Not only is the emperor wearing no clothes, but he is standing alone in front of a world that is laughing at him.
President Donald Trump addressed top political leaders from around the world at the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting 2026 in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 21. During the speech, Trump revisited his old, grievance-filled hits, such as “Sleepy Joe Biden” and the 2020 election being stolen. He was tilting at windmills, both literally and figuratively. He also appeared confused, mixing up Greenland with Iceland on more than one occasion.
But perhaps the most damaging part of his speech was the way Trump spoke of our North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies. The casualties of his words and recent actions may be irreparable in the world’s eyes.
America needs allies to stay safe, but Trump’s narcissistic foreign policy tactics will never admit that. Trump’s foreign policy views are based on what he wants or what he thinks might benefit him, and rather than true isolationism, he treats security guarantees as protection rackets rather than as mutual interests.
This vision of solitary strength appeals to those who see alliances as burdens, foreign entanglements as traps, and international cooperation as weakness. But this thinking fundamentally misunderstands how power works in the modern world and ignores the hard experiences of history.
Alliances are not charity. They are investments in American security that return dividends far exceeding their costs. Consider the global network of military bases that enables American strength. From Ramstein in Germany to Japan, Qatar to Australia, these installations exist because host nations permit them.
Without allied cooperation, the United States would lose its ability to respond rapidly to threats, collect critical intelligence, and maintain credible deterrence against adversaries.
The intelligence sharing among Five Eyes partners, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, provides capabilities no single nation could replicate alone. This cooperation depends on decades of trust. Treating allies as transactional partners erodes that trust and the unique access it provides.
Maintaining the United States' technological advantage also depends on allied cooperation. The most advanced semiconductors powering everything from smartphones to weapons systems come from Taiwan and South Korea. Leading-edge research happens in partnerships spanning allied universities and laboratories. Supply chains for critical technologies stretch across friendly nations. Alienating these partners doesn't make America more independent; it makes the country more vulnerable to disruption and weakness.
Trump seems incapable of recognizing the ultimate, and non-quantifiable sacrifice that our NATO partners made. When the United States invoked NATO Article 5 after Sept. 11, allied nations answered. They fought and died in Afghanistan and Iraq, with over 1,000 non-American NATO troops giving their lives in that conflict.
Denmark, which has sovereignty over Greenland, suffered 43 fatalities in the war in Afghanistan, the highest loss per capita within the coalition forces.
It is particularly repulsive when Trump said, “The United States is treated very unfairly by NATO. I want to tell you that. And when you think about it, nobody can dispute it. We give so much, and we get so little in return. And I've been a critic of NATO for many years. And yet I've done more to help NATO than any other president by far than any other person.”
Trump is no student of history because if he were, he would understand that it can provide a strong warning. In the 1930s, democratic nations failed to maintain their alliances and stand together against rising authoritarianism. The result was the most destructive war in human history. The postwar alliance system was built on that painful lesson: collective security prevents conflicts that cost far more than alliance maintenance ever could.
America standing alone isn't a strength; it's strategic suicide. In a dangerous world, allies fortify American power, extend its reach, share its obligations, and provide the partnerships necessary for addressing threats no nation can face successfully in isolation. The choice isn't between independence and entanglement; it's between security through cooperation and vulnerability through isolation.
So, the big cheese stands alone, and Americans are less safe because of it.
Lynn Schmidt is a columnist and Editorial Board member with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. She holds a master's of science in political science as well as a bachelor's of science in nursing.
Americans across the political spectrum have continued to ask about the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s connections among the political elite. (Angela Weiss/AFP)
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner speaks to voters at a town hall at the Elks Lodge 188 on June 7, 2026, in Portland, Maine.
McConnell and Platner both feel entitled
The two men could not be more different. One, a Republican, octogenarian, seven-term Southern senator, the other a progressive, millennial Maine oysterman who’s never spent a day in elected office.
But Mitch McConnell, the senior senator from Kentucky who’s been MIA for the past few weeks and Graham Platner, the Maine Senate candidate who’s facing calls to drop out of his race against Sen. Susan Collins, apparently do have something in common: an outsized sense of entitlement.
McConnell, who is 84 and not running for reelection, has been hospitalized for three weeks, and yet we still don’t fully know what he was admitted for or what his condition is. Per CNN, “his office has not disclosed a medical reason for the hospitalization or provided specifics on his health status beyond saying last week that he ‘continues to improve’ and ‘is working closely with his staff on Kentucky and Senate matters.’ ”
While several legislators have said they’ve talked to him and insist he sounds strong, others have said they are completely in the dark. One MAGA influencer, Laura Loomer, posted ”High level source close to the White House tells me ‘Mitch McConnell is officially brain dead. He’s not coming back.’ ”
Meanwhile, up in Maine, Platner has been artfully dodging calls from his own party to drop out of his race after several allegations of misconduct from women, including a sexual assault allegation from a former girlfriend, came to light. While Platner, who has managed to survive a Nazi-tattoo scandal, a sexting scandal, and several old tweets scandals, denies the allegations, he has not quit.
High-profile Democrats including Sens. Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer, the latter of whom had unsuccessfully hand-selected Maine Gov. Janet Mills to face Collins instead of Platner, have urged Platner to drop out, while other Dems have accused him of trying to influence the picking of his replacement.
Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson released a statement Tuesday, which said in part:
“Unfortunately, Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like. We have repeatedly reiterated to Graham Platner’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate nor in determining what this process looks like.”
Both incidents show a deep lack of accountability to voters, who in one case deserve to know whether their senator is capable of performing his duties, and in another deserve a candidate who isn’t being accused of crimes, bigotry and deception.
The offensive and odious entitlement of both McConnell and Platner stands out not because it is particularly unique among today’s political class. Tom Kean, the New Jersey GOP congressman, missed more than 100 votes, only sharing after a three-month mystery absence that he was dealing with depression.
Former President Joe Biden’s Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin failed to disclose a hospitalization for prostate cancer surgery, flouting the established rules for Cabinet members and senior U.S. officials.
From Biden’s insistence on running for reelection despite his obvious cognitive and political weaknesses to Trump’s brazen flouting of laws and norms, few politicians seem to appreciate that their public service job comes with responsibilities to constituents, including transparency and honesty.
But both parties increasingly justify the chicanery, because the stakes of winning elections and keeping power are simply too high. But that’s no excuse. If we’ve learned anything over the past decade, it’s that character and accountability do, in fact, matter. And when we, the voters, stop caring about it, well, so do they.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.