The ‘special relationship’ between the US and the UK, as envisioned by political cartoonist Ben Jennings. My way is better, I think.

(But don’t think for a moment that I would put myself forward.)

The news has been full of nonsense about Donald Trump wanting Nigel Farage to be the UK’s ambassador to the United States, in return for whatever services Farage managed to deliver for the Trump presidential campaign.

We may conclude from this that Mr Trump wishes to hand out appointments as rewards for services delivered to him – personally – rather than to the best person for his country, or to request that they are made along those lines.

I disagree with this; it shows poor leadership – leadership by cronyism.

The best leadership is, of course, leadership by example. Let me provide an example of it, in support of the claim in the headline.

This Writer recently met and befriended a young lady who is a US citizen – the granddaughter of an acquaintance who lives here in Mid Wales. She is travelling around the world and stopped off to visit her grandma for a while.

As bad luck would have it, her grandma fell ill yesterday and was rushed to hospital in a town more than 30 miles away – unbeknownst to the American granddaughter.

Finding out later, the young lady was beside herself. She was terribly concerned for her grandma’s safety but had absolutely no way of travelling to the hospital to find out more (nobody here would tell her anything).

So I gave her a lift. It was a simple act of kindness that generated a huge amount of goodwill.

Now let’s get metaphorical. I’m the UK’s ambassador to the US; the granddaughter is the US. Are you with me so far?

As ambassador, I provided vital help to the US at a time of need. I don’t want any personal favours in return. As I mentioned before, the best leadership is leadership by example – I want the US to remember what I did and help someone else when they need it.

(From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs – but don’t tell the Americans who coined that phrase!)

Of course, because it was a UK representative that gave aid when the US needed it, the US is grateful, and it may be that the UK (the country, not the representative) receives preferential treatment from now on – the reputation of the country as a whole improves as a result of the actions of the ambassador.

So, from a simple act of goodwill, several very beneficial results follow – not just for the US and the UK, but hopefully for other countries as well.

Therefore I would be a better ambassador to the United States than a selfish toad like Nigel Farage.

His attitude can be judged from his behaviour as a Member of the European Parliament – get paid a fortune and do nothing.

Source: Nigel Farage would be great UK ambassador to US, says Donald Trump | Politics | The Guardian

Afterword: Responses to President-elect Trump’s suggestion have been almost uniformly negative. The Huffington Post provides some, here.

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