Opinion Tavleen Singh writes: The United States of Trump

This love for Trump was partly because Narendra Modi said he was his friend but mainly because Trump seemed to be doing to Muslims what our Hindutva brethren would like India to do. Throw them all out. It came as a nasty surprise when our treacherous ‘friend’ took Pakistan’s side during our Operation Sindoor. We grumbled that this was only because his ‘favourite Field Marshal’ recommended him for the Nobel Peace Prize. But now Pakistan is playing the role of mediator between the United States and Iran. India sulks in the wings.

The United States has been my favourite foreign country from the days of my childhood. I remember vividly that one of my most cherished toys then was a tiny bottle of Coca Cola. These toy Cokes were given to us children by uncles who were privileged enough in those socialist times to afford foreign travel. Aunts would bring back tiny bottles of French perfume and uncles would bring us those little bottles of Coca Cola.

Then there was Hollywood that seduced us with films like ‘Ben Hur’ and ‘The Sound of Music’ that we watched in elegant cinemas in Connaught Place called Odean and Plaza. When the sixties arrived in Delhi, albeit a bit late, I remember falling in love with Bob Dylan’s songs and dreaming secretly of going one day to America. Foreign travel was impossible in those days because the Government of India seemed permanently short of foreign exchange.

When I became politically conscious, I found myself more drawn to the United States than any other country because liberal democracy, freedom of speech, writing and thought define my political ideology. To this day. And free markets define my economic ideology. I also became an admirer of certain American presidents. I have watched President Kennedy’s ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’ speech many times and always been bewitched. And been as bewitched by Ronald Reagan’s speech in Berlin famous for this line ‘Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.’

In 1990, when Mr. Gorbachev was still president and when the Soviet Union still existed, I went to Moscow for the only time under Soviet Russia. I was surprisingly included in the prime minister’s press party. We stayed in Hotel Rossia near Red Square. It was built like a prison with spartan cell-like rooms. Large ladies who looked like prison wardens sat on every floor. We bribed them with little packets of cheese and chocolates, that the Air India crew had given us, just to be able to get a cup of tea in the morning. It was when I saw Moscow’s empty shops, its desperately poor people and its rickety fax machines that I understood where India’s socialist shabbiness came from. But failed to understand why our leaders chose the Soviet Union as a role model and not the United States.

The truth is that I would like in my lifetime to see India build fine universities modelled on American universities. And cities and villages that resemble American cities and villages. I admire the spirit and insolence of American people who lampoon and criticise their president without looking over their shoulder. How did this country that Reagan once described as a ‘shining city on a hill’ elect an illiterate, crass vulgarian as their leader and Commander in Chief? Is there a side of the United States that can only be understood by Americans?

Perhaps. What gives me hope is seeing that Trump’s poll ratings are abysmal and that millions of American came out in the No Kings protests. What gives me hope is this extraordinary mission to the moon which without question represents that America that I still love and admire. Just as I never believed that tyrannical theocrats represented Iran, I do not believe that Donald Trump represents America. For the moment he has managed to revive the ‘ugly American’ in the eyes of the world and inadvertently exposed America’s ugly, brutish underbelly.