In her Pundit Roundup, Georgia Logothetis asks, “How will Trump handle a possible coming recession?”
First, we can scratch the word “possible”. A recession is only a matter of time. These happen periodically, and we have just passed through one of the longest periods without a recession that America has experienced in recent history. I think there is a strong chance we’ll see a full implosion, a full-fledged worldwide economic and monetary collapse so serious that the Great Depression by comparison will seem like a Sunday picnic.
Savvy economists, including those who predicted the 2007–2008 Financial Crisis have been pointing to danger signals for several years now. The inherent weaknesses that caused that crisis were never appropriately dealt with, primarily because doing so would have curtailed the power and seriously limited the profits of our biggest banks.
Everything is fragile and more interlinked than ever, and the situation is exacerbated by the most incompetent White House resident America has ever had. Trump’s misguided steel tariffs imposed on allies are but one example.
This, of course, is topped by Trump’s bizarre need to measure dicks with Xi Jinping, imposing massive tariffs on Chinese goods. Many agree that we need to find ways to deal with China – but Trump doesn’t even have the semblance of a strategy! As a result, China has recently stopped purchasing any American agricultural products. And Trump totally overlooks the powerful weapon that Xi Jinping has: China is the creditor that holds a huge chunk of America’s debt. In addition, China has invested heavily on the ownership side of many American companies.
It is a bizarre form of brinksmanship. Trump is ill-equipped to engage in a war of wits. He is trying to play Bluff Poker – China is playing multi-dimensional Chess!
Trump’s attempts to sabotage America’s switch to solar and wind energy, eliminate increased vehicle fuel-efficiency standards, and to try to impede the rising market share of EVs and hybrid vehicles are other examples.
Any rational leader would have increased support for America’s investment in these technologies of the future, thus enhancing our country’s competitiveness.
But rather than supporting this Green Change, Trump and his cohorts are proposing outrageous “bail-outs” to the owners of coal-fired power plants! He is doing his utmost to allow damaging exploitation of federal land. And he is opening up additional offshore waters to oil-drilling, risking environmental damage that may well be irreversible.
All this in addition to his efforts to tear apart America’s multi-ethnic social fabric. His vision of America is a xenophobic, Christianist white nationalist country.
Considering this background, let us ask how Trump will handle a recession?
The answer is simple: By playing the Blame Game!
What is terrifying are the details. Let me share what I see:
- I expect him to blame Jerome Powell and the Federal Reserve Board. Heck, Trump has already been doing that for many months. Moreover, Trump pressured Powell into lowering interest rates when he should have been raising them. Which means the Fed will lack this strong tool when serious problems eventually do arise.
- He will blame “the Jewish bankers”. That he was “wrong to trust them”. (Even much of the Left will buy this. Heck, there is plenty of rhetoric from the Left attacking the same group!)
- Trump will cut social spending, contending that America can no longer afford it.
- …and bear in mind: Trump and the Republicans have already “emptied the bank” through their trillion-dollar tax-break to America’s richest 0.001 %. (Never mind this talk of the one-percent.)
- However he phrases it, Trump will scream even louder about the invasion of dark-skinned people “who are coming to take jobs needed by Americans”.
- He will, as needed, mobilize the National Guard and military to quell social unrest, shoot looters on sight, protect businesses and the wealthy, and “enforce border control”.
- Hell, through Twitter Trump might even recruit Alt-Reich militias for said tasks, promising pardons to “people willing to protect America”.
This Alt-Reich vision hides what the Koch-led plutocracy has long been preparing from their shadows. They have been systematically preparing what can best be described as the New Feudalism. Here are three radical steps that would coincide “nicely” with Trump’s yearning for a lifelong presidency:
- Expect Republican proposals to postpone elections in the face of massive social upheaval.
- Expect some Republicans to propose limiting the right to vote to property owners.
- Expect a Republican proposal to deny the right to vote to anyone who (by their accounting) is “a net recipient of government handouts”. Because allowing such people to vote would only mean the election of politicians who will vote in favor of hand-outs, and America cannot afford that.
Am I overly pessimistic? Time will tell. But I believe it is imperative that we seriously prepare for such scenarios – prepare as individuals, as families, as friends and neighbors, and as communities. We need to nurture them all, for they are our best hoping for preserving our vision of America.
