The Week That Changed the World
The reign of the neo-cons and nation-builders, the arrogance of globalist dictates and medical mandates, it all crashed this week on the unlikely soil of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
There, President Trump used trade, rather than diplomacy, to wrestle with the demons of the Middle East. He came to reward the enterprise of cities already booming. He did not stop in Israel, he went straight to the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He said he wanted peace through strength. Trade was his calling card.
He arrived to a royal purple carpet treatment and left with a $600 billion investment in the US economy. Devotees of the Trump mythology, the Saudis offered a pop-up McDonald’s near the media center and welcomed Elon Musk, who demonstrated his Tesla Optimus Robots, training “very hard,” 17 hours a day, to learn how to fold shirts, make sandwiches and possibly boost world economic output by10x.
Trump’s main mission was to trumpet Saudi Arabia as a model for a re-imagined Middle East, one based not on oil but on innovation, not on quid pro quos but on technology. He praised Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for signing the largest defense agreement in US history — nearly $142 billion to buy state-of-the-art war fighting equipment from a dozen US defense firms. Lest the mullahs in Iran miss that message, Trump said Iran can choose “chaos and terror” or peace. “I want to make a deal with Iran,” he said. “I want to give them a chance at greatness.” If Iran snubs the offer and pursues a nuclear weapon, he made clear the US will dismantle it with massive force. Offering partnership to longtime foes, Trump also said he would move to lift sanctions on Syria and normalize relations. This morning, Syria's new leader, President Ahmed al-Sharaa, flew to Riyadh for a meeting with Trump and Crown Prince Salman, with Turkey’s President Recep Erdogan joining by phone.
Qatar’s offer of a $400 million new Air Force One, a gift likely made because Trump is frustrated by Boeing’s delay in building the one under contract, is stirring controversy in DC. Trump may no longer care. He is on a mission to use the carrot of trade to ease the unrelenting intractable issues of peace. He told Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman he hopes Saudi Arabia will recognize Israel, as “a personal favor to me.” He did not pressure, he did not demand concessions, he played the long economic game.
Oh to be a fly on the wall of the Lincoln Project, a vile group of liberals who push foreign wars in the name of a fading moderate GOP, and get kickbacks from liberal NGOs to keep preaching their label’s nonsense on TV. Nation-building — the idea that America can turn war-torn countries into democracies by building infrastructure — has never worked, not anywhere it has been tried, said Breitbart’s Alex Marlow.
If that is all that happened in the last few days, it would be epic. But so many wheels are turning that we may look back and call this the most consequential week in Trump’s second term. Consider:
Over the weekend, Secretary Bessent met in Switzerland with envoys from China. They worked out a framework for a trade deal, in the meantime time putting a 90-day pause on tariffs. Wall Street was jubilant, erasing all its losses of 2025.
Also over the weekend, Secretary of State Rubio and Vice President Vance negotiated an end to the India-Pakistan conflict. In the negotiations, Trump was the closer, promising them trade if they made peace.
Hamas released the last American-Israeli hostage, Edan Alexander, held for 584 days in captivity. Given a white board on the flight home, Alexander wrote, “Thank you President Trump.” Since taking office in January, Trump has negotiated the release of some 50 Americans held in captivity around the world. Earlier this month, Trump freed African-American Tony Holden, a Memphis contractor and father of six, after 2.5 years in Kuwaiti prison on fake drug charges.
Ukraine and Russia are to meet in Turkey on Thursday. If helpful, Trump has said he may well show up. If either Zelenskyy or Putin fail to show, this is unlikely.
Trump signed a massive Executive Order requiring Big Pharma to charge European Union nations a percentage of their R&D costs. Until now, Trump said, US citizens have been subsidizing costs of other nations. The U.S. “will no longer tolerate profiteering and price gouging from Big Pharma” he said. “The principle is simple — whatever the lowest price paid for a drug in other developed countries, that is the price Americans will pay.” RX prices could be cut by 50 to 90%. HHS Secretary RFK Jr., father of the MAHA movement, called Trump the first president of either party with the “intestinal fortitude” to take on Pharma.
Perhaps the most astonishing event of the week was when some 50 Afrikaners arrived at Dulles Airport. Trump had offered them refugee status because they are under threat of genocide from a South African regime that is seizing their lands and killing their bread-winners. He accused the media of refusing to cover the story. That they arrived waving American flags was a great rebuttal to the illegals who arrived under Biden’s watch, waving flags of their native countries.
In response, liberals pilloried the idea that these refugees are under threat, South Africa’s president called “cowardly” for leaving the country, and the Episcopal Church in the US ended its program to help resettle them because of its “commitment to racial justice and reconciliation.” It appears the Left thinks whites fleeing genocide deserve no sanctuary, only people of color with questionable criminal pasts.
That is the world Trump is disrupting — the world of false equivalencies and moral hypocrisy, of foreign policy and Pharma corruption, of forever wars and justice only for people of color. Newsweek said Trump’s tariff policy is causing chaos, and is evidence of an amateur presidency. And AOC warned DHS not to arrest anymore Democrats, like the three members of Congress from New Jersey who stormed an ICE detention center and assaulted law enforcement officers, because it constitutes “public intimidation.” We will see if these milestones undercut Dem talking points.
This week too, a grand jury indicted Milwaukee Judge Hannah Duggan for helping an illegal alien escape from ICE agents. And the DNC began looking for a way to dump their just-elected vice chairman, David Hoge, who wants to primary moderates.
Maybe, just maybe, we’re winning.