When running a democratic form of government, people have to believe that leadership is not just thinking about the next news cycle or the next election but a country’s long term health. Everyone talks about the American dream where you work hard, have the opportunity to gain mobility to a different social class than you were born into and that your children’s life will be better than the life you had. These are two fundamental aspects of the American experience and what the citizenry expects of all leaders from the federal level down to the local level. However, what happens to democracy and the American experience when our leaders no longer think about America in the long term but are just trying to win the news cycle or the next election?

Think about how you might approach your own life goals when planning what you want to achieve today, tomorrow, a month from now, a year from now or ten years from now. It may be wise or effective to borrow from the future you simply to satisfy an impulse for today. What would the future you say if you left them under more pressure and stress when you didn’t have to, just to feel like you got a small scale achievement? This dynamic is currently happening now in our federal government. The constant lack of any long term plans and patterns of moving from news cycle to news cycle can and will have devastating effects on how the United States is perceived long term. This negative pattern is playing out most notably in our foreign policy.

For example, take a look at how the United States bombed Iran. According to all known reporting at this time, the Iran nuclear facilities were not completely destroyed but only set back approximately a few months to a year. If the goal was to prevent Iran from ever getting a nuclear bomb, how is bombing them and only setting them back a few months going to achieve that goal? There was an agreement to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear bomb back in 2015 called the JCPOA. From the reporting before the deal was torn up in 2018 by President Trump, Iran was following the agreement and not close to a nuclear bomb. Now, Iran has more enriched uranium than ever before. Why would they ever trust us in the future to be a country of our word if the United States rips up agreements, lets Israel bomb Iran before negotiations can begin and then bombs Iran just to win a news cycle? The news cycle was won but to what level did the United States hurt itself diplomatically just to win a news cycle?

At the beginning of the current administration, one of their goals was to make the government more efficient and save money. This is a great goal as government agencies need to be reformed and modernized for the times. On the surface it appeared to be an opportunity to bring the federal government into the 21st century but instead in another effort to win a partisan news cycle, DOGE decided to cut USAID. Leaders may not want to spend an excess on foreign aid and this might have been presented as a win for the United States government to save money in this area. However, the result of this particular spending cut made the United States look smaller, pettier and harmed the country globally. We live in a global world now, therefore isolating ourselves from other countries creates an opportunity for others to fill the vacuum we left. Again, only focusing on a short term goal of saving money by cutting the spending on life saving aid to different countries negatively affects humans, communities and can result in death. This blame falls squarely on America and for what, just to save a couple of dollars in a bloated federal budget?

To go along with the above mentioned short term thinking outside of our borders, this is also happening within our borders which reinforces to the rest of the world that we no longer care about anyone or anything but ourselves. The only country we care about is the United States and our short term sugar highs matter more than any long term strategy or empathy. This can be seen by the recent ICE raids all over the United States. ICE is deporting anyone they see fit under the guise of deporting criminals only. This will deter people from other countries wanting to come to America. Immigrants are a part of our history, economy, communities and what makes America truly great. They have contributed to this country in so many valuable ways.

One thing I cannot overstate is how detrimental the short term cut of foreign students being allowed to attend to our elite universities will be to the long term health and growth of the United States. With these cuts, the best and brightest people will not be able to lend their talents and expertise to the United States and they will share this with other countries instead. Losing these talented people will negatively impact the United States by reducing the number of scientific breakthroughs, advanced technologies, and so many other jobs that could have been filled in the United States.

There are many other examples of short term thinking policies by this current administration that can create long term negative effects such as, green energy, tariffs, health care, national debt, etc. The next time you hear about a short term win and something that gets this administration through a news cycle by harming the future of United States citizens just think to yourself, “Does this policy make life better just for my current self or also my future self?