Why I routed for Team Trump this 2024 US presidential election.
And why I believe it’s important even if I’m obviously not an American. An essay for my friends and for liberals, progressives or democrats who would be curious to know more about the other side.
There is a tendency on both sides of the political arena or the societal questions to see the other side as fascist, racist, … in short, Hitler.
And even I can fall for that shortcut, but instead for Hitler that would be Mao or Stalin, in short Communist. But that would be about the political leaders, not their voters. I understand the good intentions from the Kamala or Democrats rooters if they also respect the Trump or Republicans rooters. That’s the first principle of democracy. If democracy do not apply for a politician or party you disagree with, you are the authoritarian and don’t believe in democracy.
The goal of this essay is to grow the understanding between the two sides instead of resorting to directly to go to the reduction ad Hitlerum. To reduce the polarization that has been growing since the creation and widespread of social medias around 15 years ago and to return to healthier debates where ideas are at the center.
I do have a clear dislike of the biased mainstream media, more poetically named legacy media.
This is the mass media institutions that dominated prior to the Information Age. I equate this to taking the blue pill or the red pill. Either you believe them or that they are most of the time correct and want to report the news accurately. Or you take the red pill, like Neo, and start seeing what the reporting’s agenda is, seeing through the matrix. As most things are not black or white, the blue and the red pill are also a spectrum I guess, meaning you take the magenta pill, being bluer or more red. But in the end of the day, you are probably mostly blue or mostly red. This is for another text another time but my believe is that you are born with a clear tendency to lean to what was once called the left or the right and that has to do with evolution. I’ll get back to that.
Talking about being red pilled, I’m curious to hear if you have had a clear red pill moment, a moment where you experienced cognitive dissonance that made you question your perception of the world?
Legacy media is massively dominated by the celebration of certain ideologies or political parties and the hate of other ones. This occurs ‘softly’ in all the Western World if I may generalize from my following of news and medias in Sweden, Belgium, France and the US. And this occurs of course ‘hardly’ in all totalitarian states.
So, yes, I’m biased about the biased legacy media!
The difference between the personalities and the system.
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, as humans, one may find attractive or repulsive, but this shouldn’t be the decisive fact about the election of a president. Factors like their achievement, entourage, life journey, etc. are more important as these will lead to what decisions are taken during their mandate.
Kamala Harris took part in the Democratic primary in 2020 and of the around 20 candidates she gave up first. She got 844 votes out of 37 million and despite that got chosen by Biden to be his VP. It was therefore not for her popularity or her track record within politic. But yes, she is a non-white woman and according to DEI ideology (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) that is in the DNA of the Democratic party. This works in reverse too as when Kamala ran for president, her running mate Is a white guy that’s hard to believe was the best choice.
It's now clear, even for the legacy media, that Joe Biden have been in cognitive decline for years, but the Democrats chose to wait after the first debate to suddenly decide that he was not fit to run again. And that there is no time to organize a primary making de facto the Democrat candidate not chosen democratically but internally by the top dogs of the party behind closed doors.
On the other side, Donald Trump, not part of the Republican party at the time, started his political journey in 2015 by challenging the around 20 candidates at the Republican primary gaining supports form the Tea Party movement to finally create his own, MAGA (Make America Great Again). This popular movement made him win the election and grew larger in 2020 and even more in 2024.
On one side a candidate with no popular legitimacy and totally formed by her party and on the other a candidate which political journey came from the people and has only grown for the last 10 years and has probably deeply transformed his party.
Donald trump has 5 kids and 10 grandkids. He works with three of his kids. Kamala Harris got married in 2014 to a man with two kids, aged then 15 and 20. I have no judgment for people to have or not have kids, except for high level politicians. This should be a criteria as you will pass laws influencing the lives of millions. You should know what having kids really means irl.
And, yes, I believe there should be some kind of exam to be a top politician. If you can’t locate a country on a map, you shouldn’t be able to possibly bomb them! You need to pass tests to be a bar tender or a taxi driver but not a politician. That’s wrong!
Trump and his political allies, Gabbard, Musk, Vance & Kennedy Jr have been campaigning for many months, doing unedited longform interviews by the dozens, town halls & rallies, explaining tirelessly their ideas, their life paths and their common goals daily.
Biden announced that he retired from the race with a short post on X, then barely endorsed Kamala later when she was confirmed. Kamala did not give any formal interviews or hold press conferences for 75 days after being officially chosen as the Democratic nominee.
The Left cries wolf Pavlovian-style for fascism while simultaneously advocating for censorship and lawfare.
Various movements, parties, and organizations of the Left spread DEI ideology, wokeism, and cancel culture. They fragment and divide society into ever smaller groups of victims who are encouraged to demand their special rights at the expense of other groups. There are good intentions when it comes to protecting minorities and supporting weaker groups, but they have swung the ideological pendulum so far that it has become unsustainable, and the election results in the USA are clear evidence of this.
The Left's ideologies and lawfare methods lead to censorship, lack of freedom, and intolerance towards dissenters. They want a society with equal outcomes for all, but it is equal opportunities for everyone that provide the positive force to drive societies forward. Capitalism is not perfect, and previously the capitalist pendulum swung too far, but the development of our societies constantly moves forward, with two steps up and one step down.
I wrote ‘Team Trump’ as this really is the key reason why I do have hope for positive change from this presidency.
Robert Kennedy Jr as a life path and work experience of a lifetime to take on the colossal health challenges that plague the US citizens. He not only experienced the assassination of his uncle JFK, but also of his father RFK during the Democratic primary of 1968. Kennedy Jr. was 14 years old and became addicted to heroin at 15. He would stay addicted for 14 years before finding sobriety and a rich career dedicated among other things to the protection of the environment. Now at 70 years old he is in impressive physical condition, all the more in contrast to a certain number of his European health minister counterparts!
Tulsi Gabbard as a long military track record and does want peace and end pointless wars driven by the military industrial complex.
Elon Musk, love him or hate him, it’s a joy to follow the Starship program and think big. He doesn’t have the track record of one major company success story but five or more. Hans Asperger can make it difficult for many to follow his line of thought and his way of speaking. In that regard, the biography written by Walter Isaacson gives many keys to understand him.
His specialty is optimizing production, whether it’s cars, rockets, tunnels, etc. He is the perfect choice to be put in charge of government efficiency. Sweden, Belgium and many other countries should pick up the idea. It seems to work in Argentina after Javier Milei took office a year ago!
JD Vance as the Vice President is so nice. 40 years old, father of three, born in white trash poverty. He wrote a memoir about his youth and his family, Hillbilly Elegy, 8 years ago (long before he could dream of being a senator or even less a vice president). It’s a great book and a poignant story.
Kennedy, Gabbard and Musk have been Democrats for the longest time and all three decided they could not support them this election cycle as the liberal/left/progressive ideology moved to the far left, while their own ideology remained unchanged. The radicalization of the liberals made them leftists and while I find common ground with liberal values, even if I lean more towards the right and conservatism. As it is now, I believe leftism is a force of destruction.
Important political trends that are spreading across the world.
Europe has long imported American culture and been influenced by American politics. Therefore, the direction the USA takes in the coming years will also affect the development in Europe.
The American political reforms we can look forward to include changes aimed at improving public health and reducing the influence of big food and pharmaceutical industries, as well as significant efforts against addiction and drug problems, focusing on harm reduction and rehabilitation.
Regulations that stifle technological development and entrepreneurship should be minimized, and government spending should be reduced through a streamlining and efficiency of bureaucracy. Unnecessary government functions should be phased out, and crazy, unnecessary projects should be terminated.
Trump's team will work for individual freedom and increased free speech, hopefully dismantling the large censorship apparatus that has developed secretly over recent years.
They aim to reduce the federal oversight of family and education policies, giving more autonomy to the states. They want to dismantle unfair and meaningless DEI projects within government and the education system, support family formation, and promote common sense and Christian values.
They intend to reform the unsustainable and uncontrolled immigration policy that has destabilized both the U.S. and European countries. They will try to end ongoing wars and avoid starting new ones.
The 1920s post first world war birthed a golden age.
A century later, there could be a new Roaring Twenties this second part of the decade. Of course, we know how it ended in 1929! On the other side, there can’t be a golden age without hard times before and after…
Oh, wait, Artificial General Intelligence, AGI, is coming before the end of this decade according to most AI researchers. Will this create a permanent golden age or the end of humanity? That is for a next essay! Thanks for reading and much love whether we disagree or not.
Nicolas Debot, December 6th, 2024.