Opinion
Getting Ready for Four More Years with President Trump
The Democratic Party continues to be weakened by divisions and endless and meaningless infighting
By Liu Yunyun  ·  2020-02-09  ·   Source: Web Exclusive

History repeats. The impeachment trial of U.S. President Donald Trump ended unsurprisingly with his acquittal by the U.S. Senate on February 6. The fiasco was nothing more than a huge squander of Congress' time, taxpayer money and prime time coverage.

It is a pity that this waste cannot be recycled to address the real challenges facing the people in the U.S. such as extreme weather conditions, a deteriorating infrastructure and a crumbling healthcare system, among other things.

His last State of the Union address was apparently an overstatement and both his domestic and foreign policies are undeniably flawed. But despite Trump's personal and public antics, the U.S. economy is currently in a cycle of continued expansion. Its GDP is expanding at a reasonably fast rate, its unemployment rate dropped to the lowest in 40 years in 2019, and the Dow Jones is hitting all-time highs.

Even if a large portion of the U.S. voting population reportedly disapprove of the president for various reasons, it is likely they will vote for him in the presidential election in November based on the growing economy, and very sadly, an inconvenient fact: fewer immigrants. In the Trump era, values, beliefs and ideals have become irrelevant.

As the campaign season goes into full swing, the Democratic Party continues to be weakened by divisions and endless, meaningless infighting. They seem to be handing victory to Trump on a silver platter. Therefore, the Democrats should throw in the towel and start preparing for the 2024 elections, before voters get bored with the same candidates and rhetoric and start turning to the Republicans by rote.

Oblivious to the dire mistakes they made during the 2016 election, the U.S. media is drifting further away from the average person on the street and the Internet. Trump has become a convenient target for the liberal media and a hero for conservative pundits. The constant and daily attacks on Trump by late night talk show hosts like Stephen Colbert have made their shows less dynamic.

A few months before the 2016 election, six media professionals from five prestigious U.S. media outlets, including Bloomberg Television, Foreign Affairs magazine and Buzzfeed, visited China International Publishing Group, where I work. When I mentioned that Trump was very likely to win since the American people I had spoken to—college professors, church goers and others—had all suggested they wanted a change even if Trump is amateur, our media friends grinned and shrugged. They probably could never imagine the Oval Office being occupied by a man who appeared on the cover of Playboy. But they were wrong four years ago, and they will be wrong again this year.

Incidentally, the Chinese Yiwu Small Commodities Market reported that they had received many orders for T-shirts, flags and baseball bats with "Trump 2020" and "Keep America Great" slogans, but had not received nearly as many orders for other candidates.

So Trump, riding a lucky wave of economic expansion and a weak opposition party, will most likely get reelected in 2020, and the rest of the world will have to be prepared for this stark reality.

Copyedited by Rebeca Toledo

Comments to liuyunyun@bjreview.com

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