The Consequences of Holding Your Breath Until You Turn Blue

“I will build a great wall ― and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me ―

and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will make Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words.”

 Trump’s First Mention of the Wall, June 16, 2015

“I.” “I.” “I.” That Donald Trump picked a showdown with the Democrats, after the mid-terms provided a totally unanticipated and massive House shift in favor of the Dems, was startling. Perhaps he is unaware that it only the House that is reflective of the population; the Senate elects two Senators from each state regardless of population. Trump’s popularity remains solid only with his base. His abrasive and mendacious personality are increasingly a turn-off with the moderate Republicans and independents he needs to carry an election. Thinking the GOP would pull a Senate nuclear option to do whatever Trump wanted… facing an incoming Democratic House majority. Seriously. Inept on steroids. Hey, Donald, get Mexico to pay for that wall!

Unfortunately, his base diehards – bolstered by Fox News zealots – remain convinced that the United States faces an armed invasion of well-armed drug dealers, gang members and clandestine terrorists at the U.S.-Mexican border… Not the desperate asylum seekers who face personal violence, death and torture in their home countries seeking to stay alive and take care of their accompanying children. Facts die hard in the Trump administration. Separating children was not a good visual for anyone outside the base, Donald. Adhocracies, national leadership that shoots first and asks questions later, don’t work.

We can expect more Trump rallies in 2019, the only place where Trump can look as if he is a winner. His base is all about those visual manifestations of Trump’s efforts – learned in his years as a television personality. For Trump, where his giant name has been plastered on buildings all over the world, a picture of a physical structure associated with his name is a keystone to his reelection bid. Initially, he accepted full responsibility for any Congressional budgetary standoff over funding the wall:

“During the Oval Office debate [with Democrats Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi… GOP VP Mike Pence silent and uncomfortable in the room], Trump said he would be ‘proud’ to take responsibility for a government shutdown if it meant securing the border. He doubled down on the matter of a potential shut down at a bill signing later in the day, saying, ‘I don't mind owning that issue.’” BusinessInsider.com, December 11^th.

Then he changed his blame-driven mind; the Democrats were now responsible for the shutdown. His base stood by his revised interpretation, but the rest of the world believed his initial statement. What an opportunity for the Democrats to draw their own line in the sand, watching as Republicans twist and squirm trying to justify the inane shutdown forced by their fearless leader.

We live in an era where the real gangsters – drug cartels well-armed with U.S. guns smuggled south – actually prefer a hard wall; it gives them an excuse to raise drug prices in the U.S. Just as Trump has allowed states to cut healthcare coverage to treat addicts who create the demand that drives his feared trafficking. Genuine border security would be seriously enhanced with 21^st-century technology, not hideously-expensive and ineffective medieval castle walls. Even we were stupid enough to build a wall, think about the maintenance bill to keep a physical wall intact! Aside from normal wear and tear, think folks are going to respect that wall and keep it in pristine shape? If America’s pattern of deferred maintenance is any indicator, that wall (if built) would crumble in bits and pieces without repair.

What’s more, the cartels have the money to dig tunnels, use modern submarines and aircraft (drones, anyone?) and bribe officials on both sides of the border. For anyone willing to analyze the reality of drug smuggling (and easy-to-get assault weapons sold legally here and smuggled south), the colossal nature of the waste of taxpayer money represented by the potential of Trump wall is painfully obvious. It has little to do with genuine border security; the nastiest people who want to cross over have the financial means to do so.

Added to the unwinnable trade wars – even though we know Trump will turn normal gives and takes into the “greatest successful trade war in the history of mankind” – an abnormally high rate of turnover of senior Trump appointees (even for Trump: Chief of Staff, Interior Secretary, Attorney General, ISIS coalition ambassador, UN representative, Defense Secretary, etc.), near-universal condemnation of his troop pullouts in Syria and Afghanistan from his own party bigwigs, the forced closing of the Trump Foundation and the mounting toll of criminal convictions of senior Trump campaign officials, appointees and personal representatives, Trump’s endeavor to hold his breath until he turned blue – his partial shutdown of the federal government over the Dems’ refusal to vote for funds for his wall – began a series of steep stock market declines, more than enough to erase all the 2018 share gains. “…I think it's a tremendous opportunity to buy," opined the architect of the fall – The Donald himself – on Christmas.

Even the market gains from his wasteful tax reform act – the nation got a massive deficit increase with nothing much to show for it anywhere else – were totally lost. He tried to blame this huge collapse in share prices on the market-anticipated .25-point rate increase from the Federal Reserve, consistent with a pattern of such minor increases that barely moved the market each time such a rate hike was announced. “The only problem our economy has is the Fed,” said Trump on December 24^th. Only his base believed that blame assessment. What the financial community saw was instability, a presidency that was already unraveling, unable and unwilling to face the 2019 reality of a Democratically-controlled House. The President was now the inept precinct captain of a cabinet of equally inept Keystone Cops.

For example, no one was even thinking that the current market plunge had anything to do with instability in the banking sector. It was simply Trump-induced instability. Then, bumbling Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin got on the phone to call the CEOs of our six largest U.S. financial institutions seeking assurances of sufficient lending liquidity (which he got). The markets reacted as if he knew something really bad about our banks or he would never have made that call. Another big plunge.

The one big calling card that those, beyond his irrational base, who voted for Mr. Trump hold dear are related to economic statistics – numbers based on “averages” so if the rich get really richer, the data only reflects overall “average” success even as most live with unchanged or reduced economic reality. His unemployment numbers are already teetering. With a market fall, added to the already serious cost-of-living increases (especially in food, housing, healthcare and steel/aluminum durables), Trump’s major perceived success will vaporize.

Unless he compromises and soon, no matter his attempt to assess blame elsewhere, Trump will be held responsible for any economic failures. Although those who have delved into his decades of massive litigation, his litany of business bankruptcies, watching as Hong Kong real estate lenders handed his head to him in federal court, etc. know he is an inept bully-businessman, too many Trump supporters still cling to the notion of having a self-made billionaire do the same for them and the country. I wonder how most of us would have done if we too had inherited $400 million with lots of already-purchased prime NYC real estate.

              I’m Peter Dekom, and our Emperor is as devoid of clothes as any comparable emperor in the entire recorded history of emperors!