Trump's chickens come home to roost

Trump struggles to see very far, especially when it comes to policy (Source: here)

You have to search long and hard to find a political leader, who is more short-sighted than US President Donald J. Trump. Most of his policies are so myopic that many of them are already backfiring spectacularly.

Trump believes in bullying his way to victory, so his policies tend to be launched with great fanfare and considerable menace. Rarely, however, has he thought about their long-term consequences. His myopia is now starting to catch up with him. His policy chickens are coming home to roost.

In this blog I will provide insightful examples of Trump's myopic policies and illustrate why they are so damaging for Trump, the United States, and, in some cases, even the world. Trump's abuses of office strengthen the case for reform of Western democratic institutions.

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Trump's paedophilia, his abuse of women, the treasonous attempts to overturn democracy, and his eye-watering corruption place him right at the top of the list of America's worst-ever presidents. While in office, Trump has consistently undermined key institutions, such as freedom of the press, rule of law, and human rights. The damage he has inflicted on the fabric of American society is so extensive that the country will require emergency care when he leaves office; Trump's corruption has exposed too many loopholes in the US Constitution to trust American democracy to be safe.

In this blog I will focus on one of Trump's most damaging character traits, namely his severe political short-sightedness. Trump’s myopia is only now beginning to receive the attention it deserves among media outlets, political analysts, and voters. It compels him to prioritize immediate and highly visible stunts, whose primary objective is to glorify himself. Due to Trump's singular focus on his own needs, he neglects America's national interest. His policies are like a firework, whose initial impact may be startling, but which soon dissipates and leaves nothing behind. Meanwhile, as time passes Trump's failure to defend America's national interest starts to cause real damage.

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Let me start by illustrating Trumpian political myopia with reference to a couple of banal stories, which hit the headlines over the past few weeks, namely Trump's order to paint the Lincoln Reflection Pond and his demand that his name be put above that of J. F. Kennedy on the wall of the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.

Both are typical Trumpian vanity projects - and both just blew up in his face.

Trump spent USD 14.7m to paint the bottom and sides of the reflection pond 'American Flag' blue. He claimed the new paint would last a century. However, less than a fortnight later the paint is coming off in large peels and algae has turned the pond as murky green as it was before.

(Source: here)

Why did this happen? Because Trump hired a friend rather than a professional painter to do the job. His friend apparently did not know how to paint pools and he certainly had no idea how to prevent the paint from peeling. The USD 14.7m of tax payers' money spent on the paint job has been a complete waste.

As for the Kennedy Center, Trump’s name was removed just a few weeks after it was put there, although the wall remains covered in tarpaulin, so no one actually knows what the wall looks like right now. Trump was too arrogant and too ignorant to check if it was within his powers to decide what goes on the Kennedy Center wall.

The two episodes demonstrate why Trump's political myopia is damaging. When Trump takes decisions solely to generate instant self-gratification without regard to the longer-term consequences, technical issues, or economic constraints, or, indeed the law, then he is gambling with public money, which more often than not ends up being wasted.

Trump's myopia makes him look ridiculous, but sadly it often has far worse consequences too. Let us illustrate this with a few other examples, where the costs have been considerably higher.

Trump's war on Iran: Trump went to war with Iran amidst a cacophony of media excitement. He bragged that only he had the guts to do what no other president since 1979 had dared to do. He claimed that he would defeat Iran in a matter of days. His alliance with Israel, he boasted, would seal US-Israeli hegemony in the Middle East for decades to come.

Yet, here we are some forty days later and Trump has just had to sign an extremely humiliating Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in order to end the war. And at Versailles of all places!

The Iran war has been a disaster. Not only did Trump fail to bring Iran to heel he also had to make major financial and sanctions-related concessions to Iran. The Strait of Hormuz has effectively been surrendered to Iranian control and Trump has achieved absolutely nothing as far as the nuclear issue is concerned.

Trump's war with Iran will cost the Republicans the upcoming midterm election and put Trump on track for impeachment. The US has lost the trust of its erstwhile loyal allies in the Middle East many of which now (prudently) diversify their international alliances to include China and Russia.

The big winner of the war is Iran, which has emerged a local hegemon with which Iran’s Arab neighbours have no choice but to engage in order to guarantee their security. Tragically, the repressive regime in Teheran has been strengthened by the conflict.

Trump's defeat at the hands of the Iranians is as damaging to America's reputation as the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, but in terms of geopolitical significance it is far, far worse. Posterity will remember Trump's Iran war as one of the greatest and most embarrassing failures in US military history.

Incidentally, as I type these words there are signs that the MOU itself is falling apart, which would be entirely in character. Another example of Trumpian myopia.

Trump's threat to invade Greenland: To Trump and his buddies, the plan to annex Greenland must have seemed like a total no-brainer. After all, how would the tiny Danish army possibly pose a challenge to the mighty US military in a territory as large as Greenland?

Trump therefore decided to rely on the threat of force and ignore any possible diplomatic complications when he announced his Greenland plan. To sweeten his offer a bit, he arrogantly primised every Greenlander some money and pledged to send a hospital ship to Greenland in the belief this would split Danes and Greenlanders over the issue.

Everyone now knows that Trump's assessment of the Greenland situation was completely wrong.

Having failed to do his homework, within a few weeks of announcing his plan to 'take' Greenland he was forced into a humiliating climbdown at the Davos Summit (see here).

It turned out that Europe was ready to stand united with Denmark. Several European nations even pledged to put boots on the ground to deter a US invasion. Like all bullies, Trump shrank when he was challenged. The prospect of American soldiers fighting NATO allies in Greenland was too much for him.

Trump could easily have avoided the humiliation if only he had examined recent European history. True, Europe is often divided, but Europe also has a strong track record of pulling together, when things get really hairy. We last saw this during the 2011-2012 European Debt Crisis, when Mario Draghi's "ECB will do whatever it takes" moment came to symbolise Europe's collective willingness to act decisively in the face of existential threats.

Trump's misguided Greenland adventure has had significant costs for the world, for the US, and for Trump himself. The rift in NATO has strengthened Russia, who is now regarded by many Europeans as an actual ally of the United States. The US has been weakened by replacing its strongest, most reliable, and longest-standing allies with a fascist war-mongering commodity tyrant like Putin, who, I am sure, will turn his back on the US at the drop of a hat.

If there is any poetic justice, it is this: Trump himself has also caught major flak over Greenland as he now finds himself holding the Iran baby all by himself, because after Greenland no European nation wanted any part in his Iran war. Actions have consequences.

Trade Wars: Trump hoodwinked his way to the presidency by convincing the American public that tariffs are paid by foreign countries. Trump's promise made many American voters felt warm and fuzzy at the prospect of a little trade war or two. Unfortunately, the warm fuzzy feeling proved temporary, a bit like peeing in your pants to keep warm. The pleasure does not last long and soon you regret that you did it in the first place.

Protectionism has been catastrophic for US agriculture and large sections of US industry. Tariffs pushed up the US inflation rate, forced the Fed to raise rates, and strengthened the Dollar, which widened the US trade deficit even further. Needless to say, Trump's approval rating collapsed.

Yet, all this was avoidable. Trump could have consulted with the best economic advisors, but chose instead to follow the snake-oil prescriptions of a charlatans like Peter Navarro. Good economists would have told him that tariffs are paid by importers, not exporters. They would have told him that the large US trade deficit means that tariffs will hurt almost all Americans. He would also have been told that China will ends up with large trade surpluses regardless of tariffs, because Chinese exports find their way into America's over-stimulated markets via third countries.

Trump deliberately did not take good advice on trade, because he wanted tariffs to pay for tax cuts for the rich. His arrogance and short-sightedness led him to believe that the American public would never understand what he was doing. But they did eventually understand and now even the most economically illiterate American knows that tariffs are bad news.

Dodgy DOGE: Do you remember when Trump triumphantly launched Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to cut USD 2.0 trillion in Federal spending? Well, the cuts never materialised and DOGE turned out to be yet another a poorly thought-out and costly concept.

One of DOGE's first interventions was to lay off large numbers of staff at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). This cull so undermined IRS's ability to collect taxes that the government suffered a major shortfall in revenue. Musk also tore up thousands of government contracts without understanding that unilaterally breaking contracts triggers costly compensation claims. When the dust finally settled, DOGE had increased rather than reduced the Federal deficit.

But DOGE's activities had even more serious ramifications beyond the government budget. More than 770,000 American children were deprived of critical emergency food aid, when Trump cut USD 187 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The closure of USAID and its long-standing public health, HIV, and vaccination programmes in poor countries cost at least 793,900 people their lives most of whom were children. Nor is the killing over; Lancet, a well-reputed medical journal, predicts that another 14 million deaths of all ages could occur by 2030, including more than 4 million children younger than age 5 years.

There are hundreds of similar stories and they will keep coming. Just this week, it emerged that the US government will have to fork out more than USD 1 billion to bring a screwworm outbreak under control, because DOGE had closed the government's screwworm monitoring programme in order to save a measly USD 15m.

Energy and environment: From the onset, the Trump Administration was clear about its intention to double down on fossil fuels and cut back on renewable energy. Trump went on to shut down several high-profile renewable energy schemes, including a number of off-shore wind farms.

It is obviously moronic to shut down renewable energy projects in the middle of a fossil-fuel induced climate crisis. What is even more idiotic is to do it without checking first whether the projects in question have a right to compensation. This was not done. Reuters reported this week that the Trump Administration has to pay hundreds of millions of Dollars to scrap already-entered-into leases on off-shore wind farms.

What takes the biscuit, however, is that Trump pivoted from renewable energy to fossil fuels just as he went to war with Iran. Oil prices soon hit pain territory. Other countries saw the writing on the wall and invested heavily in renewable energy. As a result, the United States is now falling far behind its main competitors in sustainable energy technology, including solar and batteries to which America will ultimately have to return as the climate crisis worsens.

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And then there is all the rest: I could write at length about Trump's Big Beautiful Bill, which, cut taxes for people with more money than they can spend in multiple life times without the slightest consideration of the long-term consequences of rising inequality and rising public debt.

I could elaborate on Trump's funding cuts for US universities and scientific institutions, which now pose a serious threat to America's erstwhile status as the world's leading R&D hub.

I could also explain why Trump's deliberate effort not to regulate monopolies is killing small business dynamism, reducing the welfare of American consumers, and may yet trigger a financial crash.

And I could explain how Trump's interference in the business of the Federal Reserve reduces trust in the US as a destination for investment and how his politicisation of the US Supreme Court is turning the United States into a banana republic. I could remind you how Trump's destruction of the operational independence of the Department of Justice has already contributed significantly to the Trump Administration's rampant corruption.

And so on and so forth.

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Where do Trump's many policy failures place him in the hierarchy of American political crooks? Before I answer this question, I should recognise - in fairness to Trump - that Western democratic leaders rarely deliver meaningful improvements during their time in office. As a general rule, the best you can hope for is that don't screw up too much while they are in power.

Take the example of President Barack Obama. Unlike Trump, Obama was not corrupt and he believed in strengthening rather than undermining institutions. Still, Obama only managed to rack up two meaningful achievements during his eight years in the White House, namely killing Osama Bin-Laden and passing a deeply flawed healthcare reform ('Obama Care').

Nor is Trump the only US president to have been myopic, wasteful, and corrupt. Harding's Secretary of the Interior, Albert B. Fall, took bribes from private oil companies, while his Veterans Bureau chief, Charles R. Forbes, embezzled millions. Nixon wiretapped the Democratic National Committee headquarters and ordered FBI, CIA, and IRS to cover up the crime. Grant turned a blind eye to distillers and federal agents, who colluded to defraud the US government of millions in liquor tax revenues. Buchanan's administration was condemned for widespread bribery and corruption. The Reagan administration sold weapons illegally to Iran in order to covertly fund anti-communist rebels in Nicaragua.

Still, even these quite serious crimes look like misdemeanours in comparison to the felonies being committed by Trump. Trump is, in my humble opinion, the most corrupt, criminal, morally compromised, and wasteful president America has ever had.

In his first term alone, Trump carried out more than USD 1.6bn worth of business with clear conflicts of interest and became the first US president to be criminally indicted and convicted on felony charges.

In his second term, Trump has taken cronyism to never-before-seen levels. Protected by a Supreme Court ruling from 2024, which says that he cannot be prosecuted for crimes committed in office Trump is now stealing ad nauseum. 

Juicy government contracts and favourable regulatory rulings are being dished out to anyone willing to line the pockets of the president and his family.

US tax payers are being forced to pay upwards of USD 1 billion to refurbish a presidential jet, which Trump has arranged will be his own free of charge after he leaves office.

Trump has also blackmailed the IRS into paying him a settlement of USD 1.8 billion in tax payers money after threatening the IRS with a USD 10bn lawsuit for allegedly leaking information about his tax affairs. Speaking of taxes, Trump recently appointed his close friend, Todd Blanche, to the post of Attorney General. Blanche immediately waived all Trump's pending tax liabilities and forbade future investigations of his tax affairs not just by the IRS but by any “other agencies or departments” as well. Blanche has, in effect, granted Trump a licence to commit unlimited tax fraud.

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Thankfully, Trump will be gone a few years from now, but not so the flaws in the American institutional framework exposed by Trump's corruption. Trump has demonstrated that US democracy (and Western democracies in general) grant far too much leeway to elected officials to lie, steal, and abuse power.

Election promises are far too easily broken and the powers voters have to put crosses on ballot papers every few years are simply not sufficient to prevent politicians from committing massive breaches of trust, crimes, and other moral failures.

For too long, we have accepted such problems as unavoidable cost of democracy. The need for compromise, they say, means that politicians can never deliver in full what they promise.

I do not buy this excuse. We should not settle for a political system, which delivers political corruption, inefficiency, and abuse of power on the scale we see in the United States today.

The real reason why politicians lie and steal and abuse power is that they can. Political reform in Western democracies is clearly overdue. The rules of Western democracy have barely changed since they were first introduced in the Netherlands in the late 1500s. The enormous wiggle room we still afford to our politicians - and which they exploit to the hilt - is a legacy of Feudalism, when no one dared to demand better of those in power.

We no longer live in feudal times. It is within our power with a few, powerful reforms to transform Western democracies into much more effective institutions, which actually deliver what our politicians promise. The single most important reform we can undertake to make this happen is to make election commitments legally binding, with big fines or prison sentences for politicians, who fail to deliver and banker-sized bonuses for politicians, who do what they promise. To read more about my proposals for political reform see here and here.

The End