Trump’s Disastrous Assault on U.S Soft Power

Talking Feds

Harry Litman

Election, Government, January 6, Politics, Merrick Garland, Law, Harry Litman, Trump, News, Legal

4.8 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 6 March 2025

⏱️ 25 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Harry talks with Max Boot about his latest article, “US soft power took decades to build. Trump is dismantling it in weeks.” Boot explains the critical source of U.S. influence in the world, more than military might, is “soft power,” foreign aid and other far-seeing acts of altruism for people around the world. Soft power is the key to the country’s diplomatic, commercial, and cultural success. It was built up painstakingly over decades with programs like the Marshall Plan and in 3 short weeks Trump has taken a battering ram to it, acutely harming our international standing. Allies such as Canada are perplexed at the U.S.’s bullying tactics, and people around the world dependent on U.S. aid have been gravely harmed. The chief beneficiary of this short-sighted abandonment of longstanding U.S. policy is China, which will aim to fill the void left by the end of U.S. aid programs. Boot concludes, “[i]t is staggering to see how much damage Trump has done to U.S. soft power in just two weeks and painful to imagine how much ore he could do in the next 206 weeks.”

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Transcript

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0:59.0	Thank you. at audible.com.com.uk. Welcome to Talking Fed's one-on-one, deep-dive discussions with national figures
1:05.0	about the most fascinating and consequential issues defining our culture and shaping our lives. I'm your host, Harry Littman.
1:15.1	Welcome to another talking feds one-on-one. We are only three weeks into the new administration,
1:21.9	and Trump is wreaking havoc, not just domestically, but internationally. Foreign policy scholars all understand that the
1:31.1	United States' preeminent position and influence in the world depends on far more than its raw might.
1:37.9	But that lesson seems entirely lost on Trump and his bull in a China shop approach to international relations already has
1:47.1	gravely undermined our ability to influence world affairs. Or so is the position of our guest today.
1:55.6	To consider the grave impact of just three weeks of Trump rule on the international scene,
2:00.4	we're really fortunate to welcome.
2:02.4	Max Boot, a Washington Post columnist, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
2:08.7	He is a Pulitzer Prize finalist in biography and the author most recently of the New York Times
2:14.6	bestseller Reagan, his life and legend. But his latest article,
	...

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