Four more years of Trump?

Jun 14, 2018 | 5:00 AM

IMPROBABLE AS IT MAY SEEM, President Trump could be re-elected in 2020.

He’s been vilified by many, including those who know him personally such as former FBI director James Comey.

“He has a craving for affirmation that I’ve never seen in an adult before,” Comey told a conference in Ottawa. “It’s all, ‘What will fill this hole inside me?’ (Globe and Mail, June 5, 2018)”

Author Thomas Frank’s assessment is less psychological:

“He is deeply unpopular, the biggest buffoon any of us has ever seen in the White House. He manages to disgrace the office nearly every single day. He insults our intelligence with his blustering rhetoric. He endorses racial stereotypes and makes common cause with bigots. He has succeeded in offending countless foreign governments [!]. He has no idea what a president is supposed to be or do and (perhaps luckily) he has no clue how to govern (Harper’s magazine, April, 2018).”

However, Trump seems to vaguely understand the connection between trade deals and wage stagnation.

Trump withdrew from one such deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would have strengthened U.S. corporate power at the expense of Canada.

If he pulls out of NAFTA, it will hurt all three countries in the short term. But trade will not stop. We will continue to trade with the U.S. under rules of the World Trade Organization. Tariffs under the WTO would add only 1.5 per cent to Canadian exports.

Trade deals have been a bad deal for many U.S. workers. Jobs have been sent elsewhere. Wages have been stagnant. The threat of moving jobs offshore looms over those workers who complain.

Candidate Trump characteristically expressed his disdain for NAFTA on a visit to Flint, Michigan, where hundreds of thousands had been poisoned by lead in the water. In a caustic manner, he said, “It used to be that cars were made in Flint and you couldn’t drink the water in Mexico. And now the cars are made in Mexico and you can’t drink the water in Flint.” Funny, and a telling display of Trump’s lack of sympathy.

The American economy is on a roll and that could put Trump back in office for another four years. The U.S. unemployment rate was 3.9 per cent in April, 2018, a seventeen-year low. Under trade deals, corporate America is currently sending some of those jobs offshore. If trade deals are cancelled that will create a worker shortage that will drive wages up.

Of course, cancelling trade deals will also drive up the cost of goods for Americans but voters may not care, or will be unable to make the connection. The pain of unintended consequences has never been a problem for Trump, says Thomas Frank:

“The president, always a fan of burning down the village in order to save it, is currently threatening to scuttle the whole agreement: ‘A lot of people don’t realize how good it would be to terminate NAFTA, because the way you’re going to make the best deal is to terminate NAFTA.’”

What matters for American workers is that they are back at work. No matter that the sparks for the economic recovery were ignited by former President Obama and chair of the Federal Reserve Janet Yellen.

In the 2020 campaign, the slogan could be “it’s the jobs, stupid.” And Trump could win.