By Terence Smith
I really liked the headline on Peter Baker’s excellent page one news analysis in today’s (12/21) New York Times on the royalist aspirations of President Donald Trump:
SECOND TERM
LOOKING MORE
LIKE A REIGN
And the sub-head in the print edition that was delivered to my doorstep:
“Trump is Testing Limits in Policies, and Profits.”
Peter Baker had fun in his piece pointing out how Trump copied the royal welcome he got from Britain’s King Charles in his reception last month for the crown prince of Saudi Arabia that included….“yes, a stirring military flyover, a procession of black horses and long, regal tables” at the state dinner.
But Baker’s more substantive point: that Trump is pushing the legal and political boundaries of the American presidency well beyond his predecessors was thoroughly documented in the article that followed. There was also a companion piece inside the paper by Shawn McCreesh about Trump’s fatuous (and probably illegal) addition of his own name above that of the late President John F. Kennedy on the face of the Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in Washington.
Vainglorious? Of course. Silly? Yes. Tacky? Certainly. But revealing of the man, his means and motives.
Ever since Trump was re-elected and launched his second term with a blizzard of executive orders straight out of the pages of Project 2025, I have wondered to myself what the end result will be.
Will Trump actually change political opinion and attitudes in the United States for years-to-come?
Will the agencies he has destroyed, like the estimable USAID, be reconstituted by a successor?
Will his passion for “Drill, Baby, Drill” dissolve in favor of climate control?
Will we restore some sense and sensibility to our border and immigration policies?
Will NATO and our other alliances be revived and respected as before?
Will any of the fragile cease-fires and supposed peace agreements Trump brags about survive his term in office?
Will a future president right the wrongs and end the silliness?
Will the daily cheapening and corruption of our political rhetoric depart with Trump?
Will American voters think twice about the candidates they support in the future?
Or, will J.D. Vance or another candidate carry Trumpism into the future?
So many questions; so few answers.