Washington DC was buzzing on Saturday 2 November with the news that the UK had appointed its first black woman as leader of a major political party. And, if you believe that let me play you at poker. Not only did I not hear a word about Kemi Badenoch’s victory, I did not (and never do) hear a word about the UK in the USA.
The so called ‘special relationship’ is a purely one-way process: adoration and a sense of entitlement in one direction, and utter disdain in the other. Of course, the USA is buzzing with election fever.
Whenever I arrive in the USA, I take the ‘taxi test’ or, more specifically, the ‘Uber test’. I get the driver, invariably an immigrant, talking about what the news is stateside, and it usually ends with them revealing their political preference. To a man, and they have always been men, usually of African, Middle Eastern or South Asian heritage, they voted for Trump last time round and intend to do so again. At the weekend after I landed at JFK and was being driven to my hotel, the driver (from Jordan) told me that he was all for Trump.
One of my sons was in DC a few years ago and, after repeated visits to the White House Visitor Centre to buy gifts, he got speaking to the staff in the shop all of whom were black. To a woman, and they were all women, they were for Trump on the grounds that he had done more to help black people than their first black president.
But try explaining this, as I often do, to left-wing wokesters back home, and all you get are scornful blank looks. A UK colleague of a left-wing persuasion in China last week told me he was worried about the USA descending into a fascist state. Another UK colleague here in DC told me that the taxi drivers only said they supported Trump because they feared being beaten up if they did not. Beaten up by whom I wondered? Trump derangement syndrome is as infectious as measles, and it leads people to utter the complete nonsense exemplified above.
That said, Washington DC is in the grip of Harris-mania. While there are no political posters or billboards in the capital, political memorabilia and souvenir stands are everywhere. And they are all for the Harris-Walz, President-Vice-President duo who threaten to inflict further mediocrity and misery on the USA if elected. Trump supporters and souvenirs were nowhere to be found as I walked the length of Pennsylvania Avenue.
People, mainly women, were thronging the pavement as I got towards the White House. Their t-shirts and placards proclaimed the ‘wise words’ of Kamala Harris, nearly all extolling the virtues of womanhood and how women can change the world. The women themselves were ‘of a type’: generally, not too young, none too slim, and with pink dyed hair.
I got speaking to one in my hotel lobby who told me they were out supporting Harris and against Project 2025. Probed further about Project 2025, I was told that it was a Heritage Foundation document outlining plans to curb the power of trade unions, ban overtime and make everyone work 80 hours (some contradiction there I thought), and have a USA-wide ban on abortion. I swallowed my temptation to say “hey, the more you tell me, the more I like them”. For all I knew, the woman could have been menopausal.
Clearly, Trump is about as welcome as a dog turd on a brand-new carpet in Washington DC, which will make things very interesting if he is re-elected. How I hope he is, simply to see the reaction of the left on both sides of the Atlantic. Maybe, if Harris challenges the result and it goes against her, the pink haired jelly monsters will invade the Capitol and leave used tampons on people’s desks. I am sure that none of them would end up behind bars if they did.
Speaking of turds, while I did not see this myself, a colleague showed me a picture – there is a turd monument on the Washington Mall ‘celebrating’ the January 6 Capitol invasion and general poopery. It only just appeared last week, and is accompanied by a sarcastic inscription castigating the invaders and, of course, is anti-Trump. Perhaps the next administration, whoever is in charge, could lend it to the UK. I think it would look rather splendid on the fourth plinth at Trafalgar square with an inscription dedicating it to Sir Keir Starmer.
Roger Watson is a retired academic, editor and writer. He is a columnist with Unity News Network and writes regularly for a range of conservative journals including The Salisbury Review and The European Conservative. He has travelled and worked extensively in the Far East and the Middle East. He lives in Kingston upon Hull, UK.
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Trump derangement syndrome abounds everywhere and yet those who exhibit it are 99.9% incapable of giving any examples of the terrible Hitleresque things he did as President. OK he’s bonkers, but are any politicians certifiably sane these days?
Is that the special relationship that made sure the pound lost it status as the reserve currency to be replaced by the dollar and ended the British Empire and replaced with USA military bases everywhere?
America only has a special relationship with one country and it ain’t the UK.
There has never been a ‘special relationship’ only a hypocritical ‘do as we say, not as we do’ abusive partnership.
I’m a Canadian senior. Things here are very similar to the UK, suffering through the idiocies so common in the west. Thank you for the comments you make.
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