For my
mostly stateside readers, I’m talking about Monday’s announcement by Keir Starmer (pictured) that he would step down as Prime Minister.
Wouldn’t you know it, it was almost 10 years to the day that David Cameron
did likewise.
Cameron’s
decision immediately followed his failed gamble that a defeat of a referendum
calling for Brexit would deflate the anti-free trade movement within his
Conservative Party.
Instead,
the yes vote to withdraw from the European Union precipitated his own fall from
power, and overshadowed the terms of five subsequent PMs (including, now,
Starmer) who eventually stood in front of 10 Downing Street to say, too, they
would be stepping down.
Six
leaders in 10 years represent no way to run a government, let alone a business.
Coalition fractures mean at minimum that long-term projects won’t start, and
that unscrupulous leaders will make a money or power grab while they can. At
worst, they encourage a voter perception of anarchy and the need for a
strongman to quell the chaos.
Sifting
through the controversies that eventually engulfed Starmer in an article last
month in The Financial Times, Anthony Seldon, co-founder of the
Museum of the Prime Minister, summarized questions related to this streak of
ineffective British leaders:
“Is it the
incumbents or the system that is responsible? Are the problems the prime
minister faces simply greater than before? Has the job now become impossible?”
Seldon
cites three government structures in decline that are contributing to the
current “churn at the top”: the replacement of Members of Parliaments motivated
by the public interest by ones acting in their own private one; a deterioration
of the civil service; and an electorate susceptible to instant gratification.
He also
fears current developments in the two established parties, the Conservatives
and Labour: “It is entirely possible that one or both will cease to exist as
exist as mainstream parties in the next 10 [years]. If that happens, another
source of national stability will be swept away.”
Seldon’s
sweeping historical overview is fine, as far as it goes. But it doesn’t take
into account how the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-09 stoked popular
resentment on both sides of the Atlantic against international trade
arrangements that millions came to regard as inequitable.
That
popular unrest was manifested in the successful Brexit campaign, which produced
its own inevitable lamentable consequences in the public sphere, according to The
New York Times’ Michael D. Shear and Megan Specia:
“Perhaps
no part of British society was changed more by Brexit than its political
landscape, which has fractured into a chaotic tug of war in which no party
seems able to satisfy the demands of an angry and disillusioned public for
long.”
With all the
hang-wringing by Seldon, Shear and Specia over volatility in the British
government, they should cast their eyes “across the pond.” Here, unsteadiness over
the past decade was generated not by six people, but by just one, driven
by rage and retribution?
Yes, just
as Britain took a flyer on a major shift in government, so did the United
States 10 years ago this fall, when it elected Donald Trump—a candidate
with no governmental or national security experience—President. Anger over two
major issues that landed him in the White House also propelled the Brexit
campaign: immigration and unequal class outcomes over trade policy.
In the
last 10 years, Britain has only had one leader who remotely resembles Trump:
Boris Johnson. As I wrote in this post from 10 years ago, when it looked
like Johnson would not seek the brass ring, their shared traits include
brashness, lying, an overactive libido, non-ideological conservatism,
irresponsibility, a brand name, and faux populism.
Even so,
Johnson has been no match over time for Trump, who, even after being cast out
of the White House in the 2020 election, darkened American politics with
ceaseless conspiracy mongering and his bid to return to power to avoid criminal
and civil responsibility for his misdeeds.
And now, when
he’s not busy earning nicknames like “Landscaper in Chief” and “The Creature
From the Green Lagoon,” the Trump Presidency has created a vortex of
instability characterized by longtime friends and allies insulted and
alienated, promises made and broken, policy positions taken before being
forsaken, including:
*Republican
Senators cozy up to him unashamedly, only to find themselves “primaried” and
losing their seats for no reason they can account for.
*The same
senators are assured by White House aides that Trump will support a housing
bill they’ve been working on with Democrats for over a year, only for the
President to cancel the signing event at the last minute, insisting he won’t
put his signature on it until Congress passes his pet voter ID legislation.
*Trump
publicly speculated about making Venezuela the 51st state.
*Even as
the Trump administration negotiated with Iran, it prepared and launched a
surprise invasion.
*With the
“Memo of Understanding” (not yet a treaty, let alone one fulfilling initially
stated war aims), Trump is teaching Israel’s Bibi Netanyahu what US observers
have known for years: don’t count on his loyalty when he finds it
disadvantageous.
*By
exempting many agricultural commodities he announced last year, Trump has
“raise[d] questions about the coherence of the president’s tariff initiatives
as a whole,” according to a report this month by the American Enterprise Institute.
*At
the start of the Iran War, he called for “unconditional surrender”—a demand
long-since dropped.
I wish the
British all the best as they look for a competent leader who’ll last more than Boris
Johnson’s three years or Starmer’s two. But it could always be worse. They
could choose a Trumpian leader desperate and able to stay on longer,
perpetrating untold damage in the process.
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