I think all of this harkens back to the flawed theory that Trumps team has embraced. They view every other country with suspicion and contempt. They hate globalization because it embraces different cultures and views, and that is a threatening concept to these small minded people. They only want to increase the coffers of the rich, and they mean predominantly white wealthy people. They want to nullify education, history, civil rights, diversity, and basic services that our country put in place to help the middle class and the poor. They thrive on greed, power, and their ability to punish anyone who opposes their narrow minded and flawed ideology. They mirror the extremist groups in the middle east and the dictatorships in Europe, South America and other countries, and seem to have no problem with any of the fallout from their actions. A lot of people and countries are going to suffer because of the feckless actions of this President, who is insulated by his wealth and his spineless supporters in Congress. My only consolation is that when the tide finally turns, and the voters in this country denounce all of this, we can then start to build again, and hopefully prevent another such debacle from ever happening again by strengthening our laws and raising our standards for the Presidency in this country.
Excellent! Written clearly and rationally. I was thinking along those lines earlier today and am glad that my thoughts hold some water -- especially concerning the force of We The People. Also, it seems to me that whatever 'survival' reasons are held by those enabling Trump, those people will have to face the citizens long before any elections come about. Unless they're completely in accord with Project 2025 and/or Trump, they will eventually know that We The People are not and will not be pleased to be forced to damage or sacrifice our democratic republic.
“ Their MAGA supporters might not be moved by that, but other voters will be. At that point, we will likely be having a pretty different retribution discussion.”
We can only hope that the voting majority will wake up SOME time! And, if the Republican legislators don’t work FOR us, let’s vote them out! How can these foolish legislators NOT realize that they’re ruining their OWN country, too?
Agreed, foreign nations were probably waiting to see exactly what the tariff would be and respond accordingly. They may come back with their own broad tariffs or be more targeted, like say whiskey/ bourdon which would effect KY the most.
I believe that Canada has already responded with their reciprocal tariffs.
Jared I appreciate your expertise and I wanted to ask about a more ominous sequela. I have heard some substacks and have no expertise by which to decipher them regarding this move as being an intentional crashing of the economy. They cite the dismantling of the FDIC and the strategic Bitcoin reserve as evidence that Peter thiel and the PayPal mafia is influence is at work. That these maniacs want to convert the economy to something akin to what China has as WeChat. The idea that they could control the whole currency method. Is this conspiracy talk or could there be anything to this? I don't think Peter thiel spent millions electing JD Vance's vice president for no reason. I would appreciate anybody's comments in this regard. It seems like all this other stuff might be a smoke screen for something more ominous like this. And what could we do to stop it anyway?
Perhaps there is a method to this madness. We see the obvious authoritarian moves: getting rid of all oversight by firing the IGs, withholding grants to states and universities and threatening law firms and the press to bend them to your will, using DOJ to investigate your enemies and ICE to send people to a gulag without due process.
But the tariffs (on everyone but Russia), along with shutting down all research, ending global outreach by canceling USAID and USAGM, firing government workers leaving only skeleton crews, putting quacks in charge at CDC and NIH, and destroying the trust that we've taken 80 years to build...this is destroying U.S. hegemony and there is at least one world leader who is cheering it on. It's the leader whose side we've inexplicably taken in the Ukraine war. It's also the one who saved Trump's bacon when no bank would lend to him.
“Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets.” -- Don Trump, Jr. in 2008
With respect to the last paragraph, I wouldn't discount either hypothesis. He's clearly a complete ignoramus about most of how much of our world works. But he's awfully effective at dominating the public discourse, at manipulating people -- those who are equally ignorant and those who are equally racist and hateful of their fellow man.
I think all of this harkens back to the flawed theory that Trumps team has embraced. They view every other country with suspicion and contempt. They hate globalization because it embraces different cultures and views, and that is a threatening concept to these small minded people. They only want to increase the coffers of the rich, and they mean predominantly white wealthy people. They want to nullify education, history, civil rights, diversity, and basic services that our country put in place to help the middle class and the poor. They thrive on greed, power, and their ability to punish anyone who opposes their narrow minded and flawed ideology. They mirror the extremist groups in the middle east and the dictatorships in Europe, South America and other countries, and seem to have no problem with any of the fallout from their actions. A lot of people and countries are going to suffer because of the feckless actions of this President, who is insulated by his wealth and his spineless supporters in Congress. My only consolation is that when the tide finally turns, and the voters in this country denounce all of this, we can then start to build again, and hopefully prevent another such debacle from ever happening again by strengthening our laws and raising our standards for the Presidency in this country.
Remember that Trump does not want to leave office, and he's implementing a one-party rule, it's in progress and it might be too late, think?
Excellent! Written clearly and rationally. I was thinking along those lines earlier today and am glad that my thoughts hold some water -- especially concerning the force of We The People. Also, it seems to me that whatever 'survival' reasons are held by those enabling Trump, those people will have to face the citizens long before any elections come about. Unless they're completely in accord with Project 2025 and/or Trump, they will eventually know that We The People are not and will not be pleased to be forced to damage or sacrifice our democratic republic.
“ Their MAGA supporters might not be moved by that, but other voters will be. At that point, we will likely be having a pretty different retribution discussion.”
We can only hope that the voting majority will wake up SOME time! And, if the Republican legislators don’t work FOR us, let’s vote them out! How can these foolish legislators NOT realize that they’re ruining their OWN country, too?
Very disappointed in the silence from most of the world today, except France.
They’re probably working on counter tariffs (I hope).
Agreed, foreign nations were probably waiting to see exactly what the tariff would be and respond accordingly. They may come back with their own broad tariffs or be more targeted, like say whiskey/ bourdon which would effect KY the most.
I believe that Canada has already responded with their reciprocal tariffs.
Jared I appreciate your expertise and I wanted to ask about a more ominous sequela. I have heard some substacks and have no expertise by which to decipher them regarding this move as being an intentional crashing of the economy. They cite the dismantling of the FDIC and the strategic Bitcoin reserve as evidence that Peter thiel and the PayPal mafia is influence is at work. That these maniacs want to convert the economy to something akin to what China has as WeChat. The idea that they could control the whole currency method. Is this conspiracy talk or could there be anything to this? I don't think Peter thiel spent millions electing JD Vance's vice president for no reason. I would appreciate anybody's comments in this regard. It seems like all this other stuff might be a smoke screen for something more ominous like this. And what could we do to stop it anyway?
https://open.substack.com/pub/jimstewartson/p/grand-theft-crypto-strategic-bitcoin?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=91roo
Perhaps there is a method to this madness. We see the obvious authoritarian moves: getting rid of all oversight by firing the IGs, withholding grants to states and universities and threatening law firms and the press to bend them to your will, using DOJ to investigate your enemies and ICE to send people to a gulag without due process.
But the tariffs (on everyone but Russia), along with shutting down all research, ending global outreach by canceling USAID and USAGM, firing government workers leaving only skeleton crews, putting quacks in charge at CDC and NIH, and destroying the trust that we've taken 80 years to build...this is destroying U.S. hegemony and there is at least one world leader who is cheering it on. It's the leader whose side we've inexplicably taken in the Ukraine war. It's also the one who saved Trump's bacon when no bank would lend to him.
“Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets.” -- Don Trump, Jr. in 2008
https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/12/21/how-russian-money-helped-save-trumps-business/
Either something nefarious is afoot, or Trump is way stupider than we thought.
With respect to the last paragraph, I wouldn't discount either hypothesis. He's clearly a complete ignoramus about most of how much of our world works. But he's awfully effective at dominating the public discourse, at manipulating people -- those who are equally ignorant and those who are equally racist and hateful of their fellow man.
A trade war-for what? Because he’s against anything that might benefit other cultures that celebrate diversity or DEI.
For the “Dumb and dumber”.