In the old days it was a lot easier covering US presidential elections. All you had to do was wait for the network TV anchors to call the result, usually around 2am or 3am Eastern Standard Time (7am or 8am in the UK). Dan Rather at CBS was excitable (“It’s tight as a tick, hotter than a Laredo parking lot”). ABC’s Peter Jennings was Canada-dry, never a hair out of place. NBC’s Tom Brokaw personified the Greatest Generation, all Midwest manhood. Each in their own way made compulsive viewing.
But here I am in Paris, sans TV coverage, surfing the internet and sifting through a storm of WhatsApp group messages from the US. Gradually, almost unbelievably, it becomes clear we’re witnessing the mother of all political comebacks, the prospect of a second term in office for Donald Trump, bolstered by a Republican majority in the Senate. Some seven years ago I first encountered President Trump in the Oval Office. The Big Man was seated behind the Resolute Desk. Being a germophobe, he declined to shake my hand. Nor did he bother standing up.
“Thank you for seeing us,” I said, with a smile, “and thank you for subscribing to the Financial Times.” Trump didn’t miss a beat. “Dat’s OK. You lost. I won.”
Seems like only yesterday
My first presidential election was in 1988, when George HW Bush wiped the floor with his Democratic opponent, Massachusetts governor Mike Dukakis. Like Kamala Harris, Bush – a war hero fatuously labelled a wimp by the American media – was a sitting vice-president. Unlike Harris, Bush distanced himself from the incumbent, Ronald Reagan, and defined his own “kinder, gentler” political agenda. Then again, Bush, a former CIA director and ambassador to China, had years to prepare for the top job. Thanks to Joe Biden’s refusal to recognise his incapacities, Harris, the San Francisco prosecutor, barely had three months.
Back in old Blighty…
Kemi Badenoch is a clear winner, even if the turnout among Tory party members voting for their new leader was disappointingly low. She has joined the elite group of politicians affectionately called by their first name, alongside Boris (Johnson) and Ken (Livingstone). Her elevation is not obvious. Famously abrasive, Kemi could pick a fight in an empty room, allies joke. If she’s wise, her first name could be her biggest asset.
Trevor Phillips, host of Sky’s Sunday morning news show, made another telling point about Kemi. She hates being called the first black woman party leader, or the first black woman anything. Yet Rachel Reeves never stops talking about being the first woman Chancellor of the Exchequer. What’s going on here?
Reeves is rightly proud of smashing another glass ceiling in British politics. She is a role model, keen to encourage other professional women to step up. By contrast, Badenoch declines to be defined by gender or ethnicity. Her ascent underlines how Western politics increasingly divides along cultural rather than economic or traditional left-right lines. Until journalists grasp this, they will continue to misread the US and its country cousin, the UK.
Risks and rewards
I am in Paris to promote Gambling Man, my biography of Masayoshi Son, the founder and CEO of SoftBank, the Japanese media-tech conglomerate. For three days, in mid-February 2000, Son was the richest man in the world. Then he lost 97 per cent of his fortune in the dot-com bust. His story is one of insane risk-taking, but also perpetual reinvention.
Son is an outlier in Japan, an object of suspicion because of his Korean heritage. (His father made a fortune in pachinko, the slot machine gambling game immortalised in the eponymous bestseller by Min Jin Lee.) But Son is a proven winner, a walking model of the tech-savvy, globally-minded entrepreneur.
Looking at Labour’s first Budget, with its heavy state spending, tax rises on employers and top-down industrial strategy, I wonder whether its architects spent much time thinking about born risk-takers like Son. Labour has a ready riposte: it could have been a lot worse. But that is not good enough. I’m no fan of Brexiteer James Dyson’s politics, but he’s not wrong in saying that the Budget was spiteful towards family-owned businesses, including farms.
Reeves is betting on short-term pain for long-term gain. After the chaos of Boris Johnson and the incompetence of Liz Truss, it’s worth giving Labour space. But the financial markets, foreign investors and UK’s nascent entrepreneurs may not be so forgiving.
Lionel Barber was editor of the Financial Times from 2005 to 2020, and is author of “Gambling Man: The Wild Ride of Masayoshi Son” (Allen Lane)
[See also: The revenge of Donald Trump]
Content from our partners
Related
This article appears in the 07 Nov 2024 issue of the New Statesman, Trump takes America