Don’t Join the Autocrats!
Trump’s overtures to Vladimir Putin are not just morally wrong but damaging to the US’s long-term interests.
I just mailed off the final chapter of my new book on competition between autocratic and democratic great powers in the twenty-first century, focused on China, Russia, and the United States. It draws on lessons from the cold war to argue that the world’s democratic camp, anchored by the United States, has not just more collective economic and military power than its autocratic camp, anchored by China and Russia, but better ideas about how to govern. And yet by the time the book comes out in October I am not sure which side the US will be on. In words and actions, President Trump seems to have more affinity with the autocrats than with the democrats—and particularly with the most belligerent, imperial autocrat in the world today, Vladimir Putin.
Read my latest article for The New York Review in full here.
Today Trump sees clear skies and quiet waters - no sharks - but that will change dramatically in the months ahead. The cabal will turn in itself and new fools will drop in for guest appearances, but everyday citizens will see his disdain for them and he will become isolated and ineffective as the ‘26 Election, the Sword of Damocles, approaches and his political serfs scatter.
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