Dear Experts: No, We Are Not Approaching Global Disorder

Geopolitical risk analyst (and founder of the Eurasia Group), Ian Bremmer.

Many commentators from Ian Bremmer to Paul Krugman continue to claim that we have gone from a liberal world order to an international system in disorder. As per the usual, they could not be more wrong. For its part, the global elite have been living in fear of what the uncertainty that a Trump-led America would mean for their pocketbooks (and job prospects). This fear has obscured the purported objectivity and skewed their analyses of geopolitical trends.

Ian Bremmer’s second book. It is a fantastic read, and many details are profoundly insightful, but his overall assessment that there can be no international cooperation without the globalist institutions that once dominated the world is completely off-the-mark.

How else can you explain Ian Bremmer’s insistence that global risk is at an all-time high? Or Paul Krugman’s claim following the election of Donald Trump that, the Dow was going to plummet? Then there is the Nobel Prize-winning Yale economist, Robert Schiller, who has been warning us that the end is nigh because of the Trump Administration’s pending trade war with China.

As I recently wrote, these folks just don’t get it! Even as these supposed wizards of the Establishment continued casting doubt and suspicion on the efficacy of President Trump’s policies, even as they lamented the decline of the European Union (mostly because of their own globalist policies), the world economy has skyrocketed. Indeed, following Brexit, the British economy has gone through a sort of renaissance.

Here in the U.S., the stock market has reached record highs. The day after Donald Trump won the presidency, consumer confidence increased to historic levels (at least compared to the last eight years). Now, those of us who were early supporters of the Trump phenomenon have been vindicated yet again: global investors have made far riskier investments than previously thought possible, as confidence in the market has soared since the election of Donald Trump.

New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, the “accidental theorist” is almost always wrong. About everything. Yet, he is held up as the sine qua non of economic forecasting and assessments. Why? Because he’s a Leftist.

There is an old investor’s saw about the economy being driven by 80% confidence. Markets love decisiveness. No matter what policies are being implemented, the market is predisposed to respond favorably to firm and decisive policies enacted in a timely manner. It’s just the nature of things. Look at how President Trump has governed. He is the embodiment of decision. He has taken authoritative and bold actions on everything from immigration policy to the economy. And that’s just in the first few days of his Administration!

The world is noticing. For the most part, the world likes what it sees. This is in stark contrast to the doom-and-gloom fear scenarios that the usual suspects in the media and academia have been postulating for the last eighteen months. I think their mask has been lifted. I think we can all see who they are and what they believe.

These individual, so-called “experts” are not anything special. They don’t have some great crystal ball that gives them insight into the turbulent shocks that the world has been experiencing since 2008. These elites are nothing more than overeducated Statists. Their entire worldview (irrespective of their political party affiliation) is predicated on the state always being in control. The systems they favor–and serve–are highly centralized ones in which they can sell their “observations” to the policymakers.

The smartest people in the room couldn’t see this happening either.

These people are not evil. But, they are human. And, as such, they have a vested interest in maintaining the established order–no matter how many people it harmed–and they are also subject to being wrong. Like many people (particularly the well-educated), these geopolitical experts and policy elite are also arrogant. Not only are they wrong; not only do they refuse to objectively look at the trends sweeping throughout the planet, but they are also proud to be wrong. What’s more, these elites are resentful of anyone who would dare challenge their predilection toward statism.

However, thankfully, the market still determines winners-and-losers. Now that conservatives are in power throughout the West, the products that these groups of specialists are offering are no longer valuable. They simply do not relate to the real world. Their analyses are based on the elite’s own worldview, and their audience is other globalist elites. For some time, this was a solid business model. But, now, this is no longer the case. For the most part, the globalist elites have been run out of government. They are no longer having their say. This is a good thing for you and I. It also makes for a more interesting and wider perspective of geopolitical analysis.

Despite their intellectual heft, globalist elites of both parties have seen their system come to an inauspicious end and they still don’t seem to realize it.

So, what about the knee-jerk assumption that the world has entered a period of upheaval and disorder? These same people who have been consistently wrong; who have totally missed the biggest trend of the last 20 years–that of the anti-globalist reaction sweeping throughout the world–are now doubling-down on their inaccuracy and claiming that we’re all in for it.

Well, to be fair, we might all be in for it. But how has that changed from any other point in history? Weren’t we all in for it during the heady days of the Cold War? I’m pretty sure if you asked those young men in the trenches of World War I, they would’ve thought they were all in for it as well. The point is, things are always bad and times are always tough. But, are they apocalyptic, as the analysts seem to suggest? Absolutely not.

In fact, the worst foreign policy crises have occurred completely absent of the rise of Donald Trump, or the Brexit vote, or the rise of the AfD Party in Germany, or Marine La Pen in France. Three of the worst humanitarian crises have taken place under the globalists who populated the Obama Administration. The civil wars in South Sudan and Syria, and in Yemen, these all happened under the Obama Administration. So too did the recent wave of Russian revanchism in both Ukraine and Syria. China has gained more ground in the South China Sea over the last eight years than they have in the last twenty. Meanwhile, Venezuela has collapsed, and the Mexican Drug War is destabilizing the entire Western hemisphere.

This Far-Right German political party was once the laughing-stock in German politics. But, now, between the ongoing economic crisis and the growing disruptions caused by the influx of immigrants, especially refugees fleeing the Syrian Civil War, the AfD Party has become the third largest party in Germany’s government. Plus, their popularity is on the rise, since embracing a wholly anti-Islamic party platform. The longer the refugee crisis persists in Germany, the greater the popularity the popularity for this party increases. And, as it increases, so too will its political power. On top of being anti-Islamic, this party is rabidly anti-EU. Should they gain an increased level of power, akin to what happened in Great Britain during Brexit, we can expect to see some form of European disintegration, as Germany reduces its commitment to the EU.

Where were these elites pointing this out?

Since the rise of the Right, today’s economic forecasts are mostly positive. Things seem to be getting better. Consumer confidence is high. The stock market has broken all records. Investors are taking bolder risks. If anything, the global economy is about to be shored up after eight years of anemic growth and uninformed economic policies (not just in the United States, but throughout the world). Things are changing, all right. But, they are changing for the better.

The global trends may be shifting away from the globalist consensus that has dominated since at least the end of the Cold War, but that does not mean that disorder will soon follow. Sure, nationalism may cause states to remake parts of the map. In some cases, this may challenge American interests. In those cases, the U.S. must be willing–and able–to defend those interests. Although, there may be some cases where the international map is reordered by the United States herself, as I recently assessed in the potentiality of Alberta’s secession from Canada.

There is a group calling for both the Canadian provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan to secede. Clearly, they need to work on their name.

Such an event would be a serious boon for the United States, not just economically, but from a national security standpoint also. These trends are also being seriously driven by the rapidly shifting global demographics. As the Baby Boomers pass on, the Gen-X’ers and Millennials–who are far fewer in number than their outgoing Baby Boomer predecessors–are inheriting a world of slower growth and declining population. This can only be reversed by a complete reversal in our overall policies. Such an outcome can never come into fruition under the old, globalist consensus. As such, that order must be forgotten.

Paul Krugman, Ian Bremmer, and the like are simply wrong. They get some of the details right, but their larger picture analyses are wrong. I think that things are going to get better, the more that America’s economy rebounds and the stronger that America’s military becomes.

Why?

Because the U.S. economy is the largest in the world. Whether purposeful or not, the global economy orbits around the U.S. economy. When the American economy does well, the world economy does well.

In regards to America’s military: for all of the international consternation over America’s military dominance, when America’s military is viewed as strong, global hostilities tend to diminish. That’s not to say that global conflict goes away, but it is to say that brush wars don’t become regional wars, and regional wars don’t become world wars when the U.S. military has the ability to deter its adversaries and reassure its friends.

All of these things are moving in the right direction under the Trump Administration. Make no mistake: there will be challenges ahead. The end of the globalist order means that America had better get more accustomed to engaging in greater bilateral, realpolitik-type relationships. And the loss of certainty within the internationalist institutions that have dominated the world following the Second World War, means that some enemies will have greater room to maneuver. However, the better the American economy does, the more willing to engage in bilateral relations the U.S. is, and the stronger the U.S. military is, the more peaceable those international relations will be.

So, my friends, don’t believe the purported experts. They are operating on a paradigm that no longer exists and will not be coming back any time soon. Trust me, the world is entering a period of greater, long-term stability and is moving away from the period of upheaval and disorder. Make your investments accordingly because there is a lot of money to be made.

Also, start checking out The Weichert Report far more often than you usually do, because I guarantee you that this website is far more prescient than any of the “experts.” Keep an open mind in this new time, as all of the old assumptions no longer ring true. That’s what I do. That’s why, frankly, I’ve been right thus far.

Get ready, everyone, stability is finally upon us!