Anthony Scaramucci is no fan of Donald Trump, but even he was shocked by our live poll of 2,000 Irish people who had come to hear us talk about all things Orange Man-Baby.
“Which is the bigger threat to global stability, the USA or China?” It’s a question I’ve asked a fair few audiences before, and the numbers voting USA keep on climbing. That’s not good for the land of the Mooch, who famously lasted 11 days as Trump’s head of comms in term one, many wars ago.
By more than nine to one, 92% to 8%, our Dublin audience went for the Americans as global wreckers. “That breaks my heart,” said Scaramucci, as the numbers came up. I tried to ease his pain by listing why one might have voted for China instead, but if anything, my analysis made things worse.
Despite China being a repressive, surveillance-state dictatorship with an enormous global espionage and sabotage network, committing industrial-scale intellectual property theft on our ideas and industries, with a dreadful human rights record, including the mass detention of Uighurs in so-called “re-education camps” and making aggressive, expansive plans for Taiwan and the South China Sea, people still think the USA is worse? So it would seem.
In diplomacy, you just never know when you might need somebody, which is why it is generally unwise to treat your allies badly, and even with your enemies sensible to have a little space in which you might be able to engender goodwill should the need or opportunity arise.
The Trump administration has treated Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky pretty abominably, deliberately seeking to humiliate him in the White House, withdrawing the military support that the Ukrainians were able to enjoy under Joe Biden, and repeatedly trying to bully him into accepting an end to the war on aggressor Vladimir Putin’s terms.
Under the kind of pressure that would break most humans, Zelensky has kept on keeping on, in a way that makes him, according to a poll I mentioned here recently, the most admired and respected world leader in the eyes of Americans, with their own Dear Leader down in 16th, behind Delcy Rodríguez of Venezuela and Belarus dictator Alexander Lukashenko.
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I’m in Ukraine, a nation let down by America
Now suddenly, as Iranian Shahed drones shower down on to a dozen countries in response to the Trump-Netanyahu war against Tehran, Ukrainian expertise is in demand. The nature of warfare has changed substantially during the four years of this war, and the Ukrainians now have more experience than anyone at dealing with drones.
So when the Americans asked for help, despite the abuse and provocation he has endured at their hands, Zelensky responded immediately, with his usual good grace. “I gave instructions to provide the necessary means and ensure the presence of Ukrainian specialists who can guarantee the required security,” he said.
I really hope JD Vance said thank you. We all remember how much the vice-president values such good manners.
It’s almost a decade now since Barack Obama expressed the view that Brexit might not be the best idea for the UK, provoking almighty fury among those leading the campaign for the greatest act of economic self-harm known to man. How dare he? What right does an American president have to seek to interfere in OUR affairs? Who does he think he is?
Now these self-same people, and their rabid media cheerleaders, appear to want nothing more than an American president interfering in our politics, not least by a daily outpouring of bile against the man the British people have elected as prime minister.
At least Obama was making cogent points in an intelligent manner about an important debate. Trump is having a tantrum because when he asked Keir Starmer to jump, the PM did not say, “how high?”
Yet Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch both seem to believe that is exactly the response Starmer should have made. It is really quite weird.
Obama was a popular figure in the UK, with an intellect and charm that were respected. Donald Trump’s ratings here, and across Europe, are lower than for any president at any time, yet the UK right wing is so wrapped up in the MAGA nonsense that they cannot see the damage they are doing to themselves politically.
Long may their vote-destroying, reader- and viewer-losing stupidity last. Interestingly, it is not a mistake that the far right parties in France and Germany appear to be making.
Farage may be feeling confident as his crypto friends pour in their millions, which he will be using to pump out lies and misinformation ahead of the Scottish, Welsh and local elections in May. But he is making mistakes.
Selecting Matt Goodwin as candidate in a north of England constituency with a sizeable Muslim community was a mistake. His silly stunt visiting the Chagos Islands was a mistake. His blind support for Trump on Iran, most recently with yet another Mar-a-Lago over Clacton weekend visit, is a mistake.
Hubris. It can bring down the best of them. And the worst.
From Dublin we travelled north to Belfast, and knowing as I do that the Mooch loves his US-UK history, I organised a tour of Hillsborough Castle, our base whenever in Northern Ireland for the peace process talks, and scene of some of the most important moments.
So many memories came flooding back. Of the “not a day for soundbites” hand of history falling on Tony Blair’s shoulders. There was the time we had three-quarters of the IRA Army Council in the room next to where Reverend Ian Paisley’s delegation was gathering. The time I forgot to stop my bath running and caused a minor flood.
Oh, and it was actually at Hillsborough, as we waited for George W Bush to arrive, that I finally persuaded Tony Blair it was time for me to resign. The next morning, on a 6am run around the grounds, I ended up in a fight with a US secret service officer who jumped me from behind a tree, thinking I was an intruder heading for the president (thankfully, a British security guy stepped in!).
But perhaps my favourite memory concerned the sleeping arrangements of the Ulster Unionists. One evening, as we prepared for a through-the-night session with Sinn Féin’s Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, I suggested to a gaggle of the UUs that they grab a few hours’ sleep.
I showed them to our bedrooms. I suggested to the very proper John D Taylor that he sleep in the room being used by Tony Blair. Thinking I would be appealing to his Unionist instincts, I explained this was where the Queen slept when she was here.
“I could not possibly sleep in a bed used by Her Majesty,” he protested. I gave him my room instead.
A few hours later, we needed the Unionist team back in the room. I went to wake them up. But we couldn’t find Taylor’s colleague Ken Maginnis.
“I wonder… he wouldn’t, would he?” I sneaked into the Queen’s bedroom… and there was Ken, dead to the world, a smile upon his face, from which a gentle snore emerged.
Breaking news. The USA v China vote produced an identical result in Belfast to the one in Dublin.
We had another polling question for the Northern Irish: who deserves a Nobel peace prize more, Donald Trump or Gerry Adams? The result: Adams 87%, Trump 13%. Fair to say US soft power is just one more victim of the wrecking ball.
