Don't Bite the Hand That Feeds You" is very interesting, as it's in a very real sense an economic history. Its three main protagonists are not the usual suspects — bankers, economists and industrialists, but three quite unfamiliar faces: the "poor man" James Fisk, the British merchant-adventurer George Peabody, and the radical firebrand Stephen Pearl Andrews. Each of them seems to see America's economy from a point of view that runs counter to the orthodox American understanding of free-market capitalism. Fisk comes off as an almost perfect embodiment of mercantilist thinking, while Peabody can seem closer to socialism. And Andrews is a radical social reformer who advocates "free land" for all, and the abolition of monopolies as well as wage labor. All three of them saw a need for the state to intervene, through subsidies and special privileges, to protect the poor and middle classes from the predatory and exploitative nature of the emerging capitalist economy. For Fisk, what America needed was a national bank, funded by the federal government, to lend money to farmers at low interest rates, and set up land banks to purchase submarginal land for resale at low rates to farmers. Peabody was more ambitious: he dreamed of investing the federal government's massive wartime budget surplus in building a continent-wide railroad system (the first such infrastructure ever conceived), bringing the nation together and creating American industries. And Andrews came the closest to the anarchism of the nineteenth century. It's ironic that Andrews, Fisk, Peabody, and most American progressives were all on the far right of the political spectrum of their day. But their social agenda was in the progressive tradition of American politics — the tradition that gave us a large and expanding public sector, a progressive income tax, and the New Deal. Though as progressive a program as Roosevelt could devise had far fewer social resources than the programs in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, but it made a real difference in American lives. Roosevelt's American version of the welfare state is a far better description of America's progressivism than liberalism. It was an expression of "the common good" — in this case, the good of the poor and the middle class. All this, of course, is very far removed from what became known as "the Reagan Revolution" — that right-wing project which led to the largest income transfers from the poor and middle classes to the rich in American history. All of this seems utterly forgotten now, as we watch once again the emergence of a new economic elite — a new gilded age — with all the familiar symptoms: declining public investment, decreasing minimum wages, the evisceration of the social safety net, etc. If Trump wins, it will be largely because of these issues. If he fails, as I think is likely, it will be despite them. The election of Donald Trump has created an entirely new problem for people like myself who see him as so manifestly unfit to serve as President of the United States. No candidate can be removed from the ballot on these grounds, unless he or she commits outright fraud. Hence, all means short of fraud are justified in preventing his election. The question, though, is what should we do in the meantime? What is Trump really like? How should we judge him? The best answer, it seems to me, is to draw upon a variety of sources, including his own videotaped statements. In the video clip of him that I reproduce below, Trump says: "I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” Indeed, he has made that boast of late; but this is no idle boast. It clearly reflects his temperament, and it can also give us some indication of his psychology. When people say that Donald Trump is ignorant of public affairs, they are wrong — though I would not necessarily call him well-read. Rather, it is his inability to deal with a situation when the public is skeptical of him. This is why, for instance, he attacked Megyn Kelly, for asking a very tough question. It is also why he has lashed out at all those who have exposed his lies or his ignorance. He knows that he doesn’t know much about politics and public affairs, but he is not worried about the perception of the public: “I could shoot somebody in broad daylight and not lose voters,” he declared. Now, I certainly don’t think he means what he says when he talks like this. But some very serious observers take him literally. In particular, his willingness to attack opponents by challenging them to physical duels, as well as his willingness to call upon his followers to shoot them (and, in the case of the latter, to shoot them in broad daylight), clearly indicates his complete lack of judgment and his complete narcissism. Trump is really and truly bad in every way — in his ignorance, his recklessness, his vulgarity, his lack of judgment, his narcissism, and also in his dishonesty. If Trump is serious about the things that he has promised to do as president, there is absolutely no way in the world that he should be permitted to become president. Nevertheless, this election will be held, and should be held. So what should those who are opposed to Trump do? I think that we should give the Republican Party a chance to make a good choice. This is because Trump has, after all, made himself electable in certain ways. Trump’s narcissism may be extreme, but he has also done something unusual for the Republican Party: he has won over millions of poor working-class whites who usually vote Democratic. For years, those voters have been voting for the Republican Party despite its lack of concern for them, but that lack has now become so plain that millions of white working-class voters have had enough. For them, the Democratic Party can seem like it is for people like Hollywood celebrities, immigrants, black athletes, black rappers, and minorities in general — not for working people like themselves. But after the election of a man like Donald Trump, such voters have simply given up on the Republican Party. They may not like Trump personally, but they can accept that a narcissistic demagogue can be elected. Hence they will vote for the Republican candidate, whoever that may be. If the Republican candidate is not a Trump, then Trump’s followers will vote for a Democrat. But if the Republican candidate is a Trump-like candidate, then there is a very good chance that he or she will win the election. This is a risk that I think we should take. I think that the Democrats should win, though not by that much. They should win by somewhere between three and five points. Under this scenario, Trump would most likely be denied a majority in the House. More important, the Republicans might be denied a majority in the Senate as well. If this happens, then a Democratic filibuster becomes more likely. In that case, the Republicans might try to create an uproar in the Senate by accusing the Democrats of illegality, thus forcing the Democrats to change the rules for filibusters and then win a majority. In that case, Trump may well be the next President of the United States. He would be, if you will, a “king for a day,” a king who would be a minority President who would not have full control over either party’s agenda. This will not be his election year, but Trump would probably have had a hand in the Republican Party’s policies that followed his election. In any case, since I think that Trump will lose a great deal of support (including that of the very evangelicals that his own lack of seriousness can make attractive to some people) and that the odds are good that he will lose the election by a very large margin, this is an election year when we can and should give him the chance to show us whether he can, in fact, convince his followers. I would like to say that I am confident that Trump will lose. But I don’t know. The problem is that we can’t actually tell. People often forget that most of what Donald Trump is saying is not just false, but that it is a type of ignorance. For instance, I thought that by now he would know how the Electoral College works, and he would refrain from making that claim. It reminds me of the late Mark Twain’s famous dictum about America and European civilization, namely that we have nothing to fear but fear itself — not least because it’s true. And it’s an ignorance that can hurt him — if enough people realize that. This is not the election of Trump’s opponent: it is not the election of Hillary Clinton, or Tim Kaine, or even the election of any of the Republican candidates. This is the election of Donald Trump — and it can go either way. We do not have a choice. It is not whether we like or don’t like Trump. Rather, it is whether we will take part in the election of a narcissist, or will allow ourselves to be ruled by an ignorant demagogue. This election is very important for the whole world. This election will decide how the world continues. The presidential campaign of Jeb Bush, from which he has now withdrawn, is being used by the more radical of the liberals as a case study for the theory of democracy they advocate: that when ordinary citizens get the information they need, they will choose more enlightened policies and elect more enlightened leaders. I had not paid much attention to the presidential campaign so far, and I must confess that my