The Free Press
Wait, he said what about Gaza? We’re shuttering which government departments? Some people have been delighted by President Trump’s return. Others, horrified. But on one thing this divided country is agreed: He has staged a very busy first three weeks. Even for us in the news business, it’s been hard to keep up with all of the onrushing executive orders, proclamations, Truth posts, and Elon tweets, each announcing a new, radical departure from policies of the last four years—or even longer. For all the tangible changes he’s making, there’s an unreality to much of the last few weeks: a trade war that lasted only hours, a whirring social-media rumor mill, off-the-cuff comments that may be just that—or the overthrow of decades of U.S. Middle East policy.
How to explain this new mode of presidential behavior? Economist, polymath, blogger, and podcaster Tyler Cowen has a theory, which he laid out on his blog, Marginal Revolution. His argument is as original as the phenomenon it analyzes, which is why we’re republishing it today. —The Editors
The Donald Trump administration has issued a blizzard of executive orders, and set many other potential changes in the works. It might rename Dulles Airport (can you guess to what?). A bill has been introduced to add you-know-who to Mount Rushmore. There is DOGE, and the ongoing attempt to reshape federal employment.
At the same time, many people have been asking me why Trump chose Canada and Mexico to threaten with tariffs—are they not our neighbors, major trading partners, and closest allies?
I have a theory that tries to explain all these and other facts, though many other factors matter too. I think of Trumpian policy, first and foremost, as elevating cultural policy above all else.
Imagine you hold a vision where the (partial) decline of America largely is about culture. After all, we have more people and more natural resources than ever before. Our top achievements remain impressive. But is the overall culture of the people in such great shape? The culture of government and public service? Interest in our religious organizations? The quality of local government in many states? You don’t have to be a die-hard Trumper to have some serious reservations on such questions.
We also see countries, such as China, that have screwed-up policies but have grown a lot, in large part because of a pro-business, pro-learning, pro-work culture. Latin America, in contrast, did lots of policy reforms but is still somewhat stagnant.
Okay, so how might you fix the culture of America? You’d want to tell everyone that America comes first. That America should be more masculine and less soft. That we need to build. That we should “own the libs.” I could go on with more examples and details, but this part of it you already get.
So imagine you started a political revolution and asked a simple question about every policy change you made: “Does this reinforce or overturn our basic cultural messages?” Every time the policy or the policy debate pushes culture in what you think is the right direction, just do it. Do it in the view that the cultural factors will, over some time horizon, surpass everything else in import.
Simply pass, or announce, or promise, such policies. Do not worry about any other constraints.
You don’t even have to do them!
Not all of them even have to be legal! (If they’re illegal, that might provoke more discussion.)
They don’t all have to last!
You create a debate over the issues knowing that, because of polarization, at least one-third of the American public is going to take your side, and sometimes much more than that. These are your investments in changing the culture. And do it with as many issues as possible, as quickly as possible (reread Ezra Klein on this). Think of it as akin to an early Jordan Peterson cranking out all those videos. Flood the zone. That is how you have an impact in an internet intensive, attention-at-a-premium world.
You will not win all of these cultural debates, but you will control the ideological agenda (I hesitate to call it an “intellectual” agenda, but it is). Your opponents will be dispirited and disorganized, just like the Democrats today. Then just keep on going. In the long run, you may end up “owning” far more of the culture than you suspected was possible.
Yes, policy will be a mess, but you can’t have everything. The culture is worth a lot, both for its own sake and as a predictor of the future course of policy.
Now let’s turn to some details.
In the first week, Trump made a huge point of striking down DEI and affirmative action (in some of their forms) at the very start of his administration. The Wall Street Journal described the anti-DEI orders as the centerpiece of his program.
We’ve seen many other efforts to make statements about the culture wars: a bar on transgender people serving in the military, for instance. Or no more “identity months” for the Department of Defense. There are more of these than I can keep track of.
It is no accident that these are priorities. And keep in mind the main point is not to, say, prevent servicepeople from celebrating Black History Month, though I do not doubt that is a favored policy. The main point is to get people talking about how you are eliminating Black History Month in the military. Just as I am, covering the topic right now.
How is that war against USAID going? Will it be abolished? Cut off from the Treasury payments system? Simply rolled up into the State Department? Will presidential “impoundment” be invoked? I do not know. Perhaps nobody knows, not yet. The point, however, is to delegitimize what USAID stands for, which the Trumpers perceive as “other countries first” and a certain kind of altruism, and a certain kind of NGO left-leaning mindset and lifestyle.
The core message is simply “We do not consider this legitimate.” Have that be the topic of discussion for months, and do not worry about converting each and every debate into an immediate, tangible victory.
What about those ridiculous nominations, starting with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.? As a result of that nomination, more people have started questioning whether the medical and public health establishments are legitimate after all. And once such a question starts being debated, the answer simply cannot come out as fully positive, whatever the details of your worldview may be. People end up in a more negative mental position, and of course then some negative contagion reinforces this further.
Releasing the JFK assassination files and lifting the lid on unidentified anomalous phenomena? The point is to get people questioning the previous regime and asking why they kept secrets from us, what really was going on with many other issues, and so on. It will work. The good news, if you can call it that, is that we can expect some of the juicier secrets to be made public.
I think by now you can see how the various attempts to restructure federal employment fit into this picture. Trump’s “war against universities” has barely begun, but stay tuned. Don’t even get me going on “Gaza real estate,” the very latest.
Finally, let’s return to those tariffs (non-tariffs?) on Canada and Mexico. We already know Trump believes in tariffs, and yes, that is a big factor, but why choose those countries in particular? Well, first, it is a symbol of strength, and of Trump’s apparent ability to ignore and contradict mainstream opinion. But also those are two countries most Americans have heard of. If Trump announced high tariffs on, say, Burundi, most people would have no idea what it means. They would not know how to debate it, and they would not know if America was debasing itself or thumbing its nose at somebody, or whatever.
Targeting Canada and Mexico gets the cultural point across. Especially the Canadian tariffs, which thus might be harder to truly reverse. At least to many Americans, Canada comes across as exactly the kind of “wuss” country we need to distance ourselves from.
To be clear, this hypothesis does not require any kind of cohesive elite planning the whole strategy (though there are elites planning significant parts of what Trump is doing). It suffices to have conflicting interest groups, competition for Trump’s attention, and Trump believing cultural issues are super important, as he seems to. There then appears an impromptu order, which nonetheless looks just like someone always intended it as part of a concrete plan.
For more from Tyler Cowen, listen to him talk AI on the latest episode of Honestly: