by Richard Coulson

First published in The Tribune

I repeat what every reader has already learned from every  conceivable source: today’s US election will be the strangest the nation has ever known. Both major parties are losers.

The Republican Party, founded by the Great Emancipator Abe Lincoln and continued by such popular moderates  as Ike Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan, is being led by Donald Trump, who has lost—indeed spurned—the support of the traditional leadership of the G.O.P.  (Grand  Old Party). Trump  win or lose, Its core has been shattered beyond repair by a candidate whose bombast  inspires  the extremes of loathing or adulation.

Meanwhile, the Democrats, heirs to the great traditions of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jack Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson,  march under the banner of Hillary Clinton,  enjoying  the most luke-warm support  of any presidential candidate in recent history. Even for die-hard party loyalists, the great potential of being the first female candidate, with unmatched  practical experience, has been eroded  by her obsessive habits of deception, concealment, and financial avarice.

Worse, as shown by a recent poll, eight of ten voters have lost faith in the electoral process and cast their ballots doubtful  that any national unity will be achieved, and in some cases threatening to revolt against the official results, as “rigged”.

So who will emerge as  the American victor tomorrow? Any columnist should make a clear distinction between what he would like to happen, and what he honestly believes  will happen. In the early pre-Trump days of the Republican primaries, I was a firm Republican, supporting Jeb Bush or possibly Marco Rubio, congenitally negative towards Hillary’s brand  of economic  liberalism  with its disdain  for capitalist free enterprise.

However, once Trump spurted to the nomination, I reversed field,  with no great enthusiasm. I decided that Hillary, with all her baggage, was preferable to the incoherent, often  racist and sexist, rantings of Donald Trump, mouthing impractical  policies  capped by  the meaningless platitude “Make America Great Again”. Surely he would be the loosest  cannon ever ensconced in the White House, bringing incalculable risk and disrepute to America’s security  and prestige.

But will he win? I have consistently accepted  the majority view of polls and pundits: not likely. His millions of wildly enthusiastic fans will simply be out-numbered  by even more millions of tepid Hillary backers, particularly in  electoral-heavy states  like New York and California. Thirty-three million votes have already been cast;  will the remaining estimated 90 million be swung towards  The Donald  by the bizarre revelations (actually, non-revelations) issued just ten days ago by FBI Director Comey? Probably not, but in  this peculiar climate of sudden change, I may be wrong.

I can well understand and even sympathize with many of the Trump partisans. Blue-collar workers  left behind by the hi-tech revolution, residents of decaying rust-belt towns  in the coalfields of West Virginia  or the oil-soaked coastal swamps of  Louisiana, their interests  and their aspirations  have been long ignored by the smarty-pants Republican leadership, the elite “intelligentsia”  housed in Congress and in the think-tanks, universities and corporate offices of  elegant Washington, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. The United States  have become two nations, beer vs. wine, divided not mainly by race but by radically different levels of personal opportunity and life-style, sharing little in common.

Unfortunately, the Republicans at the top of the heap  could find nobody better than Trump to represent the down-side  of the economy, and are now reaping the consequences as they are reviled and rejected by his populist rhetoric, and his  brash intolerance drives his followers ever deeper into bitter opposition. There is plenty of ignorance and bad judgment to share at both ends  of the spectrum.

The certain prospect of unappealing victory by either major US party sends messages to The Bahamas. Of course,  conditions are not parallel—we have, thank the Lord, no politician to match the crude, unapologetic insults of Trump.  Whatever Mr. Christie’s failings may be (and they are legion), he is a warm-hearted gentleman impossible to dislike at the personal level.

However, with our election now looming only six months away, voters here are beginning to face the same depressing dilemma as in the US: whom do you distrust the least?

As must be admitted by all but Cabinet Ministers, Bradley Roberts, and party “stalwarts”, the PLP is in deep trouble, despite its history as our dominant party  with deep roots in the electorate.  Perhaps the near unanimous views  of editorial writers and columnists, and  the predictable opposition of White (and some Black) Knights from Eastern Road, do not represent  true national opinion,  but this year the malaise runs much deeper. Conversations, short of a formal poll, with many Bahamian workers and residents of “over the Hill” constituencies suggest a rolling wave of disillusionment with the PLP and its leadership by Mr. Christie.

Of course, the alternatives are hardly  appealing. The FNM has not recovered from its recent split between competing leadership, and Dr. Minnis, while a tactically successful victor, does not appear to have the gravitas and wise temperament  of a national unifier. Many citizens admire the energy and imagination of Bran McCartney in creating the DNA, but  do not find it, yet, with enough backing for more than a “spoiler” role. Maybe in a few years . . .

The PLP is still the party  to beat, but its profound errors and deceptions since May 2012, linked directly to Mr. Christie  as Maximum Leader, give it a heavy burden. Thanks to ever-improving media and telecommunications, our citizens are far more aware of  public events and  are  alert to the following flops, among many others:

–Rising cost of living caused by the unnecessary  and regressive VAT, bringing  no reduction in public debt,  just the opposite.

— Complete failure to improve our electric power supply after Mr. Christie’s grandiose promises in August 2013.

— Total collapse of Government’s chosen solution for managing our massive garbage dump on its ever-smoldering landfill and its frequent Vesuvius bursts.

—  No visible evidence of any work to get Baha Mar open, despite Mr. Christie’s boasts  that a new operator has been  found, after 18 months of closure.

— National Health Insurance still talk and no results.

As long as Mr. Christie remains in office, his custom of grandiloquent words followed  by careless execution will repeat these consequences of failure. Whether any of his present Ministers would be more competent as leader is an open question, but clearly none of them has the nerve to openly contest  him. The only change within the PLP comes from Alfred Sears,  the  personally respected lawyer who returns to  the political fray after a few years’ absence. His direct challenge to his old friend Perry faces two major hurdles: first, persuading the official  PLP delegates, many firmly entrenched, to vote for him as party leader at next winter’s  convention; second, assuming success, convincing  voters at next May’s general  election that he can truly create a “New PLP”. At least, he is the only politician so far to produce a Manifesto giving a detailed road-map of his policies.

Observing  the maneuvers of him, Mr. Christie, Dr. Miinis, and Mr. McCartney over the next few months  will provide a diverting spectacle, with more open and vigorous debate than in the past, and possibly creating  new structures in our political scene. The apocryphal Chinese curse goes, “May you  live in  interesting times. ” We are now in the midst of them.

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Mr. Coulson has had a long career in law, investment banking and private banking in New York, London, and Nassau, and now serves as director of several financial concerns and as a corporate financial consultant. He has recently released his autobiography, A Corkscrew Life: Adventures of a Travelling Financier.