I hardly dare look at the news at the moment. Every hour brings some new, extraordinary and barely credible report that turns out to be absolutely true later, and often even worse than it appeared at first glance. Trump has unleashed Elon Musk to destroy America's democratic and constitutional norms at home while he torches the country's reputation abroad in between rounds of golf. What made the USA great was its leadership of democratic nations across the world and its opposition to despots and dictators. All that has been jettisoned in just a month of Trump's second term. The world is now a far more dangerous place than it was.
Who now would regard America as a reliable partner? Trump is showing the world that nothing he agrees to is worth the paper it's written on, whether it be on trade or security or anything else.
Last Monday James Marriot wrote in The Times that: Conspiracists are about to get a dose of reality. He argues that a society with rational scientific and political guardrails to protect health and freedom, can sustain “an underbelly of madmen and extremists—medical sceptics, conspiracy types and anti-democratic fantasists.” But, and here's the killer:
“Our society has been peaceful and healthy for so long that for many people serious disaster has become inconceivable. Americans who parade around in amateur militia groups and brandish Nazi symbols do so partly because they are unable to conceive of what life would actually be like in a fascist state." And:
"The supporters of autocracy who fawn at the feet of the anti-democratic 'thinker' Curtis Yarvin and cheer when Donald Trump suggests that 'He who saves his country does not violate any law' have no serious understanding of what it means to live under an autocratic government."
They are about to find out. Trump's new Defence secretary Pete Hegseth, a former soldier and Fox News host, is about to carry out a 'purge' of senior military commanders, including it is said, the chief of the general staff.
At a Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Liz Truss claimed Britain is now a "failed state" and later, Elon Musk wandered around on stage whooping it up and carrying a petrol chainsaw (with the engine running), symbolically cutting bureaucracy. The new Attorney General Pam Bondi was asked about investigating and prosecuting Joe Biden for something or other, and Steve Bannon told the audience that men like Donald Trump only "come along only once or twice in a country's history" and wants him to stand again in 2028.
This is how far down America has sunk.
After Trump's unhinged and entirely unwarranted attack on Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday, claiming he (Zelensky) was a dictator who started the war in his own country and is enriching himself out of it, the Ukrainian president suggested Trump was living in Russia's 'disinformation' space. This seemed to me quite a measured response implying that perhaps Trump might have been mistaken. The response came swiftly. A WH spokesman has said Zelensky should "tone down his rhetoric" about Donald Trump.
It's the equivalent of holding someone's arms behind them while someone else punches them in the face. Reminder: Trump has NEVER breathed a word of criticism of Putin. As some wag has already pointed out, if Trump genuinely believed Zelensky was a dictator, he would be cosying up to him. The fact that he isn't doing that shows Trump knows he's both democratically elected and popular.
Zelensky is now coming under huge pressure from The White House to sign an 'improved' minerals deal in what is nothing less than a global protection racket.
Who will save America?
Kash Patel has been narrowly confirmed as head of the FBI. If you don't know who he is check this image:
Yes, folks. This is now the head of the FBI, "shoving boots up the Deep State's ass since 1983." Americans should be very afraid.
Who will save America? Don't look to the Senate. Republicans there are, in an article for Vanity Fair, said to be "scared shitless" about reprisals by MAGA supporters unless they're 100% behind Trump. Patel has threatened to go after Trump's political opponents and presumably anyone who disagrees with him, using the FBI, and a majority of Senators seem to think that's OK, although I'm sure most of them don't. It's the first step in politicising the FBI.
Stuart Stevens, who was Mitt Romney's chief strategist in his 2012 presidential campaign said: “It’s tempting to compare Republicans to Prussian aristocrats in 1930s Germany. But Prussian aristocrats were more responsible. They were dealing with civil unrest and the threat of a communist takeover. Republicans today have historically low unemployment, and a record stock market. What’s their excuse?” Quite.
And while the Supreme Court may not be quite so fearful (although that can't be ruled out), it is majority Republican and some of the justices, including the chief justice himself, have implied a more muscular presidency wouldn't be a bad thing. I wouldn't rely on them.
We can hope that some on the SCOTUS might see that the problem with making rulings in Trump's favour is that it would also provide the same powers to the next Democrat president. Of course, this assumes that there will be one.
I say this because of the serious danger that some Republicans will realise they could well become targets for their own self-made weapons down the line, and make sure there isn't an election or if one is held, Democrats don't win.
Such is the way dictatorships are made, slowly at first then suddenly.
The G7
I see that the world's seven leading economies have been unable to agree on the text of a statement on the third anniversary of Putin's invasion of Ukraine because the USA can't now accept Russia being described as the 'aggressor' although that is precisely what it is. Previous G7 meetings have had no problem. It's obviously Trump's doing.
He is not only corrupting America's democracy and judicial system, but he's even debasing the English language. It's Alice in Wonderland stuff where ordinary words are either banned or their definitions bent totally out of shape.
German elections
You have to admit that Russian investment in so-called 'active measures' over thirty years or more has delivered a stunning success at a bargain price. For not much more than a couple of billion dollars a year Putin has crippled the West.
Trump's victories in 2016 and 2024 were helped by Russian manipulation of social media and that will play a huge part in this coming weekend's elections in Germany. The far-right AfD is in second place and although unlikely to form the next government or even play a part in it, they are a formidable force in German politics.
Like Orban's Fidesz party they are pro-Russian and anti-EU. There is no evidence that Putin has ever contributed to AfD funds but I would be amazed if he hasn't helped financially or paid influencers to pump out a constant stream of helpful misinformation to discredit the SPD and the CDU, the other two mainstream parties, and raise fears about migration.
Macron to Join Starmer in Washington
I see reports that Macron will accompany Starmer to The White House next week. I think the French president might stiffen Starmer's resolve. He's known for being a bit more fearless and blunt when it comes to speaking the truth.
Europe has an economy about ten times (10x!) the size of Russia's but because of divisions, it behaves like it's the other way around. Putin is a bluffer. This is how he's always got his way. Sabre rattling is his modus operandi. If the war in Ukraine has told us anything at all, it's that Russian armed forces were never very good and now they are depleted and weakened. Putin only has bluff but Trump is determined to let him off Scot free and we will all pay the price for that.
