Trump Unbundled

 People deserve the leaders they choose. This is all the more valid for democracies where the assumption is that the electorate is educated and politically astute. Four years ago as Donald Trump created a divisive agenda and embellished a campaign with lies and racist slant one felt the United States of America was getting what it deserved. Even though one knew Trump had hijacked the Republican Party there was an inner voice that hoped he could step in as the 45th President and change by embracing the statesmen like qualities that the Oval Office thrusts upon its incumbents.

Four years later and the circus of the US election is unfolding again. It is obvious that there is a hard core of Trump supporters who continue to embrace President Trump believing in the hyperbole he has been spinning. It is unlikely that die hard core of his base will embrace the truth of Trumps failures as a man and as a President even when faced with his lack of action on the COVID 19 pandemic that has left close to 180,00 Americans dead. The fact he has embraced white supremacists, ridiculed minorities and shunned responsibility for the failures of his office do not matter to them. 

In 2016 the media played into Trumps strategy by giving him more air time each time he made unspeakable remarks and in a sense gave a platform for his views rather than ignoring him. Now the challenge is to unbundle this President even though Trump has a state machinery to defend the agenda and his position. However, one must admit that Trump’s success in 2016 was also on account of the failures of the Hilary Clinton campaign who ignored the states they were traditionally strong in and the Democrats just could not mobilise the voter base who could have titled the balance in their favour.

The challenge will be how to take an electorate who are increasingly apathetic towards the 2020 election to go out an vote? The choice is Trumps dramatic but untrue characterisations versus the Biden camps search of a meaningful message. Trumps assurance is his base, some of whom may have wavered but the question remains if he has marshalled in enough to replace those he lost. Yet it is clear his base also envisions cannot get him elected. In 2016 there was a large blue collar work force who were disgruntled with Hilary Clinton strongly enough to swing to the Trump camp. Biden and his team have to focus on these key segments in addition to the large number of people who did not vote in 2016.

To unbundle Trump is more a matter of focus on his content of his failures rather than a generic denunciation of the man. As we saw in 2016 some of the worst gaffes and revelations (the Hollywood tape, Stormy Daniels etc) did not faze him or his base. Unlike the previous election this time his character flaws can be pitched against his policy failures and this should be the focus of any challenge to Donald Trump.

His Presidency has left a litany of lies, and behavioural flaws most if not all of which have effected policy.  The unbundling of Trump is therefore a unique journey into the mind of a man who can only evoke two emotions; you can either love him or hate him, but ignoring him is no more possible.

Trumpism is to embrace the lies.

There is a plethora lies that can be attributed to Donald Trump, to he point he is labelled as a serial liar. Through this summer he has averaged at over 250 lies a month! What is amazing is that Trump continues to utter his lies over and over based on the dictum that if you utter a lie often enough people will believe it to be the truth. This certainly was the case with his accusation that President Obama was not born in the United States, which some of his followers still believe to be the truth. 

When faced with the gravest threats to US society in the shape of the COVID-19 pandemic Trump continued to lie about the gravity of the crisis and the measures he was taking. Sadly as US citizens died each day at an alarming rate President Trump claimed US was a leading example of fighting the pandemic, so much so that claiming the effects of the virus in the US were minor. At one point he was touting untested remedies for the COVID-19 and consistently denying there was a crisis. It was a clear case of the liar believing his version of reality and anyone who did not buy into that reality was enemy.

Politicians, including Presidents, are prone to stretch the truth, but Donald Trump does not bend the truth he simply creates his own version of the truth through a web of lies. One wonders when his wife, Melania, at the RNC meeting stated that people expect the President to tell the truth was it a tongue in cheek reference to her own husband.

Disavowing his former allies.

In Trumps White House it’s been normal to a cavalcade of officials be appointed and then to exit, some within a few weeks. The exits were either because they fell out with Trump and his inner circle or resigned in the face of criminal investigations. Upon their appointment Donald Trump has espoused lavish praise on the appointees calling them ‘very good’ people and upon their exit calling them losers. In cases where his former associates have been criminally charged Trump has been quick to state that he only knew them fleetingly and distanced himself from them. The most glaring fallout was with Steve Bannon, former chief strategist for Trumps election bit and then and advisor. During the early years of Trumps Presidency Bannon was a permanent fixture at the Oval Office and now discarded and facing a criminal charge Trump can only say that Bannon worked for his administration but he did not know him that well.

It would seem that Trump has no sense of loyalty to the people who have  served his cause. They are as good as their total subservience and submission to Trumps whims is the only barometer of acceptance by the President. Loyalty to Mr. Trump is a one way street and explains why sycophancy is the order of the day and a necessary qualification to work with Mr. Trump. This implies that the President will not necessarily get the best advice since there is a propensity on his part to surround himself with yes men. 

Ego before nation.

 Most people who have known Donald Trump attest to his over grown ego. He does not want to be ignored and resents attention to anyone but himself. This ego also shapes the self image that Trump carries to the extent that he considers himself smarter than anyone else, brighter than the best scientists, and considers his art of the deal implies he can negotiate with anyone, including dictators in North Korea or the NATO leaders. Having an over sized ego is one thing but in Trumps case he holds a vindictive nature against people who may be considered better than him. This explains his benign hatred for President Obama and everything the previous administration achieved. 

The result of this egoistic trait has meant that valuable time and resources have been wasted on proving he can deal with North Korea, when the lack of results shows how his ego cannot be out before the national interest. Trumps position on climate change, Immigration, healthcare and Russia show how one mans ego has been the focal point of a policy that he cannot rationalise. 

Trumps Achilles heel.

In 2016 Trump came under pressure to release his tax returns to which he declared if he won the election he would do so. Four years later not only have the tax filings not been released he and his lawyers have Ben fighting the courts which have ordered their release. What is it that Trump does not want to be disclosed?

Here is a theory, and mind you only a theory. Let’s go back to 2014 and Trump is flirting with the idea of entering the Presidential race. It was no secret amongst top banks that Trump was a risky client and since his earlier bankruptcies top western banks avoided lending to the Trump group. The exception was Duetsche Bank who at one point had an exposure of $2 billion to Trump companies. In addition there were a number of syndicated loans on projects where Trump was a significant minority shareholder in a project.  For instance the developer of 1290 Avenue of America, in which Trump owns 30% equity borrowed from a consortium of banks almost $1billion of which $ 211 m was provided by Bank of China. The loan was signed in November 2012. Around the time of the election in 2016 Bank of China denied it had leant the money however in 2017 its name appeared on listed of banks holding a mortgage on the said development. If it was an arms length transaction why would the bank deny it ever loaned the money? 

Now here is the theory and at the outset one must state that it is entirely conjecture. Prior to the election banks lending to Trump got nervous that a risky client would be impossible to handle if he became President. Some of these banks called in their loans. It is possible that some of these loans were bought by Russian banks and this may explain why Trump has been soft of Mr Putin and Russia. This would explain why the battle for the tax filings is so important as it would reveal the trail of the financial dealings. 

Either way whether true or not it does make an interesting plot for a financial thriller.

As the final run for the election of the next president heats up Americans have to make a moral choice not an emotional choice. One can excuse any number of Trumps failures and indiscretions but forgiving him for his failure to handle the COVID-19 pandemic is something one cannot do.  Jimmy Carter lost the election for the handling of US hostage crisis in Tehran, but today with thousands of Americans having died of the COVID-19 virus Trump not only survives but thrives on laying blame on others or flatly denying that he failed. If Trump is to be judged solely on his handling of the pandemic then he will lose the election. This is where the soul of America will be tested; is a second term for Trump worth more than 179,000 dead Americans?

Naya Pakistan in an age of tolerance!

The Naya Pakistan that Imran Khan has promised the people has been slow in unfolding itself. It has its stops and starts, distractions and stumbles but in little bits and pieces, some more significant than we realize, the vision of  Imran’s Pakistan has given us a few glimpses and some of them are disturbing to say the least. There is a consensus amongst most historians that General Zia Ul Haq did a great disservice to the modernization of Pakistan with his embrace of the ultra orthodox platform he not only shifted the pendulum of Pakistani society he provided a legitimacy to every one to claim they were the champions of Islam and their interpretation of how society was ordained to be correct. This new Zia doctrine permeated into institutions of the state to the extent that even the armed forces were affected. It reached a point where Zia’s views of military promotions were based not on the merit of the soldiers but on whether he considered you a devout Muslim.

 

Decades later today we are faced with a specter of change, which most of us who support Imran hoped, would be to move Pakistan forward as a tolerant modern state. However, we are faced with the prospect of a massive effort to rewrite our history, school books being examined to purge anything not consistent with a particular view of history, Turkish drama serials being promoted as if they speak of our, a Pakistan, history and then a constant appeasement of a ultra religious segment that refuses to embrace or accept the founder of Pakistan’s vision of a tolerant Pakistan. In fairness Qaid e Azam hosted mixed signals at times indicating that shariah law would be the law of the land and at others promoting a liberal secular Islam. 

There is little denying through recent history successive ruling administrations in Pakistan have been rudderless is defining a social and economic agenda where education and social reforms could shape a modern Pakistan. Since Zulfikar Ali Bhuttos government of the 1970’s failed in its socialist promise of ‘roti,kappra, makkan’ (food, clothing and housing) the disconnect between the political elite and their promises has been evident. Sadly for Pakistan Bhuttos government and then later his daughter, Benazir Bhuttos, first government, were the only moments where the ruling party held enough of a political majority to bring about meaningful change and both failed miserably.

These failures played into the hands of the mullah orthodoxy which was made all the more important during General Zia’s regime. Geopolitical pressures arising from the war in Afghanistan against the Soviet invasion meant that Zia’s government and the army became conduits to American support and funding of radical right wing militant groups to fight the Soviets. It was these very groups or their protege splinter groups that were to then turn on Pakistan and wreck havoc with terrorist attacks. 

Since the 1970’s a massive export of labourers and skilled professionals to the Gulf countries was encouraged with the view to benefit from home remittances from this work force. These very workers over the past five decades imported into Pakistan a mindset of societal change which has prompted an Arabization of Pakistani society. The dupatta was replaced by the abaya, the Urdu farewell of ‘Khuda Hafiz’ was replaced by ‘Allah Hafiz’, and many more social norms imported that had for centuries been alien to Pakistani society. Sadly these social imports did not emulate the elements of tolerance as seen in UAE and Bahrain where people of other faiths are given remarkable freedoms. 

Imran Khan has at times argued that the Muslims in Pakistan have an identity crisis. No they have never had an identity crisis they are being edged into a new identity which is divorced from the history of the land and it’s people. The history of the land encompasses a vast and diverse swath from the Indus Valley Civilization to the Vedic period, the invasion by the Greeks, the Mauyra empire, to the Ghazni and Ghauri period, the Afghan Lodi empire, the Mughal empire and finally the British empire till independence in 1947. This is the continuous history of Pakistan and projecting that Turkish or Arab history is our history plays into a narrative that is not true.

Imran Khan may be partially right about Pakistanis having an identity crisis. Many of our brethren take pains to point out that their family tress is embedded in the land of the Arabs. This is far from the truth as history tells us successive invasions from the north created a melting pot in India yet the original settlers of the land embraced the customs of successive invaders and at times the religion too. Many of our customs still carry the traces of this historical heritage, we simply cannot just redefine ourselves in to a new mould.

Tinkering with the education system will have profound consequences on Pakistani society and it’s place on the world stage. Most certainly Islamic studies should be a part of the syllabus but not at the expense of science and history. Yes there is an elite  educational system, a product of which was Imran also, which in 1950’s was divorced for the people, but in the past five decades it has tried to remain elitist but also imbibed a broader more egalitarian format. Countries have have become competitive on the world stage, Korea, Japan, India and many others have modernised their educational system. We in Pakistan can do the same so long as we understand that a modern educational system does not mean you are westernising society.

A Naya Pakistan should be proud of it’s history not one that tries to rewrite it. Most of all it has to be a tolerant Pakistan where minorities are not only protected but encouraged to be equal partners in the progress of the country. When it announced that a Hindu temple was to be built in the capital I felt this was a positive development only to learn a few weeks later the back stepping started. This I suspect is from the pressure of the ultra conservative segment of society. Why cannot we learn from other countries that have been tolerant to other faiths. If Muslims in USA or UK can build a mosque then why not a temple for Hindus in Pakistan?

The narrative of the PTI government has to change. It has to speak of a modern Pakistan, a tolerant Pakistan and a progressive Pakistan. Yes Islam is our state religion but we do not need it to be forced onto every aspect of our lives. Strangely enough amongst the Islamic groups there is little consensus of which sect is the right way and if Islam in Pakistan is under threat it is from the sectarian schisms of the mullahs themselves. I have lived 40 years in a Muslim country were people are deeply religious and not once have I been asked if I am a Shia or a Sunni. As I have undergone my own personal journey to Islam in the past half decade I have been helped by many here towards a tolerant Islam and it perhaps explains why the country has progressed. 

There is a lot to learn about tolerance and we must acknowledge that we as Pakistani Muslims have forgotten what it means. To see a Hindu journalist once in a mosque meditating while his host, a sheikh prayed at Maghreb time to me was the epitome of tolerance and acceptance. I know in Pakistani the mullahs would say that the mosque is now unclean etc etc. Bricks and cement do not become unclean by well meaning acts of faith, if anything it creates an acceptance that countries like Pakistan could well learn from.