Does Trump Hate America? Is He Pro-China?
post 75 – Illogical Nation 3
PEOPLE ARE STARTING TO ASK
My friend Douglass Umi, “The Octogenarian Curmudgeon” has some theories. Not everybody will agree with them, and Douglass doesn’t claim they are correct. But he has a low tolerance for bad logic which he says he sees all around and thinks is one of the pillars supporting America’s recent embrace of authoritarianism. So, he “speaks the unspeakable” – he offers what he sees as the simplest, most logical explanation for events.
HOPE
Last week in “Looking For America,” I wrote about Hope and how its foundations are being reinforced today – especially by young optimistic folk musicians. A big part of that hope comes when we transcend the fear of seeing things for how they really are and persevere anyway. I‘m not saying Douglass’ theories are right, but let’s not be afraid to listen.
Spook: I heard someone say Trump hates America. Does he?
Douglass: Most likely not.
Spook: Does he love America?
Douglass: The evidence suggests Trump doesn’t care either way.
Spook: But does he believe his policies are good for America?
Douglass: Maybe. Probably not. Logic suggests America’s welfare is not his motivation. But if we assume his motivation is wealth, power, and adulation, we can better understand and predict his so-called unpredictable decisions.
Spook: For example.
TARIFFS
Douglass: Tariffs. First, he threatens them. Stocks tank. Then he un-threatens them. Stocks rebound. Then he threatens again. Then un-threatens them again. Stocks dip and rebound again.
After a few rounds, he actually imposes them. Stock tank. Then he un-imposes them. Stocks rebound. But this time, only part way. So he further un-imposes them. Stocks still don’t bounce back all the way. So he piles on more exemptions. This is where we stand today on March 9.
His tariff policy is creating chaos in the markets. Market chaos may or may not be good for America, but it’s certainly good if you want to manipulate the market.
Spook: Ouch!
ANGER IS NOT A VIRTUE
Douglass: You’ve written extensively that “Anger is NOT a Virtue?” Over the years, people have been misled into believing that if you’re not angry, you‘re not paying attention, or you don’t care. But angry people make good pawns for Oligarchs. They give power to the tax cutters, deregulators, disestablishmentarians, and everybody else they think will “tear the system down.”
But nobody tears the system down. They love the system. They disrupt it. And they milk it to get richer and richer. Are you recording this?
Spook: Yes.
Douglass: This is Part 2 of “Anger is not a Virtue.” Put this in all bold capital letters. And give it its own line…
WHEN YOU HEAR SOMEONE EXTOL DISRUPTION – RUN!
Spook: Why’s that?
Douglass: We’ve been brainwashed into believing “disruption” is good. It’s not. Innovation is good. Solutions are good. Expertise is good. Order is good. Disruption is the chaos that comes when a system gets unsettled. Disruption comes with both good and bad decisions. But, either way, it’s painful - except for the people with the money, power, and resources to gobble up more than their fair share of the broken pieces and enhance their riches.
Are tariffs good? Who knows? I don’t mind seeing tariffs on China. But for *&^^%$ sake, why put tariffs on Canada and Mexico? Because it’s part of a drug war? Give me a break. That makes no sense. If your motivation is to stop fentanyl from coming into America, tariffs are a stupid idea.
But suppose – open your mind, now, and look at this from a purely logical perspective. Suppose the motivation is to disrupt the market. Announce tariffs. Stock crash. Buy low. Ease tariffs. Stocks rebound. Sell high. Repeat over and over and make billions of dollars. If that’s your motive, tariffs are a very smart idea.
Of course, nobody in or around the Administration would have foreknowledge of Trump’s erratic decisions so nobody could benefit personally from them.
Spook: You’re kidding, right?
Douglass: I am. Looking at this purely logically, do you believe nobody in or around the Administration has foreknowledge of Trump’s next move? Therefore, nobody’s making personal gain? C’mon, man!
TIK TOK AND CHINA
Spook: You also have a theory about Tik Tok?
Douglass: Almost every foreign policy decision makes sense IF you assume Trump is not as anti-China as he claims.
Spook: What explains that?
RUNNING AMERICA LIKE A BUSINESS
Douglass: Part of the MAGA mantra is that we should run the government like a business. Nonsense! The government should be an antidote to business. Businesses should conform to the will of the people via government oversight, not the other way around. MAGA wants to force the people to conform to business models. Musk. DOGE. Big Government Republicans telling cities, states, colleges, and corporations what they can and cannot do.
But here’s the thing. The Oligarchs running the White House didn’t get disgustingly rich by leading middle-of-the-pack companies. They come from industries dominated by 3 or 4 or 5 huge companies.
RUNNING THE WORLD LIKE A BUSINESS
The next logical step is to impose that business model on the whole world. Now you have 4 or 5 or 6 countries running the world. So you give China Taiwan and the Pacific Islands; Russia gets most, if not all of Europe; Israel gets the Middle-East (at least temporarily); and Saudi Arabia gets the “Greater Middle-East.”
Oh, and America gets Panama, Greenland, and everything in between. Canada. If we assume this is the plan, then all of a sudden, troops on the border with Mexico fighting a fake immigrant surge make sense. Tariffs against Mexico and Canada make sense.
CHINA’S CHIP MONOPOLY
Ending the “Chips” program and letting China corner the market on chip production makes sense. While China gobbles up the chip industry, America gobbles up the minerals needed to build high-tech from Ukraine and Greenland. It all makes sense.
Bailing out Tik Tok again and again, makes sense if the goal is not national security but making the biggest profit possible on it. Turning against Ukraine and threatening not to defend NATO countries makes sense.
Spook: This is a radical theory.
Douglass: It’s pure logic. Maybe right. Maybe wrong. But the simplest explanation. If Trump cared about America’s welfare, his decisions would be erratic and illogical. But if he is out for his own financial gain, power, adulation, and divvying up the world, then everything makes a lot more sense. All of a sudden Trump is not some inconsistent waffler. He’s a focused achiever with a plan.
Spook: Do you have any final words?
Douglass: Put that in our pipes and smoke it! See if it fits. Until then, what’s that you always say?
Spook: Keep the Flame Alive!
Douglass: Yeah. Keep the Flame Alive!
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Douglass makes too much sense here... it's daunting and frankly, frightening.
“This notion of a supranational deep state does not seem to be far-fetched to me, though I remain agnostic about rumors involving the [Trump administration's] Offal Office. I certainly don’t buy the alt-right notion that Trump is playing 'four-dimensional chess' against the deep state. The six-time bankruptee would probably lose at checkers to a nine-year old and tweet that he whipped Garry Kasparov.” (Geoff Olson, “A Deep State of Confusion”)
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Trump’s most faithful followers admire him as some sort of genius that resists/challenges the Deep State, etcetera. And there's “the swamp” that Trump claims he'll drain — although he himself is a part of it. Since the Trump administration kowtowed to big fossil fuel, mostly via the recklessly significant loosening of environmental protections, he, far from genuinely trying to “drain the swamp”, actually wallowed in it.
A revelatory review (by Geoff Olson, 01/10/2018) of the book The American Deep State: Wall Street, Big Oil and the Attack on U.S. Democracy notes that the book's author describes big oil CEOs and lobbyists in the U.S. as being a notably large part of the American Deep State. Therefore, it would be a large part of the national Capitol’s swamp that Trump claims has corrupted D.C. and, ergo, was supposedly seeking to destroy him and his presidency.
If Trump does end up boding well for the world, it will have been accidental. How could it not be?