The Union is taking the Mick

Monday’s (24/10) Union discussion with Mick Mulvaney, former chief of staff for the Trump White House, was an evening of chumming it with enablers of American authoritarianism. Mulvaney’s interlocutor did not have it in him to even steer the conversation, only directing Mulvaney once … to an incisive discussion about the lessons of Harvard Business School. Disappointingly, on the attempted extortion of Ukraine for dirt on Hunter Biden, the vice-president of the Union resigned on even asking a question. Instead, he fumbled his words and invited Mulvaney to merely “talk us” through his side of a plot that ended with Trump’s impeachment.

The sense from Mulvaney was of general victimisation. He is slighted by his alma mater, which refuses to invite him to speak. The media call Trump a racist after Charlottesville despite the good working relationship he maintains with a black cameraman. Mulvaney presented his own record as outstanding, such as when he refused to run negative advertisements during his first congressional campaign. In fact, the presence of dark money attack ads in that election was so notable that it made national headlines.

Mulvaney emphasised his disobedience to Trump, which was limited to comments made either in private or later disavowed. In 2016, Mulvaney said Trump would be disqualified from office in an ordinary universe, a claim he recalled before his appointment and unrecalled upon leaving. His most objectionable revision of the night involved the 2020 presidential race. Days after the election, Mulvaney railed against the “TV networks” deciding “who is president” and claimed they act as if the winner of most votes “doesn’t matter”. At his Union event, he instead presented his post-January 6th resignation as a rejection of Trump and not opportunistically abandoning a sinking ship. We should hope that the aspiring Conservatives at the debate, then eager not to make Mulvaney uncomfortable, do not follow his path into such spinelessness.

Adam Kutnar, PhD student at Homerton College

Taylor travesty

I read with intrigue and horror Sarah Abbas’s review of Taylor Swift’s new album, Midnights. While admittedly I wasn’t impressed on my first listening, it took only a couple more listens to grow on me, with “Mastermind” rapidly becoming a favourite of mine (your ranking of it on your website is a travesty). I implore the author of your review to listen to Midnights a few more times before realising and admitting her error.

Isaac Kaufmann, Fitzwilliam College

The NUS has gone nutty

It appears that what we all know has been finally said out loud: the National Union of Students is an antisemitic, loony-left, madhouse of an institution. I would call it Bennite, or Corbynite, or some such thing, but that would be an insult to the professionalism and character of the first, and to the latter’s ability to dodge mentions of his antisemitism.

But is this not what we expect of SUs? Yes, they provide perfectly competent services to students, and administer some things very well, that is true. But the moment your average students’ union delves into politics, they do so with the empathy of Braverman, the foresight of Truss, and the judgment and subtlety of that chap who tried to rig a CUCA election.

Again, even Corbyn got through a few years running Labour without his dodgy attitudes towards Jews getting him the boot. The NUS president couldn’t manage a year.

Disgusted of Peterhouse

Poem of the week

It’s social engineering!

His daddy he worked in consulting,

And finds the idea quite insulting,

That try as he might,

Admissions: No bite!

No doubt for his fee-paying schooling!

Thomas Brian, Peterhouse