No putz has offended more millions in more places, more quickly—with no tipping point in sight

The Trump Horror Show is the fastest growing American “export commodity” – jeopardizing hundreds of billions in lost tourist dollars, lost foreign student tuitions, and lost confidence in American trustworthiness.

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How long will right-wingers tolerate siege warfare against the economy, inflation, trade, veterans, legal residents, civil rights, courts, tourism, law firms, and university systems—before quaking in their boots?

Onslaughts of lawless, merciless, helter-skelter destruction, its speed alone exposing the unprecedented power-grab, produce its own ungovernable momentum. No surprise that mass collective protests erupt, in the streets, the media, law schools and the courts. The Trump Horror Show, already primed globally, is the fastest growing American “export commodity”—jeopardizing hundreds of billions in lost tourist dollars, lost foreign student tuition, and lost confidence in American culture, prestige and commerce. Gosh, all in barely 100 days, with an eternity looming. Except for high-priced lawyers, who directly benefits from such erratic chaos?

Economists barely tabulate the already lost trillions from humongous tariffs imposed willy-nilly. We know that numberless Canadians, Mexicans, Europeans, Asians and Greenlanders (!), thunderstruck by bizarro, shot-gun aggression, now judge America a nemesis to their nations, life-styles and prosperity. Decades of foreign military bullying already tarnish America’s brand; in record breaking time, Trump has doubled-down the global repulsion. Thanks to Trump, anti-Americanism is ripping apart absurd MAGA delusions about Yankee exceptionalism—except as the exceptional international pariah. 

Domestic outrage matches overseas repulsion, with 750 resistance street protests this weekend. Aside from MAGA sycophants, what sane adult is not recoiling in horror? Certainly that includes the dumbstruck CEOs who realize they got ambushed: Trump’s top priority was retribution, not lower taxes, fewer regulations and higher profits. Conservative farmers are aghast at tariff inflation. Old soldiers (already incurring Trump scorn) and marginal seniors are terrified at cuts to basic, life-sustaining services, whether by the VA, Medicare or Social Security. Food banks, food programs and sick Medicaid recipients are left in the lurch—lets alone myriads of D.C. professionals brutally dumped by Trump/Musk/Doge wackadoodles. 

A brew of bad faith and vengeance

An indefensible war against the idea and operation of government, mixing equal doses of bad faith and gross malfeasance, must rebound against the failed instigator who pooh-poohs public opinion reversals. Not only does bad policy make bad politics, but a badly-explained, scatter-gun rampage invites the wrath of an angry majority—which will terrify all but the most slavish MAGA enablers with career-ending elections.

No putz, at least in American history, has ever offended more multitudes than Trump in such a short time—and the fierce counteraction is just starting. Consider the magnitude of the Great Trump Tornado, blasting away at whatever MAGA perceives as the “enemy,” in total denial about devastating outcomes. MAGA cruelty refuses to hear cries of pain and suffering (even their own). On display is a death and destruction trip by a criminal president desperate to act the TV dictator as long as vengeful pugnacity works. Trump has never known what “too much” means until a clear, higher power, whether a father figure, the courts or the electorate, enforce reality on delusions of grandeur. 

Though scoffing at prison despite criminal convictions, such private acts differ from simultaneously wreaking the economic stability of America and the world. Soaring like the prideful Icarus too near the sun, what new, epic, impetuous, illegal Trump blunders will alienate both friends and foes alike? What new outrage will confirm his global prize as most unpopular, even hated politician—remarkable considering the nasty competitors in the wings? Chaos, vs. planned, creative destruction, is the ultimate double-edged sword that quickly mocks the creator’s stupidity. What Trump loves—feasting on disorder and concocting outrages, the next worst than the last—is now crushing his approval numbers to low 40’s, a good dozen points less than its post-election high. Behold more clearly than his first term the Narcissist-in-chief as insular, malignant psychopath—as if he’s the only actor in a world full of breakable toys and games.

Alienation knows no boundaries

So, not only are manic gestures impacting practically every earthing, even innocent penguins, the refusal to change course means the demolition derby goes on to the bitter end. Bombs destroy structures, not the opposite. Core to never admitting error is becoming the victimized Whiner in Chief, wherein all black eyes to his infallibility come from sabotage, thus the necessity to scapegoat (whether appointees or opponents). Only the weak forever blame failure on someone or something else. This vicious cycle must end badly: if a leader hasn’t a clue how to reform government within legal and Constitutional restraints (indeed, feasts on criminal bad faith), he will never alone dig himself out of his own self-fulfilling hole. 

Trump isn’t only not playing chess, but his fantasies (like America again the dominant, 19th C industrial/factory powerhouse) are absurd, outdated delusions. Trump wields his simple hammer and primitive saw in a world economy rationalized by labor and resource fluidity, computers and high-tech machinery that improve productivity. Huge monopoly capitalism has abandoned the Ford-style assembly line, but instead commandeers the oversight controls that define modern capitalism. How many physical products does Meta (Facebook) or Microsoft or Amazon actually manufacture? What ship-able, domestic commodities do Twitter (X) or a slew of software companies (Ebay, Paypal, Uber, Palintir, Netflix) make that fit Trump’s medieval idea of commercial value? Even Apple, however much they domesticate assembly, or Tesla, depend on foreign-made materials and parts with labor costs no Trump can change. We live in high-tech times while Trump is stuck in a Robber Baron mindset. Trump may have gotten elected thanks to disruptions from this new, electron-based economy, but his misguided non-solutions will misfire, wholly oblivious to technology, science, finance, and the global nature of supply chains, profits and control.

The cult of collusion doubles down

Further, the Trump cult refuses to learn what modernity means, dreaming of lost golden eras that never existed. When have so many dumb sycophants come up with dumb defenses of dumb, boomeranging trade policies? Or the wholesale demolition of government platforms on which majority prosperity, even survival, depends, like medical research on vaccines and pandemics? Success against modern menaces, like cancer, heart disease, diabetics, even obesity, did not come from a physical factory mentality. Without modern science, we’d all be living in 1900—an appalling, regressive, nightmare idea. 

Thus the bullshit president must dump bullshit to cover the epic contradictions. Thus his dream of being a dictator in a democracy depends on his invocation of the divine right of kings. Services and rights once established—and popular—are nearly impossible to rescind (abortion being the notable exception). Nothing Trump has done will lower grocery prices, increase employment, advance growth or corporate profits. Au Cointreau, explaining why consumer confidence in a consumer-driven economy just hit historic lows. That fact is a political killer alongside another huge no-no—the rejection of competent expertise to handle an undeniably global, complex, inter-related high-tech economy. Instead, Trump trusts equally arrogant, narrow-minded bozos who will only make predatory crony capitalism more predatory. 

Short of starting an unjustified, stupid, unwinnable war, what greater blunders are in store. A staggered Trump won’t intimidate China or Russia, Iran or North Korea, even the backward Supreme Court. Eventually, right-wing senators, fighting for their lives, will turn against a rigid, badly-educated, wannabe dictator with one bad idea after another. Though I disagree that Trump is an innocent victim, Amy Fittig does capture today’s melodrama: “Trump’s disastrous trade policies, combined with disastrous DOGE policies and disastrous anti-science, anti-expertise obsession, define a cosmic plot by nefarious insiders to humiliate his presidency.” And it will get worse before it gets better as I see no dramatic tipping point to reverse the barrage against good government, common sense, and the interests of the majority that will assert its will. 

FALL FUNDRAISER

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