Who knew what President Trump meant by “America First”? All America?
On this issue at least, I have the support of Marjorie Taylor Greene, a former Georgia congresswoman and former Trump supporter who remains steadfast in her America First movement. Green tweeted On Saturday, just before Trump's triumphant press conference on the United States' beheading of the Venezuelan government in the middle-of-the-night military detention of Nicolas Maduro and his wife: “This is what a lot of MAGA people thought they voted to end. God, we were wrong.”
Really wrong. Nearly a year into his second term, Trump has done nothing but worsen the domestic problems that Greene called “America First” priorities – reducing the “rising costs of living, housing and health care” in the 50 states – even as he pursued the “endless military aggression” and foreign adventurism that “America First” supporters despise, or at least have become accustomed to. Another Trump deception. Another lie.
Here's an amazing statistic: thanks Military Times: Trump ordered 626 missile strikes worldwide in 2025, 71 more than President Biden ordered in his entire four-year term. Current targets include Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Nigeria, Iran and the waters off Venezuela and Colombia. He recently threatened to strike Iran again if it killed protesters marching through the streets of Tehran to protest the country's dire economic situation. (“We are locked, loaded and ready to go,” Trump wrote. Friday.)
The President doesn't like “forever wars,” as he's said many times, but he definitely likes fast-paced takeoffs and cinematic covert operations. Let us leave aside for now the attacks in the Middle East, Africa, the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific. This is Trump's new statement about “run” Venezuela, which signaled the start of his stunning bid for US hegemony in the Western Hemisphere. Any such ambition increases the likelihood that rapid action will lead to a dead end.
How Stephen Miller, perhaps Trump's closest and most like-minded (read: crazy) adviser, described the administration's actions. worldview On Monday to CNN's Jake Tapper: “We live in a world, a real world, Jake, that is governed by power, that is governed by power, that is governed by power. These have been the iron rules of the world since the beginning of time.”
You know, that old immoral iron law: “Might makes right.” Music to the ears of Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, eager for their own hegemonic expansion and confident that the United States has given up the moral high ground from which to argue.
But it was Trump, a master of branding, who gave the White House worldview a name—his own, of course: “The Donro Doctrine.” And it is Trump registered what this could mean in practice for America, in a stunning and war-mongering performance Sunday, returning to Washington aboard Air Force One. The wannabe king of the United States turns out to be the wannabe emperor of the entire hemisphere.
“We have a responsibility,” Trump told reporters about Venezuela. “We'll get this done. We'll fix it. We'll hold elections at the right time.” He added“If they don't behave, we'll strike again.” He continued pointedly and ominously: “Colombia is also very sick” and “Cuba is ready to fall.” Looking north, he yearned for more: “We need Greenland from a national security standpoint.”
In addition, Trump recently said that Colombia's leftist President Gustavo Petro “really needs to watch his ass” and that, given Trump's displeasure with Mexico's intransigent President Claudia Sheinbaum, “We need to do something about Mexico.” In their cases, as with Maduro, Trump allegedly complained that each was complacent or complicit with drug cartels.
And yet, just last month Trump pardoned former President of Honduras Juan Orlando Hernandez, convicted by a US court and sentenced 45 years imprisonment for his central role in “one of the largest and most brutal drug trafficking conspiracies in the world.” Hernandez helped traffickers smuggle 400 tons of cocaine into the United States to “shove drugs up the noses of gringos.” And Trump pardoned him in less than two years in prison.
It is therefore unlikely that, weeks later, the US President really believes in taking a tough line against leaders he suspects of aiding the drug trade. Could Trump's real motivation be something other than drug dealing?
In his speech after Maduro's arrest, Trump used the word “oil” 21 times. He announced this on Tuesday on social networks. mailOf course, he took control of the proceeds from the sale of up to 50 barrels of Venezuelan oil. (Not that he cares, but it would violate the Constitution, which gives Congress the power to appropriate money coming into the U.S. Treasury.)
Or perhaps, according to the Monroe Doctrine, our current president has a retro urge to dominate half the world.
Lately his focus has been on Venezuela and South America, but North America is also on his radar. Trump has long said he might target Mexico to fight the cartels and that the US's other North American neighbor, Canada, should become the 51st state. But most of all he is interested in the third part of North America – Greenland.
The icy island is home to fewer than 60,000 people, but its mineral wealth is increasingly accessible given a warming climate that Trump calls a hoax. For him, making claims is not just an American problem. This is an existential threat to NATO, given that Greenland is an autonomous part of NATO ally Denmark, said Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. warned.
No one in 80 years could have imagined that NATO, bound by its principle that an attack on one member is an attack on all, would be attacked from within, least of all by the United States. In a wonderful statement On Tuesday, US allies rallied behind Denmark: “Denmark and Greenland, and they alone, must resolve issues concerning Denmark and Greenland.”
Trump's insistence that control of Greenland is necessary for US national security is absurd. The United States has had military bases there since World War II, and all NATO countries believe Greenland is critical to defending against Russian and Chinese encroachment into the Arctic. However, Trump does not rule out using force to seize the island.
He imagines himself to be the Emperor of America – and all that. America first.
blue sky: @jackiecalmes
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