For the past two years, Donald Trump has generated panic about the state of the United States and portrayed himself as the only guy capable of saving the country from itself. Only he could lower the cost of groceries and gasoline. Only he could mend the flawed healthcare system. Only he could fix the immigration system, which was dysfunctional. Only he can put an end to the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
The voters have sipped the Kool-Aid, so the game is up. The ruse is over, and the presidency has been secured. Will the buyers of the golden sneakers regret their purchase? For everyone save the most cult-following MAGA lemmings, I believe the answer is yes.
Despite two years of incessant finger-pointing at the Biden administration for rising supermarket prices that were reduced at the time, Trump has remained silent on the working-class cost of living issues since the election. His only statement on supermarket costs came during an interview with Time magazine for his Man of the Year article when he conceded that there is little he can do to bring grocery prices back down to 2019 levels. Economically, the only thing that will achieve this is a severe recession, which no one wants. He has spoken almost little on gasoline prices, which were already at four-year lows before the election and have continued to decline since.
What Trump has said regarding issues affecting the lower end of the socioeconomic range, which accounts for 80-90% of his support, is that he will unleash his First Buddy Elon Musk on reducing the federal government and increasing the amount of skilled foreign workers receiving HB-1 visas. There is no universe in which the level of government cuts imposed by Trump, Musk, and their junior sidekick Vivek Ramaswamy do not significantly reduce the level of benefits depended on by Trump’s constituency for daily existence. Food stamps, free school lunches, subsidies for small businesses and family farms, government support for rural hospitals, or government funding for public schools in economically distressed districts are just a few examples of how Trump’s obsession with depriving the federal government of its resources and powers to finance a fresh round of tax breaks for corporations and the ultra-wealthy will not help those who fell for his lies and fears to re-elect him.
He has adopted the new fixation of regaining the Panama Canal, purchasing Greenland, and, before announcing his departure, ensuring that Justin Trudeau’s term as Canada’s premier is as brief as possible, rather than concentrating on the lives of people he believed were causing the country to fall apart. It doesn’t matter if Jimmy Carter gave the Panama Canal back to Panama in 1977, and that the Torrijos-Carter Treaties gave Panama complete authority over the canal zone in 1999. Ignore the fact that the Danish government and the prime minister of Greenland have made it clear time and time again that Greenland is not for sale.
Ignore the fact that Trudeau had little chance of winning reelection in the next Canadian elections before Trump urged him to travel to Mar-a-Lago to curry favour following his remarks about imposing tariffs on Canadian imports and wanting Canada to become the 51st state.
According to Trump’s supporters and spokespersons who are making the rounds in the media, Trump is simply being Trump by using outrageous remarks as a starting point for negotiations to reach agreements that will benefit the United States. Even though that description is kind, it shows a terrible lack of understanding of the greater interconnectedness that underpins the global political and economic system, not to mention that it confirms Trump’s utter disregard for international norms and the legitimacy of prior US commitments.
MAGA supporters are still waiting to hear the specifics of Trump’s proposed plan for better, less expensive health care, including how he plans to lower the cost of gas to $1.50 per gallon and bring the price of a dozen eggs back to $1.99. They must not be holding their breath, I hope.
