At Times Like This
Seven years ago, in the midst of the 2016 presidential election, one of the comments about Donald Trump that got lost in the shuffle was that he would likely not be a steady and reliable leader in a crisis, especially a serious crisis that might involve nuclear weapons. The issue came up several times during his presidency like when he abruptly cancelled the Iran nuclear ban deal, started playing footsie with Kim Jong Un while North Korea was testing ICBMs in the background, and once again in Helsinki when he became embarrassingly sycophantic with Vladimir Putin and asked rhetorically why he shouldn’t believe him when he said he did not interfere in the 2016 American elections, despite strong assertions to the contrary from the U.S. intelligence community. But for the most part, we were all lucky because there really never was a crisis (at least not one that we knew about) that caused us to wonder if we had inadvertently put ourselves into the hands of an unhinged leader who would fold under pressure. By now, everyone in the world understands that Trump is full of bluster and underneath is a marshmallow in the face of anything the approaches a danger to himself or his way of life. We haven’t had to search for the clues to this behavior, but just watch his crocodile tears as he pleads victimhood to any allegations against him. This is not subtle behavior, in fact, I would suggest that Trump’s biggest asset for the electorate is that he is so easy to read. Where his actions were startlingly unbelievable at one point (so very unpresidential), they have become all too familiar and predictable to us at this point.
I understand that the way Republicans have been trained to react these days to almost any criticism directed to them and their leadership, especially Donald Trump, is to deflect. The “What about Hillary?” Commentary has almost become laughable at this point. It is seven years since Hillary had any sway on the national scene or even in the Democratic Party. While she was a powerful force in the country (whether you liked her or not) from probably as early as 1990 until 2016, she is as far from the center of gravity as a has-been or wannabe could be at this point. I recall in early 1993 Vernon Jordan, the quintessential power broker of his day, telling me that if hubby Bill had not been nominated and elected, Hillary would most certainly have been Attorney General in 1993 based on her standing in the Democratic sphere. He claimed that she, not Bill was the power stroke in the Clinton family. But that was long ago and yet the echoes of “Lock her up!” still ring in the ears of Republicans whenever any criticism is turned towards them, their policies or their fearful leader, Donald Trump. Forget that the Trump irresponsibly-tethered DOJ had a full four years to tag her with almost anything and that it never happened…because nothing existed with which to tag her. And that’s not the only deflection direction, whether its Biden’s age or Nancy Pelosi’s effectiveness, they will use almost anything to not have to answer to the weaknesses that sit on the surface of Donald Trump like a boil on his forehead.
But now we have a very thorny global crisis, and a very real one at that. This might well qualify as a once-in-a-generation moment of stress in the geopolitical firmament at a time when the world is just now recovering from a Pandemic that rocked everyone’s world in one way or another, a new and not unrelated onslaught of our old economic nemesis, inflation, and what some of us have called a Fourth Turning of the world towards totalitarianism and evil. It was quite startling to hear Yevgeny Prigozhin say as he headed for Belarus on Saturday that good had unmasked evil for what it was. The implication was that his mercenary force, with the flowers in their hair from the citizens of Rostov-on-Don, were driving out the evil spirit of the Putin military oligarchs who were both incompetent and had evil intent for the citizens of both Ukraine and Russia. This weekend could be best characterized as a nuclear scare for people who understand such threats. How many movies do we have to see where the rogue faction of Russian or Chinese military are feared to have gotten control of the nuclear arsenal? This is not an unimagined situation and there is little scarier than an irresponsible madman with little to lose and even less conscience to guide him. We all know the nuclear scenario now after living with it as a distant dark cloud in our lives since 1945.
Let’s think about the world as we currently know it. China has been steadily moving away from the U.S. of late and Xi has come to understand that an internet-connected world with a much more modern population today than even 20 years ago is not easy to control and manage as in Red China days of yore. He has successfully used his Belt and Road Program to ingratiate himself and China to large swaths of the emerging markets of the world. The Helpful Chinese versus the Ugly American is pretty widespread by now. India has also more apart from the U.S. than we can ever remember. These 1.3 billion people (this month becoming the most populous nation in the world) are no longer the polite little colonial servants portrayed in Rudyard Kipling’s Gunga Din. If they are a “better man”, it is less through servitude than through education and work ethic. And that has made them more like the fearless Ghurkas with their knives drawn and ready for righteous battle against any foes contrary to their interests, including the U.S.. The Middle East is still a mess with a growing swath of instability that covers everything from the Mediterranean Sea through the Levantine areas, Persia, Afghanistan and Pakistan to the borders of the Punjab. The path taken by the Light Brigade in 1854 from Calcutta to Crimea is virtually impassable today by varying degrees. Would you rather cross Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey or Georgia into Russia to get to Crimea, where its unclear who will hold that little gem of a peninsula next month, Russia or Ukraine, or God-knows, Belarus.
When I recently saw that Paraguay is considered one of the more stable Latin American countries as places like Brazil flip-flop from totalitarianism to progressivism, Venezuela can’t restart its engine since Chavez and Mexico is one big hot cartel mess, I can’t say the Western Hemisphere is in better shape than anywhere else. Australia/NZ and Canada are still good, but there’s a reason those places are so unpopulated. Where does that leave Europe and the U.S. (and maybe Japan)? It leaves us holding the bag for global leadership since everyone else is focused on their own knitting.
At times like this, we need a steady hand on the tiller and I for one am happy that we have Joe Biden, as old as he is, on the bridge of our ship of state. The way he has handled the Trump nonsense and the way he has restored the faith of NATO and other parts of the world has been comforting. This weekend, I was sure we were in good hands. Hand that leave ego out of the equation. Hands that are strong enough and yet compassionate enough for the job at hand. You are a good man, Joe Biden, and at times like these I sure am glad you are our leader.