The United States (and its president*) appear to be under sustained attack from those who would support the country doing nothing locally or internationally — as per Joe Biden and Barack Obama.
The left wing of New Zealand politics simply cannot acknowledge the crucial role the US, and its elected president, must play in the world — for if they don’t, who will?
Like him or loathe him, the US President has presided over an economy like a mother hen guarding her chickens. His “America first” approach is unsurprisingly, very popular with Americans who don’t take to the streets to show their support — the Greenland issue perhaps not so much.
It is, however, the constant abuse of the President and his vision for America by the left wing that leaves one gasping for a breath of reality.
No country, not even America, can keep funding as well as acting as the world’s defence force. It is no bad thing for Europe to now fund their own defence.
For the first time in living memory, those running drugs into a vulnerable world have met a fate that only the left would challenge. In fact, the thought of these narco-terrorists in their high-powered offshore speedboats getting a missile up their collective exhaust pipes is no bad thing — unless you happen to be a drug runner with a liking for speedboats.
If we compare the current President or any other past President of the US for that matter, against the leaders of Russia, North Korea, China, Syria (Arabic) and Iran (Persian) we note one particular peculiarity. Demonstration against those regimes simply don’t occur any more. It does in America.
During the Tiananmen Square massacre in China 1989, an estimated 10,000 protesters were killed or wounded, yet that event barely provoked any outrage from the left wing in New Zealand.
We now observe that the last bastion of free speech — Iran — will not tolerate civil disobedience, as an estimated 30,000 have been killed or imprisoned by their “authorities”.
Religious freedom in Iran means you are free to be a Muslim but nothing else. Even to speak against the ruling regime and radical Islam is punishable by death.
So why then do we not see demonstrations against Ayatollah Ali Khamenei all over the streets of New Zealand? A mere 25 local Iranian people protested in Dunedin recently, unsupported by locals.
Obviously, the day of demonstration clashed with the usual protesters watching afternoon TV and their elected Dunedin councillors were too busy with washing their keffiyehs.
Hamas and the Islamic death cults attract little or no condemnation from Western media these days. Women in much of the Middle East are treated as vassals of men due to the religious preachings of radical Islam, yet we hear no comment from the Greens, Te Pati Maori nor Labour condemning such treatment of women.
Can it be that the Ayatollahs of Iran, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un and Xi Jinping the Chinese premier, are more open, more transparent and tolerant of their citizens’ criticisms than the US President?
If we leave aside the reality that democracy as we know it to be, is unheard of in these countries, it leaves an open question of why there is so much criticism of the US and its president. The punitive actions of so many other countries against their citizens are studiously ignored.
The left much prefer open season on the soft target of US and its elected President. In this country it’s been open season on the US and its President from day one of his re-election.
It is worth reflecting on just how many world leaders, past and present, would pass muster on the competency and morality test, if there was one — which is probably why there isn’t one.
Should royalty also be included in that reflection?
It is, however, the abuse of those New Zealanders who are prepared to speak out in support of the US President, at least in some measure, that is troubling.
The left wing, who speak their own particularly nasty brand of shibboleth at every opportunity, studiously ignore the world’s current tyrants’ suppression of freedom in their unbridled quest to hold on to power.
As for international law and their court of justice, it maybe be of some use if they had some teeth and discovered a backbone.
New Zealand should always remember that in 1942, an American battle fleet sailed into the Coral Sea to engage the then enemy, Japan — now a great friend.
Were it not for that naval battle, Australia and New Zealand might well be different countries today. Historical documents show Port Moresby, Fiji and Samoa were next in line for the Japanese forces.
We have America to thank for being prepared to fight on our behalf. American blood has been shed all over the world to protect democracy at a huge cost to that nation, yet the left wing remains silent, save for their constant carping at how bad the US is.
Compared to whom and what other countries?
The greatest fault of the left is not simply their criticism of others but that they judge those who would seek necessary change, well before such vital tasks are completed.
*The President of the United States’ name is being withheld in this article due to the extreme hardship and offence the mention of it could cause to the left-wing contributors to this newspaper.
- Gerrard Eckhoff is a former Otago regional councillor and Act New Zealand MP.
