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When Donald Trump boasts of the dawn of a “new golden age” and claims that foreign investments are pouring in, he isn’t lying for once. But the president isn’t talking about the United States, and certainly not about regular Americans, who are increasingly struggling to make ends meet. Instead, he is talking about himself and his family businesses.

And for the Trumps, things are indeed going great… not because of their amazing business sense, but rather because the president is so unapologetically and openly corrupt.

World and business leaders have gotten the message.

To get stuff done in Washington, DC, or to prevent the weight of the US government from bearing down on you, it helps to come bringing gifts.

Earlier this month, for example, the Swiss brought Trump a special desktop Rolex clock and a personalized gold bar weighing more than two pounds.

And, wouldn’t you know it, the White House announced a few days later that the tariff the president had imposed on Switzerland will be slashed from 39 percent to 15 percent.

What a coincidence!!!

Obviously, Trump won’t be able to keep these “gifts,” right? Right???

Au contraire, dear reader.

See, he accepted them “on behalf of his presidential library,” which makes them legal.

Just like that $400-million jumbo jet Qatar gave to Trump as an “unconditional gift,” which sounds much nicer than “bribe.”

But, of course, that’s what these “presents” are. This becomes obvious when you break it down.

               The Swiss:           Can you reduce our tariffs?
              Trump:                 No way.
              The Swiss:           Here is gold.
              Trump:                 On second thought…

This isn’t any different from Western governments and companies going to the Middle East or African countries in the post-colonial era to ply monarchs and other authoritarian leaders with “gifts” to be allowed to exploit the resources of their countries.

Ironically, the tables have now turned, and it’s those nations bribing an authoritarian US president. 

Which brings us to the visit of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to Washington, DC, on Tuesday. 

Prior to meeting the man who, according to a US intelligence report, ordered the murder of a Washington Post journalist in 2018, Trump announced that he plans to sell the Saudis some F-35 fighter jets.

The Pentagon isn’t thrilled. While we aren’t sure how former Fox News morning show host Pete Hegseth feels about it, the people who actually know and care about these things worry that the advanced technology in these planes could end up in Chinese hands.

Not Trump. 

After all, the Saudis have been very generous to him and his family. 

For example, his son-in-law Jared Kushner got $2 billion from the country’s sovereign wealth fund even though its advisers objected to the deal. 

What those “advisers” apparently didn’t take into account was that this wasn’t about whether Kushner would be a good steward of that money.

Who cares about $2 billion? Certainly not the crown prince. He just wants to be on Trump’s good side. 

Which probably also explains the announcement on Monday of a new project between the president’s family business and its Saudi-based development partner, which combines the Trump family’s two main grifts: cryptocurrency and foreign real estate dealings. 

And, instead of severing the ties between himself and his family business, Trump seems to use the presidency as a tool to bring in untold billions of dollars for himself and his kids.

Since all of this is happening out in the open, with each plane and gold bar “gifted” to him it becomes more apparent to world and business leaders what it takes to end up in the president’s good graces. 

Trump’s corruption is as apparent (and lacking sophistication) as that of a mobster running a protection racket. Replace him with a guy called “Donny the Mouth,” and Saudi Arabia, CBS News, or Apple with “Graciano’s Butcher Shop,” and it’s all the same thing. 

It’s understood that, unless you pay the bribe, bad things will happen to you.

Paying off the president in some way is simply included in the price of doing business in and with the United States these days. 

It helps that Congress doesn’t care. While Republicans were really concerned with this kind of thing when Joe Biden was in office, presidential corruption no longer seems to be a concern of theirs, with the main excuse being that Trump is very transparent about his business dealings. 

Yeah, no kidding, he is very transparent… transparently corrupt. 

The big difference is that Biden’s alleged behavior took place before he was in the Oval Office, and there is no clear evidence that he benefited personally (although his son Hunter certainly took advantage of the same dynamic of people thinking they could gain the favor of an influential US politician if they showered his spawn with money). 

Oh, and it happened on a much smaller scale.

To be fair, it’s not just Trump but also others in his orbit. 

Want to get a slice of the billions of dollars the government is spending on rounding up, detaining, and deporting immigrants? Just hand a bundle of cash to “border czar” Tom Homan. 

Does he still have that money? Did he pay taxes on it? Who cares? Certainly not this administration or GOP lawmakers. 

Want something on a larger scale than $50,000 in a paper bag but below the billions of dollars the Trumps are raking in? How about this story from ProPublica detailing how an obscure, newly created LLC is getting tens of millions of dollars from the government for a PR campaign. 

How is it spending that money? That is entirely unclear, although it seems as though a nice chunk of it will find its way into the pockets of people working for or associated with the Department of Homeland Security.

The extent of all of this corruption will take years to unravel once the GOP no longer controls all branches of the government. And, to be honest, a lot of it will likely never be uncovered. 

What we know right now, however, is this: None of this benefits the American people — and nobody involved, from the supposedly “America first” president on down, gives a hoot about that.