The following is my
answer to a Quora question: “Was Barack Hussein Obama II a better
president than Donald John Trump regarding worldwide approval?”
Barack Hussein Obama II was definitely a better
president when we consider policies, international engagement and legacy. But then, you could put a cardboard cutout of
Forrest Gump, and it would do better. Obama
was no angel. His policies were closer
to Ronald Wilson Reagan than Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower, and he was as
interventionist as the previous presidents. He was simply more adept at spinning it.
However, Donald John Trump perfectly encapsulates how
much of the rest of the world sees the US: a military bully, an exceptionalist
state, an anti-intellectual idiocracy. Before
Trump, the US was far and away the least accomplished developed nation by any
measure of human development, whether it is healthcare, racial harmony and
wealth distribution. Under Trump, the US
is working hard at widening the lead at the bottom of the pile, and trying to
drag the rest of the planet with it, whether it is upsetting international
trade, denying climate change, or facilitating failed states.
Trump’s America is losing friends, and rapidly
learning that having a larger military than the next twenty nations is not
enough to get things done. When the
economy is a creaking edifice, and the stock market does not reflect the actual
worth of the market, but goes up in a bubble, it is a matter of time before
that economy fails. A poor economy makes
it difficult to deploy that big stick.
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