“You sent me to Hell. I’m here to return the favor.”[i]– Spawn
“…some men aren’t looking for anything logical, like money. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.”[ii]– Alfred
The 2020 US presidential election was claimed to be of existential importance. Joe Biden was fighting for the “soul of America”, and he promised to reverse the damage done to the liberal world order by Donald Trump. However, outside of re-entering the Paris Climate Accords, Biden has continued Trump’s America First doctrine, he even completed his withdrawal from Afghanistan. The upcoming election this year is declared to be of even more existential significance than 2020. Democracy and global security are on the precipice, or so the foreign policy blob would have us believe. Apparently, all that stands between autocracy and hellfire is Biden and his coterie of despots.
For the illiberal liberal class, a second Trump term means the end of their cherished ‘rules-based order’, an international system that is reliant on economic imperialism, occupation, and a ruthless sanctions regime that isolates ‘rogue states’ like Russia and North Korea. Analysts and commentators fear for the future of institutions like NATO. As I’ve noted before though, those who oppose Trump vehemently are not his moral betters. Their hatred for Trump is driven by his debasement of US hegemony. People like John Bolton, who writes in an op-ed on what he thinks the foreign policy of a second Trump term would look like that “Unburdened even by wisps of philosophy or consistency, varying day-by-day on how he sees his legacy, Trump will be something to watch.”[iii] Bolton is right to point out that Trump has no guiding philosophy or ideology, but the loyalists who surround him have ideologies and they will see an unburdened Trump as an opportunity to implement them. This will likely be some form of Christian theocracy or militarism; it is hard to say for sure.
Bolton does make some important arguments relating to this uncertainty, as ultimately, Trump acts on whims that are not rooted in a set of guiding principles, and he did not pursue a grand strategy in his foreign policy, instead officials around him formed a grand strategy that attempted to articulate his instincts. However, Bolton misses an opportunity to reflect on deeper issues with US foreign policy, and how Trump is a manifestation of the response to these issues, especially trade and China. Bolton misses this more thoughtful analysis because he, like most internationalists, sees Trump as a crisis, not an inevitable symptom, and this is why he focuses on Trump as a character, instead of focusing on what he may do based on who he may select as his foreign policy advisers. Bolton captures this misguided focus when he writes in conclusion that he ignores deeper policy analysis “because they are largely ignored by Trump. Beyond any doubt, that void remains the most important point to understand about a second Trump term. As before, it will be all about himself.”[iv] While that may be true, if one were interested in understanding why Trump has a chance to become president again, and if he does get elected, how that came to be, then they would need to look far beyond Trump’s character.
For Trump his second term will be about him and his legacy, but as analysts we have an obligation to resist the urge to view Trump and his foreign policy vision, if he even has one, through a Manichean lens. A few get close to this nuance. Hal Brands writes on Trump’s potential return to the White House that “It’s a mistake to make everything about Trump, of course. The specter of change after the next election always hangs over US diplomacy.”, and “It would be unfair to blame Trump for all of these strategic problems. It’s not unfair to say that he contributes to them.”[v] While he may contribute to strategic problems in US foreign policy, what those strategic problems are depends on the analyst. Brands is a liberal internationalist who has written many books and articles on US grand strategy and foreign policy.[vi] To him, the main strategic problems in US foreign policy are related to China. Trump made these worse by going the fight against them alone through protectionist trade policy and insults over Twitter. Brands may be a bit more reflective than Bolton and his ilk, there is still the underlying assumption that the US is locked in a cold war with China and the liberal world order must stand strong in the face of their revanchism. Brands undermines his point that making this all about Trump is a mistake when he writes that “Whether or not he wins the presidency again, the Age of Trump isn’t over. The challenge his return could pose for US policy is already here.”, and he remarks that the “Age of Trump isn’t over”[vii] Surely, if making it all about Trump is a mistake, then marking an era in US history with his name, implying that it is him and his political movement that are its prime actors, is a huge mistake. As Andrew Bacevich noted in 2017, there is no Trump era.[viii]
What is more significant about his political candidacy, why he is viable and his appeal, are glossed over to focus on him and his bombast, and it feeds into his ego, and it consolidates the anti-Trump industry. Scholars and policy analysts rush to write their account of foreign policy during the Trump era, and they totally miss the failed foreign policy that previously helped Barrack Obama, which now helps Trump.
If Trump’s first term did not force any introspection from the illiberal liberal class, then perhaps his second term will. Even if it doesn’t, then the slow burn of the current international system will at least be accelerated. If Biden is re-elected, or if another Democrat replaces him as the nominee and wins, then the US led world order will continue its unraveling at a snail’s pace, though an issue that Trump agrees with Biden on, China and Taiwan, may fester no matter who is elected. It is unlikely that China will invade Taiwan in the short term. It is almost certain that the US will not shift from strategic ambiguity to strategic clarity, though Trump will be pushed to do so some of his advocates, who despite being restrained in areas like Europe and the Middle East, are extremely hawkish on China. If China and the US are going to trade blows over Taiwan at some point anyways, we may as well get it over with as quickly as possible. Thus, having someone as volatile as Trump may be a much-needed catalyst.
If the election is Biden versus Trump, then it is the American Slow Cooker versus the American Arsonist. I am not a supporter of Trump, I am a supporter of tearing down the liberal world order and starting over, and of the US and other Western powers worrying about their own citizens, not about policing the world.
Though my position is that Trump winning the election would be better for America and the world in the long term, I am fully aware that there will be dire short-term costs. Trump would inevitably coddle the religious right, who are essentially a Christian Taliban hell bent on outlawing abortion, having prayer in public schools, and imposing a form of theocracy in America.[ix] This is likely the worst part of Trump’s legacy from his first term. From his judicial appointments to his hiring religious right cretins like Mike Pence and Betsy Devos, Trump filled his lack of ideological conviction with faux conservatism. Christian right cults added Trump into their apocalyptic fantasies as a messiah, here to smash the forces of secularism and Marxism that are supposedly wrecking America, poisoning its morality and breaking apart its communities. Trump will also try to pursue an idiotic policy of invasion in Mexico and other South American countries to wipe out drug cartels, though on this issue, as well as on China, he does not differ from other Republican candidates.[x] He will certainly be pushed to become even more militaristic on the Southern border and on states like Mexico than he was in his first term.
US allies may be petrified by Trump’s chances of regaining the presidency, but they are not satisfied with Biden, and he shows few signs of changing. Biden has not reentered the TPP, the Iran Nuclear Deal, or ended Trump’s trade war with China, and if Trump won, would it be a deviation from Biden or him ending what he started, which was continued by Biden? An administration stuffed with MAGA loyalists may be a terrifying prospect, but an even more terrifying prospect is the American empire sharing the same fate as those before it, from Rome to Russia. Trump stepping in and preforming a planned demolition is preferable to Biden and his type presiding over a corroding global power, giving way to a much worse version of Trump and his political movement. Chaos is on the horizon. How fast it approaches depends on who wins, but whatever the result, it is undeniably impending.
“Not Our World Order!”
“All spirits are enslaved which serve things evil.”[xi]– Percy Bysshe Shelley
The illiberal liberal class’s freakout over Trump’s potential return is both amusing and misleading. It is hilarious to read frantic articles bemoaning the imminent demise of their precious liberal rules-based order. It is also misleading, as they rush to assure us that Trump is the issue, not them and their ideology. According to them, Trump’s popularity is not a result of their unpopularity. Instead, their unpopularity and the distrust people have for them is a result of Trump’s popularity.
Mostly all notable scholars in International Relations have penned articles noting the threat that Trump poses to the Western alliance system and the rules-based order. Earlier I mentioned essays by Bolton and Brands. Another essay that embodies the reality of the threat that Trump poses are an article for Foreign Affairs by Daniel W. Drezner. In his article, he writes that “For many observers, it is hard not to conclude that under President Joe Biden, the United States has returned to the postwar tradition of liberal internationalism. In this view, the Trump administration was an ephemeral blip rather than an inflection point. Equilibrium has been restored.”, and he later refers to Biden’s quip in meetings with US allies that “America is back”, whatever that means.[xii] Drezner explicitly notes that in the view of many who look at foreign policy through an internationalist lens, Biden is a return to US liberal hegemony, while Trump was an “ephemeral blip rather than an inflection point”[xiii] This requires deconstruction, as it represents the mainstream view of US foreign policy in the Washington establishment. To see Trump as an ephemeral blip implies that his style of leadership and the more unorthodox ideas, he brought to US foreign policy were fleeting, transient, not representative of a deeper shift in views within the Republican party on foreign affairs and what role the US should have in the international arena. In the internationalist worldview, Trump’s unorthodoxies and his slight dissent from establishmentarian views do not symbolize an inflection point, meaning Trump’s election and presidency are not a turning point for US foreign policy. This position is delusional, wishful thinking, and US foreign policy as it is being conducted is unsustainable. The Biden team is papering over the cracks in the empire. Drezner remarks that after years of Trump’s “bizarre behavior” of coddling dictators, threatening to leave many longstanding US agreements with allies like South Korea and NATO and allegedly befriending Valdimir Putin, Biden is a return to normalcy, and yet, one glance at Trump’s record towards Russia shows that he and his administration were incredibly hawkish, from his withdrawal from the IMF Treaty to his cancellation of the Nordstream 2 Pipeline.[xiv]
However, according to Drezner, Biden is a return to normalcy. This view must reconcile with the reality that Biden has not reversed many of Trump’s actions. He has not rescinded the tariffs on China, renegotiated the TPP or the Iran Nuclear Deal, nor has thawed US relations with the WTO. The freakish scenario that Drezner describes in his essay, that Trump will not have the “adults in the room”, that Trump will be unshackled from voices of reason in his circle and thus, his worst impulses are not likely to be impeded, is a scare story meant to justify his authoritarian position that the world order must be “Trump-Proofed”.[xv] What this means is that much of US foreign policy must be made above any reproach or debate. The so called “adults in the room”, people like James Mattis and Bolton who Drezner refers to as figures who kept Trump in check, are psychos akin to Patrick Bateman in Brett Easton Ellis’s novel American Psycho, conversing about death and misery just as they would the weather. Drezner then notes that “Trump’s second term would most closely resemble the chaotic last few months of Trump’s first term, when the 45th president came close to bombing Iran and unilaterally withdrawing all U.S. troops from a variety of trouble spots such as Somalia and Syria.”[xvi] This is all incredibly misleading, as Bolton wrote an op-ed for The New York Times that argued the US should bomb Iran, and as National Security Adviser to Trump, he pushed for Trump to withdraw from the Iran Nuclear Deal and when Trump fired him, one of the reasons cited was Bolton’s requests that Trump be more militaristic towards Iran.[xvii] Bolton also worked to sabotage the US-North Korea peace summit in 2019, however, he is touted as a significant anti-Trump voice, one who had taken Trump on in defense of the rules-based order.[xviii] It is also interesting that Drezner sees unilaterally withdrawing from places like Somalia and Syria is chaotic. Entering these countries without a declaration of war via Congress and drone bombing all over the place is not chaotic, but withdrawing apparently is. Essentially, being militaristic is just and necessary to promote peace, while restraint and allocating funds used for operations abroad to domestic issues is chaotic and isolationist.
Drezner captures the anti-populist and anti-democratic tendencies of the illiberal liberal class when he concludes his essay by remarking that “Trump’s third loss of the popular vote in 2024 would send a powerful signal that isolationist and populist sentiments in the United States are trending toward remission.”[xix] Judging by Trump’s continued popularity, they are not, and beyond that, Drezner is illustrating that what he hopes the 2024 re-election of Biden does is silence the pesky populists and deplorables who are not satisfied with the US grand strategy of liberal hegemony. Rather than make the case for his worldview and considering those who dissent from it, Drezner and his ilk of disgruntled globalists desire an erasure of the plebs from having their say on how the US conducts its foreign policy. Their opinions are not needed or valuable, but their bodies are when the US needs to send troops somewhere or have weapons made.
The message in Drezner’s article, as well as others by scholars like Joseph Nye, is that foreign policy must be left to the experts, who despite having a record of death and catastrophe, are still the experts. Just like war is peace, when they’re wrong, they’re right.
Conclusion
“God creates dinosaurs. God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man. Man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs.”[xx]– Dr. Ian Malcom
The likes of Drezner and Nye may be terrified of a second Trump term, but they will never utter the real reason for their fear. They mouth platitudes about liberalism and democracy and argue that Trump is a unique scourge who threatens all that is good and just in the world. The false narrative that illiberal liberals have crafted, that Trump is an existential threat to liberal democracy and the US led liberal world order, is a distraction and is used to avoid the debates we should be having if we wanted to stop the rise of demagogues like Trump. Writers like Anne Applebaum will tell us that Trump will likely try to withdraw the US from NATO, and that this a mortifying prospect, however, she and others who peddle this argument will not tell us why NATO is necessary or what its purpose is.[xxi] If you go and read Trump’s 2024 campaign platform, it will tell you that Trump intends to reassess NATO’s mission and purpose.[xxii] If you are a staunch advocate for NATO and you are confident in your case, you should welcome skepticism and debate. The only reason you would squelch debate and smear anyone who dissents from the illiberal liberal hive mind is if you do not have a strong case. Waving your arms around and shouting that Russia will invade Germany is not a strong case. Instead of inspiring necessary debates, like whether we should have NATO, or should we continue economic warfare with North Korea, Trump’s candidacy and his moments of dissent from Washington orthodoxy, especially in foreign policy, inspire vitriol and hatred from his opposition, who claim to be against the hatred and vitriol that Trump represents. The narrative that they have constructed around Trump’s rise and popularity is mirrored by the narrative of their own reaction to and effort to sabotage and depose Trump since he managed to get himself elected in 2016. The illiberal liberal’s counter narrative to Trump’s own narrative is as hostile and mythical as what it claims to oppose. David W. Blight captured this in an article in which he discusses ‘Trump’s Lost Cause’ and its staying power in American politics.[xxiii] He writes that “To be sustained as public propaganda, Lost Causes need a pure narrative with clearly identified villains and heroes. Sometimes, they are havens of sick souls; other times, they are the means to power for a disciplined political movement.”[xxiv] This exact set of criteria is true for Blight’s own side. His side’s pure narrative has clearly identified Trump as the villain, and the Democratic party as victims of his conspiracism and violent, roving band of brainwashed followers. The illiberal liberal class is Lost Cause as well, and Trump is the most prominent threat to it. Blight goes on to write that “At Trump rallies, constitutionalism is for losers, history is little more than a useful weapon, and American civics is mere entertainment, deployed for attendees eager to indulge their hatred of liberalism, representative democracy, and – in many cases – of non-white America.”[xxv] He is trying to argue that Trump distinctly takes advantage of xenophobic grievances and that he has constructed a Lost Cause narrative based on conspiracies and lies, however, Blight is unwittingly revealing the Lost Cause narrative that he subscribes to. While what he says may be true for many in Trump’s base, it is certainly not true for all of them. Blight’s ilk routinely indulges in hatred for liberalism and representative democracy. As for American civics being reduced to mere entertainment, that is entirely the fault of the illiberal liberal class. Keeping the serfs divided in culture wars and over diversity hires is a tool of the ruling class. While we. bicker over nonsense, our rights are slowly snatched from us. They loiter around like pickpockets, waiting for us to busy ourselves in pointless quarreling and then slipping their hands into our pants, robbing us of our rights. Instead of directing our rage at the real criminals, we point at each other across imagined political fault lines that are manufactured by the permanent regime.
If Trump does not take the presidency this year, then it will again be business as usual, which for the fortunate may be solace, but for many it is the exact opposite. The same forces of resentment that were stoked by Trump will continue to simmer and will eventually boil over into a future election, and that may be the fall of the Republic to a truly fearsome dictator. Trump and his movement are not going away. The rage and resentment he exploits is real. If he does lose in the upcoming election, the illiberal liberal class will sigh a chorus of relief, but we will be back in the same place in the next election. If Trump wins, hell may break loose, but at least the forces that Trump channels will be made harder to ignore. It is not just that the so-called liberal world order as it is currently constituted must fall and be rebuilt, either by steady deconstruction or by demolition, what allowed Trump to rise and become a viable political candidate must be confronted and reconciled. Those who scream the loudest about how he must be stopped are usually those who are exposed for who they are by him. They are what they claim to hate. They are the illiberal liberal class. They are not a contrast to Trump- they are a variation of him. To this day, they are in complete denial of this.
Susan Glasser of The New York Times, who wrote a book on Trump in the White House, conducted over 300 interviews as part of her research and according to her, one of her sources told her that what Trump views as one of his biggest mistakes in his first term, hiring figures who were pro-establishment and worked to sabotage his populist agenda, would be corrected in his second term and this source likened it to “the infamous scene in 1993’s “Jurassic Park” in which velociraptors learn to open doors.”[xxvi] While pithy, an extension of this comparison would liken Susan Glasser and the illiberal liberal class to John Hammond and Trump to Hammond’s rival, who bribes one of Jurassic Park’s programmers to deactivate the Park’s security system to steal dinosaur embryos, unleashing all of the dinosaurs, notably the Tyrannosaur Rex. Hammond, an industrialist, creates Jurassic Park and marvels at its magnificence, oblivious to the fact that the genetic technology he uses to bring dinosaurs to life can be dangerous if abused or exploited. The illiberal liberal class created Trump through his television show The Apprentice and then during the 2015/16 campaign when they employed the Pied Piper strategy, elevating him and giving him billions of dollars’ worth of free media coverage. Like the Tyrannosaurus Rex, Trump was soon rogue, and his creators were left reeling, unable to destroy what they brought to life. It is not Trump they brought to life, it is the resentment and anger of his supporters, who are not wrong in feeling that they are little more than refuse.
Comparing Trump to the velociraptors learning to open doors, not to the rogue creation who breaks free from the shackles of his creator to wreak havoc, reveals their lack of imagination and more importantly, their unwillingness to take any responsibility for what caused Trump. For too long they have had their parade untarnished and protected from even the slightest criticism, it is time for it to be knocked down and exposed as the front organization that it is. If Trump is the only Molotov available on hand, so be it, let him win, and let him commit arson on the international order.
[i] Spawn. New Line Cinema, 1997.
[ii] The Dark Knight. Warner Bros. Pictures, 2008.
[iii] Bolton, John. “Erratic, Irrational and Unconstrained: What a Second Trump Term Would Mean for America’s Foreign Policy.” The Hill, August 1, 2023. https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4129137-erratic-irrational-and-unconstrained-what-a-second-trump-term-would-mean-for-americas-foreign-policy/.
[iv] Bolton. “Erratic, Irrational and Unconstrained: What a Second Trump Term Would Mean for America’s Foreign Policy.”
[v] Brands, Hal. “Trump’s Campaign Is Already Shaping Global Affairs.” http://www.bloomberg.com, July 9, 2023. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-07-09/trump-s-possible-win-is-shaping-policies-of-china-russia-japan-eu.
[vi] Brands. Making the Unipolar Moment U.S. Foreign Policy and the Rise of the Post-Cold War Order. Cornell University Press, 2018., The Twilight Struggle. Yale University Press, 2022., and What Good Is Grand Strategy?: Power and Purpose in American Statecraft from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush. Ithaca, Ny: Cornell Univ. Press, 2015.
[vii] Brands. “Trump’s Campaign Is Already Shaping Global Affairs.”
[viii] Bacevich, Andrew. The Age of Illusions. Metropolitan Books, 2020.
[ix] Fitzgerald, Frances. The Evangelicals: The Struggle to Shape America. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2018., Hedges, Chris. American Fascists. Simon and Schuster, 2008., Hedges. “Onward, Christian Fascists.” Truthdig, December 30, 2019. https://www.truthdig.com/articles/onward-christian-fascists/., and Stewart, Katherine. The Power Worshippers inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism. New York Bloomsbury Publishing Usa Ann Arbor, Michigan Proquest, 2020.
[x] Grandin, Greg. “Opinion | the Republicans Who Want to Invade Mexico.” The New York Times, November 1, 2023, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/01/opinion/sunday/republican-war-mexico.html.
[xi] Shelley, Percy Bysshe. The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley. e-artnow, 2018.
[xii] Drezner, Daniel W. “Bracing for Trump 2.0.” Foreign Affairs, September 5, 2023. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/bracing-trump-possible-return-allies-rivals.
[xiii] Drezner. “Bracing for Trump 2.0.”
[xiv] Kerns, Jen. “President Trump Is Tougher on Russia in 18 Months than Obama in Eight Years.” The Hill, July 16, 2018. https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/397212-president-trump-is-tougher-on-russia-in-18-months-than-obama-in-eight/., Polyakova, Alina, and Filippos Letsas. “On the Record: The U.S. Administration’s Actions on Russia.” Brookings, December 31, 2019. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/on-the-record-the-u-s-administrations-actions-on-russia/., Stanley, Tim. “Ignore the Democrat Witch Hunt – Trump Is Quietly Turning into a Hawk on Russia.” The Telegraph, March 4, 2017. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/04/ignore-democrat-witch-hunt-trump-quietly-turning-hawk-russia/., and Ward, Alex. “Trump Is a Hawk. 2017 Proves It.” Vox, January 30, 2018. https://www.vox.com/world/2018/1/30/16925544/trump-state-union-2018-military-2017.
[xv] See Drezner’s book on this exact topic: The Toddler in Chief: What Donald Trump Teaches Us about the Modern Presidency. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2020., as well as this spot in MSNBC detailing a Task Force set up by the American Bar Association to ‘Trump proof’ American institutions: Wagner, Alex, and Jeh Johnson. “New Task Force Aims to Bolster U.S. Institutions against Trump Threat.” MSNBC.com, December 5, 2023. https://www.msnbc.com/alex-wagner-tonight/watch/new-task-force-aims-to-bolster-u-s-institutions-against-trump-threat-199481413882. and see this article by Francis Fukuyama where he defends the ‘deep state’: Fukuyama, Francis. “In Defense of the Deep State.” Asia Pacific Journal of Public Administration, August 25, 2023, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/23276665.2023.2249142.
[xvi] Drezner. “Bracing for Trump 2.0.”
[xvii] Bolton. “To Stop Iran’s Bomb, Bomb Iran.” The New York Times, March 26, 2015, sec. Opinion. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/26/opinion/to-stop-irans-bomb-bomb-iran.html., and throughout his book, Bolton discusses his disdain for the Iran Nuclear Deal and his role in Trump’s withdrawal from it: The Room Where It Happened. Simon and Schuster, 2020.
[xviii] DePetris, Daniel R. “John Bolton’s Awful Legacy on North Korea – 38 North: Informed Analysis of North Korea.” 38 North, October 17, 2019. https://www.38north.org/2019/10/depetris101719/., and Ahn, Christine. “With Bolton out of the Way, Peace with North Korea Is Possible.” Truthout, September 13, 2019. https://truthout.org/articles/with-bolton-out-of-the-way-peace-with-north-korea-is-possible/.
[xix] Drezner. “Bracing for Trump 2.0.”
[xx] Jurassic Park. Universal Pictures, 1993.
[xxi] Applebaum, Anne. “Trump Will Abandon NATO.” The Atlantic, December 4, 2023. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/01/trump-2024-reelection-pull-out-of-nato-membership/676120/., and Townley, Dafydd. “US Election: How a Trump Victory Could Embolden Russia, China and Israel.” The Conversation, January 12, 2024. https://theconversation.com/us-election-how-a-trump-victory-could-embolden-russia-china-and-israel-220628.
[xxii] Donald J. Trump Campaign. “Issues | Donald J. Trump for President 2024.” http://www.donaldjtrump.com, 2024. https://www.donaldjtrump.com/issues.
[xxiii] Blight, David W. “The Power of Trump’s Lost Cause | by David W. Blight.” Project Syndicate, January 11, 2024. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/trump-lost-cause-post-truth-political-myth-by-david-w-blight-2024-01?barrier=accesspaylog.
[xxiv] Blight. “The Power of Trump’s Lost Cause | by David W. Blight.”
[xxv] Blight. “The Power of Trump’s Lost Cause | by David W. Blight.”
[xxvi] Harris, Mary, and Susan Glasser. “Trump’s Second Term.” Slate Magazine, November 15, 2023. https://slate.com/podcasts/what-next/2023/11/what-would-donald-trump-do-in-his-second-term.
Reference
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Applebaum, Anne. “Trump Will Abandon NATO.” The Atlantic, December 4, 2023. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/01/trump-2024-reelection-pull-out-of-nato-membership/676120/.
Bacevich, Andrew. The Age of Illusions. Metropolitan Books, 2020.
Blight, David W. “The Power of Trump’s Lost Cause | by David W. Blight.” Project Syndicate, January 11, 2024. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/trump-lost-cause-post-truth-political-myth-by-david-w-blight-2024-01?barrier=accesspaylog.
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———. The Twilight Struggle. Yale University Press, 2022.
———. What Good Is Grand Strategy?: Power and Purpose in American Statecraft from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush. Ithaca, Ny: Cornell Univ. Press, 2015.
Brands, Hal. “Trump’s Campaign Is Already Shaping Global Affairs.” http://www.bloomberg.com, July 9, 2023. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-07-09/trump-s-possible-win-is-shaping-policies-of-china-russia-japan-eu.
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———. The Toddler in Chief: What Donald Trump Teaches Us about the Modern Presidency. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2020.
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Harris, Mary, and Susan Glasser. “Trump’s Second Term.” Slate Magazine, November 15, 2023. https://slate.com/podcasts/what-next/2023/11/what-would-donald-trump-do-in-his-second-term.
Hedges, Chris. American Fascists. Simon and Schuster, 2008.
———. “Onward, Christian Fascists.” Truthdig, December 30, 2019. https://www.truthdig.com/articles/onward-christian-fascists/.
Jurassic Park. Universal Pictures, 1993.
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Not Without Incident: Questioning Big Brother's Platitudes 
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