As Goes The US

As goes the US, so go we, and by we, I don't just mean Canada, I mean the globe. It's our reality. Everyone's reality. We are at the mercy of the dumb choices made by Americans. 

We are living through the American century. The last five hundred years or so were dominated by Europe, and the spread of colonialism. That began to change around the turn to the 20th century, and America's spectacular ascension to world dominance was complete with the catastrophic self-destruction of Europe and parts of Asia in World War Two. America rebuilt Europe and Asia, and made them in its image. Fortunately for us. American hegemony rapidly spread liberal democratic values around the world, individual rights and freedoms, and global trade on a scale never before seen in history. It resulted in the most widespread and longest period of peace and prosperity ever. By every meaningful measure, from the reduction of poverty and infant mortality to human longevity, more people have lived better and longer than ever before. Thanks to the unprecedented influence of the most powerful nation, militarily and economically, that has ever existed. All of it was supported by an international financial and political system of treaties and agreements that generated unprecendented levels of security, trade and cooperation. 

As Joni Mitchell sang, 'Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got till it's gone'. 

My biggest fear about trump in 2015 was that if he was elected US President he would move to dismantle the international system that America had created. He tried in his first term, but his incompetence ensured that he failed. This time he's trying harder, and he has many more tools (and I mean that in both the common usage and the pejorative sense) at his disposal. I also feared that he would divide Americans against each other on racial and political lines, and attack the institutions of government, which is his modus operandi. His objective is to make American rule of law and democracy weaker, because he fancies himself an American Putin, the absolute head of a criminal gang that can skim off the proceeds of state revenues for personal enrichment. That may be harder to do than he thinks, given the structure of the US government. But signs of corruption are certainly there. His re-shaping of government departments under staunch loyalists, and the recent sacking of 17 Inspectors Generals signals his intentions. No doubt he will move more aggressively this time to leverage the US government to enrich himself and his cronies. I suspect that his threats of tariffs are part of that. 

My grandfather used to say 'bullshit baffles brains'. And he said it decades before the internet, the greatest bullshit generating machine ever created. Grandpa Sam was a visionary and astute observer of human nature. He saw how easily people could be distracted and manipulated. He might have foreseen a politician like trump, the greatest bullshitter the planet has ever seen. Trump complains the US is being charged too much by Panama to use the canal. Well, if you bothered to look it up you'd find that they were charged a million dollars last year. That's a million dollars to use a waterway that moves roughly $270 billion worth of cargo annually, 40% of all U.S. container traffic alone. Not sure how much cheaper it could get in trump's view. He wants Canada to stem the flow of fentanyl into the US. Virtually no fentanyl crosses the US/Canada border. Guns coming from the US into Canada is another story. 

Trump is a small man with a small mind. He has no principles (except for the pursuit of personal self-interest), no long term strategy (except self-enrichment), and thinks transactionally. He will do and say whatever he perceives in the moment will burnish his image as a strongman. The perception of strength is relative - you are only strong (or weak) in relation to others. So he threatens and bullies allies (Canada, Denmark, Panama), because he perceives that they are vulnerable and might give him a few easy wins. My hunch is that he has grossly miscalculated. And the result will be that he looks weaker. Every bully sooner or later gets exposed for the weakling that he is. Looking weak can be dangerous because it requires escalatory behaviour to prove strength. I shudder to think what that may mean with trump. As it stands, because he threatens so much, there is a danger of not taking his threats seriously. What is the most powerful person on the planet willing to do to get his credibility back? Trump may pick up a few easy wins, like he did with Columbia this week (hardly a 'win' really). But his wins are our losses. They mean an America no one trusts, an America without respect, and that results in a weaker international order, a less safe, less peaceful, less prosperous, less cooperative world.