Us politics

Friday

Fraser Nelson

Trump has just created a vacancy for a world leader in free trade. Step forward, Theresa May

Rather than seek to inspire or unite a country, Donald Trump’s inaugural address was a long vindictive swipe at his enemies mixed with a whinge about free trade and how America has been the loser from it. Nothing about only fearing fear itself, nothing about asking what you can do for your country rather than vice versa. Instead, a story about “carnage” caused by that big bad world. It has gotten a little too scary for America, so it’s time to retreat. “For many decades, we’ve enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry,” he said. “We’ve made other countries rich while the wealth, strength and confidence of our country has

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

There was nothing peaceful about Washington's anti-Trump protests

Washington, D.C. I just witnessed an anti-Donald Trump protest, and it was nasty. About an hour ago, I looked out the window on the corner of 13th and Massachusetts Avenue and saw a crowd of roughly 300 people  — most of them dressed in black and wearing bandanas and hoods — moving quickly through the street. There were loud chants of ‘Fuck Donald Trump’. I walked out onto 13th Massachusetts Avenue and followed the noise down 13th towards Franklin Square. Suddenly it was chaos. There were some loud bangs. People and policemen were running in all directions. I could see lots of smoke which turned out to be tear gas.

Steerpike Steerpike

BBC's Michelle Obama gaffe

Although Donald Trump has suggested that he is unhappy with the BBC’s coverage of him, it’s the corporation’s reporting of Michelle Obama at today’s inauguration ceremony that has landed the BBC in trouble. As Katty Kay, the BBC reporter, led the coverage on the news channel, she offered a running commentary of the movements of various White House figures. However, when a black woman left the building, she felt the need to clarify to viewers that this woman was not in fact Michelle Obama: ‘That is not Michelle Obama, just somebody coming out and checking everything is ready I imagine.’ Still, on the bright-side, Mr S suspects Michelle will be too preoccupied

Steerpike Steerpike

Friday caption contest: Trump's inauguration - smile!

As Donald Trump is sworn in today as the 45th US president, not everyone at the ceremony appears thrilled to be there. In fact, both Hillary Clinton and the departing first lady — Michelle Obama — look as though they would like to be anywhere but the White House: Mr S welcomes your caption suggestions on this historic day.

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

Trump! How did this happen?

It happened because you banned super-size sodas. And smoking in parks. And offensive ideas on campus. Because you branded people who oppose gay marriage ‘homophobic’, and people unsure about immigration ‘racist’. Because you treated owning a gun and never having eaten quinoa as signifiers of fascism. Because you thought correcting people’s attitudes was more important than finding them jobs. Because you turned ‘white man’ from a description into an insult. Because you used slurs like ‘denier’ and ‘dangerous’ against anyone who doesn’t share your eco-pieties. Because you treated dissent as hate speech and criticism of Obama as extremism. Because you talked more about gender-neutral toilets than about home repossessions. Because

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Meet the real deplorables - and no, it's not Farage and his champagne populists

Washington, D.C. Nigel Farage’s 2016 celebration of Nigel Farage’s 2016 is a party that might never stop. And it is a jolly affair. Yesterday, at the Hay-Adams Hotel, in Washington, DC, Nigel and his pals — let’s call them the champagne populists — had a US election bash. Nigel stood up to do his usual routine about how this year would be remembered in a hundred years as the glorious moment when nation state democracy reasserted itself, and everybody cheered.  The champagne populists raised lots of glasses to themselves and talked about how they got Donald J Trump elected to the White House. Meanwhile, the American voters who actually elected Donald

Mark McGinness

What would Alistair Cooke have made of Trump's inauguration?

Margaret Thatcher’s Lord Chancellor, Quintin Hailsham, himself half-American, once observed that the US system of government was ‘an elective monarchy with a king who rules . . . but does not reign’. The British system was ‘a republic with a hereditary life president who . . . reigns but does not rule’. And so, perhaps, it is unsurprising that the ceremony marking the beginning of the American king’s rule is more coronation than induction. Who better than an Englishman to view this peculiarly American spectacle and pomp? Until his death in 2004, Alistair Cooke, the veteran reporter and legendary voice of the long-running radio broadcast, Letter From America, had followed every

Rob Crilly

Washington's lobbyists are starting to panic

Things are changing in Washington… and not just at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Political newbies watched the fireworks at the Lincoln Memorial on Thursday night. Elderly women prepared for their first inauguration. One family had brought their daughter to Washington to witness the moment that Donald Trump was sworn in.   And Washington regulars – the politicos, party hacks and think tankers who are here all year round – are feeling unsettled. In part this is the natural response to a change of party at the top. But it is also the result of Trump’s extraordinary style of politics, which is sowing fear among lobbyists who must try to navigate his impetuous manner and Twitter rants.

Alex Massie Alex Massie

No, Donald Trump isn't a 'massive, magnificent gift' for Britain

There are certain traditional ceremonies without which the inauguration of a new American president cannot take place. Chief among them, at least on this side of the atlantic, is the opportunity such a moment provides for pondering anew the health and well-being of the ‘special relationship’. A remarkable amount of tripe must be talked on these occasions. You will recall how Bill Clinton’s supposedly-unhappy time at Oxford prejudiced him against this country and you will recall, of course, that Barack Obama’s Kenyan heritage left him temperamentally ill-disposed towards this sceptr’d isle. Obama, of course, confirmed this by removing the now famous Churchill bust from the Oval Office, an act of unpardonable

Thursday

The Spectator

Barometer | 19 January 2017

Starting cold Why is US Presidential Inauguration Day always on 20 January? — The date was moved from 4 March in the 20th amendment to the US constitution, passed on 23 January 1933, but it is hard to find any significance to the date. The change was made in an attempt to reduce the lame-duck period of an outgoing president, though it did increase the risk of a repeat of what happened in 1841 when William Henry Harrison was sworn in. Choosing not to wear a coat, hat or gloves, he made the longest inaugural speech of any president, at two hours. Three weeks later he was reported to be

Rob Crilly

Surprisingly, Donald Trump's inauguration will be relatively low-key

Who would have thought it? The man who declared his presidential ambitions after arriving down a gilded escalator and whose private apartment has been derided as over-the-top dictator chic, is having a low-key inauguration. Once Donald Trump, showman extraordinaire, has been sworn in as the 45th president of the United States he will depart down Pennsylvania Avenue for a procession that will last 90 minutes at most. That makes it one of the shortest on record. Four hours is not unusual. He plans to grace three inaugural balls. Bill Clinton, the ultimate schmoozer, managed to fit in 14. Even Barack Obama managed 10 and spread the festivities over five days. Trump

Nick Hilton Nick Hilton

The Spectator podcast: You're fired!

On this week’s episode, we discuss the winners and losers as Trump moves into the White House, where Theresa May’s Brexit strategy is headed, and whether you can wear fur so long as the animal died in a snowstorm. First, the world’s media is currently congregated in Washington for the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States. But what will happen when Trump swears the oath of office, and what will it mean for the UK and the rest of Europe? We had a peek behind the curtain this week, thanks to The Times’s intrepid reporter Michael Gove, but whilst we wait for the full reveal, we

Wednesday

Gavin Mortimer

Unlike Merkel, Trump understands the Islamist threat to the West

The reaction in Europe to Donald Trump’s recent remarks critical of the continent was all too predictable. It was an echo of the response when, following the Islamic terror attacks in November 2015 that left 130 Parisians dead, Trump said: ‘Paris is no longer the same city it was….they have sections in Paris that are radicalised, where the police refuse to go there. They’re petrified.’ On that occasion the liberal media and the French Establishment reacted with outrage, rejecting the idea that the Republic had lost control of parts of Paris. The mayor, Anne Hidalgo, even threatened legal action against Fox News when they repeated Trump’s assertion. Now it’s Angela Merkel

Tuesday

Douglas Murray

Obama's decision to free Private Manning disgraces America

Barack Obama’s decision to commute the prison sentence of Private Manning is a final, disgraceful undermining of American interests by the outgoing US President. Manning’s decision to dump vast swathes of stolen information with the Wikileaks organisation, which then published them, caused untold and untellable damage to America and her allies. It revealed operational details which should never have fallen into the hands of America’s enemies. Manning ensured that they were available not just to such groups and nations but to the entire world. And of course leaks encourage leaks. It was no surprise that shortly after Manning another low-level figure in what is meant to be America’s security apparatus

William Cook

Trump has given Merkel a new lease of life

Donald Trump’s Times interview has been a big story in Britain, but the President Elect’s parallel interview with Bild Zeitung (Europe’s largest circulation newspaper) has made an even bigger splash in Germany. Why so? Because Trump’s comments about Germany were a lot more pointed – and specific – than the pro-Brexit platitudes he tossed to Michael Gove. Trump’s remarks about Merkel’s ‘catastrophic mistake’ of ‘letting all these illegals [sic] into the country’ hardly came as a surprise. After all, when Merkel won Time Magazine’s Person of the Year, Trump tweeted that ‘they picked the person who is ruining Germany.’ Yet until this week, there were still some Germans who thought

Sunday

Fraser Nelson

Michael Gove's interview with Donald Trump: main points

Michael Gove has landed the first British interview with Donald Trump for The Times (where he is, now, a columnist). This is his first interview since he spoke to Justin Welby for The Spectator – it’s online and as good as you’d expect. The ability to build such bridges won’t hurt Gove should he want to return to government. Here are the main points:- Trump congratulates Britain for Brexit.. He says: “People don’t want to have other people coming in and destroying their country. I thought the UK was so smart in getting out [of the EU]… Obama said: they’ll go to the back of the line [queue]… that was

Thursday

The Spectator

No, he didn’t

The irony of Barack Obama’s presidency is that while it began at a time when it seemed America’s fortunes could only improve, his inauguration day turned out to be his personal high water mark. The retiring President’s speech in Chicago this week contained flashes of the optimism that he brought to a country and a world which was reeling from the banking crisis and mired in the deepest recession since the 1930s. It recalled the sense of hope that he would lift America’s reputation abroad, shattered as it was by the Iraq war. Yet eight years on, even Obama’s keenest supporters are struggling to answer: what exactly is his legacy?

Dot Wordsworth

Nativism

The title of America’s first woman bishop was claimed in 1918 by Bishop Alma White, leader of the Pillar of Fire Church, noted for her feminism, anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism, for her alliance with the Ku Klux Klan, and for her nativism. I was puzzled by the word. After all, Native Americans are what we used to call Indians. Native American is not a new piece of terminology. Sir Fulke Greville in his Life of Sir Philip Sidney, published in 1628, inveighed against the Spaniard as a race for suppressing ‘the poor native Americans’ with heavy impositions. But these American Indians, no matter how heavily suppressed, hardly seemed the sort of

Theo Hobson Theo Hobson

America won't forget Obama's message of hope

Those who sneer at Obama for promising more than he could deliver have little understanding of the nature of moral idealism. They accuse him of naivety but they are themselves naive. They fail to grasp that Obama expressed the basic moral idealism that unites the vast majority of people in the West. He expressed it more eloquently than anyone else had for decades. To say that he created unrealistic hopes is inept. Those ‘unrealistic hopes’ are intrinsic to the basic creed of the West – ‘liberty and justice for all’ sums it up. Such intense idealism is a crucial aspect of the politics of the West, however awkward this is. It’s risky

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Trump’s family favourites

Donald Trump will not find satisfaction as the 45th President of the United States of America. He really wants to be king. Just look at the gilded-bling madness of his penthouse on the 66th floor of Trump Tower in Manhattan, or the sprawling exuberance of his holiday palace in Mar-a-Lago, Florida: Trump aspires to be an American emperor, the Big Mac Rex with triple cheese. Winning the White House is great, but it’s not enough. Trump now seems determined to treat the Oval Office as just one of his courts — the principal court, perhaps, at least for four years, but one of many. He wants to lord it over