I expected the USA to sink immediately beneath a tsunami of
blood. I’m not exactly sure why, just that it seemed that the democratic
process had slumped to the level of a TV game show. Of course, that that was
before Ardern was elected.
I say I was shocked, but I was not surprised. It was obvious to anyone who listened to anything out of the States beside Oscar acceptance speeches, that John and Jane Doe wanted something done about the creep of the rust belt, the war on traditional values and the deluge of illegal migrants through its porous border.
The idea that prosperous nations should take responsibility
for citizens of failed and failing states has become a shibboleth of the Left
and to deny it is to invite lazy insult from those who carelessly toss around
terms such as ‘human rights’, ‘oppression’, and ‘genocide', and although illegal
migration affects fewer Americans than the economy it is doubtlessly the match
that lit the fire under Trump’s supporters this year.
While in the grip of what Sky News Australia calls ‘Trump
Derangement Syndrome’ I waited for the deluge which never quite came, at least
not because of Trump’s policies.
Under his watch no new wars were enjoined and efforts made
to extricate the US from existing ones. He responded to middle America’s dismay
over the heartland’s economic slide and removed taxes and regulations to
restore jobs and capital. Probably most notorious in the eyes of liberals he
reaffirmed that vile old notion of national pride. Trump required US allies to pay
their share of their own security and controversially vowed to limit illegal
migrants.
His loudly expressed love for America, its history and
traditions sounded a dangerous note to Californian and East Coast lefty
liberals who had cheered on eight years of Obama’s ‘apology tour’, and from
there it was a simple linguistic shuffle for his enemies to align him with
nationalistic dictators like Hitler and Putin.
Between 2016 and 2020 I became aware that my symptoms of
derangement were less noticeable, that from time to time the Don even made me
laugh, and that - if you can ignore Hollywood - the USA was still a viable
thing. I’m not suggesting that I’d have invited him around for a drink – after
all he was a known bottom-pincher and anyway I’m not a golfer.
And then came covid. Had it not been for the virus slipping
out of the Wuhan lab and thence around the globe I’m sure the Kamala Harris
campaign would have tried to hang that on him too. Just the same, he was
punished for it, like other Western leaders have been and several that are yet
to be- Australia and Canada, looking at you.
So in 2020 the MSM, lefty celebs and Big Pharma helped the
Democrats pull off a cheeky move that put a confused and bewildered elderly
gent into the Oval Office.
Three years later New Zealand voters showed their weariness
with the ideological whining and nanny-speak of the Left which was characterised
specifically by lockdowns, MIQ and mandated vaccines. In the wider societal arena
it was a vote against the ‘my truth’ of identity politics and the slipping away
of the democratic process.
But here’s the real surprise.
If you ask a selection of voters in this country who gave
Labour the thumbs down and invite their views on Trump, most of them will
immediately parrot the old tropes from CNN, BBC, New York Times et al
about his fascist plans for a Fourth Reich.
At the same time these New Zealanders will probably say that
they oppose biological men taking sporting medals from women, that they believe
in rational scientific truths about the cause of, for example, earthquakes and that
they are not the actions of angry gods.
They think that people who support abortion up until full
term have lost their moral compass.
Puzzled as to why our Coalition has not yet accepted the
Cass Report, they will affirm that chemical castration and mutilation of
children is not the mark of a healthy society. They will say that a woman who signs
up for a lifelong drug cocktail of male hormones, marries a man and becomes pregnant,
is not giving her in utero child any chance of a healthy life.
These voters may be wondering how hysterical trans activists
have thought through the logic of marching to support Hamas, Hezbollah and the
Houthi rebels, and why students enjoying the opportunity to study at our
previously well-regarded tertiaries want to obliterate the Middle East’s sole
democracy, Israel, and still be considered tolerant and educated.
They would much rather that judges sentenced people
according to their crime not according to their ethnicity.
They will be uneasy that the NZ Law Commission is still
pursuing Kiri Allen’s hate speech laws whereby calling former Olympian Caitlyn
Jenner a four-letter word is ok but to call her ‘Bruce’ could have them face a
criminal charge.
And yet all these issues are supported and promoted to a
greater or lesser extent by Kamala’s Democrats and opposed by Trump’s Republicans.
As they say, go figure.
Meanwhile, Harrison Ford, Oprah and De Niro will be sulky that
not enough of their fellow Americans obeyed their hectoring messages about how
they should vote and will be amplifying their messages to resist. (Left
resistance wise and good, Right resistance insurrectionist and criminal.)
And the winners who bothered to listen to the people will be partying up at Mar-a-Lago.
Penn Raine is an educator and writer who lives in NZ and France.
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