Flushing Decency: Inside Trump’s Useless China Summit and the Cost to Americans
From profiting off corporate tech deals in Beijing to dumping chemicals in the National Mall's reflecting pool, Trump's corruption has reached new lows. What can we do about it?
Edwin Eisendrath hosts It’s the Democracy, Stupid on Lincoln Square and WCPT820 AM/Heartland Signal. He’s the former CEO of the Chicago Sun-Times, a long-time management consultant, a former Chicago Alderman, HUD Regional Administrator and teacher in Chicago’s public schools. Subscribe to his Substack.
What an epic fail Trump’s China summit was.
Trump’s gaping awe at the Imperial power of China’s communist leaders mirrors his gaping awe at the Imperial power of that other dictatorship, Russia. Trump loves these guys. He’s jealous that they don’t have to do pesky things like file financial disclosure documents or allow a free press.
Trump famously told the world that China was responsible for the COVID pandemic. He said they shouldn’t be allowed to buy American land. He said their students shouldn’t get visas to come here. He told us he would impose 150 percent tariffs on China because he said they’ve been cheating us for years.
Never mind. They fed him dinner on gold rimmed plates in their most exclusive retreat.
President Xi talked about Taiwan. If Trump had a point of view about that democracy we didn’t hear it. We didn’t hear him mention the word freedom even once. That’s the sort of thing American presidents do when the visit countries that surveil their people and lock whole ethnic groups in forced labor camps.
Donald Trump doesn’t care about any of that.
Did he at least negotiate a new trade framework? He did not. Did he do anything to restrain China’s expansive territorial claims to the South China Sea? He did not. Did he win concessions on, well, on anything? He did not. This summit was as useless as when he rolled out a red carpet for Putin in Alaska.
What does Trump care about? Well, he brought with him the CEOs of some big American companies. The CEOs of Apple, Boeing, and NVIDIA. I’d like to think they were there to help promote investment in America, to help showcase American tech leadership, and to show the world what a free people can accomplish. But that’s not why they were invited.
Like all employees of the federal government, Donald Trump files mandatory ethics disclosures. His May disclosure report revealed more than 30 investments of between one and five million dollars just this year. These are his personal investments. And the report shows he invested millions in Boeing, Oracle, Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Apple.
Every other president in memory put his personal wealth in a blind trust so there would be no conflicting interests. Not Mr. Trump. He invested his personal money in companies. Then he chose to bring the CEOs of those companies to China to win deals.
He invested in companies, then he chose to use the power of the presidency to make those investments more valuable.
That’s our president. On Air Force One heading home, he summed up the summit this way: “China has a Ballroom, and so should the U.S.A.”
Is there a single American surprised by this grotesque and criminal conduct?
There is not.
Donald Trump has flushed down one of his golden toilets our sense of decency, our judgment about good conduct, and our expectation that government leaders work for us.
As you know, Donald Trump is suing the government of the United States for ten billion dollars. Never mind that we taxpayers are defended by people who work for Donald Trump. Last week, we learned that the Justice Department — Mr. Trump’s Justice Department — has “settled” the suit by taking $1.776 billion of our money to set up a fund to pay a bonus to everyone convicted of trying to overturn our democracy on Jan 6th. That’s right, Donald Trump wants you to pay them for all they suffered when they failed to overturn our election by force.
Next thing you know, Trump will offer the open AG job to ousted Hungarian dictator Viktor Orban.
But none of this is a joke. Our country is hurting.
When a reporter asked if American’s financial stress weighed on Trump as negotiated with Iran, he said, “Not even a little bit. I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody.”
Gas prices are shockingly high. Electricity costs are soaring — just in time for air conditioning season. Housing prices remain high. Remember, Trump told us that housing prices would come down because he was going to make a lot of properties vacant by deporting millions of immigrants. His ICE cruelties continue. Deportations continue. But it turns out, Trump and the New York Times were wrong, and deportation is not a housing policy.
Meanwhile, across the former Confederacy, they are partying like it’s 1952. Now that the power drunk majority on the Supreme Court opined that racism is no longer a thing and laws protecting people on account of race are illegal, Alabama, Louisiana, South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, and Tennessee are racing to get rid of black elected officials, and to break up black communities into multiple districts where their votes won’t matter.
This week Knox County in Tennessee banned Alex Haley’s book Roots from school libraries. But John Roberts doesn’t see racism anywhere. Maybe if he looked in the mirror first …
The country is hurting. Economically, socially, spiritually.
What does Trump do? He invites religious leaders to pray in front of a giant gold statue of himself. And many did. He drops a bunch of Ty-d-Bol pods in the reflecting pool on the national mall to turn it blue.
If the world can’t be his oyster, he’s determined to make it his toilet.
Our country is hurting and Trump does not care. He said so himself this week. When a reporter asked if American’s financial stress weighed on him as negotiated with Iran, he said, “Not even a little bit. I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody.” When a friendly FOX flack tried to get him to walk that back, Trump leaned into it even more.
Americans are going to get the last laugh. Come November, that great flushing sound you hear will be the sound of MAGA going down the drain.
Thank you Edwin. You collected all of our worries and put them out there. These concerns are real, but our President and his minions don't care. I suggest they should care, because poisoning the environment with chemicals and removal of environmental protection laws hits everyone. As to John Roberts looking in a mirror. Well, my guess there would be no reflection in that mirror, just as there is no deep reflection in his judgement. Thanks, again for all you do. Take care.
A small point of clarification--the economy is not bad everywhere. I live in a predominantly white community, mostly rural. We might not be billionaires, but most have comfy savings and can afford $460/gl gas, to go out to dinner where a meal averages $25 not including tip. It is still maddening for us Dems to encounter those who go blithely about their business, evidently not knowing what destruction is taking place. Because they likely won't be affected by it. Just line I won't. Except spiritually. This regine is focused on keeping THEIR POWER at any cost. Caring about OTHERS is not in their vocabulary.