Imagine. It is twenty years ago, and you are an aspirant political novelist. So you do some drafting and take your efforts to a publisher. Your two principal characters are a prime minister resembling Boris Johnson and a US president: a dead ringer for Donald Trump.
Arriving full of optimism, your meeting is brief, and you leave with both ears full of fleas. Your interlocutor had never read anything more absurd. You may have some talent as a writer of light comedy, but if you should ever revert to politics, there is one crucial attribute which you will need to grasp. Verisimilitude.
Twenty years on, events have provided you with a response, even if it is a cliché. In today’s politics, truth is far stranger than fiction.
Boris was strange enough. But The Donald is on another level. Elected against all expectations once – and now twice, triumphing in a landslide that none of the pollsters saw coming. There is one quality which the regurgitated President appears to share with Boris: luck. BoJo was up against the ideal opponent in Jeremy Corbyn. In 2016, Trump had Hillary Clinton, the clear favourite to win apart from one crushing disadvantage: a majority of voters could not stand her. This time around, he first faced Joe Biden, clearly gaga. Then panicked Democrats went to Plan B. The Vice President could not be accused of being gaga, yet her handlers treated her as if she were. Perhaps they were wise to limit Kamala Harris’ media appearances. The worst of her rambling inanities sounded like Hillary after a lobotomy.
As a result, Trump is back. So what will he do, and does he know? In one of the Just William books (Richmal Crompton would have been a good biographer for Boris, if too sympathetic), William announces that he is going to be King. ‘But when you are King,’ asks another member of his gang, ‘what will you do?’ ‘I’ll rule.’
To be fair to Trump, his intentions go well beyond preening and grandeur. He has plans. This includes foreign affairs, though it is becoming steadily harder to work out his strategic intentions, if they even exist.
His other goals are easier to identify. In pursuit of them, he is appointing Cabinet members who intend to get things done: ‘disruptors’ as they have been described. Will this disruption be fruitful?
There is one basic question. Does Trump have any grasp of political reality? Boris often oscillated between insecurity and a belief in his omnipotence. In Trump’s case, there is no evidence of insecurity. He has said that he intends to remove 12 million illegal immigrants and has appointed adjutants who will help him to implement his policies: mass deportations, walls et al.
There will be challenges in the courts and at state level. There would also be economic consequences. In the US, as opposed to the UK, illegals are not given free accommodation and welfare benefits. They survive by working, often as cleaners, gardeners or slaving in low-grade catering establishments. This all helps to keep down prices and subsidises the lifestyle of many well-off Americans. Any mass removal of immigrants would be inflationary.
In recent US elections, inflation has been a crucial factor. Admittedly, President Trump will not be able to run again: even if truth may be stranger than fiction, there are limits. But he will want to go out on a high note.
Inflation also brings us to tariffs. No-one has ever accused Trump of being an economic sophisticate. He believes that if a foreigner makes a buck in the US, he has stolen that greenback from an honest-to-God American. Unfortunately, that destructive attitude is widely spread in the States, and infects many members of Congress. Mercantilism prevails. It is hard to sell the argument that, in the long-run, free trade is in the country’s interests, partly because there are usually short-term problems.
Economic progress, which includes moves towards free trade, always inflicts some suffering on, as it were, the hand-loom weavers. But it is simpler for them to voice their grievances than it is for the beneficiaries to make their case. It is lamentably easy to persuade the elected members of Congress that their constituents could lose their jobs because some foreigners are stealing them.
That is why tariffs have a superficial appeal. ‘Save American jobs’ is a more potent slogan than ‘imports keep down prices’, especially as the pro-tariff lobby will claim that the US should be able to produce anything that it needs at a competitive price: nonsense, but it can be made to sound plausible.
This is why it will be hard for the UK to achieve a trade deal with the US. I have never understood why agriculture should be a basic problem. American beef tastes delicious, and as for chicken, many Brits are happy to consume battery birds reared in concentration-camp conditions.
At least Trump is not under the illusion that he is Irish. He likes the UK, especially Scotland, and would love another state visit (what would the King think?). It would help if we had a more amenable Prime Minister. In personality terms, the President and the PM have little if anything in common. That is not to Keir Starmer’s discredit. It is, however, a good reason to retain the services of the current Ambassador in Washington. Karen Pierce is feisty. She is popular on the Hill. If anyone can charm the Presidential monster, it is her. That is not to her discredit. It is her job.
Peter Mandelson would make a good Ambassador, if a replacement is needed. But he is too high-falutin’ for The Donald. Then again, who isn’t? The nomination of Matt Gaetz as Attorney-General and RFK Jr to oversee Health displays a willingness to defy every relevant political principle from morality to common sense. It seems more than likely that the Senate will turn down both of them. Although Trump would no doubt be furious, the senators would be doing him a good turn. It would also reassure uneasy Americans that there are checks and balances in their Constitution which can withstand even Trump in rabid mode.
This is not to say that the re-elected President has no redeeming features. Under him, the US could evolve a sensible policy on fossil fuels, including no retreat on its embrace of fracking. Then there is Elon Musk.
Musk has one difficulty in dealing with Trump. The two men are equally egotistical. Moreover, Elon Musk is an unambiguously successful businessman. Trump might forgive him all that simply because the Left hate Musk, a fact which is greatly to his credit: ‘Let them hate me, as long as they fear me.’
It is, however, more than possible that the two bulls will not be able to find a modus vivendi in the same kraal. There could be a spectacular, technicolour parting. But – suppose that it could be made to work. Musk will be able to reform the structure of government and save vast sums of money, while setting an example to overburdened governments throughout the West. The man who electrifies the cars might yet come to electrify the Administration: it is not impossible.
We live in a world where nothing seems impossible, for good or ill: where truth is still trying to catch up with fiction. If wise, we must hope that the second Trump Presidency will not be an abject failure. The West needs a functioning US. ‘In God We Trust’: let us hope that the Almighty is listening.
Click here to subscribe to our daily briefing – the best pieces from CapX and across the web.
CapX depends on the generosity of its readers. If you value what we do, please consider making a donation.
