Donald Trump and the Erosion of American Greatness from Spiegaal

["Dave Farber" <farber () gmail com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
> Date: November 7, 2017 at 2:45:08 PM EST
> To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
> Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Donald Trump and the Erosion of American Greatness
> Reply-To: dewayne-net () warpspeed com
>
> [Note:  This item comes from friend Shannon McElyea.  DLH]
>
> Donald Trump and the Erosion of American Greatness
> Some say Donald Trump's presidency does not present an existential threat to the American Republic. But after a year 
> of MAGA, it has become clear that a disaster is unfolding whose consequences for humanity and decency will be 
> substantial.
> By Roger Cohen
> Nov 6 2017
> <http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/roger-cohen-on-trump-and-the-erosion-of-american-greatness-a-1176642.html>
>
> Ten months into the Trump presidency, the world has not gone over a cliff. Nuclear brinkmanship with North Korea has 
> not produced Armageddon. That this must be considered an achievement is testimony to how alarming Donald Trump's 
> erratic belligerence has been. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany has concluded that Europeans must now take "our 
> destiny into our own hands." Dismay is widespread. The post-war order, stripped of its American point of reference, 
> is frayed to the breaking point.
>
> This is no surprise. Trump's election, like Britain's perverse flight from the European Union, reflected a 
> blow-up-the-system mood. The tens of millions of Americans who elected Trump had few illusions about his irascibility 
> but were ready to roll the dice in the name of disruption at any cost.
>
> The president, who continues to act principally as the rabble-rousing leader of a mass movement, is the ultimate 
> provocateur. He jolts the facile assumptions of a globalized liberal elite. Rising inequality and rampant impunity 
> for the powerful certainly demanded such a jolt. But the question remains: How dangerous is Trump to the world and 
> the American Republic?
>
> One school of thought argues: Not very. For all the presidential mouthing and angry ALL-CAPS dawn tweeting, there's 
> no sign of the wall on the Mexican border; and NATO is no longer "obsolete" (at least some days of the week); and the 
> "One China" policy has not been scrapped; and the Iran nuclear agreement endures for now, despite Trump's outrageous 
> refusal to recertify it; and the United States embassy is still in Tel Aviv; and the North American Free Trade 
> Agreement hangs on. Even Trump's decision to quit the Paris climate accord has not yet been made effective.
>
> So perhaps Defense Secretary James Mattis and H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, have ring-fenced Trump's 
> recklessness. Perhaps they have neutralized his ahistorical ignorance. Trump's "America First" may be a slogan of 
> impeccable fascist pedigree, but it will not upend the world.
>
> I wish I could believe this, but I am dubious. A disaster is unfolding whose consequences for humanity and decency 
> will be substantial. America's word, which has constituted the undergirding of global security for more than seven 
> decades, is a fast-devaluing currency. Trump is likely to become more capricious in the coming months. The 
> investigation by Robert Mueller into possible collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump presidential campaign has 
> already led to the indictment of the president's campaign manager, Paul Manafort. War was ever a great distraction 
> from domestic difficulty.
>
> Stepping into the Void
>
> Already, Russian president Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping of China are stepping into the void. This is inevitable. The 
> message from the Trump White House is one of withdrawal - from global responsibility above all, be it for the 
> environment, European stability or the fate of the Middle East. 
>
> If the Iran nuclear deal is working but Trump chooses to trash it because the Islamic Republic did not become a 
> benign power overnight - the deal was about centrifuges not Iranian support for Bashar al-Assad's butchery in Syria - 
> then why on earth should any other nation conclude a treaty with bait-and-switch America?
>
> The most terrifying thing to me about the insults hurled in recent weeks between Trump and the North Korean leader, 
> Kim Jong-Un, was that it was impossible to distinguish between them. The American president had descended to the 
> level of a tantrum-prone totalitarian despot.
>
> [snip]
>
> Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/
> Twitter: https://twitter.com/wa8dzp



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