Guest post by Prof. Nic Capaldi, Loyola University
This is the most significant publication to date on Trump. It is a refreshing explanation of Trump and his thinking.
The key to understanding Trump’s View of the World is his opposition to Globalism, an opposition that provides content to Trump’s America First positive agenda.
What Trump opposes is a single world government, most especially a world government administered and controlled by Technocrats (and their allies in academe and the media) committed to some form of socialism.
He opposes Globalism because it is dysfunctional, is contrary to Trump’s understanding of American culture, history, the role of America in the world, and because it is focused on achieving its goals by redistributing America’s wealth and resources.
In opposition to Globalism, Trump espouses a different World Economic Model based on American ideals (see 35 propositions on pp. 50-54. Trump’s political philosophy reflects a world being transformed by modern technology, a market economy, limited government, the rule of law, and a culture of personal autonomy rooted in spirituality and transcendence.
What about Trump the personality? Malloch sees Trump as a combination of two Clint Eastwood characters, “Dirty Harry” and Walt Kowalski of Gran Torino fame.
This characterization is difficult for some people to grasp or to approve both because it is so different from traditional/fashionable models of Presidential demeanor and because those differences have been demonized and misrepresented by Trump’s opponents and rivals.
It is also a characterization that endears Trump to so many in his base. In addition, Malloch explains Trump’s style of chaos management and negotiation as previously reflected in The Art of the Deal. Whether one approves of Trump or not, Malloch’s description of Trump rings true and opens the possibility of serious analysis instead of relentless and programmatic ad hominem.
Trump’s successes to date demand that we engage in this deeper analysis proposed by Malloch.
What then are Trump’s policies? To begin with, it is important to recognize that Trump makes waves not out of incompetence or rancor but because he has challenged every major entrenched interest group to rethink itself.
It is worth reminding ourselves here of publications like Mills’ The Power Elite and Dye’s Who’s Running America. He has challenged the Old Republican Party, the lobbyists, the Business Round Table, neo-cons, the military-industrial complex, academe and the media, entrenched bureaucrats or ‘Deep State’, teachers’ unions and public employee unions, the Black Caucus in Congress, etc.).
The Republican Party needs to include the American worker and not just business; the Business Round Table needs to see that we need an economy that benefits the American worker and not just stockholders; we need an immigration policy that strengthens American culture and improves the lives of present citizens as opposed to one that undermines national sovereignty and punishes the least well off by outsourcing abroad and even to illegals on our own soil; the “Deep state” must be accountable to the voters and not become a technocracy; for example, the State Department must stop promoting Globalism and realize that self-interested nation states rule the world; we need an overwhelmingly deterrent military and not the pursuit of glory and promotions in endless foreign wars; we need a world-wide market economy that plays by the same rules, unlike China and the mercantilist EU; we need a NATO that collectively defends the sovereignty of its member states and not one in which the U.S. pays for the defense of Europe so that its member states can pursue socialism at the expense of the US taxpayer; we need a responsible media that expresses public opinion rather than manufacturing public opinion; we need an educational system that prepares students for jobs in the real world and responsible citizenship not anti-Americanism; we need leaders of the African-American community who promote independence, safety and economic growth as opposed to ever-increasing federal handouts (this is not the 1960s); we need to protect the environment by promoting technological innovation and with responsible and science-based regulation as opposed to politically motivated hysteria.
Most of all we need a culture that recognizes that sometimes the best policy is choosing the least of the evils as opposed to blind ideology.
Trump is America’s wake-up call; perhaps we should stop trying to shoot the ‘bugler’ and debate the message rather than shoot the messenger.
It is to be hoped that Malloch’s brilliant book will be read as an invitation to restore integrity to public policy debate. America deserves such.
** You can order Trump’s World here.
