October 2024 – J Boima Rogers

The fact that Trump is on the ballot and polling at similar level or even above Harris in the presidential race in some polls is an indictment of the American political system.  If we consider the electorate as the jury and congress, the two major political parties, Biden administration, media and judiciary as the prosecutor then it has displayed gross incompetence in allowing a convicted felon who is also under indictment for (multiple) other alleged criminal offences, to participate as a candidate in the presidential election and to be viewed positively by a high proportion of the electorate (Jury). The prosecutor has failed abysmally in  demonstrating to the jury how unfit Trump is to ever become president again. Indeed, these institutions should be sued for criminal negligence. They have failed to sanction Trump, with overwhelming evidence that his words and actions clearly violated the oath of office and subsequently.  Even worse is that the jury is currently being blindsided on two key talking points that Trump is absolutely unqualified for but which unbelievably he appears to be winning the battle, notably, the economy and immigration.

While the house of representative impeached Trump twice, the senate failed to convict him, despite a myriad of evidence of impeachable offences presented. Both major political parties  have been derelict as prosecutors.  The Republican party prevented conviction in both impeachments with its leader, Mitch McConnell,  asserting that it was up to the legal system to deal with the issues raised in the impeachments; that same leader presumably stated in a new biography that Trump was “stupid, despicable and narcissistic”. The party has caved in to a man who has abandoned major traditional positions and instead turned it  to a cult, making leading members complicit in the falsehoods that its dear wannabe dictator leader exhorts his followers to adhere to, forcing  out all Republican politicians who dare to question such falsehoods.  A major litmus test has been whether Trump lost the 2020 elections which a host of relevant officials, including Trump appointed officials and sixty court cases have confirmed he lost, many adjudicated by Trump appointed judges.  To be part of the cult, members have got to openly adhere to the dear leader’s statement that he won or at least question the validity of the result.

The Democrats and Biden administration failed to act in time on criminal charges relating to “unlawful (theft)” removal of documents when Trump left office and “actions” he took and/or failed to take in his attempts to illegally hold on to power culminating in the insurrection of January 2021.  State courts have either not pursued cases indicting Trump and his minions on election interference despite a plethora of evidence or have been thwarted by the federal courts or incompetence. In Colorado the US supreme court quashed an attempt to remove Trump from the ballot because of his actions and in Georgia his indictment on election interference has stalled because of the ineptitude of prosecutors. Trump has, with the connivance of friendly judges, successfully run the clock to avoid going to trial – the exact actions of a man who “believes he is innocent”.   The end result is that despite brazen actions that should have made him ineligible to be on the ballot, possibly in jail, Trump is once more standing for the most powerful position in America and the world.

The federal judiciary, which Trump with the connivance of Republicans in the Senate, packed  with unqualified (according to the US Bar Association) and highly partisan judges, has repeatedly given Trump a pass notably recently when the supreme court elevated him to the status of a monarch; that court and a Florida Trump appointed Judge have delayed prosecution (running the clock) and in the case of the latter,  dismissed a major court case on alleged unlawful retention of government documents.   

The media has treated Trump as “normal”, failing to outrightly reject, ignore or adequately disparage false assertions and a plethora of  fascist/racist statements.  They have treated him and his offensive actions and rhetoric as the those of a regular politician and his lies as news, allowing despicable falsehoods to fester, giving him/his lies the oxygen he craves. Then there is the ”Trump media”, which includes the behemoth, Fox Media (which paid a gargantuan $787 million for lying for Trump), masquerading as a major news outlet but actually,  together with a host of smaller propaganda outlets, spewing out highly biased, toxic lies and misinformation put out by Trump and his minions, including Trump’s own “Truth” Social, an Orwellian absurdity.  It should be noted that Trump’s biggest gripe and one of the main reasons he is reluctant to do a second debate and interview with major news outlets other than his propaganda outlets is his opposition to fact checking of his statements, a process which uncovers his falsehoods.

With the prosecutor having displayed gross incompetence the jury is being bombarded by Trump and his propaganda machine in the final stretch of the campaign with key talking points that George Orwell would recognise as masterpiece.  The Orwellian scenario relates to the two major talking points that appear to have given Trump a lifeline in the closing days of the election, namely, Trump’s claim to be the better manager of the economy and immigration.

Source: S&P Global, US Bureau of Labor Statistics, US Department of Treasury

On the economy, a review of key indicators demonstrates that while Trump appears to be winning the war of public opinion the reality is starkly otherwise.  As Obama highlighted in his recent speech,  he left the economy in pretty good shape for Trump after inheriting a huge mess (the great recession) from another Republican president, George W Bush.  Trump’s management of that economy and in particular his diabolical mismanagement of the Covid pandemic meant that at the end of his term the American economy had again been left in a lurch by a  Republican president. A snapshot of the state of the economy in January 2021 and September 2024 shows that when Trump handed the keys on to Biden, Inflation and unemployment were significantly higher, (more than double and a third higher respectively) the economy (GDP) had a lower growth rate, less than half the rate of the Biden-Harris administration in September 2024. The Trump administration had inherited a growing economy, tweaked the rate up by a whisker (marginally) by juicing it with tax cuts that overwhelmingly favoured the rich and corporations (overwhelmingly benefiting the rich).  These tax cuts, which were unwarranted and unaffordable, increased US government debt by ($8.4 trillion) a quarter,  – rather perverse to increase the national debt when the country was not in a recession – $4.8 trillion of Trump’s  extra debt was non-covid related borrowing . 

The snapshot above does not give the full picture of Trump’s gross incompetence because as a result of the pandemic which Trump had totally mismanaged, unemployment and inflation rose dramatically after he left office, peaking in the Biden administration as he tried to ameliorate the mess Trump had left.  Efforts by the (Biden) administration to counter the effects of Trump’s blunders are the main cause of the inflation, something that virtually all advanced economies have had to deal with. It should be noted that under Biden, the US economy has out-performed other major advanced economies in key indicators such as economic growth rates, jobs, inflation and investments.  A view confirmed by the International Monetary Fund(IM) which stated this week that the “US was pulling ahead of the world’s advanced economies” with a surge in investments resulting in higher productivity and wages. The CEO of Bank of America noted on 16^th October that the US economy was the envy of the world. The Economist magazine reported that in a poll of reputable economists, over two third (68%) of them stated that the US government deficit and inflation would be higher under Trump’s economic platform than that proposed by Harris. In short, the talking point that Trump appears to be winning with the jury, who have consistently given him a higher score than Biden and Harris, is unjustified by his track record and his plan and this is validated by economists who are best qualified on this issue.

The other key talking point favouring Trump is his presumed competence in managing immigration, with illegal immigration being a major concern of voters.  While the jury (voters) have credible concerns about the level of immigration, particularly in its illegal form, the level of illegal migration which increased significantly at the start of Biden’s term has gone down significantly. NBC reported that June 2024 saw the lowest level of crossings in the US southern border since January 2021. Trump has made the issue of immigration as an existential threat painting a picture of hordes of immigrants laying waste to America and his language mirrors those of fascists a century ago, including statements that they are “poisoning the blood” of Americans –  statements made by Hitler; that Haitian immigrants are eating the pets of Americans – Republican leaders in the state have refuted this claim;  that immigrants are marauding criminals – credible statistics show that immigrants are less likely to commit crime than native born Americans.  He plans to lock up all illegal immigrants and deport them in one big swoop, carrying on with some of the inhumane treatment meted out in his first administration.  Trump says he  will roll back the legal status of legal immigrants; this hardline measure would target non-White immigrants as he indicated during his term in office that he would like more immigrants from Europe. 

A number of issues would need to be looked at in the debate which cast a very dark cloud on the Trump posture. Trump opposed a bipartisan congressional immigration legislation which a conservative Republican senator played a leading role in crafting – Trump’s opposition killed the bill.   His action demonstrated that he is not really interested in resolving the immigration issue unless it benefits him politically.  The solution offered by that bill would have resolved many of the concerns raised by Republicans but its passage would have been viewed as a Biden win and for that reason Trump opposed it.

The Trump aversion to immigration is perverse as the country is a land of immigrants who have made huge contributions to the country. The richest man in America and the world, Elon Musk, is an immigrant who according to his brother, Kimbal, was an illegal immigrant at one stage; the second richest man is the son of immigrants.  This fact and other aspects of the Trump story make his position perverse.  In this century, parents of two of American presidents have been immigrants, namely, Obama (father) and Trump (mother).  Both parents of Kamala Harris are immigrants as are the parents of the wife of Trump’s vice- presidential nominee, J D Vance. Trump’s current wife is an immigrant, as was his first wife. He was engaged in chain migration relating to his wife’s family.  In a bizarre twist of the perverse Trump world, the richest man noted, Musk, an immigrant, has adopted and is strongly promoting Trump’s anti-immigrant posture. The immigration talking point is complex and the American and Trump story makes his hardline position inappropriate and as with the economy, the jury is being taken for a ride by a highly prejudiced demagogue who does not have solutions to the real challenges facing the country in the twenty first century. 

These two key talking points appear to be pivotal in propelling Trump to victory as the jury has positioned them as very or even the most important issues.  Democrats have not so far been able to point or focus the jury to the fallacy of Trump’s strength in management of the economy as evident in his record in the data above, his plans and the views of experts.  Democrats have also not been able to focus the jury on the positive aspect and complexity of immigration, how Trump is not particularly interested in resolving the issue and the fact that he and his vice-presidential candidate’s personal interests make it perverse for them to take such a hardline stand. Trump has created a cult following which appears impervious to logic and also blind to the most obvious anomaly in the messenger and message. One wonders if there are rational Republicans who can see through these key talking points and the other issues in the race. 

The other issues that are very important include abortion, democracy, the western alliance,  the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine.   In all of them, Trump’s views and track record are at variance with the majority of Americans, the Jury.  The supreme court justices he appointed were largely responsible for taking away the fifty-year old abortion rights women had, a position that is at variance with the views of the majority of Americans. He has demonstrated in his actions and statements that he does not respect or believe in democratic values, the bedrock of the American  experience. He is hostile to the western alliance that America and western democracies that successive American governments from both parties have nurtured for eight decades.  He has indicated that he will give Russia a pass on its war with Ukraine and would place no restraint on Israel’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, in Gaza and Lebanon, positions that are at variance the those of the majority of Americans across party lines.  And we don’t have to take the word of Democrats; in a significant departure from all other presidential re-election campaigns, numerous former Trump officials and from other previous Republican administrations have labelled Trump as unfit to be president; the latest being his longest serving chief of staff, General John Kelly.  

It should be noted though that the lack of qualification, abysmal track record and unhinged plans may not be enough to keep Trump from the White House.  Eerily, it was just under a century ago that a lowly corporal with no relevant experience and unhinged rants was given a pass by prosecutors (as defined above) and the jury of German voters gave him the opportunity to unleash the most horrendous calamity in the 20^th century.  Like Trump he had populist rhetoric full of hate, misinformation and lies that appealed to German voters and again a large proportion of them were working class voters who were persuaded to abandon their traditional leftist parties, same way White working-class Democrats have abandoned the party that has and continues to fight on their behalf.  Like the conservative German elite, mainstream (country club) Republican leaders believed that they could coopt the upstart Trump only to be rudely put in their place by a wannabe dictator who has jettisoned some of their cherished positions on fiscal discipline, support for NATO and other allies and democratic values.  Like in the case of the  Austrian corporal Business leaders have jumped on board with promise of tax cuts and “pro-business policies”.  General Kelly has revealed in a recent interview that Trump expressed favourable views of Hitler, the Austrian corporal.

Trump’s most prominent corporate supporter, Musk, shares his dark traits, namely, Trump’s racist and misogynist views.  Under Musk, Twitter or X which he bought in 2022, masquerading as a “free speech absolutist”, has allowed hate, racism and misogyny to blossom in that forum; its owner has made it a major platform  for Trump.  A major enemy of DEI, the South African native who is the recipient of huge amounts of pork (government contracts) has been mentioned as Trump’s efficiency guru if he wins the election; various federal and state agencies have court cases against Musk and his companies. In a bizarre twist of the perverse Trump campaign, Musk, an immigrant has been engaged in voter suppression efforts by emphasising the need for voters to validate their citizenship before being allowed to vote.  An immigrant is likely to deny native born voters their rights because of issues that are often racially biased, bizarre.

The jury is about to elect a man who has demonstrated that rather than make America great will take it down again because he does not have the brains, skills stamina and temperament for this very demanding job.  America has experienced three catastrophic meltdowns in the 21^st century, namely September 11, 2001, the great recession and Covid19.  Under the last Trump’s incompetence resulted in  a negative impact that was by far the worst among advanced countries relating to the devastation in jobs, economic shock and (1.2 million) deaths.  The country appears to be heading towards another major catastrophe, a second Trump term.  

J Boima Rogers is Principal Consultant at Media and Event Management Oxford (MEMO, www.oxfordmemo.co.uk