Should it be about the economy? No. Punishing a POTUS at midterms for economic sluggishness is so … pedestrian. We should be pursuing accountability for any number of more distinctive, more egregious Trump acts.
But if the combined flaws in our system prevent any of that, there’s always the economy. Fortunately, our president has been waging an odd one-man war on calm and prosperity in that area.
THE ITCH
Here’s an exchange I had with a friend at the turn of this month:
On February 19, Trump said he would decide in the “next 10 to 15 days” about whether to attack Iran or not.
On February 20, the Supreme Court shot down many of the Trump tariffs and the rational he had (ab)used to deploy them.
For one comparatively lovely week, we operated with a minimum of entirely avoidable, unnecessary Trump power plays that extract a considerable economic and human toll.
On February 28, the war on Iran began.
I’m not saying he started the Iran war because SCOTUS shot down his tariffs. That would be assigning too much of an identifiable reason for the Iran war.
All I’m saying is, Trump loved tariffs because they were a tool for bullying without having to cooperate with anyone or any branch of government. When that toy disappeared, Trump apparently endured maybe a few days without a high-profile theater for working on his strongman strut.
You can imagine him sitting in whatever pre-war meetings they had. And I, for one, can imagine our Chaos Agent with a trigger finger that might have been a little less itchy if SCOTUS hadn’t imposed that pesky Constitution on him.
Nobody wanted Trump to start dozens of tariff fistfights that bumped up the cost of living for so many Americans. But he did it, in part because he craved the conflict.
Most Americans did not want Trump to spike gas prices and create various supply shortages by plunging the Middle East into unrest and violence. But that’s what we got. When you’re president, they just let you do it.
BUT WHY?
If inflicting unnecessary economic crises on his own country seems like an odd way to serve his constituents, that’s because Trump’s not trying to serve his constituents.
Trump serves Trump. Then Trump serves wealthy businessmen. Then Trump serves white people who like him. Then Trump serves, however temporarily or shamelessly, whoever will help him serve the people at the top of the list.
But even if we set aside the personality defects of which we will likely never see again in the Oval Office — and even though we would get more emotional satisfaction by directly punishing Trump for the corruption, the war crimes, the cruelty — Democratic candidates and their supporters should not be afraid to drill down to one undeniable truth this year:
With his tariffs and then his war in Iran, Donald Trump has singlehandedly made surviving in America more expensive for every citizen since the week he took office.