A Really Useful Idiot

"Give me your tired, your poor and huddled masses, and find a haven, banishing all fear.

"

Trumpism, it started with the Tea Party.

American hegemony had gone too far. They had been the de facto winners of the Second World War. Roosevelt had provided the supplies and equipment, the Doughboys came to the rescue of a fractious Europe and Marshall Aid was supplied for its rebuilding. The USA halted the spread of communism beyond East Germany and in Asia and the Americas, with some notable exceptions. They became the home base of global institutions, including the United Nations, NATO, the World Bank, and the IMF. They consolidated and celebrated their influence with nuclear weapons, movies, advertisements, fins on their automobiles, skyscrapers, junk food and damaging chemicals. They were doused in dollars, oil and bumper crops. The wealthy became wealthier and ambitious migrants from Europe, Asia and the Americas boosted their talent pool. 

The rest of the world lapped up the fairy story. It allowed the USA to exploit the natural resources of other nations and take over their companies. American products from planes and weapons to fast food, fizzy drinks and domestic appliances were foisted on the world along with a glamorous narrative of a nation too good to be true. The United States were not colonialists in pursuit of an empire, that was old hat, they were buying their way into exploiting the resources and the economic growth of what they regarded as their domain, the free world.

They had their comeuppance in Korea, Vietnam, and parts of Central and South America, and this created a scintilla of doubt amongst the radicalised young in the 1960s and 1970s. But the USA was high on self-belief and had charismatic political and business leaders who assumed global leadership, never more so than when Gorbachov ceded the freedom of the Soviet republics and the creation of democracies in new nations that were former republics.

Things turned sticky in the Middle East as oil-rich autocratic nations began to exercise their wealth and George Bush, father and son, took military action in Iraq and Afghanistan. It didn't end well and they had harangued other Western countries to reluctantly support the invasions. The patina of American power began to lose its sheen but the USA still retained its reputation as the alpha country in the free world. Trump 1.0 muddled through with the Maga base kept in check by the grown-ups in the administration. However, the rehearsal had convinced Trump that he did not need advisers or seasoned politicians; what he needed was amateurs and fellow travellers to parody a government while he played out his fantasies and took corruption to the next level. The fact that 75 million voters had endorsed his second term gave him the power to follow his fundamental instincts.

His second coming started with a momentum that was meant to shock and awe the rest of the world. Previous policies and agreements were shredded, diplomacy was derided, felons were released from jail and tariffs were hiked to levels that left the rest of the world wincing and pleading for clemency. He acted as if he was all-powerful and world leaders responded accordingly. But some leaders baulked at the idiocy of Trump's gameplay which had gone too far. Canada and Mexico challenged him and they were supported by angry citizens and businesses who boycotted American goods. This mood was echoed and copied around the world as Trump threatened to take over Greenland and Panama, make Canada the 51st state, rename the Gulf of Mexico, suggest the USA should take over Gaza for real estate development, humiliate President Zelensky, give license to Vice President Vance to insult Europe and the Pope on his death bed, withdraw from the Climate Change agreement and no longer provide refuge for immigrants who now fear being banished to distant lands. The United States has forsaken the Statute of Liberty's Call as "a place of hope, beyond compare."  

The worm had turned. Canada's Prime Ministers Trudeau and then Mark Carney both called him out. China did not flinch and retaliated with equally severe tariffs on American goods. The American Finance sector was faithful to Mammon and the Bond market collapsed. Harvard University sued Trump over his withdrawal of research funding. Elon Musk, Trump's Tonto, had had enough; his businesses were in freefall, and he had become a derided figure of fun as he closed down government departments and agencies with the deftness of a SpaceX rocket exploding on takeoff. Trump had taken the red pill and was still in Wonderland."All persons more than a mile high to leave the court" seemed a suitable epitaph for Musk's time in government.

The shackles that had bound Western nations to the USA in its pomp were broken. Elections in Canada and Australia returned anti-Trump candidates, who months earlier had been facing defeat. China took a long-term view and began trade negotiations with other countries that had been hammered by Trump's Tariff proposals. The European Union was united in its opposition to Trump who, never one to admit mistakes, was beginning to row back on his proposals claiming they were part of his deal-making strategy. 

The disruption that Trump had inflicted on the world had backfired, the umbilical cord to the USA had been severed. We are moving to a New World Order. Trump has been a Really Useful Idiot.

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