Let’s get serious about Trump

In his letter of February 10, Colin Bullen claims Donald Trump is “a true friend of Britain” eager to cut us the best possible trade deal.

Perhaps that’s true, but I consider it highly unlikely. It’s anyone’s guess what Trump actually believes in, but three things we can say for sure: he believes passionately in Donald Trump, in protectionism and in the fact that the world is divided into winners and losers and there is no way that he is ever going to be the loser (read his book The Art of the Deal if you want assurance on that).

We run a trade surplus with the US, ie we export to the US substantially more than we import from them.

In Trump’s terms this means at the moment we are the winners.

If Trump is not to lose face, something he dreads more than anything else, he needs to transform us from winners into losers.

As a taste of what we might expect from Trump, let me quote from the interview between him and Conservative MP Michael Gove in January.

Gove asked Trump whether the UK was now “at the front of the queue” as regards a trade deal with the US after the Brexit vote.

Instead of the enthusiastic ‘Yes’ we might expect from this “true friend of Britain”, Trump evaded the question and simply answered “I think you’re doing great”.

The thing is Trump loves absolutely everybody. Gove also asked Trump what it meant for him to have German blood in his veins. In reply, Trump said “Well, it’s great. I mean, I’m very proud of Germany and Germany is very special Bad Dürkheim, right? This is serious Germany, right? Like this isn’t any question – this is serious Germany.”

To tell the truth, I’m not sure what half of this means. Perhaps Colin Bullen can enlighten us. Michael Aylward address supplied