OPINION:
Transformative presidents are never appreciated in their own times. They are often mocked and vilified for daring to shake up the status quo. It was that way with Presidents Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, and it’s that way with President Trump.
A quarter of the way into the 21st century, America now has a president with the vision and determination to change the course of a nation that has lost its way by confronting the long-ignored challenges in a world very different from the one we left behind 25 years ago.
In the second half of the 20th century, the world benefited from an international order built and maintained by American power. This Pax Americana produced the longest period of peace between great powers in modern history. With Europe on its knees, Soviet Russia and its Warsaw Pact allies crumbling behind an Iron Curtain and China bogged down in its ruinous Cultural Revolution, America thrived and helped pull these countries out of deep ditches. We rescued and modernized Europe, collapsed the Soviet Union and muscled up China with our manufacturing and trade.
But that’s the world no longer.
Since the turn of the century, we have been moving toward a world of big-power competition in which, ironically, we have made ourselves weaker by strengthening some of our adversaries. We offshored manufacturing to China, ceded financial industry dominance to Britain and sent increasing sections of our service economy to India.
Despite receiving our help, China and Russia have become dangerous adversaries. Each seeks to set its own world order that undermines our interests and security. We can neither ignore nor give in to it.
Previous American administrations missed this shift, clinging foolishly to the mirage of the outdated, rules-based order. Mr. Trump saw it, and his presidency offers a clear, transformative answer: “America First.” It’s his strategy to counter our adversaries’ efforts while bringing America back to its ascendancy.
“America First” prioritizes U.S. national interests, economic strength and citizen well-being over international obligations. It emphasizes renegotiating trade deals, securing borders and reducing foreign interventions such as nation-building while demanding that allies pay more for our mutual defense.
Mr. Trump’s economic nationalism is the perfect antidote to a rising, Democratic-advocated socialism, which seeks equality by pulling people down, not lifting them up.
“America First” is committed to bringing back well-paying manufacturing jobs to rebuild our middle class, unleash American innovation and preserve the American dream.
It’s about the right policy to build a new economy through technology. The future is artificial intelligence and quantum computing, which thrive on innovation. Innovation thrives on free market capitalism. Mr. Trump wants to lift the heavy hand of government from the private sector and allow innovators the freedom they need to flourish.
He also recognizes that, since the country’s birth, innovation has been our “gold.” The telephone, automobile, nuclear power, internet and iPhone have led to America’s economic preeminence, but innovation has been choked by too much red tape and overzealous, mistrustful regulators. Mr. Trump understands that the future depends more than ever on our innovative spirit and the technological advances it delivers, backed by expanding our access to rare earth elements and supporting strategic industries such as computer chips, metals and energy.
While other presidents, such as Barack Obama, have invited “minor incursions” or sent pallets of cash to bribe terrorist states, Mr. Trump has redesigned the way we project power. Previous administrations have used military might in the wrong places, without clear goals or not at all. American military prowess has the capacity to improve the world: remove threats (as in the strikes on Iran), deter aggression (as in the case of U.S. support for Ukraine) and generate conditions for peace (as in the Middle East).
America isn’t safe from its adversaries, who have ever more destructive means of undermining our security. Nor are we safe on our streets. “America First” seeks to reduce the crippling scourge of the past 50 years: drugs. They have created much of the violence in our cities, robbed Americans of their ability to care for themselves and their children and, in too many cases, taken lives.
The dismantling of cartels with law enforcement and the military is the best way to win the war on drugs. We now have a president with the will to deploy federal resources to help local communities fight crime and support the police in their efforts to keep us safe.
Transformational presidents aren’t afraid to meet the challenges of their times. Lincoln saved the Union and freed the slaves. Roosevelt led the nation out of the Depression. And Mr. Trump is bringing real hope and change by having the courage to do what’s needed to put us on the right path for the 21st century.
• Rod Blagojevich served as governor of Illinois from 2003 to 2009. In February, he was pardoned by President Trump for his conviction on corruption charges.
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