Will There Be Life after Trump?

What will survive of his madness?

Donald Trump has received the most devastating criticism that any person, especially a president, could ever receive. He deserves it.

But just when one thinks there is nothing else bad to say about him, Foreign Policy magazine’s website presents an interview with Radoslaw Sikorski, Poland’s former foreign minister.

The journalist asks, “Do you think Trump is just ignorant of that history [pre-World War II], or do you think this was an expression of actual hostility to the notion of alliances in general?

Sikorski answered, “If I were to comment on his ignorance, I wouldn’t know where to begin.”
Therefore, it was not by chance that Martin Wolf, the chief economics commentator at the Financial Times, stamped the label “ignoramus” on Trump.

After the display of such dismal character, one might wonder: are he and his internal and external policy interventions here to stay, or will the next U.S. president (given the questionable hypothesis that the U.S. will survive Trump) undo each one of them?

As for the president, the answer will depend on November’s midterm elections. If the Democrats regain the majority in both houses of Congress, it is possible that impeachment proceedings will take place, even more so now that Michael Cohen, President Trump’s long-time attorney, has leaked that he secretly recorded a conversation he had with Trump two months before the presidential election, in which the two discussed payments made to a former Playboy model who said she had an affair with Trump.

If the Republicans threatened to remove Bill Clinton from office for having an affair with a White House intern, isn’t there reason enough for impeachment in a similar situation with a Playboy model?

In my opinion, neither situation is reason for impeachment. But the hypocritical puritanism among a portion of American legislators says something else.

However, if there is no impeachment, Trump's defeat in a bid for re-election may come in two years. If he survives a new election, it is going to be every man for himself.

But if he is defeated, will his initiatives remain? This is the topic of Janan Ganesh’s column, Ganesh being one of the many good commentators for the Financial Times. He believes that some of Trump’s initiatives in domestic policy (tax policy, hostility toward immigrants and protectionism) will survive because they have public support.

I am not sure about the protectionism piece, judging from a recent study by the Pew Research Center, which found that nearly half (49 percent) of those surveyed think that rising tariffs for U.S. import partners will be bad for the country. Only 40 percent believes they are good.

Regarding the two topics that have stirred up emotional reactions this past week (the fight with NATO, the affection for Russia), it is reasonable to expect that a new president, either Republican or Democrat, would undo Trump’s initiatives. After all, nowadays, 72 percent of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of Russia. And conversely, only 23 percent are critical of NATO.

Either way, the world must not stand around waiting for the disorder that Trump is encouraging. There have been some moves and attempts to address the situation here and there. It is too bad that Brazil is adrift in the middle of the storm, without a real president and with a lack of presidential contenders that think beyond the alliances (or in a very specific case, beyond getting out of prison).