Today, I propose a theory to explain Donald Trump, his remaining term and legacy and what it might mean to you and me. There are hundreds of metrics judging a Presidency, covering everything from stats on the original election, popularity, and economic metrics. One key measure is a ranking of success or effectiveness relative to all other Presidents back to George Washington. That quasi-official determination is made by a panel of historians all the while every other group and individual has their own independent opinion. All of the rankings are by definition, highly subjective but historians in particular, are subject to the prevailing cumulative biases of a defined academic community. While their authority on the matter is informed by a specific knowledge base, they would be misled if they don’t account for their own kind of groupthink. Into this mix, I’ll throw in a bomb, make of it what you will. I’m not qualified to do this ‘academically’ but there are reasons if not proofs. Trump will not be measured as a great President; he’ll be measured as a world emperor.
My comparisons are not meant to belittle any of the truly great Presidents e.g. Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln; they presided over the nation at crucial times. Reagan, in contrast, also great, managed the country and economy well but made his greatest mark presiding over the fall of communism in the East bloc countries by leveraging their own inherent weaknesses. FDR also managed both domestic change and a world threatening war.
What sets Trump apart is his reshaping the entire geo-political globe, not just active conflict areas. He’s reasserting a moral foundation to American greatness and he’s doing the same domestically. It would be a fair argument to ask if that’s greater than bringing down the oppressions of the communist bloc nations or the combined Axis powers; and it’s also contingent on Trump being able to finish what he started. Ergo, the jury will remain out on my theorem for now.
In the interim, here are a few queues to make my case: The White House released this list on 9/6/26. [The link will likely be destroyed by future administrations so in the future, search for Trump, 25 Accomplishments, 2026].
Apart from these substantial accomplishments that easily eclipse the total productivity of all other contemporary Presidents, Trump is playing the proverbial 4-D chess to simultaneously neuter the ambitions of every other global rival to the USA: China, Russia, and Iran bloc adversaries. Add to that the drive to buck up arrogant but impotent allies that are driving themselves toward extinction from woke-isms, and immigration; the EU, UK, Canada. Trump may likely oversee the total reworking of the Middle East that has vexed the modern world for almost a hundred years. He may very will preside over the conditions that assure the self-destruction of what is left of Russia after a suicidal Ukrainian war. He has forced a reshaping of the world that China had hoped to control and may be in office long enough to see further deconstructing of XI’s global ambitions and for China’s internal cancers start to debilitate any further recurrence. Trump is actively consolidating our peaceful control and oversight of the Western hemisphere and has just acquired permanent advantage of the Arctic covering the Northern hemisphere.
Consider that Trump has risen from the ashes and obliterated three political dynasties, Clinton’s, Bush’s, Obama’s, and one would-be dynasty that never had the competency to emerge as one, Biden’s.
Forget Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, FDR, Reagan, for a moment. How does Trump stack up against Pharaohs, China’s dynasties, all the more successful emperors of Rome, Alexander the Great, the Ottomans, The Holy Roman empire, Napolean? Name one that tilted the global balance of powers in less than two years? We could dicker over specific cases forever but my point here is that this is now his league of peers whom he will actually be compared to.
Now that I’ve shown you the macro-scope, let’s talk about the micro just a second. When you look at Trump on this date, just a month away from a mid-term election that in a worst-case scenario could unravel a great deal of everything he’s accomplished and on top of that, set off a series of administration and family persecutions that would rival an entire civil war, Trump seems strangely unmoved and impervious to all of these threats. There is no sense of panic, no acknowledgement of impending doom, no perceptible fear. It’s almost like he’s faced death before and now says, ‘been there done that’. One has to ask, what does he know that we don’t know?
Trump is the unicorn that everyone talked about but no one believed existed, the pol and statesman that was willing to do hard things that needed to be done and had not been done by his predecessors, even if it meant risking his chances of doing far more in the second half of his administration. As he’s demonstrated in the past, there may be yet way more contingency plans waiting in the wings. Come hell or high water, he’s moving forward. Damn the torpedoes.
If the reader here interprets this as worshipful, you miss the mark. Trump’s record and prospects and the eventual final assessment of his impact doesn’t need my two cents. If the vast TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) crowd had this level of objectivity, they could still hate him just as much but it might impact their perpetual futility, but I see no deviation in store for their retardation.
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A helpful introduction to the author in my ABOUT