Trump, McKinley, and the Paradox of “Restoration”

“That’s all a man can hope for during his lifetime — to set an example — and when he is dead, to be an inspiration for history.”

—William McKinley

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January 22, 2025— We pride ourselves on having read a little bit of history. But when Donald Trump decided to restore the name “Mount McKinley” to Alaska’s Denali in his inauguration speech, we thought, “Huh, what gives?”

Of course, like anyone who’s studied economic history, we knew all about the Gilded Age and the Robber Barons.

Even the People’s History of the United States — thank you, Howard Zinn — with its focus on the working class and disparity between Carnegie’s Gospel of Wealth and the fate of meatpackers in Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle hammers home the wealth disparity of the Gilded Age. For nearly all Americans but a handful, material conditions improved but were far from gilded.

But we have to admit, we’d never paid much mind to McKinley. For all we knew, the 25th president only appeared on trivia lists of the presidents who’d been assassinated.

Trump’s decision to “restore” the name of North America’s tallest mountain seemed out of character, even for him. We’re all used to his bellicose, distracting tactics to gain the upper hand in deals. But we have never put him in the category of someone who pays much attention to printed words in a thick, dusty book.

Silly us.

Turns out, the “restoration” of the name Mount McKinley is actually helpful in understanding the posturing already underway for Trump the 2nd. It’s less about honoring the legacy of a 19th-century president and more about virtue-signaling a nostalgic yearning for an age when American ambition knew no bounds.

The mountain isn’t just the tallest peak in North America — it now represents an entire ethos of expansion, protectionism, and what some might call imperial optimism.

From a branding standpoint, we gotta credit where it’s due. Someone in Trump’s camp did their homework.

William McKinley, a man of tariffs and territories, is considered the patron saint of American exceptionalism circa 1897. The gold standard? Check. High tariffs? Of course. Expansion into the Pacific and Caribbean? Why not?

Yet, invoking his name in 2016 wasn’t about economic nuance; it was branding shorthand for “Make America Great Again.”

We love a good paradigm-shifting moment. We have to. That’s what the Grey Swan is all about. Whether Trump and his highly visible cabinet picks will be successful or not, well, as we said yesterday, “the devil will be in the details” and will keep us busy for the next two years, at least.

For now, the markets, our primary beat, love the theme of American exceptionalism Trump is laying on thick. All three of the major indexes are up over 3% since lows reached ten trading days ago.

McKinley loved tariffs, too. He was a populist protectionist. McKinley’s policies of high tariffs were designed to protect American industry during an era when we still built things — cars, steel, skyscrapers.

Trump’s tariffs, on the other hand, hitched themselves to a much shakier proposition: reviving industries already outsourced and hollowed out by decades of globalization.

What McKinley implemented during the Gilded Age — a time of booming railroads and industrial monopolies, a time when America was moving up in the world, and arguably “great” — Trump attempted to mimic in the age of app stores and outsourcing.

The comparison is romantic at best and delusional at worst, but it is also appropriate given Musk and the tech oligarchs’ newfound coziness with Washington.

The Gilded Age represented America’s economy running to nearly its fullest. Today, regulations and a manipulated fiat money system leave us with an economic system that rewards the wealthy more for owning assets, than for building great things that the common man can enjoy.

But the symbolism of Denali’s rechristening holds another layer of irony.

Denali, meaning “The High One” in the Koyukon Athabaskan language, had held its name for thousands of years before a gold prospector decided it should instead honor McKinley — a man who’d never set foot in Alaska, let alone climbed its icy heights.

When President Obama officially restored the name to Denali in 2015, many saw it as a long-overdue recognition of the land’s indigenous roots. Trump’s “restoration” of the McKinley name is another shot across the bow, the supremacy of old narratives.

Here’s an interesting historical factoid that provides a narrative twist: McKinley’s presidency was cut short by an assassin’s bullet, just as the Progressive Era overtook his version of America. It turns out that tariffs and territorial acquisitions were not enough to secure long-term prosperity.

Like fans of Taylor Swift seeking clues in her lyrics, Trump acolytes will read everything into his inaugural speech.

The “restoration” was less about policy and more about myth — a signal to those longing for an America that likely never existed as they imagined.

As a political rallying point, it’s brilliant. There are at least 77 million people in the United States craving that narrative.

And so far, that narrative is working. Trump’s ability to turn perception into reality and his claims of a new Golden Age are met with acclaim from his supporters. Let’s see how far it lasts… the devil’s in the details.

It might be a lot of fun. It could be a total disaster.

Regards,

Addison Wiggin,
Grey Swan

P.S. “The new administration will accomplish a lot of ‘good’ things,” Dick B. contributes on cue. “But it nor the Congress will be able to overcome the problems brought about by foolish overspending in the last 30 years. Albeit most of it in the last 12 years. A crash correction along with great suffering is needed to bring things back to reality. Government cannot produce wealth in any form. Put the brakes on.”

A member whose email address only reads “mesenfants” is a little less forgiving:

“Add my voice that Trump and his buddy billionaires are self-centered egomaniacs who can change the plight of the poor by parting with some of their money instead of depriving Ukraine and others of preserving their freedom from the regime of a fellow self-centered billionaire Putin.

“They are all guilty, both parties.”

P.P.S. “Spot on,” C Polley writes regarding our comments on the pathos we felt for the outgoing administration.

David W. didn’t care so much for the essay:

“You aren’t as much in the tank for Trump as, say, Jim Rickards,” David writes,  “but the whole slant of anti-Biden, let’s repeat all the innuendo and let things slide with Trump, it’s really getting tiresome.”

We had a short interchange with David afterward, but he has since ghosted us… it seems we’re equal-opportunity offenders. That’s the downside of looking at uncomfortable truths… those that are most worthy of exploring.

All ideas, critiques, and slander are welcome. Send your comments to addison@greyswanfraternity.com. Thank you in advance.