theamericanconservative--2020-04-16--Peter Navarro: President Trump’s Wartime Consigliere

White House National Trade Council Director Peter Navarro is interviewed by Fox Business Network outside the White House October 08 , 2019 in Washington , DC .
( Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images ) WASHINGTON– “ Peter Navarro goes to the White House to be a trade adviser—which is evidence of the thin line that exists ideologically between Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in terms of isolationism and protectionism , ’ ’ Golden State strategist Rob Stutzman snipes in Politico .
“ On immigration and trade , the Trump administration has been radically non-traditional Republican—and Navarro is evidence for that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ House director of the office of trade and manufacturing policy and President Trump ’ s wartime consigliere .
He ’ s just been tapped as the administration ’ s point man on the Defense Production Act , an extreme measure invoked in response to a nation ravaged by the fallout to Coronavrius .
Of course , Stultzman ’ s right .
Just not in the way he thinks .
Nature is value-neutral and Mr. Stultzman represents a California Republican Party , like in-person dining at family-owned restaurants , that will be remembered as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ away a perspective that ’ s both rococo and coo-coo for cocoa puffs .
Heretofore Republican establishmentarianism is dissolving into a fine mist .
The anxious , Nineties platform of the Cali Right—and populist Left—is on the ascent .
Concerns that fully unchecked immigration leads to Balkanization , un-interrogated “ free ” trade is no trade at all , that America is counterproductively extended abroad , and its cities embarrassingly stretched out at home , look more prescient than preposterous .
Such anxieties served as the ideological foundation of a motley crew of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a nation-state that joined the union one-hundred and seventy years ago this year .
Before waging a one-man , now one-nation war on China , Navarro was a failed Democratic politician complaining about zoning in San Diego .
Largesse at home and on the high seas would not be salvation , but sarcophagus .
Maybe Navarro was right .
Navarro backed Hillary Clinton for First Lady , but rejected her for president .
The United States made the same calculation .
As has been noted , from Steve Bannon to Steven Miller , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the gold coast has given America kosher cannabis , sanctioned same-sex marriage , but also , Reagan , Nixon , and now , national populism .
What was batted down on Long Beach won power in Washington .
And to stare too long at San Francisco ’ s South of Market district on a bad night , or a good one , is to wonder if the ideas won ’ t one day rebound back across the continent .
Peter Navarro is a Blue Dog Democrat of the old school , those who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ himself , he ’ s in the Republican Party because Donald Trump ’ s on top of it .
It ’ s feature , not bug .
At one point , Navarro ’ s fortunes were on the fritz .
Forget about all that .
He ’ s joined this phoenix of a president .
Like his boss , the two are in their seventies , but have been improbably reborn .
Like Milton in Office Space , I ’ m told Navarro ’ s office was humiliatingly moved around , especially in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ patrons like Bannon , the once-White House chief strategist .
Navarro won ’ t have to burn the building down now , though .
He ’ s running it .
He gelded Gary Cohn , formerly Trump ’ s economic point man , in an early 2018 confrontation over tariffs .
The ex-Goldman executive resigned in a huff upon discovering , after a year of service , that the populist president was a populist .
Navarro didn ’ t capture Cohn ’ s job , but he wasn ’ t jonesing for it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t poker buddies .
He talks almost like a surfer —among other flourishes , the economist calls people “ brother ” —and Trump ’ s cadence is more circus promoter than wave catcher .
But for a politician whose ideas have found ruinously few adherents in Washington proper , Navarro ’ s nationalist naggings , for Trump , have been a hand on the brain .
All this came to a head with the onset of the Coronavirus , when Navarro was again prescient .
It was going to be a big @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Beijing was both menace and manna from heaven , a cathartic vindication of decades of complaints about collapsing regional supply chains , cratering native industry and craven economic decision-making .
Navarro should work to be remembered as icon , not Icarus .
Feuding openly with Anthony Fauci , the District of Columbia ’ s man behind the curtain , and second-guessing the scientists , is , fair or not , a mug ’ s game .
But what ’ s next ?
Who knows , brother ( or sister ) .
But it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s sojourn in Washington was no shot in the dark .

WASHINGTON– “Peter Navarro goes to the White House to be a trade adviser—which is evidence of the thin line that exists ideologically between Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in terms of isolationism and protectionism,’’ Golden State strategist Rob Stutzman snipes in Politico.
“On immigration and trade, the Trump administration has been radically non-traditional Republican—and Navarro is evidence for that,” says Stultzman of the White House director of the office of trade and manufacturing policy and President Trump’s wartime consigliere. He’s just been tapped as the administration’s point man on the Defense Production Act, an extreme measure invoked in response to a nation ravaged by the fallout to Coronavrius.
Of course, Stultzman’s right. Just not in the way he thinks.
Nature is value-neutral and Mr. Stultzman represents a California Republican Party, like in-person dining at family-owned restaurants, that will be remembered as a historical curiosity. Evolution has swept away a perspective that’s both rococo and coo-coo for cocoa puffs.
Heretofore Republican establishmentarianism is dissolving into a fine mist. The anxious, Nineties platform of the Cali Right—and populist Left—is on the ascent.
Concerns that fully unchecked immigration leads to Balkanization, un-interrogated “free” trade is no trade at all, that America is counterproductively extended abroad, and its cities embarrassingly stretched out at home, look more prescient than preposterous.
Such anxieties served as the ideological foundation of a motley crew of reformers that dominated but were defeated in a nation-state that joined the union one-hundred and seventy years ago this year. Before waging a one-man, now one-nation war on China, Navarro was a failed Democratic politician complaining about zoning in San Diego. Largesse at home and on the high seas would not be salvation, but sarcophagus. Maybe Navarro was right. Navarro backed Hillary Clinton for First Lady, but rejected her for president. The United States made the same calculation.
As has been noted, from Steve Bannon to Steven Miller, from Michael Anton to Matt Drudge, the gold coast has given America kosher cannabis, sanctioned same-sex marriage, but also, Reagan, Nixon, and now, national populism. What was batted down on Long Beach won power in Washington. And to stare too long at San Francisco’s South of Market district on a bad night, or a good one, is to wonder if the ideas won’t one day rebound back across the continent.
Peter Navarro is a Blue Dog Democrat of the old school, those who know him say. Like the president himself, he’s in the Republican Party because Donald Trump’s on top of it. It’s feature, not bug.
At one point, Navarro’s fortunes were on the fritz. Forget about all that. He’s joined this phoenix of a president. Like his boss, the two are in their seventies, but have been improbably reborn. Like Milton in Office Space, I’m told Navarro’s office was humiliatingly moved around, especially in the early days, after losing internal patrons like Bannon, the once-White House chief strategist.
Navarro won’t have to burn the building down now, though. He’s running it.
He gelded Gary Cohn, formerly Trump’s economic point man, in an early 2018 confrontation over tariffs. The ex-Goldman executive resigned in a huff upon discovering, after a year of service, that the populist president was a populist.
Navarro didn’t capture Cohn’s job, but he wasn’t jonesing for it. True, Navarro and Trump aren’t poker buddies. He talks almost like a surfer —among other flourishes, the economist calls people “brother”—and Trump’s cadence is more circus promoter than wave catcher.
But for a politician whose ideas have found ruinously few adherents in Washington proper, Navarro’s nationalist naggings, for Trump, have been a hand on the brain.
All this came to a head with the onset of the Coronavirus, when Navarro was again prescient. It was going to be a big deal.
A superbug sent courtesy of Beijing was both menace and manna from heaven, a cathartic vindication of decades of complaints about collapsing regional supply chains, cratering native industry and craven economic decision-making.
Navarro should work to be remembered as icon, not Icarus. Feuding openly with Anthony Fauci, the District of Columbia’s man behind the curtain, and second-guessing the scientists, is, fair or not, a mug’s game.
But what’s next? Who knows, brother (or sister).
But it’s clear now that Peter Navarro’s sojourn in Washington was no shot in the dark.


theamericanconservative--2020-04-17--Pompeo Dodges Questions About 2018 Wuhan Lab Warnings

If our government knew a virus could leak from the Chinese facility two years ago , why was nothing done ?
American officials in China cabled Washington several times , warning that a biolab in Wuhan was conducting risky experiments on bats and coronaviruses , according to new reports .
The State Department received those cables two years ago .
The American people should be informed about what the State Department knew—but don ’ t expect to hear the answers anytime soon from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo , who gave an extraordinary interview to Martha MacCallum on Fox News @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ The mere fact that we don ’ t know the answers , that China hasn ’ t shared the answers , I think is very , very telling .
To your point , the President said that there are multiple sources .
What we do know is we know that this virus originated in Wuhan , China .
We know that there is the Wuhan Institute of Virology just a handful of miles away from where the wet market was .
There ’ s still lots to learn.
” Saying that “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” because China hasn ’ t shared them is very misleading because we now know that American diplomatic officials warned Washington two years ago about inadequate safety at the Wuhan biolab .
Those unheeded warnings reportedly prompted the U.S. government to consider whether the Wuhan lab was the source of the virus , according to a recent Washington Postarticle .
In January 2018 , the U.S. embassy in Beijing sent U.S. science diplomats to the Wuhan Institute of Virology ( WIV ) , which had distinguished itself in 2015 as “ China ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ level of international bioresearch safety ( known as BSL-4 ) , ” says the Washington Post .
“ WIV issued a news release in English about the last of these visits , which occurred on March 27 , 2018… Last week , WIV erased that statement from its website , though it remains archived on the Internet.
” U.S. officials on the trip were so concerned by what they saw that they sent two diplomatic cables labelled Sensitive But Unclassified back to Washington .
“ The cables warned about safety and management weaknesses @ @ @ @ @ @ @ attention and help , ” says the article .
( This may explain why the U.S. government gave $ 3.7 million to the Wuhan lab . )
U.S. officials warned in the first cable that “ the lab ’ s work on bat coronaviruses and their potential human transmission represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic.
” In other words , the U.S. government already had many pieces of the coronavirus origin puzzle two years before the pandemic began .
Pompeo further dissembles and spends 90 percent of the interview blaming China @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that there were days—days that went by—from when the Chinese Communist Party , the leadership there , knew about this virus before they told the public writ large , ” said Pompeo .
There ’ s no doubt that China did not share everything it knew about the virus and its origins with the World Health Organization , or with the U.S .
But that is not an excuse for our government ignoring multiple warnings from U.S. officials on the ground in Wuhan .
MacCallum pressed him , charging that U.S. officials “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a pandemic could result from how mishandled everything was there .
What happened to those cables ?
Who received them in the State Department ?
Who went over them in the State Department two years ago ?
” “ Martha , I appreciate you want to ask about that .
I can ’ t comment on the cables tonight .
I can say this .
This is a laboratory that contained highly contagious materials .
We knew that .
We knew that they were working on this program .
Many countries have programs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are open and transparent , they have the ability to control and keep them safe and they allow outside observers in to make sure all the processes and procedures are right .
I only wish that that had happened in this place .
We would know more about it and we would know more about what has transpired there , if anything , today.
” The Chinese government isn ’ t the only one attempting to shirk responsibility here .
The State Department was warned of what was happening in the lab in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about it .
The U.S. even went as far as funding the Chinese research .
Consider that this may be the “ costliest government cover-up of all time ” as a U.S. government source briefed on the details of early actions by China ’ s government told Fox News .
How much ?
As information like these cables surface , it is clear we may not yet know the half of it .

American officials in China cabled Washington several times, warning that a biolab in Wuhan was conducting risky experiments on bats and coronaviruses, according to new reports. The State Department received those cables two years ago.
The American people should be informed about what the State Department knew—but don’t expect to hear the answers anytime soon from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who gave an extraordinary interview to Martha MacCallum on Fox News Wednesday night.
Pompeo told MacCallum, “The mere fact that we don’t know the answers, that China hasn’t shared the answers, I think is very, very telling. To your point, the President said that there are multiple sources. What we do know is we know that this virus originated in Wuhan, China. We know that there is the Wuhan Institute of Virology just a handful of miles away from where the wet market was. There’s still lots to learn.”
Saying that “we don’t know the answers” because China hasn’t shared them is very misleading because we now know that American diplomatic officials warned Washington two years ago about inadequate safety at the Wuhan biolab. Those unheeded warnings reportedly prompted the U.S. government to consider whether the Wuhan lab was the source of the virus, according to a recent Washington Post article.
In January 2018, the U.S. embassy in Beijing sent U.S. science diplomats to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which had distinguished itself in 2015 as “China’s first laboratory to achieve the highest level of international bioresearch safety (known as BSL-4),” says the Washington Post. “WIV issued a news release in English about the last of these visits, which occurred on March 27, 2018… Last week, WIV erased that statement from its website, though it remains archived on the Internet.”
U.S. officials on the trip were so concerned by what they saw that they sent two diplomatic cables labelled Sensitive But Unclassified back to Washington.
“The cables warned about safety and management weaknesses at the WIV lab and proposed more attention and help,” says the article. (This may explain why the U.S. government gave $3.7 million to the Wuhan lab.)
U.S. officials warned in the first cable that “the lab’s work on bat coronaviruses and their potential human transmission represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic.”
In other words, the U.S. government already had many pieces of the coronavirus origin puzzle two years before the pandemic began.
Pompeo further dissembles and spends 90 percent of the interview blaming China. “Today you saw further evidence that there were days—days that went by—from when the Chinese Communist Party, the leadership there, knew about this virus before they told the public writ large,” said Pompeo.
There’s no doubt that China did not share everything it knew about the virus and its origins with the World Health Organization, or with the U.S. But that is not an excuse for our government ignoring multiple warnings from U.S. officials on the ground in Wuhan.
MacCallum pressed him, charging that U.S. officials “said that it was highly likely that a pandemic could result from how mishandled everything was there. What happened to those cables? Who received them in the State Department? Who went over them in the State Department two years ago?”
Pompeo answers:
“Martha, I appreciate you want to ask about that. I can’t comment on the cables tonight. I can say this. This is a laboratory that contained highly contagious materials. We knew that. We knew that they were working on this program. Many countries have programs like this. And in countries that are open and transparent, they have the ability to control and keep them safe and they allow outside observers in to make sure all the processes and procedures are right. I only wish that that had happened in this place. We would know more about it and we would know more about what has transpired there, if anything, today.”
The Chinese government isn’t the only one attempting to shirk responsibility here. The State Department was warned of what was happening in the lab in Wuhan and seems to have done nothing about it. The U.S. even went as far as funding the Chinese research.
Consider that this may be the “costliest government cover-up of all time” as a U.S. government source briefed on the details of early actions by China’s government told Fox News. How much? As information like these cables surface, it is clear we may not yet know the half of it.


theamericanconservative--2020-04-17--Will COVID-19 Retire the World’s Policeman?

This pandemic may prove the decisive factor in America 's retreat from global hegemony .
The aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt ( CVN 71 ) is moored pier side at Naval Station North Island ( 2016 ) ( U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist Seaman Jimmi Lee Bruner/Released ) For declaring in March that the U.S. economy might be reopened by Easter , President Donald Trump was roundly mocked .
Yet , it appears his political instincts were correct .
He was more in tune with his country than were his critics .
By early Easter week , Gov @ @ @ @ @ @ @ six states in the New York-New Jersey region had formed a consortium to synchronize the opening of their economies .
California ’ s Gavin Newsom and the governors of Washington and Oregon had done the same .
The governors may disagree on the timing , May 1 or May 15 , but most agree with Trump .
America can not remain shut down for months without lasting damage to the livelihood and lives of millions of citizens who are about to be shoved into a new Great Depression .
However , something just @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to reopen soon .
Tuesday and Wednesday , the U.S. set records for the numbers of fatalities from the virus .
Tuesday it was 2,364 dead , the following day 2,371 .
That put the national casualty total above 30,000 .
The U.S. did not record its first coronavirus fatality until Feb. 29 .
It took 38 days after that to reach 10,000 .
However , it took only nine days to vault from 10,000 fatalities to more than 30,000 .
The ominous implication : If this 2,300-dead-per-day figure is near the new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fatalities projected for the duration of the pandemic — in two weeks !
Even if we reduce the Tuesday-Wednesday average daily death toll by over half , to 1,000 deaths a day , that would mean 44,000 more dead for a total of 75,000 by June 1 .
What makes COVID-19 worse than the flu ?
The coronavirus is more easily transmissible .
It is more savage in how it maims immune systems .
It is more lethal , killing far more of the infected than the regular flu , though we do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
For we have no hard number of those who carry or have carried the virus asymptomatically .
Nor we do know whether having survived COVID-19 renders one immune to a new infection .
Since the medical experts are predicting a second wave of the virus in late summer or fall , this is no small matter .
And seeing what happened on the carrier Theodore Roosevelt , the coronavirus could have a major impact on U.S. global commitments .
Americans were already coming home from the Middle East , drawing down our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the Taliban , and moving our 5,000 troops in Iraq into fewer bases .
We have disengaged from the Saudi war against the Houthi rebels in Yemen and are drawing down our forces in Syria .
In Libya ’ s civil war , it is Russians , Turks , Egyptians and Gulf Arabs , not Americans , who are the supporting actors .
American soft power is also in retreat from the world .
Some 10,000 Peace Corps volunteers have been brought home .
Scores of thousands of U.S. citizens have been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have shut the door to Europe , China , the world .
What now becomes of the U.S. geo-strategic “ pivot , ” the shift of planes , troops , ships and bases from the Middle and Near East to the Indo-Pacific theater to contain a rising China ?
And contain China with what ?
The Roosevelt has been ravaged by the coronavirus .
As of Tuesday , 589 cases of COVID-19 were reported from a crew of 4,800 .
Four thousand sailors in Guam are in various stages of a 14-day isolation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the island .
But it is not just the Roosevelt .
Every U.S. warship—carriers , cruisers , frigates , destroyers , subs—has cramped quarters conducive to the spread of the coronavirus .
How many of these vessels will soon be doubling as hospital ships ?
The same question might also be asked of the U.S. Army and Marine barracks in South Korea , Japan , Australia and Okinawa .
There are allegations that the coronavirus did not originate in the Wuhan “ wet market ” where bats are sold for food but instead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Chinese bioweapons laboratory a few miles away .
Whatever the truth , the Wuhan virus appears to have become the most effective means of disabling U.S. hard and soft power that we have encountered in many a decade .
Of those 10,000 Peace Corp volunteers , and scores of thousands of other Americans who have been repatriated home , how many of these “ soft power ” soldiers will be going back after they have been out of their host country for 18 months ?
Will this pandemic prove the decisive factor in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
With the U.S. budget deficit for 2020 originally set at $ 1 trillion , now triple that , there is going to be a hard reckoning for the allocation of our diminished resources after the nation reopens .
And policing the planet is likely to be seen as yesterday ’ s priority , and a primary candidate for discard .
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of Nixon ’ s White House Wars : The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever .

For declaring in March that the U.S. economy might be reopened by Easter, President Donald Trump was roundly mocked.
Yet, it appears his political instincts were correct. He was more in tune with his country than were his critics.
By early Easter week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the governors of six states in the New York-New Jersey region had formed a consortium to synchronize the opening of their economies. California’s Gavin Newsom and the governors of Washington and Oregon had done the same.
The governors may disagree on the timing, May 1 or May 15, but most agree with Trump. America cannot remain shut down for months without lasting damage to the livelihood and lives of millions of citizens who are about to be shoved into a new Great Depression.
Twenty-two million Americans are now unemployed.
However, something just jolted the gathering consensus over the need to reopen soon. Tuesday and Wednesday, the U.S. set records for the numbers of fatalities from the virus. Tuesday it was 2,364 dead, the following day 2,371. That put the national casualty total above 30,000.
The U.S. did not record its first coronavirus fatality until Feb. 29. It took 38 days after that to reach 10,000. However, it took only nine days to vault from 10,000 fatalities to more than 30,000.
The ominous implication: If this 2,300-dead-per-day figure is near the new normal, we would surpass the 61,000 fatalities projected for the duration of the pandemic — in two weeks!
Even if we reduce the Tuesday-Wednesday average daily death toll by over half, to 1,000 deaths a day, that would mean 44,000 more dead for a total of 75,000 by June 1.
What makes COVID-19 worse than the flu?
The coronavirus is more easily transmissible. It is more savage in how it maims immune systems. It is more lethal, killing far more of the infected than the regular flu, though we do not know exactly how much more lethal. For we have no hard number of those who carry or have carried the virus asymptomatically.
Nor we do know whether having survived COVID-19 renders one immune to a new infection. Since the medical experts are predicting a second wave of the virus in late summer or fall, this is no small matter.
And seeing what happened on the carrier Theodore Roosevelt, the coronavirus could have a major impact on U.S. global commitments.
Americans were already coming home from the Middle East, drawing down our 12,000 troops in Afghanistan after a deal with the Taliban, and moving our 5,000 troops in Iraq into fewer bases.
We have disengaged from the Saudi war against the Houthi rebels in Yemen and are drawing down our forces in Syria.
In Libya’s civil war, it is Russians, Turks, Egyptians and Gulf Arabs, not Americans, who are the supporting actors.
American soft power is also in retreat from the world.
Some 10,000 Peace Corps volunteers have been brought home. Scores of thousands of U.S. citizens have been repatriated by the State Department. We have shut the door to Europe, China, the world.
What now becomes of the U.S. geo-strategic “pivot,” the shift of planes, troops, ships and bases from the Middle and Near East to the Indo-Pacific theater to contain a rising China?
And contain China with what?
The Roosevelt has been ravaged by the coronavirus. As of Tuesday, 589 cases of COVID-19 were reported from a crew of 4,800. Four thousand sailors in Guam are in various stages of a 14-day isolation period in hotels and spare rooms across the island.
But it is not just the Roosevelt. Every U.S. warship—carriers, cruisers, frigates, destroyers, subs—has cramped quarters conducive to the spread of the coronavirus.
How many of these vessels will soon be doubling as hospital ships?
The same question might also be asked of the U.S. Army and Marine barracks in South Korea, Japan, Australia and Okinawa.
There are allegations that the coronavirus did not originate in the Wuhan “wet market” where bats are sold for food but instead escaped through a horrible blunder in a Chinese bioweapons laboratory a few miles away.
Whatever the truth, the Wuhan virus appears to have become the most effective means of disabling U.S. hard and soft power that we have encountered in many a decade.
Of those 10,000 Peace Corp volunteers, and scores of thousands of other Americans who have been repatriated home, how many of these “soft power” soldiers will be going back after they have been out of their host country for 18 months?
Will this pandemic prove the decisive factor in America’s retreat from global hegemony?
With the U.S. budget deficit for 2020 originally set at $1 trillion, now triple that, there is going to be a hard reckoning for the allocation of our diminished resources after the nation reopens.
And policing the planet is likely to be seen as yesterday’s priority, and a primary candidate for discard.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.


Pompeo’s Wuhan Dodge

Just what were in those U.S. diplomatic cables about the security of the Chinese virology lab two years ago ?
American officials in China cabled Washington several times , warning that a biolab in Wuhan was conducting risky experiments on bats and coronaviruses , according to new reports .
The State Department received those cables two years ago .
The American people should be informed about what the State Department knew—but don ’ t expect to hear the answers anytime soon from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo , who gave an extraordinary interview to Martha MacCallum on Fox News Wednesday @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The mere fact that we don ’ t know the answers , that China hasn ’ t shared the answers , I think is very , very telling .
To your point , the President said that there are multiple sources .
What we do know is we know that this virus originated in Wuhan , China .
We know that there is the Wuhan Institute of Virology just a handful of miles away from where the wet market was .
There ’ s still lots to learn.
” Saying that “ we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ because China hasn ’ t shared them is very misleading because we now know that American diplomatic officials warned Washington two years ago about inadequate safety at the Wuhan biolab .
Those unheeded warnings reportedly prompted the U.S. government to consider whether the Wuhan lab was the source of the virus , according to a recent Washington Postarticle .
In January 2018 , the U.S. embassy in Beijing sent U.S. science diplomats to the Wuhan Institute of Virology ( WIV ) , which had distinguished itself in 2015 as “ China ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of international bioresearch safety ( known as BSL-4 ) , ” says the Washington Post .
“ WIV issued a news release in English about the last of these visits , which occurred on March 27 , 2018… Last week , WIV erased that statement from its website , though it remains archived on the Internet.
” U.S. officials on the trip were so concerned by what they saw that they sent two diplomatic cables labelled Sensitive But Unclassified back to Washington .
“ The cables warned about safety and management weaknesses at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and help , ” says the article .
( This may explain why the U.S. government gave $ 3.7 million to the Wuhan lab . )
U.S. officials warned in the first cable that “ the lab ’ s work on bat coronaviruses and their potential human transmission represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic.
” In other words , the U.S. government already had many pieces of the coronavirus origin puzzle two years before the pandemic began .
Pompeo further dissembles and spends 90 percent of the interview blaming China .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ there were days—days that went by—from when the Chinese Communist Party , the leadership there , knew about this virus before they told the public writ large , ” said Pompeo .
There ’ s no doubt that China did not share everything it knew about the virus and its origins with the World Health Organization , or with the U.S .
But that is not an excuse for our government ignoring multiple warnings from U.S. officials on the ground in Wuhan .
MacCallum pressed him , charging that U.S. officials “ said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pandemic could result from how mishandled everything was there .
What happened to those cables ?
Who received them in the State Department ?
Who went over them in the State Department two years ago ?
” “ Martha , I appreciate you want to ask about that .
I can ’ t comment on the cables tonight .
I can say this .
This is a laboratory that contained highly contagious materials .
We knew that .
We knew that they were working on this program .
Many countries have programs like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ open and transparent , they have the ability to control and keep them safe and they allow outside observers in to make sure all the processes and procedures are right .
I only wish that that had happened in this place .
We would know more about it and we would know more about what has transpired there , if anything , today.
” The Chinese government isn ’ t the only one attempting to shirk responsibility here .
The State Department was warned of what was happening in the lab in Wuhan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it .
The U.S. even went as far as funding the Chinese research .
Consider that this may be the “ costliest government cover-up of all time ” as a U.S. government source briefed on the details of early actions by China ’ s government told Fox News .
How much ?
As information like these cables surface , it is clear we may not yet know the half of it .


theamericanconservative--2020-04-18--Trump’s Plan to Reopen the Economy is the Right One

Like so many of President Trump ’ s most audacious claims , his bluster that he had “ total authority ” to re-open the economy was merely an opening bid .
The “ plan ” —really a non-binding set of guidelines—that he and his task force issued yesterday is hardly the stuff of tyranny ; it leaves the authority to lift lockdowns in the hands of state governors .
This was no doubt disappointing to a number of prominentconservativecommentators who wish to see an immediate re-opening of the economy , broadly .
Their focus on the ( inevitable ) inaccuracy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from the sobering data : nearly 35,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus in the last six weeks , despite the most widespread and aggressive public health measures implemented in this country since 1918 .
There ’ s a reason almost every single country in the western world has imposed draconian social distancing : this virus is very contagious , very severe , and , left unchecked , has the potential to break even a very wealthy country ’ s health care system in short order , as it did in Lombardy .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ arguments for a broad , universal “ re-opening ” of the economy .
The first is the obvious ethical problem : as Yoram Hazony explained , it ’ s not clear how Americans could “ honor thy father and mother ” while flippantly exposing them to a severe disease .
The second defect is the mistaken notion that there is a clear trade-off between public health interventions and the health of the economy .
This is flatly wrong : public health interventions do not crush the economy , pandemics do .
During the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most severe outbreaks had the most depressed local economies , and those areas that put in place the most aggressive public health measures saw their economies recover more quickly .
The reason is obvious : even in the absence of government diktats , people do not want to go to work , or go out on the town , while a pandemic is spreading uncontrolled .
The 81 percent of the public that think social distancing measures need to remain in place aren ’ t going to turn on a dime and open @ @ @ @ @ @ @ control .
Those who want a healthy economy should focus on beating the virus .
Given the seriousness of COVID-19 , others have suggested that some sort of national lockdown order be put in place .
This , too , would be unwise .
While New York and New Jersey are still struggling to cope with the epidemic , other states have barely been touched , and are nowhere near exceeding their health care capacity .
Shelter-in-place orders are a necessary but temporary measure to protect the health care system .
In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ health-care systems are not in any jeopardy of being overwhelmed , a phased re-opening is wise .
Here , too , the President ’ s plan is helpful : he suggests that re-opening only occur when the data shows a downward trajectory of relevant illness over a fourteen-day period , with hospitals able to cope , and a robust testing program in place for front-line health care workers .
A staggered plan is best because it will allow hotspots to ride out the crunch while the rest of the country supports those less @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and a functioning economy .
Moreover , the president ’ s plan isn ’ t just epidemiologically sound ; it ’ s politically astute .
As a matter of constitutional law , President Trump does not have “ total authority ” to force states to re-open or remain closed ; state-level directives are rooted in the police power , which the federal government does not possess .
Showdowns with state governors would leave the president on the legal and political low ground : if the President were to order , say , Gavin @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have both the power and the political incentive to resist .
That would leave the president looking impotent , and Newsom looking like an even more attractive 2024 presidential contender .
Conversely , if he were to order the state of North Dakota to stay closed against its governor ’ s wishes , he would fail , and needlessly agitate his base .
A savvy politician , the president likely grasps this troublesome dynamic and has decided to stay above the fray , issuing guidelines rather than heavy-handed orders .
That is the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ time to re-open the entire economy , nor is it time for a heavy-handed , universal federal lockdown .
It ’ s time to beat the virus , in a way that makes sense–and our country ’ s governors are best positioned to do that .
Will Chamberlain is publisher of Human Events .

Like so many of President Trump’s most audacious claims, his bluster that he had “total authority” to re-open the economy was merely an opening bid. The “plan”—really a non-binding set of guidelines—that he and his task force issued yesterday is hardly the stuff of tyranny; it leaves the authority to lift lockdowns in the hands of state governors.
This was no doubt disappointing to a number of prominent conservative commentators who wish to see an immediate re-opening of the economy, broadly. Their focus on the (inevitable) inaccuracy of various epidemiological models has distracted them from the sobering data: nearly 35,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus in the last six weeks, despite the most widespread and aggressive public health measures implemented in this country since 1918. There’s a reason almost every single country in the western world has imposed draconian social distancing: this virus is very contagious, very severe, and, left unchecked, has the potential to break even a very wealthy country’s health care system in short order, as it did in Lombardy.
There are two irreparable defects in the arguments for a broad, universal “re-opening” of the economy. The first is the obvious ethical problem: as Yoram Hazony explained, it’s not clear how Americans could “honor thy father and mother” while flippantly exposing them to a severe disease.
The second defect is the mistaken notion that there is a clear trade-off between public health interventions and the health of the economy. This is flatly wrong: public health interventions do not crush the economy, pandemics do.
During the Spanish Flu, those areas with the most severe outbreaks had the most depressed local economies, and those areas that put in place the most aggressive public health measures saw their economies recover more quickly. The reason is obvious: even in the absence of government diktats, people do not want to go to work, or go out on the town, while a pandemic is spreading uncontrolled. The 81 percent of the public that think social distancing measures need to remain in place aren’t going to turn on a dime and open their wallets until the pandemic is under control.
Those who want a healthy economy should focus on beating the virus.
Given the seriousness of COVID-19, others have suggested that some sort of national lockdown order be put in place. This, too, would be unwise. While New York and New Jersey are still struggling to cope with the epidemic, other states have barely been touched, and are nowhere near exceeding their health care capacity. Shelter-in-place orders are a necessary but temporary measure to protect the health care system. In the more rural parts of America, where health-care systems are not in any jeopardy of being overwhelmed, a phased re-opening is wise. Here, too, the President’s plan is helpful: he suggests that re-opening only occur when the data shows a downward trajectory of relevant illness over a fourteen-day period, with hospitals able to cope, and a robust testing program in place for front-line health care workers.
A staggered plan is best because it will allow hotspots to ride out the crunch while the rest of the country supports those less fortunate areas with goods, services, and a functioning economy.
Moreover, the president’s plan isn’t just epidemiologically sound; it’s politically astute. As a matter of constitutional law, President Trump does not have “total authority” to force states to re-open or remain closed; state-level directives are rooted in the police power, which the federal government does not possess. Showdowns with state governors would leave the president on the legal and political low ground: if the President were to order, say, Gavin Newsom to re-open California, Newsom would have both the power and the political incentive to resist. That would leave the president looking impotent, and Newsom looking like an even more attractive 2024 presidential contender. Conversely, if he were to order the state of North Dakota to stay closed against its governor’s wishes, he would fail, and needlessly agitate his base.
A savvy politician, the president likely grasps this troublesome dynamic and has decided to stay above the fray, issuing guidelines rather than heavy-handed orders. That is the correct move. It’s not time to re-open the entire economy, nor is it time for a heavy-handed, universal federal lockdown. It’s time to beat the virus, in a way that makes sense–and our country’s governors are best positioned to do that.
Will Chamberlain is publisher of Human Events.


theamericanconservative--2020-04-20--Joe Biden’s Foreign Policy Gave Us Donald Trump

He acts as though all we need to do is return to the pre-Trump status quo .
It 's not so simple .
My progressive friends are uniformly unenthusiastic about Joe Biden having won the contest to become the Democratic Party ’ s presidential nominee .
Their lack of enthusiasm , which more often than not borders on outright dismay , is understandable and appropriate .
For anyone who wants nothing more than to return this country to the status quo ante Trump , Biden might make for an acceptable candidate .
He is , after all , a consummate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and he recites them ( or reads them off a teleprompter ) with apparent conviction .
Unlike Trump , he at least sounds presidential .
Yet Biden is also a card-carrying member of the political establishment whose myriad failures vaulted Trump into the White House in the first place .
If elected , Biden can be counted on to take the country back to where it was before Trump showed up to spoil the party .
My progressive friends are unhappy with that prospect .
So should conservatives be as well .
To @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , consider the essay that the former vice president published in Foreign Affairs just as the coronavirus pandemic was beginning to bite .
Bearing the predictable title “ Why America Must Lead Again , ” the essay , meant to convey Biden ’ s foreign policy vision , appeared at the tail end of a two-decade period during which American leadership had produced less than reassuring results .
Yet Biden is not one not to tarry over mistakes .
So his essay , for example , makes absolutely no mention of the 2003 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee he ardently supported—the equivalent of Hubert Humphrey running to succeed Lyndon Johnson in 1968 and pretending the Vietnam War never happened .
While skipping right past Iraq , the would-be commander-in-chief offers a something-for-everyone potpourri of promises , touching on everything from trade and climate change to fighting corruption abroad and “ lifting up women and girls around the world.
” Prominently featured in this smorgasbord are assurances of his willingness to use force and a vow that when he occupies the Oval Office the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strongest military in the world.
” It ’ s as if a reluctance to employ violence or a shortfall in available striking power has somehow hampered recent U.S. policy .
Yet fully unpacking Biden ’ s foreign policy vision requires giving due attention to the clichés that he trots out to clinch his argument .
History itself , he insists , validates that vision .
“ This is not a moment for fear , ” Biden assures his readers , giving his best imitation of FDR .
“ This is the time to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ us to victory in two world wars and brought down the Iron Curtain .
The triumph of democracy and liberalism over fascism and autocracy created the free world .
But this contest does not just define our past .
It will define our future , as well.
” Here , in a nutshell , is the narrative that presidents and wannabe presidents routinely employ to divert attention from the complexities and ambiguities of America ’ s actual role in the world .
Define the past as a succession of victories , engineered by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ creation of a “ free world ” —past , present , and future woven together into a seamless garment .
Pretty soon you ’ ll be pressing for regime change in Venezuela or demanding that the ayatollahs knuckle under to Mike Pompeo ’ s latest demands .
Biden ’ s framing of history conveniently excludes all that happened before 1914 or after 1989 , while airbrushing more than a little of what happened in between .
Does the outcome of World War I qualify as a victory or did it merely set the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ flu epidemic of 1918-1919 and b ) another war with Germany that turned out to be even worse than the first one ?
As for defeating fascism , didn ’ t Josef Stalin , neither democratic nor liberal , lend a hand ?
Yet by depicting history as a story of America rising up in glory to thwart distant threats , Biden captures the essence of the past to which establishment politicians , i.e.
, just about everyone except Donald Trump , instinctively revert in stump speeches or on patriotic occasions .
That @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doubt the case .
Yet I submit that the dishonesty of Joe Biden and others of his ilk in sanitizing American history poses its own danger .
As far as foreign policy is concerned , a Biden presidency is likely to compound the follies that gave us Trump in the first place .
For my money , status quo ante Trump is not a good place to be .
Democrats , you owe it to your country to do better than this .
Andrew Bacevich , president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
His most recent book is The Age of Illusions : How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory .

My progressive friends are uniformly unenthusiastic about Joe Biden having won the contest to become the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee. Their lack of enthusiasm, which more often than not borders on outright dismay, is understandable and appropriate.
For anyone who wants nothing more than to return this country to the status quo ante Trump, Biden might make for an acceptable candidate. He is, after all, a consummate political insider. He knows his lines and he recites them (or reads them off a teleprompter) with apparent conviction. Unlike Trump, he at least sounds presidential. Yet Biden is also a card-carrying member of the political establishment whose myriad failures vaulted Trump into the White House in the first place.
If elected, Biden can be counted on to take the country back to where it was before Trump showed up to spoil the party. My progressive friends are unhappy with that prospect. So should conservatives be as well.
To appreciate what this is likely to mean, consider the essay that the former vice president published in Foreign Affairs just as the coronavirus pandemic was beginning to bite. Bearing the predictable title “Why America Must Lead Again,” the essay, meant to convey Biden’s foreign policy vision, appeared at the tail end of a two-decade period during which American leadership had produced less than reassuring results.
Yet Biden is not one not to tarry over mistakes. So his essay, for example, makes absolutely no mention of the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, which as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee he ardently supported—the equivalent of Hubert Humphrey running to succeed Lyndon Johnson in 1968 and pretending the Vietnam War never happened.
While skipping right past Iraq, the would-be commander-in-chief offers a something-for-everyone potpourri of promises, touching on everything from trade and climate change to fighting corruption abroad and “lifting up women and girls around the world.” Prominently featured in this smorgasbord are assurances of his willingness to use force and a vow that when he occupies the Oval Office the United States will continue to possess “the strongest military in the world.” It’s as if a reluctance to employ violence or a shortfall in available striking power has somehow hampered recent U.S. policy.
Yet fully unpacking Biden’s foreign policy vision requires giving due attention to the clichés that he trots out to clinch his argument. History itself, he insists, validates that vision. “This is not a moment for fear,” Biden assures his readers, giving his best imitation of FDR. “This is the time to tap the strength and audacity that took us to victory in two world wars and brought down the Iron Curtain. The triumph of democracy and liberalism over fascism and autocracy created the free world. But this contest does not just define our past. It will define our future, as well.”
Here, in a nutshell, is the narrative that presidents and wannabe presidents routinely employ to divert attention from the complexities and ambiguities of America’s actual role in the world. Define the past as a succession of victories, engineered by the United States and leading to the creation of a “free world”—past, present, and future woven together into a seamless garment. Pretty soon you’ll be pressing for regime change in Venezuela or demanding that the ayatollahs knuckle under to Mike Pompeo’s latest demands.
Biden’s framing of history conveniently excludes all that happened before 1914 or after 1989, while airbrushing more than a little of what happened in between. Does the outcome of World War I qualify as a victory or did it merely set the stage for a) the devastating Spanish flu epidemic of 1918-1919 and b) another war with Germany that turned out to be even worse than the first one? As for defeating fascism, didn’t Josef Stalin, neither democratic nor liberal, lend a hand?
Yet by depicting history as a story of America rising up in glory to thwart distant threats, Biden captures the essence of the past to which establishment politicians, i.e., just about everyone except Donald Trump, instinctively revert in stump speeches or on patriotic occasions.
That Trump himself is manifestly dishonest is no doubt the case. Yet I submit that the dishonesty of Joe Biden and others of his ilk in sanitizing American history poses its own danger. As far as foreign policy is concerned, a Biden presidency is likely to compound the follies that gave us Trump in the first place. For my money, status quo ante Trump is not a good place to be.
Democrats, you owe it to your country to do better than this.
Andrew Bacevich, president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, is TAC’s writer-at-large. His most recent book is The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory.


theamericanconservative--2020-04-21--Joe Biden is the 2020 Candidate of Fear

Joe Biden is the 2020 Candidate of Fear

Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden participates in the 11th Democratic Party debate on March 15 , 2020 .
( Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images ) The Democratic Party is decadent , its future stillborn as its past seizes ownership of its backward-looking present .
In 2020 , the party is set to nominate for president a man who wasn ’ t good enough for the nomination in 1988 or 2008 .
Has he acquired a new vision or new vigor ?
No , but his party has run out of options .
Joe Biden is the candidate of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Obama administration has been his prime selling point in the Democratic primaries , and it certainly helped him to win the support of African-American voters .
But Biden is Barack Obama ’ s antithesis .
In 2008 Obama truly was the candidate of “ hope and change , ” in the sense that he did represent a new page in American politics—he was a one-term senator , not mired in the ways of Washington like his rivals Hillary Clinton and John McCain ( or Joe Biden , for that matter , who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ; he was to be the first African-American president , providing hope that racial division could be overcome and inspiring young people of color to the highest aspirations ; and his policy agenda seemed to be a break with the low expectations of what could be achieved at home and the excessively high expectations of what force could achieve abroad .
However poorly the hopes panned out , and what little change succeeded , there was no doubting what Obama symbolized when he was first elected .
And Joe Biden ?
He ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as the Baby Boomers—or , in fact , a few years older—can still dominate national politics , especially in the Democratic Party .
Though the 77-year-old Biden is a year younger than Bernie Sanders , he was the old man of the Democratic race in two senses that count for more than his birthday .
First , Biden , not Sanders , was the candidate of experience , the one who made his pitch based most of all on his biography , not his plans and policy dreams ; Sanders was the candidate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decades-long tenure in public life .
Second , Sanders was the candidate that young voters preferred ; Biden needed not only African-Americans but older Americans in order to become the party ’ s presumptive nominee .
The problem for Democrats here is not necessarily what happens in November 2020 , but rather how cohesive the party will be even if Biden can win .
Does a Democratic Party led by a 78-year-old President Biden and an 80-year-old Speaker Pelosi have any future in a post-Boomer America ?
Democrats have long taken for granted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ America ’ s generational ethnic transformation : as whites become a smaller majority , and in more and more places are reduced to an electoral plurality , the minority voting blocs that have proved loyal to the Democrats should provide them with permanent power .
Yet this is no longer a safe bet if the Democratic Party splinters ideologically , and the ability of leaders like Biden and Pelosi to appeal to the young leftists of all races who supported Bernie Sanders is very much open to doubt .
To win elections with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ completely different set of voters holds the future of your party , is apt to be a Pyrrhic , and most temporary , victory .
The dead hand of the past lies heavy on the whole country , not just the Democratic Party .
Since 1992 , Americans have consistently elected Washington outsiders to the White House .
Bill Clinton had no national experience when he won that year .
George W. Bush had none when he was elected in 2000 .
Barack Obama had been in the Senate only four years when @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump had no prior experience of holding office of any kind when he became president .
Although considerable continuities emerged throughout the administrations of George H.W .
Bush ( a true Washington insider ) , Bill Clinton , George W. Bush , and Obama—all supported the project of a “ liberal world order , ” in which the United States was embroiled in foreign conflicts , while globalization was their imperative in economics—voters at each election demanded something new and different from the previous status quo .
Clinton was certainly not elected because @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gave them ; Bush II was not elected over Clinton ’ s vice president , Al Gore , because voters wanted to extend the Clinton era ; and Obama was elected in explicit repudiation of Bush II .
Donald Trump , of course , was the leader the country turned to in order to repudiate all of the above : Trump was as bold in his criticism of George W. Bush for the Iraq war , and of earlier Republicans for NAFTA , as he was in his attacks on Barack Obama ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ successful presidential contenders of the last 30 years has presented himself as a champion of an earlier status quo or a force for restoring Washington to its old ways .
Even George W. Bush campaigned on a newfangled “ compassionate conservatism , ” not a return to Reaganism ( or to the 1994 spirit of Newt Gingrich ) .
While it ’ s possible that in 2020 Americans really will want to reverse the tides of time—after the misery of the COVID-19 experience and in reaction against the changes in government that Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ potent in 2016 as to elect Hillary Clinton , and in four years under Joe Biden it is not going to get any fresher .
Whatever opportunities this may present to Republicans and Sanders-style Democrats after 2020 , for the country it will mean being stuck with an agenda and governing vision that had proved its limitations by 2016 .
The same conditions that led to the rise of Donald Trump ’ s populism and Bernie Sanders ’ s socialist movement that year will be established again under Biden , and after Biden @ @ @ @ @ @ @ forms than they did after Obama .
The Trump and Sanders phenomena have happened for a reason , after all .
They happened because “ hope and change ” failed to deliver on its promises , and with Hillary Clinton there was no hope of anything other than stagnation .
Trump and Sanders , in very different ways , represented new hopes and a defiance of stagnation .
Biden , by contrast , offers no future at all .
That includes a future in which he ’ s re-elected , age 81 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ thing ?
The near certainty that Joe Biden could only serve a single term if elected as president makes his choice of vice president a fateful one .
That person will be the presumptive frontrunner for the 2024 Democratic nomination , and voters will take that into account when they cast their ballots this November .
Should Biden win , he will be a lame duck from Day 1 .
Quite apart from whatever drawbacks his running mate will have in her own right ( if Biden follows through on his pledge to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of electing a placeholder president for four years is not likely to sit very well with the American people .
It would be an extraordinary abdication of leadership .
And it ’ s not as if anyone would look to leadership in Congress to fill the gap .
Nor , given the limitations of the office , would a vice president looking ahead to 2024 have the power to supply needed leadership before then .
Quite the contrary : the vice president would be a target for everyone ’ s criticisms , Republicans @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hardly a scenario for a return to stability and “ competence ” in government , as Donald Trump ’ s critics say they want .
It ’ s equivalent instead to not having a president at all for four years—which may sound like a libertarian ’ s fantasy , except that the administrative state would continue to pursue an aggressively progressive agenda during the interim .
That too can only contribute to populist resurgence .
For all the debilities that come with being the candidate of old age , there are advantages , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the paladin of the emerging Democratic Party , a party whose socialism and identity politics have been consistent losers at the ballot box—including , for the most part , in the 2018 midterms , and including in the Democratic presidential race this year .
Biden is a survivor from an older , more broadly popular Democratic Party , one that still had powerful support in white working-class communities , such as those in Pennsylvania , Ohio , Michigan , and Wisconsin that will be as decisive in 2020 as they were in 2016 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Boom generation , Biden is the third coming of the president they grew up idolizing , John F. Kennedy .
JFK was the president they wished they could be , a glamorous symbol of America before Vietnam and Watergate .
( Never mind that JFK actually deepend the country ’ s involvement in Vietnam . )
Bill Clinton , who like JFK claimed an Irish ancestry—though one which in Bill ’ s case has never been proved—was the first Boomer elected president , and at 43 was just a year older than JFK @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Like JFK , Clinton had celebrity charm ; and if he was a womanizer , too , that just went with the type .
Now Biden represents the same Boomer vision in maturity , even if he ’ s a few years too old to be a Boomer himself .
Like Clinton , he also makes an unverifiable claim to Irish ancestry .
Like Kennedy , he identifies as Roman Catholic .
( And yes , like Kennedy and Clinton , he has been accused of mistreating women , and worse . )
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ memory of America—the look and feel of the country in the late 20th century , when white ethnics ( Irish , Italians , Poles , and others ) who had been at the margins earlier in the century now helped to define the mainstream , even occupying the highest office in the land .
To elect Biden at 77 is , perhaps to some of these voters , a way of showing that they still matter in a country whose future will look very different .
Much is made by Trump ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ support ; but ethnic and generational identification with Biden should not be overlooked .
Indeed , as a candidate who hopes to unite white ethnics and blacks , Biden is a throwback to the Democratic Party of an earlier age , too .
As the candidate of fear , Biden aims at a quite different segment of the electorate .
Fear is what motivates upper middle class , highly educated voters .
This professional class , filling as it does the ranks of journalism and the academy , presents itself as anything but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ really hate , and hate is something that only deplorables experience , at least as a political emotion .
Liberals will admit to being personally afraid , or worried for their communities , as a result of the horrors they believe Donald Trump has unleashed on the land .
But only a populist demagogue , or maybe sometimes a socialist one , tries to capitalize on fear .
Good liberal politicians are always about hope and change .
Obama only made the slogan explicit .
( In fact , “ hope ” was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1992 campaign as well , which drew attention to the name his birthplace : Hope , Arkansas . )
Yet liberalism is the politics of fear in the most profound sense : it is an ideology that attempts to neutralize fear through the all-provident power of the state , guided by enlightened leadership .
The fear that men and women traditionally feel on account of religion—fear of God ’ s wrath or fear of a universe without any order—is allayed by liberalism ’ s programmatic commitment to science and to rationalism more generally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , yet that rational explanation will somehow be moral , too .
What is important is that fear can be forgotten , without the need for any unearthly power to supply salvation .
Instead , a supreme earthly power will remove all earthly worries : fear of want , fear of violent death , even fear of disease .
The state is not the only institution that will meet these needs : for many liberals , the free market or science outside of government plays the greater role in provision .
But the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that make possible the efficient operation of the rest of liberal society .
And the state rests on a psychological foundation best explained by Thomas Hobbes .
No doubt Joe Biden has given little thought to the 17th-century philosopher from Malmesbury , England .
Most liberals do not think of themselves as Hobbesians , and a great many denounce Hobbes as an authoritarian or worse .
But he understood that a politics suitable for a modern society has to prioritize fear , and its negation , over other emotions and their gratification .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ fear , particularly the fear of a violent death , can compel men to be reasonable .
Fear of this kind is nigh universally felt , and its effects are quite predictable : people will support a power—an institution—that can protect them from violence .
By itself , that ’ s not a formula for liberalism .
And what liberal society does with Hobbes ’ s political psychology is different from what he himself advised should be done in works like Leviathan .
Liberals accept a great deal of competition and pluralism of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ competition and diversity possible is its harmlessness .
The passions are allowed free rein , but only as long as they are weaker than the fear of violent death that holds society together .
To say that populism has a passion that is stronger than the fear of violent death would be going too far .
But populism does involve a very strong passion for dignity , a desire for greater recognition of one ’ s status or plight—one ’ s humanity , in a felt and not just formally acknowledged sense .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the upper-middle-class opponents of populism in general and Trump in particular .
They sense that this passion is the beginning of a different kind of politics , and has the potential to supplant the foundations of the old liberal system if it ’ s not checked .
Populism has an understanding of human psychology and human nature different from those of liberalism , and such different foundations lead to different forms of politics and theories of the state .
Joe Biden ’ s voters have passions of their own , and they are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they are moved by a desire for justice or decency or fairness or any number of other objects of feeling .
But all of those passions have been trimmed to fit the context of fear—the context of a political system in which fear has been negated but remains central , for should some other emotion displace it at the center of political psychology , the logic of the rest of the system would fail .
The logic of competition for status or dignity looks very different from the logic of escaping from fear @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to upset this balance .
This is why revolutionary or fascistic implications are attached to Trump ’ s politics by his detractors .
Trump and his supporters are very far from being fascists , but their opponents believe that their emotional core , and their scale of passions , is inevitably incipiently fascistic .
Biden is the candidate for an America less concerned with dignity and more prepared to enjoy the fruits of a political psychology based on neutralizing fear .
Under President Biden , the welfare state , science , and even @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the fear of death at bay , and that will make room for mild pleasures : pornography and video games and varied cuisine and recreational activities of all sorts .
Joe Biden ’ s louche son Hunter—known for his hearty indulgence in drugs and his sexual adventures with strippers—is a perfect specimen of humanity under this system .
If he gets more stimulation than others , everyone else should get enough .
And if they don ’ t , they mustn ’ t complain , they should ask for a program .
For @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s affairs , or his great wealth , what exercises their ire the most is his spirit , which isn ’ t satisfied with creature comfort .
His supporters are also motivated by something other than what liberalism can easily satisfy .
( And this holds true whether we are talking about the nationalists or the Christian conservatives among his base . )
Fear should have no competitor as the sovereign passion in a good , rational liberal order , but in Trump the glimmer of competition can be seen .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ no such danger : he sprinkles oil over turbulent waters , promising as he does only “ competence ” and more moderate politics .
Yet here too , Biden ’ s supporters are too quick to address an immediate concern without looking to more serious long-term difficulties—for what Trump , and in a different way Bernie Sanders , indicates is that the liberal order has become too dessicated of humanity and feeling , too mechanical , too perfect .
And so it courts a backlash , of which populism is not so much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ American voters have tried to add new humanity to the nation ’ s politics in every presidential election since the end of the Cold War .
They believed Bill Clinton when he said , “ I feel your pain.
” They gave a “ compassionate ” conservative a chance , and afterwards they demanded more “ hope and change.
” When that effort , too , succumbed to the inertia and decadence of Washington , voters turned to Donald Trump , the most decisive break from politics past .
Now Joe Biden asks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and accept our country ’ s senility .

The Democratic Party is decadent, its future stillborn as its past seizes ownership of its backward-looking present. In 2020, the party is set to nominate for president a man who wasn’t good enough for the nomination in 1988 or 2008. Has he acquired a new vision or new vigor? No, but his party has run out of options.
Joe Biden is the candidate of old age and fear. Nostalgia for the Obama administration has been his prime selling point in the Democratic primaries, and it certainly helped him to win the support of African-American voters. But Biden is Barack Obama’s antithesis. In 2008 Obama truly was the candidate of “hope and change,” in the sense that he did represent a new page in American politics—he was a one-term senator, not mired in the ways of Washington like his rivals Hillary Clinton and John McCain (or Joe Biden, for that matter, who also ran for president that year); he was to be the first African-American president, providing hope that racial division could be overcome and inspiring young people of color to the highest aspirations; and his policy agenda seemed to be a break with the low expectations of what could be achieved at home and the excessively high expectations of what force could achieve abroad. However poorly the hopes panned out, and what little change succeeded, there was no doubting what Obama symbolized when he was first elected.
And Joe Biden? He’s a symbol that people as old as the Baby Boomers—or, in fact, a few years older—can still dominate national politics, especially in the Democratic Party. Though the 77-year-old Biden is a year younger than Bernie Sanders, he was the old man of the Democratic race in two senses that count for more than his birthday. First, Biden, not Sanders, was the candidate of experience, the one who made his pitch based most of all on his biography, not his plans and policy dreams; Sanders was the candidate of the dream, despite his own decades-long tenure in public life. Second, Sanders was the candidate that young voters preferred; Biden needed not only African-Americans but older Americans in order to become the party’s presumptive nominee. The problem for Democrats here is not necessarily what happens in November 2020, but rather how cohesive the party will be even if Biden can win. Does a Democratic Party led by a 78-year-old President Biden and an 80-year-old Speaker Pelosi have any future in a post-Boomer America?
Democrats have long taken for granted the advantage they expect to gain from America’s generational ethnic transformation: as whites become a smaller majority, and in more and more places are reduced to an electoral plurality, the minority voting blocs that have proved loyal to the Democrats should provide them with permanent power. Yet this is no longer a safe bet if the Democratic Party splinters ideologically, and the ability of leaders like Biden and Pelosi to appeal to the young leftists of all races who supported Bernie Sanders is very much open to doubt. To win elections with one set of voters, while a completely different set of voters holds the future of your party, is apt to be a Pyrrhic, and most temporary, victory.
The dead hand of the past lies heavy on the whole country, not just the Democratic Party. Since 1992, Americans have consistently elected Washington outsiders to the White House. Bill Clinton had no national experience when he won that year. George W. Bush had none when he was elected in 2000. Barack Obama had been in the Senate only four years when he won in 2008. And Donald Trump had no prior experience of holding office of any kind when he became president. Although considerable continuities emerged throughout the administrations of George H.W. Bush (a true Washington insider), Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama—all supported the project of a “liberal world order,” in which the United States was embroiled in foreign conflicts, while globalization was their imperative in economics—voters at each election demanded something new and different from the previous status quo. Clinton was certainly not elected because voters wanted more of what Bush I gave them; Bush II was not elected over Clinton’s vice president, Al Gore, because voters wanted to extend the Clinton era; and Obama was elected in explicit repudiation of Bush II. Donald Trump, of course, was the leader the country turned to in order to repudiate all of the above: Trump was as bold in his criticism of George W. Bush for the Iraq war, and of earlier Republicans for NAFTA, as he was in his attacks on Barack Obama’s record.
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None of the other successful presidential contenders of the last 30 years has presented himself as a champion of an earlier status quo or a force for restoring Washington to its old ways. Even George W. Bush campaigned on a newfangled “compassionate conservatism,” not a return to Reaganism (or to the 1994 spirit of Newt Gingrich). While it’s possible that in 2020 Americans really will want to reverse the tides of time—after the misery of the COVID-19 experience and in reaction against the changes in government that Trump has instituted—the Obama legacy was not so potent in 2016 as to elect Hillary Clinton, and in four years under Joe Biden it is not going to get any fresher. Whatever opportunities this may present to Republicans and Sanders-style Democrats after 2020, for the country it will mean being stuck with an agenda and governing vision that had proved its limitations by 2016. The same conditions that led to the rise of Donald Trump’s populism and Bernie Sanders’s socialist movement that year will be established again under Biden, and after Biden those forces might take on much stronger forms than they did after Obama.
The Trump and Sanders phenomena have happened for a reason, after all. They happened because “hope and change” failed to deliver on its promises, and with Hillary Clinton there was no hope of anything other than stagnation. Trump and Sanders, in very different ways, represented new hopes and a defiance of stagnation. Biden, by contrast, offers no future at all. That includes a future in which he’s re-elected, age 81, in 2024. Who can imagine such a thing?
The near certainty that Joe Biden could only serve a single term if elected as president makes his choice of vice president a fateful one. That person will be the presumptive frontrunner for the 2024 Democratic nomination, and voters will take that into account when they cast their ballots this November. Should Biden win, he will be a lame duck from Day 1. Quite apart from whatever drawbacks his running mate will have in her own right (if Biden follows through on his pledge to pick a woman), the idea of electing a placeholder president for four years is not likely to sit very well with the American people. It would be an extraordinary abdication of leadership. And it’s not as if anyone would look to leadership in Congress to fill the gap. Nor, given the limitations of the office, would a vice president looking ahead to 2024 have the power to supply needed leadership before then. Quite the contrary: the vice president would be a target for everyone’s criticisms, Republicans and rival Democrats alike.
This is hardly a scenario for a return to stability and “competence” in government, as Donald Trump’s critics say they want. It’s equivalent instead to not having a president at all for four years—which may sound like a libertarian’s fantasy, except that the administrative state would continue to pursue an aggressively progressive agenda during the interim. That too can only contribute to populist resurgence.
For all the debilities that come with being the candidate of old age, there are advantages, too. Biden is not running as the paladin of the emerging Democratic Party, a party whose socialism and identity politics have been consistent losers at the ballot box—including, for the most part, in the 2018 midterms, and including in the Democratic presidential race this year. Biden is a survivor from an older, more broadly popular Democratic Party, one that still had powerful support in white working-class communities, such as those in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin that will be as decisive in 2020 as they were in 2016. For many voters of the Baby Boom generation, Biden is the third coming of the president they grew up idolizing, John F. Kennedy. JFK was the president they wished they could be, a glamorous symbol of America before Vietnam and Watergate. (Never mind that JFK actually deepend the country’s involvement in Vietnam.) Bill Clinton, who like JFK claimed an Irish ancestry—though one which in Bill’s case has never been proved—was the first Boomer elected president, and at 43 was just a year older than JFK had been when he was elected. Like JFK, Clinton had celebrity charm; and if he was a womanizer, too, that just went with the type.
Now Biden represents the same Boomer vision in maturity, even if he’s a few years too old to be a Boomer himself. Like Clinton, he also makes an unverifiable claim to Irish ancestry. Like Kennedy, he identifies as Roman Catholic. (And yes, like Kennedy and Clinton, he has been accused of mistreating women, and worse.) Biden is a callback to the Boomer memory of America—the look and feel of the country in the late 20th century, when white ethnics (Irish, Italians, Poles, and others) who had been at the margins earlier in the century now helped to define the mainstream, even occupying the highest office in the land. To elect Biden at 77 is, perhaps to some of these voters, a way of showing that they still matter in a country whose future will look very different. Much is made by Trump’s critics of the racial dimension to his support; but ethnic and generational identification with Biden should not be overlooked. Indeed, as a candidate who hopes to unite white ethnics and blacks, Biden is a throwback to the Democratic Party of an earlier age, too.
As the candidate of fear, Biden aims at a quite different segment of the electorate. Fear is what motivates upper middle class, highly educated voters. This professional class, filling as it does the ranks of journalism and the academy, presents itself as anything but fearful—according to its propaganda, fear is really hate, and hate is something that only deplorables experience, at least as a political emotion. Liberals will admit to being personally afraid, or worried for their communities, as a result of the horrors they believe Donald Trump has unleashed on the land. But only a populist demagogue, or maybe sometimes a socialist one, tries to capitalize on fear. Good liberal politicians are always about hope and change. Obama only made the slogan explicit. (In fact, “hope” was a byword of Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign as well, which drew attention to the name his birthplace: Hope, Arkansas.)
Yet liberalism is the politics of fear in the most profound sense: it is an ideology that attempts to neutralize fear through the all-provident power of the state, guided by enlightened leadership. The fear that men and women traditionally feel on account of religion—fear of God’s wrath or fear of a universe without any order—is allayed by liberalism’s programmatic commitment to science and to rationalism more generally. Everything will have a rational explanation, yet that rational explanation will somehow be moral, too. What is important is that fear can be forgotten, without the need for any unearthly power to supply salvation. Instead, a supreme earthly power will remove all earthly worries: fear of want, fear of violent death, even fear of disease. The state is not the only institution that will meet these needs: for many liberals, the free market or science outside of government plays the greater role in provision. But the state at a minimum supplies the rules that make possible the efficient operation of the rest of liberal society.
And the state rests on a psychological foundation best explained by Thomas Hobbes. No doubt Joe Biden has given little thought to the 17th-century philosopher from Malmesbury, England. Most liberals do not think of themselves as Hobbesians, and a great many denounce Hobbes as an authoritarian or worse. But he understood that a politics suitable for a modern society has to prioritize fear, and its negation, over other emotions and their gratification. Other passions disturb the peace; but fear, particularly the fear of a violent death, can compel men to be reasonable. Fear of this kind is nigh universally felt, and its effects are quite predictable: people will support a power—an institution—that can protect them from violence.
By itself, that’s not a formula for liberalism. And what liberal society does with Hobbes’s political psychology is different from what he himself advised should be done in works like Leviathan. Liberals accept a great deal of competition and pluralism of many kinds, but what makes the competition and diversity possible is its harmlessness. The passions are allowed free rein, but only as long as they are weaker than the fear of violent death that holds society together.
♦♦♦
To say that populism has a passion that is stronger than the fear of violent death would be going too far. But populism does involve a very strong passion for dignity, a desire for greater recognition of one’s status or plight—one’s humanity, in a felt and not just formally acknowledged sense. This passion is what most deeply offends the upper-middle-class opponents of populism in general and Trump in particular. They sense that this passion is the beginning of a different kind of politics, and has the potential to supplant the foundations of the old liberal system if it’s not checked. Populism has an understanding of human psychology and human nature different from those of liberalism, and such different foundations lead to different forms of politics and theories of the state.
Joe Biden’s voters have passions of their own, and they are no doubt usually sincere in saying that they are moved by a desire for justice or decency or fairness or any number of other objects of feeling. But all of those passions have been trimmed to fit the context of fear—the context of a political system in which fear has been negated but remains central, for should some other emotion displace it at the center of political psychology, the logic of the rest of the system would fail. The logic of competition for status or dignity looks very different from the logic of escaping from fear. The Trump phenomenon and populism threaten to upset this balance. This is why revolutionary or fascistic implications are attached to Trump’s politics by his detractors. Trump and his supporters are very far from being fascists, but their opponents believe that their emotional core, and their scale of passions, is inevitably incipiently fascistic.
Biden is the candidate for an America less concerned with dignity and more prepared to enjoy the fruits of a political psychology based on neutralizing fear. Under President Biden, the welfare state, science, and even the free market will continue to keep the fear of death at bay, and that will make room for mild pleasures: pornography and video games and varied cuisine and recreational activities of all sorts. Joe Biden’s louche son Hunter—known for his hearty indulgence in drugs and his sexual adventures with strippers—is a perfect specimen of humanity under this system. If he gets more stimulation than others, everyone else should get enough. And if they don’t, they mustn’t complain, they should ask for a program.
For all that liberals complain about Donald Trump’s affairs, or his great wealth, what exercises their ire the most is his spirit, which isn’t satisfied with creature comfort. His supporters are also motivated by something other than what liberalism can easily satisfy. (And this holds true whether we are talking about the nationalists or the Christian conservatives among his base.) Fear should have no competitor as the sovereign passion in a good, rational liberal order, but in Trump the glimmer of competition can be seen. In Joe Biden, however, there is no such danger: he sprinkles oil over turbulent waters, promising as he does only “competence” and more moderate politics. Yet here too, Biden’s supporters are too quick to address an immediate concern without looking to more serious long-term difficulties—for what Trump, and in a different way Bernie Sanders, indicates is that the liberal order has become too dessicated of humanity and feeling, too mechanical, too perfect. And so it courts a backlash, of which populism is not so much a manifestation, but an antibody.
American voters have tried to add new humanity to the nation’s politics in every presidential election since the end of the Cold War. They believed Bill Clinton when he said, “I feel your pain.” They gave a “compassionate” conservative a chance, and afterwards they demanded more “hope and change.” When that effort, too, succumbed to the inertia and decadence of Washington, voters turned to Donald Trump, the most decisive break from politics past. Now Joe Biden asks them to turn back, give up, and accept our country’s senility.


theamericanconservative--2020-04-21--Trump Should Sign an America First Stimulus Plan

Donald Trump doesn ’ t understand why America can spent $ 8 trillion on “ rebuilding ” the Middle East , but “ if you want to fix a pothole in a highway , you can ’ t do it because they don ’ t want to give you the funds.
” “ Frankly , for so many years , we ’ ve let our infrastructure go to hell because we were wasting all our money in the Middle East and other places .
Okay ?
I want to rebuild our country , ” he vented .
It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ win in 2016 .
With a turn of the phrase , he succinctly describes problems that are obvious to so many Americans yet hidden from our elites : “ You can ’ t have a country without borders ” ; “ We can ’ t continue to allow China to rape our country and that ’ s what they ’ re doing ” ; “ The worst single mistake ever made in the history of our country : going into the Middle East , by President Bush.
” While Trump certainly has a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into actions has proved more challenging .
The COVID-19 crisis provides one final opportunity to put America First before the November election .
On the issue of endless war and infrastructure , there ’ s never been a more perfect time for the president to deliver on two of his most significant campaign promises .
As our country faces record levels of debt and unemployment , the concept is simple : bring our troops home and rebuild America .
Yet , in both cases , Trump faces staunch resistance from Republican leadership and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of State Mike Pompeo , for example , spent the month of March lobbying the president for an even greater footprint in the Middle East to counter Iran .
And while 88 % of Republicans support a bipartisan infrastructure bill , Republican leadership on the Hill is divided .
In response to a question about whether or not he ’ d support the White House ’ s infrastructure proposal , Senate Majority Leader McConnell said , “ we would all like to tackle infrastructure in a credible way and hopefully that ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ credible , he means “ credibly paid for ” as he ’ s hesitant to add another $ 2 trillion to the national debt .
President Trump , on the other hand , insisted that “ were going to borrow the money at zero-percent interest…our interest payments are almost zero and we can borrow long term.
” Regardless of how the project would be paid for , the fights over Middle East interventionism and infrastructure spending represent deeper fissures on the right that have emerged since Trump ’ s election in 2016 .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ office after 9/11 and reflexively share George Bush ’ s idealism in foreign policy and Paul Ryan ’ s austerity in economic policy .
But the president was elected on a very different message .
In May of 2016 , then-candidate Trump said , “ This is called the Republican Party , it ’ s not called the Conservative Party.
” By repudiating the neoconservatives in the GOP , Trump harkened back to an older Republican and conservative tradition that was embraced by Lincoln and his successors .
Out on the campaign trail @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ My politics , he said , are short and sweet like the old woman ’ s dance .
I am in favor of a national bank .
I am in favor of the internal improvement system and a high protective tariff .
These are my sentiments and political principles.
” On account of Lincoln ’ s support for the tariff and internal improvements , he won the vote of the industrialists in Pennsylvania and eventually the country .
Sound familiar ?
President Trump is a Lincoln Republican , and his unique @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the last election , but the window to implement his agenda is closing .
Because the Democrats are eager to pass another relief package to combat the effects of coronavirus , a tentative “ Phase 4 ” stimulus plan represents Trump ’ s last chance to advance any major legislation before the end of his term .
How should he go about it ?
First , he should tell Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy that his signature on any stimulus plan , including renewed funding for the paycheck protection program , is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan , Iraq , and Syria by the end of the year .
According to the Project on Government Oversight , we have spent “ an average of $ 23.7 billion monthly for the past 228 months ” in the war on terror .
This is morally indefensible and fiscally unsustainable , especially considering our present circumstances .
The savings from this withdrawal should be spent in our own backyard on an infrastructure plan that will benefit American citizens for years to come .
Second , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that any new stimulus plan must include a “ Made in America ” industrial plan to restore our manufacturing capacity and repatriate supply chains from an increasingly authoritarian China .
An America First industrial policy , already popular among Senators like Josh Hawley and Marco Rubio , could certainly include traditional infrastructure projects like roads , bridges , and tunnels , but it should also focus on developing next generation infrastructure like 5G technology and financing for companies to “ on-shore ” production to America , especially for medical equipment , pharmaceuticals , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conditions are met , the president should practice the art of the deal and negotiate with the Democrats .
While they will no doubt insist on pet projects like funding for green energy projects or expanding broadband internet access , it will play to his political advantage , and the well-being of the country , if he can finally deliver on his promise to end the wars in the middle east , restore our industrial capacity , and rebuild America .
Talk is cheap .
Trump may have discredited the neocons and moved @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of issues , however , if he fails to deliver on his core campaign promises by November he could face an uphill battle in Pennsylvania , Michigan , and Wisconsin this fall .
With his presidency hanging in the balance , he would do well to seize the moment and put America First .

Donald Trump doesn’t understand why America can spend $8 trillion on “rebuilding” the Middle East, but “if you want to fix a pothole in a highway, you can’t do it because they don’t want to give you the funds.”
“Frankly, for so many years, we’ve let our infrastructure go to hell because we were wasting all our money in the Middle East and other places. Okay? I want to rebuild our country,” he vented.
It’s moments like this that helped Donald Trump win in 2016. With a turn of the phrase, he succinctly describes problems that are obvious to so many Americans yet hidden from our elites: “You can’t have a country without borders”; “We can’t continue to allow China to rape our country and that’s what they’re doing”; “The worst single mistake ever made in the history of our country: going into the Middle East, by President Bush.” While Trump certainly has a way with words, translating meme-worthy exclamations into actions has proved more challenging. The COVID-19 crisis provides one final opportunity to put America First before the November election.
On the issue of endless war and infrastructure, there’s never been a more perfect time for the president to deliver on two of his most significant campaign promises. As our country faces record levels of debt and unemployment, the concept is simple: bring our troops home and rebuild America.
Yet, in both cases, Trump faces staunch resistance from Republican leadership and members of his own administration. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, for example, spent the month of March lobbying the president for an even greater footprint in the Middle East to counter Iran. And while 88% of Republicans support a bipartisan infrastructure bill, Republican leadership on the Hill is divided.
In response to a question about whether or not he’d support the White House’s infrastructure proposal, Senate Majority Leader McConnell said, “we would all like to tackle infrastructure in a credible way and hopefully that’s what they’ll recommend.” By credible, he means “credibly paid for” as he’s hesitant to add another $2 trillion to the national debt. President Trump, on the other hand, insisted that “were going to borrow the money at zero-percent interest…our interest payments are almost zero and we can borrow long term.”
Regardless of how the project would be paid for, the fights over Middle East interventionism and infrastructure spending represent deeper fissures on the right that have emerged since Trump’s election in 2016. Most Republican members of Congress came to office after 9/11 and reflexively share George Bush’s idealism in foreign policy and Paul Ryan’s austerity in economic policy.
But the president was elected on a very different message. In May of 2016, then-candidate Trump said, “This is called the Republican Party, it’s not called the Conservative Party.” By repudiating the neoconservatives in the GOP, Trump harkened back to an older Republican and conservative tradition that was embraced by Lincoln and his successors.
Out on the campaign trail, a young Abe Lincoln once quipped, “My politics, he said, are short and sweet like the old woman’s dance. I am in favor of a national bank. I am in favor of the internal improvement system and a high protective tariff. These are my sentiments and political principles.” On account of Lincoln’s support for the tariff and internal improvements, he won the vote of the industrialists in Pennsylvania and eventually the country. Sound familiar?
President Trump is a Lincoln Republican, and his unique policy priorities flipped the upper Midwest red in the last election, but the window to implement his agenda is closing. Because the Democrats are eager to pass another relief package to combat the effects of coronavirus, a tentative “Phase 4” stimulus plan represents Trump’s last chance to advance any major legislation before the end of his term. How should he go about it?
First, he should tell Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy that his signature on any stimulus plan, including renewed funding for the paycheck protection program, is contingent on them removing any roadblocks to the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria by the end of the year. According to the Project on Government Oversight, we have spent “an average of $23.7 billion monthly for the past 228 months” in the war on terror. This is morally indefensible and fiscally unsustainable, especially considering our present circumstances. The savings from this withdrawal should be spent in our own backyard on an infrastructure plan that will benefit American citizens for years to come.
Second, he should tell Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi that any new stimulus plan must include a “Made in America” industrial plan to restore our manufacturing capacity and repatriate supply chains from an increasingly authoritarian China. An America First industrial policy, already popular among Senators like Josh Hawley and Marco Rubio, could certainly include traditional infrastructure projects like roads, bridges, and tunnels, but it should also focus on developing next generation infrastructure like 5G technology and financing for companies to “on-shore” production to America, especially for medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, and rare-earth minerals.
If these two conditions are met, the president should practice the art of the deal and negotiate with the Democrats. While they will no doubt insist on pet projects like funding for green energy projects or expanding broadband internet access, it will play to his political advantage, and the well-being of the country, if he can finally deliver on his promise to end the wars in the middle east, restore our industrial capacity, and rebuild America.
Talk is cheap. Trump may have discredited the neocons and moved the Overton Windows on an important set of issues, however, if he fails to deliver on his core campaign promises by November he could face an uphill battle in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin this fall. With his presidency hanging in the balance, he would do well to seize the moment and put America First.