If you needed definitive proof that the entire global financial system is nothing more than a neurotic golden retriever flinching at a rolled-up newspaper, look no further than this week’s pathetic display on the European bourses. The markets have rallied, the champagne corks have popped in Frankfurt and London, and the ticker tape is green. Why? Because the loud man in the White House decided, for the forty-thousandth time, not to burn the house down after explicitly threatening to burn the house down.

They call it the “Taco” trade. This is not a joke. Highly paid analysts in suits that cost more than your car have actually coined the acronym “Trump Always Chickens Out.” Let that sink in. The bedrock of our geopolitical stability, the guiding algorithm of the Western economic alliance, is now predicated on the assumption that the Leader of the Free World is fundamentally a bluffing coward. And the markets love it. They absolutely adore it. The FTSE 100 climbed 0.8% to a dizzying high, while the German Dax and the French Cac leaped 1.4%, all performing a synchronized dance of relief because the bully lowered his fist.

It is a spectacle of humiliation that would be funny if it weren’t so painfully illustrative of our collective decline. We are witnessing the financial equivalent of an abusive relationship where the victim buys the abuser a nice watch because he didn't hit her this week. Trump threatened fresh tariffs on eight European countries—an act of economic vandalism that would have sent inflation spiraling and severed trade ties that have held since the reconstruction of Europe. Then, in typical fashion, he pivoted. He cited a “framework deal.”

Let us be clear: there is no framework deal. There is barely a framework for a deal. There is likely a napkin with “Europe = Bad/Good?” scribbled on it in Sharpie. But the mere utterance of the phrase was enough to send the algorithm-addled brains of Wall Street and the City into a frenzy of optimism. It is performative stupidity on a grand scale. The Right will claim this is 4D chess, a master negotiator squeezing concessions out of a recalcitrant Europe. The Left will claim it’s proof of his incompetence and lack of follow-through. Both are missing the point. The point is that the system is broken. When trillions of dollars in market capitalization hinge on whether one man had a good nap or not, we do not have an economy; we have a casino run by a erratic toddler.

Perhaps the most grotesque detail of this entire sordid affair was the specific reassurance that sparked the rally. The gains solidified after the President stated he would “not use military force to acquire territory.” This is where the bar is now. We are celebrating the fact that the United States is not going to annex Belgium. The German DAX is up because the Panzer division isn't rolling into Munich to seize BMW factories. We have lowered the standard of international diplomacy to “at least he promised not to do a Genghis Khan impression today.” And the traders, those soulless devoid-of-memory goldfish, cheer for it.

This is the “Taco” reality. It is a cycle of manufactured crises followed by manufactured relief. It renders all long-term planning obsolete. How does a CEO in Brussels plan for the next five years when the trade policy of their largest partner is determined by the Taco principle? They don’t. They just hedge, cringe, and wait for the next tweet. It is an intellectually bankrupt way to run a civilization, but it is perfect for the grifters. The volatility is the point. If things were stable, you couldn't make money betting on the panic.

So go ahead, celebrate your “Taco Thursday.” Watch the lines go up on the graph and pretend it means the economy is healthy. Pretend that a 1.4% rise in the Stoxx 600 represents actual value creation rather than just a collective exhale of breath from a terrified continent. The sad truth is that everyone involved—the blusterer in Chief, the spineless European bureaucrats eager to sign any “framework” to save their skins, and the avaricious market ghouls—deserves each other. They are locked in a dance of dysfunction, and the only losers are the people who actually have to live in the real world, wondering why their currency fluctuates every time a certain someone feels insecure about his poll numbers. Enjoy the rally. It will last exactly as long as it takes for the wind to change direction.