Tony Blinken
Appearances
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And in this case now, you've got Russia and China that may have a sphere of influence. These are autocratic countries. We're a democracy. They also, in a world of instant communication, can't afford to let their people see a successful democracy. So they're going to meddle in ours to try to make sure that ours is not succeeding.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And they can say to their own people, see, they're no better than we are. All of these things lead to conflict. They lead to destruction. They lead to economic chaos. They lead to a bad place for America and for Americans.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
One thing is this, and maybe it's a little bit related. I think one of the things that President Trump understands, knows, and has a tremendous instinct for is the so-called attention economy and dominating it every single day. And in a sense, it doesn't matter what you do or what you say as long as you're dominating the attention economy. which he does.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I mean, if you look at a newspaper, these 10 people still look at that, whether it's online or a hard copy, and you see 10 headlines, probably seven of them are going to have his name in them. So if that's how you gauge your success, and you know, that's not totally crazy, then it almost doesn't matter what the substance is, as long as you're in the headline.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
This gets back to this basic predictability. When Biden left office, we had, and sorry again for the long speak, but it actually is meaningful to people. We had the highest level of foreign direct investment ever. That means that countries, companies were pouring money into the United States because they saw this as the best place to invest.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And part of the reason for that was predictability, whereas other countries might be chaotic and you pretty much knew what you were getting with the United States.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Things like the rule of law, things like no political retribution, things like transparency, all of these things were what attracted other countries to us and had them making massive investments here in ways that created growth, that produced more jobs, helped us produce better products to sell around the world.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
When you lose that, and that's what I'm afraid we're at risk of losing, then you're heading again to a bad place.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
So, Tim, I think there are a lot of things that are on the chopping block, and we'll, you know, we'll see how it 80 years, we've had allies and partners that could sort of count on us as necessary because of these alliances that we built to protect them if they got into hot water. And now they don't know.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And that means they're going to have to make their own bets for the future if they can't bet on us. So, for example... Countries like Japan, like Korea, like even Poland, we heard this the other day, that have forsworn nuclear weapons may decide that, you know what, we have to go down that road because we can't count on America. And once you go down that road, it's very hard to go in reverse.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
They will get together amongst themselves and away and around from us.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Now, maybe, for example, you'll have countries coming together to figure out different kinds of supply chains to make sure that they have access to the stuff that they need and can trade with each other without making themselves reliant on the United States because then, based on the whims of whoever's in office, something could go off, go bad, and that relationship, that dependency could be used as leverage against them.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
All of these kinds of things take a lot of time, a lot of investment. But once they're unleashed, they're really hard to pull back again. So, you know, now we see, look, we've seen just in the last 100 days, after Europeans and the Northeast Asians moved away from creating dependencies on China, de-risking as we urged them to do for the last four years.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Now, all of a sudden, the Europeans are talking again to China about a big free trade agreement. Japan and Korea come together and talk to their Chinese counterparts about the same thing. At the same time, the European Union and Latin America, they just finished a big free trade agreement. All of this around the United States, not with the United States.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Once you do that, hard to put back in the bottle.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I've had a number of conversations with Marco Rubio, Senator Rubio, who I've known for years, in part because of his service on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And at the risk of damning him with praise that he might not want, we've had really good conversations. And Tulsi Gabbard?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I don't know her, have not talked to her, but I do know Senator Rubio, and I think he's extremely well prepared for the job by his service on the Foreign Relations Committee, on the Intelligence Committee, and he's deeply thoughtful about most of the things we have to confront.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Well, look, Tim, I'll say two things. First, those words when spoken were accurate, and I wouldn't take them back. Second, I haven't spoken to Secretary Rubio at all since he's taken on the job. So I don't really benefit from hearing directly from him how he's seeing this, how he's thinking about it. Is that unusual?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Look, I think everyone does this differently. In my case, I benefited tremendously from talking to my predecessors, many, many conversations with Henry Kissinger before he passed away, very frequently with Condi Rice, Jim Baker, and obviously Madeleine Albright when she was alive, John Kerry. So in my case, I wanted... the benefit of their extraordinary wisdom.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But again, people do this differently. And actually, I talked to Mike Pompeo a couple of times back in the day, Rex Tillerson. The challenge that anyone in an administration has is they're following the guidance of the president. or what they believe to be the guidance of the president, because in this case, it seems to shift a bit on a daily basis.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And you're always trying to divine what that might be. I had a tremendous advantage on the job because I'd worked for Senator Biden when he was Senator, Vice President Biden, President Biden for 22 years. So I always pretty much knew in advance what he was thinking. And when people around the world heard me speak,
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
They knew that I was speaking with authority on behalf of the president because of that relationship. I think it's maybe more challenging now for the secretary to, again, make sure that he's seen as speaking clearly for the president. So he has to figure out what it is the president wants him to do and wants him to say. That's part of the challenge of the job.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You know, one of the things I've learned from doing this for 32 years and being in government for much of that time is, look, there are always going to be compromises you're asked to make, and everyone has to decide for themselves. And it's different for every individual. What is a compromise on my beliefs, my principles, my values that I can't make?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
What is something that tells me that the ends don't justify the means? That's a different decision for everyone. And look, what we don't know is it's possible that the secretary is managing to do and protect some things by being seen somewhat differently. Yeah.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Well, the big picture is this, Tim. I think what's really frustrating is we put the country in a position of strength. both at home and around the world. At home by investing in ourselves in really historic ways so that our competitiveness would be as strong as possible.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
There would seem to be something of a contradiction between some of the things that he did and stood for when he was in the United States Senate and what he seems to be doing and standing for for now. And that's obviously a good question to ask him.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Well, I seem to remember during the campaign that President Trump said he would end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. So now we're at 100 days. Hasn't happened. And I guess there's not much accountability for those kind of promises. But leaving that aside, look, when we were talking about tariffs, one of the effects of tariffs is all of these companies that are trying to plan for Christmas are
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
now can't do it. They can't make the contracts, buy the stuff they need because prices are going to be too high and they won't be able to make ends meet. So people are talking about Trump has really taken a real whack at Christmas. Here's someone who's getting Christmas early, Vladimir Putin. just go down the list of things that he's gotten, that he's wanted, and he's gotten for free.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And it's like the best Christmas ever. Somehow, the person and country that committed this horrific aggression against Ukraine, against its people, and against the entire international system, all the rules that we had put in place to try to prevent war, somehow absolved from that. Upfront, unilaterally, we're talking about basically giving him
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You know, everything from the Chips and Science Act to the Inflation Reduction Act to the Infrastructure Act, all of these investments but designed to make sure we could compete around the world and that our workers, our companies had what they needed to compete effectively.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
the territory that he seized by force, recognizing the seizure of Crimea back in 2014, lifting the sanctions, even lifting the sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that we managed to get the Germans to stop that sent Russian gas to Germany and to Europe. Now they're talking about
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
lifting that and recreating Europe's energy dependence on Russia, and so on down the list, blocking Ukraine from ever getting into NATO. Somehow, we're punishing the victim, we're rewarding the aggressor. So it really is an early Christmas for Vladimir Putin.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Look, first, Tim, you go back, and we tried to make sure that the Ukrainians had what they needed when they needed it to fend off the Russian aggression.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
If you look at it, well before the aggression, when we were trying to build this extraordinary coalition of countries to help defend Ukraine, to help strengthen NATO, to help punish the Russians if they went in, we were sending weapons to the Ukrainians September before the aggression, Christmas before the aggression. So when it actually happened,
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
They had a lot of javelins and a lot of stingers in their hands, and they were able to repel the aggression. People thought that Russia was going to roll over the country in a matter of a few days. They pushed them back, and they pushed them back. 50% of the territory that Russia originally grabbed, they're pushed back from. Then at every step along the way,
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
We tried to make sure that they had what they needed. And the nature of the war changed, where it was being fought, how it was being fought, what was needed. And each and every time, you know, there'd be some kind of public dispute about, oh, did we give them a certain weapon system fast enough? A lot goes into those decisions. It's not just the weapon system.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But what I was working on around the world with others in the administration led by the president was to make sure that our alliances and partnerships were as strong as possible.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
It's do they know how to use it, which means you've got to train them on it. Can they maintain it, which means you've got to put that in place. Is it part of a coherent battle plan? All of those things, you know, the Pentagon was looking at, we were looking at, try to make sure that when we were doing something, it would actually work and make sense.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Are there things that, you know, I would have liked to have seen done sooner or faster? Sure, there's always something. But by and large, this was done in a very deliberate, very systematic way. And the result is a country that shouldn't be around given the totally disproportionate force that Russia could bring to bear versus Ukraine is still standing.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You know, on one level, you say to yourself, there's pretty much everything you'd wanted. There's something about everything you've done. Oh, we could have done something a little bit different here, a little bit better there. There's no question about that.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And I think the thing that will eat at me for a long time is obviously the Middle East and Gaza and the horrific human suffering that we saw on all sides. And we've gotten to a better place faster than we did, which ultimately we did when we left office. But unfortunately, that's also something. that seems to have been dropped. But as I'm looking at the really big picture, what I'm seeing is this.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Because when we're dealing with all of the problems that we're likely to talk about around the world, whether it's Russia and Ukraine, whether it's China, whether it's Iran, whether it's anything else, we're so much better off when we're doing it with allies and partners than when we're doing it alone.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
President Biden came to office with probably the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the worst global health crisis in at least 100 years, relationships with our allies and partners that had been badly frayed, if not torn apart, and of course, profound divisions at home. And what he handed off
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
at least, when he left office, was an economy that the economists called the envy of the world, even if people were not feeling some of the benefits as much as they needed to be. Obviously, gotten through COVID in ways that everyone's now forgotten. And we had the strongest relationships and partnerships with allies in Europe and Asia and well beyond than we've had in as long as I can remember.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And that put us in a position of extraordinary strength to deal with all of these challenges that we see around the world. Unfortunately, that's all been torn up in the space of 100 days.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
That's exactly what... I worked for President Obama for eight years. He called that the sweet spot. The sweet spot?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And where we're headed now is a world not where it's America first, but where it's America alone. And that's not good for us. It's not good for getting stuff done that matters to the American people.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
For which I thank you. Tim, there's so much that goes into this, even into the domestic side, that we could probably talk about for a long time. But I think it comes down to something very fundamental that we see both at home and we see around the world. And that is this notion of dehumanization.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
this notion that someone you disagree with or have a profound difference with is somehow not only your enemy, but basically isn't human. And we saw that in the dehumanization in the Middle East in all directions. We see that in our own country in terms of dehumanization of one's political adversaries.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And for me, that is the most potent poison in our commonwealth because once dehumanization sets in, Everything bad becomes so much easier and everything good becomes so much harder. And I think we saw that in the debates are the wrong word. You know, the horrific things that people were hurling at each other in the context of this tragedy in the Middle East.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But we also see it poisoning our politics in profound ways. If we can't find a way to pull back from that. We have a massive, massive problem that I think will be maybe the biggest challenge we face. Never mind China, never mind Russia, never mind Iran. That really is at the heart of what ails us. And that's what we've got to figure out.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Tim, I think you put your finger on something that's very important and probably right. There's a big difference between the ability to do the job effectively and the ability to sell the job you're doing. I think he might be one of the first to acknowledge that
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
We were not as effective, and he was not as effective, arguably, as he should have been, could have been, in actually conveying to the American people everything that we were doing for them, and very, very successfully. And it was a big, big frustration.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
So much so that I think, to some extent, people couldn't somehow connect all of the good things that were happening with what the administration was doing. And if you don't have that connection... It's obviously not going to redound to you in a positive way politically. And yeah, it is part of the job. And I think it's also the reason why, ultimately, he decided not to run again.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
It wasn't about doing the job in the moment. It was the ability or foreseeing the ability to be able to do the job for another four years, including this notion of communicating effectively with people.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
As you say, you go back in the DeLorean machine, hindsight's always 20-20. And on just about anything or everything you do, you always think there's something I could have done a little bit differently or maybe more than a little bit differently. But here's the thing. First, every decision that we made, every judgment that we made, every policy we pursued, that was him. That wasn't someone else.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
That wasn't me. That wasn't any of the other advisors. Everything that we did was the product of a decision that he made and an informed decision through discussion, debate. argument that he was more than fully engaged in. So you can say, I don't like the results of those policies. That's fine.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But you can't say that he was not the person responsible for them, who decided them, who made those decisions, made those judgments and got those results. And that's fundamentally the bottom line. I think that's the bottom line that he saw. Now, again, coming back to your point about, well, did we communicate that effectively? I think the answer is no.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Does that mean he could be confident about being able to do that same job, making those decisions, making those judgments? for another four years with advanced age, that's something different. But these decisions about what he should have done, when he should have done it, what difference might that have made in political outcomes? Yeah, it's easy to prognosticate about that, but no one knows.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
One of the things that I've learned too over working for three presidents over the course of the Clinton, Obama, and Biden administrations is, you know, keep whatever counsel you gave to the president to yourself.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Trandaragua, yes. I haven't seen the evidence. It sure would be good to see it. And again, I know this is rapid fire, but this is not about immigration. It's about the Constitution, and it's about due process, and it's about the rights that everyone needs to be afforded. Because when you short-circuit those rights for one person,
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
you're going to wind up short circuiting for lots of other people, including people who may be listening to this podcast.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Well, that and all of my Chicago Bulls memorabilia and, you know, shirts. I'm obviously giving those to Goodwill.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I have to say I'm originally from New York, so I'm really a Knicks fan.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Yeah, tough. I know. I know. But keep the faith.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I mean, look, I'm stuck in the 70s and a lot of classic rock. There are a lot of people that I love today. Let's see. Maggie Rogers. Love Maggie Rogers.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Look, I think we've got to start with this. Back in his first term, I think President Trump was right to put more focus on China and to put more focus on some of the egregious practices they were engaged in that were doing real damage to American workers, to American companies, to American communities, including, for example...
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Tim, I'm going to get together with John Huntsman and try to figure out how to resist that and make sure we uphold the dignity of the offices that we once held.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You know, this notion of overcapacity where they flood the market with certain products that have been subsidized and otherwise given an unfair advantage, pushing American companies, American products, American workers out of that sector. And it was important to focus on that. But the way you do it really matters. And here's the thing.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
If we're dealing with something that China is doing that we don't like and we're doing it alone, we're what, about 20, 25 percent of world GDP. when we're doing it with our European allies, our Asian allies, suddenly we're 50 or 60% of world GDP. That's something that China can't ignore.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But instead of focusing intensely on those areas and on those products where China was trying to get an unfair advantage and lining up allies and partners, to join with us. We've gone at this with a machine gun spraying everything in China, but also our allies and partners, the very people that we need with us to deal effectively with what China's doing. So I think there's clearly a role
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
for focused, targeted tariffs, for example, on certain Chinese products, especially in areas where they're trying to dominate the sectors of the future in ways that are unfair. Solar panels, electric vehicles, batteries for those vehicles. That's where you want to put the focus. That's what Biden was doing.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
But now in broadening this out and basically having what amounts almost to a trade embargo with China and doing it in a way that's alienating our allies and partners who are not with us, We're pushing them toward each other, away from the United States, and maybe even toward China.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And that's simply going to undermine everything that we're trying to do to protect our workers, to protect our companies, to protect our people.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I think they have the ability in many ways to wait us out. They can take more pain by the nature of their system than we can take. And partly that's what they're counting on. So they match the tariffs in a dramatic way. And it's now a little bit of a game of chicken to see who's going to pull their punch first. I hope we can find a way to navigate this in a smart way. Look, Tim, here's the thing.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
We spent a lot of time talking about de-risking, not decoupling from China. Now that sounds like Diplo speak, but basically it means let's focus on the specific areas where either China is taking unfair advantage of us economically, or where we've got a national security issue or question.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Like for example, we don't want to be selling them the highest end microchips because that's going to go into their military and pose a threat to us or throw a threat to our allies and partners. But it doesn't mean cutting off trade. It doesn't mean cutting off investment. That's beneficial to both of our countries. We both need it.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Now what we're seeing is instead of de-risking from China, we have the rest of the world that's looking at de-risking from us because we've lost the most important thing that undergirds any trade relationship, political relationship, military relationship, and that's trust. People don't know that they can trust the United States. They don't know what we're doing. They don't know where we're going.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
They don't know if what we say today is going to be reversed tomorrow and then reversed again the day after. So I think China's looking at this too and thinking on the one hand, look, this isn't great. It does hurt us, but we have some ability to to endure and to take more pain by the nature of our system than the United States does. So I'm afraid they're going to try to outweigh this.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Look, I get that people are not, you know, necessarily enthusiastic about foreign aid or diplomatic programs.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
One penny on every dollar covers basically everything the State Department and USAID do, or in the case of USAID, were doing in the past. And the bang for the buck is incredible. Because not only are we helping countries solve problems that, if not solved, are going to come back to bite us because in the absence of solving them, people are going to go to war. You're going to have mass migrations.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You're going to have disease that spreads across the planet and hits us. You're also building incredible goodwill through what we've often called soft power. If we're in retreat.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
If we're pulling out of that, if we're ending this very, in the context of our own budget, modest support to helping to feed people, to helping provide basic health security, to making sure that they can deal with some of the challenges posed by climate change, you name it, go down the list. We're going to see problems get a lot bigger and come and bite us, and we're going to lose that goodwill.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And who fills in? Who takes advantage of the vacuum? China. We see it now with China getting into the position we were in with so many of these programs. And that means that China will get the benefit of whatever successes they have and their influence is going to go up, not down. That's an America that's in retreat. Look.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
We were working hard to get ambassadors to all of our embassies around the world. We had confirmation problem after confirmation problem because people would hold up our ambassadors for one unrelated reason or another. Meanwhile, China was putting in place more embassies than the United States has around the world. What does that mean?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
That means that when an American company is trying to win a contract in a given country, we can't send our ambassador in to see the president, to see the prime minister, to see the finance minister, the Chinese can. And guess who wins the contract? It plays out in so many different ways to the detriment of our own people and our own interests.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
I've got a lot of friends around the world that I've made over the years. Most of them now are no longer in positions of responsibility. Those are the folks I talk to. I tend not to talk to people who are in government now. The last thing I would do is to give them advice about what they should do, but I'm hearing from a lot of people I know. And again, it comes back to this question of trust.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You spend 80 years building up this trust by building strong economic partnerships, by building up military alliances, by building up political alliances. If that is then taken down in a matter of 100 days, the trust is gone. And that makes it incredibly hard to rebuild. If you look at the idea of, can we put this genie back in the bottle? Not so easy. So what does that mean?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
What does that mean in terms of what they're doing? It means that countries are now looking for ways to work around us, to work more closely together, but without the United States. And that I think is the trend that we're seeing because the unpredictability, the possibility that what's said today will be reversed tomorrow and then reversed again means that they simply can't count on us.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
You know, um, President Biden used to like to say it's never a good bet to bet against America. The problem we now have is that people will not be betting on America. And that will play itself out for many, many months and many, many years. All right.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Well, I think the sort of diplomatic language that I typically hear is, Tony, what the F is going on? That tends to be how the question is posed. Look, there really is confusion. Here's the thing. We were talking to him about tariffs a little while ago. But we don't even know what the administration is trying to accomplish because we keep hearing different things. Is this about raising revenues?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Maybe, except at some point that doesn't work because the tariffs go so high that trade stops and you don't get the revenues. Is this somehow about bringing manufacturing back to the United States? Maybe, except that that takes years and it takes massive investment and people are loath to make those investments in an environment of unpredictability.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Is it about dealing with the trade deficits that we have with some countries? And it seems that this is something that has motivated President Trump for a long time. Maybe that's what's going on. Except that the link between tariffs and trade deficits is not so obvious. We have 27 countries in the European Union, right? They all basically have the same tariffs.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
They basically have the same trade policies. We've got surpluses with some, deficits with others. So that whole link is not clear. And by the way, trade deficits are not necessarily a bad thing. It basically means we import a lot of stuff. So people have cheaper prices. They've got greater choice.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And then our manufacturers can take the inputs for their products that they bought more cheaply and produce a product that they can sell at a better price. So there's just general confusion about what is the president trying to accomplish. And I'd say really quickly two things.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
As I'm trying to decipher this myself and trying to have these conversations and at least try to explain what I see going on. One is this notion of what the economists call autarky or economic self-sufficiency. Basically, let's make everything and build everything and do everything in the United States. Sounds good, right?
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Except that many, many years ago, we figured out that this thing called comparative advantage was actually a pretty good thing for us, where some countries would make some stuff, we'd make other things, and everyone would be better off. Because again, Lower prices, more variety, an ability to make our own products less expensively.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And then the countries that have tried over the years to do self-sufficiency did not work out so well. The Soviet Union tried that. It went off the cliff. North Korea's tried that. It's gone off the cliff. But that seems to be one thing. The other thing is this.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
My sense is, as the president's looked at history, he's attracted, and we've heard him talk about it, so it's not a surprise, to something that was characteristic of the 19th century. And that was this notion of having a sphere of influence. And it basically means this. The big countries, the big guys, the strong guys get to carve up the world. And we get our part.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
And the other big guys, and in this case, it would be Russia and China, get theirs. We get to do what we want in our sphere. They get to do what they want in theirs. The Chinese get to do what they want in theirs. And that's kind of the way the world looked in Europe in much of the 19th century, except it didn't work out so well.
The Bulwark Podcast
S2 Ep1032: Tony Blinken: America Alone
Because inevitably what happens is one country that has one sphere decides it wants to get bigger. It wants more. So it tries to take some more territory. And then these circles rub against each other and you get conflict. Or within one area, one country tries to keep its people down and then the people rebel and they get pushed down again and then it eventually blows up.