When Everything is an Emergency

Tariffs on Canada and Mexico because of the so-called fentanyl emergency.  Tariffs on the rest of the world because of the national emergency described as the poor ‘international economic position of the United States and the need to protect American workers’.  Mass deportations based on the 1789 wartime law called the Alien Enemies Act.  Arrests and deportations of students who protested Israeli actions in Gaza with essentially no justification at all other than a vague and unconvincing order to fight antisemitism.  The firing of large numbers of federal employees with almost no analysis or justification or congressional oversight.

Trump has declared multiple emergency situations and has claimed emergency executive power in an avalanche of executive decisions that have sidelined congress and centralized the direction of almost all government activity in the oval office.  Trump has become a dictator.  This is not a representative democracy and we are perilously close to becoming an authoritarian state.

 

Congress is unwilling and/or unable to rein him in, because republicans live in fear of having Trump or Musk single them out as unfaithful to the MAGA cause and losing their next election.  The tiny republican majorities in the house and senate ensure that the outrage from the democratic side remains impotent. The legitimacy of these sweeping executive actions will be tested in the courts, but Trump has already extorted law firms and threatened judges with impeachment to game the system.  

 

Trump’s apologists would argue that he must perform these executive actions because they are urgent and congress has been unable to move quickly or decisively.  But the reason congress has been stymied for many years is that the country is deeply divided.  Overriding congress to take aggressive actions at a time when the country is struggling to find a balance in opinion and direction threatens our democracy and the rule of law.  The consequences may be disastrous.

 

Trump’s arrogance and narcissism are well known.  His reliance on his business instinct, forged in the cauldron of his street-brawling real estate and construction deals, is for the most part unguided by respected experts.  His MAGA advisors are not highly regarded and they were clearly chosen primarily for their loyalty and sycophancy. 

 

Trump may be successful in ‘evening the playing field’ with some trading partners, because the USA is the most powerful economic nation on earth.  But the long-term consequences of a chaotic and mean-spirited USA will certainly be the loss of trust and respect in the world community, and may be the end of our exalted economic position as nations adjust their alliances and trading relationships to a new world order.

Trump’s America is a Bully and a Spoiled Brat

Here are a few facts that reflect on Trump’s assertion that the USA has been taken advantage of by other nations and that we desperately need to put America first.  The first fact is that our GDP is by far the largest in the world and is seven to fifteen times more than the GDP of the next ten strongest economies excluding China, whose GDP is a little more than half of ours.  The per capita GDP is also very high, eclipsing all but a few small-nation outliers – Luxemburg, Switzerland, Iceland and Singapore.

The second fact is that our average personal wealth is more than twice that of every other developed nation, with the exception of Luxemburg, Switzerland and Hong Kong.  The third fact is that the average wages in the USA are higher than every other nation except Luxemburg, Hong Kong and Iceland. 

It is hard to argue that the USA is suffering in a general sense.  We are the acknowledged technology capital of the world, we have been the largest producer of crude oil in the world since 2018, we have an unmatched military capability, and we have untapped natural resources and vast areas of arable land that are the envy of the world.  

 

Trump’s brutal trade policies and his threats to acquire Greenland, the Panama Canal and Canada can only be interpreted as the antics of a spoiled child and bully that will never be satisfied.  There is no rationale, either economic or political, for these hyper aggressive actions, other than the greedy frenzy of an arrogant, ignorant MAGA group led by two narcissistic autocrats.

 

It is true that the last 30 years have left a good part of the American population behind with stagnating wages and cultural shocks.  The high wages and wealth skew wildly toward the top end of the American wealth demographic.  Somehow, Trump has managed to convince this group that radical liberals and the rest of the world are at fault for their economic malaise.  This fiction will not stand the test of time, but Trump’s strategy will no doubt be to shut the door on any democratic processes and eliminate all opposition before that happens.  

 

The USA is powerful and can assert its will on many nations even if the terms are wildly unjust and punitive. A bully can prevail for a time.  But in the long run, I believe there is enough strength and integrity in other nations to enable a re-ordering of world commerce and affairs.  The sad truth for us is that it will be the stature and economic strength of the USA that will be diminished in the end.  This is what happens to bullies and spoiled brats.

Patience

I am not a particularly patient person.  This is most evident in my driving habits.  I like to say that I am an energetic driver, but it is clear that I generally am impatient and too eager to get to my destination in the most efficient and fastest way possible.  My impatience is also evident in my unwillingness to endure long plateaus in new hobbies or acquiring new skills.  I am not big on persevering if progress doesn’t come pretty quickly.  

Recently, I have been confronted with an example of patience and perseverance that is making me reevaluate my own predisposition for impatience: my grandson.  He was born on October 18^th and I have seen him about every two weeks since his birth.

 

The thing that has really made an impression on me is how much time it takes for a baby to develop various physical capabilities.  Other animals can ambulate almost immediately.  Our family watched an Icelandic horse give birth to a foal that was up and walking within minutes!  Baby birds start to fly around two weeks – is that crazy or what?

 

My grandson, Oliver, whom I love dearly, just recently found his feet at five months.  He is capable of flinging his arms and kicking his feet quite energetically, but he is just now learning how to control his hands to bring objects up to his mouth for exploration.  He can roll over, but not back yet.  Crawling is months away and when he finally walks, at about a year, he will ‘toddle’ like a drunken sailor for another year.

 

Human babies are incredibly slow developing in the realm of physical capabilities.  They are literally helpless for years!  But something very profound and amazing is going on behind the scenes during all that time.  That big human brain is gobbling up much of the energy provided by its caregivers and creating a basis for incredibly complex activities in the future.

 

And despite the apparent frustratingly slow progress on the physical front, Oliver is undeterred.  He tries again and again to make different movements or explore different sounds or try different facial expressions.  He learns how to smile and laugh and emit shrieks of glee or frustration or discomfort.  

 

As it slowly dawns on him that his parents and others around him have amazing freedom of movement and speech, he recommits himself each day to emulating them.  His determination, and yes, his patience, are laudable.  He will not leap up and walk right away, nor will he make an intelligible sound for some time.  But he works on it, making slow but steady progress.  

 

Maybe I need to be more like Oliver.  I need to be willing to keep plugging away at the things I become interested in.  I need to persevere.  And maybe, like Oliver, I will find that some amazing things are going on behind the scenes when I persevere and be very happy with the long term result.