Trump in the China Shop

Trump isn't making peace, he's breaking it across the globe, and instilling ill will for the US around the world. He's on the brink of an illegal invasion of Venezuela, possibly Iran, and escalating the Ukraine proxy war with Russia. As a finale for the political circus ring master, there are tariffs and sanctions here, tariffs and sanctions there, tariffs and sanctions everywhere...all bound to boomerang right back to the US. Looks like the Don's goal is to hasten the end of the US/NATO empire...that certainly appears to be the inevitable outcome to me.

Trump is only a symptom of the inevitable end of empire. I mean a game show host and real estate shyster with no political experience is the president..not once but twice. If any thing Europe's leadership is worse led by the three stooges Macron, Stammer, and Mertz with Ursula as their overseer. The west declines as the east rises. It happens again and again in predictable patterns.

The 7-Stage Collapse Pattern: Spain, Britain, USSR... USA Is At Stage 5 (18 min)

For 500 years, a pattern has destroyed every global superpower that followed it. Spain collapsed in the 1600s. Britain lost its empire by 1954. The Soviet Union disintegrated in 900 days. Three empires. Three complete collapses. All following the exact same seven-stage sequence. And the United States has already completed five of those seven stages.
This documentary traces the collapse pattern across three superpowers and five centuries—from Spain's silver wealth that bankrupted the richest empire on Earth, to Britain's pound that lost reserve currency status within decades of two world wars, to the Soviet Union that went from superpower to non-existent in less than three years. Each believed they were exceptional. Each believed the pattern wouldn't apply to them. Each followed the sequence to total collapse anyway.
The seven-stage pattern is identical across all three empires: Stage 1 - Military Overextension, Stage 2 - Currency Debasement, Stage 3 - Debt Spiral, Stage 4 - Loss of Productive Capacity, Stage 5 - Social Decay, Stage 6 - Loss of Reserve Currency Status, Stage 7 - Collapse. Spain completed all seven stages between 1590 and 1670. Britain completed them between 1914 and 1954. The Soviet Union completed them between 1945 and 1991. And the United States is currently at Stage 5, with clear warning signs of Stage 6 emerging.
This isn't speculation about some uncertain future. This is pattern recognition across 500 years of documented history. Three empires followed seven stages. All three collapsed completely. The United States has completed five stages and is showing early signs of stage six. The math is unsustainable—$36 trillion debt growing by $2 trillion annually, interest payments exceeding $1 trillion, no political will to address it. The pattern says Stage 6 and 7 are inevitable. The only question is timing. History doesn't predict the exact date, but it shows the sequence with absolute certainty. Understanding where we are in that sequence determines whether you prepare or get blindsided.

Chas and Glenn discuss the situation...
Chas Freeman: Imperial Overstretch - 500 Years of Dominance Come to an End

(45 min) Ambassador Chas Freeman discusses the current historical time we live through, as the foundations for 500 years of dominance come to an end.
The essay Chas recommends...
The Great Reckoning What the West Should Learn From China by Kaiser Kuo

Consider what China’s trajectory means for countries across the Global South that were told for decades there was only one path to prosperity: the Washington Consensus path of privatization, deregulation, and democratic governance. China offers proof that another model can work: state-led development, long-term planning, massive infrastructure investment, and selective integration with global markets, all while maintaining political autonomy. Whether one admires this model or not, its success cannot be denied, and its implications ripple far beyond East Asia.

Worth a read or at least a scan.

Rick Wolff also agrees...It is obvious the US is in decline.
Richard Wolff "I've NEVER Seen This Before!"
(55 min conversation with Sabby)

Tariffs and sanctions end up hurting the US. Look what Europe has done to itself with all their sanctions on Russia. Sanctions on China will hurt us as well.
Today's title, Trump in the China Shop" comes from Einar Tangen in this interview.
Einar Tangen: How China Won the Economic War

(45 min) Einar Tangen is a Senior Fellow at Teihe Institute and a Senior Fellow at CIGI. Tangen discusses how China made its supply chains immune to economic coercions and, at the same time, has powerful economic weapons at its own disposal. China's restrictions on rare earth minerals are a powerful instrument, yet the risk of weaponizing trade is that other states will diversify away from China.

Jeff Sachs and John Mearsheimer have their usual debate about the inevitable war with China versus a possible cooperative solution.
Jeffrey Sachs & John Mearsheimer: Spheres of Security to Prevent World War III
How should the security needs of great powers be balanced with the sovereignty of smaller nations on their border? The concept of Spheres of Security limits the activity of other borders of other great powers. Mexico has the freedom to engage in political and economic cooperation with any state, yet Mexico does not have the freedom to host Russian missiles or Chinese military bases. This is common sense and must be applied to all great powers, yet how feasible is such an agreement between the great powers?
John J. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, where he has taught since 1982. Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned economics professor, bestselling author, innovative educator, and global leader in sustainable development.

Pepe is back in Thailand. He has a wide ranging interview with Nima starting with Western Asia and the coming regional conflicts.

(70 min) Pepe Escobar: Iran’s Military Prepares to Wipe Out Israel’s Attacks - EU Goes All in
He promotes his Iran documentary, The Golden Road, hopefully to be broadcast by PressTV.
He begins with Iran and ends with Venezuela and China.

Pepe was also with the Judge this week discussing Iran. Pepe Escobar : Iran Ready For War.
(25 min) They also discuss Russia.

Max Blumenthal : Israel Resumes Killing and Blocking Aid.

A short history of Israel breaking ceasefires w/Max Blumenthal (9.5 min)
The Grayzone's Max Blumenthal sets Israel's flagrant violations of the recently signed Gaza ceasefire against a historical backdrop stretching back to the inception of the self-proclaimed Jewish state.

And one more from Max. Excellent documentary of Max' visit to Iran
Uncaptured: Jews in the Islamic Republic of Iran (54 min)
Join Max Blumenthal on a trip throughout Iran as he meets members of the second largest Jewish community in the region. In this collaboration with acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Maria Mavati, Blumenthal takes a look at the lives and rich history of Jews inside the Islamic Republic that might surprise outsiders, and which provides a stunning rebuke to Zionist portrayals of post-revolutionary Iran.
"I had read and heard so much about them," Blumenthal reflected on the Jewish Iranians he met during this project. "Some of it might have been true, but much of it felt like propaganda. So I wanted to see for myself – to meet Iran's Jews where they lived, in their congregations, and communities. What I found was an authentic brand of Judaism in practice, one representing thousands of years of tradition, and which today remains uncaptured by the militaristic force of Zionism."

Alastair Crooke : Israel and its Neighbors After Two Years of War

(22 min) From a comment..
''MORE CHILDREN were killed in Gaza, Palestine, in the FIRST 3 WEEKS of Israel's ongoing bombardment since October 2023, than in ALL WARFARE WORLDWIDE in the LAST 3 YEARS of 2020, 2021, & 2022 COMBINED.''
- A quote from Professor Norman Finkelstein during a debate with Eli Lake on YouTube in November 2023.

Venezuela
Perhaps the next US illegal war?
The Nobel War Prize Strikes Again

(28 min) Show notes here
And the Nobel Peace Prize goes to . . . María Corina Machado? Wait, what's going on here? Why does it seem like, far from celebrating a champion of peace, the Nobel Committee is in fact paving a path to war? Let's find out!

This is nothing new. The goal to capture Venezuela has gone on for decades...

(24 min) For BBC Television's Newsnight, gonzo journalist Greg Palast flew to Venezuela to get the inside information on the man the Bush Administration loved to hate: Hugo Chavez.
Palast met with the president the Bush men called a madman, a dictator — and then finds the man who took Chavez hostage (Palast wore a hidden wire for that one).
Here, from the winner of the George Orwell Prize for Courage in Journalism, are the inside documents that tell you why they wanted Chavez dead.

Phil Giraldi : CIA Unleashed on Venezuela.

(26 min) They also discuss Israel.
From one of the comments...
Venezuela has the largest oil reserves of any country on the planet. More than Saudi Arabia, more than Russia, more than anybody. That’s why we are going into Venezuela. To steal their oil. That seems the bottom line to me too. The drug cartels in Venezuela are like the WMD's in Iraq.

'We are nobody's backyard': Trinidad labor leader slams US war on Venezuela

Trinidadian labor leader David Abdulah joins The Grayzone's Max Blumenthal to discuss the mobilization of Caribbean social movements and multilateral organizations in resisting the US military build-up that has seen a wave of lethal American attacks on fishing boats on the dubious grounds of combatting "narco-terrorism."
Abdulah addresses the extrajudicial US assassination of two citizens of Trinidad and Tobago, and the role of his country's Prime Minister, Kamla Persad Bissessar, in supporting Trump and providing a full-throated endorsement of his escalating regime change war on neighboring Venezuela.
Finally, Abdulah offers a sweeping and incisive history of multi-lateral Caribbean efforts to foster regional integration, detailing Washington's attempts to keep the strategically important Caribbean rim fragmented and isolate nations from one another.

The idea Venezuela is trafficking drugs to the US is about the same as Iraq has WMD's. It is an excuse for colonization.

(12 min) on Venezuela.

US conducts 10th deadly boat strike as bombing campaign quickens
“The vessel was known by our intelligence to be involved in illicit narcotics smuggling, was transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics,” Hegseth wrote, though he provided no evidence to justify his allegations.

More provocation...
US Flies B-1 Bombers Near Caribbean in Latest Provocation Aimed at Venezuela
Last week, the US flew three B-52 bombers near Venezuela, in what the US Air Force called a “bomber attack demonstration mission.” US special operations helicopters have also flown within 90 miles of Venezuela as part of a major US military buildup in the region, which has involved the deployment of eight Navy warships.

Lawlessness and Arrogance
D.C. Aims for Regime Change in Caracas
The airstrikes in the Caribbean are “murder in international waters of unknown people and without due process.” “Members of the Trump administration are like vigilante cops,” says senior fellow Bill Astore. “They think they can enforce the law by breaking the law. In attempting to display toughness, they’re showing moral weakness by murdering people who could well be innocent.”
... “In a world where government lies may be easily refuted in seconds, Trump’s initiation of war for Venezuelan oil and resources presented as a war on drugs and made up narco-terror is as illegal as it is embarrassing,” concludes senior fellow Karen Kwiatkowski...
“The CIA -- and the spineless members of Congress who never met a war they didn’t like -- remain both consistent and ascendant,” says Kwiatkowski. “The only war Americans need today is the one we must fight against the military-industrial-congressional complex that President Dwight Eisenhower warned us of almost 65 years ago.”

Over and over again my friends. Basically using the same playbook...
The entire (100 min) interview on the Duran with Brain Berlietic was informative, but Brian's description of how the US/NATOstan's use of NGO's to promote regime change was masterful (cued below). Alexander adds important points as well.

(about 6 min) Excellent description of US coup machine.

So we reward Argentina and target Venezuela. Cronyism is playing a role.
The REAL Reason We’re Giving $40 Billion To Argentina Is UNBELIEVABLE!

(33 min) The Trump administration’s proposed $40 billion bailout to Argentina would seem to contradict Trump’s “America First” rhetoric and shows this President is willing to treat the US treasury like a cash register doling out ungodly sums of taxpayer dollars to global billionaire interests.
As Jimmy and Kurt Metzger discuss, the bailout is structured in a way that allows private hedge funds — such as those tied to billionaire Rob Citrone and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant — to reap profits while U.S. taxpayers absorb the risk. Jimmy also points out that the policy is being pushed despite Argentina’s poor economic track record and adverse impact on U.S. farmers (especially soybean and beef producers) in a trade war context.
This bailout is sadly just another part of a broader system where government subsidies favor elite global interests while American workers and everyday citizens get the shaft but still get to foot the bill.

Jimmy exposes the "No Kings Protests"
Here’s Why “No Kings” Rally Was A FRAUD & Had NO POINT!

(28 min) The “No Kings” rallies across the country this past weekend drew a great deal of attention, but the reality is that these were not genuine protests but in fact staged, “astroturfed” events designed to divide Americans and protect establishment power.
Jimmy and Kurt Metzger criticize the rallies for lacking any specific demands or policy goals, describing them as “controlled opposition” to channel public frustration into harmless displays rather than real political action.
They highlight the hypocrisy of Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi and the contradictions of participants who rail against “kings” while supporting powerful elites. Sadly, movements like this merely serve as distractions from systemic issues like war, inequality, and corporate control, reinforcing the illusion of resistance while maintaining the status quo.

The Economy has been rigged for decades. Gold is part of the story...
The Secret Gold Network That Controls Nations

(17 min) There’s a gold empire hiding in plain sight...Not in history books. Not in museums. But right now — operating in secret, controlling more wealth than most nations.
This is the story of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) — the mysterious institution in Basel, Switzerland, that acts as the central bank of central banks. Created after World War I, it quietly became the world’s most powerful financial entity — managing the hidden gold that backs nations, funds wars, and shapes the global economy. From Nazi gold transactions to Bretton Woods, to modern gold manipulation through paper markets, the BIS has operated in shadows for nearly a century — beyond laws, beyond governments, and beyond public scrutiny.
Once you understand how this hidden gold empire works, you’ll see why your money, your savings, and your entire financial reality are built on secrets they never wanted you to uncover. Because history doesn’t just repeat — it compounds. And gold has always been the center of power.

Like a rock rolling downhill, the fall of empire is insured. It is just matter of time. Trump, while not the cause, certainly is enabling and accelerating our decline... from militarizing our country to regime changing others. The bipartisan desire to regime change Russia, Venezuela, Iran, and even China is foolish and does not serve the interests of citizens, only the oligarchs who want to rape and pillage the natural resources of these nations.
As I often recommend get to know your local farmers. I went to visit one of ours last week, and plan to share the experience in next week's column. In the meantime, I hope you'll share your stories, ideas, and observations in the comments below. Have a wonderful Sunday. We're supposed to get a much needed rain which will be worth celebrating. Take care!