Where to now for the battle to save the West?
Not that Trump was ever the messiah, but his MAGA movement did make serious inroads in the culture war despite the mistakes that led to yesterday’s electoral wipeout.
It was a beacon of hope.
MAGA leaders were regularly platformed at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship, the premier movement to reconstruct the West in the face of the managed decline being perpetrated by global elites.
But now anti-freedom, pro-Islamification socialist trans activists are back in charge of the US Congress.
It’s not because people voted for Abdul El-Sayed’s idea of Islamic America in Michigan or the “God is non-binary” nonsense of James Talarico in Texas.
It would be wrong to think America has suddenly embraced the anti-western cultural Marxism embodied in the socialism of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Most people are oblivious to the all-out assault on their civilisation that is hiding in plain sight.
They just want cheap fuel, groceries and for their kids to be able to afford a house. They are not wrong to want these things.
The midterms went the way they did because Donald Trump took his eye off the ball.
He promised no foreign wars but went to the elections with an unresolved war in Iran.
Gas, as the American’s call it, is through the roof and people are in pain. Like Australia, everything in America moves because of engines powered by diesel fuel. People are hurting and it’s all because of Iran.
They thought when they voted for Trump they were getting America first.
Trump’s constant hyperbole and unfulfilled promises about solving wars in a day lost people.
For those of us, like Family First, who are engaged in the battle for the soul of Western civilisation against political and cultural forces which hate our heritage, don’t know what a woman is and who are hostile to Christian freedoms, yesterday’s midterms are a big setback.
Whether we like it or not, America is globally influential.
Trump did extraordinary work closing the border to tens of millions of illegal aliens, gutting corrosive DEI programs, protecting children from trans drugs and surgeries, unleashing fossil fuels so energy could be cheap and reliable and defending the unborn.
But in the end his character, something thinking people have always had a rock in their shoe about, let him down.
His constant and unnecessary belittling of opponents, breaking of promises and unwillingness to admit mistakes became impossible to overlook.
All politicians lie, Anthony Albanese is exhibit A, but a time comes when voters no longer cut them slack.
Trump was absolutely correct to do whatever was necessary to stop the Muslim rulers of Iran from getting nukes.
But he failed to explain why the sacrifices to achieve this, particularly at the bowser, should be borne by American citizens.
Failed “forever wars” have jaundiced Americans against their indispensable role as the world’s police.
This is diabolical for Australia in the face of the Chinese Communist Party’s ambitions to take Taiwan and dominate the Pacific islands.
You may not like America but wait ‘til you meet your new overlords from Beijing.
Those waging war on the West had a win yesterday.
Not because voters saw it in the terms that El-Sayed, AOC and Talarico do.
Make no mistake, the radical Democrats, like Australia’s radical left embedded in the Greens, Labor and the “moderate” faction of the Liberal party, know exactly what is at stake.
They are always playing for sheep stations, unlike the centre right who are too complacent or like Scott Morrison deny the culture wars are important.
It is why red-green alliance of leftists and Islamists are rejoicing at yesterday’s results.
Those of us in the fight to save the West, including Australia, need to do a much better job explaining the stakes.
We need to make sure our leaders are people of character and keep their promises.
We need more of our people to carry the arguments in public in a sustained way, like the advocates of the red-green alliance constantly do.
Trump was important because he defied the orthodoxy and broke through.
He created a beach head for restoring pride in the nation state, closing borders to illegal people movements and pushing back on harmful LGBTQA+ ideology and the climate cult.
He slew sacred cows.
There’s no doubt he inspired the Hanson revolt here.
But like MAGA, there are lessons for One Nation.
Character let Trump down. This is also One Nation’s vulnerability.
Popularism of course is important. We live in a democracy, and the will of the people must be allowed to be expressed despite what elites think.
But unless that popularism is undergirded by well-thought-out policy solutions based on principle and led by men and women of character who keep their promises and are humble, we will continue to lose.
Yesterday has set the fight for the West back years.
The upside is the red-green alliance’s mask will slip and people will be repulsed. A spike in gas prices because of a war against mad Mullahs in the Gulf will be seen as a small price compared to the bitter fruits of socialism once allowed to flourish.
This will likely pave the way for a new leader to step into the breach and continue the work.
JD Vance and Marco Rubio are both impressive. One legacy of Trump’s MAGA was the raising of some good leaders.
The test will be if they can learn from the mistakes, re-shape the battle for the soul of American and in doing so help us win the war for the West.
Lyle Shelton is National Director of Family First and the party’s lead candidate for the NSW Legislative Council.