By Dennis Matanda
If Donald Trump’s scandal-plagued presidency has, at infancy, successfully tottered past a plethora of stumbling blocks, conventional wisdom suggests that the intensity of public outrage to Trump’s tweets, snafus, and dis-diplomacy will simmer down as the days, weeks, and months crawl towards January 20, 2021. Ceteris paribus, America shall tolerate a full presidency that lashes out against anyone who – perceivably or otherwise – slights the Oval Office and White House occupant. That we are in such unfamiliar territory is not in doubt.
That Trump will use the bully pulpit to attack enemies – mortal or otherwise – is not in doubt. Perhaps we could even see that an enemy of the United States is one who suggests that ‘the Emperor has no clothes.’ Note that conventional enemies are engaged in open hostility – in a cold, warm, or hot war. The United States is as hostile to North Korea as North Korea is hostile to the United States. The United States and the former Soviet Union were each other’s enemies until the Berlin Wall came down. Or perhaps this warfare is back on again. With the advent of cyber warfare, terrorism and online attacks, on the one hand, and non-state actors like al Qaeda and ISIS on the other, global politics has, Trump notwithstanding, undergone a seismic paradigm shift. Hence, one who criticizes Donald Trump could, mutatis mutandis, be declared inimical to America.
Of course, on top of hyperbole and trying to find humor under the circumstances, we ought to be tarred ‘reductionists’ for transferring Trump’s character to the entire American government infrastructure. Trump is not the U.S. government, and the U.S. government is not equal to Trump. While the power of the American president has grown in leaps and bounds, especially since September 11, 2001, other branches of government like the U.S. Congress and U.S. Supreme Court still possess a powerful punch.
Invariably, in a world where everyone and their mother professes to be a Trump critic, there’s ample space for cleverly couched constructive criticism to propel the United States towards a more perfect union. But what does criticism have to do with rags such as ours? Do we qualify as ‘fake news?’ Do we spread falsehoods about Trump, casting aspersions without merit? Well, we only bring this up as a matter of precaution. We try to be overly cautious because some of our writers are also considered economic or health experts from Africa and the Caribbean. And since most U.S.-based experts on Africa or the Caribbean are, in essence, doing business directly or indirectly with the United States government, they have a direct line to the Man who sits behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.
For instance, although USAID’s FY 2018 budget supports Trump’s ‘America First’ vision, the US$ 15.4 billion requested for economic support and development, global health programs, and international disaster assistance, amongst other priorities, support programs like the Trade and Investment hubs that richly benefit trade and investment across western, eastern and southern Africa. In this regard, if one of our experts even suggested that Donald Trump was ‘thin-skinned,’ that could – factual or otherwise – be deemed a criticism of the American president. A critique could affect one’s chances of contributing expertise to a USAID program. And in the Trump Era, where friends are few and enemies are everywhere, one mustn’t blame a president who extracts enmity and hostility in critique – however small.
Considering that there are numerous ways to skin a cat, experts do not have to say anything about Trump. After all, what does it help to say that the American president is as capricious as they come? It neither changes the price of Ethiopian coffee to compare Donald Trump to Jacob Zuma nor seeks a rationale for what could happen if Trump and “Rocket Man” continue their war of words.
As Trump’s tweets demonstrate, the Trumpian Movement, like Chip Berlet in Right-Wing Populism suggests, may be more robust than most think. In his King of the Mountain, Arnold Ludwig says many rulers of the past century managed to keep power despite being crazy or demented. Although intellectual or academic credentials are ostensibly relevant to the presidency, populist presidents like Trump are neither paranoid, fanatical extremists, nor stupid. Trump has been hailed as a genius for using the American people to triumph over Hillary Clinton. Besides, it’s a truism that American leaders have, from time immemorial, leveraged legitimate grievances to channel their followers’ hopes and fears into rebellion.
That the Trump presidency is a rebellion is not in doubt. That Trump continues to challenge tradition is not in doubt. But should Trump’s critics be overly cautious in hurling assegais at the White House? We do not know. That is the truth. Because one cannot know definitively whose thigh they may have to retrieve their projectile from, ensure that all arrows bear no barbs, that tips are not poisoned, and that constructive criticism is kept to the bare minimum.
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