Dimitri Lascaris says Trump’s chaotic second presidency is hastening the demise of U.S. global power.
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Dimitri Lascaris says Trump’s chaotic second presidency is hastening the demise of U.S. global power.
“Trump could turn out to be a godsend for the rest of us if we can avoid a catastrophic war,” says Lascaris.
Dimitri Lascaris is a lawyer, journalist and activist. He worked for many years as a lawyer for some of the biggest corporations on Wall Street. To say he knows a lot about deal-making is an understatement.
Lascaris says Trump’s acclaimed business prowess and “art of the deal” are wildly overrated. He is a failed real estate magnate who has been bankrupted and bailed out numerous times.
His 1987 bestselling book, The Art of the Deal, should have been titled The Art of the Con.
Trump’s proposal to take over Gaza and turn it into a “Riviera of the Middle East” is typical of his unscrupulous and brutish style. It is ethnic cleansing – a blatant war crime on a massive scale – dressed up by Trump as a wonder deal.
The 47th U.S. president’s stupidity, arrogance and criminality are fully on display.
As Lascaris points out, this does not bode well for Trump’s other big ambition – to produce a peace deal in Ukraine with Russia.
Trump and all recent American leaders have no credibility. They are seen as “agreement incapable”. During his first presidency (2016-2020), Trump broke the Iran nuclear deal and Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia.
It is doubtful that Trump possesses the depth of historical and political understanding to cut a deal over Ukraine. Especially since, as Lascaris notes, Russia has won the war and Trump has no leverage. He will be forced to accept Russia’s exacting terms, which means a humiliating defeat for the U.S. and its NATO proxies.
However, Lascaris warns that denouement could make for an extremely dangerous situation because Trump’s megalomania will find it impossible to accept such a debacle and contradiction to his boasts about “Making America Great Again.”
Lascaris says that Trump’s MAGA slogan will turn out to be MAWA – make America weak again.
His chaotic, irrational, impetuous and unscrupulous mode of business and foreign policy is alienating America’s postwar alliances and client-state relations. Trump is accelerating the demise of the American empire.
As Lascaris points out, Trump’s brutish and bullying behavior is a con to distract from not addressing the deep economic and social problems of the United States.
In Trump’s case, it’s not so much the Art of the Deal as the Art of the Con.
