Andrew Dickens: Why New Zealanders love and loathe Donald Trump

I’ve been watching a lot of the late night shows this week from America on YouTube.  Fallon, Kimmel and Colbert, all of them have used the same joke - “oh my god... it’s only been a week”  And then the audience cheers or laughs or boos or cries, or more likely all of that, all at once because what a week it's been. The second golden era of Trump kicked off and he started doing things, brilliant things. Colombia won’t take deportees, so hit them with killer tariffs and economic sanctions that take hold in a week.  Within 12 hours Colombia folded. Crisis over, back to work, business as usual. That was just one day. A short crisis is so much better than a long festering one where nothing happens. Or take the ceasefire in Gaza. Trump said call a ceasefire, rebuild Gaza.    Well you know that’s what everyone wants. Jewish, Arab and American construction tycoons - because there’s peace and money there.  Gaza may be rebuilt as Israeli condos or Palestinian homes with or without Arab money. But who cares, there’s a ceasefire. Now this may have long term consequences, but again who cares! There’s a ceasefire. Thank God something finally happened. It’s been a week of rapid and effective decisions and that’s what you can do with executive power and every level of government behind you. I talked earlier about how MMP causes indecisive leadership in New Zealand.  Well, Donald Trump is the antithesis of MMP, and that’s probably why so many Kiwis loathe him while so many New Zealanders love him.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.