My wife and I have just watched the segment on Bolt with Niall Ferguson and then Rowan Dean where the issue of multiculturalism and immigration was at the centre of the conversation. The way I would construct what was said is this:

• there is this problem associated with migration where some people are entering the country who do not wish to become part of the majority culture
• this has now created social tensions causing people to look for political solutions
• the result has been this terrible situation where “populists” like Donald Trump are now able to get political traction.

My question then is this: In what way is Donald Trump not attempting to solve the very problem Andrew Bolt and the others have raised? They can give it any name they please, but when you get right down to it, the issue is how do we ensure that those allowed to migrate into Australia will become Australians, or in the US case, Americans.

So I will repeat what I have said before, following Kant: if you would will the end, you must will the means. Commentators, historians and magazine editors are not political leaders, and their skills are not in devising political programs. Are not Trump’s ends their ends? If not, what is it exactly that they do want? And if they more or less do share Trump’s ends, do they not see that he is onto something in the approach he is taking? Or if they support the ends but not the means, how would they go about achieving these ends?

It just does seem to me that they do support the ends that Trump is promoting, but for some reason find themselves unwilling to endorse either the means or the man.