The Coup, the Broligarchy and the New World Order

We're going to have a hard time getting the attention, sympathy and collaboration of our American friends for a while. They're very busy trying to undo a coup.

 

Protesting the coup

To understand the radical changes in the US foreign policy one must first understand the radical changes that have and are taking place in America domestically. There’s been a coup. It is, as yet, incomplete. Trump and a very small cohort of technocrat centi-billionaires (referred to hereafter as the broligarchy) are taking control of the country. The rule-based approach to both domestic and foreign policy has been replaced with a transactional approach.

Internationally relations with other countries will be negotiated solely basis of their power relative to the US. The disparity in power between weaker and dependent nations will be monetized, irrespective of what those relations were historically. For instance, nations that are heavily dependent on access to US markets will have to pay for that access, either with tariffs, or other concessions. Wealthier trading partners will be able to negotiate better terms. Canada and Mexico will initially have to pay 25% tariffs for access, while relatively powerful China will only have to pay 10% tariffs. Historical enemies like Russia won’t be treated any differently than historical allies. There are no moral or ideological underpinnings or restrictions here. If a deal with Russia is lucrative, while financing Ukraine’s war on Russia is not, Ukraine will be thrown under the bus, irrespective of how NATO partners feel about it. The spoils will be divided. Trump et al have proposed that Ukraine repay the US for previously supplied weapons with 50% or more of their critical minerals. Russia benefits from the crippling of NATO and the normalizing of relations. NATO and other European countries will not be able to defend themselves from further Russian aggression without US support. Nato members will either have to dramatically increase their defence spending in support of NATO to appease the US, or come up with an alternative defence force of their own. Both options would put billions into the coffers of US arms manufacturers because at present European arms manufacturers don’t have the capacity to replace US arms. Additionally, they would have to replace thousands of US troops and military bases in Europe, who, in any case, are unlikely to be deployed against the new trading partner –Russia. Thus the imbalance of military might between the US and its former allies will also be monetized.

Domestically entities and agencies that cost money rather than make money are being dismantled at an alarming rate. So are the checks and balances intended to prevent the abuse of authority. It’s all part of Musk’s and his bros' –the broligarchy– plans to reduce government spending by at least one trillion dollars. Despite never having been elected or vetted Musk was placed in charge of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), accountable to no one, but nonetheless with an office in the White House. Already many government agencies that provided essential services have been dismantled, or soon will be, as alarmed opponents desperately scramble to get temporary judicial restraining orders. Additionally, tens of thousands of experienced public servants are being fired, including judges from the Department of Justice. (Some of these dismissals may be more about punishing those who ruled against Trump or Musk rather than about saving money.) Congress seems to be completely subordinated to the Executive Branch, as demonstrated by two occasions in which Trump and Musk blocked government spending bills despite the bills having had bilateral support. The daily protests by thousands of government employees and other concerned citizens seem to be ineffectual. –Should the need arise, Trump has contingency plans in placeto mobilize the National Guard and other state security forces to squelch dissent–the enemy within. Meanwhile, the resulting domestic crisis is diverting attention away from the massive changes in foreign relations.

The threat of tariffs and annexation of Canada is real, although the latter may be unlikely, (More on that later) But appeals based on the previous rule-based world order, or to sympathetic American consumers and businesses who would also be adversely affected by tariffs, are futile. In the case of the former, simply because the rules of the previous rule-based world order are no longer in place. The premise of the second is that Trump might be dissuaded by the pain his actions will cause fellow Americans. The history of his previous term in office, and all of his actions to date in this term, indicate that he doesn’t care one iota about the pain caused to his compatriots. As long as the pain is somebody else’s, he can live with it, Maybe he even get some perverse sadistic pleasure out of watching people plead, grovel and whimper. As long as it doesn’t interrupt the accumulation and consolidation of the wealth and power of the Broligarchy it is okay. Under this rubric, there is no appeasing Trump et al. More wealth results in additional power. Additional power provides the means to exact even more concessions and raise tariffs even higher, in an endless positive feedback loop. Giving the bully your lunch money won’t stop him from coming back for more, again and again. This applies as much to external affairs as it does to domestic ones.

The whole scheme is analogous to another such scheme most of us are less cognizant of: the relations between wealthy countries and less-developed countries (LDCs) in the global rule-based economy. Contrary to the popular belief that wealthy nations are wealthy because of merit –our superior technology, our work ethic, our ingenuity, etc.– we are also monetizing and exploiting an imbalance of power. The rules that benefit us are not some natural phenomenon predetermined by natural laws of nature or an invisible hand; they are rules created and enforced by global institutions. Institutions that wealthy countries and corporations have created to maintain and exploit their power over LDCs. These institutions include the World Trade Organization (WTO), International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, NATO, and the G7, USAID, to name but a few. The difference between this and Trump’s transactional bilateral approach is that the rule-based world order befitted wealthy nations collectively at the expense of LDCs, while Trump’s transactional might-makes-right approach deals with countries individually. This transactional approach eliminates the need for all these aforementioned institutions needed in the rules-based economy to create, maintain and enforce a favourable rule-based world order. For the broligarchy’s purposes, such rules are superfluous –unnecessary and unjustifiable expenses.

In some ways, Trump’s approach is more akin to the rule of the imperial colonial global powers of old. In that epoch, other countries were subjugated and colonized through the use of military might, in the name of God and King. However, post WWII, most of these colonies were granted “independence”--pseudo independence because they remained economically dependent on their former colonial overlords, but the expense and hassle of administration was transferred to locals –right-wing dictators, elected officials, kings, etc. These were propped up by the now-neocolonial powers, or, if they were uncooperative, replaced or killed. Under the new neocolonialism control over the resources –both human and material– continued unabated. (Under such an arrangement Canada may also avoid annexation if the Broligarchy doesn’t want to take on the expense and hassle of administration.) There was rivalry between superpowers --the West and the USSR for instance-- that affected access to satellite countries' resources, but dynamic may be attenuated under the US's new transactional modus operandi, because of Trump’s apparent readiness to negotiate with former adversaries. He and his broligarchy are narrowly focused on the accumulation and consolidation of wealth and power. They don’t aspire to achieve global hegemony or spreading an ideology, and therefore don’t have to compete with rivals on that score.

Things are undoubtedly more nuanced than what I have described them here, but I hope this will help people get past the incredulousness everyone seems to be feeling. I think once you see and recognize the nature of the paradigm shift we are experiencing things will make more sense. Trump is not the blundering idiot others and he himself makes him out to be. Consider this is a warning. He and his broligarchy cartel are far more treacherous than they appear. Most of what Trump has said and done, what he’s saying and doing, will start to make sense if viewed through the lens of this transactional approach. Horrifying sense.  (Continues below)

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I really encourage readers to follow the link above. It will assure you that my claims are well researched and well-founded. It consists of a series of questions posed to Perplexity AI, and its responses. Perplexity generally has to be brow-beaten if you want it to provide more than the main-stream, generic, usually false narrative, I'm getting pretty good at brow-beating. It helps if you already know a fair bit about the issues you are researching and can point it toward the right sources. You'll probably want to skip over the fluff at the beginning and scroll down to where the questions and responses start to become informative. There are links to Perplexity-provided sources embedded throughout. You'll probably recognize a lot of them. Here's that link again: There’s been a coup. Tell me what you think. 

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Meet the all-male Broligarchy: 

 

 

1. Elon Musk - Co-leader of DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency)

2. Mark Zuckerberg - CEO of Meta (formerly Facebook)

3. Jeff Bezos - Founder of Amazon

4. Peter Thiel - Venture capitalist

5. Marc Andreessen - Venture capitalist

6. Vivek Ramaswamy - Co-leader of DOGE

7. David Sacks - AI and Crypto Czar

8. Jared Isaacman - NASA Administrator

9. Charles Kushner - Ambassador to France

10. Stephen Feinberg - Deputy Secretary of Defense

11. Howard Lutnick - Secretary of Commerce

12. Scott Bessent - Secretary of Treasury

These individuals are characterized by their immense wealth, their connections to the tech industry, and their apparent influence in the Trump administration. It's worth noting that this group represents an unprecedented concentration of wealth and power in the U.S. government, with many of these individuals belonging to the top 0.0001% of wealth in the country