Trump the usurper

American politics was supposed to continue to be a dynastic struggle between the Clintons and the Bushes. It was supposed to be this way as that would mean nothing would change. Trump is a usurper. It is for this reason above all that he is so hated by the liberal establishment.

We have got to the stage however where everything Trump does is met with fury. This is the case whether he does something stupid or something sensible. Trump only has to exist to cause liberal anger. I can think of no US President in history who has caused such anger from opponents apart perhaps from Lincoln and his election caused the Civil War.

 I think the main reasons for Trump causing such a degree of fury are these:

1. He boasted that he could grab women by the p*ssy.

2. He wants to ban people travelling to the US from certain Muslim countries.

3. He wants to build a wall between Mexico and the USA.

4. He beat Hilary Clinton.

5. The Russians interfered in the election.

Like everyone else I found Trump’s comments about grabbing women to be vulgar, but which of us has not in private said something outrageous? Have you ever said something along the lines of I could throttle him? Have you ever made a joke that you wouldn’t like to be repeated on national television? Have you ever said something insulting about a politician, an entertainer? Have you ever in private done something you are rather ashamed of? Go on then cast the first stone.

Did Trump actually grab women? Who knows? I would guess that he probably did. But how many rich and powerful older men have been able to touch young beautiful women where they please? Are we to convict all of them? It’s not as if they are doing anything illegal. Rich, powerful men don’t need to do anything illegal to sleep with young beautiful women. They just need to have lots of money. Do you really suppose that Melania married Trump because of his looks? So Trump may have in a vulgar way said something outrageous, but he also said something that is true. So long as women are attracted by wealth and power, ugly, fat, old men will be able to sleep with whomsoever they please. If women don’t like this, it is up to us to say “No I don’t want your riches, your power or whatever jobs you might offer.”

I have little doubt that Trump has had numerous affairs, but this is a private matter between him and his wife or wives between him and his God or gods if he has any. Trump has been convicted of precisely nothing and if we start convicting men because they boast about their sexual prowess in private we are frankly going to need to build a lot more jails.

Trump completely bungled his attempt to ban people from certain Muslim countries because he was too honest about it. But I strongly suspect a majority of Americans would like security to be a factor in the issuing of visas and in fulfilling US duties with regard to asylum. Such policies however ought not to be discriminatory. It should be harder for people from any country that hates America to travel to America.

People from safe, prosperous countries should be able to travel with ease to America for holiday and business purposes. It need not matter what they believe. But if people are unfortunate enough to come from countries that regularly produce terrorists it is only sensible if security checks are made before granting them visas. But this should equally apply to countries that terrorise by means of Novichok as those who terrorise by means of flying planes into towers.

Likewise there is little reason for America to fear that tourists from Japan will overstay their welcome, so it makes sense to make travel from Japan as easy as possible. But there are large numbers of people from certain countries who enter the US on a tourist visa and never go home. It therefore makes sense to make it considerably harder for these people to obtain visas.

With cleverness Trump could have limited the possibility for people from various countries to obtain visas without doing so in a discriminatory way. He could likewise have limited the possibilities of people entering the US illegally from Mexico and staying illegally without having to build a wall and without treating Mexicans in any way cruelly. Britain is surrounded by sea, but even this doesn’t prevent people from arriving illegally. So the issue isn’t fundamentally whether you have a moat a wall or whether you don't. What matters is whether those who arrive illegally believe that they have an excellent chance of staying. If Trump wishes to discourage illegal migration, the key is not to reward it.

We have borders for a reason. We treat citizens of our sovereign state differently from those from other sovereign states. We have a special duty to pay our taxes for the welfare of our fellow citizens, not to pay for the welfare of everyone in the world. We would be bankrupt very quickly if we tried to provide the same level of public service we get in Britain to absolutely everyone in the world. For this reason we have a border and limit who can enter that border. If we didn’t we rapidly would cease to have our sovereign state at all. If you really wish to have completely open borders and unlimited migration, you are saying that you wish to abolish sovereign states and simply have the world completely without states and borders. There is an argument for this, but if that is your argument then make it and put it to the electorate honestly. But I’m afraid you will get very few votes.

For this reason we simply cannot allow unlimited economic migration from anywhere. Not only would this make our system of paying taxes in order to gain various benefits, unworkable, but still more crucially it would damage the countries from which the economic migrants have come. If the best and brightest from Mexico understandably hope for a better life in the USA their talents won’t be used to help Mexico become a more developed and more prosperous country.

It is for this reason that it is in both the interests of the US and Mexico that migration between these places is managed and limited. The best way to do this however is to make it impossible for illegal migrants to function inside the USA, by for instance making simple everyday tasks require identification only available to US citizens, and to be strict with those who are caught living in the US illegally so that criminality is seen not to pay. At the same time the USA should be doing all it can to help Mexico develop into a place where people want to stay rather than a place they want to leave. The same goes for everywhere not just Mexico. We must not reward people smugglers, but instead use free trade rather than corrupt aid to encourage people to make their own countries more prosperous.

Trump is hated most because he beat Hilary Clinton. Liberal America was looking forward to feeling good about itself. Identity politics had given us a black president, next it had to give us a female president, after that it would be time for a black female president with a First Lady. Obama’s most important characteristic was something that he was born with. It didn’t much matter if he was good, bad or indifferent. It mattered only that he was black. So too Hilary Clinton was born with her most important characteristic. This is the problem with identity politics. It makes people cease to care whether an author is a good writer. What matters is that she’s not dead, white nor a man. We cease to judge according to talent or character, but instead by whether someone is female, gay, disabled, transgender or from an ethnic minority. It’s a sort of apartheid, only in reverse. Whatever is not white, not straight and not male has virtue. Those liberal Americans who are white, straight and male get to feel a wonderful frisson of guilt which can be overcome by voting first for Obama and then for Hilary Clinton. At this point they are cleansed and can feel virtuous again.

But Trump took this moment away from them. There was no moment of feeling warm and gooey because America had elected its first female president. Instead millions of Americans had demonstrated their contempt for identity politics. Identity politics lost. Just like the Remainers they have been fighting a rearguard battle ever since.

Liberal America has been desperately trying to annul the result of the Presidential election since the moment it was announced. It has used the CIA and the FBI to attempt to thwart that result and hopefully annul it.

Trump’s sin is that the Russians wanted him to win and almost certainly interfered in the election. But the Russians have been interfering in all sorts of elections lately. They were probably involved in Brexit, in Macron’s election and the Scottish and Catalan independence votes. What are we to do? Shall we annul all elections where it can be shown that the Russians were probably interfering? The trouble is that lots of people from all around the world interfere. Obama advised British Brexit voters that we would go to the back of the queue. The head of the IMF told us that Brexit would be a disaster. Sometimes this interference works, more often the voters just ignore it. Did Russian interference in the US elections mean Trump won? Who knows? But do we really want to go down the route of saying that if it can be proved that the Russians helped one candidate, that candidate must lose? That too might allow the Russians to choose who they want to be president. They might for instance “support” the candidate they want least.

Did Trump’s team contact the Russians? Probably. Does it matter? No. I’m sure many previous US presidents elect and presidential candidates have informally contacted the Soviets. It’s sensible politics and benefits security to have such contacts. If someone showed that Kennedy had contacted Khrushchev prior to gaining power, I would consider this to have been quite sensible. Let them try to develop a relationship as soon as possible. Perhaps it might help in a crisis involving Cuban missiles.

The problem with the liberal rearguard action is that it is trying to prevent Trump doing his job. Whatever he does causes outrage, even above average economic growth figures. How dare he be successful.

I disagree with Trump on many issues. I especially dislike his protectionist tendencies, but we must give him a chance. It just might be that his threats to raise tariffs against China, the EU and Canada will make it necessary for these places to be less protectionist. It might on the other hand lead to a  trade war where everyone loses. Let's wait and see. Let's be open about the possibility of a Trump success rather than decide we have inevitable failure before anything has even been attempted. 

I think Trump’s unorthodox methods of diplomacy might bring about peace in the Korean peninsula, which might ultimately lead to reunification. This would massively benefit the people of North Korea and would make East Asia much more secure and prosperous.

It looks as Trump and Putin have come to some sort of an arrangement with regard to Syria which will put Syria in the Russian sphere of influence. The Israelis have been involved in the negotiations and clearly think this might improve Israel’s security situation. The main benefit is that Jihad will have been crushed in Syria. The price is that Assad will remain in power. Is it worth it? Yes. If we had backed Assad from the beginning we might have avoided war. We must start to think strategically and in terms of what is in our foreign policy interest rather than what makes our foreign policy look virtuous. This is how Great Power diplomacy keeps the peace. It always was this way. 

The price for peace in the Middle East will I strongly suspect be an eventual peace deal between the USA and Russia ending the Little Ice Age of Cold War II. This will mean that sanctions against Russia will cease and Russia and Ukraine will have to come to an agreement about their borders. Russia will keep what it has, but will have to promise not to play quite so rough in the future. Learn to live with this. The deal won't get any better.

If Trump achieves all of these things then he will deserve to win a second term. He might even go down in history as a second Ronald Reagan. It is all too early to judge. But it would be better for the whole world if liberal fury over Hilary Clinton not winning the election and Trump’s boast about being a cat lover didn’t spoil the best chance we have had for peace in some time.