Professional historians have tended to underplay the role of individuals in shaping the destinies of humankind. In his 1961 book, What is History?, EH Carr famously mocked what he called the “Bad King John and the Good Queen Bess” school of history-writing. Now it is true that, as Karl Marx once said, individuals make history not in the circumstances of their choosing. They are constrained in their actions by the economic and social conditions prevailing, and in particular (so Marx argued) by technology and class relations.

Nonetheless, on occasion individuals can play a vital and even determining role in shaping history, for good and especially for ill. There might have been no Soviet state without Lenin; there certainly would have been no Nazi state without Hitler.

In the world we now live in, individuals who shape history loom large. And none more so than Donald Trump. Admittedly, his rise to power must be understood against the background of broader economic and technological changes. Without the disenchantment of the White working class due to globalisation, and without the use of the new media forms to amplify his image and his untruths, Trump may have never become president of the United States of America.

Nonetheless, once he assumed office, he has, in turn, actively reshaped the lives and fortunes of millions of individuals apart from himself. For instance, had someone else been president of the US in 2026, the war against Iran on Israel’s instigation might never have happened, sparing the countries of West Asia from death and destruction, and countries outside the region from higher oil, gas, and fertiliser prices as well.

A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily…— Commentary: Trump Truth Social Posts On X (@TrumpTruthOnX) April 7, 2026

A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily…

In this column, I wish to turn attention away from the damage done to the world by Trump’s Iran war, and focus instead on the damage he has done to his own country in the year and three months since he won a second term as president. In this time, there are at least seven important ways in which Trump has weakened a country he promised to “make great again”.

The first of........

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