Trump is naive, Trump is unintelligent, Trump is evil.

We casually lash out against this political figure, who most will either hate or love, as if we were cracking racial jokes in the canteen. Ironically by the way.

Naive, unintelligent and evil are closer than we may think. They work in tandem: We consider him evil when his limited understanding of sensitive issues fails to act as a safety switch.

However true that may be, I nevertheless want to point your gaze the exact opposite way. Towards the price of intelligence, of understanding, of empathy.

Simple folks are persuaded by simple means. Brighter folks are bogged down in much more sophisticated ruses.

Our kindness can be used against us, and naturally we are more or less skilled in the art of evading exploitation thereof.

But kindness is a disposition only. When it is acted out, we are left with a practical situation marred by pros and cons, benefits and sacrifices.

Once we are knee-deep in the reality of acting out, we are increasingly more willing to turn a blind eye to the sacrifices to achieve the desired outcome. We explain the discrepancy to ourselves and mostly to others, and since we communicate words better than emotions, what remains after the years are the explanations themselves. They become the resolve.

As years pass by, the resolve hardens into an ideological fortification.

In the political stratosphere this is taken to the extreme. You cannot discern the politician from the fortification, battle-hardened and petrified.

Trump has lived a different life, but let’s forget about him for a brief second. In the end, the problem is not that Trump does not understand us, but that we don’t understand him anymore, or anybody else who is more concerned with living than being caught up in ideological warfare.

The problem is us. Armed with a primitive conviction, we go out and wreak all sorts of havoc.

The custom of candidates and cabinet members to testify to their politics during election years provides us with a window to examine the mentality of the leaders we are about to elect. Here are two articles from 2024 and one from 2020.

The Biden biosphere

Why America Must Lead, Joe Biden, 2020

Written before he was elected, he spends considerable time attacking Trump.

The article could really have been written by all of us. Hand us a microphone, and we immediately respond with platitudes: “We need to stand together in opposition to tyranny.”

What this essay requires of the reader is an attitude to the question of whether we create those tyrants proactively.

All governments need to handle dissent and mass incitement. All governments need to preserve peace during protests. All governments are vulnerable to riots and revolutions. Some are more brutal than others.

For Biden and his key cabinet members, they are very much in the clear that US power should be used in the good cause throughout the world. He attacks Trump for leaving the reins:

President Donald Trump has belittled, undermined, and in some cases abandoned U.S. allies and partners.

[…] the rapid advance of authoritarianism, nationalism, and illiberalism has undermined our ability to collectively meet them

Liberalism is at the heart of his foreign policy. Taken straight on, there is no doubt that it is his ambition to tick off all the boxes in the policy list:

I will reaffirm the ban on torture and restore greater transparency in U.S. military operations, including policies instituted during the Obama- Biden administration to reduce civilian casualties. I will restore a government-wide focus on lifting up women and girls around the world. And I will ensure that the White House is once again the great defender—not the chief assailant—of the core pillars and institutions of our democratic values, from respecting freedom of the press, to protecting and securing the sacred right to vote, to upholding judicial independence.

Even before the Biden administration came into existence, the focus on global affairs was remarkable. Biden and other key members in his cabinet all believe that solving foreign problems will help the national problems.

As vice president, I secured bipartisan support for a $750 million aid program to back up commitments from the leaders of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras to take on the corruption, violence, and endemic poverty driving people to leave their homes there. Security improved and migration flows began to decrease in countries such as El Salvador

It remains unanswered as of yet whether this reasoning explains the massive interest in the rest of the world’s nations:

Today, democracy is under more pressure than at any time since the 1930s. Freedom House has reported that of the 41 countries consistently ranked “free” from 1985 to 2005, 22 have registered net declines in freedom over the last five years.

[…] An insidious pandemic, corruption is fueling oppression, corroding human dignity, and equipping authoritarian leaders with a powerful tool to divide and weaken democracies across the world.

The deck is clearly stacked against Trump domestically and USA’s major competitors globally.

In 2020, the Biden campaign consistently fused Trump’s ethical standard with the scorn it lavished upon “the autocrats”.

By pulling out of treaty after treaty, reneging on policy after policy, walking away from U.S. responsibilities, and lying about matters big and small, Trump has bankrupted the United States’ word in the world.

[…]

He has taken a battering ram to the NATO alliance, treating it like an American-run protection racket.

Trump pressures NATO countries to increase spending. Biden/Obama claims to have done the same before Trump. But the difference is the frame of mind with which is was done:

But the alliance transcends dollars and cents; the United States’ commitment is sacred, not transactional. NATO is at the very heart of the United States’ national security, and it is the bulwark of the liberal democratic ideal—an alliance of values`, which makes it far more durable, reliable, and powerful than partnerships built by coercion or cash.

NATO is not a business, it is the worldly manifestation of a value system that must never be viewed merely as a cost/benefit problem.

Why am I stressing this? Because every step Biden and his democratic friends walk along this road, they become more and more contingent on the immorality of their foes. Note that this also entails Trump at this point. However millions of Americans are ready to testify to the fact that Trump is the only person caring about them.

What if millions are ready to testify that only with Putin do they feel that the person in power is one who cares about the everyday life of ordinary Russians? It poses a problem:

What should we say about the autocrat or strong leader who holds on to power to use that power for the benefit of this own people?

If we shy away from admitting a fundamental conflict at this point, we only have ourselves to blame.

We can hope that popular leaders accidentally also turn out to be cruel people. Or the far more popular indictment: That all power corrupts and it is only a matter of time before unconstrained power will lead to brutal abuse.

—Trump seems to be on the other team, taking the word of autocrats while showing disdain for democrats. By presiding over the most corrupt administration in modern American history, he has given license to kleptocrats everywhere.

But we have a problem. Even Stalin of all leaders is in Russia still regarded with some respect. Search for Stalin on Levada.ru’s pages and examine the surveys. And how could you claim otherwise? Stalin got Russia through WWII and crafted the industrial change in the country. Respondents are shown to be mixed with regard to whether Stalin brought more good than bad.

Political scientists how long known that liberalism is an elite project. Voters are governed by different attractions.

Larry M. Bartels writes in The Populist Phantom in Foreign Affairs:

Six decades ago, the political scientist Herbert McClosky’s classic study of “consensus and ideology in American politics” documented the shallow allegiance of many ordinary Americans to the “rules of the game.” McClosky concluded that members of “the active political minority” were “the major repositories of the public conscience” and “the carriers of the [democratic] Creed.”

(The articles itself attempts to refute the media promoted notion of populism as a driving factor behind recent elections, stating that voters may oscillate between candidates, but are actually rather stable on issues).

Do you see the problem? People may want freedom, but they don’t necessarily want liberalism as a religion to go with it.

Biden again:

The Kremlin fears a strong NATO, the most effective political-military alliance in modern history. To counter Russian aggression, we must keep the alliance’s military capabilities sharp while also expanding its capacity to take on nontraditional threats, such as weaponized corruption, disinformation, and cybertheft. We must impose real costs on Russia for its violations of international norms and stand with Russian civil society, which has bravely stood up time and again against President Vladimir Putin’s kleptocratic authoritarian system.

I urge the reader to enter the only habitat in which this perception can survive: The Biden-biosphere. And then leave it again and enter other spheres of culture. How do these words look seen from their perspective? Ask yourself as a Russian citizen, what coded language does Biden use?

We can of course ignore his use of the standard trope in diplomatic language: Their leader is a tyrant (who our government responsibly hate). He mistreats his people (which our government care for). A trope employed by Russian and American politicians alike.

Biden says that China cannot ignore the US:

On its own, the United States represents about a quarter of global GDP. When we join together with fellow democracies, our strength more than doubles. China can’t afford to ignore more than half the global economy. That gives us substantial leverage to shape the rules of the road on everything from the environment to labor, trade, technology, and transparency, so they continue to reflect democratic interests and values

Paraphrasing: The USA controls 50% of global GDP, because we control our Western minions. We shape the rules so [… censored …] and also reflect [insert the usual list] democratic interests and values.

Biden says that Kremlin cannot ignore NATO (so Clinton really did cross a red line in the 1990s?) and Putin’s government does not enjoy legitimacy as viewed from the perspective of Russian voters. (But do visit Levada.ru, a sociological research centre in Russia labelled as funded by foreign money and praised as independent in the West, and find out yourself. It only takes five minutes).

The Blinken thinking

America’s Strategy of Renewal, Antony Blinken, 2024

While Biden merely lashes out against the resident autocrat within the walls of the City on the Hill itself, Secretary of State Antony Blinken in 2024 after four years of working in Biden’s staff reveals a whole different level of conviction and determination.

Whenever I analyse politicians’ articles, I ask myself if the mentality sounds like the product of being isolated with likeminded people. In other words: Is he dishing out the consensus inside a closed group? Or is there evidence that he understands others as well?

The Biden administration has seen three years of non-stop commitment to global warfare. In Blinken’s view this was a worthy investment. The Biden administration transformed Trump’s country to a globally strong partner. This has paid dividends in the sense that for the investment of one Ukraine, they have gained the fear of China and many smaller autocratic countries.

He uses the word revisionist a lot. We need a vocabulary to better understand Blinken.

• Revisionist: A state wanting to challenge the status quo which is that USA is the winner of the Cold War.
• Rules based: A set of non-binding, non-written agreements controlled by USA on how to operate in the global space.
• Disinformation: The spreading of the lie that USA is becoming weaker and its days as a dominant power are limited.
• US interests: An expression that is completely synonymous with “freedom and equality”. The more they shape the world according to US interests, they freer the world becomes.

Blinken believes in the liberal brotherhood of the West. He clarifies that we are bonded by en ethos which the “revisionists” cannot compete with.

China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea have complicated histories and divergent interests, and their partnerships with one another do not come close to the United States’ long-standing alliance architecture. Underneath their grand claims of friendship and support, these countries’ relationships are largely transactional,

Unlike USA, the bloc’s relations are not value-based but opportunistic. The North American bloc is bound together by values instead.

It is this alliance architecture that both Biden and Blinken laments that Trump has nearly squandered away. Biden says:

For 70 years, the United States […] played a leading role in writing the rules, forging the agreements, and animating the institutions that guide relations among nations and advance collective security and prosperity—until Trump.

This is the hegemon speaking. They are so used to influencing foreign nations, that he habitually reminds us that the USA is “forging” the rules of the game.

The club of liberals live in an eternal twilight between US interests and moral necessity. A land where shadows of the plans of their “enemies” stretches far into the sacred country, and when the hour strikes late, the blurring of visible contours between chivalry and selfishness.

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty (and of primacy).

Back to Blinken.

And yet all four revisionists share an abiding commitment to the overarching objective of challenging the United States and the international system. That will continue to drive their cooperation, especially as the United States and other countries stand up to their revisionism.

He acknowledges no room outside the status quo with US as the dominant power.

Translation: When R-CH-I-NK outlive their revisionism, i.e., when they challenge the primacy of USA, the latter will stand up to it, and so will the whole united West of liberal democracies. This resolve we owe the Biden administration:

When the Biden administration came into office, key European partners were determined to gain autonomy from the United States while deepening economic ties with China. Since the invasion, however, they have reoriented much of their economic agenda around “de-risking” from China.

No doubt Biden meant it, when he said in 2021 that America was back on the big stage. They protect their alliance partners. And they have something to sell.

(The Burns returns)

William Burns, director of CIA, explains the theory of return of investment outlined earlier in a similar article in Foreign Affairs in 2024.

The key to success lies in preserving Western aid for Ukraine. At less than five percent of the U.S. defense budget, it is a relatively modest investment with significant geopolitical returns for the United States and notable returns for American industry.

It is an investment that makes good sense. A million dead altogether. But for many years to come, it makes good sense.

The context is of course the ever-present feeling that the goal is within sight. Putin’s plans have been thwarted. And for good measure, blow up the enormousness of the plans to show how little Russia has gained. Like invading Kyiv for any other purposes than diverting the troops from Donbas.

NATO matters, but nothing matters more to Russians than other Russians in different places. Or Americans to Americans. Hence The Hague Invasion Act.

Outside the biosphere - only the strong man?

Soon we will know how many voters entered the biosphere of the hegemon and who decided that their lofty ideals were too far removed from contemporary America.

Perhaps Trump’s most saving grace is exactly his inability to understand the geopolitical necessity to engage in war, and perhaps that resonates well with the population.

After all, can you blame a population for not wanting war?

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