The New York Times: An injured America inside and isolated outside

Trump’s erratic decisions threaten economic stability, isolating allies and removes the next generation of dreamers in America

So many crazy things happen to Trump administration every day that some strange but incredibly revealing things get lost in the middle of the noise. A recent example was the scene on April 8 at the White House, where, in the middle of his furious trade war, our president decided that it was the perfect time to sign an executive order to strengthen coal mining.

“We are bringing back an abandoned industry,” said President Trump, surrounded by coal miners using helmets, members of a workforce that has decreased to about 40,000 of 70,000 in the last decade, according to Reuters. “Let’s put the miners back to work.” To reinforce, Trump added about these miners: “You could give them an apartment in Fifth Avenue and a different kind of job and they would be unhappy. They want to mine coal; that’s what they love to do.”

It is commendable that the President honor men and women who work with their hands. But when he highlights coal miners for praise while trying to zero the development of clean technology jobs in his budget – in 2023, the US wind industry employed approximately 130,000 workers, while the solar industry employed 280,000 – suggests that Trump is trapped in a directist ideology that does not recognize green jobs as “real work”. How will this make us stronger?

This Trump II administration is a cruel scam. Trump competed in another term not because he had any idea how to turn America into the 21st century. He competed to stay out of jail and to take revenge on those who, with real evidence, tried to hold him responsible to the law. I doubt he has spent five minutes studying the workforce of the future.

He then returned to the White House, his head still full of ideas from the 1970s. There he launched a trade war without allies and without serious preparation – which is why he changes his tariffs almost every day – and without understanding the global economy is now a complex ecosystem, in which products are mounted from components from various countries. And then he has this war led by a trade secretary who thinks millions of Americans are dying to replace Chinese workers “squeezing small screws to make iPhones.”

But this farce is about to play all Americans. By attacking our closest allies-Canada, Mexico, Japan, South Korea and the European Union-and our biggest rival, China, while making it clear that Russia favors Ukraine and prefers climate-destroying energy-oriented industries, damn the planet, Trump is triggering a serious loss of global confidence in America.

The world is seeing America of Trump exactly for what it is becoming: a renegade state led by a strong impulsive man disconnected from the rule of law and other American constitutional principles and values.

And do you know what our democratic allies do with renegade states? Let’s connect some points.

First, they don’t buy treasure titles as much as they used to do. So America needs to offer higher interest rates to do so – which will spread throughout our economy, from car pay to residential mortgages at the cost of financing our national debt at expense of everything else.

“Are President Trump’s erratic decisions and border taxes causing worldwide investors to move away from the dollar and US Treasury titles?” Asked The Wall Street Journal editorial page on Sunday under the headline, “Is there a new US risk prize?” Too too soon to say, but not too early to ask, as securities income keep up and the dollar continues to weaken – classic signs of a loss of confidence that doesn’t have to be big to have a big impact on our entire economy.

The second thing is that our allies lose faith in our institutions. Financial Times reported on Monday that the European Commission is issuing disposable phones and basic laptops for some US employees to avoid the risk of espionage, a traditionally reserved measure for travel to China. It no longer trusts the rule of law in America.

The third thing people abroad do is tell themselves and their children – and I heard it repeatedly in China a few weeks ago – that may not be a good idea to study in America anymore. The reason: they do not know when their children can be arbitrarily arrested, when their relatives can be deported to salvado prisons.

Is this irreversible? All I know for sure today is that somewhere outside, while you read it, there is someone like Steve Jobs’s biological father, who came to our back in the 1950s to get a Ph.D. at Wisconsin University – who was planning to study in America, but is now looking to go to Canada or Europe.

You diminish all these things – our ability to attract the most energetic and entrepreneurial immigrants in the world, which allowed us to be the world center of innovation; Our power to attract a disproportionate portion of world savings, which allowed us to live beyond our means for decades; And our reputation for defending the rule of law – and over time you end up with a America that will be less prosperous, less respected and increasingly isolated.

Wait, wait, you say, but China is still excavating coal? Yes, it is-but with a long-term plan to gradually eliminate it and use robots to do dangerous and harmful to the health of the miners.

And that is the point. While Trump is doing his “Zig-Zag”-rambling about anything that seems to him a good policy at the moment-China is weaving long-term plans.

In 2015, a year before Trump became president, then-China Prime Minister Li Keqiang revealed a growth plan-oriented growth plan “made in China 2025”. He started asking: What will be the 21st century growth engine? Beijing then made huge investments in the components of this engine so that Chinese companies could dominate them at home and abroad. We are talking about clean energy, batteries, electric and autonomous vehicles, robots, new materials, tools, drones, quantum computing and artificial intelligence.

The most recent Nature Index shows that China has become “the main country globally for research production in the database in Chemistry, Earth and Environmental Sciences and Physical Sciences, and is in second place in Biological Sciences and Health Sciences”.

Does that mean China will leave us behind? No. Beijing is making a big mistake if you think the rest of the world will let China indefinitely suppress its domestic demand for goods and services so that the government continues to subsidize export industries and trying to do everything for everyone – leaving other countries emptied and dependent. Beijing needs to balance her economy, and Trump is right to press her to do so.

But Trump’s constant bluff and his wild and intermittent imposition of tariffs are not a strategy – not when you are facing China on the tenth anniversary of the deed in China 2025. If the Scott Bessent Treasury Secretary really believes in what he said foolishly, that Beijing is just “playing with a couple of two,” someone warns me when I want to buy chips. China has built an economic engine that gives it options.

The question for Beijing – and the rest of the world – is: How will China use all the surpluses it generated? Will invest in them to make a more threatening military force? Will you invest in more high -speed railline lines and six -track highways to cities that don’t need them? Or will invest in more domestic consumption and services, while offering the next generation of Chinese factories and supply lines in America and Europe with 50-50 owned structures? We need to encourage China to make the right decisions. But at least China has choices.

Compare this to the choices Trump is making. He is undermining our sacred rule of law, throwing away our allies, undermining the value of the dollar and shattering any hope of national unity. He even got the Canadians boycotem las vegas because they don’t like to be informed that we will soon have them.

So you tell me who is playing with a pair of two.

If Trump does not stop his renegade behavior, he will destroy all the things that have made America strong, respected and prosperous.

I’ve never been so scared of America’s future in my life.

Thomas L. Friedman, an American journalist, currently editorialist for The New York Times.