Here we go again. The collective consciousness of the planet, which possesses the memory of a concussed goldfish and the foresight of a mayfly, is currently vibrating with the frantic energy of a suburban PTA meeting during a book-burning. The subject of this existential tremors? Donald Trump is returning to the global stage, and the nations of the world are scurrying like cockroaches when the kitchen light flickers on. The latest to emerge from the shadows with a ‘win’ is Vietnam. Yes, the same Vietnam that the American Right treats as a cautionary tale of socialism and the American Left treats as a romanticized backdrop for their grandfather’s trauma. It turns out, striking a deal with the man who thinks a trade deficit is a personal insult involves the same intellectual rigor as bribing a bouncer at a mid-tier strip club.

Vietnam has apparently secured ‘concessions’ by promising to buy things they probably don’t need from people they definitely don’t like. The strategy is so transparent it’s almost poetic in its stupidity. To avoid the wrath of the orange god-king, Hanoi is dangling the promise of buying Boeing planes and American liquefied natural gas. It isn't a trade policy; it’s a grocery list handed down by an angry landlord. The Vietnamese leadership, showing a level of pragmatic cynicism that I almost respect, has realized that the leader of the free world doesn't care about geopolitics, human rights, or regional stability. He cares about numbers on a spreadsheet looking ‘big’ and ‘strong.’ If you can make a chart go up, he’ll let you do whatever you want in your own backyard. It is the diplomatic equivalent of jingling keys in front of a toddler to stop them from eating the couch cushions.

The American Right, of course, is already preening. They see this as a masterclass in ‘America First’ negotiation, ignoring the fact that forcing a country to buy Boeing aircraft—a company currently known for doors falling off in mid-air—is less of a strategic victory and more of a corporate bailout with extra steps. They cheer for the ‘deal’ while completely failing to grasp that international trade isn’t a zero-sum game played on a Monopoly board. They think they are winning, when in reality, they are just accelerating the conversion of the American presidency into a high-stakes protection racket. It’s not about the economy; it’s about the aesthetic of dominance.

On the other side of the aisle, the Left is busy clutching their collective pearls, wailing about the ‘erosion of norms’ and the ‘destruction of the liberal world order.’ It’s a touching performance, really. They act as if the pre-Trump era was a golden age of altruistic diplomacy rather than a slightly more polite version of the same corporate-driven hegemony. They hate the transactionality of it all because it’s tacky, not because it’s inherently different from the neoliberal extraction they’ve overseen for decades. They want the exploitation to come with a side of virtuous rhetoric and a white-tie dinner. Trump just skips the appetizer and asks for the cash in a brown paper bag, and their refined sensibilities simply cannot cope with the lack of decorum.

What is truly exhausting is the intellectual void at the center of this entire spectacle. We are watching the slow-motion collapse of global institutions, replaced by a series of bilateral shakedowns that would make a 1920s mob boss blush. Vietnam’s ‘concessions’ are a symptom of a world that has given up on the idea of rules. In this new atavistic reality, the only rule is that the biggest bully gets the lunch money. It is a return to a tributary state model, where nations pay homage to the empire not in gold or silk, but in Boeing orders and LNG contracts. And for what? To maintain a precarious status quo that is already disintegrating under the weight of its own hypocrisy.

The pundits will spend weeks analyzing the ‘nuance’ of these trade deals, but there is no nuance. There is only the bored, repetitive cycle of a failing civilization trying to bargain with its own obsolescence. Vietnam is just the latest to figure out the cheat code: flatter the ego, pump the numbers, and wait for the next four-year cycle of madness to reset the board. We are all trapped in a room with two groups of idiots—one side thinks the fire is a feature, and the other thinks if they just yell ‘decorum’ loud enough, the flames will stop being hot. Meanwhile, the planet continues to spin, blissfully indifferent to the fact that its most dominant species has decided that international relations should be handled like a season of ‘The Celebrity Apprentice’ directed by Caligula. It would be funny if it wasn't so incredibly tedious.