Something struck me as I stood in the kitchen last night. I had watched a documentary about Jim Morrison and The Doors, and suddenly I was back in another time. A time that in many ways is not so different from our own.
I grew up with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, The Searchers, Gerry & the Pacemakers and that whole wave of music that washed over us in the 1960s. But The Doors were something else.
Jim Morrison was something else. Darker. More mythical. More romantic. And with Ray Manzarek’s organ, The Doors had a sound that lodged itself in the body.
Then come the words from ‘Strange Days’: ‘Strange days have found us.’ It was 1967. And here we are again.
### **Strange days**
The strange thing is that the 1960s were permeated by the notion of ‘the system’. We rebelled against the system. Against the authorities, against the war, against conformity, against the people who told us how to think and live.
Today, those who inherited this culture have themselves become the system. It is one of history’s little ironies. Those who were supposed to liberate us from the authorities have themselves created a society in which the boundaries of what one is allowed to say and think have become ever narrower.
That is why I recognise something from that time. There is an unease out there. People sense that something is not right. The old truths no longer hold. The old authorities have lost much of their authority.
‘Strange days have found us.’
### **The American hero**
America has always had room for larger-than-life personalities. John Wayne. Alan Ladd. James Dean. Jim Morrison. They are very different, but they all represent something deeply American: the individual who dares to stand alone.
James Dean is a good example. In ‘Giant’, he plays Jett Rink, the poor ranch hand who strikes oil and becomes fabulously rich. It is a story that could hardly have been European.
The egos are too small in Europe. In America, there is room for them. That is also why Europeans have such difficulty understanding Donald Trump. They become furious with him. They perceive him as vulgar, self-absorbed and boastful.
But Trump is quintessentially American. He has the American belief that it is possible to succeed, that it is possible to win, that it is possible to do something great. That is something Europeans have lost.
**We have lost our sense of greatness**
I also watched a documentary about 11 September. What struck me this time was the people on board the aircraft. The flight attendants who realised that something terrible was about to happen and tried to alert the outside world. The passengers on United Airlines Flight 93 who realised what the hijackers intended to do and decided to fight. They knew what it might cost. Yet they did it. That, too, was greatness.
We saw the same thing in the Americans who landed on the beaches of Normandy. Young boys who ran straight into machine-gun fire.
We in Europe owe these people more than we like to think about. Yet we have almost stopped talking about such qualities. We have completely lost our sense of our own greatness. We no longer understand what greatness is.
Instead, we talk about representation, identity and diversity. That has become the moral yardstick of our time. But a society also needs ideals. It needs people who dare to do something extraordinary.
### **Where are Europe’s leaders?**
The British had Lord Nelson. They had Winston Churchill. Nelson went first. He paid the price himself. Churchill, too, was an anomaly. He did not really fit into the political system, even in his own time. But when Britain truly needed him, he was there.
Look at Europe today: Where are the people of that calibre? When I look at British politics, I see Rishi Sunak, Andy Burnham and Keir Starmer. The differences between them are far smaller than the politicians themselves would have us believe. I look at Norway and see Jonas Gahr Støre and Espen Barth Eide.
It is difficult to imagine a greater distance between the world Trump represents and the world Sunak, Burnham, Starmer, Gahr Støre and Barth Eide represent. And this distance has become far greater than it used to be between conventional right- and left-wing politics. We live in a global world in which the civilisational war is playing out right through our own societies.
### **When celebrities became political authorities**
I remember 1968. I remember Tromøya. Later, the Isle of Wight. I remember the music and the films. ‘Light My Fire’. ‘The End’. Vietnam. Woodstock. It was a time when culture was changing at tremendous speed.
And at some point, journalists began asking pop stars what they thought about the Vietnam War. Why should a pop star know more about Vietnam than anyone else? No one really asked that. Fame itself suddenly gave them political authority.
We have lived with that ever since.
Hollywood actors tell people what to think. Pop stars tell them whom to vote for. Famous people begin to believe that because they are good at one thing, their opinions on politics must also be especially valuable.
Robert De Niro is a good example. He has appeared in some of the most important American films ever made. ‘Taxi Driver’. ‘The Deer Hunter’. A fantastic actor. But he has also become an inveterate Trump-hater.
If you become rich enough and famous enough and let it go to your head, and believe that your fame can be converted into political insight, you can seduce yourself into believing almost anything. The interesting thing is that this no longer seems to work as well as it did a few decades ago. Americans do not necessarily allow Hollywood to tell them whom to vote for. I think that is healthy.
### **Trump understands language**
One of the most fascinating things about Trump is his language. It is an important part of the explanation for why he gets through to people. He has a fabulous ability to express himself. American English is direct. It is vivid. It is playful. New expressions are constantly emerging. Trump masters this instinctively. Look at how he deals with the press. A little remark, a word, a look, a jab at a journalist – and everyone in the room understands who is in control.
European politicians do not speak like that. They speak the language of administration, and Norwegian politicians are no exception. Language reveals the culture.
I grew up with an NRK where language had a standard. Riksmål had a standard. That did not mean that everyone had to speak alike, but there was a notion of quality. Such standards have been dismantled. And when standards disappear from language, they tend to disappear elsewhere as well.
### **From ‘Taxi Driver’ to ‘Joker’**
Films tell us something about the society that created them. ‘Taxi Driver’ showed an America in disintegration. Robert De Niro’s Travis Bickle drives through a New York filled with crime, prostitution and social decay.
Many years later came ‘Joker’. Joaquin Phoenix plays a man who finds himself outside society. But the world around him has become even darker. It is interesting to watch these films alongside one another. Because culture registers things before politics does.
Artists can sense that something is wrong long before politicians dare to say it. Jim Morrison did.
‘Strange days have found us.’
### **America has begun to remember who they are**
That is why I follow what is happening in the US so closely. Pete Hegseth represents some of this. Scott Bessent represents something else.
These are people who once again dare to talk about strength, quality and ambition. About being the best. About winning. These were once entirely natural American ideals. Then came a period when they became almost suspect.
Now they are returning.
This is what Europeans find so difficult to understand about Trump. They think it is only about one man. About his personality, his style, his statements. It is not. Trump is an expression of something greater.
America has begun to remember, and become conscious of, who they are. The question is whether Europe will ever do the same. Because we need more than economic growth, new budgets and yet another government report. We need to rediscover something we have lost.
Courage. Standards. Self-confidence.
And a sense of greatness.
This is an adapted text from a transcription of the Editor’s podcast “Skogpod” dated 27.09.26, and as such it is typical of the style and pattern of thought.
