Dec.24

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

Donald Trump, Geographer

Donald Trump says he wants to make big changes to the world map—and we're not just talking about doing it with a Sharpie. Everyone knows that he's been talking about making Canada the 51st state. In the last 48 hours or so, he's added three more items to the list:

• Denali: The tallest mountain in the United States is located in Alaska, and is currently known as Denali. It was also known as Denali for hundreds of years, up through 1896. In that year, a gold miner and participant in the Yukon gold rush thought a new name would be nice and, having heard about the results of the presidential election, chose Mt. McKinley. McKinley never visited Alaska, and had nothing to do with the mountain, but that was an era where white made right, and so the new monicker stuck. In the mid-1970s, Alaskans decided to switch it back, and in 2015, Barack Obama made the switch at the federal level.
  
  Over the weekend, Trump told an audience at one of the seemingly infinite TurningPoint USA conventions that he wants to overturn Obama's decision. Describing McKinley as "a very good, maybe a great president" who raised a "vast amount of money" to help pay for the Panama Canal, Trump decreed that "we are going to bring back the name of Mount McKinley, because I think he deserves it. That's not very gracious for somebody who did a great job."
  
  We doubt that Trump can name three things McKinley did as president. Presumably, someone was whispering in the Co-President-elect's ear, and persuaded him there's a twofer here: (1) strike back against "wokeism" and (2) poke Barack Obama in the eye. Of all of Trump's map-re-making plans, this is the most plausible, since it can be done via executive order. On the other hand, the people of Alaska want the name to remain, and all of the members of the Alaska congressional delegation have already pushed back against the plan. Also, a president can force the people who make government maps to use a particular name, but other than that, his decrees are not binding. We suspect most maps would continue to feature the Denali name; does he really want to facilitate these acts of defiance?
  
  
• The Panama Canal: Speaking of the Panama Canal, Trump has apparently decided that the U.S. should take it back. In the same speech that had the Denali/McKinley bit, he declared that Panama is charging "exorbitant rates" and suggested that the real power behind the Canal is now China. José Raúl Mulino, the president of Panama, said that neither of those things is true, and that his country has no interest in giving up the Canal.
  
  For roughly 70 years, of course, the Panama Canal was an American possession, until ownership was transferred during the Jimmy Carter years. There is no such thing as "takesy backsies" in a situation like this and, even if there was, the Hay–Bunau-Varilla Treaty says that the lease granted to the United States had a 99-year-term. In other words, even if the Carter administration had not ceded the Canal early, it would have revered to Panamanian control 20 years ago.
  
  Trump's game here (and with the "Canada as the 51st state" stuff) is to try to gain leverage in trade negotiations with Panama and Canada. However, while the guy who got the Panama Canal built preferred to speak softly and carry a big stick, Trump does the exact opposite. There is no chance he tries to follow through on his implied threats, and even if he does, well, Justin Trudeau and Raúl Mulino read the papers. They know he couldn't even get Congress to lift the debt ceiling, much less lend support and funding for military operations against two of the United States' North American neighbors.
  
  
• Greenland: Remarkably, Trump is going on again about acquiring Greenland. Yesterday, he announced the appointment of Ken Howery as ambassador to Denmark, and added: "For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity." Already, Prime Minister Mute Egede of Greenland has responded: "Greenland is ours. We are not for sale and will never be for sale. We must not lose our long struggle for freedom."
  
  Why is Trump so obsessed with Greenland? Part of it is surely legacy; if he becomes the first president in 120 years to expand the United States' territorial holdings, he presumably thinks that will become an important part of his legacy (he might want to look into how much good the acquisition of Alaska did for Andrew Johnson's legacy). Beyond that, the Co-President-elect sometimes has strange fantasies that he shares out loud. And apparently, he is attached to the notion that maybe the United States can trade "clean" Greenland for "dirty" Puerto Rico.
  
  However, the most important thing—reportedly—is that Trump is convinced that Greenland has vast mineral reserves that can be monetized by the United States. In view of this, the right-wing commentariat has decided that the island CAN be had, for the low, low price of $1.5 trillion. Where that figure came from is anyone's guess, but, for comparison purposes, note that the total value of Saudi Arabia's oil reserves is estimated at $1.8 trillion. Does it seem likely that Greenland is as resource-rich as, very possibly, the most resource-endowed piece of land on the planet (and note, they are almost exactly the same size, at roughly 2.15 million square kilometers)? And even if Greenland really is that resource-rich, why would Denmark sell, as opposed to accepting bids from private contractors and then taking a cut of their profits?

We recognize that Trump might just be talking out his rear, so as to distract from the various embarrassments of the last week. And we are certain that, even if he's serious, he's not going to make any progress on Operation A Man a Plan a Canal—Panama, Operation Danish Thunder, or Operation Moosemeat, Eh. We only write this up to observe that Trump v2.0 continues to unfold much like Trump v1.0 did: a lot of hot air, and very little substantive policy. (Z)