When England was under direct threat in the early 1940s, and Churchill was nearly alone as a voice of resolve and defiance, he was still fighting to organize a successful bid to become prime minister. It wasn't until England's survival was at stake that his personality and fighting spirit became the only and suddenly obvious political solution, and the weak and incompetent Neville Chamberlain, forced out (like Biden and his party, he also sought to effectively surrender to Britain's enemies). A group of British businessmen organized a new, but almost desperate message that was famously displayed in public in London: "What price Churchill?"

The presidential debate this week was a true repetition of history: Trump is a modern Churchill, pugnacious, defiant, patriotic, and ready to win. Biden (and his party) is compliant, afraid, and delusional about both global risk, and global opportunity. But who replaces Biden in the 2024 election will be that, and worse: dangerously radical, and determined to put the nails in America's coffin -- with glee.

Trump is telling Americans exactly what they need to hear, right now, versus a deceptive fantasy about some new imaginary world. The U.S. is under attack on all flanks, and especially within, and as Trump clearly repeated, the country is on the verge of potential war and collapse from other groups that want to destroy it, and from incompetence internally. This isn't a message that most people want to hear, and many will simply pretend things are still normal when they are not.

There will be plenty of opportunity for more Americans to step up and into the public realm, and take leadership roles in state and federal government. But there won't be anything left to lead, at least not in the way we assume, unless a fighter leads the fight, right now, and wins the country back. That means closing the borders, settling global conflicts and establishing national security; recapturing energy independence, rebuilding the military, and supporting American business enterprise, American ingenuity, and American faith.

What price Trump?

Matthew G. Andersson is a former CEO, and has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Time Magazine, the Guardian, the National Academy of Sciences, and the 2001 Pulitzer Prize report by the Chicago Tribune. He received the Silver Anvil Award from the Public Relations Society of America and has testified before the U.S. Senate. He attended the University of Chicago, and the University of Texas at Austin, where he worked with economist and White House national security adviser W.W. Rostow at the LBJ School of Public Affairs.

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