That was not an Onion headline—just a reflection of what appears to have actually happened this week as Donald Trump took a sledgehammer to the central pillar of his campaign in both economic and foreign policy: isolationism. The one HUGE asterisk here is his devotion to scapegoating immigrants, especially Mexicans and Muslims, for every ill that exists in our country. That working thesis seems to remain strong as Trump’s administration rushes to staff up on border security and unleash the most virulently anti-immigrant policies in recent memory on a defenseless minority.
With that giant caveat, the New York Times brings us a taste of just how lightning quick a consummate connoisseur of ignorance can abandon the ideals he never had in the face of realities he never imagined.
He discovered that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia may not be the “best friend” he imagined and that staying out of the civil war in Syria was harder than he assumed. He acknowledged that 10 minutes of listening to China’s president made him realize he did not fully understand the complexity of North Korea. He dropped his opposition to the Export-Import Bank after learning more about it. And he said he no longer thought NATO was “obsolete.” [...]
He has not appointed a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton, ripped up or renegotiated the nuclear agreement with Iran, reversed Mr. Obama’s Cuba policy or terminated his predecessor’s program permitting younger unauthorized immigrants to stay.
That's really just the tip of the iceberg. Turns out there won't be “terrific” health care "for all," we're not bringing back torture (yet), NAFTA isn't nearly as bad as Trump thought, and China's not a currency manipulator.
In fact, this WSJ article recounting Trump's meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping really captures the essence of what a rube our ‘Who knew it could be so complicated?’ pr*sident is:
Mr. Trump said he told his Chinese counterpart he believed Beijing could easily take care of the North Korea threat. Mr. Xi then explained the history of China and Korea, Mr. Trump said.
“After listening for 10 minutes, I realized it’s not so easy,” Mr. Trump recounted. “I felt pretty strongly that they had a tremendous power” over North Korea,” he said. “But it’s not what you would think.”
Who knew on health care? Who knew on Syria? Who knew on North Korea? Who knew on taxes?
So much of this is new to Mr. Trump that only after he publicly accused Mr. Obama of having wiretapped his telephones last year did he ask aides how the system of obtaining eavesdropping warrants from a special foreign intelligence court worked.
Warrants? Who’s ever heard of that? And for that matter, who could have guessed there was trouble on the horizon for Trump & Co.?
He arrived at the White House surrounded by advisers who, like him, were neophytes to governing. His White House chief of staff, chief strategist, senior adviser, counselor and national economics adviser have no prior government experience of consequence. Nor do his secretaries of state, Treasury, commerce, housing or education.
Yeah, well, Trump's collision course with reality has really thrown his base into a tail spin, forcing some of his biggest supporters to engage in a new round of fake news.
To some of his supporters, the pivots suggest that Mr. Trump the outsider may have been captured by Wall Street veterans in his White House, while Stephen K. Bannon, his chief strategist, is sidelined.
It got to the point that Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist radio show host, focused his Thursday program on defending the president against his own base. “Is Trump selling us out?” Mr. Jones asked. “And the answer is no. In fact, Trump is attempting to co-opt the establishment.”
Like Jones, Trump's most ardent defenders have been laughably explaining that all those once-reviled policies and organizations are suddenly syncing with Trump because they've evolved toward him. Whether or not his bitter enders fall for that crapload of nonsense will be a measure of just how stupid they are.
Meanwhile, the NYT attributed Trump's identity crisis to his “steep learning curve” as president. Looks a lot more like invasion of the body snatchers.
The problem is, the man isn't guided by anything other than an endless stream of outside forces bouncing off his insatiable desire to "win." And his measure of winning is as impermanent as the course of a styrofoam cup bobbing around in the Atlantic. On a calm day, it might not move that much. But with the Perfect Storm, who the hell knows where that thing will end up.