Friday, March 29, 2024

FROM THE RIDGE: Trump’s in a league of his own

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This column comes with a reader advisory. If you are in that small minority of impassioned folk who are convinced that President Donald Trump is the best thing that has happened for America and the world, then I suggest you stop reading at this point. You won’t like this.
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If you have ignored this advice and have continued, then please don’t feel compelled to write to me pointing out the error in my views or opinion.

Over 25 years of writing this column, I’ve had plenty of people get in touch who don’t agree with me, which is fine because we all have different views on the world and its happenings. We usually have an exchange where we agree to differ.

But a lot of Trump advocates write nasty and unpleasant notes, such is their passion for this man. Not all, but quite a few.

It’s curious that a small group of people hold such a passion for a man who has zero knowledge of them and their lives and wouldn’t care one iota if he did.

I can’t think of a living human being that I’m more contemptuous of, or I dislike, more than Trump.

There are greater despots out there such as Duterte, Kim Jong-un and Assad, but the world has always suffered from appalling people like this who are more than prepared to put their personal gains in terms of power and wealth ahead of their fellow citizens.

But Trump is different. Democratically elected and in charge of the United States, which is a cornerstone of the world economy and of democratic nations.

Even before he was elected, most of us here could see that he would not make a good leader of that or for that matter, any country.

Nothing that has happened in the four years since has shown that view was wrong.

The way he has treated women, his complete lack of empathy for others and a long list of other character failings prove that.

He is a billionaire, but that fortune was created by his father and it would seem he has done nothing to add to that immense wealth himself.

Recent news is that he hasn’t been paying tax for a decade or more might be because his own business empire is in trouble rather than straight out evasion. That he has personal debts over US$400 million to foreign entities, thus raising national security concerns. It could explain many of his odd foreign policy preferences.

But he did run a reality show. The Apprentice was created in the UK and Trump’s tenure of the US version was remarkably successful.

He has treated the presidency as though the whole thing is a reality show.

His four years in the White House have been chaotic.

If the ordeal hadn’t had such a profound impact on America itself, international relations, and trade, it would be amusing and bizarre.

Trump and his ascension to the presidency is a symptom that the US empire has reached its peak and is in decline, as is the fate of all empires eventually.

It may still be the wealthiest nation, although with US$27 trillion of debt, one must wonder how these tables are created – but it will soon be overtaken by China.

The bigger game here is the arm wrestle of the two biggest economies and militaries as they compete for dominance.

But despite that national wealth, the disparity of wealth within the country is huge and many people are finding living exceedingly difficult. They are the people who switched their allegiance to Trump because he has been excellent at appealing to their fears.

Trump’s biggest failure has been his complete mismanagement of a public health crisis.

Instead of a rational response, he has treated the emergency incompetently and in his own interest of being re-elected and it has cost the lives of 211,000 Americans with an estimate that it will be 400,000 by the end of the year. That is how many people the US lost in the whole of WW2.

And then as expected, given his disdain for simple measures like social distancing and wearing a mask, he’s caught the virus himself.

I suppose one must give him credit for consistency, given he has played loose with other people’s lives and then his own.

The difference being that he has the best medical attention and drugs available of any person on the planet. Unlike many of his fellow citizens, who can’t even get medical care because he unwound the Obama healthcare initiatives designed to assist the most vulnerable, the poor.

Based on the current polling in the race for the presidency, he is unlikely to gain a second term.

Biden at nearly 79 is obviously no spring chicken, so worth keeping an eye on his vice-presidential nominee Kamala Harris, as she has a decent chance of coming into play over the next four years.

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