Trump Force One,” Sam Tanenhaus Profiles the Man Peter Pomerantsev and Anton Shekhovtsov (P20)

Uncertain times What would President Trump do? The new nationalism in Eastern Europe Has economic growth stalled? After the Paris attacks America’s race problem Hillary’s game A social revolution in Ireland 2 PROSPECT Foreword by Sameer Rahim ver the last year, Prospect has tracked the big ideas Lee’s great 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird, and its challenging changing our world. In recent months, some of alternative version released last year Go Set a Watchman, tell us these have been distinctly worrying. The rise of about race relations in Barack Obama’s America. Donald Trump in the United States is challenging Hillary Clinton kept close to Obama while she was Secre- long-cherished assumptions about what is accept- tary of State, never displaying in public her frustration with Oable to say in a western democratic election. Trump’s populist his hands-off attitude to Syria. But now she is the Democratic campaign has targeted immigrants—especially Mexicans and nominee, Clinton is being notably more hawkish, writes Mark Muslims—and challenged China in language more suitable to a Landler on p16. One of her worries, if she becomes president, barroom brawl than a diplomatic overture. will be the right-wing turn in Eastern Europe, as described by In “Trump Force One,” Sam Tanenhaus profiles the man Peter Pomerantsev and Anton Shekhovtsov (p20). Poland, Hun- who is now the presumptive Republican presidential candi- gary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic are, in different ways, date (p3). He argues that although Trump’s politics are nasty, rejecting the liberalism of the post-Cold War era. his supporters should not be casually dismissed. Often they are The November attacks in Paris left the population “reeling in Americans who have been left behind by the free market, and horror,” says Lucy Wadham (p25). The terrorists targeted the feel like the political consensus does nothing for them. Bataclan music venue, where young people socialised in har- Economist Robert J Gordon and former US Treasury Sec- mony. Wadham writes that the liberal resolve of the “Bataclan retary Lawrence Summers identify economic stagnation as a generation” is more resilient than the attackers think. worrying problem. Gordon argues that technological advances We also looked at the remarkable social change in Ireland. A such as computing have not led to substantial growth; Sum- once conservative country has embraced gay marriage. What is mers, though, is more optimistic about the future (p8). strange, says Gerry Lynch (p33), is that many of its supporters Trump’s rise comes at the same time as increasing racial ten- describe themselves as “passionately Catholic.” sion in the US. On p29, Diane Roberts looks at what Harper Sameer Rahim is Prospect’s Arts & Books editor Contents 03 Trump Force One 16 Hillary’s game 25 “This is our struggle, 33 The strange death of sam tanenhaus mark landler not yours” Catholic Ireland lucy wadham gerry lynch 08 Growing pains 20 Rolling back freedom 29 The war’s not over yet robert j gordon and peter pomerantsev and diane roberts lawrence summers anton shekhovtsov Follow twitter.com/prospect_uk www.facebook.com/ Prospect.Mag PROSPECT 3 Trump Force One Donald Trump’s vows of vengeance against America’s enemies could propel him to the White House. What would he do there? sam tanenhaus fter the latest round of United States primaries and ignore these mounting affronts or act as though ordinary Ameri- caucuses, more than half of the 50 states had cho- cans are to blame. sen their preferred candidate—and Donald J Trump That Trump should be the voice of this protest is unusual, had galloped far ahead of the Republican field. He given his own wealth and opulent lifestyle—part Medici, part has kept winning, all over the map, some of the victo- Kardashian. But revolts are commonly led from above. It may be Aries strikingly large, 19 states so far, from Alabama (rural, evangel- true that Trumpism amounts to little more than “a smelly soup ical, low-income Deep South) to Massachusetts (urban, secular, of billionaire populism and yahoo nationalism—all flavoured prosperous New England), and Michigan (industrial, working- with a tangy dollop of old-timey racism,” as David Remnick, class) to Florida (urban and rural, ethnically diverse). The only Editor of the New Yorker, put it in July last year. But Trump’s question now is whether Trump’s two remaining opponents, Texas supporters have been hearing such insults for many years now, Senator Ted Cruz and Ohio Governor John Kasich, can deny him directed at themselves. And nothing so unites rich and poor, the the nomination outright before the party’s delegates convene in favoured and the unlucky, as the feeling that they are being rid- Cleveland, Ohio, in mid-July. iculed by the same people. No matter the outcome, Trump already seems to be remak- What provokes Remnick, and others, is Trump’s long history ing the Republican Party, if not in his garish image, then along as one of Manhattan’s glitziest presences. He has owned a sports the lines of his fixations and enthusiasms. It is fast becoming “the team—the New Jersey Generals, an American Football team that party of Trump,” as the New York Times has declared, in mingled played three seasons in the now defunct United States Football horror and amusement. League, a competitor of the established National Football League But what is this new Republican Party? Who belongs to it? (NFL). He owns exclusive golf courses with exorbitant member- What do they want? What do they see in Trump? And what does ship fees. His name is affixed in giant gold letters on some of New he see in his own presidency? What would he do if he does get York’s most expensive apartment buildings. For many years, he to the Oval Office? has been flattered by maître d’s at the 21 Club and other dens of No one, least of all Trump, can really say. His ideas, or effu- the rich and famous. But with this comes something else, often sions, on policy—domestic and foreign—come in soundbites, emo- overlooked—a wider orbit of experience than the typical novice tionally vivid, but frustratingly devoid of nutriment. His slogan, politician travels in, and far greater freedom of speech and act. “Make America Great Again!” emblazoned on the caps he sells, His approach to the presidency as a form of “brand extension”— is borrowed directly from Ronald Reagan’s 1980 campaign. Like a prize to be annexed to his personal empire rather than a semi- Reagan, Trump combines nostalgia for simpler, happier times priestly office—seems to desecrate the holy legacies of George along with the promise that even simpler and happier times are Washington and Abraham Lincoln. But it also gives Trump an just around the corner, if only we’ll stride forth to meet them. But authority and pomp mere politicians lack. His campaign visits there are differences, and they reflect changing times. Reagan was often begin in airport hangars, where he descends from his Boe- a cheerful salesman of the Cold War dogma when America saw ing 757, “Trump Force One,” as some call it. After closely compar- itself as the beacon of the “Free World.” Trump speaks of a nation ing the two planes, the Washington Post concluded that it’s more that keeps “losing” and promises lewd vengeance on an array of luxurious than the original. When Trump was weighing his pres- villains, real and inflated. Abroad there are swindling trade part- idential run back in 2013, local Republican leaders in New York, ners (China, Japan, Mexico); leering Islamic State terrorists who suggested he begin one rung below. “Our pitch was, if he runs for torture Americans and get away with it; slippery allies and client governor and makes it, he would be the presumptive front run- states that feast on American “loans” and drag us into their wars. ner,” one of the group recently told the New York Times. At home, things are no less bleak: stagnant wages and mounting There is one practical reason for Trump’s grand sweep towards debt for the middle class, even as the “one per cent” grow richer, the nomination. He knows more about television than any other and surging tides of immigrants, legal and undocumented alike, presidential candidate ever has. At its peak, his reality show steal jobs and soak up welfare benefits. Worse are the elites in both The Apprentice, first broadcast in 2004, drew 20m viewers a week, parties—multiculturalist snobs on the Democratic left, plutocrats exceeding all but the first two Republican debates in this (or any and “hedge fund guys” on the Republican right, who together previous) season. Time and again he has demonstrated mastery of the news cycle. First, he did the unthinkable, picking a fight with the right-leaning cable giant Fox News, the most potent force in conservative media, after clashing with its popular host Megyn Sam Tanenhaus is an American writer. His next book Kelly in the first televised debate. Trump got the better of her and will be a biography of William F Buckley Jr her boss, Fox’s mogul Roger Ailes. Next he boycotted a debate 4 PROSPECT © TY WRIGHT/GETTYIMAGES “Make America Great Again”: Trump’s slogan echoes Ronald Reagan’s 1980 campaign PROSPECT 5 © JOE MCNALLY/GETTY IMAGES © JOE MCNALLY/GETTY “Part Medici, part Kardashian”: Donald Trump relaxes at his home in Greenwich, Connecticut in August 1987 held just before the Iowa primary, which took place on 1st Febru- rivals were left gasping for minutes of it here and there.

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