When Timo Soini met Ridge Forrester
I’ve seen some crazy s**t in my lifetime. Of course the craziest was when you “won” the presidential election on November 8th. But a close second happened in 2006 when I was backstage at my friend Tuomas’s TV show, Tuomas & Juuso Experience.
Among the show’s guests that night were Timo Soini, then an MP and head of the not-yet-popular populist Finns Party, and Ron Moss, a.k.a. Ridge Forrester from the Bold and the Beautiful.
As I took a sip of the beer I’d just opened, I watched Timo walk over and introduce himself to Ridge. The conversation went something like this: “Hello! I’m Timo Soini, the future president of Finland.” Ridge was clearly starstruck: “Oh wow, the president, that’s amazing!”
I chugged the rest of my beer and Tuomas and I laughed about that night for years.
Back in 2006, the idea of Timo Soini in a position of political power was almost as ridiculous as the thought of… hmm, let me think… oh yeah, I know – Donald Trump in the White House.
Yet here we are. You’re President of the United States and you tweet. He’s Finland’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and he “ploks”.
You’re both bullies with below-average writing skills. And now you’re both officially losers.
There are lots of reasons why Soini and the Finns Party tanked in last night’s municipal elections: fighting among party representatives, inexperience, failing to actually do s**t, yada yada.
But if we’re lucky, there’s another reason: You.
I mean, think about it. First came Brexit. The world was sucker punched. Then a few months later came the knockout when you won enough electoral college votes to win the U.S. presidency. People all over the US and Europe looked at each other and let out a big collective: “WTF?!?”
All of a sudden it looked like the wave of populism that took most of us by surprise was about to turn into a tsunami that would engulf not only Britain and the US, but the rest of Europe. We’re all going to drown, we thought.
But then the tides started to change. Wow. Ok, cool… that was quick.
Holland held its general election in March and the right-wing populist Geert Wilders fell flat on his face. Ha ha, eat that Geert!
And last night Timo Soini and the Finns Party ate it, too, and Soini spent the night doing what most Finnish guys do when they’re sad – crying into his beer.
Next up are presidential and parliamentary elections in France and the federal election in Germany. As we’ve learned recently, polls can be deceiving. But that said, Le Pen is expected to lose, too. And so is the far-right Alternative for Germany.
Ding, ding, ding! Europe is back in the ring and ready to rumble!
Honestly, Donald, I’ve struggled to come up with ANYTHING positive about your presidency. But maybe – just maybe – you’re such a complete and total disaster and so obviously dangerous – like Armageddon-style dangerous – that voters around Europe are now thinking twice before voting for their own versions of you. If that’s true, maybe you’re actually helping Europe to stay united instead of driving it apart. Good for you. And better for all of us.
With you in power we’re all probably going to drown anyway. But maybe now at least we have a chance in hell. Maybe…
Gotta go, but hey, if you happen to run into Ridge Forrester, tell him “the president of Finland” says hi!
Lissu