Our own Ilana Mercer was one of Mr Trump’s earliest and most vocal and consistent supporters. When he announced he would run for election, and when she immediately went into drum majorette mode, I thought she had gone a little funny in the head. Here was a businessman and television personality, trying to break into the closed shop of American politics. I thought Ilana was funny in the head, and I thought Mr Trump a bit of a joke.
Then he showed his teeth, and I sat up. I began to read Ilana with more attention. I said nothing to her when she strained our charitable status to the limit. I watched astonished as the crowds began to gather, and as the most unlikely candidate anyone could have imagined began to tell truths I never thought to hear in front rank politics. Until close to the end, I doubted he could win. I thought Ilana would be terribly depressed by his losing, and that she would go away and sulk for a decade.
But he’s now President-elect Trump, and Ilana was right all along.
I think we should be grateful to Ilana for two reasons:
First, Mr Trump has shattered the Cultural Marxists, or at least shown their sudden weakness. I still doubt – I always doubt anything good! – I still doubt that he will do many of the things he has promised. But he has, in a sense, already delivered. For years, people like us have been dismissed as right-wing extremists – sinister or merely comic figures right on the edge of permissible discourse. Well, something like our own words have now been uttered by the President of the United States, and with every show of conviction. We are suddenly in possession of something like the centre ground of politics. Ilana has been a critically important herald of the new consensus on the right.
Second, Ilana has shown us the value of just going on and on, and not paying attention to the “sensible” people. The sensible people – of whom I am one in relative terms – would have told her she was headed for disappointment. She paid no attention. She followed her conscience, and now finds herself on the winning side of history. There is a lesson in that for us all.
When the history is written of these extraordinary times, Ilana will have her page. She has certainly deserved it.
And so, congratulations to Ilana Mercer, and deep thanks for her commitment to the Libertarian Alliance Blog. And I hope she does not feel that her work is at an end, but that she will continue to share her thoughts with us for many years to come.
