Bogotá, Colombia – In a move that has shaken the cobwebs off the corridors of power in both Washington and Whitehall, Colombia has elected a Trump-backed outsider to the presidency. The man, a walking paradox of charisma and chaos, rode to victory on a wave of populist sentiment that has left the chattering classes in London clutching their pearls and their single-origin coffees.
Let us be clear: this is not a victory for democracy. This is a victory for the politics of the gut, the raw and unwashed instinct of a populace that has been fed a diet of grievance and grievance-adjacent snacks for far too long. The new president, a former reality TV star with a questionable haircut and a passion for tweeting at 3am, promises to “drain the swamp” of Bogotá. Because, as we all know, swamps are notoriously full of crocodiles, bureaucrats, and presumably, the occasional lost tourist.
The warning from London was swift and dripping with the kind of condescension that only a former empire can muster. A spokesperson for the Foreign Office, no doubt speaking through a monocle and a stiff upper lip, expressed “grave concern” about the “populist trend” sweeping the continent. Because nothing says “populist trend” like a man who claims he can solve climate change by planting more cacti and who believes the Earth is flat but only on Tuesdays.
But let us not mock the messenger. The real story here is the death of nuance. The death of the patient, plodding, boring politics that has kept the world from descending into complete and utter madness. Or has it? Perhaps this is simply the final act of a long-running farce, where the clowns have finally taken over the circus and are now demanding better dressing rooms.
In the streets of Bogotá, celebrations erupted with the kind of fervour usually reserved for winning the World Cup or discovering a new flavour of arepa. The new president, let’s call him El Guapo for the sake of our collective sanity, stood on a balcony and promised to “make Colombia great again.” A phrase so tired it should be put out to pasture, yet still it gallops on, fueled by the oxygen of media attention and the cheap gin of hope.
London’s warning is, of course, entirely hypocritical. Did they not just spend years wrestling with their own populist demons, from Brexit to Boris Johnson to the ongoing spectacle of a government that seems to be run by a committee of angry badgers? The pot is calling the kettle gordo, and the kettle is at least enjoying a good meal.
What does this mean for the world? Absolutely nothing, or everything. It means that the tide of populism is not a tide at all, but a permanent flood, lapping at the shores of every nation that has ever held an election. It means that facts are optional, experts are suspect, and the loudest voice in the room is the one that gets the vote. It means that we are all, every one of us, living in a world where the absurd has become the new normal.
So raise a glass of whatever passes for gin in this fever dream of a reality. The apocalypse is cancelled. It has been replaced by a reality TV show where the contestants are all nations and the prize is the last shred of our dignity. And the winner, as always, is the one who shouts the loudest.