There is a fact pattern in operation here

Will anyone stop this “make me” imperial mercantile manifest destiny.

Sep 08, 2026

A near-miss of an assassin’s bullet put Donald Trump in the frame of mind to take no prisoners in his second term. Honestly, who would blame him, given the multiple threats he faced, and the lack of honesty and resources the Biden administration displayed during the 2024 election cycle? But we’ve now entered a new phase of what might be described as monomania if it didn’t have so many consiglieri attached to it. I think it might be best described as Trump’s version of imperial manifest destiny, enabled by his simplistic, mercantilist vision of the world.

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The vision is a sanitized, yet amoral, no-holds-barred assault on the existing political system of the United States, simultaneously applied to the local, state, federal, and fourth estate media. At every level and branch of government and information distribution, along with the levers of military, political, legal, economic, and plain old excavator power, the Trump administration is on a full court press to make its (meaning his) vision into reality. It’s a “make me” attitude that has been mugging Congress and the American people since inauguration day in 2025.

In Trump 1.0, we experienced the daily flooding of the media zone, which fairly well inoculated the public to bolder and bigger lies, unsupported claims, and bluster. But in the first Trump presidency, the cabinet was more-or-less drawn from traditional political pools, and respected military pedigrees. Not so this time. Somehow, the Senate, believing it’s more important to support Team Red than to take the long view for the nation, allowed Pete Hegseth, Robert F. Kennedy, and the like, not to mention, for a time, Elon Musk, to inhabit the halls of power and money. Non-cabinet players such as Putin-friendly Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner also enjoy tremendous authority in foreign policy and relations.

The only “normal” appointees seem to be Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. Yet even these have caved again and again, toeing the administration line on Iran, Venezuela, and massive government overspending. Making Washington, D.C. his plaything, Trump has distracted much of the nation, and the Supreme Court’s attention, on items of small, but annoying importance. Tearing down the White House East Wing without the slightest congressional nod, replacing it with a massive ballroom that is now a fait accompli, renaming, and now shuttering the Kennedy Center, and most recently, beginning construction on the eyesore-to-be triumphal Arch blocking the view from Arlington House of Capitol Hill and the White House.

Veterans groups are suing to stop construction. That’s cute. Back in the 1890s after the heat of that century’s transcontinental manifest destiny (meaning stripping Native Americans of their land, sovereignty, and ratified treaties to make the equivalent of billionaires out of railroad investors), Bernette Haskell, a Marxist who published the International Workingman’s Association newsletter, Truth, handled things this way:

Truth is five cents a copy, and dynamite forty cents a pound…

These days, if you have the correct permits, a stick can be had for around $60. Not that I would condone placing one at the base of whatever arch is being constructed across the Potomac on the far side of the Memorial Bridge. But should some anarchist, or aficionado of The Deer Hunter, or Rambo, contemplate such a thing, I would find it hard to shed a tear for the edifice’s demise.

But it’s unlikely to be stopped by any judge’s order. In Washington, D.C., and its environs (Arlington National Cemetery being federal property), the backhoes are controlled by the man with the long red tie, just like he did when he built and bankrupted New Jersey casinos. “Make me,” is the reply when a judge orders “stop.” And then the lawyers escalate to the U.S. Supreme Court, who, despite the dissent of its Chief Justice, seem to grant imperial privilege to do such things.

It’s laughable that Congress, which ultimately controls the purse strings, and therefore, the checks that run the backhoes, cranes, and construction workers salaries, might actually decide to flex. Congress could stop the ballroom, or the arch, or the Iran War, or the Department of War’s Office of Strategic Capital’s 35 percent take (I mean “stake”) of North American Blue Energy Partners—the owner of 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan heavy sour crude reserves.

Never mind that there is no Department of War—Congress never authorized the name change from Department of Defense, therefore there is not an actual Office of Strategic Capital in the Department of War. But by magic, there is. The NDAA passed on May 4, 2026 did note that by Executive Order 14347, the DOD is calling itself by that name, and did in fact fund and authorize the Office of Strategic Capital, which existed since 2023 for these purposes:

developing, integrating, and implementing capital investment strategies proven in the commercial sector to shape and scale investment in critical technologies and assets;
identifying and prioritizing promising critical technologies and assets that require funding and have the potential to benefit DOD; and
making investments in such technologies and assets, such as supply chain technologies not always supported by traditional private capital.

The OSC was never really envisioned as exercising 35 percent minority ownership of the world’s largest oil reserves. But it is under the Trump manifest destiny empire.

In times of distress, the U.S. government has been known to take equity stakes in companies, or as part of bail-out deals to preserve long-time American marques, like General Motors. But in this Trump era, while the nation is arguing over ballrooms, arches, and ICE deportation of British trolls, the government has done some pretty significant “investing”:

8.5% of Intel, worth about $41.5 billion, $32.63 billion more than the government paid;
MP Materials, 15%, worth about $1 billion;
USA Rare Earth, between 7 and 13%, worth nearly $300 million;'
Lithium Americas, 5% worth $54 million (and additional options on Thacker Pass JV);
L3Harris Missile Solutions, around 20% (private acquisition of about $1 billion);
Atlantic Alumina, DOD investment in private company to the tune of $400 million, value is not disclosed;
U.S. Steel, a single “golden share” allowing our government veto rights and consent requirements after the company was acquired by Nippon Steel, no financial value.

There are also between $5 and $6 billion in announced but not closed “quantum deals,” though the Treasury Department pegs it at $2 billion.

But Steve, the Chinese do this all the time. Yes. Yes, they do. But the Chinese run a centrally-planned command economy, crush dissent with jail and the barrel of a gun, and exert positive control of everyone who is under their government’s boot. America has always been the escape for communism, not a co-signer.

But Steve, many of these positions are results of COVID CARES warrants and policies. Some of them, true. But the government has since sold or the companies have repaid those loans. For example, the airlines—the government held warrants in 11 airlines, all auctioned in 2024, and some of those airlines, like Spirit, no longer operate.

The kinds of investments and equity stakes the Trump administration is pursuing have historically, in the U.S., only been made during times of war. That being said, we are definitely at war with Iran, though the administration, and Republicans in Congress, refuse to acknowledge it. Our operations in Venezuela also have a larger arena: capping China’s access to the Western Hemisphere.

And while all this is going on, the executive branch of the federal government is exercising more and more control over areas like AI, surveillance, and the federal reserve. There is, day by day, less and less authority distributed to other branches and outside organizations. And corporations like Amazon, Meta, Google, and Microsoft are lining up to get into the trough of Uncle Sam’s pig sty.

Meanwhile, Americans continue to pay for all of this at the pump, at the grocery store, and in our paychecks. The constant stream of invective, denials, and outright lies has made us deaf to what is really going on. These are the actions of a “make me” administration. The White House posts “Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Announces Historic Oil Agreement to Secure American Energy Dominance and Drive Venezuela’s Economic Recovery” while neither Venezuela nor Americans are seeing the benefits of it. The only thing that’s true is the word “historic.”

You would think that as the U.S. has caused the closure of the Hormuz Strait, and continues to poke Iran without actually toppling the regime, that this would be the action of an imperial power that wants the light sweet crude supply to stop, while simultaneously taking control of the world’s largest exporter of heavy sour crude, which is much harder to refine, yet the U.S. has plenty of refinery capacity for it.

Add that to the fact that Canada has long been the U.S.’s largest source of heavy sour crude, which that nation lacks the refinery capacity to process. And you would think if a country wanted to corner the market on certain oil products, they’d enter into disingenuous negotiations with Canada, forcing them to walk away from the table, in order to play the Canadian oil card. So far, the 50 percent Canadian tariff specifically excludes oil, but now that the U.S. has a (better? owned?) partner to receive the product that Canada flows through the pipeline network, should we expect more disrespect for our northern neighbors?

Does Trump’s mercantilist manifest destiny include a Canadian takeover like Venezeula, or a “51st state”? I think the Canadians would go down shooting before that could happen, but there could be a lot of pain, and a lot of hurt feelings for decades should the Canadian oil card be played in Washington.

There is a fact pattern in operation here. Put America on a war footing, announce to the world that we are indeed willing to go to war to obtain resources and control of other nations in an imperial controlling way, feed our own people an unending stream of distraction and deception, and purge the military, economic, executive, and legislative structures of people who might actually stop the plan—these are the actions of someone bent on being emperor.

Julius Caesar would recognize it (he himself did it). And one day, we will find ourselves looking across the Rubicon and seeing the triumphant army marching into our own Rome, in defiance of the law, and of our own government’s trust by its citizens. Like Caesar’s triumphs, we look across the Potomac and see it being built before our eyes.

A giant billboard in the shape of an arch that says, “make me.” And nobody has, not yet.

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