Author: Buck Banks

Trump Lost at Davos

Buck Banks

“Donald Trump and his team clearly went to Davos determined to demean and insult their hosts. It was, one might say, a novel approach to diomacy: ‘You’re pathetic, your societies and economies are falling apart, now give us Greenland.’ … And it worked about as well as you’d expect. Trump may have imagined that the Europeans would cower in the face of his wrath. Instead, they humiliated him. He dropped his latest tariff threats in return for a ‘framework’ that gave the United States essentially nothing it didn’t already have — and left behind a Europe that is finally united in resistance to his bullying.”

— Paul Krugman

Choosing Between Being Trump’s Happy Vassal or Miserable Slave

Buck Banks

“Until now, we tried to appease the new president in the White House. We were very lenient, also with the tariffs. We were lenient hoping to get his support for the Ukraine war… But now so many red lines are being crossed that you have the choice between your self-respect. Being a happy vassal is one thing. Being a miserable slave is something else.”

— Belgian prime minister Bart De Wever, quoted by The Guardian.

Carney: We’re in a Rupture, Not a Transition

Buck Banks

“Every day we are reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry. That the rules-based order is fading. That the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must. … “Let me be direct: We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.”

— Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada did not mention the United States or President Trump by name in a speech on at the World Economic Forum on Tuesday, but it was clear where he placed the blame for what he called a “rupture” in the world order, the New York Times reports.