The Art of the Deal?

Let’s see. Donald Trump has asked the world to join with him, as President of the United States, in a multinational effort to contain, negate and suppress a global pariah, Kim Jong-un. That most of the world blames the escalation of recent tensions, pushing that ugly North Korean leader dangerously close to pulling the nuclear trigger, on Donald Trump’s neurotically-compulsive need to grand-stand for his base by tweeting those he opposes with his litany of late-grade-school-level name-calling.

Trump believes that the world needs to act in unison against that obvious nuclear threat. But when it comes to trade agreements, Donald Trump chastises multinationalism, tells leaders that his mandate is to put “American First” (which he assumes they will do for their own nations), and that the United States no longer believes in globalism and multinational trade agreements. The U.S. now believes that trade agreements must be bilateral. Only very large nations or those desperate for U.S. support have indicated that they would even entertain such go-it-alone policies. Yet Trump seems to believe that he can, country-by-country, rewrite American influence over what he describes as the “Indo-Pacific,” embracing mega-huge India as a counterbalance to Chinese power.

But Donald Trump came back from his Asia circuit with little in the way of anything tangible. Even that seeming lovefest with Japan’s PM Abe did not convince Japan to negotiate a one-on-one trade agreement with the U.S. Trump’s inept foreign policy messages fall into his rather transparent mixed-message approach, one which may work with his base but clearly has found little traction anywhere else. His visit included Japan, China, South Korea, Vietnam and the Philippines. Lots of ceremonies, pomp and circumstance. Not much beef.

Trump’s affirmation of a “great relationship” after his meetings with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte – known for his support of extra-legal killings of drug users and dealers – resulted neither in a commitment to enter into bilateral trade negotiations with the US nor a slowing of Duterte’s recent cozying up to the People’s Republic of China at the expense of relations with the US.

China’s President Xi has played Trump like a violin, smiling as The Donald continued to embrace policies that allow China to grow in international power and influence at our expense (more below). What is it, Donald? The world works together, multinationally, so as to clamp down on dangerous foreign powers with WMDs, or separately in a bilateral world? Join forces or go-it-alone.

As for world trade, it is painfully obvious that Trump’s efforts have fallen mostly on deaf ears, particularly when it comes to less powerful nations feeling rather clearly that they are no match for the economic bargaining power of the United States. Bilateralism seems dead on arrival. My November 11th blog Designing a Trade World without the United States, lays that reality out, down and dirty. Trump and company are profoundly out of step with contemporary global realities. His administration’s attempts to sell coal during the recent Bonn climate conference drew out-and-out jeers.

But Trump’s international ineptness doesn’t stop there. Despite the unanimity of Trump’s own intelligence agencies (some of whom Trump has labeled as “political hacks” in tweets), and the findings of his GOP-controlled Congress, Trump blindly and openly accepts the word of one of the most manipulative leaders on earth, Vladimir Putin, that Russia did not try to interfere with the American election process. That other nations have had Russian cyber-penetration of their own elections, with tons of rather tangible evidence, doesn’t seem to matter a whit to Donald “I actually believe my opinions are always fact” Trump.

Word at the understaffed and rather demoralized Department of State, where even Secretary Tillerson is undermined by the President at the few foreign policy efforts he has attempted, is that Trump’s ill-prepared and inexperienced son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is in the final stages of preparing his peace plan for a negotiated settlement between Palestine and Israel. Yup, that same son-in-law who told daddy-Trump that there would be no political fallout from firing FBI head, James Comey. Boy Kushner, not Tillerson. Picture the elder Middle Eastern statesmen being forced to listen to a pitch from that boy-diplomat on peace. Yeah, stupid. Meanwhile on November 13th, a massive 7.3 earthquake hit the Iran-Iraq border killing hundreds and injuring thousands. It is a region where massive suffering never seems to end. 

The headline from that trip: In the words of our former UN Secretary, Susan Rice, Donald Trump is “making China great again.” China is smirking, turning Trump’s belief that flattery is how you manipulate people back on Trump. “President Trump’s recently concluded trip to Asia had the potential to advance important American security and economic interests. Played correctly, his ambitious five-country, 12-day trip could have steadied his administration’s rocky start in this vital region. Instead, it left the United States more isolated and in retreat, handing leadership of the newly christened ‘Indo-Pacific’ to China on a silver platter…

“[In] China, the wheels began to come off his diplomatic bus… China always prefers to couch state visits in ceremony rather than compromise on policy. This approach seemed to suit President Trump just fine, as he welcomed a rote recitation of China’s longstanding rejection of a nuclear North Korea and failed to extract new concessions or promises. He also settled for the announcement of $250 billion in trade and investment agreements, many of which are nonbinding and, in the words of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, ‘pretty small.’ Missing were firm deals to improve market access or reduce technology-sharing requirements for American companies seeking to do business in China.

“Mr. Trump showered President Xi Jinping of China with embarrassingly fawning accolades, calling him ‘a very special man’ and stressing that ‘my feeling towards you is an incredibly warm one.’ He blamed his predecessors rather than China for our huge trade deficits and hailed Mr. Xi’s consolidation of authoritarian power. Such scenes of an American president kowtowing in China to a Chinese president sent chills down the spines of Asia experts and United States allies who have relied on America to balance and sometimes counter an increasingly assertive China.” Susan Rice’s Op-Ed in the November 13 New York Times. Increasingly, nations around the world are learning to trust China and avoid dealing with the United States as much as they can. Bad lesson!!!

My October 26th blog, Fraudster, Huckster or Savvy Populist President, lays out the rather substantial list of Trump’s business failures, from bankruptcies and excessive litigation to his getting decimated in US federal courts at the hands of Hong Kong Chinese investors who handed The Donald his lunch. But what that blog did say is that Trump caters to the one thing he believes he does well: salesmanship. Convincing people, through charm, lying (“hyperbole” in Trump’s own words) and bullying. Like campaigning, right? Even after the election? If you say something enough…

Trump’s own mainstay – under-educated white males squeezed out of well-paying blue collar jobs who believe El Presidente will restore their obsolete livelihoods – are among the few that have in fact bought into Trump’s salesmanship, hook line and sinker. They are angry. They are very well armed. To them: Globalization and immigrants are the problem. Overregulation and taxation of the wealthy are the problem. And if Trump doesn’t deliver, it will not be his fault. Swamp dwellers, including establishment Republicans, liberals and non-whites will be to blame. Automation? What’s that? See my November 10th Understanding Automation blog for the real blue collar job killer. It’s all about the base, about the base… The rest of the world, not so much. We are alone and getting “aloner” fast.

I’m Peter Dekom, and if only selling to people who have announced in advance they are buying… but being unable to sell to anyone else… is good salesmanship, then Donald Trump is at the top of his game.