This article appears as part of the Unspun: Scottish Politics newsletter.
There’s been what’s called ‘an instructive moment’ over on the burning pile of demon excrement once known as Twitter.
Learning anything from Elon Musk’s right-wing propaganda channel X is a rarity given it’s now where blue-ticked, spittle-flecked, dead-eyed extremists go to flatulate lies and threats to a circle jerk of other similarly deranged extremists.
However, an instructive moment we had, nonetheless. It featured Scotland’s very own Niall Ferguson, MAGA’s pet historian, being publicly humiliated by JD Vance, the guy-linered US Vice President.
You may have missed it, as Vance has been busy in Munich defaming the Scottish Government with lies about abortion buffer zones. Though that was just a mere side-show to a rant assaulting European democracy.
Read more from Neil:
- Scotland should wear Vance’s hatred with pride, and get nasty with Trump
- Say goodbye to the old order, tomorrow belongs to Trump
- Cruelty has become the new currency in modern politics
Ferguson had the temerity to rather meekly question the shafting of Ukraine by Donald Trump. In case you’ve been – understandably – hiding behind the couch to avoid the unfolding of the most shameful week in American history, here’s what happened.
Incidentally, that reference to a ‘couch’ isn’t meant to mock Vance.
Ferguson wrote on X quoting George Bush Snr: “This will not stand. This will not stand, this aggression against Kuwait.” The former president’s comments were made after Saddam Hussein attacked his neighbour.
Ferguson then said: “Future history students will be asked why this stopped being the reaction of a Republican president to the invasion of a sovereign state by a dictator.”
As we know, Trump has blamed Ukraine for starting the war when it was Russia which invaded, blocked Ukraine from participating in so-called ‘peace talks’, called President Zelensky a dictator, lied about Zelensky’s approval ratings, tried to blackmail Ukraine for its mineral wealth in return for partitioning the country, and even opposed putting the words ‘Russian aggression’ in a G7 communique.
Trump makes Neville Chamberlain look like Rambo. America has become an appeaser, an enemy of Europe and a lackey of Russian fascism.
In response to Ferguson’s rather bloodless comments, Vance went ape. “This is moralistic garbage,” raged the man meant to be spending his time helping run the most powerful nation (for now) on Earth, rather than shredding once-favoured academics.
Garbage, Vance added, “is unfortunately the rhetorical currency of the globalists because they have nothing else to say”. He sneered at Ferguson asking him what his plan was and accused him of “reliance on irrelevant history” – rather stinging, you’d imagine, for a professional historian.
After saying that European nations “pursue domestic policies, on migration and censorship, that offend the sensibilities of most Americans”, Vance added a few more barbs about “lazy, ahistorical nonsense”, “moralisms” and “historical illiteracy”.
Clearly, many Europeans might feel like saying ‘stick your comments where the sun don’t shine, wee man, we’ll pass whatever damn laws we want and America can beat it’. But that’s an entirely different column.
Ferguson responded with a whole list of things he’d done for MAGA. He’d “criticised” Joe Biden; he’d said “the war would not have happened if President Trump had been reelected”; he’d “supported his campaign for reelection”; he’d “consistently predicted his and your victory”; he’d “welcomed the vibe shift that victory represented”.
The last one does sound rather weird. But anyway.
Ferguson added: “I am not sure I really qualify as a globalist. In fact, I agree with all five of the points you make. Indeed, I praised your Munich speech.”
After offering fealty, Ferguson tried to defend his position on Ukraine before reiterating “I agreed with most of your criticisms of Europe at Munich”.
Vance didn’t reply. Ferguson was, as the kids say, left hanging.
Ferguson has certainly put the hours in for MAGA of late. Last October, ahead of the US election, he wrote a column for the Daily Mail headed ‘Why Kamala Harris poses a greater threat to democracy – both at home and abroad – than Donald Trump’.
I know, I’m still laughing too.
Here’s the thing that chaps like Ferguson just don’t get: it doesn’t matter how much you suck up to the MAGA cult, it will never be enough.
You must debase yourself, you must bend the knee, you must buy their lies, deny the truth, and guzzle the Kool-Aid. A true cultist never questions, and anyone who does question must be punished publicly so nobody else transgresses.
That is the moral of this sad little tale. It is a warning to all those on the right who would flirt with this hellish bunch. You do so at your peril – especially your moral peril.
Read Neil Mackay every Friday in the Unspun newsletter.
The right are shaming themselves everywhere you look when it comes to Trump. In November, the journalist Andrew Neil was telling us: “Ordinary voters take Trump’s pronouncements a lot less seriously than the largely liberal-left commentariat. The bloviators who dominate broadcasting work themselves into a frenzy over his latest outrageous remarks… Plain folk tend to shrug and say ‘it’s just Donald’.”
Now Neil is having a meltdown – like those bloviators – over Trump’s behaviour towards Ukraine. What Trump has said is “demonstrably untrue”, and “Putin propaganda”.
Finally, you get it, fella. Welcome to the club of folk who can see and hear.
Meanwhile, the saddest man in Scotland, Tory leader Russell Findlay, tries to hop onto the Trump bandwagon while everyone else with a brain-cell is exiting the carriage.
He’s been rattling on about his own version of Musk’s ‘Doge’ department in Scotland to cut waste.
I mean, what can you say, apart from: go home, son, you’re way out of your depth.
Neil Mackay is The Herald’s Writer-at-Large. He’s a multi-award winning investigative journalist, author of both fiction and non-fiction, and a filmmaker and broadcaster. He specialises in intelligence, security, crime, social affairs, cultural commentary, and foreign and domestic politics.
