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Notes -
There is none.
In 1980's, Soviet system was completely discredited among all classes and strata of population, the more educated the more so. There were not "true believers" anymore, there was no equivalent of people voluntarily defending the Party line (and professional agitators were despised by everyone, including themselves), no equivalent of people sincerely putting "in this house, we believe in the Party" signs.
It was age of universal distrust in any authority (mixed with credulous trust in astrologers, shamans, self proclaimed prophets, faith healers, UFO contactees etc...)
And your conclusion from all that is that there's no parallel at al???
The one part we could really nitpick about is the one concerning the educated classes, but I'm confident to say that whatever level of trust they have in the current American system is a function of their trust in the Democratic Party's ability to assert itself as the long-term political hegemon on a national level. Most of this trust would evaporate in an instant should Trump win another election.
The Party is means to the end, means to promote the Idea.
If you believe in the Idea and the Party fails, does it mean that the Idea were false and worthless? No, it means that it was weak, that it needs to be cleansed and purged from weaklings and traitors, or abolished and replaced with something better. If the masses reject the Idea, it means that they are dumb ignorant rednecks who need to be put in their place.
And the Elite Human Capital believers in Idea are as strong as ever before (it helps that modern Idea is rather incoherent grab bag of various contradictory things instead of perfectly logically consistent science of Marxism-Leninism).
It depends on how we define the word.
In the case of the USA, if we define 'system' as 'the political structure founded after the War of Independence and the constitution's ratification', then I'd say it's indeed not discredited by any class other than left-wing activists and their sympathizers who see it as implicitly white supremacist and classist. But if we define it as 'the Global American Empire's globohomo Deep State as it exists in 2024', the situation is pretty much the opposite. On a related note, I'd refer to this comment of @RenOS as a good description of the overall loss of societal trust in the US.
The USSR, on the other hand, did not have such political longevity, so the system meant 'socialism in one country, as founded by Stalin', and I can largely agree with your assessment, although I think the idea that the system discredited itself was the main driving force behind Gorbachev's popularity, for the short time it lasted, that is.
Is long dead. US of 2020's has less in common with US of 1790's than USSR of 1980's had with Russian Empire of 1750's.
Yes. The Elite Human Capital overwhelmingly supports GAE, both ideology(as far as we can talk about one) and practice.
Why shouldn't they? The system works for them, life of EHC is as good as it could be. Exact opposite of Soviet elite, who knew they were miserable beggars compared to their Western counterparts.
Open defections are so far rare. The peasants are getting more restive, but what can you expect from dumb rednecks.
This is more like USSR in 1930's, not in 1980's (of course, modern EHC is far from Bolshevik party hardened in revolution and civil war).
No other system presents better QOL for the UMC. As I’ve said before, you can go see the Waldsiedlung in East Berlin where the rulers of the richest communist country lived…like the US lower middle class of the Reagan era.
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