Donald tusk and donald trump have both divided the people. Which of them has got it right? | thearticle

This week has been the story of the Two Donalds. In Dublin, Donald Tusk declared that there was a “special place in Hell” for “those who promoted Brexit without even a sketch of a plan to

carry it out safely”. Meanwhile in Washington, Donald Trump had a very different message to deliver in his State of the Union address to Congress: “Here in the United States we are alarmed

by new calls to adopt socialism in our country. America was founded on liberty and independence — and not government coercion, domination and control. We are born free and will stay free.

Tonight, we renew our resolve that America will never be a socialist country.” Both speeches certainly resonated on either side of the Atlantic. For the President of the European Council to

introduce the discourse of damnation into the Brexit debate marked a new and dangerous departure. In Britain, his remarks united friend and foe in fury; elsewhere in Europe they were seen as

a statement of the obvious. Tusk’s diabolical metaphor may have widened the narrow English Channel to a chasm. Trump’s assault on socialism was also deliberately divisive: Republicans leapt

to their feet to give their President an ovation, while Democrats stayed defiantly in their seats. In the past, a denunciation of socialism would have united both main parties. But the

recent electoral success of Left-wing firebrands — first Bernie Sanders, the “democratic socialist”, and now Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with her 70 per cent “soak the rich” tax rates — has

polarised Americans on the role of the state. Of course, there is one big difference between the two Donalds: the US President is elected, whereas the EU Council President is appointed.

Trump’s long-delayed and much-heralded State of the Union fired the first shot in his re-election campaign. The contrast between Trump and Tusk is not so much a question of populism — both

men, after all, deployed aggressive rhetoric to rally their supporters — than the difference between an elected leader who is accountable to voters and an official who is accountable to

nobody. Trump denounces socialism because he believes that this will be a platform for a successful campaign in a country where the politics of envy has never had much traction. Ever since

1906, when the German sociologist Werner Sombart wrote a book entitled _Why is there no Socialism in the United States?_, academics have argued about his question. Another question might be:

why are tycoons rarely elected in Europe? Silvio Berlusconi, despite being Italy’s most successful postwar prime minister, is the exception that proves the rule: he was generally despised

by his EU counterparts and unceremoniously deposed by his coalition partners in 2011 after he refused to resign at the behest of Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy. Norma Percy’s BBC

documentary _Inside Europe_, broadcast this week, was a salutary reminder of how the EU deals with elected leaders who don’t play by its rules — as the British are finding out. Trump is

probably right that there is still a majority of Americans who reject socialism. But the United States is in some ways becoming more like Latin America— not just because Hispanics make up an

increasingly large proportion of the population, but because class politics plays a greater role than at any time since the 1930s. Trump made implicit reference to this fact when he

appealed to working class voters who, he said, were adversely affected by illegal immigration, unlike their wealthier neighbours. The Democrats used to speak for the blue collar workers, but

three years ago many switched to Trump. Recent polls suggest that penal taxation on the rich is quite popular, however, so Trump will need other issues on which to campaign. Many fear that

he will resort to racially divisive rhetoric. I doubt that: my own anecdotal evidence suggests that many people of colour respond to his promise of rewarding hard work. The US economy is

working for them as well as for the tech billionaires, most of whom are liberal Trump-haters. Time will tell which of the two Donalds is right. For what it is worth, I suspect that Sombart

will be proved right that Americans will not vote for socialism, and so if the Democrats lurch to the Left, Trump will be re-elected. As for Tusk: he may one day discover that there is also

a special place in Hell for Brussels bureaucrats who try to thwart the workings of democracy.