Weakened institutions don't necessarily mean a weakened economy. You can have a strong economy and a high GDP without an independent judiciary or constitutional rights for example. (I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with either of you, but pointing out a communications mismatch between your comment and the GP that you replied to; I think you're talking about different things).

This is the only thing that has me clinging to hope, is that last time it didn't turn out terribly. I have a sense of foreboding about what the supreme court will look like at the end of his term, and the consequences we'll have to live with for decades as a result. And a potential WW3, which seems more plausible on a daily basis. A large scale conflict feels almost unavoidable; I would prefer a cool, calm, collected individual at the helm when it hits.

He didn’t have immunity from the Supreme Court, and majority of the Senate and the House back then. Some Republicans working with him still had integrity to prevent atrocities, but they are not there anymore.

The last time he was surrounded by chiefs of staff, generals, legal counsel, agency directors, etc. who would say "that's crazy, you can't do that" against his worst impulses. Now, all those people are gone and people like them will not be welcome. Now, he has a conservative judiciary (thanks to his last-minute appointees) who recently ruled that he will not bound by the law. Now, his inner circle has a plan to rapidly cleanse all non-partisan Federal government positions of anyone who might tell the Trump administration why something he wants can't be done.

There is no reason to expect things to go like they did the last time around.

I'd argue that the war in Ukraine was caused by the State Department being weakend and not being able to effectively deal with Russian plans to invade. Yes the US economy has been phenomenally succesful over the last 8 years and thats in no small part due to Trumps deregulation of the oil industry which has become the largest in the world. But in the mean time China is dominating renewables which is the future. People also voted for Trump because they're feeling economically insecure, the distribution of wealth is skewed to the rich. the US middle classes have not been a beneficiary of this economic bonanza at all. Which explains why they voted Trump. So either wages have to rise significantly for them, which means corporates endure lower margins or prices fall because of a massive supply side boom, which can be met domestically because it would be inflationary, and cant be met by imports because he's promised to impose 20% tariffs on everyone. Is a circle that cant be squared.

I wouldn't focus on Trump in terms of per capita GDP.

During Trump's term, per capital gdp went from $58.2k to $64.3k, a 10% increase.

During Biden's term, it went from $64.3k to $81.7k, a 27% increase.

GDP should be medianized or the top 100 most income people removed from it or something. That top echelon money isn't going back into the economy.

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