| Donald Trump hit the 100th day of his second term, a benchmark that typically “triggers a slew of sober press assessments, gauging the White House’s roster of early achievements against those of past administrations.” But Trump 2.0 has been so unorthodox, Chris Lehmann explains, that it was instantly marked not by the usual grading of public policy but by our shrunken economy: “The lurch into negative territory signals a potential recession in the offing.”
What’s happening now couldn’t be a weirder shadow to the original 100-day milestone, which began with FDR’s policies to pull the country out of a depression. “Roosevelt saved the democracy,” writes Robert L. Borosage. But with Trump rolling back the New Deal and “opening the country to new excesses of private plunder,” he could sink the country into a depression and launch a “reign of chaos and corruption.”
But a little hope is perhaps to be found beyond our borders. This week, in Canada, the Liberal Party led by Prime Minister Mark Carney eked out a victory over the Conservative Party. Our Canadian correspondent Jeet Heer argues that Carney’s win is a direct result of Trumpism. “Trump has repeatedly called for Canada to be annexed by the United States and turned into the 51st state,” Heer writes. And this “revival of 19th-century imperialism has rattled the Canadian electorate.” With a rampaging Trump to the south, Carney’s appeal was that he stood for Canadian sovereignty and stability. With such close election results, “liberal centrism continues to hold, but only tenuously.”
-Alana Pockros
Engagement Editor, The Nation |
