Trump prepared

Written by

May 16, 2026

Of course he did.

Trump prepared for this summit in a way that few if any presidents have done before previous summits—which is to say, he barely prepared at all. Usually, the National Security Council holds interagency meetings—first among midlevel experts, then with Cabinet secretaries and the president himself—to hammer out positions on various major issues. Advance meetings are then held with counterparts from the other country to work out an agenda and to agree on as many issues as possible before the heads of state sit down to talk.

By contrast, Trump held no such meetings, not formally anyway. The list of officials and executives that he brought with him to Beijing included no China specialists, not even the few who hold key positions in the departments of State and Defense.

As usual, Trump thought that he could wing it and that his presumed friendship with Xi would pave the way for vast progress and profits, which he could brag about back home to boost the economy, maybe end the war in Iran, and in any case restore his popularity before this fall’s midterms.

Why does he think he can wing it? Because he thinks he’s very clever. Why does he think that? Because he’s very notclever.

And yet, it keeps working for him.

It’s like a jigsaw puzzle, or a lock. There’s something about the US that makes it sufficiently receptive to the bullshit of a trump to put him in charge of everything. It’s weird.

Comments

7 responses to “Trump prepared”

Piglet

May 16, 2026 10:10 AM

I keep asking myself, what comes after Trump? He won’t be president forever—22nd Amendment aside, he isn’t immortal—but then what? Does everyone just shrug and say that was a weird blip, back to business as usual? Are there trials? How does anyone, let alone the pathetic Dems, even start to fix what he’s broken? There are millions of people who voted for him three times and they’re not going anywhere. The rest of the world has had to accept that going forward, the richest and most heavily-armed nation can’t be trusted. No matter what the US agrees to, you have to factor in a 4-year expiry date in case the voters of Bumfuck, Wisconsin get mad about gas prices again and elect another decomposing vegetable.
Ophelia Benson

May 16, 2026 11:25 AM

Seriously. It seems pretty obvious to me that we’ve permanently screwed ourselves (we Murrikns) and there’s nothing we can do about it.
Harald Hanche-Olsen

May 16, 2026 2:34 PM

The Dunning–Kruger effect is strong in this one.
Harald Hanche-Olsen

May 16, 2026 2:48 PM

But to be a tad less flippant, no, I think it will take at least a generation for the US to regain some of the trust it enjoyed, if it ever happens. I am old enough to be confident it won’t happen in my lifetime. On the plus side, the fact that Europe must now realize it’s on its own means it will have to grow up and get serious about defending itself. We can only hope it is not too late.

Returning to the flippant mode because why not, I was reminded of a quip I saw some while ago: I am glad Congress is not alive to see this.
Ophelia Benson

May 16, 2026 3:24 PM

Heh. Funny, flippant or not.
Your Name’s not Bruce?

May 16, 2026 5:02 PM

Why does he think he can wing it? Because he thinks he’s very clever. Why does he think that? Because he’s very notclever.

He seems to forget that The Art of the Deal was ghostwritten. He believes his own bullshit, and thinks he can win the day through shear force of will, personality, and intellect. He has no clue that he has come to a battle of wits completely unarmed, and that Xi (or anyone else sitting across from him) can take him (and by extention the United States,) to the cleaners without him ever suspecting. His advancing mental decline, his inability to keep his lies straight, and his forgetting anything he says or does within five minutes, on top of his naked self-interest and personal aggrandizement, will not serve America well on any front.

It seems pretty obvious to me that we’ve permanently screwed ourselves (we Murrikns) and there’s nothing we can do about it.

And on so many dimensions, too. The willfull destruction of institutional memory and continuity amounts to the self-lobotomization of American government. Assuming Deocrats can wrest power from the autocratizing Republicans, who will risk returning to the civil service, if your career is always one electoral cycle away from evaporating? Trump has replaced the concept of public service to sel service, with only “suckers and losers” opting for the former.

…I think it will take at least a generation for the US to regain some of the trust it enjoyed, if it ever happens. I am old enough to be confident it won’t happen in my lifetime. On the plus side, the fact that Europe must now realize it’s on its own means it will have to grow up and get serious about defending itself. We can only hope it is not too late.

Certainly American power and influence has taken a serious body-blow, with more and more countries trying to work around the United States rather than with it. America has gone from being the indispensible ally, to the erratic, unreliable, best-be-avoided obstacle and menace, and Trump can’t even see it.

Here’s Gwynne Dyer’s take on this:

If this were just a personal and political disaster for Donald Trump and his associates, few people outside the United States would see it as a tragedy, and neither would about half of the American population. However, if it also involves a permanent decline in US power in the world, most Americans and many people elsewhere would see it as an unwelcome change.

The key word here is ‘permanent’. In fact that collapse has already occurred, as witness the almost unanimous refusal of America’s erstwhile allies to get involved in Trump and Netanyahu’s ‘war of choice’ against Iran, but it is so recent that a recovery still seems possible. Maybe it is, and maybe not.

Economic strength was always the key factor in any system of states, with military power mainly determined by a country’s industrial production. By that traditional measure the United States has long been in relative decline (it produced more than half the manufactured goods in the world in 1945, but only 16% now.)

However, the United States has remained the foremost power because it spends a lot on a very high-tech military (eight times China’s spending) and it continues to lead in science, in finance and in intellectual property. Those more or less intangible assets are more easily lost, however, and they are what is currently at risk because of Trump’s presidency.

https://gwynnedyer.com/2026/death-rattle-of-a-superpower/
iknklast

May 17, 2026 7:09 AM

it continues to lead in science, in finance and in intellectual property

Which is why the war on ‘elitism’ – more properly the war on the intellect – is so devastating to the country. That is our most basic asset right now, and we are busy throwing it down the garbage disposal.

From what I’ve heard, the brain drain has already started. If we allow it to continue, indeed, as some of the people I know do, cheer it on, we will really be lost.

And the left is as guilty as the right. The guilt felt by those who went to college, who have operated in the intellectual property arena, is so easily preyed upon both by the left-wing peddlers of toxic nonsense and the right-wing peddlers of toxic nonsense.

What’s lost? Oh, only the entire country? A country with a stockpile of nuclear weapons (not to mention huge amounts of conventional weapons) and a power-hungry, narcissistic madman with the nuclear codes.