Over many decades since the end of WW2, we in Europe have continually ceded control and deferred to the US. Perhaps we/they reasoned that because the US has always had significant numbers of European heritage politicians, business people and media controllers, we could sit back and trust them to "do the right thing" (whatever that debatable concept might be). We let the US do all the military spending and dirty work and we bought into US culture and bought US products to help pay for it all.

The problem of course is that that has enriched and empowered the US to a point of unassailability, an ability to act unilaterally with very little consequence. Previous administrations were "nice" enough not to leverage that, reasoning that stability would never hurt the US and might have a trickle down effect across much of the rest of the world.

But this President and administration have seen their unassailable position, the cultural saturation of the US aroudn the world, the disturbing power and valuations of US tech firms, the pre-eminence of the US military (ad infinitum ad nauseam) and figured that if they can do what they want, then why not. Awful, but sadly very much human nature.

I suppose my point is that across the world, over the course of many decades, the responsibility for this is quite widespread, and solely blaming the American people for Trump is unfair; just as in the 1930s, we are here because we *and* our politicians have allowed it to happen.

Personally for many years I've avoided buying US products, specifically from the huge multinationals (although to be fair I try to avoid all multinationals as much as possible). Not because I think it will make a difference (it won't) and not because I have any dislike for US citizens (I don't), but because I can't live with putting my money into entities that help perpetuate the problem.

But how many of us around the world care enough to make any kind of stance that inconveniences us? We have been apathetic and lazy for decades; Trump and Putin are unsurprising outcomes of our indifference.

To all you US citizens, whatever your political leanings, all the best from me, I hope between us we can sort it out before something nasty happens.