USA -Trump's Foreign Policy: It is all about RealPolitiek and the EU better get their act togetherUSA -Trump's Foreign Policy: It is all about RealPolitiek and the EU better get their act together

Otto Eduard
 Leopold von Bismarck

While the US and most of the foreign Press is focused on Trumps twitters and the Mueller report, there has been a major shift in US foreign policy. 

Trump has embraced the law of the jungle, which political scientists and historians define as RealPolitik.

The term “RealPolitik” is widely used today as a synonym for “power politics” and understood as the realist approach to foreign policy, a venerable tradition that stretches from Machiavelli and Bismarck to scholar-diplomats of the postwar era such as George Kennan and Henry Kissinger.

RealPolitik can also be seen as the political approach of self-sufficiency. Decisions on public policy, when approached from a position of RealPolitik, are not afforded time for sympathy or compassion. Rather, RealPolitik is an approach of shrewd pragmatism solely on the basis of political expedience. 

Case in Point: In the Middle East the US Trump Administration has chosen three principal partners: Israel - the only nation in the Middle East with a nuclear arsenal - Saudi-Arabia, the number one oil producer in the world and Egypt , the country with the largest army in the Middle East.These countries have developed a very close relation with the US over the years and importantly to the US, do what they are told to do by the US. 

Realpolitik has played a huge role in this case, as it allowed Israel’s Prime Minister, Netanyahu, to successfully outplay the Iranians in most encounters, as proven by the recent Israeli attacks on Iranian military bases in Syria. Moreover, it allowed Israel to develop close relationships with Arab states that were previously aggressive towards the Israeli cause, a thing that was deemed close to impossible a couple of decades ago.

In Europe, the US Trump Administration considers Russia, not the EU, as the most important power, and developed a "cloaked", but nevertheless close relationship with them.It is no secret, except it seems to the EU Commission, that the US Trump Administration would like nothing better than seeing the EU break apart.

The EU has been engulfed in a state of political instability that seems to have no end in sight. Cohesion between member states is at a historical low, populists are gaining traction at a pace never seen before and a constant state of fear and paranoia has characterized the European population ever since the migration wave has hit the continent four years ago.

At present it seems that pragmatism and self-interest is what characterizes Western Europe the most and a fracture has appeared between the underprivileged East and the heavily industrialized West.

The recent emergence of the populist parties have made this very clear and now the European continent finds itself for the very first time with countries that have elected far-right or Eurosceptic political parties, as seen in the cases of Italy, Austria, Hungary, Italy, Romania and the Czech Republic. Realpolitik dictates that the ideology doesn’t matter anymore, but what happens when the two ideas are applied at the same time?

If Britain does not come to its senses about Brexit and holds a second referendum to stay in the EU,  it is very well possible Britain could become one of the poorest nations in Europe within a period of ten years, specially if Scotland votes to become an independent nation and joins the EU.

In the Far East it is quite obvious that the US Trump Administration considers China not only as the major power in the Region, but certainly a long term dangerous rival.

Both sides have fought a trade war over the past year with damaging consequences for the global economy.

Issues around technology transfer have been key during trade talks between the world's two largest economies in recent months.

"Every country now correctly recognizes that their prosperity, their wealth, their economic security, their military security is going to be linked to keeping a technological edge," says Stephen Olson, research fellow at global trade advisory body Hinrich Foundation.

But many also say their dispute goes well beyond trade - it represents a power-struggle between two very different world views.

Unfortunately, deal or no trade deal, that rivalry is only expected to broaden and become more difficult to resolve.

"We have entered into a new normal in which US-China geopolitical competition has intensified and become more explicit," says Michael Hirson, Asia director at consultancy firm Eurasia Group.

Realpolitik is now at play also between China and the US, at the highest level possible/

The upcoming years are not only going to be very interesting in the eyes of the people that pay close attention to what is happening in the world, but also quite dangerous as the status quo that has kept the world in a state of peace is slowly disintegrating, leaving place to a wasteland of ideologies, interests and individuals at play that will do everything to get into power. 2019 is the year that marks the real return of ReaPpolitik, on a state never seen before.

This isn’t the Cold War whatsoever, this is a completely different world. One based on economic factors, international political bullying and a shock factor never seen before.

Welcome to Earth, which side are you on?

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USA: Politics in America are Corporate, not Citizen focused - Why are guns a right in the US, meanwhile education and healthcare are not?

USA: Corporate controlled Insurance sucks

The fact that the US isn’t among the countries with universal healthcare and free college has been a topic of many heated political debates and complaints, especially among the Millennials faced with the prospect of repaying their student loans well into their adulthood. If they have a misfortune of getting hit with a major hospital bill as well, declaring a bankruptcy is often the only solution.

Universal healthcare is something that is available in a vast number of countries across the globe. While the programs offered by each government varies from nation to nation, they’re all based on the same concept – offering access to free healthcare to everyone, old or young. Most often than not, insurance is offered freely for the underaged and the elderly, while those in the working force have a small portion of their paycheck directed to the national fund sustaining this system.

Free education is something that is widely encountered across the globe, although college isn’t always included on the list. Many countries offer a number of free university seats while others subsidize them.

Many argue that this type of education, just like universal healthcare, isn’t actually free since it is funded by the government, who in turn gathers the cash by taxing people’s paychecks and businesses. 

Basically that is an argument used in the US which in reality does not fly, because the end result in countries which do provide this service  is offering everyone access to what they need, be it education that will provide them with a better future without having to spend half of their lives paying back the student loans or getting the healthcare they need.

Across the globe, there are quite a lot of countries that offer free healthcare, from the Americas, Asia, although the most are from Europe where this seems to be the way to go when it comes to this important issue.

Many European (EU)  countries regard free education also as an investment to the economy. There is skilled workforce available on the free labor market. The opposite solution could be for example that every industry would educate their own work force starting from day one.

Capitalism or socialism doesn’t define who must pay the education: the society, the industry or the individual.

It’s the same with the healthcare: there isn’t any rule that tells that either the society, the employer or the individual should be the one who pays for the health care. It could be also so that every industry should build their own hospitals and educate their own doctors - or so that the people, the work force, do it together. But it can also be regarded as a state’s investment in the economy so that the free work force remains available and capable on the market.

These investments by the state are comparable with other investments in the infrastructure and the functionality of the society. The state offers some base for the free economy to thrive, like roads, security and so on.

Socialism is so abused and so polymorphic concept that it’s hard to define simply. But in the basic concept of socialism is about how the economic power is divided between the capital and the labor.

It certainly has nothing to do with communism, which unfortunately many right-wing conservatives like to call socialism.

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The ultimate goal is a society that has stopped the domination of capital over the labor and where the labor has taken the domination on the production. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the state should own everything.

Both of these functions can also be shared in different ways as long as it benefits the citizens and the country as a whole.

In America the concept has become totally lopsided over the years. Today about 3 % of the US population controls all the wealth in the country, with corporations basically influencing all the decision making processes of the political establishment.

If not corrected soon, it will have disastrous consequences for America.

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