3. april 2025
Gode venner i USA fortæller, at nogle i omgangskredsen er begyndt at tage anti-depressiv medicin for at modvirke de psykiske konsekvenser af at leve med Trump som landets præsident. Ingen ord kan helt beskrive deres afsky for manden.
De har også sendt mig en artikel fra The Guardian, som er et ‘must’ at læse. Den er fremragende. Vi hører ikke så meget til dem, men der er faktisk millioner af amerikanere, der forstår hvordan tingene reelt hænger sammen og som er dybt flove på USA’s vegne over præsidentens opførsel.
The Guardian, 31. marts 2025:
Thanks to Trump’s administration, the US could soon have to fight wars to get things that, just a few weeks ago, were there for the asking.
No one would allow that he could not see these much-admired clothes; because, in doing so, he would have declared himself either a simpleton or unfit of his office.”
– Hans Christian Andersen, The Emperor’s New Clothes
Elon Musk and Donald Trump inherited a state with unprecedented power and functionality, and are taking it apart. They also inherited a set of alliances and relationships that underpinned the largest economy in world history. This too they are breaking.
The American vice-president, JD Vance, visited a US base in Greenland for three hours on Friday, along with his wife. National security adviser Mike Waltz and his wife also went along. Fresh from using an unsafe social media platform to carry out an entirely unnecessary group chat in which they leaked sensitive data about an ongoing military attack to a reporter, and thereby allegedly breaking the law, Waltz and Vance perhaps hoped to change the subject by tagging along on a trip that was initially billed as Vance’s wife watching a dogsled race.
The overall context was Trump’s persistent claim that America must take Greenland, which is an autonomous region of Denmark. The original plan had been that Usha Vance would visit Greenlanders, apparently on the logic that the second lady would be an effective animatrice of colonial subjection; but none of them wanted to see her, and Greenland’s businesses refused to serve as a backdrop to photo ops or even to serve the uninvited Americans. So, instead, the US couples made a very quick visit to Pituffik space base. (Pete Hegseth, another group chatter, stayed home; but his wife was in the news as well, as an unorthodox participant in sensitive military discussions.)
At the base, in the far north of the island, the US visitors had pictures taken of themselves and ate lunch with servicemen and women. They treated the base as the backdrop to a press conference where they could say things they already thought; nothing was experienced, nothing was learned, nothing sensible was said. Vance, who never left the base, and has never before visited Greenland, was quite sure how Greenlanders should live. He made a political appeal to Greenlanders, none of whom was present, or anywhere near him. He claimed that Denmark was not protecting the security of Greenlanders in the Arctic, and that the US would. Greenland should therefore join the US.
It takes some patience to unwind all of the nonsense here.
The base at Pituffik (formerly Thule) only exists because Denmark permitted the US to build it at a sensitive time. It has served for decades as a central part of the US’s nuclear armoury and then as an early-warning system against Soviet and then Russian nuclear attack.
When Vance says that Denmark is not protecting Greenland and the base, he is wishing away generations of cooperation, as well as the Nato alliance itself. Denmark was a founding member of Nato, and it is already the US’s job to defend Denmark and Greenland, just as it is Denmark’s job (as with other members) to defend them in return.
Americans might chuckle at that idea, but such arrogance is unwarranted. We are the only ones ever to have invoked article 5, the mutual defence obligation of the Nato treaty, after 9/11; and our European allies did respond. Per capita, almost as many Danish soldiers were killed in the Afghan war as were American soldiers. Do we remember them? Thank them?
The threat in the Arctic invoked by Vance is Russia; and of course defending against a Russian attack is the Nato mission. But right now the US is supporting Russia in its war against Ukraine. No one is doing more to contain the Russian threat than Ukraine. Indeed, Ukraine is in effect fulfilling the entire Nato mission, right now, by absorbing a huge Russian attack. But Vance opposes helping Ukraine, spreads Russian propaganda about Ukraine, and is best known for yelling at Ukraine’s president in the Oval Office. On the base, Vance blamed the killing in Ukraine on Joe Biden rather than on Vladimir Putin, which is grotesque. Vance claimed that there is now an energy ceasefire in place between Russia and Ukraine; in fact, Russia violated it immediately. Russia is now preparing a massive spring offensive against Ukraine; the response of Musk-Trump has been to ignore this larger reality completely while allowing Biden-era aid to Ukraine to come to an end. Denmark, meanwhile, has given four times as much aid to Ukraine, per capita, as the US.
Greenland, Denmark and the US have been enmeshed in complex and effective security arrangements, touching on the gravest scenarios, for the better part of a century. Arctic security, an issue discovered by Trump and Vance very recently, was a preoccuption for decades during and after the cold war. There are fewer than 200 Americans at Pituffik now, where once there were 10,000; there is only that one US base on the island where once there were a dozen; but that is American policy, not Denmark’s fault.
We really do have a problem taking responsibility. The US has fallen well behind its allies and its rivals in the Arctic, in part because members of Vance’s political party denied for decades the reality of global warming, which has made it hard for the US navy to persuade Congress of the need to commission icebreaker ships. The US only has two functional Arctic icebreakers; the Biden administration was intending to cooperate with Canada, which has some, and with Finland, which builds lots, in order to compete with Russia, which has the most. That common plan would have allowed the US to surpass Russia in icebreaking capacity. This is one of countless examples of how cooperation with Nato allies benefits the US. It is not clear what will happen with that arrangement now that Trump and Vance define Canada, like Denmark, as a rival or even as an enemy. Presumably it will break down, leaving Russia dominant.
As with everything Musk-Trump does, however, the cui bono question about imperialism in Greenland is easy to answer: Russia benefits. Putin cannot contain his delight with US imperialism over Greenland. In generating artificial crises in relations with both Denmark and Canada, America’s two closest allies these last 80 years, the Trump people cut America loose from security gains and create a chaos in which Russia benefits.
People protest over JD Vance’s visit to Greenland in front of the US embassy in Copenhagen, Denmark, 29 March 2025. Photograph: Nils Meilvang/AP
The American imperialism directed towards Denmark and Canada is not just morally wrong. It is strategically disastrous. The US has nothing to gain from it, and much to lose. There is nothing that Americans cannot get from Denmark or Canada through alliance. The very existence of the base at Pituffik shows that. Within the atmosphere of friendship that has prevailed the last 80 years, all of the mineral resources of Canada and Greenland can be traded for on good terms, or for that matter explored by American companies. The only way to put all of this easy access in doubt was to follow the course that Musk-Trump have chosen: trade wars with Canada and Europe, and the threat of actual wars and annexations. Musk and Trump are creating the bloodily moronic situation in which the US will have to fight wars to get the things that, just a few weeks ago, were there for the asking. And, of course, wars rarely turn out the way one expects.
Much effort is spent trying to extract a doctrine from all this. But there is none. It is just senselessness that benefits America’s enemies. Hans Christian Andersen told the unforgettable tale of the naked emperor. In Greenland, what we saw was American imperialism with no clothes. Naked and vain.
As a parting shot, Vance told Greenlanders that life with the US would be better than with Denmark. Danish officials have been too diplomatic to answer directly the insults directed at them from their own territory during an uninvited visit by imperialist hotheads. Let me though just note a few possible replies, off the top of my head. The comparison between life in the US and life in Denmark is not just polemical. Musk-Trump treat Europe as though it were some decadent abyss, and propose that alliances with dictatorships would somehow be better. But Europe is not only home to our traditional allies; it is an enviable zone of democracy, wealth and prosperity with which it benefits us to have good relations, and from which we can sometimes learn.
So consider. The US is 24th in the world in the happiness rankings. Not bad. But Denmark is No 2 (after Finland). On a scale of 1 to 100, Freedom House ranks Denmark 97 and the US 84 on freedom – and the US will drop a great deal this year. An American is about 10 times more likely to be incarcerated than a Dane. Danes have access to universal and essentially free healthcare; Americans spend a huge amount of money to be sick more often and to be treated worse when they are. Danes on average live four years longer than Americans. In Denmark, university education is free; the average balance owed by the tens of millions of Americans who hold student debt in the US is about $40,000. Danish parents share a year of paid parental leave. In the US, one parent might get 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Denmark has children’s story writer Hans Christian Andersen. The US has children’s story writer JD Vance. American children are about twice as likely as Danish children to die before the age of five.
- Timothy Snyder is the Richard C Levin professor of history at Yale University, and the chair in modern European history supported by the Temerty endowment for Ukrainian studies at the University of Toronto. His latest book is On Freedom.
27. marts 2025
Kloge ord fra USA – uddrag af indlæg af Joyce Vance fra ‘Boston-gruppen’:
Why do Republicans still support Trump? Why aren’t Americans out on the streets protesting in massive numbers like we have seen people in other countries doing—Israel, Georgia, Turkey, South Korea, and others? In part, it’s because a large number of people who are Trump supporters just don’t care. Their guy can do anything, and they don’t care. They’ll believe any lie, and they’ll ignore any horrible; they’re all in for Trump for reasons the rest of us still struggle to understand.
The question is, how many of the rest of us are there? By that I mean Americans who, regardless of party affiliation, still care about truth and democracy.
Statistics from the last election provide reason for some optimism. Donald Trump won with 49,9% of the popular vote. Although he has claimed he has a mandate for a radical transformation of government, the numbers just don’t back that up. If there ever truly was a mandate for Trump, the reality is, it’s evaporating day by day as egg prices stay high and people lose their jobs.
There is a cancer on the heart of the presidency, to quote from the Watergate era, and it’s infecting all of us.
22. marts 2025
11. marts 2025
“State of the Union”
Selvom man skulle tro det var umuligt, bliver nyhederne fra USA mere og mere vanvittige, og det er fuldstændigt – som i fuldstændigt! – umuligt at forudse, hvad der vil ske de kommende dage. Det er virkelig dramatisk.
Aktiemarkederne rasler nedad overalt i verden p.g.a. Trumps handelskrig med told til højre og venstre. Økonomerne siger, at en krig på toldsatser taber alle på, også USA, og aktiemarkederne over hele verden er da også de seneste dage gået i rødt – blodrødt!
I går blev Trump af en journalist fra Fox News konfronteret med de dårlige nyheder fra aktiemarkederne og blev også bedt om at kommentere økonomers advarsler om risiko for en egentlig recession i USA som konsekvens af den handelskrig, han har sat gang i. Om en mulig recession sagde Trump blot: “Who knows?”, og derefter fortsatte han:
“All I know is this: We’re going to take in hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs, and we’re going to become so rich, you’re not going to know where to spend all that money. I’m telling you, you just watch. We’re going to have jobs. We’re going to have open factories. It’s going to be great.”
Altså blot en af de sædvanlige tirader, og da interviewet blev offentliggjort, faldt aktiemarkederne yderligere!
Amerikanske aviser skriver, at Trumps første prioritet synes at være at videreføre skattenedsættelserne fra hans første perioder for virksomheder og velhavere i USA samtidig med hans løfte om at nedbringe det gigantiske underskud på det amerikanske statsbudget. Det hænger naturligvis ikke sammen, og det amerikanske budgetkontor estimerer da også, at en skattenedsættelse vil forøge underskuddet med astronomiske beløb. Det er helt gak-gak!
Når økonomer fortæller Trump, at de forøgede toldsatser vil drive priserne op i USA til stor gene for de amerikanske forbrugere og samtidig vil svække landets økonomi, siger han ganske enkelt, at de tager fejl! Logik for perlehøns gør ikke indtryk på Trump, og told synes da også for ham mere at være et symbol på amerikansk styrke. På Fox News sagde han:
“Tariffs are not just about protecting American jobs, they are about protecting the soul of our country. Tariffs are about making America rich again and making America great again, and it is happening and it will happen rather quickly. There will be a little disturbance, but we are OK with that.”
En konservativ (men Trump-kritisk) kanal, The Bulwark, kommenterede ovenstående med ordene: “Donald Trump lider af vrangforestillinger!”
Endnu mere interessant er en iagttagelse af professor James Fallow, der efter at have lyttet til Trumps “State of the Union” tale til kongressen sagde, at Trumps mentale skarphed er blevet synligt ringere: “Trump synes mere og mere at bevæge sig tilbage i tiden og er tilbøjelig til at benytte sig af primitive og forudsigelige sætninger.”
Kort sagt: En skør, paranoid, narcissistisk gammel mand med en – måske – begyndende demens står i spidsen for verdens mægtigste land!
Det er helt vildt!
(Kilde til ovenstående: “Heather Cox Richardson from Letters from an American” og New York Times.)
1 marts 2025
Gårsdagens møde mellem Trump, Vance og Zelensky må gå over i historien som et af de mest pinlige og nedværdigende møde mellem statsledere. Det var råberi sat i gang af Trump, sekunderet af den tåbelige vicepræsident, med det klare formål at ydmyge og mobbe Zelensky. Det var grotesk, og det blev til overflod klart, at Trump-administrationen ikke har noget som helst problem med, at Putin invaderede Ukraine.
Liza Donelly fra Boston-gruppen (se nedenfor) skrev efter mødet:
A rant today, I was so upset, and still am. Trump shouted at Ukranian president Volodomir Zelensky, with Vance repeatedly chiming in to say, “Have you said thank you?” This is so incredibly wrong and disrespectful. I am beyond embarrassed for our country. I just hope and pray that this backfires on Trump bigtime.
Der er tænksomme og fornuftige mennesker i USA, hvilket ovenstående viser, men de er ikke stærke nok til at udgøre en reel front mod Trump-administrationen, der ikke viger tilbage for at bruge alle midler for at ydmyge og mobbe modstandere til tavshed (se mere nedenfor). Der må fra disse mennesker på et eller andet tidspunkt komme en stærk og tydelig aktion mod Trump, men i hvilken form – og hvad bliver konsekvensen? Det kan gå helt galt for den amerikanske nation.
Det er ikke for meget at sige, at der er ubehageligt mange lighedspunkter mellem Hitlers adfærd i 1930’erne og Trumps adfærd i disse dage og måneder. Se mere Her!
Det private modtræk her i huset mod Trump-vanviddet var i går en fantastisk koncert på Viborg Idrætshøjskole med Aarhus Symfoniorkester og Dmitry Matvienko som dirigent. Først Mieczyslaw Weinbergs fantastiske cellokoncert med Ivan Kariza som solist (Weinberg var polsk jøde men voksede op i Sovjet, Kariza er hvide-russer) og dernæst den evigt-smukke 6. symfoni (“Pathétique”) af Tjajkovskij. I 3. satsen går orkestret helt bananas med tordnende pauker og brølende basuner, og det var pragtfuldt at lytte til. I den sidste 4. sats dør musikken ud til sidst som et sidste åndedræt fra en døende, hårrejsende smukt, og dirigenten trak stilheden så langt ud, at publikum ikke kunne finde ud af, om koncerten var slut. Tankevækkende er det, at Tjajkovskij selv dirigerede førsteopførelsen i 1893 og døde kun en uge senere i dyb fortvivlelse. Var symfonien et signal…?
Stor musik kan noget helt særligt…!
28. februar 2025
Dansk presse dækker naturligvis USA tæt, men det undrer mig, at mens Trumps tirader bliver gengivet næsten ordret, også hans tåbeligheder og løgne, så er der stort set intet om de kræfter, der afslører hans løgne og perfide opførsel over for modstandere. Dansk presse er meget ‘sidetung’!
Som modvægt mod den intense Trump-dækning følger jeg en amerikansk tænketank med rod i universitetsmiljøet i Boston og med professor Heather Cox Richardson som ankerperson, og det er stærke sager, de skriver om.
Senest beretter de, at Trump har besluttet, at uafhængige og kritiske medier som A.P. og Reuters er blevet forment adgang til præsidentens presseseancer med henvisning til, at de nægter at bruge udtrykket “Den amerikanske Golf” om det havområde, der indtil 2025 hed “Den Mexikanske Golf”. Kun (højreorienterede) medier med en positiv tilgang til Trump-administrationen har nu adgang og resultatet taler for sig selv –
Den frie og kritiske presse, der er garant for det ægte demokrati, er truet i USA.
Mindst lige så alvorligt er rapporter fra Trump-kritiske republikanere, der fortæller, at de ikke tør stå frem af frygt for at miste deres job og af frygt for deres personlige sikkerhed.
Kongresmedlemmet Eric Swalwell fra California siger:
“It’s more more personal. It’s their personal safety that they’re afraid of, and they have spouses and family members saying, ‘Do not do this, it’s not worth it, it will change our lives forever. We will have to hire around-the-clock security.’”
Liz Cheney (også republikaner) fortalte helt tilbage i 2021, at nogle af hendes kolleger stemte imod at stille Trump for en Rigsret af netop den grund.
Grov mobning, intimidering og chikane med en voldelig dimension virker! Det vidste Hitler, da han nazificerede det tyske samfund i 1930, og det ved Trump i 2025.
Det er altså vildt!
Hvis man vil følge tænketanken, kan man gå ind på denne hjemmeside og tilmelde sig nyhedsbreve, hvoraf nogle er gratis: Her!
27. februar 2025
Jeg følger nyhederne tæt, og det er gået op for mig hvorfor! Jeg følger dem i håb om en eller anden positiv nyhed om Trump – fx. at han er faldet om med et seriøst hjerteanfald eller på anden vis er blevet ekspederet over, hvor han hører til. Politikere lyver fra tid til anden, nogle gange endda med god grund, men Trump lyver hele tiden som den skamløse, patologiske løgner, han er, og det er ikke til at holde ud at høre på hans tirader om, at …“Danmark har været en dårlig allieret for USA”, “Danmark behandler ikke grønlænderne godt”, EU er skabt for at røvrende (Trumps udtryk!) USA osv osv. Det er historieløst, hovedløst og åndssvagt, og det virkeligt forfærdelige er, at millioner af amerikanere tror på ham. Han gør et godt job, synes de!
Forleden dag skrev han på sit sociale medie, at “Den der redder sit fædreland, overtræder ingen regler…”, og formodentlig er det første led i en plan om at tilsidesætte den amerikanske forfatning, så han kan få endnu en periode, når den nuværende udløber i 2028! Man kan håbe, det hele falder til ro, men det tror jeg ikke. Det bliver endnu værre de næste fire år!
Så derfor følger jeg nyhederne tæt…!
Medicin mod alt dette er god musik som fx. det uddrag af Rigoletto, der i skrivende stund strømmer ud fra højtalerne inde i stuen, hvor AM sidder og læser. Også gode vandreture i den fantastiske natur, der omgiver Viborg, er effektiv modgift, og altid med et kamera i lommen 😁 –
,Forleden aften var vi heldige på vores aftentur, hvor solen gik ned netop som vi passerede mosen et par hundrede meter fra, hvor vi bor, et mageløst syn med skræppende gæs i baggrunden som første signal om, at foråret nærmer sig –
19. januar 2025
I 1776 vendte amerikanerne med deres uafhængighedserklæring for første gang ryggen til Europa. I 2025 er de med Trump som præsident på vej til at gøre det for anden gang!
Præcist dét er den forbandede virkelighed, der tegner sig for Danmark og de øvrige europæiske lande. Sigtbarheden i krystalkuglen er ikke god, men alligevel er billedet tydeligt.
Valget af Trump som præsident i USA er et wake-up call af gigantiske dimensioner i Europa og i Danmark i særdeleshed. Siden 2. verdenskrig har vi ligget i læ af den amerikanske sikkerheds-paraply og har udnyttet den gunstige situation til at opbygge verdens bedste og dyreste velfærdsstat – finansieret af alle de milliarder, vi har sparet ved ikke at opbygge et troværdigt forsvar. Tivoligarden har marcheret til glæde for turisterne, men men krudt og kugler er der ikke blevet ofret mange penge på – USA og NATO passede jo på os.
De kommende fire år bliver en gyser af hidtil ukendte dimensioner, og noget tyder på, at Donald Trump Jr. er ved at blive kørt i stilling til at blive farmands efterfølger, og hvis det bliver virkelighed er Europa for alvor alene hjemme.
Man kan vælge at tro, at det nok skal gå alt sammen. Jeg vælger at tro, at det bliver værre.
Vi håber alle, at besindige folk i den amerikanske administration i et eller andet omfang kan tæmme Trump, men som den psykopat og forbryder, han er, er det ikke sandsynligt. Man kan vælge at tro, at det nok skal gå alt sammen. Jeg frygter, at det bliver værre.
På dagen for Trumps indsættelse – det sker i morgen – sidder vi i et tog på vej mod Nürnberg, og vi vil på ingen måde savne den væg-til-væg TV-dækning, der utvivlsomt er forberedt. Vi er bestemt heller ikke kede af at gå glip af Trumps triumferende ansigtudtryk, når han aflægger ed på at ville overholde den amerikanske forfatning foran “den største forsamling nogensinde’…!
Iøvrigt tror jeg, at han er flintrende ligeglad med den amerikanske forfatning.
