Many Americans are watching the gains racked up in their pension accounts in the last five years wiped out in the past few weeks. And fretting that no one seems to know what to do about it. The president says that economy is just fine. The Congress says the president is detached from reality in this as in other matters, and retreats to a posh hotel to come up with a plan. Donald Trump says he knows what to do, and if given the chance, will make America great again, which he and fellow Republican wannabees propose to do by cutting taxes. Democrat Hillary Clinton says give me another lease on the White House and I will fix things by raising taxes – a piker, by the standards of her Socialist challenger, Bernie Sanders, with whom she agreed on over 90 percent of the issues that came before the Senate for votes when their service there overlapped. Republicans propose to repeal regulations they claim are stifling banks and making it difficult for small businesses to get credit, Clinton to tighten those regulations and tax risky banks to prevent “Wall Street”, the district that is home to many of her supporters, from causing another financial meltdown, and to let banks fail rather than bail them out. Sanders would take an axe to the banks, and chop the big ones into smaller pieces. Capitalist buccaneer Trump supports government subsidies of ethanol, an Iowa product, while attacking government intervention in markets. Little wonder that Americans are confused as their savings shrivel because oil prices are plummeting, which economists chortled would be a good thing for them.

All of this matters not only here, but to other countries that recognize the importance of America to world order and global prosperity. Witness the fact that the mother of all parliaments took time from discussing whether Britain should remain in the EU or leave, its Trident should or should not tote nuclear missiles, whether to accept more immigrants, to debate barring Donald Trump from entering the UK. Trump says he has no desire to visit and knows that attacks by foreigners, even English-speaking foreigners, will only enhance his standing with many of his followers. Besides, it will be easier to hop over once he replaces his Boeing 757-200, a smaller corporate jet and two helicopters with Air Force One and an infinity of other aircraft. For now he is focused on the Iowa caucuses, only nine days away, and his battle with Texas senator Ted Cruz, with whom he is in a neck-and-neck race. Cruz, claims The Donald, might be disqualified from serving as president because he was born in Canada and therefor does not meet the Constitutional requirement of being a natural-born US citizen. Cruz says Trump is disqualified from running as a Republican because he supported the single-payer health care system being pushed by socialist Bernie Sanders, attended social events with Hillary Clinton, and is infected with “New York values” – wink, wink. Both are hoping for a win in Iowa, with Trump having a good week thanks to the endorsement of Sarah Palin, a one-time Cruz fan, and the Queen of the Tea Party, very popular in Iowa and in tea party circles around the country. Meanwhile, New Jersey governor Chris Christie waits to take the winner on in the soon-to-follow New Hampshire primary, where on the Democratic side Socialist senator Bernie Sanders leads Hillary Clinton in the polls. Sanders has overcome an early image as the mad old uncle released from the attic: his passionate campaigning and an appeal to the left of the Democratic Party is producing huge rallies and large contributions, while Clinton seems to have failed recent tutoring in prepared spontaneity, and is having difficulty persuading voters that she is not excessively economical with the truth after denying she handled security-sensitive materials on her private server, which a recent report by government inspectors says she did.