The race for the White House is taking on a life of its own, with the first official debate to be taking place on Monday 26th September. There are two things that I’m unhappy about with this debate. The first is that Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate, won’t be allowed to take part, though – after his rather bizarre interview where he spoke, literally, jibberish – part of me is slightly relieved. Secondly, it is Donald Trump – not John Kasich – who will be representing the Republican Party. Yet, there is still a possibility that Trump could become president.
Hillary Clinton recently made her now infamous alt-right speech, seemingly impaling any chances Trump may have had at sitting in the Oval Office. But, in reality, it was a complete sham.
During the speech Clinton attacked Breitbart news, a self-proclaimed supporter of Donald Trump. She kicked this bit off by reading some of their headlines, including “Would you rather your child had feminism or cancer?”. This is an undoubtedly insensitive question but we must put feelings to one side, and favour facts. We find that she refers to a video, first filmed by The Michigan Review, which was intended to advertise a debate between the radical feminist Julie Bindel and professional provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos. It was meant to be an incendiary event; the same is said for the video.
She then moved on to Nigel Farage’s appearance alongsid Donald Trump, describing Farage as someone who “stoked anti-immigrant sentiments to win the referendum to have Britain leave the European Union”, going on to take his comments about gender pay gap completely out of its correct context.
Reflecting upon the speech, I became disgusted because I – a supporter of Brexit – knew that I, nor anybody else I know who voted Leave, voted as such because they hated immigrants. This figure of the establishment was there lecturing us, the British people, on how a sexist racist persuaded us to commit political suicide.
It was in this moment of introspection when I realised that Donald Trump was in with a very real chance of becoming President of the United States. For too long, people have been lectured to by holier-than-thou politicians. The American people, just like the British people, have had enough. Remain campaigners tried to portray us Brexiteers as racists, and failed miserably. Trump presents himself as hard on crime, hard on terrorism, full of love for his home country. We wanted to “take back control” – why can’t Americans do the same?
You may have noticed that some obscenely rich celebrities have banded together and created a video ‘persuading’ the American people to not vote for Trump. It was even hinted that we’d get a glimpse at Mark Ruffalo’s genitals (no thanks, Mark) if they do ‘the right thing’. A bunch of liberal Hollywood elites lecturing your average person on what’s good for the country is ludicrous.
I cannot, in all good conscience, support some of the comments Donald Trump has made. Personally I do not believe that he is the right type of conservative (or any type of conservative) that America needs.
I’m not in the habit of making predictions but if I were, I’d predict that Trump could win this and – if not – the margin is going to be tiny. And if he does, which I maintain is a possibility, I am in no position to criticise the America public for this. And neither, for that matter, is anybody else.
