Trump is right: only bold, dramatic action can defeat the quangocracy

Telegraph

14-04-2025

The American economist Thomas Sowell once wrote: 'People will forgive you for being wrong, but they will never forgive you for being right – especially if events prove you right while proving them wrong.'
So it seems with President Trump. He has been proven right about pretty much everything and now he is trying to do something about it, the elite is howling with indiscriminate outrage.
It turns out that the Paris Climate Accords led to unilateral economic disarmament in the West, especially in Britain; that China has proved to be a malevolent force and is now eating our lunch; that the overly draconian Covid lockdowns were a mistake; that the 'swamp' or 'deep state' – call it what you will – is a real threat and was subverting democracy; and that mass migration has been an economic and cultural disaster.
Trump is right that towns and cities have been hollowed out, on both sides of the Atlantic: places like Ohio and Scunthorpe have suffered, with closed industries leaving dilapidated town centres and a trail of social and drug problems in their wake.
This is not a new challenge. I spent my primary school years in the 1980s in Paisley. Its disused cotton mills pointed to the town's better days. But it has become all encompassing. It's actually worse here than in America – with sky-high energy prices and a refusal to permit fracking making it hard for the remaining British manufacturers to survive.
This was demonstrated by Saturday's dash by MPs to Parliament to back what was tantamount to steel nationalisation – engendered by China and net zero, for which MPs had enthusiastically legislated. As they congratulated themselves for turning up to work on a weekend, few of them seemed prepared to do any deep thinking about why we were in this mess in the first place.
The entire Western establishment can't bear to admit how wrong they have got it – and that their self-serving Davos groupthink has left our countries in a terrible state.
Bill Clinton allowed China to join the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on developing country terms. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, supported by Ed Miliband, outsourced huge powers to unelected officials while expanding the state and embedding human rights laws, climate change targets and DEI ideology.
The Conservative government under David Cameron and George Osborne declared a 'golden era' with China. The unelected officials at the Bank of England printed money, fuelling yet more state spending. Michael Gove cosied up to Greta Thunberg, promoted net zero and lobbied for tougher Covid lockdowns. Boris Johnson presided over a wave of mass migration. These tendencies were replicated across the West – epitomised by Canada's Mark Carney, the ultimate Davos creature, sliding from failure at the Bank of England to becoming the unelected prime minister of Canada.
Yet to read the commentary from most of the British media and establishment, you'd think that these people were geniuses and Trump an idiot. Even Nigel Farage said Trump was trying to do 'too much too soon' with his tariffs policy.
Yet it has to be understood that Trump is fighting a very influential groupthink advanced by people who will fight to the death not to harm their vested interests. Powerful market players are not always neutral. They do very well out of the status quo.
BlackRock's chief executive, Larry Fink, calling a recession now when he was seemingly reluctant to do so while the Democrats were in power is a case in point.
I know only too well how policies can be traduced and the markets weaponised against people who are trying to change things. The 2022 Mini-Budget was a sensible package of tax freezes, spending restraint and supply-side measures, including fracking, which would have generated economic growth (and was smaller in scale than fiscal announcements before or since).
A huge amount of hysteria was generated, making it very difficult to get messages across. Ultimately, Conservative-in-name-only MPs, the economic establishment and their allies in the media contributed to so much turbulence that the policies could not be implemented. I was blamed for failures that were actually the Bank of England's: it has since admitted that two-thirds of the market movement was its responsibility.
The idea that spending more time 'rolling the pitch' to 'introduce things gradually' would have helped is a nonsense. The environment facing disruptors is not one of ignorance; it is one of hostility on the part of those who have an interest in your failing. Any slowing of the pace simply gives opponents more time to organise and you are restricted and then crushed by internal and external opposition.
The only viable strategy is the one that Trump is employing of 'flooding the zone' – of using shock and awe to challenge opponents and upend the status quo. Those wanting serious change must understand we are in a fight with an unelected establishment that will do all it can to stop change happening.
Trump is right that China has cheated in international trade and that the EU and many others have acted in a protectionist way while preaching the values of free trade. His shock tactics have brought countries to the table. China is finally facing serious action after years of a dysfunctional WTO failing to do anything. Other players are being forced to choose between China and the US. If he had allowed the West to continue on its current trajectory, we would have likely seen increased industrial dominance by China and existential threats to our security.
Britain's interests are not automatically aligned with the United States. We should be putting our interests first. Obviously we cannot single-handedly take on China and disrupt the global trading system. But we can get fracking, cut regulations, abolish the Human Rights Act and get on with deporting illegal immigrants. President Trump is standing up for the people of America; we should start standing up for the people of Britain.
The British establishment and the country's current political leadership are failing to do so. Many of them don't even want to talk about what is happening. So rather than placing all their ire on Donald Trump, those who have run this country into the ground for the past 40 years need to look closer to home.