Trump's Surrender of American Power and Influence

Donald Trump - like perhaps a majority of his supporters in my opinion - is basically a know nothing.  He doesn't read, gets his "news" primarily from Kook-Aid serving Fox News, dislikes briefing reports if they are more than a single page, and in general appears to have little interest in doing the work required to be president.   Combine this with his inward looking "America First" narrative that belittles other nations and is blind to the importance of foreign trade in projection American power and it is a recipe for disaster.  A column in the Washington Post by an economist equates Trump's policies to date as a huge surrender of American power and influence across the globe.  Here are column highlights:

President Trump’s foreign policy, such as it is, rests on a massive and apparently indestructible contradiction. Trump wants the United States to remain the “essential” nation, the best embodiment of Western ideals of freedom and democracy, while at the same time deliberately alienating many of our traditional allies, whose support the United States desperately needs. American leadership becomes difficult, if not impossible.

It is hard to straddle this contradiction, because it reflects a basic misunderstanding of the American “greatness” that Trump so avidly pursues. To Trump, this greatness is mainly measured in economic terms: the number of added jobs; the trajectory of wages; the rate of economic growth. It is a nostalgic and unrealistic yearning for the economic dominance the United States enjoyed in the 1950s and 1960s.

The truth is that American greatness then and later was never about dollars and cents alone. Prosperity was a means to an end, not an end in itself. The greater objective was to promote democracy and mixed economies, with power divided between the market and government. To advance this vision, the United States advocated open trade and provided a military umbrella. The latter created a geopolitical shield against instability.

Trump sees the costs of these programs as showing that past U.S. leaders were willing to sacrifice the interests of ordinary Americans to meaningless global cooperation. . . .  these complaints, they were (and are) fundamentally misleading. The notion that Americans simply abandoned their own interests for Japan’s, Germany’s or South Korea’s — to select a few obvious countries — is counterfactual. . . . Our economic and political interests were served by a prosperous and increasingly democratic global system.

As “grand strategy,” the post-World War II American conception of the world order largely succeeded. The global economy grew richer. A wealthier Europe established stable democracies. The Soviet Union collapsed. America benefited from all of this.

But as Trump has surely discovered, running an outward-looking, internationalist foreign policy is hard when your domestic policy is nationalist and inward-looking. Abroad, the balancing act has backfired. . . . A recent Pew Research Center poll of 40,448 respondents in 37 countries finds a big drop in favorable views of the United States. 

As a result, it’s harder for Trump to lead internationally. Foreign leaders can more easily oppose him without suffering adverse domestic political consequences. He has made it even harder by antagonizing other countries by withdrawing from the Paris agreement on climate change. There was no need; all the pact’s goals are voluntary.
He quit the Trans- Pacific Partnership — a trade agreement with 11 other Pacific Rim nations; many economists consider this a blunder, because Asian economies are among the fastest-growing. And last week, Europe and Japan announced they’re negotiating a trade agreement that covers 40 percent of world trade and excludes the United States. Being outside these agreements would weaken U.S. exports. Further, the European Union warns it might retaliate against the United States if Trump restricts Europe’s steel exports.

What we’re witnessing is extraordinary: a voluntary surrender of power and influence. . . .  history suggests that trade and geopolitics go hand in hand. To deal with North Korea, Trump needs allies to make economic sanctions tougher or to support military action. He has precious few because he has been so careless in abdicating responsibility for the global trading system.

Putting an ignorant narcissist in the White House will likely cost America dearly.  Bigots and white supremacists may feel empowered and free to swagger, but the country as a whole will be the loser. 

Trump's Dangerous Economic Nationalsm

For Donald Trump and his most loyal followers, real objective facts do not matter.  Rather, for Trump, when not satiating his own ego, "facts" are whatever he needs to support his demagoguery. For his followers, "facts" are whatever allows them to blame others for their bad decisions - e.g., dropping out of high school or not pursing a college degree - and misfortunes.  The problem is, however, that objective reality and true facts  do not change to fit the needs of a demagogue or those who live detached from reality.  Nowhere is this more true than in economic and foreign trade policies.  Trump readily blames foreign trade and/or trade agreements for the decline of American jobs, but the true cause overall is something far different: automation and technological advances.  Plants that once needed thousand of workers can now operate - often at higher outputs - with a fraction of the number of workers. A column by an economist in the Washington Post looks at the dangerous falsehoods in Trump's economic nationalism.  Here are excerpts:

For starters, it vastly exaggerates the role of trade in destroying U.S. jobs. Of course, many American factories have shut, and their production has moved abroad (Mexico, China) or been replaced by the imports from foreign competitors. But these losses don’t explain the steep declines in manufacturing jobs, which dropped a third since 1990 (from almost 18 million to 12 million in 2015), even though factory output — of planes, earth-moving equipment, pharmaceuticals, computer chips — nearly doubled over the same years. Automation is the main cause. 

The often-overlooked truth is that the U.S. economy, despite much rhetoric to the contrary, is less globalized than virtually all other advanced countries. We produce most of what we consume. True, we imported nearly $2.8 trillion of goods and services last year, but we also exported almost $2.3 trillion. As a share of the $18 trillion economy, the deficit was less than 3 percent and about half its 2006 level. 

The danger of economic nationalism is that it deludes us into thinking that our problems mainly originate abroad and can be fixed by “tougher” trade policies. Not so. It’s worth recalling that the two largest economic setbacks since World War II were both domestic in origin: the high inflation of the late ‘70s, peaking at more than 13 percent (caused by easy money); and the 2008-2009 financial crisis (caused by reckless financial speculation). 

Although the United States should pursue its economic interests, it’s doubtful that trade concessions will cure chronic trade deficits. These mainly reflect the dollar’s role as the major international money for trade and international investment. Demand for dollars by foreigners raises the currency’s value, putting U.S. producers at a competitive disadvantage in global markets. This is unfair to American factories and farms, but the alternative — ruining the dollar through high inflation or exchange controls — would be worse.

Trade remains foreign policy. It’s true that today’s circumstances are very different from those after World War II. But the basic reality endures: Who we trade with and how are expressions of national purpose and power. Trump is wrong to reject the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would encourage trade between the United States and other Pacific-rim countries, creating an alternative to a China-dominated system. 

Trump’s economic nationalism . . . . Down that path lie protectionism, isolationism, more trade conflicts and threatened economic growth. It would redefine America’s relationship with the world. 

The Trump and Pence Shit Show

Having staked his campaign on rally angry whites who are terrified of losing their white privilege and/or the ability to inflict their right wing religious beliefs on all Americans, Donald Trump has cynically picked Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate.  Other than experience in Congress where he voted for some things Trump claims to oppose, the only real value Pence brings is the fact that he is a white Christofascist's dream candidate given his stand on abortion which he would outlaw in all cases and his animus towards the LGBT community.   The New York Times looks at Pence's selection in a main editorial.  Here are excerpts:

The suspicions that Mr. Trump stirs among evangelicals made Mr. Pence, who was one of the most socially conservative members of the House in his six terms there, the most strategic pick among the uninspiring politicians on Mr. Trump’s shortlist. He is a better bet than the thrice-married, ethically compromised Newt Gingrich, or the unpopular, politically damaged Chris Christie. Unassuming and affable — until his Twitter account exploded with Hillary Clinton attacks this week — Mr. Pence knows how Washington works. And unlike the talkative and bewildering Sarah Palin, who never made it to the shortlist or to the convention speaker lineup, he won’t hog the spotlight or embarrass the boss.

Above all, Mr. Trump’s choice of Mr. Pence is a gesture to Republicans whose money he needs to win, and a move to pacify any conservatives who were scheming to derail his nomination at the convention until they were thwarted by party officials this week. But having the Indiana governor on the ticket does little to convince a struggling middle class that Mr. Trump aims to force the party into its corner.

Mr. Trump does not offer any real policies for creating jobs, and he has been faulted for his treatment of his own employees, but he does at least talk about the pain people are feeling. That’s more than can be said for Mr. Pence. Take the Carrier heating equipment factory in Mr. Pence’s own state. When it announced this year that it would move to Mexico and cut 1,400 Indiana jobs, Mr. Trump predicted that if he were president, Carrier would call “within 24 hours,” to say, “‘Sir, we’ve decided to stay in the United States.’”

What was Mr. Pence doing while workers in his state were worrying about their futures? He and the State Legislature were busy waging battle against same-sex marriage and passing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, seen as a means for businesses to deny services to same-sex couples. The law was amended within days, after a national uproar and a corporate boycott that tourism officials estimated cost Indiana’s economy at least $60 million in lost convention business.

While in Congress, Mr. Pence endorsed the Trans-Pacific Partnership and other trade pacts that Mr. Trump rails about. He voted for the Iraq war, which Mr. Trump says he opposed. A staunch anti-abortion conservative, in 2011 Mr. Pence led House Republicans’ efforts to defund Planned Parenthood, which helped convince many Americans that Congress would rather engage in partisan brinkmanship than work on solving the country’s problems.

A poll last week found that only 12 percent of voters said Mr. Pence’s name on the ticket would make them more likely to cast a ballot for Mr. Trump. Among Republican voters 22 percent said it would.

For Mr. Pence’s audition in Indianapolis this week, he made a speech introducing Mr. Trump as a man who has “never forgotten or forsaken the people who work with their hands.” That’s surprising, since Mr. Trump’s record of forsaking working people is rather long. With Mr. Pence on the ticket, it gets only longer.

As for the Trump/Pence logo, some are having a field day about it standing for toilet paper and insinuated other hysterical things about the insertion of the "T" into the "P."  

Things Hillary Must Cannot Do If She Wants to Win In November

As I watch Donald Trumps surge and Republicans who I once believed had some minimal level of sanity and decency swear fealty, I wonder if this is how thinking, moral Germans felt in the late 1920's and early 1930's as Hitler rose to power.  Did they too wonder how their countrymen - and neighbors - became so fueled by hate and resentment that they were willing to put a narcissistic egomaniac who had no background to lead the nation into office? I continue to believe that we are living in a very dangerous time and that America could become an unrecognizable horror story if Trump and his forces are not stopped.  That said, a piece in Politico looks at four things that Hillary Clinton needs to avoid doing if she is going to defeat Trump in November.  Here are article excerpts:

If Clinton pushes away some of her potential supporters; fails to energize others to vote; and fires up Trump’s base by pandering to her own—well, she just might be able to make the numbers work out for him. If he does pull off the election of the century, Trump’s path to 270 Electoral College votes will begin with 164 practically in the bank, from 21 solid-red states generally considered sure things for the Republican nominee. And here’s how Clinton could push more than enough additional states onto Trump’s side of the ledger—Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Iowa, Virginia, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan—one mistake at a time.

Step 1: Take Hispanic enthusiasm for granted

It’s been a matter of faith in Democratic circles: Trump’s grotesque demonization of Latin-American immigrants will boost Hispanic turnout and Clinton’s share of their vote. As a result, you’re already hearing a lot less about Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, once the odds-on favorite to become Clinton’s vice presidential running mate. Castro was supposed to be part of a big Democratic push for Hispanic votes this year. Now, the thinking seems to be, those votes will take care of themselves.

A new Fox Latino poll shows Clinton leading Trump by an impressive-sounding 39 points: 62 to 23. But there’s a problem: That 39-point spread is actually less than the 44 by which Barack Obama beat Mitt Romney in 2012.

Yes, their numbers are growing. But Hispanics simply don’t like Clinton nearly as much as they like Obama: Her favorable/unfavorable is a net +15 in that Fox Latino poll, while Obama’s is +46. Colorado, where the fast-growing Hispanic population gave 75 percent of its vote to Obama in 2008, is a similar story to Florida. So is Nevada, where all of the major analysts still rate the Senate race between Republican Joe Heck and Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto a tossup—suggesting that they aren’t yet foreseeing a torrent of Democratic-voting Hispanics rush the polls in November.

Oh, and did we mention that Hispanic voters are disproportionately young—a staggering 44 percent of eligible Hispanic voters this year are millennials, compared with 27 percent of non-Hispanic whites, according to Pew—and that Sanders has been pulling large numbers of them away from Clinton, just as much as others their age.

Step 2: Alienate the young

Millennials, being both more numerous and less cynical than their Generation X predecessors, once seemed likely to usher in a substantial advantage for Democrats among young voters. Except then they stopped turning out. In 2012, the number of 18-to-29-year-old voters dropped by 1.8 million from the previous presidential election year. “It seems likely that the observed young-adult voting surge of 2004–2008 was temporary,” a U.S. Census study concluded, “and not representative of a permanent shift towards greater young-adult engagement in presidential elections.”

In 2016, this is likely to affect Clinton’s performance in several college-heavy states that have had relatively high turnout—and high Democratic voting rates—among those age groups. That includes swing states such as Iowa, North Carolina, New Hampshire and Virginia.

To see how much young-voter turnout matters, look at North Carolina. In 2008, Obama had a net advantage there among 18-to-29-year-olds of 368,000 votes—and eked out a 14,000-vote victory overall. In 2012, with dampened enthusiasm, Obama’s advantage in that age group dropped by 120,000, and Romney coasted to a 92,000-vote win. What’s more, those young voters are especially likely to be swayed to third-party alternatives, which—see below—could become more enticing this time around.

Step 3: Let establishment Republicans find another place to go

The key to a Clinton landslide is turning red voters blue. And once it became clear that conservatives didn’t have the guts to put forward a #NeverTrump protest candidate, “Republicans for Hillary” was beginning to have a bit of a ring to it. But there’s another possibility: A plausible moderate-right candidate could emerge as a genuine alternative. 

Take, for example, former Massachusetts Republican Governor Bill Weld, whose history with Clinton goes back decades. Weld is exactly the type of GOP moderate Clinton has reportedly been wooing as Trump edged closer to the nomination. He endorsed Obama in 2008. He compares Trump’s rhetoric to Nazism. And there are plenty of Republicans like him this year, particularly in the Northeast. Not too many years ago, you could imagine considerable appeal for Clinton among Weld-ian Republicans. But thanks to her primary run, a combination of issues—Sanders pushing her left on economic issues, her unsatisfactory answers on the email scandal—has made that a tougher sell.

Step 4: Fumble on trade

As soon as the votes were tallied in 2012, Richard Trumka of the AFL-CIO and Mary Kay Henry of SEIU were claiming unions had delivered Obama’s victory. They argued, with justification, that Ohio, Wisconsin and Nevada got into the blue column because of a massive turnout effort from labor. But earlier this year, both Trumka and Henry expressed concerns that Trump could flip that script.

“Our members are responding to Trump’s message,” Henry said in one interview. “Donald Trump is tapping into the very real and very understandable anger of working people,” Trumka said in a speech.

It’s not just that these workers are drawn to the raw emotion of Trump’s “you’ve been screwed” rhetoric. Polls show that union households tend to oppose free trade quite strongly. Sanders has made free trade a centerpiece of his primary campaign against Clinton. Trump, hoping to woo Sanders voters, frequently praises his position on that issue.

Union voters largely agree with Trump that trade deals—including those negotiated by Democratic Presidents Obama and Bill Clinton—have taken their jobs away. Hillary Clinton has yet to counter this attack in any meaningful way. Her history on trade has been careful and political, which has left her struggling to articulate a strong argument against Sanders, let alone Trump. The Final Tally

It’s not hard to see how quickly this could start costing her Electoral College votes in the Rust Belt, where Trump hopes to improve on past Republican performance. (And where, you may remember, Clinton had to apologize for threatening to put coal companies out of business.) In Ohio, for example, 22 percent of 2012 voters came from union households, and 60 percent of them voted for Obama. In Wisconsin, a similar share of the electorate voted 2-to-1 for Obama over Romney. In 2016, both states went for Sanders over Clinton in their primaries. In Pennsylvania, where Trump is planning a major effort, union households provided Obama more than half his net margin.

For what it’s worth, it’s also possible Clinton wins in a landslide, as an increasingly unstable Trump shrinks deeper and deeper into racism, xenophobia and conspiracy theories. But what’s clear is that Democrats can no longer count on a lopsided race that even a problematic candidate running a clumsy campaign can’t lose.

Again: It’s a long way to November, and Trump could always self-destruct. But he probably won’t, and 2016 is shaping up as a contest that a careful Clinton campaign can easily lose, state by state, even as she piles up the popular vote in California and other sure-win places. Demographics are not destiny. In fact, they can be a disaster waiting to happen.