President Donald Trump has completed his flying visit to woo business leaders, politicians and the world’s wealthy.
He flew into the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, yesterday and spent a whirlwind 24 hours trying to persuade the people who control world finance that they should be investing in America.
Handing round the begging bowl, his message was for him, America comes first but an economically strong America also means other countries share the wealth.
Such an argument contradicts his isolationist trade policies and his campaign message of making America great again at the expense of the rest of the world.
His speech did not go quite as planned as some of his audience resorted to hissing and booing.
Years of stagnation
“The world is witnessing the resurgence of a strong and prosperous America”, he said. “I’m here to deliver a simple message. There has never been a better time to hire, to build, to invest and to grow in the United States. America is open for business and we are competitive once again.
“After years of stagnation, the United States is once again experiencing strong economic growth, “The world is witnessing the resurgence of a strong and prosperous America.”
Trump tried to explain that the US was committed to ‘open and free trade – provided the rules were fair, which many interpreted as weighted in the favour of America.
“Consumer confidence, business confidence, and manufacturing confidence are the highest that they have been in many decades,” Trump said in his speech.
Putting America first
“I believe in America. As president of the United States I will always put America first just like the leaders of other countries should put their country first also. But America first does not mean America alone. When the United States grows, so does the world.
“American prosperity has created countless jobs all around the globe and the drive for excellence, creativity, and innovation in the U.S. Has led to important discoveries that help people everywhere live more prosperous and far healthier lives.
“As the United States pursues domestic reforms to unleash jobs and growth, we are also working to reform the international trading system so that it promotes broadly-shared prosperity and rewards to those who play by the rules.
“We cannot have free and open trade if some countries exploit the system at the expense of others. We support free trade but it needs to be fair and it needs to be reciprocal because in the end unfair trade undermines us all.”