THE least surprising aspect of the visit by President Trump is that there are protests by the usual suspects. While people might point to the size and scale of the demonstrations this time, they will omit to articulate the real reason for this. It is not so much that there is a greater groundswell of opinion about President Trump than his predecessors. Instead it is because the British public, including the self-deluded in this case, are considerably better off than their previous counterparts were.
Private Eye ran a blank cover to show the achievements of Mrs May’s premiership. However Mrs May is rather like Christopher Wren concerning St Paul’s Cathedral. To see her achievement, look around Trafalgar Square at all the healthy, well-fed, well-clothed, nicely-groomed, gadget-carrying, ideologically-informed masses freely protesting, having the time and money to congregate for their session of hate. They do not have illness, want, ignorance – apart from delusion – or fear on Mrs May’s watch. They live in a prosperous country with relative safety under the rule of law. But they are also rather ungrateful for the freedoms they take for granted. They do not recognise and appreciate their good fortune compared with those poor brave folk in Tiananmen Square 30 years ago, as Julie Lynn pointed out in TCW yesterday.
In fact, the surprising element of the protests is that there has been scant comment about the traditional antipathy between the ‘right-on’ and Republican Presidents. The broadcast media have been less than assiduous in pointing out that demonstrating against a visiting Republican President is the default position of Leftists in this country. At the very least, some Left-wing commentators have been brought up for not protesting when Barack Obama visited. So they have come up with the novel excuse that they always hate the USA, but choose to show this hate only when there is a Republican in town. Or something like that. They seem to be mumbling when asked.
The Left also caricature every Republican President as either a crook, a buffoon, a warmonger or a combination thereof. This has been the trend for the last sixty years. So here is a quick survey of the Leftist caricatures by Republican President:
Richard M Nixon – Crook and Warmonger. Crook over Watergate, or in Nixon’s case, its cover-up, warmonger over Vietnam. Never mind that Nixon was trying to end a war started by Democrats, and that he managed to reduce American involvement where his Democrat predecessors had ramped it up to no apparent effect apart from the number of full body bags coming home. Nixon also visited China and peacefully brought it into the global community. He pioneered detente with the USSR and helped reduce global tension. History has yet to be kind to him, but there is still time.
Gerald R Ford – Buffoon. Ford was a kind of ‘caretaker’ president following Nixon’s fall, having to deal with the energy crisis and the crushing realisation that the USA was effectively defeated in Vietnam and seemed to be losing the Cold War as more third world countries fell to communism. He also was gaffe-prone, both physically and verbally, being memorably described as the kind of man who could not walk and chew gum at the same time. Interesting trivia: Ford was born Leslie Lynch King Jr, but had a complete change of name following his parents’ divorce and mother’s subsequent remarriage.
Ronald W Reagan – Buffoon and Warmonger. What can one say apart from the hard fact that Reagan was the greatest US President of the last 50 years, making Americans feel good about their country after Vietnam, humiliation by Iran, and the energy crisis, ushering in the collapse of the USSR without a shooting war. Calling him a warmonger is unfair as he was standing up to Soviet expansionism and aggression, doubling down until he bankrupted his opponent. And he can hardly be a buffoon when he ended the Cold War so peacefully.
George H W Bush – None. Here is the exception. Reagan had generated so much goodwill that it is possible Americans would have been quite happy for him to serve a third term. However, a constitutional amendment restricts Presidents to two terms. Bush senior came to office at a time when communism had been so discredited that even the USSR was beginning to ditch it. Then, barely months into his presidency, the communist bloc finally collapsed after teetering for years. Leftists faced ridicule now that their spiritual home had fallen down. They had no arguments they could make to shore up their artificial credibility, and no one cared about their traditional objections to the democratic process putting a Republican into the White House. So Bush got a free pass on the traditional Leftist abuse stakes. A shame, therefore, that he served only one term, losing to Bill Clinton, a man who was his polar opposite in every way, which turned out not to be a good thing.
George W Bush – Buffoon and Warmonger. Bush was not a great communicator and his mangling of English delighted his critics. The description of Bush as a warmonger is inappropriate, given that war came to the USA on its soil through a terrorist group that Bush’s Democrat predecessor could have done more to take down, but didn’t. The invasion of Iraq was controversial amongst the fellow travellers, which is strange because the regime that was brought down was National Socialist and a menace to its neighbours, and Lefties are meant to despise National Socialism. But perhaps a troublemaking Arab Nazi regime is ok to the Left if it is standing up to the USA and subsidising suicide bombers in Israel.
Donald J Trump – Crook. However they might try, it is simply not possible to call a person who is as wealthy as Trump a buffoon. Trump has also held off major military commitments, preferring to use precision bombs and special forces to project power, so he is hardly a warmonger. And America prospers under Trump. While the Democrats made mid-term gains, Trump is still on course to win in 2020, simply because of his domestic record and also that the Democrats have morphed into something quite horrible based on perverted mix of identity-based assumed grievance and Marxism. But Trump’s opponents are working like crazy to portray him as a 21st-century Nixon. So far they have failed. But while they do, they are not actually finding ways to attack Trump on his policy. Newly-prosperous Americans who are once again proud of their country are not going to depose a man who makes them feel good about themselves.
So the current protests are par for the course every time there is a Republican in the White House. It is just America-haters doing what they do best for the worst of reasons.
