The Tribune

DONALD Trump’s presidency seems so profoundly chaotic and different that it is hard to imagine it somehow fitting into any kind of pattern, either domestically within the United States or in the contemporary world. Perhaps the passage of time may yet weave this administration into some kind of coherent fabric. But for now it still looks dismayingly unique.

Trump has just returned from a highly unusual first sally overseas. For someone who has rarely given any hint of personal spirituality or allegiance to the principles of traditional religion, Trump managed to visit centres of Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Catholicism.

Even though the Pope passed him a pointed reminder on global warming and Israeli President Netanyahu could not conceal a little eye roll at some of Trump’s malapropisms and misstatements, the President did not disgrace himself overall.

Trump’s blunt behaviour and speech at NATO, reminding America’s European allies of their financial obligations to the alliance, was a most undiplomatic public rebuke of some of America’s most steadfast associates. One could easily understand it if those allies simply stopped listening to Trump, simply waiting for his term to end.

As expected, however, all the pageantry did not divert too much attention from two issues at home which look poised to dog this president for months, if not for the rest of his term.

The first of these is Russia. As if the relationship between the Trump campaign and Russia had not generated enough headlines already, over the weekend there were reports that the President’s son-in-law had proposed back-channel links so the Trump team and Russian officials could communicate without being monitored – by the US Government!

Such a scheme is so profoundly naïve that it almost defies belief, since it presumes the Russians would be willing collaborators with the US. There is very little reason to suspect that Russia - historically, or especially now under Vladimir Putin - has anything in mind but the enhancement of its own position and influence in the world. Since the United States is still the big dog in the world’s kennel, the Russian strategy to improve its own standing has been to simultaneously influence and weaken the US.

It seems improbable that Russia regards contemporary American hegemony as a positive. To the contrary, Putin, and the Soviets before him, have largely seen global geopolitics as a zero-sum game in which they can best gain at the expense of the US - not in genuine collaboration with it.

It stands to reason therefore that a sly, clandestine relationship between Trump advisers and Putin’s team will not result in benefit for the US or its allies, despite what Jared Kushner may believe.

A second persistent problem for Trump is his stubborn allegiance to unrealistic campaign promises that he shows little sign of fulfilling. For instance, while the Republican alternative to the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act has passed the House of Representatives, some Republican Senators are likely to join unified Democrats in defeating it in the upper house.

Regardless of the current partisan strife over health care, there is a growing feeling in the US that the country is inevitably heading for a single-payer health insurance scheme. Some are calling the prospective system universal Medicare, and they argue that changing demographics and the obdurate persistence of poverty in America make inevitable this admittedly socialistic solution to spiraling costs and dysfunction in the US health care system.

Poverty is an underlying central issue in the President’s 2018 budget as well. There can certainly be a legitimate discussion about poverty and its causes. For some Americans, a welfare mentality and dependence on government support has become unacceptably normal. Indeed, President Clinton borrowed a perennial Republican theme when he pushed for welfare reform 20 years ago.

But Trump’s new budget is a stark reminder of the Grand Old Party tenet that the poor are essentially to blame for their own condition and government-supported safety nets are a waste of public resources.

Whatever tax reform plan this administration eventually proposes seems certain to benefit the wealthy and starve the government. Again, the poor will suffer.

Philosophical differences will persist in American politics, but Trump’s approach has rarely been to bridge those disagreements. He persists in exacerbating them.