特朗普遇刺之后，美国的未来可能更加黑暗。
目前，大部分政治人物都在强调降低政治烈度，让大选不再被称为“正义与邪恶”之争，因为这种说法很可能会鼓励更多此类暴力；鉴于民主党人认为特朗普再度当选将对美国构成根本性的威胁，这种“禁言”很可能会对特朗普有利。
事实上，尽管人们都在关注特朗普再度对战拜登，11月的大选涉及的远不止总统席位。民主党的整体形势并没有看上去那么严峻。许多民主党参议员和众议员候选人在国会选举的支持率都显著领先于拜登的选情，他们很可能有限制特朗普二次执政期间的举措。
鉴于总统职位只代表“三权分立”的美国政府中的一个分支的事实，各方对总统职位有过度关注之嫌。这种关注已在加剧政治紧张局势，使一切似乎都只取决于那一个职位。
实际上，越来越多的学者和专家都认识到美国总统权力越来越大的问题，称之为“帝王总统”。如果美国的开国元勋们看到现在的情况，他们在九泉之下也不得安宁。毕竟，美国的成立就是为了反抗他们视为行使专制权力的君主；依靠行政命令进行治理的总统，现在看来似乎也好不到哪里去。
类似绝对君主制这样围绕一个人的政治体制存在的一个主要问题是，这个人身上的任何偶发事件，或者这个人存在的任何缺陷，都有可能产生更广泛的政治影响。理论上，民主制度可以避免这一问题，让最优秀的人大放异彩，但美国的民主制度在这方面表现不佳，似乎无法产生优秀的候选人；一个人言语上的失误，另一个人涉事本来很正常的欺诈诉讼，都可能产生更广泛的政治影响。
当地时间5月30日，美国纽约市曼哈顿地方法庭裁定，特朗普为隐瞒在2016年美国总统选举期间向艳星丹尼尔斯支付的13万美元“封口费”，伪造商业记录，违反纽约州相关法律，34项刑事指控罪名全部成立。（图源：央视新闻）
民主党坚持认为，针对特朗普的诉讼并非出于政治目的，只是体现司法系统的正常运转。然而，政治中没有简单的事情，光是政治操纵的表象或感觉就会产生实际后果。
然而，如果人们对美国政府的其他部门，尤其是立法部门给予更多关注——他们应重新在起草法律、甄别人事安排、税收和支出方面全面发挥理论上的强大权力——就会降低任何一个人遭遇的偶然事件，甚至是遇刺事件的政治意义；这反过来又会降低这种有针对性的暴力等不可预测的灾难性事件的可能性。两个年事已高的候选人，在这场你死我活的极限斗争中承载着亿万人的希望，显然是个过于脆弱的局面，不发生意外才是意外。
增强美国政府其他分支也无法解决美国所有的问题：南北战争前几十年间，美国总统职位权力相对薄弱，但时任多名总统仍因未能阻止可预见的流血冲突而被历史学家打了低分。当时，林肯当选总统成了导火索，引燃了奴隶制这一分歧议题。美国多方呼吁的降低政治温度仍然是必要的。
试图削弱美国总统的权力就像尝试解决一个“先有鸡还是先有蛋”的问题：总统的权力是因为他积累的权力、其他政府职能让渡给总统的权力，还是因为各方对总统职位的关注？学术界对此仍缺乏共识，因此试图限制总统权力很可能就是真正的“棘手问题”。
美国最高法院最近做出多项裁决，限制联邦机构的权力，将更多权力归还给州政府和立法部门，虽然被诟病这一裁决增加了治理的难度，或被批为“司法滥权”，但在削减总统权力方面却有积极意义。美国政府不应只有总统。
令人遗憾的是，他们裁定总统任何公事行为都免于起诉，尽管初衷可能是为了防止美国政治潜在的“韩国化”，但也与他们其他裁决背道而驰，因为这将焦点重新放在了美国总统身上。
在全球范围内，这可能意味着美国的盟国将发挥更大的作用，他们应建立自己的治理能力，而不是继续依赖美国的安全保护伞。这与美国鼓励盟国“分担责任”和更为战略自主是一致的。当然，这也意味着这些盟国应带头制定自己的战略重点，而这些战略重点可能并不总是与美国的一致；将来，聪明的美国总统应认识到，尽管偶尔会有摩擦，但这实际上正是美国所需要的，美国需要把精力放在处理自己的内部事务。
对全世界来说，最好的结果就是没有人关心明年谁坐镇白宫。
英文原文：
Not long before their respective nominations, the campaigns of both US President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump have been dealt a blow. Biden’s debate performance last month has led to weeks of heightened attention on him amid speculation Democrats will try to replace him, with the intrigue dominating headlines until the attempted assassination of Trump reset the news cycle.
So far, the consensus appears to be that this will at least buy Biden a few days of reprieve, potentially enough to short-circuit attempts to replace him. However, this comes at the cost of a general election campaign that already appears like an uphill struggle for Democrats.
The danger for the United States, even before this assassination attempt, is that its political future might look like South Korea’s, where ex-presidents have ended up in prison after their term ends. Trump is a convicted felon who has promised retribution for his political opponent. In the aftermath of the shooting, the potential for a much darker future has emerged.
Much of the national discourse has turned towards lowering the political temperature and taking a step back from calling the upcoming election a fight of good versus evil, a framing that could be seen as encouraging more violence. Given that it appears Democrats view the election of Trump as an existential threat, such a taboo would be to Trump’s advantage.
Despite all the attention paid to the rematch between Biden and Trump, there is much more to November’s election. The overall situation for Democrats actually isn’t as dire as it might appear. Many Democratic Senate and House candidates are running ahead of Biden.
Given that the presidency only represents one of the three branches of the US federal government, the attention paid to the office is disproportionate. Such a heightened focus is likely to increase political tensions by making everything appear to depend on just one position.
The issue of an increasingly powerful presidency is one academics and pundits have raised for many years. The founding fathers of the country would be spinning in their graves if they saw the current state of affairs. After all, the US was founded in a rebellion against a monarchy viewed as exercising arbitrary power. A presidency that governs primarily through the use of executive orders might be little better in their eyes.
A major problem with political systems such as absolute monarchies which revolve around a single person is that any fluke incident or defect with that individual can produce broader political ramifications. Democracy is designed to be a system that avoids this problem by allowing the best candidate to lead through the will of the people, but US democracy appears to be struggling to produce good candidates.
However, if the other branches of government were to receive more attention – in particular the legislative branch, which should reclaim its influential role in drafting laws, approving political appointments and signing off on the national budget – it would reduce the political fallout from random events that befall the president. That in turn would help make targeted violence against the president less likely and lower the possibility of an unpredictable yet highly disruptive event. Placing such a heavy focus on two elderly individuals is too risky and simply asking for accidents to happen.
Putting more emphasis on the other branches of the US government will by no means be an answer to all the country’s problems, but lowering the political temperature in the run-up to November’s election is still necessary. The office of the US presidency was relatively weak for much of the 19th century, with many presidents during that era failing to head off largely foreseeable bloodshed. The issue of slavery continued to tear the nation apart even after Abraham Lincoln was elected president.
Trying to reduce the power of the US presidency is a “chicken or the egg” problem. Is the office’s power the result of actions taken to expand what the president can do, other government bodies ceding their power to the executive or the amount of attention the world pays to the presidency? There appears to be no consensus on the matter, so trying to restrain the president’s power will inevitably be complicated.
The recent US Supreme Court ruling curtailing the power of federal agencies to interpret the laws they administer has been criticised as making governance more difficult and giving too much power to the judiciary. However, its taking power away from the executive branch could be seen in a positive light as well. There can and should be more to the US government than the president.
Unfortunately, the Supreme Court’s ruling that presidents are immune from prosecution for actions taken in an official capacity – while perhaps well-intentioned to prevent US politics from looking more like South Korea’s – cuts against its other rulings by returning the spotlight to the presidency.
In a global context, a weaker presidency would mean a greater role for US allies as they build their own capacity instead of relying on the US security umbrella. This would be in line with Washington’s calls for allies to share more of the load but also mean they could have more leeway to pursue strategic priorities not necessarily in line with those of the US. A wise US president would recognise this as just what the country needs to get its house in order.
The best outcome for the world would be if no one cared who sat in the Oval Office next year.
（图源：《时代》杂志）