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Robert Walker

Well as someone living in the UK, it's nearly all about his foreign policy.

Banning people because they are Muslims isn't going to go down well internationally. Even in the UK, a mainly Christian country, we have 13 Muslim MPs (the US only has two Muslim senators as far as I know). They would all be banned from visiting the US.

And I don't think anyone in our parliament supports him at all. We have already had a debate about whether to ban him from the UK in parliament, with the debate about equally split between those who think we should ban him for reasons of hate speech (the UK has strong laws on hate speech and about half of those there argued that the things he said about Muslims go over the boundary from free speech to hate speech - we have banned other speakers from the US for not much less).

It's not too likely Theresa May will actually ban him (the debate was informational and there was no vote, and MPs don't make decisions directly) and of course if he was banned as a candidate he would surely have to be accepted as a visiting president.

But more importantly - not a single speaker in that debate supported his views that the way to stop radical extremists who claim to be Muslims is to ban all Muslims from entering the US (or any other country).

Those opposed to the ban did so on grounds of the political effects, and one speaker spoke about the financial effect on her particular constituency in Scotland where he had invested some money, though not a lot. The debate also touched on whether what he said was extreme enough to count as hate speech according to our country's legislation, with some saying it was, and others saying it wasn't. This was an ideal opportunity for anyone here who supported him to make their views clear - and nobody spoke up saying so.

Withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement would also be a big setback for our work to do something about global warming. Again the US is rather unusual there having an entire party of climate skeptics. Here in the UK there is cross party support for the need to do something about climate change. I don't think there is a single elected MP that had climate skepticism as a platform for election.

Perhaps he wouldn't be able to do either of those things though, some have suggested.

If so then he would be a president who is ineffective, trying to put through policies and being prevented from doing so by international treaties and domestic legislation.

So, that's how I see him, as a president with a foreign policy that may have support in the US but would alienate him from other countries.

Also as others have said, he doesn't seem to have a big picture, or a clear idea of foreign policy. So he'd depend on his advisers a lot. So would depend on who he has as advisers also.

Hopefully he would be a one term president. So at least we'd only have four years of it which is something. Surely the US wouldn't elect him again after they see how he messes things up? Then maybe a reaction back to someone more reasonable. But it might be a long four years.

And I hope that he wouldn't get into a major war as president. Can you imagine him being the commander in chief of the US for the Vietnam war or the Iraq war? He doesn't seem like the sort of person who would have a cool head in such a situation and do his best to find a diplomatic solution where possible.

I'm very surprised we have got to this point where he is a serious contender.

About the Author

Robert Walker

Robert Walker

Writer of articles on Mars and Space issues - Software Developer of Tune Smithy, Bounce Metronome etc.
Studied at Wolfson College, Oxford
Lives in Isle of Mull
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