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Crashing markets increase the odds of a Trump presidency
Photo: Reuters Crashing markets and floundering economies amplify voter anxiety — just like they did in 2008, when they helped propel into the White House a one-term US senator and “community organizer.”
So, is it really so crazy to think that voters might elect as president in 2016 a real estate developer with little policy experience but lots of experience in land speculation, building casinos and reality TV?
After months of believing Donald Trump was a flash in the pan, I’m willing to concede that The Donald could become the GOP nominee — and possibly the next president of the United States.
Why? Mainly, the real and obvious public angst that always accompanies economic uncertainty — which we have in spades these days, as witnessed by three successive drops of between 300 and 600 points in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, as well as continued lackluster economic growth that could get dramatically worse just in time for the 2016 presidential election.
You’d think that in such tenuous times, voters would opt for the steady hand to guide them. But history teaches us voters often take chances when times get rough by electing candidates who challenge the status quo.
Sometimes they get lucky, as they did when they elected an agent of change named Ronald Reagan. Sometimes they don’t — and they get a Barack Obama.
Either way, as the economy becomes ever more speculative, Trump’s chances of becoming president grow. I personally like The Donald and admire his ability to rebuild and rebrand himself and his business from near ruination when, in the early 1990s, he was best known for a messy divorce and lots of underwater real estate.
He’s now by most estimates a legitimate billionaire with one of the best-known brands ever created.
I’m less admiring of his sometimes noxious use of nationalism to gain cheap political points. I can’t tell you whether Trump really believes what he says about stamping out illegal immigration or defeating ISIS or crafting better trade deals with China and Japan.
But Trump’s views these days certainly sound good to many voters fed up with mealy mouthed establishment pols, so much so that they are willing to overlook his rhetorical excesses and policy gaffes.
He wants to impose tariffs on Chinese and Japanese goods. But if you think we might be heading into a recession (recall economic expansions historically last around seven years, which means we should be due for a slowdown), the last thing you want to do is increase tariffs.
Do a little research and you’ll see the depths of the Great Depression were preceded by the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which set off a global trade war and slowed the stock market and ground an already weakened economy into the dust.
Even worse, he seems to be wrong on many facts about the economy. Monday, amid the market upheaval, Trump tweeted: “As I have long stated, we are so tied in with China and Asia that their markets are now taking the US market down. Get smart USA.”
No offense to The Donald (a graduate of the prestigious Wharton Business School), but the reason for Monday’s massive sell-off had less to do with the Chinese and Asian “markets” and more to do with fears of a US recession on the heels of a Chinese economic slowdown (they are a significant trading partner) at a time when the Fed wants to raise and “normalize” interest rates because they’ve been so low (zero, to be exact) for so long.
Yet Trump remains resilient. He leads in all the public polls. Even the more reliable independent polls that once depicted Trump’s lead as less formidable are now starting to turn in a more pro-Trump direction, I’m told.
Of course, it’s not just a cheap appeal to nationalism that accounts for the Trump boom. Admirably to many Americans (myself included), Trump speaks his mind, uninhibited by left-wing political correctness.
And give him credit: Jeb Bush, the nominal GOP front-runner, was so scared to offend people that until Trump began pounding the issue, he barely acknowledged that there was an illegal-immigration crisis.
All of which means that Trump could be president, policy positions be damned.
Charles Gasparino is a Fox Business Network senior correspondent.
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