April 29 will mark one hundred days since then, as Donald trump has settled into the oval office. For most people a luxury lifestyle at relatively stable democracy is to afford not to follow politics with annoying regularity. Trump this provide is not able. For all who care about the issues of global security, nature conservation, public health, constitutionalism, civil rights, criminal justice, free press, science, public education and the boundaries between facts and the fact that they opposite, his presidency has become a daily plunging into a desperate obsession. Hundred-day period can never be fully reliable indicator, the four-year mandate, but it is worth Recalling that Franklin Roosevelt and Barack Obama came to power in times of national crisis and they were able to exercise the necessary discipline, training and toughness to take a brand new course. Impulsive, self-centered and prone to lies trump for the same period of time managed to undermine the integrity of your own office.
Trump never concealed the nature of their relationship with the truth and how he prefers to manage world Affairs. In 1980, intending to announce plans to build the Trump Tower, a 58 storey building at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and 56th street, he instructed his architect before meeting with a group of journalists. “They talk nonsense there is something in the spirit of trump, he said. — Say that it will be building in a million square feet, that there will be 68 floors.”
This is the image that trump himself had created the image of the unscrupulous, impudent, shameless rascal, who in the name of achieving their goals tinsel ready to insult anyone, to chop or to betray. “I am what I am,” he says. But what was once a small-town fun, today represents a threat to the country and the world. Trump is so cavalierly tramples the truth and liberal values that undermine the country, which elected to serve and the stability that has sworn to provide. His verbiage gives rise to a General alarm: it seems that the President of the United States can hardly rely to a greater extent than any of the world’s autocrats. When Kim Ying-Ren, a representative of the radical regime in North Korea, warns that trump and his provocative tweets create “a dangerous situation in which at any moment could erupt thermonuclear war”, is it possible to say that one of these people is more sensible than another? When trump in a hurry to congratulate Recep Tayyip Erdogan on referendum, which strengthens autocratic rule in Turkey — or, as surly and insulting conversation with Angela Merkel should be enthusiastic meeting with Abdul-Fattah Al-Sisi, the military dictator of Egypt, as supporters of liberal and democratic values across Europe to respond to the new American leader?
It seems that trump’s smug procession through the world, endlessly practicing their role. He thinks out loud and is not able to reflect. He’s not serious, not focused, and at times, seems to be a little crazy. Journalists invited to the Oval office to ask the President questions about infrastructure; it changes the subject to what bill O’reilly, the former presenter of Fox News, “good people,” innocent as he is, sexual harassment. A reporter asks about a missile attack on Syria, the tramp feeds her a self-satisfied description of how the have presented its Chinese guests at Mar-a-Lago the news about the air strike on “the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you have ever seen.”
During the presidency a little something you can keep secret for a long time. Journalists covering the White house, saying that despite their continued concern about the attempts by trump to ignore the media, information is full. Everyone tries to leak information about the rest. Instead of having to call others to order, trump leans back in his chair and monitored the effects of the news on cable channels. His administration is not so much a team of rivals, as a new form of reality show: “inner-party dismantlings”.
This presidency brings such gloom that at first glimpse the relative ordinariness of the trump fit average. When he is restrained so as not to make fun of Kim Jong-UN about the failed tests of North Korean missiles, he is credited with strategic self-control Dean Acheson. The desire to present as something normal teenage flash trump his blatant incompetence and dishonesty in the hope that it’ll play itself out, at least one or two news cycles — related to the fear of what new hell could follow then. Happens every day some outrage or confusion: dressing down that trump gave to the Prime Minister of Australia, or the public expression of gratitude for the “amazing work”, which makes Frederick Douglass. Today’s NATO “has outlived itself”; the next day, “not outdated.” First, the Chinese “great Champions” of the manipulation of currency; lo and behold — gone. When the actions of Julian Assange going to benefit the campaign of trump, the latter exclaims: “I love WikiLeaks!”; now, when the presidency in the pocket, the Ministry of justice is preparing against Assange criminal charges. News of random turns politics trump come with such alarming regularity that the urge to find a piece of solid ground, is understandable. It’s a little comforting. But leads nowhere.
A disappointment. For the first hundred days of his tenure, trump never got rid of populist rhetoric, but acted almost entirely as a plutocrat. His Cabinet and group of advisors are filled with multimillionaires and billionaires. His positions on health care, tax reform and financial regulation are highly attractive to the super-rich. How he intends to improve the situation of the middle class remains unclear. In one report in Politico describes how 30 staff sat in the conference room in the building of Executive control, trying to “reimagine” this is the first stage in the life of the administration trump. Assistants were made on the boards “lists of early success.”
One success that they can call — the appointment of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme court, but Democrats rightly believe that this place was stolen from candidate Obama, Merrick garland. The most memorable measures of trump in the first hundred days in his new post became the victim failed in the courts trying to prohibit the entry of travelers from six Muslim countries and the idea of “repeal and replace” the program affordable health insurance, which failed in the House of representatives. A list of domestic initiatives is mainly limited to reverse the achievements of the age of Obama. Trump has proposed to expand the Guantanamo prison and ordered to mitigate the financial regulations of Dodd — Frank. He turned the project on saving the wetlands and the protection of waterways from coal waste; reversed order, which forbade selling weapons to the mentally ill and protecting LGBT Federal employees from discrimination; his Vice President gave his casting vote in the Senate to allow States to deny funding of the clinic for family planning. Due to the habit of the luxury travel that characterize the entire family trump, the new President becomes the most expensive leader in the history. Meanwhile, if Congress will be adopted his budget proposals reduced funding for programs after school programs in schools, programs to support tenants, subsidy programmes unit community development, legal aid for the poor, National endowment for the arts and the National endowment for the Humanities. The promises made will become the new spectacles on account of trump. Guardians of democratic values and the environment, defenders of economic opportunities and national wealth will be considered as further increasing the damage report.
“The idea that you have to be leader of the free world, there is a little madness,” admitted Obama before you go ahead and win the presidential election. But even after anti-Semitic tirades of Richard Nixon and compiled by the astrologer work schedules Ronald Reagan with Donald trump, we find ourselves at a new level of weird is what it was always possible to judge by his biography.
Trump does not come from the common people and not a child of the modern meritocracy. He inherited the Empire from his father, engaged in real estate in several non-Central areas of new York- an impressive enterprise, noted for racist violations of Federal housing code and moved it into Manhattan. He entered the world of contractors, operators casino, Roy Cohn, stars, professional unarmed combat, Rupert Murdoch, numerous bankruptcies, divorces, tabloid, Golf tournaments in Mar-a-Lago and reality television. In the civic Affairs of new York trump real did not participate. A wealthy man, he almost did not allocate funds for charitable purposes. Been a supporter of the not too decent chic. At Studio 54 he said, “I watched as supermodels fucked… on a bench in the middle of the room.” He had no close friends. Mostly he preferred to work, play Golf and spend time at home watching TV. He never hid his anger and bad temper. When something did not hit a harmless journalist from the Palm Beach society named Shannon Donnelly (Shannon Donnelly), in the letter he told her that if she would adhere to its standards of prudence, “I promise not to expose you as clumsy, fat and ugly mess, which, as everyone knows, you are.” To the extent that we can talk about his political views, they differed inconsistency and was in fact another form of performance, part of the chit-chat of his chat show. Contributions trump’s political campaigns had nothing to do with his own belief; he allocated funds solely in order to curry favor with those who could benefit his business. He’s not believed.
By the mid 90-ies of the investment prospects trump collapsed. Banks deprived of its funding. He began to turn to more dubious sources of credit and branding opportunities opening up in the country and abroad. A typical transaction associated with one hotel in Baku (described in detail in these pages by Adam Davidson), the partners included seven Azerbaijanis, known for its excessive corruption and ties to some Iranian brothers, which served as a profitable front for Iran’s Revolutionary guards.
There is no particular mystery about why trump broke the tradition and refused to disclose their tax returns. In these documents — the entire report on his enormous tax breaks, associations, transactions, and private equity. It may be that the deals like Azerbaijan, will haunt him during his presidency no less than grotesque conflicts of interest or any possible ties with Russia, which is currently investigating the FBI and the ad hoc Committee of Congress.
As the business trump was going through difficult times, the entrepreneur made a deal with NBC to play The Apprentice, where for fourteen years he acted as a corporate leader. It was there that he honed his skills as a showman and gained access to a mass audience outside of new York, perfecting the image that became the nucleus of his presidential campaign: the populist billionaire. This role is for American history is not new: in the seventies of the 19th century, wealthy leaders of the movement “Saviors”, the southern faction “Bourbonic Democrats” associated with the Ku Klux clan and other white paramilitary groups, determined to deprive the financing of public schools, reduce government, reduce taxes for landowners, and to weaken the position of the new generation of black politicians.
However, trump quickly realized that to manage the realities of national policy much more difficult than to lead a TV show. In the transition period between election day and inauguration to Obama’s aides had said that trump is not capable of anything long to hold their attention, not going to read too detailed reports; he prefers a one – or two-page summaries, visual images and graphics. Obama held a trump one meeting and talked on the phone about ten times. Interviews failed to change the opinions of Obama about trump, whom he considered “extremely not qualified” to hold the office of President. Understanding the new President of the pressing issues was, at best, rudimentary. After hearing the explanations of Obama over the terms of nuclear agreement with Iran — a deal that trump previously considered “terrible” and vowed to roll — he admitted that perhaps it really makes sense. In one of the many books, the author of which he listed, “Think like a billionaire”, trump said, “that day when I understood that to think superficially can be a big plus, for me was a day of great discoveries”.
Inauguration day at the Capitol trump already did not show any awe due to a task or respect for their predecessors. He uttered a furious rebuff to the men sitting behind him, elected officials and international order that they served. Using the rhetoric of populist demagogues, beginning with Huey long and ending with George Wallace and Silvio Berlusconi, the new President was trying to convey the idea that he, the Leader, is in perfect communication with the people and that together they will rid the country of “American massacre” and return it to bespredelnoe a state of grace. In this Union, it seemed, was no place for the majority of the electorate who voted for Hillary Clinton. African-Americans, Americans, Muslims, Latinos, immigrants — it was hard to understand whether they belong to the same people in the understanding of the trump. Most likely they, like during the campaign, remained for him the objects of worry, fear and contempt. Leaving the podium, George Bush, as reported by the New York, muttered: “Nonsense”.
By all accounts, the West wing of the White house became a battleground for opposing camps. The most influential of them and at the same time the only camp, which boasts a guarantee of permanence — the family, in particular daughter trump Ivanka, and his son Jared Kushner. (His sons Eric and Donald Jr. remained in new York to run the family business. Despite the obligation to put the interests of the country above personal gain, the President is not willing to give up their business). Kouchner have no relevant work experience in internal or external politics. Nevertheless, he was entrusted to establish peace between Israelis and Palestinians, to guide US relations with China and Mexico, to reorganize the Federal government and help to combat the epidemic of opioid use. It is difficult to understand whether Kouchner as head all or nothing at all. But in the role of Advisor he is certainly strong enough to his whispering into the ear of the father-in-law to lower the chances of competing with him advisers, including the disgusting white nationalist new administration, Steve Bannon. Responsibilities Ivanka trump less stringent than her husband, but they seem to relate to her father delicately approached LGBT issues and women’s rights, and softened his temper.
How trump has divided members of his family in powerful and lucrative positions, reminiscent of the way small dictators. It may vary in matters of ideology, but his commitment to the family firm unwavering and not subject to ethical standards. Conflicts and privileges are not within the bounds of decency, the potential profits staggering. That day, when the family trump took XI Jinping in palm beach, the Chinese government approved the extension of brands Ivanka, so she can sell her shoes and handbags on the extensive market from Harbin to Guangzhou.
Trump is suspicious to the experts. During the campaign, he expressed his distrust of scientists, military strategists, University professors, diplomats and intelligence officers. Its the Executive branch, he made accordingly, appointing to the post of head of the Agency for environmental protection face, denying the fact of climate change; Minister of education, who at the time of the hearing on confirmation in the post demonstrated a blatant ignorance of the scope of public education; the Minister of energy of the person who previously called for the closing of the Ministry of energy; permanent U.S. representative to the UN, whose international experience is limited to trade missions, South Carolina; and adviser on the national security of the person, addicted to Islamophobic conspiracy theories until after three weeks at the post he was forced to resign, for lying to the Vice-President Penny about his contacts with the Russian government.
Trump has left open hundreds of important government positions, largely because they did not see them in any sense. “Many of these posts, I don’t want to label anyone, because without them you can easily do, he said. — Listen, well, what are these people doing? All these jobs nobody wants”. To the many Federal agencies that now languish without leadership, are the state Department, Ministry of Finance, trade, health and social security, Ministry of national security and defense. A recent article in The Atlantic describes the State Department as a “lost and indifferent”, people are not sure what they have a duty, nothing to do they gather in the cafeteria, share their fantasies and early leave from work.
Looks like trump is convinced that the conduct of foreign Affairs is not required. In his administration the most authoritative voices belong to the generals. According to the President, whose strategy aims to “knock the shit” out of ISIS (banned terrorist organizations — approx.ed.) they are the ones who should uphold international law, NATO’s effectiveness, the immorality of torture and inappropriate use of the rhetoric of “radical Islamic terrorism”. At the same time, the pace of airstrikes in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen are growing; the tension in relations with Iran, Russia and North Korea escalates. Unpredictable and impulsive expression of its own policy, trump needs a competent civil consultants, at least as a counterweight to the military point of view and his own selfish whims. When conservative columnists are writing about trump and fondly remember the “crazy theory” of international relations, Richard Nixon — a deliberate unpredictability, directed against the North Vietnamese — they tend to lose sight of the fact that this theory has not worked. After Nixon’s policy of confrontation the war in Southeast Asia lasted for many years.
The presidency trump is a rebellion against the liberal — furious attack on the achievements of groups of people who over the past half century experienced a considerable, though not uninterrupted, expansion of rights and opportunities. In public statements trump there is nothing that would indicate that he welcomes these moral achievement; his language, his tone, his personal conduct and his policy — they all involve and encourage resentment. Blame Other ethnic — minority immigrants is they shut down your factories, took your jobs, threaten your safety.
Trumpinski the revolt against liberal democracy is not a phenomenon of local significance; it is part of a disturbing global trend. When in 1989 the Berlin wall fell, and two years later the Soviet Union collapsed began the growth of the democratic movement, and liberalism is rapidly began to move forward, not only in Eastern and Central Europe. For thirty years, the number of democracies in the world increased from thirty to about one hundred. But since 2000 a number of important States including Russia, Hungary, the Philippines and Thailand — have gone the opposite, authoritarian direction. India, Indonesia and Britain began to lean toward nationalism. The Arab spring almost everywhere ended in failure. Today is the credibility and viability of democracy itself. The Communist party of China, which in 1989 has crushed the movement for democracy in Tiananmen square, and then set himself the task to prove that it can achieve incredible economic growth, ignoring the demands for human rights and political freedoms. In Russia, Vladimir Putin silenced a political competition, a nascent independent media and destroyed any hope of an independent judiciary or legislation, at the same time being able to convince millions of his countrymen that the United States is hypocritical and immoral and not democratic in greater degree than any other country. In Turkey, Erdogan put behind bars, tens of thousands of political opponents, gagged the media and a small majority won the referendum, which granted him almost dictatorial powers. Western Europe is also under question. In France, the National front leader marine Le Pen is confident collects votes in a presidential campaign under the leadership of two of its longtime allies and supporters of fascism, Frederic Chatillon, and Axel lust.
What is at stake in this anti-democratic wave cannot be overestimated. It is also impossible to ignore the extent to which authoritarian States was able to capitalize on the failures of the West — including wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Libya — and use them to reduce the moral prestige of democracy itself. Writes Edward Luce in the book “the Retreat of Western liberalism” (“The Retreat of Western Liberalism”): “But what we don’t know that, so it will result in the global democratic crisis of global depression.”
If we ever were so naive as to believe that progress in political life is inevitable, it is now faced with the opposite. Freedom House, a nongovernmental organization that examines global trends in political freedom, has revealed eleven the decline in democracies around the world and now publishes list “of countries, the situation which requires constant supervision”. This is a country where, “probably soon will be a major turning point in the trajectory of the development of their democracies.” Most of all, Freedom House is concerned about the situation in South Africa, Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, Ecuador, Zimbabwe and, in the largest of these countries, the United States. The reason this group includes the United States, is “unconventional” presidential campaign, trump and his “opinion on civil liberties and the role of the United States in the world.”
In 1814 John Adams referred to the Aristotelian notion that democracy inevitably degenerates into anarchy. “Remember, democracy never lasts long — he wrote in 1814, former U.S. Senator from Virginia, John Taylor. — It is quickly spent, exhausted and kills herself. There is no democracy, which would have committed suicide”. As a President Donald trump with his chauvinist and purely business view of politics risks to be the most reckless guardian of democracy and by dark prophecies of Adams.
To resist tempismo will not be easy. Even if the President will abandon some of its most severe promises, even if he will throw your smartphone in the Potomac and stop it’s nice to tickle nerves to the electorate “method of the dog whistle” and provoke enemies frivolous bravado, he is still Republican-led Congress, and would still have to make a series of frightening political victories. Clearly, it has not abandoned their attempts to repeal Obamacare to deprive millions of people health insurance; he certainly is not going to postpone measures to introduce tough immigration restrictions; of course he will not leave the idea about the folding of legislative and international efforts to save the environment, already suffering from the severe consequences of climate change.
Trump leads us to acknowledge the fragility of precious things. However, there are indications that Adams and those other democratic values short life, will be wrong. Hope to inspire crowds of people, participating in many women’s marches across the country on the day after the inauguration, the recent demonstrations in support of the science and a more humane, reasonable immigration policies; the serious work of the courts, which blocked “the ban on the entry of Muslims” and a number of senators and house members in both parties, who, unlike Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan, refused to put the cynicism and expedience above integrity; exemplary work of investigative journalism, which are traditional and new media; achievements opposed to trump’s candidates in the recent Congressional elections in the States of Kansas and Georgia.
The opposition Trump also needs to seriously think about why demagogue with a modest and quaint experience managed to reach the hearts of tens of millions of voters who are concerned about their lives and prospects for the future, while the candidate of the Democratic party that could not do. Standing in front of the intellectual and political challenge is to resist the most ugly manifestations of the new right-wing populism — those fears on which it plays, and disagreements that generates — and to confront the consequences of globalization, technology and cultural change. Politicians and citizens who intend to defeat the forces of reaction and tranism, must come to grips with the issues connected with job losses due to automation and output of the production abroad. Unemployment is five percent, but this figure does not give an accurate picture of the situation of the middle and working classes, which are under threat.
Explains political math: 489 of the wealthiest counties in the country voted for Clinton; the remaining 2623 County, mostly consisting of small towns, suburbs and rural areas voted for trump. The elections decided to go a little less than fifty-five percent of all adult citizens, according to the age qualification to be able to participate in the vote.
This statistic is at least as wrenching as the letter Komi, the Russian hacking of the National Committee of the Democratic party, the strategic failures of the Clinton campaign and the General darkness of the campaign of trump. This statistic says about the passivity that democracy in the era of trump can no longer afford.
Young politicians still have time to gather strength for the elections to Congress in mid-2018 and the presidential race in 2020. One well-known figure, Senator Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts, has just published “This Fight Is Our Fight”, a book about the decline of the middle class and conservative ideology since the Reagan administration. It is a kind of Manifesto of this “Audacity of hope”, which often foreshadows higher political ambitions. Last week, Warren came to our office hour for interview, and, according to custom, recognizing the mistakes committed during the presidential race, she focused attention on those issues on which Clinton lost to Trump in 2016. When the time comes to make a decision, Warren will be 69, but it would be foolish to believe that it does not apply to those who reconnoiters the situation.
Clown in the guise of transma hiding the true danger. Manner trump to lie — it’s not a joke, it is a strategy, a way of clouding our consciousness and clarity of life in the Kingdom of truth. Saying that each epoch dreams of the next. Now our task is not only to accept the presidency of emergency and to withstand his encroachments on the principles of reality and the values of liberal democracy, but also to think about the future, to discuss, to listen to each other, to cook, to store and to revive what we hold dear.
David Remnick — editor of The New Yorker (1998) and analyst (from 1992). The author of the book The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama.
