WASHINGTON: The United States transitioned to a new ''
Don
'' on a bleak Friday noon with the possibility that it may soon bring darkness and disorder across the world.
Sworn in as the country’s 45th President , New York businessman
Donald J Trump promised to dismantle a familiar world and domestic order and institute new protectionist ones where everything will be premised on ''America First.''
In a remarkable Inaugural address, the 70-year-old showman built on his campaign rhetoric and railed against the US establishment -- including an array of former presidents and lawmakers from both parties -- for not serving the American people adequately. ''We are transferring power from Washington DC and giving it back to you the people. For too long a small group has reaped the reward while people have borne the cost,'' he raged. ''Washington flourished but people did not share. The establishment protected itself…. There was little to celebrate for the struggling families.''
He also sent out an explicit warning to the rest of the world, a ''new decree'' that he wanted to be heard in every foreign capital. From this day, EVERY decision in Washington DC, whether it is on trade or taxes or immigration or foreign affairs will be made with an aim to protect American people. Countries that have been ''stealing our products and destroying our jobs'' will no longer be able to do so.
Although the truism “every country looks after its own self-interest” is commonly accepted around the world, Trump’s laundry list of complaints took aim at globalization, a US-led mantra that much of the international community was persuaded to embrace. The party is over in a Trump administration, the new President signaled.
In the process, Trump also sounded a dire warning to many countries across the world that have come to depend on America’s protection and largesse -- often at Washington’s own insistence of forging alliances -- saying the US has ''defended other nation’s borders while refusing to defend our own…spent trillions and trillions overseas while America’s infrastructure is in decay.''
''We made other nations rich while the wealth and confidence of our country has dissipated. One by one the factories shuttered and left the shore. The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from our homes and redistributed all over the world. That is the past. Now we are looking only to the future,'' he said, promising to ''bring back our borders, bring back our jobs, bring back our wealth, and bring back our dreams.''
It was a stunning interpretation of modern history and a candid articulation of protectionist policy based on assumptions that many experts even within America question. But Trump was nerveless in airing it to the world, boldly stating, ''Protection will lead to great prosperity and strength. America will start winning again winning like never before.''
Amid a flurry of abrasive, contentious statements, Trump made two conciliatory remarks, once saying the US will seek friendship with all countries and ''will not seek to impose our way of life on everyone,'' and another time promising to ''reinforce old alliances and form new ones'' while fighting against RADICAL ISLAMIC TERRORISM that he pledged to ''eradicate completely from face of the earth.''
How he will seek friendship and reinforce old alliances when he has fundamentally challenged the premise on which they are based is hard to discern but the contradictions are typical of Trump, and the historic nature of the occasion did nothing to temper it. Much of his address seemed aimed at his core constituency from Middle America that is great ferment over economic hardship -- mostly on account of rapid evolution of technologies that Trump does not recognize.
Protests against the Trump presidency raged outside the
Capitol Hill
perimeter even as his mostly white faithfuls flocked to America’s power centre to hear their idol lash out against the establishment, both Republican and Democratic, with whom he was cozy till recently.
''We will no longer accept politicians who are all talk and no action, constantly complaining and never doing anything about it. Time for empty talk is over; now arrives the hour for action,'' Trump raged, putting himself in a place where he will be reminded of it every moment.