THE terms upper, middle and working class have real meaning, though those meanings are, understandably, often contested. For the Democrats, the reality and even the term “working class” was to be ignored, and with Hillary Clinton explicitly derided.
With the term left in the gutter, the Republicans picked up a particular dimension of it and shaped it in their own image. Early on, long before Hillary, Karl Rove “discovered” its religious dimension and milked that.
And then came Trump.
READ MORE: David Pratt: What I learned from the US election result
As the Democrats pretended everyone was “middle class”, New Labour and some SNP politicians too started to talk of “hard-working people”. As inequality inexorably grew, the gutter became more and more overcrowded so that today the USA and the UK are the developed world’s “sector leaders” in the inequality stakes.
Trump at least spoke to “the gutter”, and he will no doubt continue to “feel their pain” with one hand and inflict it with the other.
Bear in mind that the Democratic elite, through desperation and gritted teeth, put themselves in a place where they chose as a candidate someone who in the last substantive primaries in 2020 was sometimes polling at less than 1%. There may be Republican “Never Trumpers”, but the Dems have their own species called “Never Sanders”.
READ MORE: John Swinney says he would welcome Donald Trump to Scotland
Meanwhile here, nominally, we have a Labour government, who think that a Britain described by Professor Danny Dorling as “broken nation” can’t be fixed the way the Attlee government – and, it’s often forgotten, his immediate Tory successors (plural) – thought it could be fixed.
For my party, the SNP, talking 2.5 or even 3 degrees to the left of Labour may appear to be easy easy an comfort zone in an admittedly (within our own bubble) very difficult time.
At another time, of electoral hegemony, a leadership can ignore what its members vote for at conference. I get that reality. However, we are in a new reality.
We in Scotland, like England, like the USA, are living in different iterations of Danny Dorling’s “shattered nation”. Being a party of the “centre left” – with an emphasis on the centre and where the left bit is really really soft – won’t work. It didn’t earlier for us in the SNP this year, and it sure as hell did not work for the Democrats on Tuesday. Complacency could be our curse too in 2026, if the actual membership is ignored.
Bill Ramsay
via email
AM I right to be even more traumatised by Trump’s victory than I was by Labour’s on this side of the pond?
Despite the late hope and energy of the Kamala Harris campaign, I wrote weeks ago of the EU jitters and their preparation for a Trump win. It sent shivers down my spine and made me more angry that we were forced out of the EU.
But – apart from all the horrors we already know from the first Trump term – the world now belongs to grifters and misogynists – possibly courtesy of the clearly unstable Musk.
READ MORE: Scotland reacts to Donald Trump's US election victory
Grifter-in-chief Trump – who sold gold trainers and Trump bibles, coins, medallions and playing cards etc during the campaign – was joined by our own buffoon Boris Johnson pedalling his crappy memoir during live coverage. And of course the member for Clacton was over there to kiss the ring rather than serving his constituents. Farage of course got his seat after seven attempts, running a company masquerading as a political party.
Starmer has congratulated Trump, as he has to – but that was maybe not so difficult. Since Blair, the Labour Party has seen its job as shaping the Tory turd rather than implementing real policies for ordinary people, and of course following the US down any rabbit hole it cares to lead.
Yup – on reflection – my trauma is justified.
Amanda Baker
Edinburgh
PROTOCOL was evident at PMQs on Wednesday in welcoming Kemi Badenoch MP to her new role as Leader of the Opposition, and as the House of Commons recognised the election of President-Elect of the USA Donald Trump. Recognition regarding the USA can certainly be questioned, as highlighted by Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey MP considering what we have already heard from Mr Trump regarding future relations with Europe.
But, returning to Ms Badenoch, we all need time to settle into a new role, a new job or “change”, however, if one has previous experience and is familiar with the set-up, it should not be a major transition. However, new Conservative leader Ms Badenoch rose to her feet announcing she will be leading the opposition with a whole new approach, that of being “constructive”.
READ MORE: Kemi Badenoch appoints Andrew Bowie as shadow Scottish secretary
Constructive opposition was not very evident at PMQs considering the meaning of “constructive”: encouraging, helpful, a positive force. In defence of Ms Badenoch, how on earth can she be constructive and in any way defend the record of the Conservatives in government who inflicted 14 years of austerity and crashed our economy, a record that will see Ms Badenoch in opposition for the foreseeable future? However, early days of the new Labour government are going down the same route!
Catriona C Clark
Falkirk
YET another public inquiry, as yet ANOTHER Metropolitan Police scandal arises, this time involving reports of sexual misconduct involving the boss of Harrods which were ignored. How many women could have been saved from this rich, powerful, sexual predator if the Met had done its job?
Yet again, we have more proof that Britain is a failed state, a rogue nation, a banana republic. But that is an insult to bananas.
Margaret Forbes
Blanefield
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