Donald Trump did not suddenly become a different
person because he survived an assassination attempt. He did not become a better
candidate. The flaws in his character will remain. But it is quite certain now
that he has won the presidency. The shooting revealed a side of his character
that will define the election and define it in his favour. Bravery and
defiance.
Joe Biden is a decent man. A better man than Trump. But
he has become weak, and it is quite clear now that he is unfit to lead anything
let alone the free world.
Trump has all of the character flaws of George Patton,
Ulysses Grant and Douglas MacArthur, but he is also the sort of man who would
say “I intend to fight it out along this line if it takes all summer” and then
do exactly that. Sometimes you need a leader with such flaws, though as Grant proved
they often make poor presidents.
Trump is a poor loser. His response to losing the
election in 2020 was disgraceful. Even if he sincerely believed that he had
been robbed he should have used exclusively democratic and legal means to fight
his cause. Democracy is above all about accepting defeat. Without that we are
reduced to forms of tyranny and eventually fighting it out with clubs.
But sometimes it can be a virtue to be a poor loser.
Grant, Patton and MacArthur were poor losers, for which reason they won in the
end.
Trump is a womaniser. He has had numerous wives and
numerous affairs. Rich and powerful men can behave that way. Ordinary men can’t
though many wish they could. Trump transcends ordinariness and transcends the
sexual morality that applies to everyone else. Our judgements barely touch him,
they merely graze his ear like the bullet that would have killed someone else.
Trump is a criminal. He has been convicted by the
courts. But criminal convictions only ruin those of us who have jobs that we
could lose and reputations that are the foundations upon which we build our
lives.
Being convicted doesn’t touch those of us who are
below this for which reason a shop lifter doesn’t care at all if he is
convicted. It also does not touch those of us who are above this. Napoleon gets
away with his whiff of grapeshot on 13 Vendémiaire and Trump gets away with all
the results of lawfare because everyone can see such trials for what they are.
Trump lacks judgement, but until the final year ruined
by Covid his presidency was quite good. He did well domestically and in terms of
foreign policy. Trump is willing to defy orthodoxy and that can be dangerous,
but it also be effective.
Trump is an isolationist, and his instincts are
protectionist. This puts him in the mainstream of American history. It is bad
for a Europe that has relied too long on American might. It is bad for China, which
has gained from free trade without reciprocating the deal, but it is not clear
that it is bad for America.
Trump is certainly too old. It would be better by far
if the contest was between too able governors in their forties or fifties, but the
difference between Biden and Trump is not merely two years. If Biden had been
shot in the ear it is unclear that he would have been even aware of it. Trump
needed to be ushered off the stage by the FBI because he was shot, Biden
frequently needs to be ushered off the stage when he has not been shot.
Trump’s thinking can at times be wild and his
statements can be so provocative as to appear deranged. Inviting Russia to
invade those NATO countries that don’t pay their way was just that. But while
actually not making it any more likely that Russia would take him up on the
invite, it did make it much more likely that those countries did pay their way.
The only way now that the Democrats can beat Trump is
by jailing him, shooting him or ditching Biden. Whatever the Democrats have
thrown at Trump he has become still stronger. So much so that he is now shaking
his fist at them.
When general James Longstreet was wounded in the
Wilderness in 1864 his first concern was to show his victorious troops that he
was still alive. Trump’s instinct is the same. It makes it more likely that
those troops will continue the battle and win it.
It is just possible that a competent Democrat
candidate thirty or forty years younger than Trump could give him a contest,
but even that is now too little and too late. The Democrats are going to be
punished for pretending that Joe Biden was fit to lead in 2020 and still more so
when it has become obvious even to those who hate Trump in 2024.
I would far rather have Ronald Reagan leading the free
world in 2024. Trump could have a very good second term, but there are also great
dangers in relying on a man whose character and judgement are so flawed.
But if you were on Omaha beach in June 1944, you would
rather have a man who was brave and defiant than a man who thought he was in
Oman.
If I had just survived someone shooting at my head, I
would have been above all scared. My instinct would have been to cower and
hide. Trump’s instinct was to shake his fist at the shooter and the world that has
tried so hard to bring him down. In that if in nothing else he has touched what
makes some leaders great.
He may just make America great again.
If you liked this article, then cross my PayPal with silver and soon there will be a new one. See below.