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US election 2020: Whoever wins, Americans deserve better the next time
Chris Kenny

Trump’s personal failings are critiqued and exaggerated so widely and wildly that it seems superfluous to mention them. Yet, it needs to be recognised that his crassness, self-obsession, ill-discipline, vindictiveness and rhetorical inconsistencies are not what we would choose from a menu of presidential qualities.

To understand the reason he became president, we need to recognise that he exists to rebel against the misinformation, hateful abuse and ideological intolerance of the modern green left, which uses all the apparatus of the so-called elites and political establishment, along with mainstream and social media amplification, to undermine and attempt to delegitimise conservative views. He is no conservative himself, but Trump-the-disrupter exists to repel the progressives, to reclaim the nationalism, social values, law and order, and economic rationalism that matter to right-of-centre voters.

While Trump has not greatly changed his nation, he has coarsened the nature of political discourse. Most politicians on the right-of-centre just roll with the punches — they accept jaundiced journalism, slanderous assaults from social media, and endless ­attacks from celebrities as par for the course.

Hillary Clinton called Trump’s supporters racists, sexists, homophobes, Islamophobes and xenophobes, then urged Americans to “resist” Trump’s presidency. Robert DeNiro said he would punch Trump. Madonna said she dreamt of blowing up the White House. And comedian Kathy Griffin posed with a macabre model of Trump’s severed head. As a candidate, and from the Oval Office, Trump has refused to just take this; he hits back just as hard, just as juvenile.

If you want social exclusion, tell people you support Trump. Want an argument, do the same. Want abuse on the street, wear a Trump T-shirt.

The hatred directed by the so-called liberal left towards their perceived ideological opponents on social media and in the public square might have made conservative voting intentions almost impossible for pollsters to measure. We will see.

Assessments of Trump’s presidency ought to focus on his actions rather than his words, and predictions about the election ought to assume voters will come to reasonable conclusions. Before the pandemic his economic strategy — driven by tax cuts and ­luring manufacturing investments — had paid off.

COVID-19 turned all that on its head, just as it has in every nation. Incumbency can be a bonus in times of crisis, but this health and economic dilemma is especially challenging. Trump’s rhetoric has been feral, and his opponents are blaming him for infections and deaths, which is a bit lame. Nine countries have higher death rates than the US, and 10 have higher infection rates — we are talking about countries such as Spain, Belgium, and Brazil. And nations with comparable performances to the US include Britain and Italy.

Yet we constantly read that Trump’s management has been disastrous. His messaging has been discombobulating but he acted on foreign travel bans and boosting medical capacity quicker than most. In the US, as here, the key pandemic management decisions and disasters belong to the states.

The critiques from the left often lack substance, and their sanctimony often backfires — as with CNN legal analyst and Trump character assassin Jeffrey Toobin who last week was caught masturbating on a Zoom meeting, or journalists who relentlessly accuse Trump of lying now exposed for three years of deceptions on the Russia collusion ­delusion, or major media companies that malign Trump as a bully, forced to pay compensation for defaming and shaming Catholic school student Nicholas Sandman because he dared to wear a MAGA hat.

They fail on substance too. They accuse Trump of ineptitude on foreign policy and border protection, yet his wall and unorthodox tactics have delivered border security that Republican and Democrat administrations routinely have promised, trade concessions from China and real progress in the Middle East.

By recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Trump brought a new realism to Middle East diplomacy. By imposing tariffs on China, he changed gears and lubricated the rusted cogs of trade negotiations. By pressuring NATO allies, he won new commitments. And by exiting Paris, he showed the way to a pragmatic, technology-based approach on emissions reduction.

If the Democrats win, they are likely to contend that their world view has been right all along, claiming vindication of their progressive and post-material agenda. That would be a mistake.

No matter the outcome, both the Republican and Democrat parties need to find better proponents in 2024.