In tribute to the Israeli hostages who were freed today, here’s an old Jewish joke:
A very elderly woman was walking with her great-grandson on the beach. Suddenly, an enormous wave came out of nowhere, crashing into the sands, sweeping forward and carrying her great-grandson deep into the ocean, where he vanished from view.
The old woman put her hands on her hips and stared at the Heavens:
“Well, God, that wasn’t very nice! The nerve of you!! My parents survived the Cossacks. I survived the Holocaust. My children survived Arab terrorists. And now, after all this suffering, you take away my great-grandson? You should be ashamed of yourself!”
The moment she stopped speaking, a second wave came — gently depositing her great-grandson back by her feet — safe and sound, with nary a scratch on his body.
The old woman put her hands on her hips and stared at the Heavens yet again:
“HE WAS WEARING A HAT!!”
Yeah, I get it. Complaining about President Trump kind of makes you sound like the angry old woman: Some people are never happy.
And that’s too bad, because there’s so much to be happy about: Sealing the southern border! Preserving the tax cuts! Sending illegals back home! Defanging the Iranian nuclear menace! Ending the DEI con game! Even bringing the MIDDLE FREAKING EAST to the precipice of peace!
But on the other hand, public policy decisions are like credit cards: Often, you get the benefit right away — but years later, you’re stuck with an enormous bill.
In the business world, we call in BNPL: buy now, pay later.
It’s a big topic in financial circles. Initially, companies liked it because it motivated consumers to pull the trigger and make a purchase — even when they were low on cash. So at first, it seemed like a godsend. Unfortunately, businesses quickly learned that BNPL transactions have high levels of credit card disputes: When the bill finally arrives, consumers have “buyer’s remorse” and try to weasel out of paying what’s owed. And because credit cards are federally protected from theft and fraud by the Fair Credit Billing Act of 1974, dishonest consumers succeed in ripping off vast amounts of businesses. According to Mastercard, these credit card complaints and disputes are now costing companies more than $100 billion annually.
As a result, lots of the “wins” on their financial legers ended up being illusionary.
President Trump is the ultimate pragmatist: He sees a problem, checks his toolkit, and picks the best tool for the job. It’s as simple as that.
And it a town like Washington, D.C., that behavior is downright baffling, because they’ve always viewed public policy through the prism of economic theories, philosophical musings, academic gobbledygook, and social engineering. Their thick ideological blinders dissuade creativity, opting instead for retreading the “acceptable” groupthink talking points… over and over again.
President Trump is gloriously unencumbered from those limitations. For Trump, the bottom line IS the bottom line: Is the problem solved?
If the answer is yes, then he did it right!
The trouble is, in American politics, that’s not the only metric that matters: So does precedence. And the long-term ramifications of President Trump’s pragmatism and “executive creativity” will stick the rest of us with a helluva bill.
I’m not saying President Trump’s approach is wrong. Arguably, the short-term benefits outweigh the long-term risks (that may not ever happen). And perhaps the White House has already based its decision-making on the long arc of history, which would make sense: If you’re a pragmatist, then decisions are a risk-reward calculation anyway.
Everything depends on the bang for the buck.
Either way, the beauty of Trump’s approach is that it maximizes the here and now. And with Donald Trump down to the final three years of his presidency, I certainly understand the urgency of rolling up our sleeves, getting to work — and striking while the metal’s hot.
That’s President Trump’s greatest strength: He’s a creative, high-energy problem-solver who’ll fight like hell to win. And in order to win, he’ll use his lawyers to exploit every loophole and maximize every legal opportunity.
From Trump’s perspective, as long as he’s following the letter of the law, he’s free to pursue the people’s agenda. Despite the Democratic blathering about him being a “tyrant” and a “fascist,” his 60+ year business and political track record is clear: President Trump might complain or threaten, but he’ll dutifully follow the letter of the law, even when he doesn’t agree with it.
His greatest weakness, however, is that he doesn’t give a damn about the spirit of the Constitution.
Donald Trump is a man of action: He’s in D.C. to get work done — one way or another. If he can do it legislatively, he’ll do that; if he can do it via executive action and/or declaring everything a “national emergency,” he’ll do that too.
Trouble is, so will the next president.
In our system of government, precedence doesn’t just matter; it normalizes behavior, codifies conduct, and establishes legal and political jurisprudence for all who follow. And it doesn’t take a great deal of imagination to see how someone like Gavin Newsom, JB Pritzker, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, or Jasmine Crockett would take advantage of all the wonderful new precedents that President Trump has established.
That includes punishing the countries they don’t like with tariffs of any size they choose. (Prediction: Draconian tariffs on Israel — for “genocide,” of course — and any other MAGA-friendly country will be a hot topic in Iowa and New Hampshire during the 2028 Democratic primaries.) Troops in red states.
And that’s not all.
Take a minute and think about all the “national emergencies” the next Democratic president could declare! The one for gun violence is obvious, but simply under the auspices of global warming, the Democrats could declare a “national emergency” that destroys our entire economy whenever they want.
Which is why it would be very wise for the GOP to “pull up the ladder” and pass legislation towards the end of Trump’s term that limits the next president from following in Trump’s shoes. Even if the next president is likely to be a MAGA stalwart like JD Vance.
The risk is too great.
The letter of the law matters, but so does the spirit of the Constitution. And we’re gonna need that Constitution at full strength, because eventually, the Democrats will return to power.
It’s just a question of when.
They won’t be able to fill Trump’s shoes, but they’ll try their damnest to walk in his steps. We need to be ready… or we’ll be stomped.
One Last Thing: The Schumer Shutdown is upon us. Rather than put the American people first, Chuck Schumer and the radical Democrats forced a government shutdown for healthcare for illegals. They own this.
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