The Wheel

 In economics, there's a pretty solid pattern over the past 40 years. Republicans break the economy - overheating it with tax cuts and deregulation - and then Democrats come in and fix things. Trump inherited the Obama recovery and coasted on that until Covid wrecked the economy. Biden led the most successful economic response to that and now the economy is booming. Let's see what happens with tariffs, deportations and crypto bubbles.

There less of a pattern in foreign affairs, but Trump will again inherit a reasonably favorable foreign policy map. Russia is bogged down in Ukraine, with the sanctions finally taking a bite. The Russian military showed in ass in Ukraine, as NATO's JV weapons have stymied the much larger and better armed Russian army. If enough Russia hawks are in Trump's cabinet, maybe Ukraine can find a negotiated peace that allows them some long term security.

Meanwhile, if there's a country in worse shape than Russia, it's Iran. Their clients in the so-called Axis of Resistance are crumbling left and right. Hezbollah is largely beaten to dust; Hamas is a shadow of its former self and now Assad has capitulated in Syria.

This is good news, right?

The problem is that we are looking at a wounded Russia, and wounded powers are more likely to do rash things than secure ones. Syria is free from Assad's boot at its neck, but as we have seen repeatedly in the Middle East, when governments collapse, the state often collapses with them. Syria could become Lebanon in steroids with competing warlords. It could become Iraq: a fragile, flawed democracy. It could become Afghanistan as religious fanatics seize power and persecute those of insufficient faith. 

Assad was awful, but there's no guarantee that Syria benefits from his ouster and this could require more Israeli intervention which will supercharge the anti-Israeli global left. The instability on its borders will thwart efforts to oust Netanyahu.

Right before October 7th, Jake Sullivan infamously said that the Middle East was not a priority for US. Now we are seeing the devastation of Gaza, the destabilization of Lebanon and the potential collapse of Syria. In the past, the US has been the indispensable nation in brokering peace in that fraught neighborhood. That seems...unlikely with Trump's collection of foreign and security policy naïfs at the helm.

The wheel of history is always turning. The anti-incumbent mood of the advanced democracies has led to a sense of "throw the bums out" regardless of what comes next. Let the "disrupters" have a turn. 

Now, as the old structures crumble, can the disrupters, the chaos agents, find a path to stability and peace? I obviously have my doubts.

The problem with chaos agents is that they are excellent at breaking things, but building things is hard. Trump famously stopped building things because he kept losing money at it and went into branding instead. He couldn't build an apartment building, but he could slap his name on one. 

Well, the wheel is turning and he will have his name slapped on whatever is coming next.