This morning, whilst drinking my morning coffee, I spent a long time wondering whether to switch on my phone, crawl back under the duvet, or simply go and live under a rock for the next two years.
I knew there would be bad news for the Republicans. We’d already switched off the news on election day. That had been enough. As a journalist, I’m supposed to keep up with the news, but even journalists have their limits.
The weeks and months leading up to the mid-term elections had been gruelling. Little sleep, constant negative predictions and the need to keep up with both American and Norwegian media had taken their toll. When, on top of that, I follow the Norwegian media’s coverage of American politics with a critical eye, it sometimes becomes a bit too much.
I keep telling myself that I must limit how often I check the media. But morbid curiosity takes over, and before I know it, I’m on a Norwegian online newspaper.
That’s why it was a welcome sight to see that Ottar Jakobsen had yesterday ventured into NRK’s election coverage with his apt commentary: ‘US election: Total Trump delirium in NRK and the Norwegian media’.
I was able to read that because Ottar is on my side and ours, as the Americans so aptly put it: We’re on the same page.
In the comments section, Kjell-Ove had a message for Ottar: “Not bad that you actually MANAGE to listen to NRK. I can’t manage that any more. It just makes me feel sick …”
That’s exactly how I’ve been feeling over the last few days, right up until this morning.
I opened my phone and checked Document first. ‘US mid-term elections: – Worst since Watergate’ was the headline.
Then on to the New York Post. The front page needs no explanation.
Screenshot: NYP.
The Washington Examiner ran the headline: ‘Republicans struggle to cope with election bloodbath: Think Titanic meets Hindenburg’.
Fox News wasn’t much better: “Democrats are storming towards control of Congress, but the blue wave could get even bigger”.
It was worse than expected. The idea of living under a rock for the next two years suddenly didn’t seem so daft.
I hardly dare think about what the coverage in the Norwegian media looks like today. It’s enough to make you feel sick.
Four years of Democratic rule
A lot hasn’t gone the way Trump promised, and the war in Iran hasn’t helped. We’re not pretending otherwise, as many did when Biden – or for that matter, Obama – was president.
Incidentally, I’m voting for the party, not for the individual. A vote for the Democrats today would be a vote for the radical far left.
I keep thinking back to those four years under Biden and wonder why people believe that another term of Democratic rule will improve the situation in the country.
The party has shifted even further to the left since then.
I remember inflation of over 9 per cent and ever-rising prices, an open border through which millions crossed into the country, rising crime, women killed by illegal immigrants and foreign gangs invading neighbourhoods.
The promotion of gender transition for children, witch-hunts against Christians and anti-abortionists, parents protesting against ‘woke’ education, and a school system that failed children. Transgender people in women’s sport, trans people everywhere, widespread anti-Semitism and an embrace of radical Islam.
The constant message that white supremacy and conservative Americans are the greatest threat to the US, and a policy that prioritised illegal immigrants over poor and disadvantaged Americans.
We witnessed a chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, with 13 American soldiers killed and billions of dollars’ worth of military equipment left behind. Then came the war in Ukraine and the terrorist attack on Israel. Petrol prices exceeded five dollars a gallon.
Endless Covid restrictions and school closures disrupted children’s education. Much of this began under Trump, but was intensified and made compulsory under Biden. Military personnel and nurses lost their jobs because they refused to take the Covid vaccine. At the same time, the authorities pursued an authoritarian line, using coercion and pressure to enforce vaccinations and other measures.
Billions spent on student loan forgiveness schemes simply shifted the burden onto everyone else. DEI and equality mandates were forced upon all federal agencies. Fentanyl flooded across the border and claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Americans. There was widespread fraud, the consequences of which we are seeing today.
At the same time, the administration pursued a lenient policy towards China, whilst that country stole American intellectual property and threatened Taiwan. Iran moved ever closer to nuclear weapons, whilst the Biden administration sent money to the Iranian regime.
Housing and public benefits were prioritised for migrants, whilst American homeless people and war veterans were overlooked. The Department of Justice labelled parents who protested at school meetings as ‘domestic terrorists’.
Massive public spending drove up inflation and further increased costs. And throughout it all, the same attitude prevailed: American citizens come last in the queue.
These are the points that spring to mind off the top of my head.
The day is still young, and we do not yet know the full outcome of the mid-term election bloodbath. Many hope that the Democrats will now show their true colours, particularly with radical candidates such as El-Sayed and Talarico, and many others.
We said the same thing after the election of Zohran Mamdani and others. Let him reveal who is hiding behind the mask, and that his election promises were nothing but empty claims. But with the victory of radical DSA candidates across the country, there is every reason for concern.
Decades of indoctrination in nursery school, primary school and at universities have left their mark. Over half the population prefers socialism.
Moreover, the Democrats know far better how to run an election campaign. The Republicans still have a lot to learn from them, both in terms of which candidates they field and how they get their message across.
For example, they could have prevented Mamdani’s victory in New York if they had fielded a Charlie Kirk-style candidate – male or female – instead of Curtis Sliwa, who was bound to lose. The same applies to several of the candidates in the mid-term elections.
If the Republicans do not wake up now and realise that, over the next two years, they must fight as if they are in danger of losing the country, they unfortunately almost deserve what is coming. Of course, I don’t actually believe that, but this must be a wake-up call for the party.
Now they can put all the blame on Trump – he deserves much of it – but the Republicans have also lost elections completely unnecessarily before Trump entered the fray.
But in the Republicans’ defence: when the media are always on your side, it matters little how much of a mess you make of things or how radical you become.
The outlook is bleak, but we cannot give up.
And so we’re back to Norway and our own media.
There’s no doubt that Norwegian media houses are celebrating today. I can picture the schadenfreude from one end to the other, with Thomas Seltzer, Hilde Restad, Fredrik Græsvik, Peter Svaar, Christina Pletten, Tove Bjørgaas, Anders Tvegård, Eirik Bergersen, Håvard Mjelde and all the others in place with their arrogant know-it-all comments.
I can safely say that even though they pretend to care about democracy and ordinary men and women in America, they do not. They turned their backs on the American people during the Biden years, and they did the same during the Obama years.
They want socialism in a country they don’t live in, come hell or high water. They couldn’t care less that they themselves don’t feel the consequences of the policies they support.
It’ll probably be a while before I dare visit their websites again. I reckon.
But perhaps it’ll be as early as tomorrow, if my morbid curiosity gets the better of me, just to see how they cover the only ray of hope: the election result in Florida.
We’ve now got our first Black governor there. That’s something to celebrate!
