Ask Bucko

It would be difficult to find a worse period in American history. The country has seen a lot of lows, from its political leaders, to its racial policies; from its misguided wars to its useless leaders, from support for brutal dictatorships to its lecturing other nations about acceptable behaviours, but Trump certainly has taken the country low.

Take a look at its cabinet. They do not engage in honest debate for the good of the country, but instead they sit around a table, to which not one has earned a seat, and fawn like children about the feet of a man with no morals, no learning, no taste, and definitely no class.

He has turned the White House into a new car sales yard. Its decor is now the stuff of legendary bad taste, its Oval Office degraded to a dodgy television studio. Occasionally the president will speak, but not in the measured tones of a person who acknowledges, not only his immense power, but also his enormous responsibility, to the peace and well-being of most of the world’s population. He instead reminds many of King George 111, a monarch who lost America, and who spoke in riddles.

America used to stand for something. It was where the world’s leaders congregated, where science and learning were celebrated, and where, whether you liked all of it, or if you did not, the arts and education, the knowledge economy, and the rights and obligations of mankind were discussed, calibrated and were duly recognised.

Although the U.S. can be disparaged for its arrogance and its sanctimonious self-regard, it truly did lead the world in matters as diverse as broadcasting, with Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America; its aid delivery, under USAID, which was occasionally obstructionist when it came to matters of family planning and birth control, but remember its benefits – providing food aid, disaster relief, supporting healthcare systems, promoting education, and fostering economic growth in developing countries. 

Not a bad list of benefits. But no longer. Donald Trump has allowed Elon Musk to dismantle USAID. The result – modelling out of Boston University estimates that the abrupt cuts to USAID have meant nearly 300,000 people have died to date. These are really rough estimates, but they give a sense of scale. 

Marco Rubio is probably the closest candidate in Trump’s cabinet for the description of “competent”. It is said that he is somewhat educated in foreign policy matters, and actually had a reputation as being relatively reputable.

However he appears to have imbibed the kool aid in Trump’s water cooler – he recently made the claim that no-one had died from the U.S. withdrawal of funding for overseas programs. He specifically denied the death of ANY children because of the cuts. Clearly he is either being badly advised, or he is wilfully blind.

Just think of the famine in Sudan, where USAID maintained soup kitchens for starving civilians affected by the civil war. Could it be possible that the withdrawal of food aid has not caused one child, or one mother or one sibling, to die of hunger? Fat chance! Not to mention the treatment of AIDS patients in Kenya, who no longer have access to retroviral drugs, which have been keeping AIDS sufferers alive.

Australia has lost faith in America

The Pew Research Center’s findings show Trump’s highest ratings, when it comes to his reliability to do the right thing in foreign affairs, come from Nigeria (79% confidence), Israel (69%), Kenya (64%), Hungary (53%) and India (52%).

Conversely, Majorities in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Mexico, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Turkey have no confidence at all in Trump.

Australia’s post-World War 2 relationship with the US has been pretty much “all the way with the USA”. We have been dragged into most of America’s disastrous wars, and we have considered the effort worthwhile, because we always believed that both nations had more in common than differences.

We believe in democracy, in helping the vulnerable, in everyone’s individual civil rights, and although most of us don’t think too much about it, we believe in the rule of law, and the fact that our governments serve the people, and not themselves.

Donald Trump is proving to be the most dangerous leader the world has seen since Hitler and Stalin. He speaks openly of invading sovereign nations, on the basis that no-one could stop the U.S. even if they wanted to.

He has initiated a trade war with the entire world, except for four countries: Belarus, Cuba, North Korea and Russia. As stated in Aesop’s fables, “A man will be known by the company he keeps”.

Both Canada and Australia have seen “Trumpian” politicians decimated in our most recent elections, and centre-left governments emphatically returned.

Most thinking citizens of democracies would be surprised if Trump does not lose the mid-terms next year, as his ‘reign’ has mainly consisted of authoritarian and racist policies, unashamed corruption, and the degradation of political representation.

His obvious dismissal of women’s rights, and their control of their own bodies, contributes to a sense that they are heading for A Handmaid’s Tale territory. Who knew we would have a world leader committed to religious fundamentalism, a theocracy in 2025?

The Democrats appear totally defeated, and the Republicans are essentially supine, terrorised and controlled by Trump. No matter the reason, they have abdicated their right to govern, as they allow Trump to trample all over the Constitution.

Of course there will be no repudiation of Trump and his no-talent team if they do not hold elections next year. That was another of Trump’s veiled threats last year, when he assured Christians they would never need to vote again, if they voted for him. Of course the American voters shrugged at “Trump being Trump”, and voted for him, anyway.

For a nation which considers itself the “land of the free”, they are tolerating daily dilution of their rights, and they appear to have been recruited to Trump’s callous disregard for the Palestinians and the Ukrainians. He wants a Nobel Peace Prize. Fat chance.