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All the while their representatives in the House of Representatives endured a marathon debate coming after painstaking, months-long investigations through various committees before voting for impeachment, their arguments coming in impassioned bursts about this "solemn day" and Trump's "travesty of law".

To be fair, Trump's six-page stream-of-consciousness letter to Nancy Pelosi, proclaiming his looming impeachment a declaration of war, was an atypical display of sustained exertion. But back in Congress his unwavering Republicans reverted to the less-is-more template the sort that countered Hillary Clinton's deluge of forgettable policy offerings in 2016 with pledges to build a wall and make things great again. They rose briefly to their feet for a moment's silence to honour the Americans who voted for Trump at that election. These voters being dead, apparently.

To the Democrats' claims that Trump's dealings with Ukraine and Congress undermined the rule of law, the Republicans effortlessly flip the accusation to allege with genius timing that even Jesus enjoyed more due process before he was nailed. Some might see this assertion as a metaphor for Democrats killing Christmas. For at the same time the Democrats in Congress were opening their veins in defence of the constitution:Trump was in Michigan addressing the very much alive blue-collar workers he lured into his camp in 2016, bearing a cheerful message for them and for the roughly half of the population still in his camp Merry Christmas! (And, OK, a rather lengthy, "I did nothing wrong.")

In the near future, Senate Republicans will almost certainly embrace simplicity when, after a trial and formal deliberation, they'll carefully consider the articles of impeachment and on each and every one of them declare: Nyet.

Whatever his outsize flaws, Boris Johnson does not deserve to be lumped with his so-called conservative counterpart across the Atlantic. But as a rallying cry, "Get Brexit Done" rendered with faint backing vocals about raising spending on services has that pared-down Trumpian quality.

As journalist Andrew Sullivan observed in New York magazine, Johnson plotted a course that might actually bring the UK out of the "epic, years-long, once-impossible-looking mess he helped make." What more did Johnson need than three plain words?

Well, he was helped immeasurably by a Labour "Opposition" that responded with a mammoth utopian manifesto. Corbynites being so remote from a cynical and jaded public, it never occurred to these apparatchiks that the very idea of policy volume would be enough to send terrified workers into the arms of an avuncular toff.

To "Get Brexit Done", Labour answered: "Hail the new Green Industrial Revolution, free full-fibre broadband for everyone, the workers collectively owning 10 per cent of companies, nationalisation of rail, mail, water and energy, giving the people of the Chagos Islands and their descendants the right to return to the lands from which they should never have been removed."

In Australia, after its shock election loss in May, Labor finally embraced brevity in a 500 word post-mortem that acknowledged "a cluttered policy agenda", and the "size and complexity" of its spending announcements contributed to the party's defeat. To its shopping list of promises on negative gearing, childcare, education, franking credits (I still have no idea what that was about), Scott Morrison responded, broadly speaking, with tax cuts. Tax cuts and a lump of coal. Tax cuts and religious freedom.

I can only agree with those who warn that conservative and right-wing populism is likely to keep winning in the near future. Not because the "workers" are dumb. Not even because their would-be saviours are too clever, though they are too energetic. Too optimistic. The broad left correctly diagnoses societal ills such as economic inequality and wage stagnation; it just can't offer a credible cure.

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So while presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders gives himself a heart attack blitzing America's trailer parks, perhaps America's left-behinds would be better helped by progressives finding a few choice words to swing an election. Say: "Crooked Donald." And: "Merry Christmas."

Julie Szego is a Melbourne writer.

Original post:
Sorry, progressives, we can expect the right to keep marching onwards - Sydney Morning Herald