The Economist Warns “The World Must Prepare For Trouble” Under Trump

If the scenes of anarchy in Berkeley last week were not enough to strike fear into the hearts of free-speech-supporting average Americans, then The Economist just turned the fearmongery amplifier to ’11′ in its latest op-ed describing the ‘insurgency in The White House’.

Washington is in the grip of a revolution, The Economist begins…

The bleak cadence of last month’s inauguration was still in the air when Donald Trump lobbed the first Molotov cocktail of policies and executive orders against the capital’s brilliant-white porticos. He has not stopped…

…In politics chaos normally leads to failure. With Mr Trump, chaos seems to be part of the plan. Promises that sounded like hyperbole in the campaign now amount to a deadly serious revolt aimed at shaking up Washington and the world.

To understand Mr Trump’s insurgency, start with the uses of outrage. In a divided America, where the other side is not just mistaken but malign, conflict is a political asset. The more Mr Trump used his stump speeches to offend polite opinion, the more his supporters were convinced that he really would evict the treacherous, greedy elite from their Washington salons.

His grenade-chuckers-in-chief, Stephen Bannon and Stephen Miller, have now carried that logic into government.

…

Americans who reject Mr Trump will, naturally, fear most for what he could do to their own country. They are right to worry, but they gain some protection from their institutions and the law. In the world at large, however, checks on Mr Trump are few. The consequences could be grave.

Without active American support and participation, the machinery of global co-operation could well fail…

If Mr Trump truly wants to put America First, his priority should be strengthening ties, not treating allies with contempt…

America’s allies must strive to preserve multilateral institutions for the day after Mr Trump, by bolstering their finances and limiting the strife within them. And they must plan for a world without American leadership.

A web of bilateralism and a jerry-rigged regionalism are palpably worse for America than the world Mr Trump inherited. It is not too late for him to conclude how much worse, to ditch his bomb-throwers and switch course. The world should hope for that outcome. But it must prepare for trouble.

Read more here (if you dare)…

Scared yet? You should be… except President Trump is seemingly enacting exactly what the American people want and voted for – which is an awkwardly democratic thorn stuck in the paw of the establishment lion, who is salivating stubbornly hoping his drool can eviscerate the painful insurgent. Three words are what they must truly come to comprehend – four more years.