FT’s Martin Wolf on Trump

The Financial Times’ Martin Wolf has written an excellent column on the international and domestic dangers unleashed by Donald Trump’s administration. He says:

Let us start with the domestic front. We are watch­ing an assault on the rule of law. Abbe Low­ell, erstwhile defender of Jared Kush­ner and Hunter Biden, warns that Don­ald Trump is push­ing US demo­cracy to break­ing point

Elon Musk’s so-called Depart­ment of Gov­ern­ment Effi­ciency was a fraud. The goal was not effi­ciency but sub­ser­vi­ence. 

A fur­ther con­cern is legit­im­isa­tion of cor­rup­tion. 

Yet more fun­da­mental is the war on sci­ence, a potent source of US excep­tion­al­ism. 

Last but not least is the fiscal policy enacted in the “One Big Beau­ti­ful Bill Act”. This guar­an­tees huge fiscal defi­cits into the indef­in­ite future. That, in turn, ensures huge cur­rent account defi­cits forever, since these are how the US eco­nomy bal­ances sup­ply and demand.

Above all, the trade war is not over. The 90-day pause on “lib­er­a­tion day” tar­iffs is due to come to an end. Deals have not been reached with more than a hand­ful of part­ners. This eco­nom­ic­ally destruct­ive war on US cred­it­ors and the uncer­tainty it cre­ates will con­tinue. The trade war rep­res­ents an assault on the insti­tu­tions cre­ated by the US after the second world war.

In just under six months, only an eighth of his term, Trump has made huge strides in his war on everything that made the US suThe Financial Times’ Martin Wolf has written an excellent column on the international and domestic dangers unleashed by Donald Trump’s administration. He says:

Let us start with the domestic front. We are watch­ing an assault on the rule of law. Abbe Low­ell, erstwhile defender of Jared Kush­ner and Hunter Biden, warns that Don­ald Trump is push­ing US demo­cracy to break­ing point

Elon Musk’s so-called Depart­ment of Gov­ern­ment Effi­ciency was a fraud. The goal was not effi­ciency but sub­ser­vi­ence. 

A fur­ther con­cern is legit­im­isa­tion of cor­rup­tion. 

Yet more fun­da­mental is the war on sci­ence, a potent source of US excep­tion­al­ism. 

Last but not least is the fiscal policy enacted in the “One Big Beau­ti­ful Bill Act”. This guar­an­tees huge fiscal defi­cits into the indef­in­ite future. That, in turn, ensures huge cur­rent account defi­cits forever, since these are how the US eco­nomy bal­ances sup­ply and demand.

Above all, the trade war is not over. The 90-day pause on “lib­er­a­tion day” tar­iffs is due to come to an end. Deals have not been reached with more than a hand­ful of part­ners. This eco­nom­ic­ally destruct­ive war on US cred­it­ors and the uncer­tainty it cre­ates will con­tinue. The trade war rep­res­ents an assault on the insti­tu­tions cre­ated by the US after the second world war.

In just under six months, only an eighth of his term, Trump has made huge strides in his war on everything that made the US suc­cess­ful. Only the Maga base, Vladi­mir Putin and Xi Jin­ping should feel happy. The most coher­ent part of the pro­gramme is the attempt to turn the US into an auto­cracy. Much of the rest is inco­her­ent. But, given the evid­ent suc­cess, in his own terms, of just his first six months, it would be a rash per­son who assumed that this counter-revolu­tion against all the US rep­res­ents, at home and abroad, will fail. One can hope. But Trump is doing ter­ri­fy­ingly well.c­cess­ful. Only the Maga base, Vladi­mir Putin and Xi Jin­ping should feel happy. The most coher­ent part of the pro­gramme is the attempt to turn the US into an auto­cracy. Much of the rest is inco­her­ent. But, given the evid­ent suc­cess, in his own terms, of just his first six months, it would be a rash per­son who assumed that this counter-revolu­tion against all the US rep­res­ents, at home and abroad, will fail. One can hope. But Trump is doing ter­ri­fy­ingly well.