The Trump administration is in full retreat from its array of right-wing populist promises.
Instead of scrapping NAFTA, they are merely looking for minor adjustments. Instead of showing China who’s boss, they have retreated on Taiwan, and are promising a far more favorable stance on trade in exchange for whatever help China might offer on North Korea — while telegraphing that they know help is bound to be limited.
.. Most dramatically, Trump reversed the overwhelming thrust of his campaign with respect to foreign policy, ordering an attack on Syria and welcoming Montenegro into NATO, saying that the Atlantic alliance is “no longer obsolete.”
.. Most dramatically, Trump reversed the overwhelming thrust of his campaign with respect to foreign policy, ordering an attack on Syria and welcoming Montenegro into NATO, saying that the Atlantic alliance is “no longer obsolete.”
Faced with any difficult problem, he chooses the easiest way out, which in politics will mean appeasing whoever presents the most current threat.
Trump’s base turns on him
Steve Bannon’s downgrade is just one of many complaints. ‘We expect him to keep his word, and right now he’s not keeping his word,’ says one campaign supporter.
.. Their complaints range from Trump’s embrace of an interventionist foreign policy to his less hawkish tone on China to, most recently, his marginalization of his nationalist chief strategist
.. a belief that Trump the candidate bears little resemblance to Trump the president.
He’s failing, in their view, to deliver on his promise of a transformative “America First” agenda driven by hard-edged populism.
.. Lee Stranahan, who, as a former writer at Breitbart News
.. “There was always the question of, ‘Did he really believe this stuff?’ Apparently, the answer is, ‘Not as much as you’d like.’”
As Bannon’s influence wanes, on the rise is a small group of Wall Street-connected advisers whose politically moderate and globalist views are anathema to the populist cause.
.. Trump voters “felt like they were voting for an anti-establishment candidate — and they’re terrified, they’re losing faith,
.. Michael Savage and Laura Ingraham, called last week’s bombing of Syria a betrayal
.. he backed away from his oft-repeated campaign line that NATO is “obsolete.”
.. Other Trump boosters worry that he’s ditching his economic agenda.
.. backed off his vow to label China a currency manipulator
.. reversal on his position to eliminate the Export-Import Bank.
.. Larry Kudlow .. expressed dismay that the president hadn’t yet released a tax plan.
.. has yet to follow through on his pledge to rescind protections for undocumented parents and children put in place under former President Barack Obama.
.. Immigration is “why we voted for Donald Trump
.. some of his loyalists are beginning to compare him to another Republican who lost the support of the party’s base: Arnold Schwarzenegger.
.. It’s like dating a girl whose father cheated on her mother. She’s always going to be suspicious,” he said. “He’s got to constantly provide wins because he’s got an emotionally damaged base that’s been abused.”
59 Missiles Don’t Equal a Foreign Policy
the public performance of President Trump and his team throughout this tragic episode hardly inspires confidence. On the contrary, the administration demonstrated a dangerous degree of incoherence and inconsistency.
.. Despite a brutal six-year civil war in which Mr. Assad’s forces have been responsible for the deaths of about 200,000 civilians, and despite near universal opposition to his rule by leaders of the civilized world
.. Ms. Haley thought it was the right time to send a signal to Mr. Assad and his allies, Russia and Iran, that the new American president’s priority “is no longer to sit there and focus on getting Assad out.”
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson confirmed this new view, which Sean Spicer, the White House spokesman, described as a simple recognition of “political reality.”
.. For months they have suggested that “America First” meant that the country should not become mired in the region’s civil wars and violent upheavals.
.. public reversal
- .. Mr. Trump raised doubts about the longstanding “one China” policy, only to endorse it weeks later.
- .. contradictory statements about NATO
- .. There had been talk of scrapping the Iran nuclear accord
.. Where the administration stands on any number of major issues can depend on the day of the week.
.. inability or refusal to articulate — or even formulate — an overarching foreign policy beyond Mr. Trump’s nationalistic slogan “America First”
.. disconnect between Nikki Haley .. and the White House
.. give heart to dictators who view inconsistency as weakness.
.. Mr. Trump has allowed, or perhaps encouraged, the creation of confusing lines of authority and alternative centers of power within the White House
.. Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, has emerged as the president’s foreign policy troubleshooter, playing a prominent role in the administration’s talks with China, visiting Iraq
.. These are jobs traditionally given to seasoned diplomats, something Mr. Kushner is not.
.. Fixing this problem is a straightforward matter of political power, will and discipline.
.. he has put down America’s moral leadership in the world while talking up dictators and strongmen
China’s Gamble: How a Crusade to Prop Up the Yuan Imperils Other Pressing Mandates
Beijing’s aggressive approach threatens to shortchange the tasks of safeguarding economic growth
.. the bank’s emphasis on propping up the yuan has constrained its ability to fight other economic ills such as persistent housing bubbles. “The issue of the exchange rate,” he says, “has become shackles on policy makers’ ability to take other necessary actions.”.. China’s currency-first policy is risky because the country now faces what economists call the “trilemma,” the theory that a country can’t at once have a controlled exchange rate, free capital flow and independent monetary policy.
.. it is also creating unintended stresses, including heightened risks of a full-blown cash squeeze
.. Since then, the PBOC has spent $1 trillion, a quarter of its currency reserves, to control the yuan’s fall.
.. China isn’t seeking to stop the yuan’s fall altogether, but to guide it lower in an orderly fashion. Too sharp a drop could drive up inflation by increasing import costs and cause uncontrollable capital flight—battering confidence in the Communist Party.
.. A weaker yuan also makes it harder for Chinese companies, from state banks to airlines, to service their more-than-$1 trillion foreign debt.
.. The PBOC is also refraining from using traditional monetary-policy tools such as one it usually employed when the economy needed a push: cutting the amounts banks are required to hold in reserve, so they can make more loans. China now has one of the highest reserve-requirement ratios in the world
.. “China should tighten as little as possible so that it won’t become too expensive for Chinese firms to borrow money, but it needs to tighten enough to keep money at home,”
.. “The strategy is ultimately about buying time, but it’s a bridge to nowhere unless the authorities successfully deal with the debt problem and undertake reforms that allow for healthier growth.”
.. China’s financial system faces a liquidity shortfall—the gap between how much money is needed to meet China’s 6.5% growth target and how much is available—of as much as 13.1 trillion yuan this year.
.. the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis called China’s $1 trillion reserve decline “unprecedented” and said China must eventually choose some combination of tighter capital controls, tighter monetary policy or a devaluation to avoid further depletion.
Economists and investors warn that because of the effect of higher interest rates on companies with massive debt, Beijing may eventually have to give up currency control and let interest rates fall.
“The greatest risk in 2017,” says Pimco’s Mr. Frieda, “is that China is forced to choose in favor of financial-system stability at the expense of exchange-rate stability.”