RUTHFULLY YOURS

Hmm, the poorly educated? What a fatuous label. It suggests there is a relevant disparity between those without  tertiary educations and those whose minds have been sharply honed by the towering intellects within academia. Always shaky, this pedestal has been completely levelled as the average intellectual acumen of academics has plummeted; that is, if their pitiful, politically-correct, mangled-English utterances are any guide.

In any event, commonsense was always far more important than education in arriving at sound decisions. Of course, commonsense and higher-education are not mutually exclusive. At the same time, campuses peddling safe spaces, victimhood and microaggressions can do no other than put commonsense at risk. Commonsense was recently on glorious display in the UK.

Once you take out the Scots and nationalists in Northern Ireland who had their own agendas, the self-serving financial set in London, and the young (under 25s) whose brains are still developing, the Brexit vote was much more decisive than the overall figures suggest. Despite getting riding instructions on what was good for them, a large proportion of the ‘poorly educated’ had the good sense to decide that they wanted to live in a country which has the right to determine who can enter and whose legal jurisdiction is not circumscribed by a foreign court.

Looked at another way, the vote for Brexit was a vote for putting the UK first. It resonates with Trump’s campaign. Trump is also relying on the commonsense of ordinary people. This will prove to be a sound strategy; though he has hurdles in his way.

Over ninety percent of African Americans will dutifully vote for the party which has made so many of them dependants. In the land of identity politics, assiduously nourished by the Democrats, a large majority of Hispanics will also vote for Hillary Clinton. To almost cap it all, the Democrats have a powerful electoral machine and an unscrupulous ground game. But to absolutely cap it all, Trump has to overcome Trump.

He refuses no opportunity to be asked questions by journalists; and, unlike politicians, he actually tries to answer them. Almost to a man and woman these journalists are university-educated rampant liberals. They probe waiting for his mistake and then inflate the misstep.

Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails were hacked revealing a conspiracy against Bernie Sanders, replete with crass and tasteless accompanying language. DNC chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, was forced to resign. A gift for Trump? Think again. For some reason it was speculated that the Russians may have done the hacking. In a to-and-fro press conference, Trump clearly tongue in cheek (I saw it) said he hoped Russia would “find” the 30,000 emails that Mrs Clinton deleted and let the press see them. The beat-up followed.

Trump was encouraging Russia to interfere in America’s domestic politics it was claimed. Some went so far to suggest it was treasonous. Though it is entirely unclear why revealing personal emails which Clinton said she deleted because they were all about yoga and stuff would put American security at risk. Leave aside media like the far left NYT and Washington Post; consider our own supposedly conservative-leaning newspaper The Australian. “There is no justification for Mr Trump to turn to Mr Putin for help to discredit Mrs Clinton,” whined the editor (July 29). It is enough to make a person with commonsense throw up, but that is the world we are in and which Trump has to deal with.

Also Trump doesn’t appear to understand the current age’s rules of the game. A conservative cannot say anything negative about any victims, even those who enter the political arena and sling personal insults. John Howard had this down pat; for example, with his refusal to wrangle with David Hicks’ father no matter what barbs came his way.

A Muslim couple whose son was killed in 2004 while serving with the US military in Iraq had a spot at the Democratic convention. Their job, prosecuted by the father, Khizr Kahn, was to stick it to Trump. And Mr Kahn did so in no uncertain terms and quite unfair terms. In the aftermath Trump tweeted: “Am I not allowed to respond?” The answer is no. And certainly not without great care; and certainly not by speculating, as an aside, that the scarfed mother might have said nothing because of her secondary status in a Muslim household. “She had nothing to say…Maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say. You tell me.”

Clinton may be able to send no help and to sleep while her ambassador is being killed in a lengthy fire-fight in the American embassy compound in Benghazi; to barefacedly lie to the parents of Sean Smith and Tyrone Woods, killed in the engagement, by blaming their death on outrage over a video; and then continually deny that she told them that – as she did again as recently as last Sunday when interviewed by Chris Wallace on Fox News. But, the fact is, such licence is available only to Democrats.

No Republican candidate is ever given an ounce of leeway by the liberal media in the United States. But Trump in particular creates a perfect storm. They despise him particularly; precisely because he appeals to those ‘poorly educated’ people they despise. And Trump suffers from a lack of political guile which gives them ample opportunity to exploit his mistakes. George Stephanopoulos of ABC News scored this time with the Khan brouhaha. But there is a conga line of journalists and commentators queuing up to trip him up.

So he can’t win then? Well he can and likely will win because of his commonsense policies.Undoing the corrupt Washington machine, fortifying border and national security, generating jobs by renegotiating trade deals and by lowering taxes and regulations, increasing the size of the military and crushing ISIS – all appeal to a population which is discontent with the status quo and think times are tough and dangerous. Prediction: Enough of the ‘poorly educated’ will have enough commonsense to vote for the no-nonsense guy despite him often putting his foot in his mouth. And the educated elite will sulk and bleat in disbelief.