Editor
The Daily Mail
Northcliffe House
2 Derry Street
London, W8 5TT
ENGLAND
January 28, 2017
To the Editor:
This letter is prompted by the distinct element of despair I have discerned in Professor Max Hastings’ (and others’) periodic comments about the purportedly sorry state of the American Republic since the ascension of Donald Trump. I must confess that I too – like many of my countrymen – was both shocked and astonished to see the prize go to a man whose entire campaign consisted of running his country into the ground – the United States was “a loser,” that ours was a government of suckers exploited by slant-eyed Chinese and lazy predatory Mexicans, that Americans have allowed themselves to be exploited and kicked around on every side, that the Obama administration was a bureaucracy of wimps which had elevated incompetence to an art form, etc. And what this country desperately needed, therefore, was a strong, unalloyed, 100% ethnically pure American leader who would restore the United States to its national greatness while dealing severely with those who had dared to “stab this country in the back.” (I kept waiting for Trump to bring up the infamous Treaty of Versailles until I remembered that Trump’s knowledge of world history begins with the death of Elvis.)
But here’s the thing: the American constitution is so supple that it allows even the unwashed who hold the most appallingly extreme views to have their day – they get to elect congenial congressmen, senators, governors and from time to time their own president. Living as they do in a democracy, it’s their right.
Percentages vary a bit from generation to generation but overall, I’ll be frank, roughly half of my countrymen are thoughtless, uneducated or wrongly educated and know nothing about the scientific method, logic or reason, or at best view them with suspicion. Ideology “Trumps” evidence. They base their most crucial judgments not on facts but on the sort of untrustworthy intuition that for centuries preserved the near-universal conviction that the sun revolved around the earth.
Which brings me to my salient point : in that about half the time their own kind comes to power through constitutional means, they have never felt a compelling need to don black shirts and march on Congress. In a truly representative political system the people get the government they deserve. So with apologies to the rest of the world, my idiotic fellow countrymen are entitled to a Donald Trump from time to time.
But fear not. The United States and its democracy have survived its Millard Fillmores, its Richard Nixons, its George W. Bushes, and even three in a row back in the 1920’s – Harding, Coolidge and Hoover. If I may be so bold, not all of your monarchs have been quite up to the standard set by Elizabeth I. Yet, praise God, Britain is still very much here. The pound may go the way of the Weimar deutschmark but there will always be an England. And be assured that whoever occupies the White House, my country will always be the U.K.’s staunchest friend. ( Never forget that we were there for you well before the war against Hitler – back in the 1930’s we rushed to your aid and sent you Mrs. Simpson. Were it not for our gift you would have been stuck throughout the second world war with an empty-headed fascist for a king. Our Mrs. Simpson, bless her heart, took him off your hands.)
I am reliably informed that Donald Trump is no less an Anglophile. In fact, he is prepared once again to come to Britain’s aid and in a big way: he is seeking to purchase the U.K. in its entirety and turn it into a prosperous American colony, just as soon as the dollar strengthens a bit further against the declining pound so we can get you on the cheap. President Trump will then inculcate the British economy with the inordinately profitable Trump way of doing business – stiffing subcontractors, strategically timed bankruptcies, implacable tax “avoidance” – and in no time England, under its new name – Trumpland – will be back on its feet and once against the most economically powerful nation in the western hemisphere. Or is it the eastern hemi-sphere? Not to worry. President Trump knows you’re out there somewhere in the Atlantic. Or is it the Mediterranean? Whatever, the American dollar will find its way.
Be assured that under Trump your quaint system of government will continue exactly as before. With just one tiny improvement: prior to elections all prospective MPs will be vetted by former model and now First Lady, Melania Trump. Should Melania be unavailable, the President has any number of former wives and paramours (heretofore known as “the plaintiffs”) who can fill in for her. In short, cheer up. The Trump presidency will not only invigorate America’s democracy but bring untold economic and political benefits to its newest colony, Great Britain.
Sincerely, Martin Blinder, M.D.
