This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/13/donald-trump-nigel-farage-picture-trump-tower
The article has changed 4 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 1 | Version 2 |
|---|---|
| At any other time, this Trump-Farage picture would be funny | |
| (about 2 hours later) | |
| You wonder how it’s possible to find the humour in the news at a time when the western world is starting to pivot towards an awkward dystopia and after a week when hostility and hate are no longer simmering just below the surface but are suddenly emboldened by Donald Trump’s election victory. | You wonder how it’s possible to find the humour in the news at a time when the western world is starting to pivot towards an awkward dystopia and after a week when hostility and hate are no longer simmering just below the surface but are suddenly emboldened by Donald Trump’s election victory. |
| The sketch show Saturday Night Live gave up on comedy entirely, sitting Kate McKinnon as Hillary Clinton at a piano, performing a version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. Rarely has the traditional “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night!” intro been delivered with such raw hurt and defiance. It was powerful. It was deeply emotional. But it wasn’t funny. | The sketch show Saturday Night Live gave up on comedy entirely, sitting Kate McKinnon as Hillary Clinton at a piano, performing a version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. Rarely has the traditional “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night!” intro been delivered with such raw hurt and defiance. It was powerful. It was deeply emotional. But it wasn’t funny. |
| It’s hard to find much humour, either, in the picture of Donald Trump and Nigel Farage grinning as they meet at Trump Tower, the interim Ukip leader having secured a meeting with the president-elect ahead of any British politician. It might have seemed comical a week ago, but now nothing is the same. Farage tweeted the image with some razor-sharp political insight into Trump’s impending term of office: “He was relaxed and full of good ideas. I am confident he will be a good President.” He used “good” twice, as if it’s all he’s got. | It’s hard to find much humour, either, in the picture of Donald Trump and Nigel Farage grinning as they meet at Trump Tower, the interim Ukip leader having secured a meeting with the president-elect ahead of any British politician. It might have seemed comical a week ago, but now nothing is the same. Farage tweeted the image with some razor-sharp political insight into Trump’s impending term of office: “He was relaxed and full of good ideas. I am confident he will be a good President.” He used “good” twice, as if it’s all he’s got. |
| Last week, if the politics of the two men in the picture repulsed you as much as they have repulsed roughly half of their respective nations, you might have said: look at the pair of clowns. Here’s Farage, usually pictured clasping a pint – your dad’s mate down the pub, the one who tells a rum gag through a haze of Embassy smoke that makes his friends laugh because someone else is the butt of the joke. And now he stands next to the president-elect of the United States, a man who got the job apparently because he wasn’t part of the establishment, because he wasn’t a politician, because he promised to break the system rather than play it. | Last week, if the politics of the two men in the picture repulsed you as much as they have repulsed roughly half of their respective nations, you might have said: look at the pair of clowns. Here’s Farage, usually pictured clasping a pint – your dad’s mate down the pub, the one who tells a rum gag through a haze of Embassy smoke that makes his friends laugh because someone else is the butt of the joke. And now he stands next to the president-elect of the United States, a man who got the job apparently because he wasn’t part of the establishment, because he wasn’t a politician, because he promised to break the system rather than play it. |
| Yet here they stand, a reality-TV star turning it on for the camera, his unnaturally white teeth bearing a smile – or is it a grimace? – and the man who looks as though he could be chairman of Trump’s fan club, typing up newsletters once a month, quoting everything he’s ever said back to him with exact dates and times, just six months away from a restraining order. Farage’s statement afterwards said they discussed “freedom and winning”. | Yet here they stand, a reality-TV star turning it on for the camera, his unnaturally white teeth bearing a smile – or is it a grimace? – and the man who looks as though he could be chairman of Trump’s fan club, typing up newsletters once a month, quoting everything he’s ever said back to him with exact dates and times, just six months away from a restraining order. Farage’s statement afterwards said they discussed “freedom and winning”. |
| It should be ridiculous. The irony is too obvious. The image shows them flanked by the marble walls and glistening golden doors of Trump’s penthouse palace. Farage, a man who uses “political class” as an insult, despite striving so hard to be part of that political class that he has failed seven times to be elected to the House of Commons, is slick with privilege. And now, as he basks in Trump’s reflected glory, he’s not pretending to be anything else. Why would he? He’s bigger than Brexit now. | It should be ridiculous. The irony is too obvious. The image shows them flanked by the marble walls and glistening golden doors of Trump’s penthouse palace. Farage, a man who uses “political class” as an insult, despite striving so hard to be part of that political class that he has failed seven times to be elected to the House of Commons, is slick with privilege. And now, as he basks in Trump’s reflected glory, he’s not pretending to be anything else. Why would he? He’s bigger than Brexit now. |
| In time it might be funny that two men who claim they stand “for the people” are so quick to remind the people that they exist in a different world entirely. Today, though, we are beyond sense, beyond irony. These two men champion ideologies that purport to be a rejection of elitism. The only thing that’s laughable is how little they themselves even attempt to hold that to be true. | In time it might be funny that two men who claim they stand “for the people” are so quick to remind the people that they exist in a different world entirely. Today, though, we are beyond sense, beyond irony. These two men champion ideologies that purport to be a rejection of elitism. The only thing that’s laughable is how little they themselves even attempt to hold that to be true. |