Monday, 12 February 2024

America: A country for old men

I follow US politics on Twitter (or X if you prefer) and the 2024 battle for the White House promises to be the most surreal ever. Presidential elections are a huge thing in America with vast sums of money - probably in the billions - being spent by both sides in an attempt to win the presidency, the senate, and the House of Representatives. They are usually an insane circus at the best of times but it now looks almost certain to be a repeat of 2020 with Biden pitched against Donald Trump, two old men whose supporters each claim the other is in the advanced stages of senile dementia.

The charges aren't ridiculous either. Both are well past their prime and prone to making gaffes of one sort or another. It’s easy to treat it as a joke but for the fact that these men are pretty certain to wind up as the last two on the final shortlist of applicants for the world’s most powerful individual. Terrifying isn’t it? Are they really the best the two parties can come up with?  Apparently, they are.

Both have a habit of losing the thread, misspeaking, and mixing things up in public speeches. They aren’t the first, Ronald Reagan was once famously prompted by his wife Nancy when he appeared to be stumped for an answer to a reporter’s question. But Reagan’s slips and lapses were nothing compared to Trump or Biden.

The Republicans have the bigger problem. Trump has essentially taken over the party and made it into a tool for self-enrichment or perhaps more accurately a ‘get-out-of-jail-free' card. Most senior figures in the GOP privately despise Trump but daren’t say so publicly.

Their problem is also ours. Biden is at least rational most of the time and willing to accept advice. Trump on the other hand is totally deranged as seems obvious to most people around the world. Unfortunately, this doesn't apply to his 60-70 million MAGA supporters who hang on his every word in every mangled speech - and there are plenty of examples. The Lincoln project has compiled a series of them in this short video:

His latest outburst is to suggest he wouldn’t respond to a Russian attack on any NATO ally who isn’t spending enough on defence and would actively encourage Putin to do whatever he wants:

He talks as if NATO is America's protection racket, forcing members to cough up billions to prevent Russia from ransacking their countries. This is the level his mind works. And don't forget this is the man Farage and Rees-Mogg support. Don't think we're immune to it all.

If this doesn't spur EU leaders to form a European armed force independent of the USA, nothing will.

The American right has always had more than its fair share of fruitcakes and knuckleheads, and I suppose there has always been a section of the electorate who would have supported some of them - who remembers Barry Goldwater for example? But Trump is way out in front. Nobody else comes close to the sheer deranged narcissism. He's an imbecile with the vocabulary of a ten-year-old and thinks he's smarter than anyone else in the history of the world.

Most worrying is the fact that he's captured the party's base and they appear unable to recognise what he is. This is more troubling than anything for the future of America and the West. He's facing serious charges in several states and is probably going to be found guilty in all of them. Not only are these civil and (mainly) criminal cases being ignored, but his MAGA supporters believe it's part of a conspiracy to bring him down!

In case you think I'm being easy on Joe Biden, here are some examples of his gaffes:

In 2007 I seem to remember there was a Western film, No County for Old Men, referring to the USA. How wrong that has turned out to be.

With a general election due over here at some point, it promises to be an eventful year.

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