Fed up: Much damage done by a president without boundaries

Congratulations, Donald Trump, on presiding over the biggest single day’s stock market point gain in Dow Jones Industrial Average history. The biggest!

Truth be told, the nausea-inducing roller-coaster of the stock market this holiday week — a dizzying drop Christmas Eve, followed by recovery Wednesday — reflected investors rattled with uncertainty. And those doubts had too much to do with a mercurial and often clueless president crashing into the china shop, a bull bringing stock markets to the brink of bear territory.

There was Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin putting out a panicked-sounding Sunday statement accounting for the emergency phone calls he had with the nation’s big bankers just to confirm they had enough credit on hand. Confidence-inspiring!

There was Trump himself belligerently musing on Twitter, as St. Nick readied his reindeer, that “The only problem our economy has is the Fed,” following reports he was furious at Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell for a routine upward nudge in interest rates.

Just what America needs: a banana-republic-style central bank subject to the manipulations of a president who has his personal business holdings on the chessboard, and shut down the federal government in a tantrum masquerading as negotiating strategy.

Not a moment too soon, Air Force One bolted for a belated holiday visit to U.S. troops in Iraq, busying idle hands that any day now will be back tweeting. Buckle up for a long and turbulent flight.

— New York Daily News