Trump Is Everything Everywhere All at Once

Donald Trump is everywhere in the news lately. He dominates the daily headlines. Thus the title to this article (yes, I stole it from the movie). He’s hard to avoid.

The fact that Trump is in the news constantly is an important issue. He is the news. That is because of powers relinquished by Congress have devolved to the presidency. He often abuses these powers with unconstitutional overreach. He makes arbitrary decisions every day. The courts are full of challenges to his actions. I wrote about this in “Our Imperial Presidency” back in April (MJ Vol. 31 Issue 16, April 7-24, 2025).

The result of this overreach is that in many cases Trump is ruling by fiat (Latin for “Let it be done”) which means he rules without legal authority. Even with legal authority he rules by whim, which is not so far from ruling by fiat. There are three glaring examples of this.

Recently, because he didn’t like the new jobs report numbers put out by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), he fired its head, economist Erika McEntarfer. On Truth Social, his media outlet, he said “In my opinion, today’s Jobs Numbers were RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.” 

I’ve been using BLS data for 20 years for economic analysis and I am familiar how the jobs data is gathered and how it is analyzed. It isn’t “gamed” but there are many revisions as the data comes in later. I sometimes question the methodology of other data (e.g., inflation), but not the JOBS data. None of these macro-data are perfect, but they have been generally reliable. In many cases there are nongovernment sources for the same data, so if you question the BLS you can usually find the data elsewhere, which are mostly similar. If he appoints a compliant replacement, will the data be reliable?

The other vanity issue with Trump is his ad hominem attacks on Fed Chairman Jerome Powell. He has been relentless because the Fed has not lowered the interest rate for Federal Funds which is a rate that largely influences interest rates on the private markets (mortgage rates, excluded). Trump, a real estate investor, thinks this will stimulate the economy and to an extent he is correct, but cheap interest rate policies usually end in tears. 

Trump calls him the names he usually uses against those he doesn’t like in such as “MORON,” “STUPID,” and “TOTAL LOSER.” I’m not a fan of Powell but to his credit he has not caved in to Trump which is a positive. Trump would like to control the Fed which would be a disaster for the economy because he has no understanding of monetary policy or the role of interest rates. The history of the control of monetary policy by politicians usually results in disastrous inflation and economic ruin. Trump would be no exception to the rule.

Lastly, his tariff policy has been a disaster for world trade and our relationship with our trade partners. It is a good example of illegal “overreach.” He rules by whim. He changes his mind almost daily about what tariff rates will be to various countries. He raises tariffs even after a “deal” has been reached. He sets rates not based on trade relationships but on political issues that anger him (Canada and Brazil, for example). He has upset a well-working global supply chain that has benefited all countries who are involved, including the United States of America. 

Trump is ignorant of how trade works. He does not understand what a trade deficit means (it has no consequence). He lies about the results of free trade. He thinks America is worse off and that we are getting “ripped off” by other countries, yet we are still the world’s second largest exporter of manufactured goods. Things were working pretty well until he became president. 

It is well known that Trump is a megalomaniac (“Narcissistic Personality Disorder”). He fits most of the characteristics: grandiose sense of self-importance, need for approval and admiration, his desire for the spotlight, a delusion of unlimited brilliance, thin-skinned retaliation against those who criticize him. He may be clever, but he is far from the smartest guy on the planet, which he seems to think he is. 

As president, the power of his office seems to have inflated an already inflated sense of his own infallibility. This evident in his desire for the trappings of his office to mimic the palaces of foreign leaders (the tasteless gilding of his offices; a new $200M ballroom); basking in the fawning treatment he gets on foreign visits; his frequent arbitrary policy decisions related mostly to tariffs; his desire to control the economy through a compliant Fed chairman; his adolescent chiding of those he disfavors; and his constant references to how smart his decisions have been.

If you add all this up, but for the U.S. Constitution one might think he is an autocrat.