Opinion

Tom Kelly: Trump not only needs to lose, he needs to lose big

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly is an Irish News columnist with a background in politics and public relations. He is also a former member of the Policing Board.

US President Donald Trump. Picture by AP Photo/Evan Vucci
US President Donald Trump. Picture by AP Photo/Evan Vucci US President Donald Trump. Picture by AP Photo/Evan Vucci

The American author, Max Boot, wrote of Donald Trump that he “combined the ineptitude of George W Bush with the corruption of Richard Nixon”. Personally I think that is too kind towards Trump and unfair to George W.

The 45th President of the United States is perhaps the most malevolent and manipulative politician of modern times. He is described by some as the American Mussolini.

The upcoming election in November promises to be the most vicious presidential run off.

Recently the president tweeted “We are going to WIN the 2020 election, BIG”. Earlier, he tweeted warnings about the election being tainted by the use of postal ballots. He suggested the election should be delayed. But even senior Republicans broke ranks to say it is not in Trump’s gift to delay the election.

Trump is far from dumb but he is dangerous. This is a president who is an actual threat to American democracy. He shows scant regard for his country’s constitution and “we the people” means nothing to a man who is so totally self absorbed and devoid of substance.

As the old saying goes - Trump knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

There is much at stake in November. Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic candidate, is carrying not just the hopes of middle America but most of the democratic world too. Even Bojo would probably prefer to cut a trade deal with Biden than Trump.

Trump is not a conventional businessman, he doesn’t do win/win. In Trumpville only ‘the Donald’ wins and chlorinated chickens would be the least of Britain’s worries. American pharmaceutical and insurance companies will decimate the National Health Service if they get the opportunity.

Trump has been the first American president since Nixon not to produce his tax returns, even after four years and a series of court challenges. So much for transparency in public office. His business interests are flourishing under the charge of his family and he shamelessly plugs his own resorts as venues for official government business in direct contravention to the protocols of the presidency.

We also know members of his family are working in his government without accountability to anyone but Trump.

The forthcoming election will effectively be a referendum on the president and for once the political bully boy is looking vulnerable. Those impacted most by his handling of the coronavirus can be found amongst his core support: working class, marginalised, angry and mainly white Americans.

Poverty and Trump’s dismantling of the most basic healthcare cover is literally killing tens of thousands of poor Americans. And yet Trump parades around his gilded resorts with a retinue of flunkies just as the demented former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu once did at the golden Primaverii palace.

If anything Donald Trump is a fighter and he doesn’t mind how dirty it gets. But this time his enemy is science. The USA death toll from Covid-19 is a staggering 154,000. And what is worse, one in five Americans are also out of work, that is some 30 million citizens.

The stock market so beloved by Trump as a measure of success is, according to Forbes, forecasting Trump’s defeat in November as their best route to recovery.

To say that America is at crossroads is an understatement. The president has sent federal agents to tear gas and baton charge peaceful American demonstrators. It is as if he is at war with his own people.

Hopefully Trump’s policy of division and disruption which worked in 2016 has run its course. But getting him out of the White House is still a huge task.

A swathe of blue needs to roust both this president and his legacy of hate. Trump not only needs to lose the election but he needs to lose it big.

In the battle between the two septuagenarians, Joe Biden’s decency needs to strike a blow against demagoguery. No mean task.