No doubt however Britain's mandarins and Her Majesty will do their usual thing, convinced that the deep traditions of what remains of the British ruling class can overcome the mistakes of foreign electorates and their champions. They are used to looking the other way in the palaces of bling that decorate many London addresses - courtesy of the Russian mafia. The offer of complete, uncritical support with all the baubles looks like an irresistible prize, from the British end of things.
Which begs the question; who or what is Trump, the politician?
When political systems start to fail huge 'personalities' begin to flourish. They are marked by the conditions of their age of course. Rasputin emerged out of the grotesque mysticism and privilege that had underpinned the Orthodox church for centuries. He adorned the Czar's family as a means of communication with the ocean of peasants who had begun to fall out of their medieval swoon for the landed aristocracy. Father Gapon (a Czarist agent) had already played his role in the 1905 revolt, taking the insurrection to the gates of the 'little father', the Czar, over the heads of the bloated aristocracy (and into the arms of the secret police.)
Mussolini, who made his office into a Parthenon and who turned his lights on through the night, was another showboater who emerged out of WW1 to deal with the fragile, impoverished and novel Italian government on the one hand and the popular revolution on the other. He defined himself (and his movement) as the new Romans, a version of Italy's greatness which implied radical change at the same time as a dictatorial means to rebuild the floundering state while stamping out any genuine working class political alternative. He placed himself between the people and the ruling class and then reorganised the state around himself.
Although both cast a long shadow down the 20th century, Stalin and Hitler were of a qualitatively different character from each other, and from the examples already described. Stalin was the centre of a counter revolution in the heart of a revolution, the offspring of gathering bureaucracy using murder, state crime and famine as its means of survival. Hitler first constructed and then spearheaded imperialism's most savage military offensive against 20th century revolution as a whole. But both men were more symbols of great historical movements in full flood rather than marking out their own original political territory. Accordingly their political personalities emerge more as poisonous bureaucrats, sitting impervious at the centre of great machines, full of secrets and without charisma. They have a connection to political crises, one to the collapse of Soviet democracy in the face of war, the other to the collapse of Wiemar and the defeat, both externally and internally, of the German Communist party. But both of them are the prodigy of complete social collapse and political defeat and not simply of a political crisis of the status quo.
Churchill was an outsider as far as the British ruling class was concerned. A poor record in WW1, an unhealthy obsession with the US, a bellicose view of Germany, he was catapulted into office by the collapse of Chamberlain's peace with Hitler. A similar ruling class outsider, General De Gaul, was not so lucky. But both stood against the mainstream as the political leaderships of their respective countries rotted into fear and insignificance. Both saw themselves as saviours of their nations. And both were brought down to their real stature by popular movements that changed the political reference points for decades; (the post war Labour Government in the case of the UK and the impact of 'Les Eventements' in '68 in France.)
Where does Trump stand in all this?
'Drain the swamp', Trump said. In the absence of a mass political movement able to take on the US's political crisis, the crisis that Obama was completely unable to resolve to the left, so enter entrepreneur, TV star, multi-billionaire and showman, the aptly named Trump. He carries all the decorations (including his little bad boy, misogynist antics) of a modern celebrity. But what is sure is that he will not 'drain the swamp.' He will not take big money out of US politics. He will make US politics dance more to the tune of big money.
The Republican extreme right have coalesced around Trump to fill in the huge spaces that he has left on his agenda. They imagine that they will be able to lead him into their particular version of utopia. But it is Trump that has 20 million followers on Twitter in the US. He can speak over the heads of the swamp directly to the people. While he has no intention of draining the swamp, it is completely impossible that Trump will give up his main leverage or the technique he has settled on to apply his influence. The establishment, including the Republican establishment, hate him. He could fail very quickly. But the immediate sword of Damoclese that hangs over history's latest charismatic clown is whether he can release a new, multi-billion dollar investment into the US's domestic future or not. Can he drown everything else out with the sound of cash pouring from the two armed bandit? That would be enough to keep Trump afloat for a couple of years. But something else entirely will need to be built to 'drain the swamp', including the finishing off of the swamp creature, Trump.
When political systems start to fail huge 'personalities' begin to flourish. They are marked by the conditions of their age of course. Rasputin emerged out of the grotesque mysticism and privilege that had underpinned the Orthodox church for centuries. He adorned the Czar's family as a means of communication with the ocean of peasants who had begun to fall out of their medieval swoon for the landed aristocracy. Father Gapon (a Czarist agent) had already played his role in the 1905 revolt, taking the insurrection to the gates of the 'little father', the Czar, over the heads of the bloated aristocracy (and into the arms of the secret police.)
Mussolini, who made his office into a Parthenon and who turned his lights on through the night, was another showboater who emerged out of WW1 to deal with the fragile, impoverished and novel Italian government on the one hand and the popular revolution on the other. He defined himself (and his movement) as the new Romans, a version of Italy's greatness which implied radical change at the same time as a dictatorial means to rebuild the floundering state while stamping out any genuine working class political alternative. He placed himself between the people and the ruling class and then reorganised the state around himself.
Although both cast a long shadow down the 20th century, Stalin and Hitler were of a qualitatively different character from each other, and from the examples already described. Stalin was the centre of a counter revolution in the heart of a revolution, the offspring of gathering bureaucracy using murder, state crime and famine as its means of survival. Hitler first constructed and then spearheaded imperialism's most savage military offensive against 20th century revolution as a whole. But both men were more symbols of great historical movements in full flood rather than marking out their own original political territory. Accordingly their political personalities emerge more as poisonous bureaucrats, sitting impervious at the centre of great machines, full of secrets and without charisma. They have a connection to political crises, one to the collapse of Soviet democracy in the face of war, the other to the collapse of Wiemar and the defeat, both externally and internally, of the German Communist party. But both of them are the prodigy of complete social collapse and political defeat and not simply of a political crisis of the status quo.
Churchill was an outsider as far as the British ruling class was concerned. A poor record in WW1, an unhealthy obsession with the US, a bellicose view of Germany, he was catapulted into office by the collapse of Chamberlain's peace with Hitler. A similar ruling class outsider, General De Gaul, was not so lucky. But both stood against the mainstream as the political leaderships of their respective countries rotted into fear and insignificance. Both saw themselves as saviours of their nations. And both were brought down to their real stature by popular movements that changed the political reference points for decades; (the post war Labour Government in the case of the UK and the impact of 'Les Eventements' in '68 in France.)
Where does Trump stand in all this?
'Drain the swamp', Trump said. In the absence of a mass political movement able to take on the US's political crisis, the crisis that Obama was completely unable to resolve to the left, so enter entrepreneur, TV star, multi-billionaire and showman, the aptly named Trump. He carries all the decorations (including his little bad boy, misogynist antics) of a modern celebrity. But what is sure is that he will not 'drain the swamp.' He will not take big money out of US politics. He will make US politics dance more to the tune of big money.
The Republican extreme right have coalesced around Trump to fill in the huge spaces that he has left on his agenda. They imagine that they will be able to lead him into their particular version of utopia. But it is Trump that has 20 million followers on Twitter in the US. He can speak over the heads of the swamp directly to the people. While he has no intention of draining the swamp, it is completely impossible that Trump will give up his main leverage or the technique he has settled on to apply his influence. The establishment, including the Republican establishment, hate him. He could fail very quickly. But the immediate sword of Damoclese that hangs over history's latest charismatic clown is whether he can release a new, multi-billion dollar investment into the US's domestic future or not. Can he drown everything else out with the sound of cash pouring from the two armed bandit? That would be enough to keep Trump afloat for a couple of years. But something else entirely will need to be built to 'drain the swamp', including the finishing off of the swamp creature, Trump.
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