January 29, 2024 - 1:00pm
From foreign policy to domestic issues, the political situation in the United States is far more tense than the media would have us believe. Last week the US Supreme Court ruled that US Border Patrol, a federal agency, could clear out the barbed wire being set up by the Texas National Guard at the border between the United States and Mexico.
Since the Texas National Guard is under the control of Governor Greg Abbott, this sets up a potential stand-off between an agency under the jurisdiction of Washington DC and one under the jurisdiction of the State of Texas. Abbott has dug in, stating that he will not comply with the Supreme Court ruling. Since then, 25 other Republican governors have stood behind Abbott.
Clearly, Republicans have had enough of the uncontrolled inflows of people at the border. Declarations of a second civil war from some corners of the internet are somewhat exaggerated, but those who say that this is just more of the American political theatre we are so used to are equally wrong. This conflict between 26 states and the US federal government could easily trigger a constitutional crisis if, say, US Border Patrol and the Texas National Guard faced off against one another at the border.
These events, combined with Donald Trump’s decisive victories in the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries this month, are rapidly changing the political landscape in DC. The Wall Street Journal reports that top Senate Republicans are signalling that the current bill being pushed through Congress to secure funding from Ukraine will have a more difficult route of passage than previously thought.
Republicans who supported funding Ukraine have tied changes to US border law to a package for Ukraine. The idea is that if their more Right-wing colleagues who are sceptical of the Ukraine war want to fix the mess at the border, they will have to concede on the issue of funding Ukraine. But now GOP powerbroker Mitch McConnell is saying that he wants to lay more emphasis on the border issue in the run up to the election — no doubt the Senate Minority Leader is also watching the constitutional chaos in Texas.
This week it is expected that the European Union will announce its funding package for Ukraine. But if this funding is not followed by an infusion from Washington there will not be enough money on the table. The EU is proposing €50 billion to fund Ukraine until the end of 2027, which would mean a total of €12.5 billion per year. The problem is that, according to Ukrainian balance of payments data, the body received around €20.6 billion in 2023 to prop up its ballooning trade deficit. Moving forward, €12.5 billion will simply not cut it.
If the United States does not send more funds, it seems likely that the EU package will disappear into a black hole. For if Ukraine cannot get enough funding to prop up its trade deficit and currency, the hryvnia will likely collapse.
The West is in a very precarious position right now. A war effort that threw a huge amount of resources behind Ukraine is very close to disintegrating. The political situation in the United States is becoming superheated and veering toward a potential constitutional crisis. And all this is taking place with an extremely contentious and destabilising election looming over the country this November. In 2024, we are set to witness multiple points of failure emerge in countries across the West.
Philip Pilkington is a macroeconomist and investment professional, and the author of The Reformation in Economics
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SubscribeIts amazing to me that a border control agency would want to remove a barrier to illegal entry to their country. same all over the West now. I hate progs
Another interesting thing, the smart set 100% believed all they had to do was remove orange man bad from the White house, and everything would be right with the World again, but the Biden regime has been a total disaster, how many wars do these clowns want
Indeed. Orange man good.
Who’s going to fight for Biden?
How do the American Right feel about Russia and Iran both throwing their weight around and being empowered? Does American first mean ceding Eastern Europe and the Middle East? How does any of that fit with the pivot to Asia and wanting to keep China down?
Why would the American Right be bothered?
The USA will be fine as an isolationist but strong power.
I think the writing is on the wall for the US being the world’s policeman. Perhaps this is its final year, especially if Trump wins, which I think he will.
With Canada to the North and Mexico and (soon a big, beautiful wall) to the South and oceans East and West they fear no-one. They have the world’s largest navy and nuclear arsenal. They are re-shoring critical industries and sit on enough fossil fuel to last centuries. They have a domestic market large enough to sustain itself and a middling (if declining) birth rate. They can import the best and brightest talent from all over he world as needed.
Why bother trying to keep the peace in the middle east or arbitrating Russia’s western borders? Why bother securing the Suez canal or the straights of Hormuz for the benefit of their Chinese, Indian and European rivals? Not to mention the benefit of the Arab world which hates them.
It is going to be a scarier world without them taking charge though. We, Britain, had better get our navy recruitment going!
The average pay of a British Rail train driver is £58K, that of a Royal Naval rating 25K.
This will have to stop.
Maybe the RN needs to strike for two years.
Why on earth the whole system is NOT run buy AI like the Docklands Light Railway is astonishing! Most of the accidents are caused by driver error, failing asleep, speeding etc etc.
We should close the whole system, down for three months break these people and start again. If the miners could be broken SO can the train drivers.
It’s just a matter of will.
It has happened before, look up the Invergordon Mutiny in the Royal Navy 1931. The ratings did not storm the quarterdecks, instead they just ignored orders and so training was cancelled.
They could start by cutting back on senior officer ranks and redistributing the savings.
The Royal Navy employs 98 Commodores, who are equivalent to a junior admiral in other navies.
A commodore should command multiple ships in either a squadron or a flotilla. The Royal Navy rarely deploys more than a single ship a mission these days hence the operational requirement of the RN surface fleet could be covered by a single part-time Commodore, who could spend 6 months ashore on half pay beekeeping or catching butterflies.
A Commodore is equivalent to a Brigadier so in addition to employing a single part-time commodore to cover the entire operational requirement of the RN fleet at sea, I suppose the brigade of 6000 royal marines could usefully employ two of the 98 cited above as brigadiers.
What the other 95 commodores do for their wage I cannot imagine but with another 38 more senior admirals employed in the Royal Navy in additional to the 98 junior admirals, one can only surmise the 98 junior admirals are rather busy saluting their senior admirals all day.
Great comment Flibberti. That’s why I come here.
Bring back half pay!
It never did Nelson any harm.
sit on enough fossil fuel to last centuries
tell that to the climate cult that is intent on regressing standards of living with ‘green’ initiatives that are neither green nor effective.
They don’t deny the existence of fossil fuels. They deny that humanity can continue to exist as we know if we keep using those fossil fuels.
Because america as we know it is based on the world subsidising it by buying its debt. An isolationist America won’t have dollar dominance (why trade in the currency of a country that doesn’t trade??) and then the US suddenly the US finds itself needing to find a few trillion of value from somewhere.
Goodbye social security and medicare. Its society is crumbling even with this massive subsidy – whatever happens when it loses dollar dominance will make Trump look like Roosevelt.
Americans are also very used to receiving a whole load of cheap imported goods. They can do autarchy but they will have to adapt to a much much lower standard of living. Because Chet in Wyoming isn’t going to make your clothes for a dollar a day.
All good points. However if the sole reason for US military engagement overseas is to maintain the reach of the US dollar, then it highlights how quickly the whole scheme might unravel.
In 1920 “Imperial Defence” accounted for 50% of the British state budget. Once India had gone and the White Dominions controlled their own destinies as independent States, the Royal Navy and the Pound Sterling mirrored their mutual demise.
I find this topic fascinating because the two are mutually dependent. If one goes the other goes with it.
If the US loses dollar dominance it can no longer fund the military. If it can no longer fund the military it loses dollar dominance. The only option is to continue with both.
The US is such a crappy ally. It throws gobs of money at Ukraine to fight its proxy war, discourages Zelenskyy from negotiating a peace deal, and now it looks like it will walk away.
The political situation looks unstable in the US right now, but I am more troubled by developments in Germany. I won’t be shocked if it bans a political party with 30% popular support.
Germany has always had authoritarian leanings, no matter of Left or Right.
You think? Somebody say it ain’t so.
Blocks European access to Russian gas then offers to sell American gas straight from a “friendly” country.
No exactly “straight from”. Shipping US LNG gas is more expensive in absolute $’s and over 10% of the energy value in the original gas is lost during the liquification process.
I’m sure the profit margins are adjusted accordingly.
… and now Biden has blocked LNG exports…
You couldn’t imagine a better, Kissingerite ally!
I am more worried about Germany than I am about the UK…but the situation in the US does concern me – probably because I live in Europe and we depend on the US for our security.
The Germans would have to be absolutely stupid to ban the AfD. There is a clear risk right now of a widespread belief taking hold that you can prohibit discontent by playing whack-a-mole with political parties, or simply demonstrate the problem away.
Agreed. It all boils down to too much short term thinking. They are either stupid for expecting the conflict to end quickly or stupid for not realizing the American public would start to turn against them, and they’re unquestionably stupid for not ending the war quickly with a settlement. If I’m Putin, I have no reason to negotiate because I can do nothing knowing there’s a decent chance American support will collapse on its own. Stupid allies are bad allies regardless of intent.
One of these has nothing to do with the other and the insistence on conjoining them only reveals the depths of our political dysfunction. Without a secure border, the US is not a country, it’s a theme park without the height requirement for going on the rides.
Congress clutches its pearls over the need for some “new” law as if enforcing those in existence would be too much like work. Beneath the surface, people are figuring out that what’s happening here is intentional. No one can be stupid enough to think that 3+ years of an open border can end well.
We’ve poured billions into Ukraine to no avail. Worse, we actively prevented the conflict from ending two years ago with the misguided “for as long as it takes” talking point that has all the gravity of a bumper sticker. People in power just can’t help themselves. They’re so disconnected from their constituents and so enriched by the war machine that they cannot stop.
People with some knowledge of recent history can understand that Putin invaded AND that we worked tirelessly to create the conditions for an invasion. And then we stuck it to Germany with the pipeline business. I hope people remember that empty suit from 2008 talking about fundamentally transforming the US. It’s happening and it’s just as bad as anyone could have thought.
As Mitch McConnell said:
So if you’re wondering what the US got out of it you should look at the growth figures. + the US has gladly stepped in to supply fuel to the West where Russia has been forced to withdraw. + the Ukraine war has kept Russia bogged down, humiliated it on the world stage and taken a huge dent out of its military and ambitions.
US government issues debt, exchanges debt for military hardware made in US, blows hardware up in field in europe, repeat. All without a drop of american blood spilt
No Americans are getting killed in Ukraine But tens of thousands of Ukrainians are we help destroy their country.
The Ukrainians are destroying the army of one of our biggest rivals. Not really. The Russians have hardly gone all in here because they don’t particularly want to kill scores of fellow slavs.
I have a hard time finding anything wrong with that. And that’s what makes Mitch an amoral sack.
the US has gladly stepped in to supply fuel to the West where Russia has been forced to withdraw. if you consider us sabotaging Europe’s main pipeline as Russia being “forced to withdraw,” then language is meaningless. We didn’t just cut off their main supply; we replaced it an inflated prices. Oh, and Team Biden now wants to hold up on exports.
The Ukraine adventure by the USA was always aimed almost as much at Germany as Russia.
German expertise and manufacturing plus Russian raw materials and cheap energy was not a benefit for US markets.
I don’t see a problem. Russia needs to have its wings clipped, Ukraine is doing the actual fighting. All the West has to do is pay for them to do it. It seems like a good investment to me.
It is indeed a sad commentary on the ineptness of the U.S. federal government that the several states must take it upon themselves to enforce our sovereign borders. On the other hand, in a sense it is a brilliant vindication of the concept of individual states rights upon which this nation was founded that the states have shouldered this vital responsibility that is being shirked ( nearly criminally negligence ) by the feds. Washington, D.C. is almost beyond redemption from its incompetence and corruption.
Americans have voiced a historically low level of confidence in the national institutions, including the military. So, what are state governors to do, when their citizens are being overrun by people entering the country illegally? There are two possible responses: 1. The cowardly, pragmatic response of Gavin Newsom and the Sacramento Democrats to add illegals to the Medicaid program, assuring free healthcare to them, while raising taxes on all California workers, including those at the bottom of the economic ladder who cannot afford healthcare for themselves and their families, or 2. The courageous, common sense and ethically, politically sound actions of Greg Abbott in Texas to physically stop illegal immigration and “redistribute” illegal immigrants to portions of the country which up until now have thought illegal immigration a problem only for border states.
Most hard-working Americans stand with Greg Abbott. We are not xenophobes. We simply realize that 10,000,000 people entering our country illegally in the past three years is not immigration – it is an invasion. It is unsustainable. Why can’t the elites in Washington grasp this simple truth? Because, they don’t want to. And, they have lost the ability to act decisively to solve real problems. They are losers. Nothing illustrates this more clearly than the catastrophe on our souther “border”.
All you need to know:
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/record-number-of-illegal-aliens-entered-the-u-s-in-december/
The Ukraine War may not be existential for the US, but it is for Western Europe. If Putin gets away with the invasion, he will be invading somewhere else soon enough (most probably the Baltic States).
It will be interesting to see if this results in physical confrontation. Abbott timed this perfectly to basically put it all out there in an election year. My guess is that he will not physically stop the border patrol from removing the barrier, but he may put it back when they’re not looking and/or he may have some other deterrents available. Either way, I’m sure he’s got a plan to keep this in the news for the entire election cycle. Abbott is building his resume for his own presidential run in 2028.