Wonks and Eggheads Still Don’t ‘Get’ Trump

Trump promised everything but a cure for cancer during last Thursday’s press conference, and there was no doubting his sincerity or his commitment to helping to shape a better world. Can he do it? One thinks of Teddy Roosevelt, who possessed seemingly limitless energy and zeal for taking on big projects, including building a national park system and the Panama Canal. Trump has big ideas too, and by all evidence the diligence to see them through. It was therefore disappointing that the stock market failed to show much feel-good energy on Friday. Chalk it up to Wall Street’s cynicism toward politicians with big ideas other than large tax cuts. Investors, of course, will always be more concerned about Fed monetary policy. This suggests that Trump’s successes, if they are going to have a major impact on the economy, will need to align themselves with the central bank’s purposely beige and often murky agenda. For the present, however, any wonk, talking head or left-tilting economist is unlikely to ‘get’ Trump.

Will the mainstream media, the political left, the academy, and a popular culture shaped by babbling ideologues like George Clooney, Jimmy Fallon, and Whoopi Goldberg eventually come around? it is encouraging that Meta’s Zuckerberg was the first celebrity from the business world to kiss Trump’s ring/ass. Although Zuck’s $440 million gift to local election boards indisputably stuffed enough ballot boxes to swing the 2020 election to Biden, it was just business. He has demonstrated that he will sleep with anybody, including Trump, if the payoff is big enough. Facebook shares went vertical after Zuckerberg’s White House visit shortly after the election, presumably because Wall Street sensed the company’s karma was coming into alignment with Trump’s America. The same could be said of Tesla’s shares, as trust and friendship between Musk and the President have deepened. For selfish reasons, we should all hope that Musk becomes the world’s first trillionaire during Trump’s watch.

China’s Evil Ambitions

If the President’s loftiest ambitions come to fruition, we will be living in a relatively peaceful world that has fewer trade barriers. The first goal is imaginable because of Trump’s apparent rapport with Putin. Although no Boy Scout, the Russian leader seems unmotivated by a desire to dominate and enslave the world. China, on the other hand, is ruled by evil ambitions, and we can only hope Trump is being diplomatic when he speaks of the two-faced Xi Jinping as a man he can do business with. As for lowering tariffs, Trump’s common-sense idea of ‘reciprocity’ has already muffled the Wall Street Journal’s knee-jerk brand of anti-protectionism. Trump says America will match the tariffs of each of our trading partners, an irreproachable idea that has set him above eggheads and editorialists who know just enough economics to be dangerous.