Unreliable

"Call me irresponsible, call me unreliable
Throw in undependable too"
          Lyrics by Sammy Cahn, "Call Me Irresponsible" 1962. Winner of Academy Award for best original song, 1963

The U.S. is no longer considered trustworthy in matters of trade and national defense.

We are irresponsible, unreliable, and undependable. 

The rest of the world is making adjustments. 

American voters wanted change. We got conned.

Middle-class Americans had been falling behind for years — not all at once, but gradually, enough to feel it. I saw the discontent up close at Trump rallies in 2015 and 2016. The crowds were hearing a barely-coded economic and racial message they recognized. You are getting screwed, Trump told them. The system is rigged against you.

He punched down at Black Americans who he said had gotten ahead illegitimately. Obama was a fraud — born in Kenya, he claimed. Immigrants from Mexico and Muslim countries were criminals, terrorists, freeloaders. The elites had built a swamp. Trump alone knew how to drain it.

We bought it. And we bought it again in 2024.

Donald Trump is on us — the American electorate. We knew he stiffed vendors. We knew he lied to his wives, his banks, his bondholders, and to us. We knew he dealt in fantastic exaggerations and outright fabrications. But the man can sell. He seems so frank, so direct, so certain.

Donald Trump is a package. When you elect the man who shakes up America's immigration system, election system, and constitutional order, you also get the man who shakes up the international system. He flipped American support from Ukraine to Russia. He's walking away from NATO. He invented arbitrary tariffs on long-established trading partners, threatened Mexico and Canada, and declared he wants Greenland. He partnered with Israel to go to war against Iran, then abandoned the effort when it went badly.

Foolish Israel. It trusted us.

The Pew Research Center has put numbers on what the world now thinks of us.

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Trump successfully made the argument that being liked and respected by foreign governments was a negative, evidence that they took advantage of weak former presidents, including Republicans, but especially Obama. Foreigners liked us because they sponged off us in matters of trade and defense spending. George Bush went to war with Iraq for principle, not for plundered oil; what a wasted opportunity. China, Mexico, Canada -- heck, everybody -- got access to our markets for free and we got screwed. We were saps.

Our reputation with foreigners cannot be repaired by a successor to Trump, whether Democrat or Republican. The U.S. voters re-elected Trump, proving that he wasn't an aberration and mistake, but a democratic choice. The arbitrary and changing tariffs on everyone demonstrate that the U.S. has hostile intent and wants to keep all options open all the time. No alliance is secure. No trade relationship is fixed. Everything is subject to instant change for reasons of the personal pique or political advantage of a president. 

The Gordie Howe Bridge connecting Canada and Detroit is a physical symbol of the unreliable USA. 

Under an agreement with President Obama and Michigan officials, Canada paid six billion dollars to build the bridge. Now, at completion, Trump says he won't allow traffic to cross it. Prime Minister Mark Carney called it "a great example of cooperation between our two countries." Michigan's leaders praised it as "an incredibly important infrastructure project" for jobs and the state economy. Trump is unhappy with Canada and Carney, so he's holding the bridge hostage until Canada hands over half of it and compensates the U.S. for an ambiguous "everything we have given them."

There is a wrinkle. The bridge competes with another bridge — one that pays tolls to a major Trump donor.

The bridge will presumably open eventually, under some arrangement. But Trump has leverage, because Canada has already spent the money. The bridge is worthless if it can't be used. Canada made the classic mistake: doing the work first, then letting itself be exposed to Trump reneging. Trump built a career stiffing contractors who did exactly that on his real estate projects.

Foolish Canada. It trusted us.

The world is taking note.

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