Will 2026 finally be the year when a critical mass of Americans wakes up and realizes that Republicans always screw up the economy?
Donald Trump inherited an economy from Joe Biden that was perhaps not firing on all cylinders but was in pretty good shape all the same.
For the third straight time, a Democratic president handed a Republican president an economy that was at the least pretty good, and at most (Bill Clinton) really humming along very nicely. And, for the third straight time, the Republican has made things worse. Which also means that Democratic presidents have to clean up messes left by their GOP predecessors.
Long story short the Union was worried splitting the country or hamstringing the southern economy would weaken the US and make it vulnerable to other world powers (we weren’t one yet). Much like Ukraine now, we were a former colony fighting a brutal war with the newest tech (which later revolutionized warfare eg trench warfare a la Longstreet) and there were military observers, advisers, and adventurers from many other countries here watching everything go down. Also they were sniffing around for weakness.