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The Whiplash Presidency

  

Category:  Op/Ed

Via:  hallux  •  one week ago  •  24 comments

By:   David A. Graham - The Atlantic

The Whiplash Presidency
The president and his aides are changing their minds at nauseating speed.

S E E D E D   C O N T E N T


This morning, President Donald Trump used the standard diplomatic channel—his Truth Social account—to announce retaliation against Canada for Ontario’s new electricity tariffs, which were themselves   retaliatory .

“I have instructed my Secretary of Commerce to add an ADDITIONAL 25% Tariff, to 50%, on all STEEL and ALUMINUM COMING INTO THE UNITED STATES FROM CANADA, ONE OF THE HIGHEST TARIFFING NATIONS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD. This will go into effect TOMORROW MORNING, March 12th,”   Trump wrote . The rest of the message is much stranger, again promising the annexation of Canada: “The artificial line of separation drawn many years ago will finally disappear, and we will have the safest and most beautiful Nation anywhere in the World.”

Earlier this evening, Ontario’s premier, Doug Ford,   pulled back   the electricity tariffs after securing a meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and the White House dropped its threat. Ford likely recognized that no matter how belligerent a stance Trump takes, he can be easily induced to change his mind.

Consider what’s happened with tariffs over the past 45 days. On February 1, Trump announced 25 percent tariffs on both Canada and Mexico, to take effect on February 4. On February 3, he announced a one-month pause in implementation. On February 26, he said he might not actually impose the tariffs until April 2; the next day, he said they’d start on March 4. On March 2, Lutnick suggested that the tariff situation was “fluid.” On March 4, the tariffs went into effect after all.

Confused yet? We’re just getting started. That afternoon, with stock markets reacting poorly, Lutnick suggested that the tariffs might be rolled back the next day. Indeed, on March 5, Trump announced that he was suspending parts of the tariffs related to auto manufacturing until April. And then, on March 6, he suspended all of the tariffs until April. Trump once   told us   that trade wars are “easy to win.” Now he seems unsure about how to fight one, or whether he even wants to.

If the defining feeling of the start of the first Trump administration was   chaos , its equivalent in this term is whiplash. The president and his aides have been changing their minds and positions at nauseating speed.

Many of the reversals seem to come down to Trump’s caprices. On February 19, he   called   Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “a dictator.” About a week later, he disavowed that. “Did I say that? I can't believe I said that,” he   told reporters . “I think the president and I actually have had a very good relationship.” The next day, Trump   berated   Zelensky in the Oval Office, sent him packing, and began cutting off military help to Ukraine. This afternoon, the U.S.   restarted   military and financial aid once again.

Another leading cause of whiplash is  Bureaucrat in Chief  Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service. Last week, the General Services Administration put up a list of more than 400 buildings that the cost-cutting crew had deemed inessential for government operations. The inventory included some eye-raising entries, including the Robert F. Kennedy building—headquarters of the Justice Department—and the main offices of the Labor Department and the FBI, but also some peculiar ones, such as  steam tunnels  underneath Washington, D.C. (One imagines that the wrong buyer could cause a great deal of mayhem with those.) Within hours, more than 100 entries had been  removed  from the list; by the next day, it was gone entirely, replaced by a  “coming soon”  message—though not before  revealing  a semi-secret CIA facility.

DOGE and other efforts to slash the federal workforce keep overstepping and requiring reversals. In some cases, officials seem to be discovering that the things Trump wants are either impracticable or too politically toxic to effect. Musk posted on X that if federal workers didn’t respond to an email, it would be tantamount to their resignation. Then the threat was removed. Then Musk sent  another email . Thousands of federal workers have been laid off, only to be  called back to work . Some workers who accepted a buyout offer were then  fired ; others had the offer  rescinded . Musk tittered over canceling and then uncanceling  Ebola-prevention programs , though some officials  dispute that they were actually uncanceled . The administration planned to shut down the  coronavirus-test-distribution program , then ultimately suspended but did not end it; it killed but then resuscitated a  health program  for 9/11 survivors.

Trump isn’t just going back on specifics. Some of his core campaign propositions are also looking shaky. Despite campaigning on the deleterious effects of inflation, he now   says   that it’s not a top priority. He   promised   booming wealth for Americans; now he   can’t rule out   a recession and is warning that people will need to endure some pain (for what higher purpose, he hasn’t made clear). And even though Trump has long said that he won’t cut Medicare or Social Security, Musk is now   targeting   them and calling Social Security a Ponzi scheme.

This kind of vacillation creates an obvious credibility problem for the president and his administration. As I wrote during Trump’s first presidency, foreign leaders quickly concluded that   he was a pushover , easily convinced by flattering words.   Trump practically always folded   in a negotiation. This history, combined with his mercurial moods, mean that counterparts don’t assume they can take him at his word. In the case of Canada, Trump seems to have come out with the worst possible outcome: Canadian leaders believe he’s deadly serious about annexing the country, a quixotic goal, but they have no reason to take his bluster about tariffs, which he can actually impose, all that seriously.

The situation might be even more dangerous if observers took Trump at his word. His dithering has given markets the   jitters , but the economic impacts might be more dire if traders acted as though they expected him to follow through on all of his tariff threats. (After he said this past weekend that a recession is possible, markets   plunged . Did investors believe he had some secret plan up his sleeve until then?)

Uncertainty is bad for markets, but the problem is larger than that. One of the most fundamental roles of the state is to create a sense of consistency and stability for society. That provides the conditions for flourishing of all kinds: economic, artistic, cultural, scientific. Trump is both seeking to seize more power for himself and refusing to exercise it in a way that allows the nation to flourish.

Today, my colleague Adam Serwer wrote about the   detention of Mahmoud Khalil , a leader of pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University who has not been charged, much less convicted, of any crime. This, too, calls into question the stability of the rule of law—specifically, the long-standing fact that the First Amendment and due process apply to legal permanent residents. (Last month,   I wrote that   Trump’s actions were showing that his commitment to free speech was bogus. He seems determined to prove me right.) The first months of the Trump presidency have been whiplash-inducing, but in the long term, the failure to set and follow consistent rules threatens national pain much worse than a sore neck.


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Hallux
Professor Principal
1  seeder  Hallux    one week ago

To top it off NOAA has been reduced to a canary in a windsock.

 
 
 
Split Personality
Professor Guide
2  Split Personality    one week ago

And we thought Biden was slowing down too much to be effective.

The new Administration seems bound and determined to prove they can be just as ineffective by going too fast.

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
2.1  devangelical  replied to  Split Personality @2    one week ago

a friend that's a gov't employee that works remotely went to the local office to work his required in person day and found out there was no desk or computer available for him and was given the option of standing in the hallway with the others or going home. he left.

 
 
 
Hal A. Lujah
Professor Guide
2.2  Hal A. Lujah  replied to  Split Personality @2    one week ago

It will be over as soon as Donald puts SpaceX in charge of air force one.

 
 
 
Split Personality
Professor Guide
2.2.1  Split Personality  replied to  Hal A. Lujah @2.2    one week ago

Didn't the FAA ground SpaceX after #7 blew up spectacularly and #8 shut down and disappeared the other day?

 

 
 
 
Hal A. Lujah
Professor Guide
2.2.2  Hal A. Lujah  replied to  Split Personality @2.2.1    one week ago

It was a rapid unscheduled disassembly.  I think Musk could fix it if he would just board the next rocket and monitor it a little more closely.

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
2.2.3  devangelical  replied to  Hal A. Lujah @2.2.2    6 days ago

gee, I wonder what it costs to have a private jet guarded by private security 24/7 ...

 
 
 
Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
2.2.4  Bob Nelson  replied to  devangelical @2.2.3    6 days ago

When you have hundreds of billions, you really do not care.

 
 
 
JBB
Professor Principal
3  JBB    one week ago

"Don't Look" - Trump to working Americans with 401Ks and IRAs...

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
4  devangelical    one week ago

let's see, 75 million+ guns sold in the last 4 years to gullible dipshits that think the gubmint is coming for them thanks to trumpski, some of those same dipshits just got axed by felon and elon, along with veterans getting bent over, and now prices are going way up because of the gross incompetence of the main dipshit in the white house. I'm really liking the direction this is going, and especially the odds ...

 
 
 
Hal A. Lujah
Professor Guide
5  Hal A. Lujah    one week ago

With all the “chain sawing of bureaucracy” to clear the landscape for billionaire tax cuts, clearly there is going no money for infrastructure.  The official position will be no money for infrastructure unless something falls down and kills at least two babies and ten adults (US citizens only).  Maiming doesn’t count.

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
5.1  devangelical  replied to  Hal A. Lujah @5    one week ago

meh, those wrongful death lawsuits can be drawn out longer than attempted election fraud and stolen classified documents cases ...

 
 
 
TᵢG
Professor Principal
5.1.1  TᵢG  replied to  devangelical @5.1    one week ago

Anyone who understands the concept of executive competence has overwhelming evidence that Trump is incompetent.

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
5.1.2  devangelical  replied to  TᵢG @5.1.1    one week ago

unless he's being judged by other incompetent executives ...

 
 
 
Trout Giggles
Professor Principal
5.2  Trout Giggles  replied to  Hal A. Lujah @5    6 days ago

They have to be white, too

 
 
 
Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
5.2.1  Bob Nelson  replied to  Trout Giggles @5.2    6 days ago

... and male. Sorry, TG...

 
 
 
Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
6  Bob Nelson    one week ago

Are tariffs on, against Canada? Dunno. What time is it?

 
 
 
Freefaller
Professor Quiet
7  Freefaller    one week ago

Just read he changed his mind on adding another 25% tariff on aluminum and steel

 
 
 
Hallux
Professor Principal
7.1  seeder  Hallux  replied to  Freefaller @7    one week ago

The 'man' put the flip into the flop.

 
 
 
Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
8  Bob Nelson    one week ago

He has invented the "fli-op"!

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
9  Tacos!    one week ago

Just imagine the freakout - and justifiably so - if Biden changed his mind this much.

 
 
 
TᵢG
Professor Principal
9.1  TᵢG  replied to  Tacos! @9    one week ago

Waiting for the "miss me yet?" billboards to appear.

 
 
 
Split Personality
Professor Guide
9.1.1  Split Personality  replied to  TᵢG @9.1    one week ago

That would be a funny meme, lol.

 
 
 
TᵢG
Professor Principal
9.1.2  TᵢG  replied to  Split Personality @9.1.1    one week ago

That was displayed when Obama was in office ... referring to Bush.

 
 

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