Trump is Often Right About the Problem...

...even if his solutions are awful. Democrats are going to need to come up with real plans for real issues if they want to compete in 2028.

Well, we’re roughly 3 months into Trump 2.0 and, well, we’re certainly living in interesting times! I’ll give Trump credit for one thing…he’s brought attention to some real problems that previous administrations, Democratic and Republican, have largely ignored, typically kicking the can down the road. To come back into power, I think Democrats are going to have to have some real solutions for these issues. Not just “Trump sucks”, however true that may be, but real affirmative solutions to issues they (and garden variety Republicans) haven’t wanted to seriously tackle. Here are a few issues I think Democrats need to seriously grapple with and have real plans for. Note: none of this should be taken as my endorsement of Trump’s solutions to these things, which mainly seem like chaos so far. If you want to see my early impressions of Trump, you can check out my book How Madness Shaped History which includes my bio of him written during Trump 1.0. Given he seems intent on destroying my modest stock portfolio, I figure it’s only fair he make me money some way. But, for now, on to the list:

Trade Imbalances/Manufacturing: I’d say there’s a complicated mix of concerns ranging from US trade imbalances with some countries (we worry only about the unfavorable sort of course¹), to the loss of manufacturing in the US. I’m not an economist, so I’m not going to pretend to try to sift through competing narratives on this, other than to say this has been a long-standing issue and people have been dissatisfied with it for a long time. Solutions on the left have been either to ignore the problem (“Who wants to work in manufacturing anyway? Factory jobs suck!”²) or to just be silly (“Down with capitalism!” Well, you might have just got what you wanted there. Welcome to…mercantilism!)

First, I think Democrats need to be forthright that the world trade system that blasted off in the 1990s has hurt a fair number of Americans. I’m not saying the median American has been hurt by it, but a fair number have. “Learn to code” turned out to be a dismissive dead end³. Also, although I do think democrats need to be honest about the future, that shouldn’t be a cope. For instance, I suspect it’s probably true that, even if manufacturing were brought back to the US, much of it would be run by AI/robots. But even if it’s true it wouldn’t help American jobs, returning manufacturing to the US would still be a good thing. The covid19 pandemic gave us a hint of the risks of relying on foreign supply networks in key industries. It’s just strategically good to keep some key industries in the US as much as possible⁴.

But this is an old issue. I remember the Michael Crichton novel from 1995 Rising Sun actually had trade imbalances as a central theme (the Japanese were the bad guys back then). Letting things just simmer for decades is not a good strategy.

Research Funding: I wrote about this in a separate post, but the truth is the US has funded a considerable amount of crap research and probably…shouldn’t do that anymore. In fact, in a “wheat from the chaff” sense, I suspect the sheer volume of junk research has actually slowed scientific progress. This was already a crisis everyone (especially scientists) was ignoring⁵. My argument is not that the government shouldn’t fund science, but rather it should have more rigorous standards for the quality, transparency and cautious interpretation of that science. Sure, Trump’s approach is to burn the whole thing down, but that’s what happens when you allow an issue to chafe. Some fields probably should be cut out of funding altogether until they get their act together (and yes, I’d include psychology in there, at least in the yellow warning zone). Most of the response so far from the left I’ve seen has been along the lines of “Hope you didn’t want a cure for Alzheimer’s” but we weren’t getting one anyway because that field of research is a classic example of what a dumpster fire so much science has become. That’s a lame response and Democrats need to have something more substantial.

Huge Deficits are Probably Bad: Again, not an economist, but in my view of history, countries that run huge deficits of the sort that require government shutdown threats every few months so we can pay off the interest on those debts tend not to do well. And yes, that means we’re going to have to pay for less stuff. Some of that’s going to be sad. There’s been a lot of controversy about USAID and, in general, I think giving aid to poor countries in need is excellent…when we’ve got money ourselves. Now…we don’t. To be sure, how Trump has gone about reducing aid has often been cruel, abrupt and chaotic…but we’re going to need to reduce these expenditures.

Right now an overwhelming proportion of foreign aid is provided by the US (Germany also deserves significant credit for basically being the #2 country). Although many on the left point out that this is a strategic good for the US (with which I agree), I am skeptical we get much credit for this. I can remember about 20 years ago David Gilmour from Pink Floyd expressing disgust that the US wasn’t providing more foreign aid (I love Gilmour, but never quite forgave him for that nonsense). I believe there’s a general perception among US citizens that the US is expected to do far more than any other country, then gets spit in the eye for thanks. And I don’t think that perception is entirely wrong.

The other thing I see from the left on various budget issues is complaints that a particular area should be left alone because it’s a tiny fraction of the US budget. So what? That’s a nonanswer. When we need to tighten the belt, we have to look for every penny to save. Come up with some real plans to reduce the deficit. I’d love to listen to them, particularly as I’m skeptical the Republicans obsession with tax cuts for the rich are going to be of much use.