Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
Trump Campaigns Against UN in World Body Speech
President Trump addressed the UN General Assembly in New York yesterday. Rather than lead the world body, it appears he is campaigning against it. His speech was a rhetorically repetitive rambling 35 minutes long that lacked any structural cohesion or argument. It was, in short, a long list of bumper-sticker ideas. The delegates laughed openly at his claim that his administration had done more than almost any other in US history, but they should have been shedding tears as he abdicated America's place as leader of the free world.
Mr. Trump began with a ridiculous boast, saying that his administration had "accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country." There was a brief pause while the translators did their work before the delegates chuckled. The President of the United States then ad libbed, "Didn't expect that reaction, but that's OK." The chuckles turned to belly-laughs. The candidate who promised that the world would stop laughing at America when he was president became an object of derision as the podium of the UNGA. Embarrassing is hardly sufficient to describe the scene.
He, then, ran down a laundry list of things he has done, things that have made the world less secure. According to the LA Times, these included "the U.S. pullout from the Iran nuclear accord, his refusal to sign a U.N.-backed compact for migration, the withdrawal from the U.N. Human Rights Council and his decision to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem."
To the extent that there was any intellectual basis for his foreign policy, it was "We reject the ideology of globalism, and we embrace the doctrine of patriotism." That is largely what happened as the world walked away from the League of Nations toward World War II. He continued, "America's policy of principled realism means we will not be held hostage to old dogmas, discredited ideologies, and so-called experts who have been proven wrong over the years, time and time again." Instead, it appears America will be led by non-experts who will be right as chance allows.
On foreign aid, Mr. Trump observed that the US is the world's largest donor in absolute terms. "The United States is the world's largest giver in the world, by far, of foreign aid. But few give anything to us," he whined. One awaits his non-experts telling the world just how Burkina Faso can send aid of any kind to the US. He stated, "Moving forward, we're only going to give foreign aid to those who respect us and, frankly, are our friends." He apparently doesn't understand the value of a bribe, which for a man who claims to be a billionaire property developer from New York City is hard to credit.
Despite his desire for a Gaullist-Thatcherite world des patries, he seemed content to ask other nations to stand with America in isolating Iran, Venezuela and North Korea. Consistency is not one of his strong points.
The best critique of his address came from Nicholas Burns, a former senior diplomat in Republican and Democratic administrations. He said via Twitter, "The tone of this speech won"t be effective outside Trump's base at home -- boastful, bitter and resentful of countries that 'take advantage of us'. He is not leading the world, but campaigning against it."
When Daniel Patrick Moynihan was US Ambassador to the UN, he wrote an article called "The United States in Opposition," which dissected why the US was often outvoted in the UNGA (largely due to the anti-Americanism of the alleged non-aligned states). Mr. Trump would rather walk out of the UN than engage America's adversaries in debate.
Therein lies the problem. For Senator Moynihan and others of his generation, America would win the debate in the long run because its values and ideals were better. Mr. Trump simply doesn't believe that. He doubts America's founding principles, and indeed, is hostile to many of them. He wants to Make America Great Again but doesn't believe in the idea of America in the first place. His antipathy was on full display yesterday, and America is a little smaller for it.
© Copyright 2018 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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