Let's Not Mix Trump Up With The U.S.A.— And Let's Hope No One Overseas Does Either
- Howie Klein
- 4 hours ago
- 5 min read
A Blue Wave Is Forming— A Big One
At a small dinner party the other night, one of the guests, an old friend, stated that she never imagined she’d be rooting for China against the U.S. Of course, she meant, rooting against Trump. She made the same mistake that he always does…. that Louis XIV did when he said, “L’État, c'est moi” (I am the state). Authoritarians— such as Trump— are bad fits for democracies because mentally and emotionally they can’t get beyond that divine right concept. But Trump is not the state, far from it. He’s a pathetic, shabby excuse for a president who was elected— fairly or not— by less than half the voters.
His pathology— his inability to distinguish between personal grievance and national interest— isn’t just a personality flaw; it’s a foundational threat to the U.S. and the world. In his mind, an indictment is an act of war against the country, an election loss is evidence of treason and criticism of him personally, whether domestic or international, is an attack on America itself. This fusion of ego and nation is textbook authoritarianism, and, as we've been watching since January, it warps every institution it touches. When Trump talks about “retribution,” he’s not talking policy— he’s talking vengeance. And when millions cheer him on, it’s not because they believe in America, but because they believe in his America: a place where power is personal, loyalty is blind and the law bends to the will of the strongman. They apparently never grasped their high school civics classes.
On Thursday, Aaron Blake explored the way things seem to be falling apart for Señor T. “A man,” wrote Blake, “who came into office vastly exaggerating the mandate that voters had just given him— and has governed accordingly— appears to have, per public polling, squandered whatever mandate he was given with his brazen actions. And indicators are increasingly dire on a number of significant policy fronts for him. Multiple polls this week showed Trump hitting new lows. His approval rating has been double-digits underwater in surveys from the Pew Research Center (minus-19), Economist-YouGov (-13), Reuters-Ipsos (-11) and now Fox News (-11). Trump was already more unpopular at this point in his presidency than any modern president not named Trump; he’s now flirting with falling below where he was at this point in his first term.” And by 100 days in back in 2017 it was already becoming abundantly clear he would turn out to be one of the 3 or 4 worst presidents in history. In the end he turned out to the worst and least fit ever, and by far— worse than James Buchanan, worse than Andrew Johnson, worse than Warren Harding, worse than Franklin Pierce… you get the idea.
But back to the present, Blake wants his readers to know that Trump’s major policies (even his xenophobic immigration policies!) “are even more unpopular than he is. That suggests his image is largely buoyed by loyalists who might not like what they’re seeing but still say they support him— for now… His tariff gambit has pushed his economic numbers lower than they ever were in his first term, with concerns being widespread and bipartisan.”
Around 40% of Americans are nowhere near rooting for China. In fact, many of Trump’s supporters still don’t understand that supporting him isn’t the same as supporting the U.S. His MAGA base is solid, even if other supporters are growing wary— especially wary of Musk, tariffs, government cuts and social safety net cuts.
“But it’s not just the polls,” warned Blake. “It’s also the discord and the administration’s clear struggles to chart a path forward and avoid shooting itself in the foot. Trump has offered too many mixed signals on his tariffs gambit to count. Most recently, that involved signaling something of a potential pullback in the brewing trade war with China, amid some of the worst economic indicators in decades. Musk’s tenure leading the U.S. DOGE Service appears to be lurching to soemthing of an unceremonious end after feuds and power struggles with top administration figures and Cabinet members— most recently, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s tenure has devolved into multiple high-profile problems that bolster the criticisms that the former Fox News host simply lacked the experience for such an important job… Trump has stuck by Hegseth this week, but all indications are that will lead to more headaches.
Also this week, Trump’s promised end to the war in Ukraine— something he said he’d accomplished on Day One— looks as distant as ever. Ukraine flatly rejected a proposed Trump administration deal that the administration has cast as its ‘final offer” (and is quite favorable to Russia). Russia, meanwhile, just launched a massive attack on Kyiv. On Thursday, Trump deployed a tactic he almost never does: actually criticizing Putin.
But perhaps most troubling for the administration, practically speaking, is what’s happening in the courts. While the courts take a while to act, their actions have increasingly hamstrung Trump. And despite the administration repeatedly blaming “leftist” judges, the ones standing in Trump’s way include a fast-growing and remarkable number of Republican appointees.
It’s not just the Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices who have sided against him on deportation issues; it’s also Republican appointees ruling against him and using strong language. In just the past three weeks, a trio of GOP-appointed judges have cast the administration as making no real effort to comply with the law, including using such phrases as “brazen” and “a path of perfect lawlessness.”
And just Wednesday, a Trump appointee became the second judge to order the administration to facilitate the return of a man it wrongly departs to the El Salvador prison.
In sum: It’s all an increasing mess. Trump might try to muddle through— including by pressing forward on tariffs and risking a constitutional crisis by challenging the courts to actually make him abide by their orders. Trump has clearly demonstrated he feels more untethered in his second term, and congressional Republicans have shown very little appetite for standing in his way.
But with the courts asserting themselves and the public taking an increasingly dim view of what he’s doing, political gravity is taking a heavy toll. It took a little less than 100 days.
And the midterms loom. In 2018, Trump’s stumbling, bungled first 2 years in the White House caused a Blue Wave that saw the Democratic congressional vote nationally go up by 5.4% while the GOP lost 42 seats— and the Speakership, slip from Paul Ryan to Nancy Pelosi. Although some Democratic incumbents were defeated in primaries— most notably Joe Crowley’s loss to AOC— not a single Republican beat a Democratic incumbent! Instead, Democrats won seats is red districts, electing new members like Jason Crow to replace Mike Coffman (CO-06), Lauren Underwood to replace Randy Hultgren (IL-14), Abby Finkenauer to replace Rod Blum (IA-01), Shanice Davids to replace Kevin Yoder (KS-03), Max Rose to replace Dan Donovan (NY-11), Kendra Horn to replace Steve Russell (OK-05), Conor Lamb to replace Keith Rothfus (PA-17), Lizzie Fletcher to replace John Culberson (TX-07), Colin Allred to replace Pete Sessions (TX-32) and Ben McAdams to replace Mia Love (UT-04). On top of that, over a dozen open red seats fell to Democrats. And although most of those Blue Wave Democrats were subsequently defeated, that’s only the DCCC’s fault for blocking progressives and forcing nominations of putrid, corrupt conservatives who wound up as untenable for Democratic voters once they saw what crap they were. No non-conservatives in their right minds were going to vote for people like Kendra Horn, Ben McAdams, Joe Cunningham (SC), Max Rose, Abby Finkenauer, Cindy Axne (IA), etc. Needless to say, the DCCC has refused to learn any lessons from that and are busy working behind the scenes against progressives like Randy Villegas and Emily Berge to make sure corporate garbage like Jasmeet Bains and Rebecca Cooke are the 2026 nominees, even though neither could possibly win in a non-Blue Wave environment.
