As the Bard put it in Julius Caesar, ‘Cowards die many times before their deaths, the valiant never taste of death but once.’ Translating that into today’s political realm gives us, ‘It’s better to die on your feet for values and outcomes you believe in as a conviction politician than to die on your knees, standing for nothing, as a cipher to focus groups, polling and a vacuous, self-interested advisor caste who take away even the satisfaction of knowing that you went down fighting for what you believe in.’ That’s the short version. Peter Dutton can fill you in on the longer version of what Shakespeare was getting at.

Of course pusillanimity on the right side of Anglosphere politics is not particularly difficult to find. Boris Johnson is exhibit number one. And David Cameron. Then there’s Scott Morrison signing us up without warning or mandate to net zero to appease the New Labor portion of his party room, all while abandoning the notion of the presumption of innocence, not to mention any lingering attachment to free-speech principles.  New Zealand’s supposedly conservative National party isn’t brave now and hasn’t been in some time. And in Washington, DC a healthy slice of Republicans in Congress used to fit the ‘no trace of bravery’ label.

My point is that all of us conservative voters around the English-speaking democratic world had become completely inured to the politicians on our side of the aisle having no fight in them. Even though it’s the left side of politics that starts every ‘culture war’ battle going, our side would coweringly collapse when the left accused us – the ones responding to their initial attacks on the established culture – of bringing up these issues. Apparently, we’re supposed to just let them attack as they see fit. Or we’re the culture warriors.  But no danger of that. Our side of politics pretty much just surrenders, pre-emptively if possible. How else does one explain John Pesutto’s siding with Labor on the transgender idiocies? Or Sussan Ley’s capitulations on the patronising, condescending ‘welcome to country’ propagandising? Or 14 years of Tory governments in Britain doing nothing, not a thing, about the culture-eroding illegal immigration, or even mass legal immigration?

All of which takes us to the distinctive appeal of Donald Trump. Imagine (because in Australia, all we can do is imagine) a politician who years out makes seven, eight, nine big ticket policy pledges and promises of what he’ll do if he wins the next election.  He doesn’t go ‘small target’. He doesn’t hold off announcing anything till he sees which way the wind is blowing or how the focus group results are trending or which way others in his party are leaning. He’s not intimidated and browbeaten by a conservative-free legacy press. And then get this. After winning the election this man sets out methodically to try to do everything he promised, mirabile dictu!  Completely close the southern border? Done in three months, with Congressional funding for finishing a permanent wall now enacted.  Pursue all existing illegal aliens in the US, making no deals and offering no amnesties while increasing the numbers of officers pursuing these illegals? Darn right, to the point that more than a million-and-a-half illegals have self-deported. Pull out of the World Health Organisation? Yep. And the UN Human Rights Council? Yep. And all the UN energy-related quangos? Yes. Quit net zero and ‘Drill, baby, drill’? You bet. End politicised debanking? Check. Cut taxes? Mais oui, including on tips (which are a huge share of some Americans’ earnings).  Opt to ignore all the Keynesian economists (the types who signed those self-indulgent letters in the past claiming Thatcher’s reforms would fail and claiming Argentina’s President Milei’s would fail and the Aussie ones claiming during Covid that there were no trade-offs between lockdowns and economic growth), and having ignored them impose the tariffs you promised – big tariffs – as both political and economic weapons? Yep again, thus far raking in hundreds of billions of dollars, and so far the prophesied mass inflation simply hasn’t appeared – which, by the way, wouldn’t surprise the minority sect of non-Keynesian economists who think inflation is solely a function of the money supply and so any tariff effects are one-offs. What about his promise to take on the universities, big companies and bureaucracies to make them get rid of the neo-Marxist, identity-politics, affirmative-action, barely disguised monstrosity that is DEI, ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’? He’s battling all of them on this, including the US military, and has racked up numerous and impressive wins already – not least a huge surge in military recruitment because soldiers hate the DEI bulldust.

Now, sure, President Trump has failed notably to bring peace to the Russia-Ukraine war (though he’s brokered seven other peace deals and Iran has been humbled). And the Hollywood and legacy media types at CNN et al. still loathe the man, as do plenty of conservative types suffering from Trump derangement. Nor can anyone deny Mr Trump can be mocking, derisory, snide and boorish. But you simply cannot get past the fact that Donald J. Trump is a fighter. In political terms, he’s as brave as they come.  His political virtues far outweigh his failings.  We sure don’t have to worry that were a top judicial spot to come open in the US that he’d appoint a bunch of wet, soft-left types of the sort that (disgracefully) gave us here in Australia the Love decision, brought to you in effect by our Liberal party.

And the rewards of bravery are already transparent. Since Trump was inaugurated one million foreign nationals (the majority illegal aliens according to some) have lost their jobs while two million Americans have gained jobs, compared to the Biden years when virtually all new jobs went to non-native Americans. I’d vote for that Trump result, as would the working-class types who flocked to Trump last election. And think how much money it will save in local, state, and federal entitlements as illegal immigrants return home. Likewise, the average median household income in the first five months is already up over a thousand dollars.  The lowest earners have gotten ten per cent richer under Trump 2, but they went down under Biden (with only the highest earners scoring noticeable gains under Biden).

So put aside all the Trump Derangement Syndrome bleatings and here’s the thing. Unlike so many other conservative politicians, Mr Trump fights and he plays to win – which the political left hates. Let me therefore be blunt. I want what American conservatives have. I just don’t see any prospect of it on the horizon Down Under. The numerology isn’t adding up. No fight in most Liberal and National politicians. No playing to win.  Heck, they can’t even stand up to their own advisors. For us conservative voters, this is the most unkindest cut of all.