Letters from an American - April 24, 2025

Episode Date: April 25, 2025

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April 24th, 2025. Vladimir, stop! Wrote President Donald Trump on his social media site this morning. Yesterday, Trump berated Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky for rejecting a peace deal that heavily favored Russia. Hours later, Russia launched its deadliest assault on Kiev since last July, killing at least eight people and wounding more than 70 others. I am not happy with the Russian strikes on Kiev.

Not necessary and very bad timing," Trump posted. Five thousand soldiers a week are dying. Let's get the peace deal done. Trump won the presidency by assuring his base that he was a strong leader who could impose his will on the country and the world. Now he is bleeding weakly at Putin. Trump was the logical outcome of the myth of cowboy individualism embraced by the Republicans since Republican Ronald Reagan rose to the White House by celebrating it. In that myth, a true American is a man who operates on his own outside the community. He needs nothing from the government, works hard

to support himself, protects his wife and children, and asserts his will by dominating others. Government is his enemy, according to the myth, because it takes his money to help undeserving freeloaders and because it regulates how he can run his business. A society dominated by a cowboy individual is a strong one. Leaders who pushed this ideology knew it attracted voters. Once they were in power, they could slash government programs and cut taxes and regulations that kept wealth and opportunity accessible to poorer

Americans. They argued that a society works best if wealth and power are concentrated among a few elites who can direct capital more efficiently than government bureaucrats can. Their rhetoric worked. From 1981 to 2021, 50 trillion dollars moved from the bottom 90% of Americans to the top 1%. But those same people talking about individualism to secure votes also knew that the world has never worked this way. In the 21st century, U.S. security and the economy depended more than ever on coalitions and government investment. As the middle class hollowed out, Republicans hammered on the idea that government action

was socialism and the government was a swamp of waste and corruption. Donald Trump rode that rhetoric to the White House in 2016, but was still restrained by establishment Republicans who understood that the modern state underpinned America's strength. President Joe Biden's rejection of the Republicans' economic vision and reorientation of the economy

around ordinary Americans made Republicans rally against another Democratic president. They turned back to Trump, backed as he was by the MAGA base, marinated in the rhetoric that government is bad, even though their counties are more dependent than Democratic counties on government aid. Now, the dog has caught the car.

In 2024, Americans reelected Donald Trump, but he is no longer restrained by those who understood the importance of alliances and government programs. Instead, he is surrounded by those who appear convinced that displays of dominance will make the U S even stronger than it was when Trump took office, and that destroying the government will free up great men to reorder society. This impulse showed as soon as Trump took office in the takeover of the U.S. government by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, a group of individuals without government experience or security clearances

working in a group whose legal status is doubtful. They were overseen by billionaire Elon Musk, who was neither elected nor confirmed by the Senate. Musk vowed to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget. In the early days of the administration, Musk dominated Trump's press opportunities and at least one cabinet meeting. He appeared to be in charge. But his support soured quickly. From the start, Musk and the doggy staff slashed willy-nilly, firing vital employees that the government then had to rehire, creating mayhem. Then, in February, Musk tried to muscle in on the prerogatives

of actual cabinet members by demanding all government employees send a weekly email listing five things they had accomplished that week. Then earlier this month, Musk publicly disagreed with Trump and his trade adviser Peter Navarro over both tariffs and immigration. He has also fought with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. According to Hannah Natanson, Faiz Siddiqui, and Emily Davies of the Washington Post, it is not clear the emails Musk demanded were ever used for anything and that initiative

is quietly dying. But Musk's fights with other members of the administration have escalated until, as Dan Diamond, Faiz Siddiqui, Trisha Thadani, and Jeff Stein of the Washington Post reported today, Musk and Secretary of the Treasury Scott Besant got into a yelling match in the West Wing of the White House. And Musk's vow of $2 trillion in cuts has dwindled down to $150 billion, although that number is not yet verifiable. Elizabeth Williamson of the New York Times reported today that the cost of firing workers

will be more than $135 billion this year, while cuts to the IRS will cost about $8.5 billion in revenue in 2026 alone. And then there is the cost of lawsuits over doggies actions. Rather than working with those government officials already in place to save government money, Musk appears to be trying to display his power over government employees. At the same time, he is scooping up data from various government agencies about individuals in the US, a treasure trove that he could use for shaping society, garnering government contracts, or raising money, either by selling it or by blackmailing people with it.

After today's news that Tesla's earnings plunged 71% in the first quarter of the year, Musk tried to reassure investors by saying he would focus more on the company. Trump ally Steve Bannon warned about Musk's true interests. We have to have a full accounting that makes sure any government data, classified or not, and any personal financial data, people's tax returns and their health records have not gone to any entity not controlled by the Trump administration or the U.S. government. Secretary of Health and Human Services,

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., also promised to sweep through the government bureaucracy he hates and come up with a new, better plan for making Americans healthier. Kennedy has a history of opposition to vaccines and has refused to urge people to get vaccinated to stop the spread of measles. That outbreak is already the largest since the disease ceased to be consistently present in the U.S. population 25 years ago. Today, scientists reported that, at current rates of vaccination, measles could become commonplace again. Kennedy has also pledged to find the causes of autism by September, pushing aside the deep research already done on the subject and instead announcing that the cause is environmental toxins. Director of the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, told reporters on Tuesday

that in order to conduct the study, the NIH is collecting Americans' private medical records from federal and commercial databases, including from the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Indian Health Service, medication records from pharmacies, and data from smartwatches and fitness trackers. It is in talks with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to see if it can get access to that database database too. The idea that the right sort of men can do a better job than the government officers who have spent decades learning how to do their jobs is on view as well in the appointment

of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who previously worked as a Fox News Channel Weekend host. Hegseth vowed to champion strong warfighters at the Pentagon, but he has had no experience running an entity as large and complicated as the Defense Department, with its annual budget of $850 billion and it's almost 3.5 million employees. The results of his appointment have been disastrous. Under Hegseth, department officials are openly feuding. Paul McCleary and Jack Dech reported today in Politico that Hegseth is using just his wife, his lawyer, and two lower-level officials as advisors, meaning he is operating without anyone who has significant expertise in the department. Tuesday, we learned that in the unsecure second signal chat, the one with his wife and brother

and other personal friends, Hegseth posted from his personal phone information he had just received from Army General Michael Eric Carilla, who leads U.S. Central Command, the command responsible for operations in the Middle East. That got even worse today when Tara Copp of the Associated Press reported that Hegseth directed staffers to install Signal on his desktop computer so he could use Signal in a secure area where his own cell phone was not allowed. The computer was connected to the internet on an unsecured commercial line, making it highly susceptible to hacking. Trump's own belief that he could and should force the world to bow to his tariff levies

revealed his conviction that he could tear up mutual agreements and impose his will. He predicted that other countries would come begging to him to lift the tariffs. Instead, the reality is that he has maimed the country's thriving economy. On Tuesday, with the stock market lurching wildly and investors dumping U.S. investments, Trump suggested that he was negotiating with China and the 145% tariff rates he imposed would soon come down substantially. Yesterday he said everything's active in negotiations with China. Today a spokesperson for China's foreign ministry said China and the US are not having any consultation or

negotiation on tariffs, still less reaching a deal. China's commerce spokesperson agreed that, any claims about the progress of US-China trade negotiations are groundless as trying to catch the wind and have no factual basis. He said that China was willing to talk but only on the basis of mutual respect and in an equal manner. When a reporter asked Trump about China's denial he said, while they had a meeting this morning, the reporter answered, who's they? Trump replied, I can't tell you. It doesn't matter who they is. We may reveal it later.

Journalist Chris Hayes wrote, It's incredible that now the best case scenario is basically Trump engaging in a humiliating climb down, but having already inflicted permanent damage and uncertainty that can never be undone. The rate at which America's government, health, defense, and economy is degrading shows that reality will not conform to the myth of the American cowboy. The cover of The Economist today shows a battered and heavily bandaged eagle under the caption, only 1,361 days to go. The American people seem to be realizing that the rhetoric of cowboy individualism

is a very different thing than its reality. Trump's poll numbers are dropping sharply. A Reuters poll found that just 37% of Americans approve of his handling of the economy, which was supposed to be his strong suit. An economist YouGov poll found Trump's approval rating was minus 13, with 54% of Americans disapproving of the way he is handling the presidency, and only 41% approving. ["Dead in Massachusetts"] Letters from an American was written and read

by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dead in Massachusetts, recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.