I’m going to be scathing in my critique because these people are both dishonest and incompetent and deserve to be called out on it.
Here’s their formula:
It’s a ridiculously simplistic formula.
First, a stylistic quibble. What is up with those asterisks in the denominator? I’ll give the authors the benefit of the doubt and assume that they wanted the formula to be understandable by people who aren’t familiar with standard math notation, in which the juxtaposition of variables indicates multiplication. But to see it written that way in an official document is just… weird.
The i subscripts in the formula just indicate that the formula is to be applied to one country at a time — country i. I’ll therefore omit the ‘i’s from the rest of the discussion.
∆𝜏 is the amount by which the tariff currently being placed on that particular country should change (according to the Trump administration bozos) in order to drive the bilateral trade deficit to zero. In other words, 𝜏 (the existing rate) + ∆𝜏 (the change in rate) would be the correct final rate (according to the formula) to achieve the dubious goal of a trade balance.
The inanity of insisting on bilateral trade balances
We’re off to a bad start already, because the notion that every bilateral trade deficit should be zero is ridiculous on its face. Let’s look at a simplified example. Suppose Malawi sells us only mangoes, and the US (henceforth ‘we’, since I’m American) sells them only air conditioners. In order for the trade deficit to be zero, we need to buy the same dollar amount in mangoes that they buy in air conditioners, and we should adjust the tariffs we impose on Malawi until that happens. Why is this desirable? Why should the amount of mangoes be linked to the amount of air conditioners? Who the hell knows? It’s just Trump’s idiotic obsession, and it makes no sense.
To make the stupidity even more obvious, think of an analogous situation. Ernesto sells tacos from a taco truck, and George runs a landscaping business. George occasionally buys tacos from Ernesto, and Ernesto hires George to mow his lawn. Suppose Ernesto pays more to George each month than George spends buying tacos from Ernesto. Is Ernesto being cheated? Is he subsidizing George? No and no. George gets every taco he pays for, and Ernesto gets his lawn mown on schedule. It would be ridiculous to say that either of them is being cheated, and ridiculous to say that the goal should be to make the amounts even.
Why is Trump obsessed with trade deficits? It’s because he is confused enough to believe that the existence of a bilateral trade deficit — a trading deficit with a particular country, Malawi in my example — means that they are cheating us and that we’re subsidizing them. He actually believes that we are just handing over the money, getting nothing in return. In reality, we get every frikkin’ mango we pay for, and they get every air conditioner they pay for. No one is being cheated, and to demand that the dollar amounts should match is idiotic and pointless.
Trump actually declares in his executive order that trade deficits are a “national emergency”. He does this because he doesn’t have the authority to impose tariffs unless it’s a national emergency. Otherwise, the job falls to Congress, where it belongs. Trump is lying about the supposed national emergency.
The formula
According to the USTR statement, the x in the formula is the dollar value of what we export to a particular country, while m is the dollar value of what we import from them. The numerator, x – m, is therefore equal to the trade imbalance. If x is bigger than m, then the difference is positive, and we are running a trade surplus. If x is less than m, then x – m is negative, and we have a trade deficit. But note that they have it backwards in the formula: it should be m – x, not x – m. Why? Because the denominator is positive. If both the numerator and denominator are positive, as they would be in the case of a trade surplus, the formula would deliver a ∆𝜏 that is positive. In other words, the formula as written would actually increase the tariffs for the countries with whom we have a trade surplus, and it would decrease the tariffs for countries with whom we have a trade deficit. The formula therefore punishes the (supposedly) good guys and rewards the (supposedly) bad ones, which is opposite to the administration’s intentions. One more indication of their clown car incompetence.
They could easily have corrected the formula if they were aware of the error. Just put a negative sign in front of the formula, or swap x and m, or redefine x and m as the amounts exported and imported by the other country, instead of the amounts exported and imported by the US. Any one of those three would fix the problem, but no.
Let’s assume that we have corrected that mistake for them and that the numerator now equals the amount of the trade deficit, not the surplus. What about the denominator? Well, it just so happens that the values they chose for 𝜀 and 𝜓 are 4 and 0.25, respectively. Those multiply to 1, thus canceling each other. How convenient. These charlatans actually and blatantly chose the values so that they would cancel out, instead of using the most accurate numbers they could find in the literature. They cheated.
After that suspiciously convenient choice of parameters, the formula is now just ∆𝜏 = trade deficit divided by total imports:
Do they actually apply this formula? No. They massage its output even more. They divide ∆𝜏 by two, for no good reason. That means that for the formula to match the actual tariffs, they should multiply the denominator by 2. They fail to do that, as you’d expect. Why 2? My hypothesis is that even those dunces realized that the numbers they were getting from the formula were ridiculously large, and dividing by 2 was a way to get them down to a range that they considered reasonable. More number fudging with no theoretical justification.
Next problem: according to the corrected formula, ∆𝜏 should be negative in the case of trade surpluses. That is, we should decrease the tariffs on imports from those countries. If the existing tariff rate is small enough, it should even go negative, according to the formula, in order to balance our trade with that country. Trump doesn’t like that, so he has arbitrarily declared that everyone will pay a minimum of 10%, whether there’s a trade deficit or a trade surplus. In other words, the policy, which is already misguided, is also unfair — it says that it’s OK for the US to screw other countries by imposing high tariffs, even if they’re doing the “right” thing and allowing us to run a trade surplus with them.
The actual rates
Here are the charts spelling out the actual tariff rates.
The chart labels them “Reciprocal Tariffs”, but that is a lie, since the formula doesn’t take into account the tariff rate charged by the other countries on our exports to them. It’s completely missing from the formula. They aren’t reciprocal tariffs, they’re misguided tariffs in response to trade deficits, and they punish US importers instead of the countries selling us those goods and services.
The label on the middle column is wrong for the same reason, and it’s even further wrong because it depicts a bilateral trade deficit as a quantifier of “currency manipulation and trade barriers”, which it isn’t. We can run a bilateral trade deficit for no other reason than that Americans want more of what the other country is selling us than they want from us. That’s not “currency manipulation and trade barriers”, and the Trump administration is dishonest for trying to sell it that way.
The numbers in the middle column are apparently those that come straight out of the formula. You can tell, because the tariffs that are actually being imposed by the US are just the middle column divided by 2. That’s the arbitrary factor of 2 I mentioned above. The only exceptions are in those cases where dividing by 2 would leave a less than 10% tariff, in which case the tariff is set to 10%. Gotta make sure that everyone gets screwed at least that much.
The US Trade Representative’s explanation
Now some excerpts from the USTR statement. The very first paragraph:
Reciprocal tariffs are calculated as the tariff rate necessary to balance bilateral trade deficits between the U.S. and each of our trading partners. This calculation assumes that persistent trade deficits are due to a combination of tariff and non-tariff factors that prevent trade from balancing. Tariffs work through direct reductions of imports.
Well, duh. The phrase “tariff and non-tariff factors” covers literally every possible factor in the entire world. Yes, there are actual reasons that we buy more in mangoes from Malawi than they buy from us in air conditioners. Therefore we should conclude that we’re getting ripped off?
While individually computing the trade deficit effects of tens of thousands of tariff, regulatory, tax and other policies in each country is complex, if not impossible, their combined effects can be proxied by computing the tariff level consistent with driving bilateral trade deficits to zero.
Not by any reasonable person. You need to do the homework before making policy decisions that will affect the entire world economy. If they want less of what we’re selling than we want of what they’re selling, that can lead to a trade deficit, independent of all the factors they list above.
This doesn’t mean that trade practices can’t be unfair, but it does mean that to assume something nefarious is going on merely because we’re running a bilateral trade deficit is stupid.
If trade deficits are persistent because of tariff and non-tariff policies and fundamentals, then the tariff rate consistent with offsetting these policies and fundamentals is reciprocal and fair.
No. If we like Malawian mangoes more than the Malawians like our air conditioners, nothing is broken. Nothing is unfair. No reason to blindly punish the Malawians. It just means that American demand for Malawian mangoes is greater than Malawian demand for American air conditioners. No big deal.
A case could be made for nudging the US’s global trade deficit — which is the aggregate trade deficit we’re running with all of our trading partners put together — toward zero, but trying to eliminate every bilateral trade deficit is bonkers. These people are clueless.
Consider an environment in which the U.S. levies a tariff of rate τ_i on country i and ∆τ_i reflects the change in the tariff rate. Let ε<0 represent the elasticity of imports with respect to import prices…
Right there they say that ε < 0, but a few sentences later they assign it a value of 4. The last time I checked, 4 was greater than 0, not less. Their sloppiness is consistent, at least. What is wrong with these folks?
let φ>0 represent the passthrough from tariffs to import prices, let m_i>0 represent total imports from country i, and let x_i>0 represent total exports. Then the decrease in imports due to a change in tariffs equals ∆τ_i*ε*φ*m_i<0. Assuming that offsetting exchange rate and general equilibrium effects are small enough to be ignored, the reciprocal tariff that results in a bilateral trade balance of zero satisfies:
As noted earlier, they have the numerator backwards. It should be positive for a trade deficit, not negative, in order for ∆𝜏 to be positive, which represents an increase in tariff rates.
To calculate reciprocal tariffs, import and export data from the U.S. Census Bureau for 2024. Parameter values for ε and φ were selected. The price elasticity of import demand, ε, was set at 4.
Which inside the Trump administration is less than 0, lol. And how convenient that εφ multiplies to 1, as noted above.
Recent evidence suggests the elasticity is near 2 in the long run (Boehm et al., 2023), but estimates of the elasticity vary. To be conservative, studies that find higher elasticities near 3-4 (e.g., Broda and Weinstein 2006; Simonovska and Waugh 2014; Soderbery 2018) were drawn on. The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25.
It wasn’t to be conservative. It was to fudge the numbers so that the product εφ came out to be 1. And picking a value of 4 for elasticity isn’t “being conservative” in the sense of “this value is more likely to be correct”. It’s conservative in the sense of “we’d better make this number big because otherwise the tariffs will be so outrageously huge that everyone will see that we’re idiots.”
Think about it. They want φ to be small (whether or not the evidence supports it), because they want to maintain the fiction that other countries will mostly absorb the tariffs and that importers and retail customers will shoulder less of the burden and therefore experience less inflation. On the other hand, a small φ balloons the value of ∆𝜏 to ridiculous levels. So they set 𝜀 to 4 to bring ∆𝜏 down, even while acknowledging that the true value of 𝜀 is closer to 2.
The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021).
I haven’t verified that, but either way I would sure like to see the actual number. Why didn’t they include it? Is it really 0.25? In any case, the question of pass-through to retail prices is irrelevant when you’re trying to determine which country is absorbing the cost of the tariffs. It’s the pass-through factor to importers that is relevant, and that is close to 1, even if the pass-though to retail customers is less. That means that US importers are bearing the cost of the tariffs and passing some of that cost on to consumers. It’s inflationary, and it’s a tax by the US government on US importers, not a tax on foreign countries. Which contradicts Trump’s whole rationale.
The reciprocal tariffs were left-censored at zero.
No, they were “left-censored” at 10, as you can see by looking at the charts. 10 is the minimum tariff you’ll see in the third column of the charts.
Higher minimum rates might be necessary to limit heterogeneity in rates and reduce transshipment.</p
No explanation of why “heterogeneity in rates” is to be avoided, and no comment on the fact that it isn’t avoided, given the large range of new tariff rates in the third column of the charts. That means there’s still plenty of incentive for transshipment. Take Vietnam, for instance, with a new rate of 46%. There’s a *lot* of incentive for them to transship through one of the countries with a 10% rate.
Tariff rates range from 0 to 99 percent.
There is no inherent limit. Tariffs could be 100%, 180%, or 2100%. 99% is an arbitrary limit. Tariffs could even be negative in a perverse world, in which case the government would be giving importers a bonus for importing more and nudging us toward a trade deficit. Obviously that wouldn’t happen in practice, but my point is that the 99% is arbitrary, and anyone who thinks tariffs are limited to being less than 100% doesn’t understand tariffs.
The unweighted average across deficit countries is 50 percent, and the unweighted average across the entire globe is 20 percent.
It’s pointless to state the unweighted average. An unweighted average is really just a weighted average with all of the weights set to 1. That gives Liechtenstein equal weight with China, which is stupid. Our trade volume with China is some 1,770 times as great as our trade volume with Liechtenstein, but these geniuses are weighting them evenly and presenting the average as if it had some kind of significance. Morons.
Weighted by imports, the average across deficit countries is 45 percent, and the average across the entire globe is 41 percent. Standard deviations range from 20.5 to 31.8 percentage points.
Here, they tell us that the import-weighted average of tariffs is 41 percent. Combine that with their assumed pass-through rate of 0.25. meaning that exporters in other countries will shoulder 75% of the tariff burden. That’s unrealistic and it clashes with the actual data, but even if you take the Trumpers at their word and assume that only 25% of the additional cost due to tariffs is passed to importers, that’s still over 10%, because 0.25 * 41% is greater than 10%. 10% import inflation! So much for Trump’s campaign promise: “I’ll reduce prices on day one.” Idiot.
Good job, Trump supporters. By voting for him, you put power in the hands of these dishonest and incompetent economic doofuses.
As you very well know, Trump is always in campaign mode. And to improve the looks, he will now personally be sharpying the official statistics.
To you, polls are whatever Trump says they are. Now statistics are also whatever Trump says they are. Disagreement with (much less hate for) the orange pedo is not allowed.
colewd:
He isn’t running against anybody. These are approval numbers. For example, the question Gallup asks is
In the latest poll, only 29% of independents said they approved of his job performance. A whopping 64% disapproved. That’s a full two thirds of the independent voters, whose opinions you used to value until you discovered that they think your Dear Leader sucks.
keiths,
A drop in approval is typical for a President in the first year. Whether he sucks or not will be judged after his 4 years.
He already had 4 years. And you are defending a pedo.
Edit: A post on official GOP account pictures Donald Trump with a car on the background, saying “The One Big Beautiful bill will drive the return of the great American car.” https://x.com/GOP/status/1951060331888889869
Except it’s a Soviet car on the background. Are Republicans still having their graphics done in Russia? Trump’s birthday military parade poster was also clearly made by Russian agents.
colewd:
We’ve already had this conversation, remember?
colewd:
keiths:
colewd,
The question you are currently dodging:
Erik:
Wow. That isn’t a parody account, either. @GOP is the official account of the Republican National Committee.
I’m convinced that the image itself is a parody, with a fake Daily Signal watermark, because no one would pick a car as ugly as that to represent the heyday of the American automobile even if they didn’t know it was Russian. It’s got to be a parody, but some doofus at the RNC didn’t get the joke and reposted it. I’m surprised they haven’t taken it down. It’s been there since yesterday afternoon.
keiths,
If you can demonstrate it is a bribe I will look into it.
A foreign government gives Trump a $400 million jet for his personal use during and after his term in office, and you’re wondering whether it’s a bribe? That’s exactly the kind of thing the Emoluments Clause prohibits.
Hi Keiths
The terms and conditions of the deal are not done and it’s still not certain if it will get done. The deal is transparent as far as I can tell. Let test this if the deal goes through.
False, lie, and idiocy.
The terms and conditions of Trump’s Qatar airplane deal are as follows:
– It will become Air Force One
– After Trump’s term, the airplane will go to Trump’s library
– It is an “unconditional gift” from Qatar
Very transparent bribery. The unsettled part of the deal involves how much the airplane would have to be (and whether it will be) rebuilt for security and who is going to do it. That is, it is only unsettled how to put the airplane into use in USA. The part involving bribery from Qatar is absolutely settled.
colewd:
You’re still dodging the question, which was:
That’s a question about what’s right, not about what’s going to happen. Suppose Congress blocks the deal. That doesn’t make Trump any less corrupt for wanting to accept the bribe.
As for transparency, do you really think that being openly corrupt excuses the corruption? If I’m completely open about planning to rob the local bank, are the police obligated to let me do it since I’m being transparent?
Michael Popok just posted this on YouTube:
Trump’s Worst GRIFT Just GOT EVEN WORSE
From the video:
keiths,
Openly corrupt 🙂
colewd:
Yes. Trump openly abuses his position for personal gain. That’s corruption, and the Qatari plane scam is just one example among many of how corrupt your Dear Leader is.
Are you under the mistaken impression that corruption is always clandestine?
Also, you’ve dodged my question yet again:
Is your answer “Yes, as long as he does it openly?”
This seems related to the Big Lie – the idea that even the most preposterous lie will gain traction and acceptance if it is repeated loud and long enough. Here, I guess the idea is that corruption becomes normalized if it is blatant and of sufficient magnitude. Which is compounded by broad application – Trump is corrupt in his grift, in his firing all the IGs, in his politicization of the DoJ, and the list can go on for a very long paragraph.
All by itself, an issue like giving billionaires huge tax cuts, or taking millions off medical insurance, or closing down USAID or the department of education, or gutting NIH, or ignoring court orders, would be unacceptable. But all of these at once (and many more) simply overwhelms normal concerns. Any particular complaint implies that the others aren’t as bad, and the sheer number of protesters all shouting at once drown out any coherent response.
Every one of Trump’s attacks on democracy targets a program or policy Congress went through agonies of partisan debate to get created in the first place. Even with a national will to repair the damage, it would take Congress decades to make a dent.
keiths,
If it is open and there is illegal corruption it will get flagged and stopped.
Except not by the justice department – everyone not totally loyal to Trump has been fired. And not by Congress, which votes along party lines for whatever Trump wants. And not by SCOTUS, which not only decides all cases in favor of Trump 6-3, but most cases they don’t even have oral arguments or written opinions, simply a 1-paragraph statement saying “we overrule the appeals court, Trump wins.”
So who else is there to flag and stop him? The big law firms he either intimidated or bought off? The mainstream media like ABC and CBS and Washington Post, who have all already surrendered? The social media, who have already paid millions in tribute? The American public, mostly people like you who simply don’t want to think about it? Who?
Flint,
Your point is he can be illegally corrupt and there is nothing we can do about it.
colewd:
That’s far from clear, as Flint notes.
Anyway, you’re still avoiding my question:
I’m not asking whether you think the deal will go through, and I’m not asking whether you think it’s legal. I’m asking whether you think it’s right.
keiths,
Assuming the deal is as you described it and he is still pushing it after he has had consultation then I agree he is wrong to accept it unless it is for presidential use only and is owned by the us government.
colewd,
Why do you think “consultation” is necessary? Isn’t Trump capable of recognizing on his own how unethical this plane scam is? If not, why should he be president? Don’t you think a functioning moral compass is a prerequisite for the job?
Remember (as described in the Popok video), the Qataris wanted the plane to remain in the hands of the US government, but Trump struck that provision out of the deal. He wants the plane for himself, even if it costs the taxpayers a billion dollars. No decent person would require “consultation” in order to recognize how corrupt that is.
A UMass poll released today found that 65% of voters think that Trump is corrupt.
Other dismal numbers from that poll:
Since April, Trump’s overall approval has dropped from 44% to 38%. His overall disapproval has increased from 51% to 58%.
Among independents, his overall approval has dropped from an already dismal 31% to an astonishing 21%. Bill must be loving that.
63% of voters think that the Trump administration is hiding important information about the Epstein case, and among those, 81% think Trump is to blame.
What a creep.
keiths,
Approval is different than the best alternative. What poll are you using here? It will be interesting to watch this. I hope you are willing to post this if the trend turns based on events like Russia Ukraine reaching a deal, the economy improving or the budget deficit reducing.
colewd:
You keep bringing up alternatives, but why? The election is over. Trump is the president. The question isn’t “Who are you going to vote for?”, it’s “Do you approve of the job Trump is doing as president?”. Only 21% of independents answer yes to that question, which is an astonishing number. They think Trump sucks, which makes sense. He’s objectively a terrible president.
It’s the UMass poll:
https://www.umass.edu/news/article/new-national-umass-amherst-poll-finds-president-trumps-job-approval-gap-slides-6
Of course. The poll numbers are what they are, whether I like them or not. I’m just glad that the trend is in the right direction and that so many independents have woken up to the fact that Trump is bad at his job.
keiths,
Alternative is everything as that’s how we choose. The poll numbers especially citing a single pole and not an aggregate of polls to eliminate noise does not tell us much and could lead to self deception.
I agree that Trumps popularity has probable dropped in reality but your attack has had little to do with his ability to do the job and more about his character. The bigger problem is the Democrats do not have a message or strategy beyond Trump is a liar criminal etc. We are not on solid ground until we have two competent strong parties.
I would like to live in a world in which I do not prefer Trump to the available alternatives.
Trump is political castor oil. Tastes terrible, is mostly placebo, but has a couple of useful vitamins.
I have no affection at all for anyone who would prefer not to see corruption exposed.
And no respect for anyone who does not see it.
Jules Pfeiffer said he hated JFK because everybody loved him, and he couldn’t be satirized. I prefer politicians who are hated. It’s much easier to talk about their faults.
petrushka,
Do I read you as believing Trump and his administration not to be corrupt? Extraordinary. Your respect, I can do without.
Allan Miller,
I have answered that several times.
I gave a link to the growth of personal wealth for congressmen. If you had looked at it you would not be reading me as tribal.
petrushka:
I would like to live in a world where people have the sense not to vote for corrupt kleptocrats who take bribes, sell pardons, try to steal elections, lie ceaselessly to the people, flout the Constitution, ignore court orders, commit felonies, and sexually assault women. Who are dim-witted, uneducated emotional toddlers who can’t admit their mistakes, lack empathy, adopt stupid policies that hurt the people, and shit on our allies, making the US weaker…
That ought to be a no-brainer.
colewd:
Friend:
Bill:
Bill’s wife:
Bill:
I repeat:
colewd:
I’ve cited no less than six reputable polls, all showing a massive drop in support for Trump among independents.
This thread is filled with criticisms of Trump’s job performance. And it’s not as if character and job performance are unrelated. Most of the shitty stuff he’s done as President is a result of his poor character — for instance, weaponizing the DOJ to go after his political enemies.
Your denial of reality is reaching Trumpian levels. Are you trying to emulate the Dear Leader?
There are several corrupt ways to get rich.
One is insider trading. This has been in the news recently. There was a movie, Wall Street, that explored the practice. Elected officials are exempt from the law, in fact if not theory.
Another is to manage an NGO at a ridiculous salary. Or have a relative do the managing.
Another is to have a child on a corporate board of directors.
Another is to pay friends and relatives out of campaign contributions.
That’s for starters. There’s never any need for a directly traceable bribe.
keiths,
Keiths
There are lots of assertions along with that are nowhere near any election. The post was originally an interesting discussion but now it is just a rant attacking someone you don’t like with no grounding in reality and understanding of what behaviour can be assigned to either party. Weaponising the justice system is an example. The more you rant the less credible you are.
There is a good chance history will expose how naive you are. If I am right I hope you learn.
colewd:
That sentence aren’t be with a coherent. But the phrase “nowhere near any election” suggests that you think Trump shouldn’t be judged unless an election is nigh, which makes no sense, as I’ve already pointed out multiple times.
A president can be good or bad even if we’re nowhere near an election. Isn’t that obvious? Isn’t it clear, for instance, that accepting bribes is wrong even in a non-election year?
What specifically am I saying about Trump that isn’t grounded in reality? I’ve been asking you for two entire months, but you just keep running away. Saying “You’re wrong!” is cheap and easy. It’s also unpersuasive. Let’s see you back it up for a change.
The topic is Trump, and the behavior I’m assigning to him is his own.
You really think there’s a good chance we’ll look back and marvel at how naive it was to think that corruption, sexual assault, dishonesty and incompetence were undesirable traits in a president?
petrushka:
If you want a $400 million personal jet paid for by a foreign government and souped up at a cost to the taxpayers of $1 billion, it’s gonna be directly traceable.
You are linking it to Trump. You seem to think Trump is doing something about it. If he isn’t,,what is its relevance here?.
Trump charges 5 million for a face-to-face, 1 million for a group chat. He pimps his crypto, boosts the fortunes of family members. Keeps a vanity jet. Eyes Gaza as a real estate opportunity, once the residents can be evicted. His corruption dwarfs that of any Congressman from either side. Are you OK with that?
colewd,
Ah Bill, Bill. The sheer irony.
The problem is clear. Trump is so awful that it becomes impossible to see. A dispassionate list of his faults is so extensive it becomes a ‘rant’. Any single criticism is just ‘TDS’ talking, or someone corrupted by the Radical Left media. But one day – one day, I tells ya! – we’ll look back and say “what a guy!”. We’ll gather at Mt Rushmore on Trump Day and gaze on his likeness.
Allan Miller,
This post started out fine as a discussion about tariff policy. The tariff seems at this point to be effective as a way to lower US debt and an effective negotiating tool preventing further killing going on in global wars. All with little if any inflationary effect.
It evolved into media indoctrinated TDS. I can see the emotion in every post. It’s obvious you guys passionately hate Trump. Let’s turn down the temperature and I commit to admitting I am wrong if all you guys are saying turns out to be true and he ends up his presidency with doing more harm than good.
colewd:
By making Americans and American businesses pay the tariffs. All while the Orange Idiot is running around claiming that other countries will pay the tariffs when in fact they won’t pay a dime. Meanwhile, he pushed the BBB through Congress, which is going to add $4.1 trillion to the national debt by extending tax cuts for the wealthy. Yay! Higher debt, paid for disproportionately by the non-wealthy, while the wealthy enjoy a huge tax break. That’s exactly what we want: more money for rich folks and less for everyone else. Won’t anyone think of the rich, who have suffered so badly?
Tariff threats have helped in one conflict — Thailand-Cambodia. Meanwhile Trump is weakening the US, alienating our allies by imposing tariffs on them, not to mention pissing them off by threatening to annex Canada, Greenland, and the Panama Canal.
Prices are higher across the board, and the rate of inflation jumped from 2.4% to 2.7% in June. Job growth has plummeted, and the news was so bad that the Toddler-in-Chief stamped his feet and fired the commissioner of the BLS as if it were her fault that his policies are hurting the economy. Then he lied about how the numbers were supposedly rigged, when they clearly were not.
Trump promised that he would bring grocery prices down starting on Day One, and by golly, he failed. They’re up. He promised that gas prices would plummet, and sure enough, they haven’t.
Yet at the Faith Office luncheon, he said:
Do you think it’s good to have a president who continually lies to the American people, won’t admit his mistakes, won’t change course when his policies are failing, and fires people for doing their jobs if they bring him bad news?
So you claim, yet after two months, I’m still waiting for you to rebut anything I’ve said about your Dear Leader.
Of course we do. He’s a horrible person and a horrible president. That doesn’t mean we’re being irrational. Sexual assault is a bad thing. So are corruption, lying to the American people, violating the Constitution and ignoring court orders, along with everything else we’ve discussed in this thread. It’s entirely appropriate and rational to despise a man who acts this way.
What would you advise? Do you think sexual assault is no big deal? Is the Constitution a stupid old document that no one should care about anymore? Are integrity and honesty overrated? Is election theft A-OK with you as long as it’s your Dear Leader who is doing the stealing?
“Turns out to be true?” It already is true. The stuff we’ve been talking about has already happened or is happening as we speak.
Allan:
Bill’s go-to escape hatch is “Just you wait!” He can’t defend Trump in the here-and-now, so he appeals to a fantasy future in which he will somehow be vindicated and Trump’s true greatness recognized. It’s laughable.
Sorry, Bill, but it’s a bit late for that. Trump is already a terrible president and a horrible person, and scholars have already rendered their verdict. He’s one of the worst presidents we’ve ever had, and even the Republican and conservative scholars agree on that. From earlier in the thread:
colewd:
keiths:
So you have learned nothing from the discussion. You have not looked up how tariffs historically worked. You have not followed the facts what effect they have right now.
First, tariffs are not “effective” “at this point” or any point. Trump keeps postponing them. Even now when the news say that Trump finally imposed tariffs on about 100 countries (imposed as opposed to threatened? who knows with Trump), ranging from 10 to 15 percent on former partners and up to 50 percent on countries Trump does not like, the caveat is that
THE TARIFFS ARE SCHEDULED TO TAKE EFFECT IN THREE WEEKS FROM NOW!!!
Thus tariffs are not effective right now. Thus far it’s been a series of tariff *threats* and chickening out by Trump. He has tested them out in practice only with some goods (as opposed to blanket tariffs that he threatened at first) from Canada and Mexico, and you are entirely wrong that there has been no inflationary effect with the goods concerned on that front. Do you care about facts like this? No, you don’t. You flatly lie about tariffs because you:
– Know nothing
– Do not care about facts
– Only believe pro-Trump media propaganda (including the idiocy that Trump has ended any wars, as if tariffs had something to do with ending wars)
Also, what effects have the *threat* of tariffs had thus far? Did you take a look at the stock market? Did you see how Trump tweeted “time to buy!” thus confirming himself for a thousandth time as blatantly corrupt (something that petrushka does not like when Democrats do it – which they never even have -, but when Trump does it he has no comment because he is a hyperpartisan hypocrite like yourself). Nah, you do not care about facts.
Why have you not admitted that Trump did any harm in his first term, e.g. insurrection on Jan6? Why have you not admitted that his business history is a series of bankruptcies and frauds? It’s because of your own media indoctrination. One as brainwashed by media as yourself is in no position to judge anyone else’s level of indoctrination.
You keep ignoring the fact that the majority of commentators here are outside US, which means
– We have no Dem vs Rep partisan bone in this discussion
– Our press has no Dem vs Rep partisan bone in this discussion
Whatever we say comes from an entirely independent and non-partisan perspective insofar as American domestic politics are concerned. But due to your unhealthily biased and one-sided media diet and wilful ignorance of basic facts of the world you do not care. You only see through American domestic hyperpartisan goggles.
To recap:
– You have been wrong all along
– You are wrong right now
– You do not care about being wrong, because in your mind wilful ignorance of facts is a winning strategy
You are defending a criminal incompetent corrupt moron to the point of emulating him. This is as deep as cultish indoctrination can go and you are that. Even the fact that he is a pedo does not move you, so clearly you have no moral compass whatsoever.
colewd,
Slavish cultism. That.very reflexive utterance of “TDS” is itself strong evidence of a cultist. You were taught to say it by the man himself. But as I have said, “x Derangement Syndrome” has a long prior history as a feeble deflector of criticism.
“Media indoctrinated TDS” is a nice double-whammy of deflection: 2 mutually reinforcing reasons why we can’t be comsidered rational.
Crikey, what gave it away? Yes, I hate him. for the reasons listed. It’s not like we have to scrat around for flaws. This was the point of my prior post. A truly awful person naturally inspires “xDS” amongst their detractors. By being awful. His slavish cultists, meanwhile, can brandish that as a sword. “You only says he’s evil because you don’t like him”.
Wha?
I simply do not believe this. If you can’t see it now, you will not see it in the future. Also ‘doing more harm than good’ is a bit of a low bar, and impossible to quantify. You already think ordinary Americans paying an extra tax is reducing debt, when the supposed intent is to repatriate manufacturing- or negotiate, or whatever he says it is today, which acts against any (already weak) debt reduction should those tariffs actually be collected.
I struggle to imagine how awful you must have pictured life under Kamala if this [gesticulates wildly] …this is your preferred alternative.
Out of several corrupt ways to get rich, why do you keep coming back to this one? Here’s a (not at all) wild guess: Because you have special hatred for Nancy Pelosi, hyperpartisan hypocrite as you are.
And why specifically “corrupt ways to get rich” as opposed to simply “corrupt ways” period? Exorbitantly corrupt people usually already are rich. And, being rich, they often do not engage in corrupt practices to gain more wealth – they already have enough wealth for multiple lifetimes. Usually they do it because “everybody does it” and they do it to expand their circle of influence.
Why specifically an NGO as opposed to any other form of corporation? Here’s another (not at all) wild guess: So that e.g. the $2B bribe from Saudis to Jared Kushner would be exempt from the definition, and also the Qatari Trojan horse airplane to Trump would be exempt from the definition. Your way of defining corruption is carefully delineated so as to make Trump a pure innocent boy, because you are a hyperpartisan hypocrite.
False. Even the ways you listed are traceable. And, of course, Trump’s corruption and bribes are eminently in-your-face blatantly obvious and traceable and require truckloads of wilful ignorance to look past.
Allan, to colewd:
Right. I doubt that Bill recognizes that the stated goals of the tariff policy are mutually exclusive. They cannot all be achieved.
Also, I don’t see how Trump’s tariffs can work as an incentive for repatriating manufacturing. Suppose you’re an executive thinking about building a factory in the US. It’s a huge investment, and it needs to pay for itself over many years. Manufacturing is more expensive in the US, so in order for the factory to be competitive, the imports it’s competing against have to be more expensive, too. The only way to make them expensive enough is to charge high tariff rates, so you, in your role as an executive, need to be confident that the tariffs will stay in place long-term and that the rates will remain high.
Why should you be confident of either of those things? Trump’s tariff policy is constantly changing, and he reliably chickens out when the markets react negatively to his policy moves. Even if he doesn’t reduce or eliminate the tariffs, there’s no guarantee that future presidents won’t. They could do so with the stroke of a pen. Even worse, the tariffs have already been ruled illegal, so they’ll only remain in effect if the administration’s appeal succeeds, and right now the market (created by Lutnick’s firm, Cantor Fitzgerald) is betting 3-to-1 that the lower court ruling will be upheld and that the tariffs will be eliminated. Under these circumstances, why would anyone be willing to bet that a US factory would be profitable in the long run?
Trump himself probably isn’t smart enough to understand that, but Lutnick and Bessent are. They are amoral bottom-feeders, deliberately lying to the public in exchange for proximity to power.
It’s interesting that stock markets plummeted on the initial announcements. Since, they have recovered those losses and then some. Does this mean markets have got on board with their benefit? Not necessarily. I think it’s more “we’ll believe it when we see it”. It could be seen as damning (by someone with TDS) that the markets may regard Trump as too unstable to take seriously. A cultist, meanwhile, would insist they are signalling their approval.
Saw this exchange today:
Reporter:
Trump:
Nobody’s seen anything like it, and they’ve seen it twice. The man is dumb as a rock.
A more complete picture is stock market + bond market. The bond market is still so deep in the hole that when stock market and bond market are considered together, the situation has not rebounded.