A lot has been said and written about Donald Trump’s recent election to the US presidency. Without repeating them, I wish to cast some light on its historical context.
The Trump phenomenon is an essential part of the imbroglio that was announced in 1996 to start in 2001, rather than the end of the world which millions of people believed would be effected at the turn of the millennium of the Gregorian calendar. And true, the imbroglio started with the bombing of the twin towers in New York in 2001 and the invasion of Afghanistan in its wake. It continues with the US creation of ISIS and her alliance’s clandestine supplies to ISIS to-date.
Various dictionaries define imbroglio as an extremely or violently confused, complicated, or embarrassing situation, an entanglement. The word also means a complex dispute or argument, a bitterly complicated altercation.
Yes, this is the dinner Trump is inviting us along to. Incumbent president Barack Obama, several celebrities and intellectuals (including our own Wole Soyinka), and Republican party honchos went so unexpectedly passionate in de-campaigning Trump.
But what less shame was it of Obama to have campaigned in 2008 on the platform of closing the illegal Guantanamo bay prison and pulling troops from Afghanistan and Iraq yet packing his bags in 2017 with zero accomplishment? This is the filthy bucket of hypocrisy that Trump must throw over the fence. No wonder opponents called his triumph an upset, yet even worse upsets are in the brewing!
Well, it’s not the physical destruction of the Twin Towers that makes it an imbroglio but, rather, the false flag that was perpetuated by certain families and intelligence agencies in their employ, both committed to the evil ideas and acts of world domination by scaring and robbing everyone through enhanced criminal state presence.
The Trump phenomenon has several sister varieties, such as this year’s Brexit referendum and election of Rodrigo Duterte as Philippine president; no wonder Trump called his movement Brexit++. But the phenomenon is itself part of a larger conundrum taking place not only in human society but also in other natural systems and cycles.
Empires will collapse from within rather than foreign invasion; and the aggressive impact of overstressed Nature (call it an angry God if you wish) will help change the dominant human mindset. Dynasties will denounce their thrones and those plotting to establish new ones will be nipped in the bud, being betrayed from within.
I am among the least surprised that Trump denies or belittles the existence of climate change and dangers posed by it. It’s better that he does what he has promised rather than the sophisticated hypocrites such as Obama who just pay lip service and reduce climate change to a commercial transaction between rich and poor countries on top of a pile of meaningless documents arrived at after hundreds of money-minting panels and conferences.
Trump is a godsend to wrestle down the Uncle Sam empire, much as Brexit is the first crack in the Caucasian solidarity mindset; Brexit is not only the voluntary closure of the European supremacy dream but also the cheapest path to dispersing the British empire.
Time has arrived for humankind to shed off the false assumption that we are always on a straight linear path heading towards greater positivity, enlightenment and goodness. Whatever grows, ages and passes on or transforms, because life is both circular and cyclical.
Trump’s triumph not only debunked intellectual punditry and mainstream political culture, it also opened floodgates for a number of suppressed truths despised as conspiracy theories, fringe ideas and backwardness. It launched a vote of no confidence in the dominant cultivators of popular culture and ideology.Â
If Trump reduces on US troops and bases spread around the world, and disentangles from US foreign military interventions and alliances, he will have gladly brought the devil home for a massage. He campaigned as a man who doesn’t want to feel trapped by a messy system, but should he renege on that campaign promise, he too will be shocked at seeing unarmed civilian masses attacking these bases and fraternizing with disarmed soldiers.
With more strange political events in other countries to happen soon, very few will doubt the eba, that war without definite commanders and no specific battlefields, is on the horizon. Yes, the declaration to humiliate weapons and money has been made, signed, sealed and safely shelved.
A new worldview has to be born and germinate on the heap of the shameful and embarrassing certainties of the current imperialist order in all its political, religious, economic and cultural manifestations and emanations.
This article is not meant to be a praise to Trump the man, but to elucidate that he is a spoke in a wheel that must move on. If Trump’s team gets swallowed by the Washington establishment that they energetically despised, and become complacent, it will be their choosing. The wheel must continue on, for their campaign was sufficient lesson for others to build on; the lesson that the silent and the ignored can have influence on world events.
There is need to reflect on the widespread discontent, the fear and confusion, the anger and frustration that dominate the public and private spheres in almost all countries.
Trump did not pretend to reverse the disintegration of personal and public values and the debasement of public manners by possessors of wealth and power. He, instead, shredded all semblances of shame and empathy. Trump thrived on the bare negative and brutal to win; so, what next?
jmusinguszi@observer.ug
The author is a journalist in Kampala.