journey back into the history of slavery. i think we will truly be making progress when we all accept the used to use leverage as all of our history. our. slavery rounds starts march 9th d.w. . speaking in the very room where the hearings to impeach him began donald trump this week declared the state of the american union stronger than ever a speech traditionally used by american presidents to appeal for bipartisan unity on ambitious political aims became nothing short of an election rallying cry as the president took credit for what he called the great american comeback many of his listeners will have found themselves pondering the democrats' chances of making a comeback after this week's chaotic primary election in iowa well our topic today

u.s. election year is trump unstoppable. welcome to to the point and it's a pleasure to introduce our guests rick no act from the washington post berlin bureau he says trump state of the union address was filled with a sense of vindication both on domestic and foreign issues but it might be too early for that. with us is also ralph bryant he is speaker of republicans overseas germany and his opinion donald trump is a president who delivers on his promise. and it's a pleasure to welcome rachel townsend klein she's editorial director at the german marshall fund of the united states she says trust us on a very good start in 2020 but his successes. are more show than

substance. so in his state of the union president trump was speaking really just hours before he was acquitted in the 2nd stage of the impeachment proceedings which of course had been expected especially by him was the enormous confidence that he projected in his state of the union speech a sign that we are now going to be seeing trump unleashed and emboldened well to to some extent that's what he wanted to project but i think when you especially look at the 2nd half of the speech where he very much attacked the democrats even though he didn't bring up impeachment itself you could tell that this is probably going to become a very ugly election campaign and impeachment specifically is going to haunt him. but you agree trump unbound yeah well it's always been pretty bold if this was part

of his signature but sure that republicans have now basically told him go for it we're all behind you do what you want and he's going to take that forward in the election year i think ralph well i think he's a funk president has a strong support of his party which is like an absolutely necessary for the next 9 months let's take a listen to some of the claims that he did make in that state of the union speech. priam thrilled to report to you tonight that our economy is the best it has ever been our military is completely rebuilt with its power being unmatched anywhere in the world and it's not even close our borders are secure our families are flourishing our values are renewed our pride is restored and for all of these reasons i say to the people of our great country and to the members of congress this state of our union is stronger than

ever before i. say you said it might be too early for this sense of vindication that he displayed when you listen to that list of claims made just there where would you say time will in fact wind up proving the president wrong well there could be a number of issues to could be coming up during this year one of them is certainly . are his comments on the so-called islamic state we don't know to what extent that group could could regroup in syria iraq over the next months the u.n. certainly is saying that's a risk when you look at trade there are number of unknowns especially when it comes to trade deal with china and potentially even the impact of the coronavirus on that whether china will be fit so hard that it can't fulfill what it what it signed in

this 1st agreement and so there are a number of issues north korea as well or sort of the fears in europe that he might still trigger a trade war some dispute with the europeans as well so those are the foreign policy issues but there is of course a lot of domestic issues as well and in fact foreign policy didn't figure strongly in the speech it was very much about the domestic situation where till you say president trump. successes are more show than substance but isn't it true that the economy is flourishing and that unemployment is as low as it's been in decades unemployment is pretty low it's not as low as it's ever been as he claimed nor as the economy is better than it's ever been so it's true unemployment is low but the growth is not very impressive it's under 3 percent a soccer rate and growth particularly in the manufacturing sector which is important in places like michigan where i'm from that's really slow it's in fact it undergoing what they call

a technical recession so the the success is pretty superficial if all you care about is a stock market then yes the economy looks great but if you care about sort of middle income actual whole house called income it's a pretty superficial success that it's tenuous rough let's drill down on a couple of those economic factors president trump actually promised 4 percent growth when he came into office as you'll remember as rachel just reminded us it's now just above 2 percent and he also absolutely claimed credit for this great american comeback essentially saying things had been very dire before he came into office the fact is the growth trend started under president obama and the growth rate was actually higher under obama wasn't it well 1st of all those bettas effect it because we had a lower level because it was easier like like you to increase the numbers but me as me condom is if you tell you if i comparer back 4 years ago they claim when trump

gets elected the stock market is going to tumble the economy is going to crash create the trade war is going to happen nothing happened we have more trade we have a higher g.d.p. gross domestic product we have you have to lower unemployment rates it's fabulous no i have to argue well he's still growth but no there is a quality of growth so i think we're talking about 2 different issues and also on trade for example the aluminum and steel tariffs ford company in michigan are you know with a. you know anything i don't hurt at her but it hurts more our our trade partners unfair trade we my farmers in the midwest he also disagree he announced that before he got elected one of the few presidents who told listen it's going to hurt you in the long one you're going to benefit he told the his his his voters the truth let me ask you rick to come in also on a trade policy because the president said in the state of the union quite explicitly that his trade policy his trade war with china was responsible for job

growth would you say that is true will in fact it has caused a lot of damage in nightmares 2 to a lot of people it's currently not clear if it's going to lead to the sort of growth he has predicted i think so far the trade war has mainly been damaging it could be an advantage that now he has reached some sort of 1st agreement but certainly it hasn't contributed to to growth to have a trade war happen now if we look at sectors like steel rachel mentioned it steel prices went up quite dramatically after those tariffs were slapped there were some new jobs created in sector but economists were analyzing that the cost of each of those jobs was $900000.00 because of the macroeconomic costs the perforated. pose so how do you reconcile that how does that match mean well you get in value how do you mean that is the benefit well you got invest before you earn i

mean if our simplest is to the damage to the overall economy because of unfair trade with china with the asian in general it's much larger than just small sector of steel and aluminum you've got invest you've got to hurt before you earn the money i think and as you mentioned i think in the mid and long one we're going to follow that up bird carefully i think everybody's going to be. if i'm there traumatically but if you want to improve or you know change change the trade relationship with china and this is the big problem and i would i would disagree i would agree with you there isn't it kind of unpleasant to start a war with your allies who could be on the side of helping you change really well me as i mean i'm right who's even involved and so is trade talks on the very low level of the am from germany i got to tell you the germans tend to you know go go to washington whether it's george bush jr or obama or clinton and they all complain about this distrait birth of the terrorists and nothing has happened at some point

you have to start and i think he did it correctly he's going to do to europe and he has to also do the same thing to china i think is just fair i think would certainly accurate to say is that the europeans have now seen that he isn't joking when he said it's 3 wars and i think that's certainly a real outcome of the 2 indeed they're quite concerned that he may be setting his sights on them next up but let me take us to another sector which is of enormous consequence for the upcoming election and that's health care rachel and in that sound bite that we heard the president talked about families flourishing would you say that that strew of middle class families in regard to health care and especially insurance no of course not i mean. even obama's health care reform which was a huge step and did give access to many more people than before and it's still a 1000000 more yeah 20000000 but the plans were still pretty expensive and health

care costs are just absorbed in the united states and you know i live in germany i have social health care the coverage is in better right and people people are realizing this prescription drug prices are absurdly high even if they've fallen by 2 percent you know fall by 2 percent when they're 200 percent too high is it's not enough so the. in the section of the speech where the president talked about his desire to bring prices for pharmaceuticals down. and a number of congress people from the democratic party stood up and started calling h.r. 3 h.r. 3 that's the name of the bill that they had proposed to bring pharmaceutical prices down that was nixed by republicans is absolutely true and the health issue i'm not in line with with but the president i have to be honest i think there could be better solutions. than the current. health plan from the president i have to admit that but still he talked to the industry of the pharmaceutical

industry and he urged them to lower prices so he did achieve something it was it was not the that he used to decide let me ask about come back to the question of foreign policy as i said it didn't get a lot of attention in this speech but we did hear one claim in the clip that we played from the speech and that was that american prestige has been restored is that your perspective rick as an american who is based here in germany and europe. certainly not in europe i mean when you look at the pew poll numbers they show very clearly that if you research from just things very clearly most europeans do not agree with that in some countries a very small amount does have quite high. approval ratings but that's not at all the q.'s europe and i mean there are numerous reasons trade being one of them

his very inconsistent foreign policy. that has repeatedly shown on north korea. his approach to the kurds and the middle east in general and. ralph. let me ask you this in a last resort a comment after that. donald trump made a very clear promise in his inaugural address and during his election campaign in 2016 to take the u.s. out of what he called the endless wars especially in the middle east you say in your opening statement that he keeps his promises but that's when he definitely has not kept well i'm sure he has a less soldiers overseas that's for sure and he secure it and he and he secured a. defense that's intense budget he increased the defense budget to put a good job he did not send out 400000 the phones in this last year like a lot like obama did he send in 3 years less than obama in one year he did actually

increase the forces deployed in the middle east at least and over the last. side but not overall overall he has less soldiers overseas which is quite an achievement i believe it's not somebody who started a war he's he can't even blame that he stepped back from the kurds so you cannot claim him as somebody who is aggressive racial. yeah i mean it's true he didn't start even once but he's aggressive in small symbolic ways without having a strategy right this was and you know he got lucky with general khomeini that you know other people were scared that this is the strike on the iranian general. but he's you know he's not pulling out of wars he doesn't have a strategy to do it his strategy is shoot a couple rockets to have a symbolic effect and i don't see anything beyond that do you think it matters to voters. i think it matters less to voters than a lot of other things frankly and the problem is voters also they don't follow

these issues that closely and so when he says he's doing this or that they're probably going to believe him so the only thing you would have to be a pretty dramatic shift you know a lot more soldiers or for example much higher casualty rates for it to to have the same effect or a war with iran or a war with iran which you know not even going to go there because we don't have that kind of time but what i do want to talk about briefly before we start taking a look at some of the democrats and whether they can actually put up a good fight rick is. the claim that the union is stronger than ever again something we heard there in that clip doesn't the polarization that was on display on tuesday night in the capital very much put the lie to that claim that's true. that speech and the reaction to lucy was essentially sort of it showed just how much the country is divided and. him celebrating his his poll ratings i

mean given the state of the economy and so on they probably should be even higher and the question is why are they not and if you ask african-americans asian americans who he tried to reach out in this address. to whom he tried to reach you know. they will tell you it's very much the other side of the court and the immigration policy is. considered by his critics inhumane and and other things to. that aren't acceptable to us that was very much a speech to his base where he actually heard the republicans in the room get up and start chanting 4 more years 4 more years we saw him refused to take the house of the speaker the hand of the speaker we didn't shake my head of my friends present tense also so well she reached her hand out he didn't take it at the end then she tore up her copy of the speech those are shocking gestures for me i have to say this is the highest level of polarization i have seen in my lifetime can the

president win by energizing his base alone well he did 4 years ago but i think is it will go further we have this before that the polls were quite low of the outcome was quite high and now even the polls are pretty calm i'm pretty confident that the polls probably and i think the outcome is going to be even higher because no he has a track record he can prove what he achieved and he delivered a lot of things as we know you might not like it might not appreciate it but he delivered i think he's a very convincing president so polarization presents the democrats with a major dilemma to defeat trump they need a candidate who can mobilize their most passionate voters on the left or should they choose someone with broader appeal possibly even to moderate voters with no party affiliation this week's chaotic primary election in iowa shows just how difficult that choice will be. for the iowa caucuses rising star be quoted judge. the only openly gay candidates the 38 year old mayor from south bend indiana

is considered a centrist. really reached. joe biden former vice president under barack obama is also a centrist candidate. 77 year old said to snow. unbalancing the camps. where true is your duty over to fish. and guess what. truth or who. gets the oldest candidate bernie sanders who is popular among young voters the 78 year old senator from vermont calls himself a democratic socialist. but the most dangerous president at about the back of this particular. sanders wants to raise taxes on the wealthiest americans to wish in fees and implement universal

health insurance coverage will one of these candidates be able to win an election against trump. so let me put that question straight away to all of you who could beat trump if anybody. well. that's a difficult question joe biden certainly looks a lot weaker than he did when all of this began bernie sanders. is very forceful and some would say he at least has sort of the temperament that could beat trump but i think a lot of people in the middle board would seriously doubt. and then there is a little before an end to the people who will seem a little currently below the curve with people who might make it. didn't figure in that report rachel because she didn't come out so well in iowa although she yeah

she didn't come out so badly either so let's bring her into the mix and who do you think could beat anybody i think they could all be frankly. 5 i mean you have to remember who last from last night was hillary clinton and hillary clinton was not a candidate what i have there excite the sort of young far left part of the democratic party or was she a candidate. could win over you know sort of moderate republicans or independents because what educated been kind of that he did to figure i just get nominated them well let's go on strike yes i know that you like are you know now i mean at least i mean i mean if so why did you succeed i mean your question just maybe like it was a running he seemed like a safe choice at the time but you know it was her or her deficits were pretty clear ok but you have a favorite among the 4 that about here i mean look i think coming out of iowa we have 2 strong centrist canis and neither one of them is biden and 2 strong left so sanders and elizabeth warren representing the left i think. i personally think

warren has a better chance of getting independent voters than sanders while also exciting his left wing so i feel like she is the stronger one on the left. i well if you ask me i fear for anybody no i don't but i think a mixture of biden and bit but it is like the moderate ones they can get you know that they can cover both dreams i think they're they have the best chances and don't forget mr bloomberg yeah right the billionaire in the wings from rick bernie sanders looking at him i sometimes feel like he's the left wing version of trump is that a plus if you think that's true maybe don't would you say that's a plus or minus for him well i think looking at it from europe he doesn't look like the trump of america because a lot of his positions are frankly quite similar to mainstream police believe so but putting down the saw it. it could help him because trump is such

a. candidate who defies the norms of politics the way we've seen it over the last decades in the united states so perhaps i think his supporters who put at least. senators can beat him by being different they wouldn't be. by trump for his. claim to be a socialist rachel if you look at polls 70 percent of americans say they're not so sure about socialism. as 70 percent of undecided voters are. john kerry was overheard in iowa in a hotel room saying that he might enter the race in order to stop cinders clearly at least the party establishment is very worried about sanders yeah i think the party establishment is very worried i'm not sure that they're right to be so worried frankly the party establishment were the ones who thought it was a much safer choice but in fact it is that one word socialist that is going to be a big week test for senators and because americans are socialist they think

communist which don't have the same history of social democracy and that's going to take too much explaining for sanders it's it's going to be tough to support a little sanders i have to admit even trump didn't have the support of the party and he bypassed the party and did pretty well so even sanders could bypass the party and do pretty well so this is not something i would worry would be worried about that actually brings me to the question of whether any of these candidates can unify the fractious democratic party the way that trump has brought his party into lockstep right but only really happened after the election so. you know as you said it might not even be necessary to do to run this campaign. ritual it's often said that pete doesn't have what it takes to attract minority voters and that it will be absolutely crucial for a successful democratic candidate to mobilize them do you think that's true and

could it shade inch so the you know the poll so far would indicate that that is his big weakness but it could change right a lot of a lot of money already voters especially african-american voters they want to go with what's sure sophie but a judge looks like he's a winner and i think in the end they'll support him but you know south carolina is going to be an important. i married just because it was a pretty. is a pretty white state you have to as well you know there's the next as well the white sage so like them to check if he can like the track minorities. it's not been proven yet what difference if any in the last could be very briefly if you would do you think the impeachment process will make to those undecided voters you know the undecided as an old story that they want the outlook to look at the economy look at the financials they look differently at health insurance that's going to be one of the big topics i don't think impeachment's going to be a topic in 3 to 6 months rick what could happen between now and november to change

the equation and them taking us back to our title and stop this president who right now looks unstoppable. himself probably because he has been so unpredictable and and that's why a lot of countries a lot of some to some dictators fear him other stones. it's really himself he can he can change the equation. yeah i think either some kind of you know chaos and scandal which you know we've already seen a few of these cabinet post stuck so far or or economy i think you know something changes there that's also going to be a problem for. ralph is he going to be elected again. burckhardt far away to call. i can say his good chance is better than last time but if he wins for sure i can call it right now ok thanks very much to all of you for being with us and thanks to all of you out there for tuning in to see so.

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look to. play . this tuesday w. news live from perth chancellor angela merkel's party is in turmoil over a scandal involving the far right now action wide outrage in germany puts conservative and liberal parties under huge pressure after regional leaders brokered decades long to boot against working with far right parties. may well as chancellor merkel keeps an eye on developments unfolding at home she visits angola to forge economic ties. plus leaving all.