A dark cloud has lifted from the planet and hope is on the agenda - Donald Anderson
Our planet has been changed for the better and a dark cloud has lifted. Let me explain why. The victory by the Democrats in the United States Congress has instantly changed our planet for the better.
As the dust settles on the American elections it is well worth reflecting on just what a momentous occasion it is and what it means for us all.
Donald Trump has dominated American politics for a decade. The ultimate populist, he has lied and cheated his way to seek to bend America and the world to his will. No bar has been so low that he would not slide under it.
He has also shamelessly exploited his office to enrich himself and his family and used his position to protect people named in the Epstein files, while at the same time abusing his position to hunt and punish people like James Comey for no other reason than that they had the audacity to challenge him or to simply do their job.
All that came to a grinding halt on Tuesday. But the Democrat victory has implications way beyond America, important though that is. Even before the polls closed Trump was backtracking on his support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
He announced that the $5billion of military aid being given to Israel will end this year, no doubt because of what Republican party pollsters have been telling him about Americans’ frustration at his uncritical support for Israel.
Benjamin Netanyahu lost the recent election in Israel and on Tuesday he lost something equally significant, the support from his strongest backer.
Israel’s ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and Gaza will come under ever increasing scrutiny and hopefully can be brought to an end. Peace still looks a long way off for Israel and Palestine, but at least now there is a glimmer of hope.
Vladimir Putin has also lost his biggest supporter. Nobody can say definitively that Donald Trump is a Russian asset, as many allege. Functionally, though, it wouldn’t make much difference if he was. His uncritical support of Putin has long been a stain on America, but that too has been changed. Ukraine now has the hope of securing support from the new American Congress.
In many ways Russia has already lost its war in Ukraine, but the cost to the people of both countries has been huge. With Putin losing his strongest supporter there is now hope for a just peace in Ukraine as well.
Our Democracies have faced huge challenges in recent years. Facts have become obscured by a blizzard of untruths and lies peddled on social media that we’ve struggled to manage. Populists have escaped proper scrutiny, but no longer.
These elections are a massive turning point. The ability of populists like Trump in peddling simplistic solutions and vile lies will be much more limited in future.
So, are things going to be all sweetness and light? Obviously not, but this is a historic change, and the tide has emphatically turned against a deeply harmful brand of populist politics, and Donald Trump has become a lame duck president overnight.
America has set aside the politics of division and hate - hopefully for good. It’s people have stepped out from the darkness and hope is back on the agenda.