COLUMN: Trump Backed Down, America Still Suffers

From Davos to Greenland to Minnesota, there's been a lot of backpedaling. Our allies (at least, our historic allies), meanwhile, are marching on. Leaving America far behind.

By Donnie Johnston
COLUMNIST

Photo by Emily Simenauer on Unsplash

Donald Trump walked onto the stage at Davos meekly insisting that he got what he wanted concerning Greenland.

And many of his MAGA followers cheered his victory.

In truth, the president got nothing but his comeuppance. Denmark did not budge; Greenland did not budge; Europe did not budge.

Yes, America has permission to place strategic military facilities in Greenland, but that right was negotiated by President Dwight Eisenhower in the early 1950s.

Yes, we may barter with Greenland for rare earth minerals, but the people of that island have longed to bring in American dollars for a decade.

Following his “speech” at Davos, the president meekly confirmed that he would not invade Greenland and that there was no agreement to buy the island.

And he backed down from the tariffs he had threatened to impose on those European nations who stood up to him.

So, what are his MAGA disciples celebrating? Trump took a licking at Davos and put away all the big talk about his plans for Greenland. He watched as European nations came together and vowed to fight his imperialistic attempts.

TACO. Trump always chickens out. He did it again.

Now the European nations, wary of the president’s next move, are creating new trade agreements with China and India and, despite sanctions, are buying more oil from Russia.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, in what has been hailed as one of the greatest speeches in modern history, termed his country’s and Europe’s split with the United States “a rupture.” It insinuates, and subsequent trade actions prove, that the world no longer trusts us, at least while the current administration is in power.

These are NATO nations, countries whose soldiers stood with us in wars on foreign soil. These have long been our trusted allies. Now they are wary of Trump’s intentions. Sad.

Ruptures can, of course, be healed, but in a nuclear world where the balance of power is now shifting, trust lost is hard to regain.

Greenland has been mentioned very infrequently since Davos and the rhetoric regarding the president’s glorious victory in Venezuela has faded since the big oil companies affirmed that they might not want to risk spending billions on infrastructure that they may lose when the next president comes to power.

Meanwhile, some Republican congressmen are starting to back away from Trump and his foreign policies and are making no bones about it. They know mid-term elections are just a few months away and maybe, just maybe, their consciences are overtaking their lust for power.

But while Trump has lost some foreign policy battles, he still has one place where he can take out his frustrations – Minnesota. He is treating this state like a foreign enemy and creating an Iran-like atmosphere, calling the governor and the mayor of Minneapolis “crooks” and even blasting the city police force as incompetent.

There is no need to get into the ICE shootings here. The videos speak for themselves, unless this all happened in “another Minneapolis.” And when asked, Trump tied the ICE shootings to the fact that he lost Minnesota in all three elections. That sounds like revenge, not justice.

And that’s the common theme of Trump’s second presidency – revenge, revenge against any and all Democrats that wronged him in the past. He has become a sour and vengeful old man, a mirror image of his MAGA faithful who want nothing more than to go back to the “good old days” when white was right, men so furious that they would have anyone arrested who dared say a bad word about their beloved leader.

Trump spent a week licking his Greenland wounds and backed down to some extent in Minnesota. But then, still claiming fraud, he had the FBI seize 2020 election ballots in Fulton County, Georgia.

Then, on Sunday, he announced that the Kennedy Center, an American institution, would be shut down for two years to “undergo renovations.” In that announcement, Trump failed to mention that many artists have refused to perform there since he took over its administration and placed his name on the outside of the building.

Greenland may have been placed on a back burner, but the turmoil and the division in America continues.

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