Historian James Curran is a long-term China fanboi:
Once more Trump talked of alliances in terms of deals done and transactions made, of partners paying their dues. Once more he revealed his weakness for the benediction of autocrats, in this case Hungary’s strongman Victor Orbán. And in a worrying prediction of the kind of diplomatic commotion that might follow an election victory, he said again that he would seize the reins of power before his inauguration to end the war in Ukraine and bring peace to the Middle East.
…Harris, though, laced her rhetoric on foreign policy with the very kind of American triumphalism that Democrats, once inclined to stress the limits of Washington’s power, have now adopted with more gusto than their Republican opponents.
…Canberra should take note: the “new Cold War” is still being prosecuted by a divided America.
So, a divided America is united in pursuit of victory over an autocratic China. That’s more than a little oxymoronic.
As in so many Australian cases, Curran is addicted to the tactical over the strategic. He likes to blame, not analyse. To score points for his team, not describe the full scope of the ballpark.
The superpower playbook is more grand than this. American freedom transcending culture, post-colonialism, economics and geopolitics as an African American woman verges on becoming president.
Yet her own policy platform is defined by the aged opponent she faces. His legacy is shifting democracy onto a war footing with China.
Unlike Australia, American democracy is big enough to incorporate the apparent opposites of Trump and Harris because its liberal light on the hill illuminates the way for humanity regardless of who holds the torch.
Canberra should take note: tactics are irrelevant. American freedom will not be cowed by China no matter how repulsed our card-carrying cringers are.
We had better be ready.
