Surveying the wreckage of the US elections, here are some observations that have emerged:

Campaigns based on hope do not always defeat campaigns based on fear.

Having dozens of retired high ranking military and diplomatic officials warn against the danger Donald Trump poses to democracy (including people who worked for him) did not matter to many voters.

Likewise, having former politicians and hundreds of academics, intellectuals, legal scholars, community leaders and social activists repudiate Trump’s policies of division mattered not an iota to the voting majority.

Nor did Kamala Harris’s endorsement by dozens of high profile celebrities make a difference to the MAGA mob.

Raising +US$ billion in political donations did not produce victory got Harris. It turns out outspending the opponent is not the key to electoral success.

Incoherent racist and xenophobic rants (“they are eating the dogs, they are eating the cats”) did not give the MAGA mob any pause when considering their choices. In fact, it appears that the resort to crude depictions of opponents (“stupid KaMAla”)and scapegoats (like Puerto Ricans) strengthened the bond between Trump and his supporters.

‘Garbage can’ narrative
Macroeconomic and social indicators such as higher employment and lower crime and undocumented immigrant numbers could not overcome the MAGA narrative that the US was “the garbage can of the world.”

Nor could Harris, despite her accomplished resume in all three government branches at the local, state and federal levels, overcome the narrative that she was “dumb” and a DEI hire who was promoted for reasons other than merit.

It did not matter to the MAGA mob that Trump threatened retribution against his opponents, real and imagined, using the Federal State as his instrument of revenge.

Age was not a factor even though Trump displays evident signs of cognitive decline.

Reproductive rights were not the watershed issue many thought that they would be, including for many female voters. Conversely, the MAGA efforts to court “bro” support via social media catering to younger men worked very well.

In a way, this is a double setback for women: as an issue of bodily autonomy and as an issue of gender equality given the attitudes of Trump endorsers like Tucker Carlson, Joe Rogan and Andrew Tate. Those angry younger men interact with females, and their misogyny has now been reaffirmed as part of a political winning strategy.

Ukraine, Europe much to fear
Ukraine and Western Europe have much to fear.

So does the federal bureaucracy and regulatory system, which will now be subject to Project 2025, Elon Musk’s razor gang approach to public spending and RFK Jr’s public health edicts.

In fact, it looks like the Trump second term approach to governance will take a page out of Argentine president Javier Milei’s “chainsaw” approach, with results that will be similar but far broader in scope if implemented in the same way.

So all in all, from where I sit it looks like a bit of a calamity in the making. But then again, I am just another fool with a “woke” degree.

Dr Paul G Buchanan is the director of 36th-Parallel Assessments, a geopolitical and strategic analysis consultancy. This article is republished with the permission of the author.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The leader of the Free Papua Movement (OPM) has called for the establishment of a “United Indigenous Nations” for global justice and an end to Indonesia’s ‘malignant’ colonisation of West Papua.

Today — August 9 — is the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, as declared at the inaugural UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations in Geneva in 1982.

OPM chairman and commander Jeffrey Bomanak said such a new global indigenous body would “not repeat the failure of the United Nations in denying any people their freedom”.

“The integrity of indigenous peoples is not for sale,” he said in a stinging statement to mark the international day.

He offered an “independent” West Papua as host for the proposed United Indigenous Nations to lead international governance with an international forum representing — for the first time — the principled values and ideals of indigenous and First Nations peoples who were the “true guardians of our ancestral motherlands”.

He criticised the UN’s lack of action over decolonisation for indigenous peoples, blaming the body for allowing the “predatory destruction of the world caused by the economic multinational imperialists and their unsustainable greed”.

Citing the UN website for indigenous peoples, he highlighted the statement:

“Centuries-old marginalisation and other varying vulnerabilities are some of the reasons why indigenous peoples do not have the same possibilities of access to education, health system, or digital communications.”

And also:

“Violations of the rights of the world’s indigenous peoples have become a persistent problem, sometimes because of a historical burden from their colonisation backgrounds and others because of the contrast with a constantly changing society.”

Bomanak said that while these two quotes read well, they were “misrepresentative of the truth that has been West Papua’s tragic experience with the United Nations”.

‘Disingenuous manipulation’
“The facts are that the UN has prevented West Papua’s right to decolonisation through a disingenuous manipulation of the Cold War events of the 1960s,” he said.

“Indonesia’s invasion and illegal annexation of West Papua remains a malignancy in principle and diplomacy only matched by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But with different diplomatic outcomes applied by the UN Secretariat.

“The UN Secretariat acts with incredulous diplomatic effrontery to allegations of collusion and complicity with a host of other predatory nations, all eager to plunder West Papua’s natural resources — the world’s greatest El Dorado.”

He singled out Australia, China, France, Germany, Russia, United Kingdom and the United States for criticism.

Indigenous people knew the story of West Papua from their own experience with the same predatory nations and the “same prejudicial and corrupt geopolitics” that characterised the UN, Bomanak said.

“G20 conquerors and colonisers have never put down their swords and guns. They have never stopped conquering and colonising, either by military invasion or economic imperialism.

“They will never understand the indigenous perception of ancestral custodianship of our lands.

“The defence forces and militia groups of G20 nations still murder us in our beds and our beds are burning.”

Conflict of interest
The UN could not stop “global melting” because it was a conflict of interest with the “G20
business-as-usual paradigm of economic exploitation” fueling expansion economies.

“They will not stop until all our ancestral lands are one infertile wasteland. The UN is unable to resolve this self-defeating dynamic,” Bomanak said.

“The UN should be a democratic, progressive and 100 percent accountable institution. This is not West Papua’s experience.

“Six decades ago, the UN should have fulfilled the decolonisation of West Papua for the commencement of our nation-state sovereignty. Instead, we were sold to the highest bidders — Indonesia and the American mining company Freeport McMoRan.”

The problem with international diplomacy was that the UN was “beholden to the G20’s vested interests” and its formal meeting place in New York, Bomanak claimed.

“Why remain inside the belly of the beast?” he asked other indigenous peoples.

“Upon liberation of our ancestral motherland, and upon the agreement of the new government of West Papua, I would like to offer all colonised tribes and nations of the conquering empires — all indigenous peoples — the opportunity to manage our international affairs with absolute justice and accountability.

“International relations with indigenous governance for indigenous people. We will build the United Indigenous Nations in West Papua.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Breaking down barriers between Pacific islands to spur economic development, visioning 21st century skills that island youth must have for jobs locally or globally, action needed to reverse the non-communicable disease pandemic sweeping the region, and reinventing governance systems for governments to successfully navigate the future of their nations — these are among priority issues that Dr Transform Aqorau believes need to be on the agenda for island leaders.

But for the most part they are not in the conversation.

“There isn’t enough discussion about the future,” said Dr Aqorau, who took up the Solomon Islands National University’s vice-chancellor position in January.

Dr Aqorau was in Majuro recently for the official opening of the Parties to the Nauru Agreement or PNA Office. He was the founding chief executive of the PNA Office from 2010-2016, guiding it from a decision of the leaders on paper to establish the first office of the PNA to becoming one of the most powerful fisheries organisations in the world.

“This is a conversation that isn’t just for universities,” he said. “Governments need to be discussing their vision for the future and work in tandem with national universities.”

It was not simply a theoretical exercise. The conversation could have much needed practical impact on islands in the region, he said.

PNA model ‘has clout’
The PNA model had shown the clout of a regional effort and the governance systems that supported the vision of the nine nations involved in PNA, he said.

“All Pacific islands need to create opportunities in agriculture, fisheries, tourism and other areas,” he said. “It’s difficult, but in the region, we should ask ourselves: What kind of collective brand can we create?”

He thinks the Pacific could offer itself to visitors as a tourism package, not in competition with one another.

“What did we learn from covid?” he asked. “Those that relied on one thing, such as tourism, struggled.”

“We shouldn’t see ourselves as separate. Instead, we should see ourselves as a single economic bloc (and by doing so) we could help ourselves more (during times like the covid pandemic).”

Tourism and trading blocs would work to the advantage of different islands, combined with technology and educational initiatives.

“In our Blue Continent, we should tear down national barriers and work together,” he said.

‘What future for our children?’
“If we don’t do these things for the people, respect for governments as institutions will decline. We need to be asking: What is the future we want for our children?”

Pacific youth should have global skills so they are citizens of the world, Dr Aqorau said.

Seeing NCDs undermine the health of people across the Pacific is great concern too Aqorau. “We need to manufacture our own healthy snacks and alternative foods from our own resources,” he said.

Governments need to get behind incentivising production of island “super foods” and phasing out imported junk food to attack the health crisis “so our next generation can live healthy like their forefathers”, he said.

“These are conversations with impact,” said Dr Aqorau. “They create jobs.”

He expressed worry about the present levels of governance in the region.

“Current structures of government are not working,” he said. “I don’t see their ability to manage this change unless there is a foundational change in the way governments are designed.”

Worsening corruption
He said he saw worsening corruption undermining governance in the region.

“I see increasing alienation of people and increased power in small groups of elite,” Aqorau said, adding that in the present governance environment there was “no way for youth and women to be involved.”

PNA was a shining example of governance that benefited people in the region, he said.

But in the area of resource extraction aside from fisheries — logging and forestry, fossil fuels, mineral mining and deepsea mining — there were no comparable levels of governance.

“PNA shows there is a lot that we can do with forestry, deep sea mining and other extraction resources,” he said.

“We need governance systems in place so we are not exploited. But it’s happening [exploitation] in forestry.”

In the context of the geopolitical competition that is putting additional stress on governance in the islands, Dr Aqorau offered this suggestion to donors.

“Instead of donating things we don’t need that add a level of burden on island countries, support constitutional reforms in governance.”

Dr Aqorau believes that “it won’t always be like this. Young people will demand change”.

Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz