America may be deeply divided, but a country capable of generating the abundance and prosperity on display at Buc-ee’s gas stations can face up to any challenge, says James Price
The image of Donald Trump resolutely holding his fist in the air moments after surviving an assassination attempt is already era-defining. As Trump said himself, “Usually you have to die to have an iconic picture”. At the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this week, all eyes will again be on the 45th President – just the way he likes it. As you read this his nomination acceptance speech will likely still be being rewritten, with the campaign pivoting from a prolonged attack on Biden to a message of national unity.
That unity is sorely needed in America today. I have spent the past month travelling through the American heartlands, across red and blue states, and rancour and division were palpable almost everywhere I went. Tensions were exacerbated no end by the frequent lack of a unifying conversation; liberals and conservatives are almost always split on what constitutes the story of the day.
I met people who, thanks to Fox News, were certain that Nigel Farage was about to become Prime Minister of the UK. Equally, I was surprised to meet people who genuinely believed that any and all footage of the octogenarian incumbent of the Oval Office, Joe Biden, stumbling over either his words or his feet, were deepfakes. (And most of all, I was chastised by older, wealthy, liberal women about the deplorable way Meghan Markle had been treated in Britain).
The extent to which the deep gulf between left and right is determining electoral strategy cannot be overstated. Both parties are focused on maximising turnout in swing states using incendiary language to mobilise their respective bases.
In this context, Trump’s defying of the assassin’s bullet is one of the few stories big enough to have to be covered by every single news outlet. Will it make America sing from the same hymn sheet? I doubt it, but it will at least force most moderates on both sides to realise the dangerous path that the country is on, and give them a chance to step back from the brink. Any lawmaker or journalist who has tried to suggest it was staged, or who even failed to report on it with the gravity that this story deserves, is being punished.
The escalating sense of doom pervading America is all the more peculiar when you realise that the very real challenges it faces – illegal immigration, the fentanyl crisis, falling life expectancy) – are within its enormous power to fix. Its military, its reserve currency, the competitiveness of its industries and its attractiveness for the world’s top talent and investment are mind-boggling by European standards.
The British economy was, on some metrics, a shade better per capita before the financial crisis. Now, Americans are at least twice as rich as Brits. This kind of economic performance is something that feels impossible today in a Europe that seems destined to become equal parts museum and safe haven for the world’s low-skilled labour.
To understand just how much more prosperous America is than Britain, consider Buc-ee’s – the gas station chain boasting America’s cleanest restrooms and the world’s longest car wash (automated, unlike here in Britain). An assistant general manager of one Buc-ee’s can expect to earn $125,000 (plus healthcare and three weeks holiday), whilst a general manager will earn $225,000 or £173,000. That’s nearly ten grand a year more than Keir Starmer makes as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
As I marvelled at the size of one of these air-conditioned stores, stocked with enough calories to feed a whole European country for a month, and encircling an enormous team of cowboy-hatted, brisket cooking sandwich makers, I forgot all of the divisions I had seen. You can’t help but marvel at what the USA is capable of, for good and ill. So I’m with Churchill – never be separated from the Americans.
James Price is a former government advisor