Washington: a moment for reflection

By Pete North - January 7, 2021

For all the drama from America last night, it actually wasn’t all that. For sure it was out of the ordinary and the surprising thing is that it was allowed to happen at all. Heads certainly need to roll. I wouldn’t go as far as calling it a coup though. Rather Trump’s rampaging supporters imagined it was. They’re fantasists just like the man himself.

There are plenty of things we could observe about this but all the salient points have already been made. There’s a lot of rank hypocrisy flying in all directions and seemingly those “mostly peaceful” demonstrations in which businesses were burnt to the ground and statues pulled down last year has vanished from the media memory. But as has been noted, these events are the natural consequence of normalising political violence. Meanwhile, nothing makes me chuckle like EU functionaries calling for the outcome of the vote to be respected.

Stretching the point somewhat, there’s a below the belt remark to be made about protesting the result of votes and refusing to implement them. Such remarks are not wholly unfairly visited on remainers. Julia Lopez MP put it best. “The humble understanding of voters that their collective choice at the ballot box will be honoured through the dignified, peaceful transfer of power after an election is the foundational underpinning of democracy. No mob can ever demand the right to overturn that sacred principle”.

What we’re looking at here, though, is ultimately the culmination of the culture wars. Armed with anti-establishment rhetoric, the alt-right got their foothold against an increasingly unhinged left, and like Brexit, the losers deserved to lose if only for their arrogance and entitlement. Since then, though, the right has sustained itself on snowballing paranoia, building to the mother of all conspiracy theories which Trump was able to leverage into direct action.

Ultimately if you’re successful in delegitimising a vote you can’t be surprised if people take it upon themselves to commit illegitimate acts. Trump succeeded where remainers failed.

This should give us all pause for thought. Tonight we have Steve Hilton remining us, in part how we got here. “Don’t the ruling elite understand that millions backed Trump in 2016, in 2020, and back him now precisely because he is a living, breathing, tweeting rebuke to all of them and their pompous, incompetent, corrupt, establishment ways.”

This shtick is real old now. It permeated the UK debate long before anyone had ever heard of Steve Bannon or Breitbart. It wouldn’t look out of place in a revolutionary communist pamphlet from the eighties and by the nineties it was pretty much standard fare for Ukippers. Even my own writing drifts in an out of it. (old habits die hard)

Of course, much of it is as true now as it ever was. But the populists and demagogues haven’t been the downtrodden underdogs for some time now. Trump has had his crack of the whip and seemingly accomplished little while the Ukipists (now Reform Party) have had almost everything their own way. Can we say they are any less corrupt, incompetent, out of touch and arrogant?

I’ve been been a Ukip watcher for quite a long time now. Having blogged its progress over many years the persistent theme has been a lack on an intellectual foundation, no credible policies to speak of and by way of Farage’s insecurity, his entourage are uniformly stupid. The Brexiteer reputation for being a bit thick is hardly unfair if the Brexit Party are the benchmark. Already Farage’s Brexit Party compatriots are complaining about the consequences of policies they agitated for. It’s starting to look like British fishing is totally screwed. They were told that would be a consequence of leaving the single market but they didn’t want to know.

For a long time now I’ve had no dog in the fight. I am not moved to vote for the decrepit husk parties of the previous century but then the upstarts have nothing to offer either. Farage’s new vessel will pivot effortlessly from Brexit to Covid conspiracy shtick, amplified by their apologists in the Spectator, and maybe they’ll make a dent at the next election – but all they’ll succeed in doing is making another giant mess they’ll take no responsibility for and move on to the next gripe when they get bored.

Just as Brexit has ultimately resolved nothing politically, the removal of Trump is no resolution either. Our politics is rotten to the core as is the state of public discourse, and that provides the ideal sea for demagogues to swim in. Though last night’s events should give us all pause to reconsider our rhetoric, chances are there will be no lasting lessons.

America’s dysfunction has brought it to the brink. Of what I’m not sure, but British politics could likewise fall down that rabbit hole, particularly as the economy deteriorates in the wake of Brexvid. In this I have no time for the kind of misanthropic bellyaching we see from the right. It accomplishes nothing. The result of last night’s little outing will likely see more corporate censorship on both sides of the Atlantic, sustaining more toxic culture wars form which there is seemingly no exit ramp.

There is much to be said for playing to the gallery. If you’re launching a career in punditry you have to tell your audience what they want to hear. There’s a long queue of blowhards waiting for their moment in the spotlight who adopt the populist rhetoric with ease, paying no regard to its inherent contradictions and inadequacies. Unless people develop the self-discipline not to follow that siren call, there is every chance we will head into the same abyss we see engulfing Washington.