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What are some aspects/themes in Macbeth that are still relevant today, and how so?

Since Shakespeare "invented the human as we know it," as Shakespearean expert Harold Bloom writes, there are themes and motifs in Macbeth such as "vaulting ambition," excessive power, subterfuge, and paranoia, that are truly relevant in modern politics.


One of the popular television series this and previous years has been House of Cards, a realistic program set in Washington, D.C. whose scripts deal primarily with themes from Macbeth that are relevant today: "ruthless pragmatism, manipulation, and power." These themes are also much in line with a note left by Vince Foster, White House aide for the Clinton Administration, whose dead body was found in a park in Washington, D.C. It read, "Here, ruining people is considered sport."


Certainly, President Richard M. Nixon, who was given the moniker "King Richard," was a man seized with "vaulting ambition" and a desire for power as well as a paranoia to outmatch that of Macbeth. His infamous wiretapping of Democratic headquarters at the Watergate Hotel was illustrative of both his ambition and his paranoia, borne not from prophesies, but from past experiences of political losses--his moving Birnam Woods. (He had thought that John F. Kennedy stole the 1960 presidential election from him because he was ahead in all the polls before the television debates.) That he abused his power is exemplified in his invocation of "executive privilege" to protect members of the White House. This privilege allowed members of the executive branch to resist interference from the legislative and judicial branches. With this political manipulation, Nixon kept Congress out of White House personnel records.  


Even with the current administration in the U.S. there are those who have voiced concerns over executive orders and other privileges taken that have by-passed the legislative branch as well as the Constitution. These actions have, certainly, been perceived by some in both Washington and the private sector as overly ambitious and excessive.

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