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Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
Even the anti-Donald Trump graffiti on the streets of West Hollywood is scarce and half gone now. Eight years ago, California was an “opposition” state. It’s a different feeling that the visitor encounters in 2025: resignation, loneliness is the issue, the feeling that we had among the Democrats who think, sometimes, there and something approaching curiosity about America’s economic potential under a deregulation president.
There is a big shrug of freedom. It’s been happening around the world since Trump won his victory in November, and it’s natural. You can’t be angry all the time. In European colonies of the 20th century, people of conflicting backgrounds often underwent what was known as “internal migration”. That is, instead of fleeing or fighting, they retreated into private life as the political empire darkened around them. Such resignation is wise, not weak.
Just don’t overdo it, that’s all. I feel like liberals have allowed a fair reception of the reality of the election to overshadow the hope that Trump’s second term won’t be so bad. Please.
Three things eased Trump’s influence last time around. None of them are working now. First, he was eager to be re-elected. This made him willing to challenge the average voter to a certain extent, but not more. (The speed with which he disavowed the weak Theocratic Project 2025 last summer showed how much this supposedly hot guy wants to avoid unnecessary unpopularity.) Unless something happens stated in the 22nd Amendment, Trump is now freed from the inherent discipline of electoral politics. Even the midterms don’t mean anything, as the race to succeed him will begin soon after. Second-term presidents have two years.
What else? His first administration was filled with veteran Republicans — Gary Cohn, Rex Tillerson — to curb his excesses. He is now spoiled for officials and cabinet secretaries in the Maga mould. Tulsi Gabbard may soon be the head of US intelligence. There is nothing Stoic or urbane about canceling that.
After all, the world in 2017 was stable enough to accommodate a certain amount of chaos. Inflation was low and Europe was at peace. The last great plague in the west was a hundred years ago. It is within the very weak network that Trump will throw his tariffs and foreign escapes this time.
We can continue in this fashion, citing practical and emerging reasons for concern. We can talk about the federal courts, which are more controlled by Trump than they were when he first took office. Will it force him? We can also say that he will be 82 years old when he dies. At the last moment, he had to think about the exposure of the law, to find the ability and the reputation of the people that he would have in his life after the presidency. Will that be such a reason now?
Ultimately, though, my argument – and most political commentary – comes down to nature. There’s a hubris in the Maga world right now that wasn’t there in 2017, in part because Trump had never won the popular vote. Talk about high economic growth, the conquest of territories, placing the American flag on Mars: if this does not bring you pride before the fall, great access, then we have different antennas. (And I hope mine is wrong.) In all democracies, a party is less dangerous than a new electoral success. The difference with the US is the size of the stakes for the outside world. Think of George W Bush after his historic best in 2002, or the rise of Lyndon Johnson in Vietnam after 1964, when the pile of his votes could be seen in space.
Yes, the election war is impossible under Trump. (Though events can push leaders into reckless action. Remember, Bush’s attitude before September 11 was that of an isolationist.) It is likely that the tariffs will trigger an uncontrollable reaction from the world, or the economy will be run. too hot, or the constitution will come to a head as Trump seeks to reward friends and hunt down enemies. At the very least, there will be internal lawsuits when it becomes clear that the public debt, urban sprawl and other issues of America are not amenable to a technological fix.
Whatever the exact nature of the coming chaos, a certain lack of concern about it has been the hallmark of the past eight years. The line for freedom in 2025 seems to be going like this: we had a big scare with Trump last time, so let’s not repeat that mistake. Not half of this proposition survives a little intellectual scrutiny. Fear it was charged, unless the two charges – one of seeking to overturn the election results – are somehow not counted. Also, even if the first season wasn’t that bad, why do you think the second season will be the same? Trump and his organization are very serious organizations now. His commencement speech this week was visually stunning and expressive.
None of this is to say that people who don’t like Trump should take the man’s advice to “fight, fight, fight”. Protests and activism have had lasting effects on Democrats. But if slavery was bad, so is self-doubt. The lesson of the 2024 election for liberals was, or should have been, minimal: stop electing useless candidates. This has somehow grown into a widespread crisis of confidence in whether their original assessment of Trump as a fluke was ever correct. Confirmation in the coming years will not be pleasant at all.
