How To Handle The Donald

[00:00:00] The Why Curve, with Phil Dobbie and Roger Hearing. How to Handle The Donald. In the few weeks since Trump entered the White House, there have been bucket loads of madcap schemes, off-the-wall plans and handbrake policy turns. Take Greenland, rename the Gulf of Mexico, turn Gaza into a US beach resort. Some playing crazy and some, like cozying up to Putin, seriously damaging to a rules-based world order.

[00:00:26] Diplomats around the world are wondering how to handle all this. Is he serious? Does he mean it? Is the noise coming from the Oval Office designed to throw everyone into confusion so other important things can slip by unnoticed? How should we understand what the world's most powerful nation really intends to do? The Why Curve. So, let me ask you first of all, can you give me five things that you've achieved this week, Roger? Well, this is a nightmare, isn't it? I mean, how can I tell you?

[00:00:54] I got up this morning, that's probably, that's pretty good. Yeah, yeah. And maybe a couple of other days I managed to do that. Even worked slightly, so, you know, that's good. Three things there, then. I know, but I'd be sacked, wouldn't I? Immediately. No, not without the other two. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but which of these European leaders could say the same? And that's the problem. You think European leaders haven't achieved five things? Well, I mean, I think this is, you know, this is what Donald Trump is trying to imply, perhaps. You know, in case of federal workers, of course, this scheme, this thing put in by Elon Musk.

[00:01:20] But actually, I think it's, you know, it's part of genuinely stirring up everything and seeing what happens. Throw it all into the air. But is it dangerous? Should we be scared? I mean, it's one thing. And what is the upshot out of all of it as well? Well, this is what we don't know. I mean, you know, it's one thing what's going on inside the US, which is bad enough. But it's just throwing all the pieces into the air in the world, really. So we are going to spend in the UK more on defence and less helping people overseas. Absolutely.

[00:01:49] There by creating a vacuum overseas, which will enable foreign powers to take more control of the world. And all sorts of other things, too. It's all very short-sighted, isn't it? Of course. Well, I don't think it's sighted at all, this thing. I think it's almost literally get in there and just smash everything up and see what happens. And I think underneath... Go back to the Stone Age. Well, kind of, we'll just break... I mean, OK, let's take a positive view in one way and say, actually, you know, Ukraine, Gaza were both stalemates, really. Yeah, yeah.

[00:02:16] And whatever else that comes out of this, there's going to be change, big change. Maybe not good change, but it will at least change. So let's pick a side and give the other side no chance whatsoever. Is that the way to solve these things? No, obviously not. But this is the reality we've got. That's exactly what we're doing, though, isn't it? I mean, the situation for Ukraine, it seems, is...

[00:02:34] Well, if you don't accept a deal which you had no part in, which is basically flying the surrender flag to Russia, if you don't accept that and allow us to take some of your mineral resources from the spoils of war, we're going to stop you fighting by not providing you any support. And we might turn your satellite access off as well. Oh, yeah. So you don't stand a hell... Can't have a chance. No, none of it's... I mean, morally, none of it stacks up at all. But... But it's accepted. It...

[00:03:01] Because they are the most powerful nation on the earth, Donald Trump is the elected president, and like it or loath it, and most of them clearly loath it, certainly the European leaders, they've got to cosy up to him. They've got to say nice things about Donald Trump even if they don't believe them, because he is powerful. But half of America didn't vote for him. I wonder how they feel about all of this. Well, probably not very happy, but the point is... But they're not taking to the streets, are they? No. Is that because they're worried? No. Has it got to that stage where they're actually worried about what would happen if there were mass protests? Because that would be the next thing.

[00:03:29] What would Donald Trump do if people are not happy with their lot in life, if none of this is working, and there's some sort of civil rights which, you know, America's got... That may well come about. But in a way, that, you know, what goes on inside America, in a way, yes, it'll be interesting to see. But what actually goes on in the rest of the world is what affects us. You know, tariff wars, all kinds of things going on. And how is that going to upset the sand table and destroy some of the assumptions we've all made over many years about how the world operates? But it is an important question as well.

[00:03:57] If we somehow have to put up with all of this and it's not achieving his end game, what happens then? Do we just go, well, thank God for that, and life goes back to how it was? One might hope, but we've got four years of this. That's the thing to remember. And I don't think it ever will go back. Because I think we'll get to the end of this, and even if we had the most moderate leader ever, and I don't think it works that way, does it? We're not going to go from Donald Trump to somebody who's mealy-mouthed and tries to correct everything he's done. We might go back a little bit.

[00:04:25] But even so, even if that was to happen, the rest of the world is not going to trust America anymore. We're going to say, even though we don't have Trump anymore, you are the country that allowed that to happen. Yeah, and what will be left on the table by then anyway? That's what we don't... I mean, this has been in, what, two months since he was inaugurated? Barely that. Yeah, yeah. And we're already in absolute chaos. Yeah.

[00:04:44] I just think we've got to get to a point where, well, and I think European leaders know this, they've got to get to a point where they do enough to, you know, the Trump whisperers, they can actually find a way of wrangling him in such a way, they hope, that he'll get what they want. But it's by no means certain. But that's the game they've got to play. Yeah, you've got to butter up to him. So it takes leaders of great humility, isn't it? You may think he's a complete idiot. But you've just got to say what you think will, yeah. You've got to say what you think he will actually want to hear. Yeah, that's the problem. Let's get a bit of a historical perspective on this then, shall we?

[00:05:14] Let's talk to Dr. Maria Ryan, Associate Professor of American History at Nottingham University. She joins us now. So, Maria, I mean, first of all, five things you've accomplished in the last week. What are those? Come on, we're asking that question. It's not easy, is it? I didn't come up with five, I must admit. No, Roger struggled with it. But I mean, what a crazy question to ask anyway. But I mean, the fact that Elon Musk, who is unelected, has got this power to run roughshod through the US Civil Service. This is unheard of, isn't it? So without precedent.

[00:05:43] Yes, you know, it certainly is. I mean, I'm reminded of Joe Biden's farewell address, you know, which is an address that all presidents give just before they leave office. And they generally use it to kind of, you know, speak their mind, you know, in a polite way, knowing that they don't have to be reelected. And he said that he wanted to warn Americans about the rise of an oligarchy in the United States.

[00:06:08] And, you know, you don't have to read too far between the lines to know that, you know, he was obviously talking about people like Musk. But also, I think, you know, the boss of Meta and the boss of Amazon, they were sitting behind Donald Trump and his family in the inauguration. And, you know, it's quite dystopian, actually, I think. Yeah. Yeah. And you can see how all of those people have fallen in line.

[00:06:38] So, for example, Meta saying, well, OK, we're not going to apply the same safeguards that we used to do on Facebook because that doesn't align with the government's approach. But also you've got the foreign policy significance because you've got Elon Musk allegedly at least threatening to turn off the Starlink, the Internet connectivity for Ukraine, in the interest of whatever Trump's foreign policy is on this.

[00:07:04] So it's an involvement across the field, which makes it really hard to know, I guess, in European capitals and elsewhere how to deal with it. It is very difficult. I mean, I think, you know, Trump is the most unpredictable of all U.S. presidents. And I think he almost sees unpredictability as kind of as a virtue in a way, because he likes to keep his advisers on their toes by being unpredictable. And he likes to keep foreign heads of state on their toes as well by being unpredictable.

[00:07:30] And I think he kind of he seems to something about his personality that he seems to seek notoriety in a way. And he loves to kind of shock people. He loves to shock the kind of woke liberal foreign policy establishments as he sees it in Washington, D.C. And he likes to shock other foreign leaders as well. So that shock. I mean, he he he obviously also wants to be loved, doesn't he? He wants to be loved by his followers. What happens if they turn on him?

[00:07:59] What if he what if he doesn't achieve what he's saying he's going to achieve? What if his approach, which even now you see, you know, you look on social media and for everyone who starts to diss Donald Trump, there's a long line of comments from people who are fiercely in support of him. But what if they turn? Could that happen? Well, it's it's very hard to know. And I should say that, you know, although I'm, you know, I'm an academic historian, you know,

[00:08:24] I often feel with Donald Trump that as historians and political scientists, in a way, we sort of lack the disciplinary expertise to fully evaluate him and everything he does, because, you know, to the untrained eye, he appears to have all the symptoms of a sociopath, really. But that's not something that I can kind of make a professional judgment about. You know, you're not a psychologist, but you wouldn't be the first person to say that. You know, but we can see clearly, even if we just look at his policies, that, you know,

[00:08:51] he is in a different category to other presidents. And I think, you know, in terms of his followers, he does seem to have this really kind of visceral connection with the people who support him. And it almost doesn't matter if he doesn't achieve what he says he's going to achieve. You know, if you take the issue of tariffs, for example, Trump first imposed tariffs on China in 2018. And he said this was going to resolve the trade deficit. China wasn't importing enough from the US.

[00:09:20] And, you know, the US was buying all this stuff from China. And he was going to impose these tariffs. And this would sort the trade deficit out. And the trade deficit actually went up a little bit the year that he imposed those tariffs. And then it came down a little bit. But it's still massive. You know, the US still has this trade deficit, I think somewhere in the region of about $300 billion with China. So those tariffs, which were kept in place by Biden, you know, they've been in place for like seven years now. And that has not resolved the trade deficit with China.

[00:09:48] The US could just ask Americans to stop buying cheap goods. Exactly. Yeah. So it just doesn't really matter that he hasn't achieved his goal. You know, he just he makes his core supporters feel as though he is standing up for them in the world and standing up for them at home against this kind of liberal woke establishment that doesn't understand them and doesn't respect them. So it's the outside world that doesn't respect America either. That's that's a big thing. You know, they they aren't paying enough for defense.

[00:10:17] They're not paying enough for our goods, all the kind of things like that. But I suppose, Maria, one of the things in this is, you know, you used about shock and he wants to shock. That's his style. But the big question, then, I think one that presumably was exercising diplomat diplomatic minds around the world is does he mean it? Are we supposed to take, you know, the great question, the great quote about him was take him seriously, but not literally. But when he's saying these things, how how much of what he says should we take as what US policy is?

[00:10:46] Well, that's a really good question. And, you know, there's a lot of debate about that. And and I guess my view is that, you know, whether we take his words literally as a moot point, but I do think that we have to take the sentiment behind Trump's comments seriously, because I think a lot of what he says, you know, for example, we're going to take over Greenland. It signals that he believes in a very different type of global order. He is a unilateralist. He is a nationalist.

[00:11:14] He is going to pursue quite a narrow vision of American national interest. He'll do it in quite an aggressive way. His preferred method is coercion. And he believes in a world in which, you know, it's every country for itself, really. I think his way of guessing what he wants in the world is to kind of start with these really maximalist, quite extreme positions. So, you know, we're going to take over Greenland. We're going to take over Canada. So it gets talked about. Yes.

[00:11:44] So I guess so anything which is halfway towards that is almost like people are breathing a sigh of relief. It's like it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Yeah. And I think, you know, if he has to make any concessions, he's still got more in the end than what he would have achieved if he'd taken a more moderate starting position. So we don't we don't necessarily have to accept that he's literally going to invade Greenland. But I think, you know, the sentiment behind that comment, you know, we do need to take seriously.

[00:12:08] And it signifies that, you know, he believes in and wants a very different type of world order. And it's a very good way of galvanizing situation. Because we were saying before you came on that, you know, there was a stalemate. There certainly was a stalemate in Ukraine, certainly a stalemate over Gaza and very bloody stalemates in both cases. And whatever comes out of this is like to be different. Might not be better, but it will be different. And maybe there is a plus in that.

[00:12:34] It's I think, you know, Kierstama said something along the lines of, you know, Trump has changed the conversation on Ukraine. And I think that is certainly true. And, you know, I agree that, you know, the war is not going to end without negotiations. But the way that he has gone about it has been kind of shocking and misguided because because Trump has more surrender than negotiations. Yeah, I mean, Trump has effectively intervened in the war on the side of Russia.

[00:13:03] You know, he's taken the side of the aggressor state and really sidelined the country that was, you know, the victim of aggression. So, you know, he is in a powerful position and he does have the capacity to, you know, shift, you know, to cause the ground to shift, if you like, in, you know, this conflict and, you know, Gaza and Israel as well.

[00:13:25] So, I mean, the situation with Ukraine, that's I mean, that is a scary situation in that he's basically said we're going to reach a deal without you involved, without Ukraine involved or without Europe really involved. Europe's going to police it all afterwards. We think you should give ground to Russia is basically what he's saying. You should also give us access to some of your mineral resources for all the help that we've provided along the way.

[00:13:52] And by the way, if you don't agree with all of this, you know, my mate Elon might turn off his satellites. So therefore, you're not only will we not support you in future in the war, we'll also remove the ability for you to actually be able to fight that war. I mean, that's almost that almost seems like an act of war from America to Ukraine in itself, doesn't it? It does. I mean, when I first read about, you know, Trump's proposal, you know, with regard to Ukraine's natural resources,

[00:14:15] I mean, it almost seemed like he was seeking reparations from Ukraine, you know, Ukraine is being being treated like a sort of defeated, aggressive state and, you know, being made to pay the cost of the war. And and it's you know, it's clear that Trump he is attracted to these kind of strongman authoritarian leaders like like Vladimir Putin. And he seems to have just a lack of compassion for the victims of aggression. He sees them as weak. I think he respects the use of military force.

[00:14:44] His own way of getting what he wants in the world involves coercion. And I think, you know, he respects coercion when he sees it, you know, when he sees Putin trying to go to get what he wants through coercion in Ukraine. So how long does the rest of the world just sit and accept that? Yeah. And does it is it right to take it in that way and say, well, yes, this is the what he said is, in effect, the end game or to say, well, what he stirred up maybe could land in all sorts of places.

[00:15:13] For example, if there's a mineral deal, maybe he doesn't get everything he wants, but maybe Ukraine gets some guarantees. If, for example, there are minerals to be taken out of Ukraine, then the US then has an interest in making sure that that happens, because therefore they will have perhaps peacekeepers on the ground as a way of making that go through. So in a way, there could be advantageous. It's another way. It's another example, isn't it, of taking it to the extreme and he'll get something out of it that he wasn't going to get otherwise. But maybe Ukraine will get something to continued support. Yeah. Because of the minerals.

[00:15:43] Well, that is possible. I mean, I think we don't really know, you know, the full deals of this agreement. You know, we don't really know whether there'll be, you know, a concrete US commitment to Ukrainian security. But I think, I mean, my view is that, you know, Ukraine's fate is tragic, really, because even with all this Western support, it's not powerful enough to beat Russia.

[00:16:07] And even though Russia has performed really poorly, you know, the performance of the Russian military has been shocking in this war. But it's still too powerful for Ukraine to actually beat it. So the tragic reality is that, you know, this war is going to end with Ukraine ceding some territory to Russia. And, you know, unless Western powers are willing to go to war directly with Russia over Ukraine.

[00:16:33] And there are very good reasons for them not to do that, because it would likely end up in, you know, nuclear war. You know, the reality is that Ukraine is probably going to end up, you know, giving up some territory. But the question is how much territory. And I think the way that Trump has intervened decisively on Russia's side suggests that whatever agreement they come to in the end, you know, it's going to be more punitive for Ukraine than it would have been, you know, under a different administration.

[00:17:01] So this is going to last a lot longer, obviously, than the four years that Trump is in office, assuming he makes it to the end, which is another question we can come to. But at the end of that four years, even if we had the most moderate leader ever in the United States to follow him, I mean, we are going to be looking and going, well, American democracy allowed this to happen. America isn't a state that we can trust in the same way. I mean, clearly, Europe is trying to ramp up its defences. If we have tariffs, even if we don't have tariffs, just a mere threat of tariffs means that we'll be looking at supply chains that can avoid America.

[00:17:31] I mean, the long term upshot of this is that America is not an ally anymore, isn't it? Yes, I agree. I mean, during Trump's first term in office, you know, NATO allies were starting to, you know, behind closed doors, I think, you know, talk about, you know, the fact that the US was no longer such a reliable ally. And that is what made Trump different to every other post-World War II president.

[00:17:57] Every other president believed in the NATO alliance and was fully committed to it. And the collective security guarantee that's at the heart of that alliance was really ironclad. And there was bipartisan agreement about this in the US. So it didn't matter whether there was a Republican or a Democrat in the White House. US allies knew that the president's commitment to the collective security guarantee in the NATO alliance would be ironclad.

[00:18:25] But Trump was the first president to cast doubt over that. And that's what made him different to every other post-World War II president. Can NATO survive this? We'll be 10 years down the line. Will NATO still exist? Well, you know, it's hard to say for certain, but I think it is quite possible that we are seeing the beginning of a fundamental rupture in the transatlantic relationship. And possibly even, you know, the beginning of a post-NATO world, you know, a world where the NATO alliance will kind of fall into obsolescence.

[00:18:54] I don't think we can say for certain that that's definitely going to happen. And the alternative power might be an EU army, I mean, or something of that nature? Yep. Potentially, you know, much more concerted European security and defence cooperation. You know, we're already seeing states commit to, you know, increase their defence spending.

[00:19:14] But I also think it's worth remembering that, you know, in the rest of the Republican Party in Congress, there is still, you know, a lot of... There is still, you know, strong commitment to the NATO alliance. There is a vocal minority now that questions the purpose of these alliances. And the current president and vice president are part of that minority.

[00:19:41] But the majority of the Republican Party in Congress, particularly in the Senate, is still quite strongly committed to the NATO alliance. And in, I think it was December 2023, the Congress passed legislation which forbids any president from unilaterally withdrawing from the NATO alliance. And that was supported strongly by both parties. And obviously, it was passed with Trump in mind. So Trump will not be able to just withdraw from NATO. There would have to be an act of Congress for that.

[00:20:08] And there won't be enough support in Congress for that. Might be easier for the survival of NATO if he does withdraw from it, though, mightn't he? You know, if we can get it... Wouldn't be taken very seriously without the US. Absolutely. No, I guess not. But then something else takes its place. So is there any examples in the history of America where we've seen such a bold shift in the approach taken by an administration? I do think that there is something unprecedented about what Trump is doing.

[00:20:35] Because I think at the end of World War II, the US established an international order that embedded US interests and values at the heart of it. And it did this for quite self-interested reasons. I don't think we should be naive about that. But every president believed that it was in the US interest to play a systematic leadership role at a global level. And Western states generally gave their consent to that. They wanted US leadership of the international system.

[00:21:06] I think what makes Trump different is that he's just not interested in playing a systemic leadership role in the same way on behalf of other states. And in many ways, I think that what we might be seeing, and obviously this is a kind of early take on the Trump administration. But I think what we might be seeing is that the Trump administration is acting as what we would call a revisionist power in international relations.

[00:21:33] And this is a term that some international relations scholars use to describe a country that wants to revise the terms, revise the rules of international relations. And usually we would expect that it would be a rising power like China, for example, that would want to do that. It would want to challenge the existing rules of the international system.

[00:21:52] But I think what we might be seeing with the Trump administration is that actually Trump wants to revise the rules of the international order that the US itself established, an order that other presidents really believed embodied US interests. But I think Trump doesn't see that in the same way. And it's easier for him to do that because the US has been the guardian of that system that you're talking about, the post-World War II system.

[00:22:18] So, in a way, the author of it can change it more easily because they're at the heart of it. But, Maria, what about how this should be handled, if it is a revisionist power, as you say, or becoming that? And I think this is the question that, you know, Macron's advisors, Macron did a particular way of dealing with it, and Starmer is trying to deal with it, and the new German Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, will have to counter it too. How to handle this sort of thing?

[00:22:42] Do you go in with immense flattery and say, yes, Donald, everything you say is right, but would you mind looking at this? Or do you try and disengage and say, well, look, America's just not a reliable partner. We have to do something else. What is the way to handle it? Well, it's very difficult. And I think, you know, U.S. allies spent four years trying to work out, like, how on earth do you handle this guy? Because it's not just that his policies towards them were different. It's also that he's just got such a difficult personality.

[00:23:11] And, you know, he's such a narcissist. And, you know, I think most of the time the approach is to try to appeal to his vanity and, you know, make him feel important in the hope that he'll give you, you know, a few concessions. And I think, you know, that is still going to happen in the short to medium term. But I think what we can already see is that in the longer term, you know, European states realise that, you know, that the U.S. security guarantee can no longer be relied upon.

[00:23:38] And they do have to make alternative arrangements for their own security. And I think it is going to result in a lot more European level security and defence planning and, you know, higher levels of defence expenditure in Europe. What about American democracy in all of this? Yes, I mean, he was voted in fair and square. I don't remember people voting for Elon Musk, but there we are.

[00:23:59] Elon Musk now sitting in cabinet meetings, firing off letters to, you know, to civil servants, supposedly catching cabinet secretaries off guard. And then, you know, you look at the playbook in all of this. So you've got Caroline Leavitt, who's the press secretary, saying that, no, they weren't called off guard, denying what has been reported because it's the press. The press are lying.

[00:24:25] Then saying, well, OK, we're going to choose now who can come to the press conferences. It used to be basically... You have to accept it's the Gulf of America, not the Gulf of Mexico. Yeah, that's right. Otherwise, you won't come. But the press association used to pick who went to the White House, didn't they? Now it's the White House is going to decide who attends and who doesn't attend. So they're controlling the media. I mean, it seems... I mean, it's almost like an authoritarian regime. We're controlling the press. We are putting people into positions of power who weren't elected.

[00:24:55] We are challenging the judiciary. I mean, there's people legitimately asking what happens if he refuses to follow a court order as though he might just ignore it. And no one's actually quite sure what would happen in those circumstances. So, Mary, you said a revisionist power. Maybe a revisionist authoritarian power might be. Is that going too far, do you think? I don't think it is, no. You know, it's really heartbreaking to say it.

[00:25:21] But I think, you know, US democracy is facing one of its sternest tests since the Civil War. And there is no doubt that we've seen the erosion of democratic norms in the US. And that Trump clearly has authoritarian tendencies and clearly seems to admire other authoritarian leaders in the world. So, you know, it's a big test. And we don't know how civil society will respond. You know, we don't know how those around Trump will respond.

[00:25:49] I think in his first time in office, the people he had around him in his administration were able to restrain his instincts to some extent. You know, I think this time he's a bit more prepared and he's got more support in the Republican Party. So the kinds of people he's appointed are not necessarily going to restrain him in the same way.

[00:26:14] But, you know, there's no doubt that he has authoritarian tendencies and it is very worrying. The real test of authoritarianism, of course, is when you get people objecting, when you get the people rising up, those civil servants who's lost their jobs, all those people who are still worried about the price of eggs or all those people who are saying, well, hang on, you promised this and it hasn't been delivered. If they start taking to the streets, how does he react to that? The authoritarian approach, obviously, would be to throw them all in jail or start shooting them.

[00:26:43] And that's when the tide turns because that's when people start going, well, this is... Would America go that far? I mean, is that the nature of the state? Could it move in that direction? It's so hard to know. I mean, you know, I tend to think that a lot of the people around Trump wouldn't necessarily go that far. And I imagine that members of the military, you know, they take their oath to the Constitution very seriously.

[00:27:05] And I have some faith that if Trump tried to, you know, use the military against peaceful protesters, that, you know, senior members of the military might refuse to obey orders. But, you know, a lot of this is kind of speculation. It's getting rid of some of those senior members of the military, of course, to try and put people in who support him. Yeah, he is. Yeah, I mean, it's it is fairly normal that a president would appoint a new joint chief of staff.

[00:27:33] But what is a bit unusual in this case is that the previous chief was not allowed to finish his term in office. So that's a concern. I mean, one thing that I do want to kind of throw out there is that in about two years time, Trump is going to be a lame duck president. With the midterm election.

[00:27:52] Yeah, I mean, like unless he dismantles American democracy, which is not impossible, obviously, he won't be allowed to run for a third term in office because you can only serve two terms, even if they're not consecutive. So, you know, in about two years time, you know, the ground could shift a little bit. And it is possible that, you know, Republicans at home and U.S. allies abroad will start to think, well, what comes next? You know, could it be somebody who's a little bit more moderate, at least than Trump?

[00:28:21] It could be J.D. Vance, who's not who's actually less intelligent and less moderate, but probably has less charisma, though. I think he'd still be fairly popular with Trump's base. And I suspect, you know, that's why Trump chose him, because he wants to leave a legacy in the party. And he sees J.D. Vance, you know, as a vehicle for his legacy in the party.

[00:28:43] And, you know, the fact that you have the president and the vice president who've both called into question the value of the transatlantic alliance. You know, I think that's all the evidence that U.S. allies need that, you know, the U.S. security guarantee is no longer reliable and they do need to start making alternative arrangements for their own defense. But what does he do if America, you know, loses out of all of this? So if the if I'm not sure whether he wants a strong dollar or a weak dollar, he keeps on changing his tune, the same as he does on interest rates.

[00:29:14] But if you've got a lot of people unemployed, you've got a weak U.S. dollar, you've got inflation, you've got stagflation. So you've got inflation rising, but you're not getting any growth or the economy is going backwards. And things are materially getting worse in the United States. Does does a man of his immense ego look at that and go, that's my fault? Or does he does he you know, at some point, does he start to question his his own career path? I wonder. Probably not.

[00:29:42] Yeah, I think it's very unlikely. I mean, Trump appears to be so narcissistic that I can't really imagine him, you know, ever acknowledging that he hadn't made America great again. And it almost kind of doesn't matter what the evidence tells you, because, you know, there are a lot of problems that he claimed that he was going to solve in his first term and he didn't. But he's still been reelected.

[00:30:08] So it's almost like, you know, Trump makes an assertion about something and his supporters believe it. And the evidence is kind of irrelevant. But what will the world look? You said two years to the point where he becomes a lame duck, perhaps less powerful because maybe he'll lose in the midterms and Congress will be potentially the House might be Democrat controlled, for example. And that he can't get things through. What does the world look like in two years time, though?

[00:30:36] Because, you know, what we're talking about now is what he's done in the last less than two months. We're five percent of the way through. Yeah. And it's already chaos. So what's going to be left? How do you see it the next two years proceeding in the global context? Well, I think there are kind of, you know, multiple plausible outcomes here. And Trump is so unpredictable that, you know, it's it's particularly difficult to say, well, X, Y or Z is definitely going to happen.

[00:31:03] But I think, you know, the general direction of travel is clear. And it's clear that, you know, the the the big Western European states now see that the U.S. security guarantee, you know, it's no longer a guarantee that they can't rely on the U.S. anymore. And that, you know, that they are going to step up their own independent defense and security planning.

[00:31:27] I'm not sure that there's anything that Trump himself could could now do that that would reverse that. And I think, you know, it is possible that members of Congress might find a way to kind of try to signal to American allies that they still believe in the NATO alliance.

[00:31:46] But the fact that there is this kind of really vocal minority in the party that currently controls the presidency and the vice presidency, you know, I think makes it very unlikely that that European states will put all their eggs in the NATO basket again. And Putin by then may well have made moves, who knows, in further expansion, feeling, sensing victory, as he clearly does in regards to Ukraine.

[00:32:12] But that is quite possible. I mean, I suppose this always reminds me of a debate that took place in the U.S. intelligence community in the 70s and 80s about the strength of the Soviet Union. And the question was, you know, how do we make judgments about the Soviet Union's likely future intentions? And some of the more hawkish analysts in the intelligence community were saying, well, we have to look at Soviet ideology.

[00:32:40] Its ideology is expansionist. Therefore, we have to assume that it's going to try to expand in the future. And more moderate analysts were saying, well, actually, the Soviet Union doesn't have the capacity to expand. So we shouldn't take it as a given that it's definitely going to expand. And in the end, the moderates were right that actually, you know, the Soviet economy was going into terminal decline. And whatever its ideology might have been, it didn't have the capacity to wage future wars.

[00:33:08] And I kind of wonder as well about Putin's capacity to actually wage further wars. I mean, I'm not an expert on Russia, but it just seems to me that that's an important question to ask, because the performance of the Russian military in Ukraine has been very poor, really shockingly bad. Maybe a bigger shock could be what comes out of the Middle East. And I mean, Donald Trump is obviously completely culturally insensitive.

[00:33:36] So there was a video going around social media in the middle of this week, which had an AI generated view of what Gaza would look like if America took over. It's got a song, catchy song going along, going no more tunnels, no more fear. Trump Gaza is finally here. You've got Trump Hotel. You've got Elon Musk in a bar eating hummus. You've got a golden Trump statue. You've got Trump and Netanyahu lying on sun lounges by the pool.

[00:34:05] It didn't come from Trump. It was somebody else generated it. But Trump reposted it. So you'd be thinking if you were the supreme leader in Iran, you'd be thinking, OK, this, you know, this is war. You know, you're not going to with that sort of rhetoric going on. It just inflames situations. And this man is supposedly a global diplomat. I mean, he's just a boy in short pants with not much idea.

[00:34:35] He's been let loose on the world. But what he said about Gaza and the push he made, it does now seem, I would say, Maria, that the Gulf countries, for example, Gulf Cooperation Council, talking about some sort of plan they might come up with, might push them into moving in. Who knows? Rebuilding. I mean, in a sense, again, it's that galvanization. I don't think anyone really surely takes seriously the idea that they will actually, the Americans will actually take Gaza. He keeps on talking about it. Yeah. I mean, I haven't seen that video you were talking about, and it just sounds absolutely awful.

[00:35:03] And obviously, Trump's comments, you know, they would, he has effectively endorsed, you know, ethnic cleansing in Gaza. And it was just, it was not only offensive, but also just bizarre what he said about. But we're all becoming apologists for that. I mean, there was, you know, there was a bit of protest to it. But we're not getting world leaders pushing back on it. No, they can't. Yeah.

[00:35:25] I mean, I wonder whether, you know, the kinds of comments that Trump has made about the Middle East and about Gaza, in a way, we've sort of stopped being surprised. And he's issuing so many challenges to world leaders. I don't want to let them off the hook here. But it's almost like it's become normal to hear him say things like this. And I think what you see in Gaza, again, is that Trump kind of has contempt for the victims.

[00:35:53] You know, I fully accept that Hamas attacked Israel initially. But, you know, Israel's response has been disproportionate. And it's kind of become the aggressor in this conflict. And what you see is, you know, Trump backing, you know, the aggressor. And he just seems to have total contempt for the victims. He backs strength, fundamentally. That's what he believes in. We haven't even mentioned, really, China. And, of course, again, you think, well, China in Trump first administration was quite a confrontation and then a not confrontation.

[00:36:22] It was hard to see which way it was going. But Taiwan very much on the on on the board now. Again, we'll try. How will Trump play that? Well, I think, you know, there's a very strong domestic consensus and it's bipartisan that China poses a kind of generational challenge to American power in the world. And there's a very strong domestic consensus behind that. And in Trump's first time in office, for the most part, I would say he went along with that.

[00:36:51] And in Washington is very polarized. But but China policy is probably the one area where there is, you know, a lot of agreement. And that agreement didn't exist with Russia. I think Russia is seen as a hostile adversary, but it doesn't necessarily pose the same kind of generational challenge as China. And I think with China, you know, Trump probably sees China as a challenge to American primacy.

[00:37:20] And I think Trump wants to be number one in the world. He doesn't want to be overtaken by China. And so I think that's probably why he went along with this kind of consensus that, you know, China is the big new adversary. And, you know, the U.S. is very reliant on imported semiconductors from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, TSMC in Taiwan, which controls over 50 percent of the global market in chip manufacturing.

[00:37:48] So the possibility of a Chinese takeover of Taiwan is a real threat to U.S. interests. And I, you know, I don't think Trump would like the idea of not being able to import semiconductors from from Taiwan. But at the same time, you know, he does think of himself as being a dealmaker.

[00:38:04] And, you know, another plausible outcome might be that he tries to come up with some kind of grand bargain with China, in which China, you know, in return for absorbing Taiwan will guarantee, you know, that that Taiwan can export, you know, semiconductors to the West. So there's a chance. A grand deal there. That would be interesting. So final question. There is a chance. I mean, he's he's getting on a bit. I mean, I mean, I don't admire the man except for his energy. I mean, he's every day he's out there.

[00:38:33] I mean, you know, whatever tablets he's taking, I want to take them because, you know, it's obviously he's he's leading. Diet Coke and Big Macs. That's that's the secret, isn't it? But if he doesn't make it, then we have J.D. Vance as a as a as a president. So how does that change the world? Does because J.D. Vance probably doesn't have the same, as we say, doesn't have the same charisma. But does he also have the the same ability to negotiate? All the same views. All the same views, perhaps. Yeah, exactly.

[00:39:01] I'm afraid I probably see him as like a slightly smarter version of Trump in the sense that he is at least more articulate and coherent. And I think he probably shares many of Trump's views on things. Actually, I think that's why he was picked as vice president. You know, Trump is not going to pick a vice president who would challenge him. So I think really we we you know, if if Vance became president. Does he share the views or is he or was he just an opportunist? He did once say that Trump was the Hitler.

[00:39:28] Yeah, he did. I mean, he's changed his tune very much on Trump. And, you know, I could change it back again. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I think he is. You know, Trumpism has become more and more influential in the Republican Party. And I think Vance has been kind of won over to Trumpism and the Trump view of the world. So I would expect quite a bit more of the same in terms of policy.

[00:39:54] I mean, we saw that speech that he gave in Munich last week, you know, which which I think is what kind of, you know, catalyzed this rupture that we're seeing now in the transatlantic relationship. It certainly was a moment, which seemed to change things. Maria, thank you so much for giving us a view. I'd like to say you've made us feel better about it. I don't think you have. No, no, just reality is coming home, isn't it? It is. Great to talk, Maria. Thanks for your time. Thanks so much. My pleasure. Bye bye. Yeah. So when America has all the world's trade. Yes.

[00:40:23] What do we do here? I think we make movies probably in the UK. Yes, well, many are filmed around here, as you know, already. Yes, I know. And we make good movies in the UK. We do. We do. And this is the future, perhaps, for us. We'll just be a nice big movie set for them to come and make it. We sort of are. Anyway, I've had movie makers tell me one of the good things about the UK is because the weather's so bad, you don't get the washed out light here. So actually, you get richer colours in movies. So that's part of the reason why, you know, they race to the English countryside.

[00:40:52] Anyway, movies are what we're going to be talking about next. Fairly obviously, from what we were just saying. Because it was Oscar season and all that. And by the time this next podcast comes out, it will be after the Oscars. Yes. And, I mean, there is a discussion really to be had in terms of whether the movie industry, because an awful lot of scenes are pirated now, of course. Yeah, yeah. An awful lot of scenes on streaming. Yeah. Legally. None of them are going to cinemas. Not that great. And all these things.

[00:41:17] But maybe that doesn't matter, because I know that the streaming industry, I mean, it is quite a good time, isn't it, in the movie industry? And the money is being spent in putting into productions, which may come from Netflix and Amazon or whatever. So... Well, it's changing. A lot of the big, massive amounts spent on the superhero movies, and that kind of is dying as a genre, I think. Yeah. Not so many people want it anymore. So, and much more, of course... So you think there's a bit of a creativity lapse? Well, much more creativity is going into the gaming industry. And the money. The money there is terrific. Actually, the launch.

[00:41:45] I think, yeah, the costs involved in a new game is way more than the costs involved in a big motion picture. And many more of the next generation want that, rather than sitting somewhere and watching something they can't control. Well, actually, what they want to watch is the movie that spins off from the game that they've been playing. They're awful, though. Truly terrible. I don't think they do at all. They want to be able to do it. They do it themselves. Anyway, so that's going to be our subject next week. Yeah. Is the movie industry basically a dying one? Yeah. All right.

[00:42:13] Well, we'll hopefully put a more positive spin, because I don't want to be depressed at the end of each episode. But that's next week on The Why Curve. We'll see you then. Thanks for listening. Bye.