From an outsider’s perspective, it’s difficult to discern any coherent U.S. strategy—assuming one even exists. One day it’s a 145% tariff on China. The next, it’s “Well, it’s still 145%, but Apple and Nvidia are exempted because their stock prices might take a hit.” Then comes a 90-day pause, adding to the confusion.
It’s not clear whether Jamieson Greer is actually steering this, or if any of it was thoroughly thought through.
This is the only explanation that has made sense to me so far. And it makes even more sense based on these exemptions.
https://www.instagram.com/share/_jW_V1hwM
This is Senator Chris Murphy explaining it’s not economic policy, it’s an attempt to blackmail corporations into submission by making a deal with him in return for sanctions relief.
Keep an eye out for what Apple and nvidia might have agreed to give.
The term for this is extortion.
The last time tariffs were this high, it led to rampant corruption as companies would pay off customs officers. This was one of the reasons for switching to an income tax. For the current administration this possibility counts as a major opportunity to generate personal wealth.
But this isn't the only reason for the policy. For someone who is at heart a coward, bullying and brandishing raw power over others is its own reward. That reason enough for the policy, and damn the consequences for the nation.
I guess for a change Americans will experience what Indians have been subjected to since forever.
Just about anything useful and high quality has been tariffed out of existence in India. It is done in the name of protecting our industry while they catch up with rest of the world.
Exactly backwards has happened. The cars we get here are so bad they are sometimes called tin cans on wheels. Without competitors from across the world Indian auto makers have absolutely no motivation to build world class cars. And it shows on the road.
Heck yea.
I expect lower tariffs in India to cause harm while also forcing economic activity.
What about Tata Motors? They own jaguar & Range Rover as well? They have zero good cars? Perhaps Chinese EV will enter into India.
Tata Motors have really good cars. But they suck big time at Quality Control and after sales service.
Yes they do own Jaguar and Range Rovers but it’s not meant for the Indian market. They do sell them here but not many takers.
There is also a reason tariffs only get raised on a multi-generational time scale, e.g., 1820s, 1890s, 1930s, 2020s.
The effects are so bad that nearly everyone who remembers the disaster must have died off for anyone to think it is a good idea.
At this point, it is obvious that there is no geo-political or geo-strategic plan of any type. The administration is just winging it, and Sen Murphy's explanation is the only one available.
It was also noted that the person occupying the president's chair said "they must be forced to negotiate". When someone is forced to negotiate, that is not a negotiation, that is extortion. Welcome to another nation run like a mob office.
You are 100% spot on in this analysis. Thank you for summarizing it so well.
It's exactly what it is. And, the seemingly haphazard, unpredictable nature of it is a feature, serving as perfect cover:
"Why these exemptions?"
"Who knows? None of it makes sense."
But, of course, it does.
It's also consistent with other, publicly-wielded cudgels, like the law-firm extortions under threat of executive orders.
People should be more alarmed of these law firms, they will be used as his private army.
People should be more alarmed, the bar does not expel the lawyers at those firms from the profession. They must be breaking every misconduct rule.
"The ABA rejects efforts to undermine the courts and the legal profession" - https://www.americanbar.org/news/abanews/aba-news-archives/2...
Rule 8.4: Misconduct: https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibili...
I think his private armies are going to be his private armies. Think Wagner group, to be deployed domestically and in central/South America.
As opposed to his public army, which he actually does control as President of the United States. I’m alarmed of that.
I’m sure the richest corporations are rushing to retain these firms in an attempt to be on the winning side.
> This is Senator Chris Murphy explaining it’s not economic policy, it’s an attempt to blackmail corporations into submission by making a deal with him in return for sanctions relief.
Weirdly the same explanation works if you're being less uncharitable, i.e. Apple agreed to invest $500B in the US but everybody knows new factories aren't going to be built overnight, so they get a reprieve from the tariffs for now provided they continue to go through with the investment. Which in turn makes them immune from future tariffs once they're actually making iPhones in the US, while allowing the tariffs to be reinstituted against anyone who didn't do likewise.
Apple can agree to invest 500B to build a factory, but they don't have to actually do it.
Building a factory takes years, and a big chunk of that happens long before you actually start work on site.
You gotta find a site, work with local govt to negotiate servicing, environmental report (there's a couple years, and potentially a couple go-arounds right there.)
So there can be lots of activity, lots of progress reports, lots of optimism, for a decade or more before any real money has to be spent.
Ultimately Apple et al can "agree" to anything, the president can have his "big win" and things can carry on just as before.
Why did he implement the tariffs in the first place?
The $500b was announced more than a month ago
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2025/02/apple-will-spend-more...
> Why did he implement the tariffs in the first place
It's easy to forget that for a day or two they said it was because of fentanyl.
He's been talking about tariffs since before the election, so they likely were anticipating it.
My comment is a reply to the parent implying he paused the tariffs due to Apple's investment
> Weirdly the same explanation works if you're being less uncharitable
Annoyingly, "assume the worst about people, especially those on the opposite side of the political spectrum" seems to be the norm these days.
Well if Trump wants it to not seem back-handed to create a scheme to force companies to come to him to negotiate, he should be open about it then
I wasn't talking about Trump specifically, or even conservatives.
Everyone on both sides automatically thinks the worst about everyone on the other side these days, usually just to score some internet points.
It's a terrible way to go through life. We should show a little grace sometimes.
Just a good time to remember that the same guy who thinks tariffs are a good idea is the guy who stood at a podium during Covid next to the world’s leading expert and suggested injecting bleach into Covid patients was a good idea.
And was caught on mic saying he likes to grope women.
I would not say anyone is ‘automatically’ questioning Trump’s character or intelligence.
There is plenty of evidence he has neither.
Truth is, Trump never said anything particularly intelligent or insightful. I think most commenters in this thread would make smarter decisions and would give better answers to tough questions without resorting to deflections and personal attacks . He always needs someone around to explain his boasting comments to make it seems logical, but this term, he’s not even surrounded by smart people anymore. It’s frightening.
You really are proving that user right, considering Trump never suggested injecting bleach.
I beg to differ. Quote from Trump:
“I see the disinfectant that knocks it out in a minute ... is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside, or almost a cleaning?"
"Because you see it gets inside the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it would be interesting to check that”
https://www.axios.com/2022/04/26/birx-calls-trump-disinfecta...
Edit: found the actual video. Enjoy!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zicGxU5MfwE&pp=0gcJCdgAo7VqN5t...
The guy is a full on moron who thinks he is a full on genius.
Never mentioned bleach. Mentioned UV disinfection right before that quote.
Never suggested it or said it's a good idea. Just said it's interesting, worth checking out, and has to be done by medical doctors.
Completely manipulating and twisting what Trump said to further your agenda - again proving the user above right. Is what Trump said stupid? Yeah. Did he suggest to inject bleach? No
OK so he suggested injecting disinfectant. Which is basically the same as bleach. If you can’t tell that from the video I’m not sure what’s going on anymore.
He also talks about putting UV lights inside the body, which is still a bit dumb, but not as dumb as injecting or ingesting disinfectant or bleach.
If you want to say he is only says it could be ‘interesting’ to inject or consume disinfectant then sure, why not - that’s still insane and dumb in equal measure.
He even tries to walk back his comments later saying he was being ‘sarcastic’ which he very clearly was not.
When you get a wound, it's often a good idea to disinfect it. Do you wash your wounds with bleach?
When you are engaged in a conversation is it a good idea to crater the conversation by myopically focusing on one minor detail, to the detriment of everyone else?
When your point is defeated and you were wrong, maybe make a new point instead of being hung up on how anyone who points out your blatant lies is nitpicking and focusing on minor details.
You're proving that user right. Taking one minor quibble about what this other poster said, which was obviously not a full recitation of all of Trump's highly questionable conduct over the years (as opposed his less questionable conduct) isn't the slam dunk you're making it. It's more like nitpicking that goes well beyond the point and only serves to demonstrate you interest in arguing small details and not anyone's actual points.
Nitpicking? Minor quibble? It was the major point that the user brought up.
> Just a good time to remember that the same guy who thinks tariffs are a good idea is the guy who stood at a podium during Covid next to the world’s leading expert and suggested injecting bleach into Covid patients was a good idea.
First sentence, right here. It's complete dishonest framing to make what Trump said seem as bad as possible. Which just goes back to the parent user's comment:
> Everyone on both sides automatically thinks the worst about everyone on the other side these days, usually just to score some internet points.
>Nitpicking? Minor quibble? It was the major point that the user brought up.
Not really. The major point the user brought up: "I would not say anyone is ‘automatically’ questioning Trump’s character or intelligence. There is plenty of evidence he has neither." That's like reading comprehension 101.
>First sentence, right here. It's complete dishonest framing to make what Trump said seem as bad as possible. Which just goes back to the parent user's comment:
Not really.
>> Everyone on both sides automatically thinks the worst about everyone on the other side these days, usually just to score some internet points.
Exactly what you did to the other poster. The other poster was clearly saying there is great reason to not assume the best about Trump. Your response? Ignore that and bicker about a minor detail.
And the bleach argument was the supporting argument for the statement regarding intelligence.
> Not really.
Yes really.
> Exactly what you did to the other poster. The other poster was clearly saying there is great reason to not assume the best about Trump. Your response? Ignore that and bicker about a minor detail.
No. The poster used that bleach argument as the reason here - which is a completely dishonest argument. It's not a minor detail.
Is this how the discussion should go, in your dream world?
- Trump is bad!
- Trump is good!
- Trump is bad!
Since, according to you, actually discussing the exact cases/reasoning brought up is quibbling over minor details, nitpicking.
>And the bleach argument was the supporting argument for the statement regarding intelligence.
It was but one example of a list much longer than the post you responded to, which anyone who was fair would recognize.
>Yes really.
No, not really.
>No. The poster used that bleach argument as the reason here - which is a completely dishonest argument. It's not a minor detail.
The bleach argument was one example and you're being nitpicky about it anyway.
>Is this how the discussion should go, in your dream world?
Strawman.
>Since, according to you, actually discussing the exact cases/reasoning brought up is quibbling over minor details, nitpicking.
You're not engaging the substance of his argument while decrying that exact failure in everyone else. You say people should focus on main points and not quibble about small details and it's exactly what you are doing.
When did you engage with the main point that Trump has poor character and is unintelligent? You didn't. You're bickering about whether or not he literally said inject bleach. Okay, throw out the bleach part. The point still stands but you don't want to discuss it because you just want to quibble about the bleach. It's a complete waste of time for anyone interested in engaging in a conversation. Maybe he was wrong, maybe he misremembered, maybe in this one instance he isn't being fair. You don't engage in any of that and you assumed the worst. It's exactly what you're complaining about and I'm not going to sit here repeating myself because you like to argue.
> It was but one example of a list much longer than the post you responded to, which anyone who was fair would recognize.
"Anyone who is fair would see it exactly how I see it!"
> No, not really.
Yes, really.
Wonderful way to have a conversation, isn't it. Everything else in your response is nitpicking and hanging up over minor details!
> The bleach argument was one example and you're being nitpicky about it anyway.
The other example was groping. So I refuted half the points the user made, pretty major to me. It's not being nitpicky, it's major difference. If I said Kamala wanted to establish soviet like price controls, people would rightfully correct that and that wouldn't be nitpicky or hanging up over minor details.
> Strawman.
No, you are just nitpicking.
> When did you engage with the main point that Trump has poor character and is unintelligent?
I did, by engaging in the DIRECT argument that the user provided for him being unintelligent. User said "Trump did X. He is unintelligent". I'm supposed to say "ohh no but he is intelligent" completely ignoring the reasoning for his conclusion? In an actual conversation, you engage the reasons provided - otherwise it just turns into unproductive "no/yes/no/yes" conversation.
>"Anyone who is fair would see it exactly how I see it!"
That's not what I was saying. I was saying anyone would reflect there is a long list of questionable behavior. Whether or not you think that is disqualifying is your opinion. Scam university, scam banks, scam businesses. These are facts of Donald Trump's past, not opinions.
>Wonderful way to have a conversation, isn't it. Everything else in your response is nitpicking and hanging up over minor details!
It's not everyone else. It's you. And it's because that's what you did to the other poster and I was rightful in calling it out. You could just stop instead of digging in.
>The other example was groping. So I refuted half the points the user made, pretty major to me. It's not being nitpicky, it's major difference. If I said Kamala wanted to establish soviet like price controls, people would rightfully correct that and that wouldn't be nitpicky or hanging up over minor details.
You didn't say that the other example was groping. You only talked about "injecting bleach" and even then not reasonably engaging in it, just pulling the kind of "technically right but clearly not getting the point" kind of argument that I accused you of. If you want to engage with the other poster fairly, you can. You didn't. It's not the end of the world but no need to keep belaboring the point by bringing up things you never expressed which would have totally changed the situation.
>No, you are just nitpicking.
How is that nitpicking? I never said conversations should go like that, so there is no reason to ask me why I would prefer it go that way. Do you not know what a strawman argument is?
>I did, by engaging in the DIRECT argument that the user provided for him being unintelligent. User said "Trump did X. He is unintelligent". I'm supposed to say "ohh no but he is intelligent" completely ignoring the reasoning for his conclusion? In an actual conversation, you engage the reasons provided - otherwise it just turns into unproductive "no/yes/no/yes" conversation.
That wasn't the entire argument. Are we now going back to grade-school reading comprehension? I quoted his point. You ignored that in your response to me where you continue to pull this obnoxious shtick. ENOUGH!
> I'm supposed to say "ohh no but he is intelligent" completely ignoring the reasoning for his conclusion?
You did completely ignore the reason for his conclusion. He said there are many reasons why Trump has questionable character, you zero'd in on a minor detail of one of those arguments and did not address anything else, let alone Trump's actual character and why it would or would not be good based on evidence. Then you accused him of doing it on purpose! You're really rude and a really bad poster that is doing exactly what you complained about and now your ego is too big to walk away. Sad!
> That's not what I was saying. I was saying anyone would reflect there is a long list of questionable behavior. Whether or not you think that is disqualifying is your opinion. Scam university, scam banks, scam businesses. These are facts of Donald Trump's past, not opinions.
If I address any of those points, would I be nitpicking and picking on minor details?
> You didn't say that the other example was groping. You only talked about "injecting bleach"
The user brought up groping and injecting bleach. I refuted the bleach argument, leaving the groping argument alone. It's also not technically right, it's completely incorrect and absolutely disingenous framing.
> You did completely ignore the reason for his conclusion. He said there are many reasons why Trump has questionable character, you zero'd in on a minor detail of one of those arguments and did not address anything else
I addressed ONE of the TWO reasons the user provided. What other reason am I supposed to have addressed? Should I start making some up?
Rest of your post isn't worth addressing it's just the same junk.
>If I address any of those points, would I be nitpicking and picking on minor details?
If you only did that while ignoring my main point, yeah. Not sure why this is a difficult concept for you to grasp.
>The user brought up groping and injecting bleach. I refuted the bleach argument, leaving the groping argument alone. It's also not technically right, it's completely incorrect and absolutely disingenous framing.
Disagree there, which can be fine and reasonable. But don't pretend you addressed the poster's point, which wasn't the bleach thing. This is basic reading comprehension, again.
>I addressed ONE of the TWO reasons the user provided. What other reason am I supposed to have addressed? Should I start making some up?
He provided more than two and you didn't address his point at all. You just repeatedly bickered about small details about one of the points and said he had bad intentions.
>Rest of your post isn't worth addressing it's just the same junk.
Look who is talking. I wish I could report posters like you, you're the worst.
It's like going in circles with you. Let's start simple.
> He provided more than two
What other reasons did he provide?
It's in his post. Why am I going to be quoting verbatim from his post at this point in the conversation?
So just those two then. Otherwise you would have mentioned the other reasons.
This dumb bothsiderism take is exactly the reason for the shitstorm hitting US right now. People really need to stop sane washing everything he says and try to actually have an objective glance at him and take him for who he is: a con man. He made a majority of conservatives as goddamn fools, voting against their own best interests because he said he'll punish the right people. Spoiler alert: he instead concentrated power in his own hands, dismantled research and social nets and is well on his way to wrecking middle class and the rights of the workers. Until this simple fact is acknowledged, every Trump voter is complicit in making this happen.
hey now, the non-voters and the terrible decision makers in the democrats also share in this blame
What social nets did he dismantle?
Similarly, democrats need to acknowledge that they are responsible for Trump getting elected. Immigration was one of the biggest issues for voters and it went rampant under the democrats.
It is sorta insane to me how someone can exist in the same reality that I do, and not be aware of, like, the main part of the platform that dude is implementing right now? Perhaps that is caused by all the mentions of DOGGY/Musk getting instantly flagged off the front page, but weren't they pretty open about their plans? It's all in project 2025. It's such a large amount of open and well-documented information that compiling it all myself would take a while, so I decided to give the Gemini Deep Research a try, here are some excerpts (but you can ask it yourself or literally just google):
> A central guiding force behind the austerity measures implemented in 2025 was "Project 2025," a comprehensive policy blueprint developed by conservative think tanks. This project advocated for a fundamental restructuring of the federal government, calling for a reduction in bureaucracy, significant tax cuts, and decreased spending across various sectors, including major social programs like Medicare and Medicaid
> The Social Security Administration (SSA) experienced significant changes and faced substantial workforce reductions under the Trump administration's austerity drive in 2025. Driven by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the administration announced plans to cut approximately 7,000 employees from the SSA, representing about 12% of its total workforce. This reduction followed a decade of underfunding for the agency's administrative budget, which had already shrunk the workforce considerably. Alongside these staff cuts, the SSA initiated the closure of regional offices and the termination of leases for numerous field offices across the country. These physical closures raised serious concerns about diminished access to in-person services for beneficiaries, particularly those residing in rural areas or lacking reliable transportation.
> Further limiting accessibility, the SSA eliminated phone services for most applications and for changes to direct deposit information. This policy shift mandated that individuals needing these services either visit an SSA field office in person or utilize the agency's online tools. This change disproportionately affected seniors, individuals with disabilities, and those without consistent internet access or digital literacy. Adding to the concerns surrounding the program, reports emerged of the administration classifying living immigrants as deceased, leading to the cancellation of their Social Security numbers
> Adding to the uncertainty, the House budget resolution for FY2025 called for significant spending cuts from the Energy and Commerce Committee, the very committee with jurisdiction over Medicare. Analysts raised concerns that the magnitude of these proposed cuts, totaling $880 billion , would be virtually impossible to achieve without impacting major healthcare programs like Medicare.
> Simultaneously, the Trump administration proposed several changes to the ACA. These included shortening the annual open enrollment period by a month, ending coverage eligibility for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, and limiting the coverage of gender-transition care by defining "sex-trait modification" as not an essential health benefit. Furthermore, enhanced ACA subsidies, which had significantly lowered premium costs for millions of Americans, were set to expire in late 2025. The administration also significantly cut funding for community-based organizations that assisted individuals with enrolling in ACA coverage, Medicaid, and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
> The Trump administration's austerity measures in 2025 also significantly impacted unemployment benefits and workforce development programs. Republican funding bills, shaped by Project 2025, proposed the elimination or substantial reduction of funding for key workforce development initiatives, including Youth Job Training Grants, Adult Job Training Grants, the Senior Community Service Employment Program, and the Women's Bureau. These cuts directly diminished the resources available for individuals seeking employment training and job placement assistance.
> The austerity measures implemented by the Trump administration in its second term in 2025 represented a significant and multifaceted retrenchment of the federal social safety net. Driven by the policy framework of Project 2025 and operationalized through the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), these measures encompassed substantial workforce reductions across federal agencies, significant proposed budget cuts to key social programs, and policy changes aimed at tightening eligibility and restricting access to benefits. While the administration often framed these actions as necessary for fiscal responsibility and government efficiency, the analysis of available information reveals a consistent pattern of cuts and changes that disproportionately impacted vulnerable populations. Seniors, individuals with disabilities, low-income families, children, and immigrants faced increased barriers to accessing essential services and benefits across Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, SNAP, and housing assistance programs. The reduction in workforce development initiatives further threatened opportunities for economic advancement. The cumulative effect of these measures painted a picture of a significantly weakened social safety net, potentially leading to increased poverty, food insecurity, homelessness, and lack of access to healthcare for millions of Americans.
Mostly Gemini delivered a good overview of the changes, but it doesn't include stuff like people's pension plans being dependent on economy being in "number go up" state, which is not the case now.
You said Trump dismantled social nets. Your AI slop doesn't mention any social nets that were dismantled.
Please tell me, what social nets could one rely on before Trump that they cannot now?
> but it doesn't include stuff like people's pension plans being dependent on economy being in "number go up" state, which is not the case now.
Sounds like a ponzi scheme.
So is it that you fail to see how any of the actions mentioned in the "AI slop" can result in lack of access to safety nets by certain population groups, or do you merely assign no value to those specific nets or those specific population groups? In former case I suggest you refer to dictionary, otherwise a history book will do. Look up what happens in any of the authoritarian regimes when all the undesirables are processed, and whether people who had guns or privilege were somehow exempt from all the frog boiling machinery in the end. "First they came for the socialists..."
You said safety nets were dismantled. Please tell me, what safety net was dismantled. Just one, the biggest one you can think of.
Again, I provided a whole list, you just refuse to count them. Even the SSA cut alone will result in people being unable to access the services they need, as repeatedly discussed in media:
https://www.newsweek.com/full-list-social-security-office-cl...
If you still insist that none of what I posted fits your definition of social net being dismantled, I invite you to post a definition that you have in mind. Given that I am confident I can find a match for it in activities of the admin.
That does not make it dismantled. People can still get social security. Just because some office is closed and now they have to travel further or do it online, does not make it dismantled.
Dismantled means destroyed. To take apart. It means that people can no longer rely on it. Them having to use the internet instead of calling is not dismantling.
Okay, as you yourself said, dismantled means taking apart. Here's a dictionary definition of it: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/take-apa.... SSA actually is a great example of this happening, as the existing social nets are split into different parts and one-by-one parts are removed as to not cause a reaction from populace. This is why I previously mentioned frog boiling machinery, as it is a part of divide-and-conquer tactic. This is why I mentioned the first they came for socialists poem.
And if you read the article I linked, you would find there why this effectively removes access to it for some people. Some of the people in most vulnerable groups of population who need these nets most don't have access to reliable transportation and internet or struggle using devices to access it. It doesn't mean they don't deserve to have it.
SSA still exists, it wasn't dismantled.
You should go ask people who can't access it anymore if it was dismantled enough.
It's not like they're building an iPhone factory, anyway.
The $500b investment is going towards a bunch of things, including a factory to build servers for their AI services.
provided they continue to go through with the investment
I recall the Foxconn Wisconsin situation, and I have no doubt Apple et al are well aware of it. String out a pretense of building factories in the US for the next three and a half years? Easy peasy. President Trump will soon get bored of this game anyway and move on to the next one; he already looks like he's bored of it and it didn't bring him universal acclaim and admiration.
Apple will not be making iPhones in the US. Labor costs would be too high, the supply chain for the raw materials and the parts is non existent, etc.
It’s a sop to Trump just like when Cook did the dog and pony show and bragged about making the 10 Mac Pros that they ship in a year in the US.
co-sign, it's the King's Tax (as Murphy had explained in a different video I watched of his). it's that simple. also it was a giant elephant to make everyone forget that they just exposed an entire military action over Signal in a completely illegal and extremely incompetent way.
I’m British so not that knowledgeable about us politics beyond the big players.
How well known is Murphy? I’d never heard of him until I saw this video but he seems very impressive and much more electable than Biden or harris.
About as well known as a politically active Lord would be in the UK. The general public probably doesn't recognize his name, anyone interested in politics does.
Murphy isn't well known.
He's getting more well known pretty fast, over all this. His explainer videos of what's going on and why it's so dangerous are often kinda boring and basic if you're a politics nerd–but that's great, because we don't need to be told, it's the folks who aren't politics nerds who need to be educated on this stuff.
This happens in politics all the time. In a couple weeks nobody remembers the politican or anything they said or did.
he's a US Senator. Senators are very important here
Yeah I get that he’s a senator! I mean how much in the public eye is he. Would a random person know who he is?
We have hundreds of Members of Parliament here in the UK, but probably only 10 that most people could name.
I wondered how big his public profile is.
Most Senators are not well known nationally (sadly) unless they’ve either:
- done a non-negligible Presidential campaign
- been born from a famous family
- the press either love them or love to hate them
- have a leadership position and/or are conspicuously ancient
Relentless self-promotors are a superset of 3, the ones who succeed
Unfortunately being sensible, cooperative, or good with policy isn’t on the list
It can occasionally work for state Governors
I think Bernie Sanders is the only current senator I'd expect a random American to know. Murphy might make the top 5 highest profile senators but you wouldn't know him if you don't pay attention to politics at all.
> How well known is Murphy?
He's the senator from the state I live in, so I know him and think he's excellent.
> much more electable than Biden or harris.
He represents a northeast blue state. It's difficult for those types of Democrats to carry non-coastal states in a presidential election, no matter how good they may be.
I suspect Bill Clinton tacked rightward to carry some southern states in 1992 and 1996, which led to his election.
Christ, Al Gore (2000 election) couldn't even carry his home state of Tennessee, so you can see how difficult it is to elect a Democrat to the presidency.
John Kerry (Dem from a northeast blue state) got smoked by George Bush in 2004.
I'm still trying to understand how Obama won twice, but I think it boils down to the fact that he invigorated the African-American vote in some key southern states.
tldr: Chris Murphy is great--unfortunately, he's the kind of Democratic presidential candidate who'd probably lose outside of the coastal states.
* edit: I would have been 'happy' with either outcome in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections. McCain and Romney are/were decent and serious people. In fact, Romney was roundly mocked by the Dems in 2012 for saying that Russia was the US's greatest external threat. In retrospect ...
> Keep an eye out for what Apple and nvidia might have agreed to give.
Well we know Nvidia did give a million dollars already:
"A $1M-per-head dinner at Mar-a-Lago is how you get AI chips to China" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43652504
I keep seeing these explanations of “4D chess”. It’s Donald Trump. He has absolutely no idea what he’s doing when it comes to economic policies. Unless you believe he can see into the future of how other world leaders would react and consistently outsmart everyone else, there’s no 4D chess being played.
This isn’t advanced negotiation tactics, it’s mafia style negotiation tactics, which are 100% in character. See the law firms now providing him with 100s of millions in pro bono work to avoid punitive executive orders.
They never mentioned if they are providing "him" - as in the US government, or "him" as in Donald Trump, 100s of millions in pro Bono work ...
I learned that "4D chess" just means, "I see the 3 dimensions, I can't explain what's happening, but I guess they can, because they have that extra dimension.".
At this point it's something like 100D chess, because 99 levels of "Why?" have been explained by "because they're morons" but the defenders keep believing there's an extra dimension...
No, it's not 4D chess, and neither is extorting companies with tariffs, extorting law firms with threats of executive orders, or hammering universities by withholding funds.
It's all blunt-force checkers that any simpleton with power can easily understand.
What about believing that he's a particularly-easily-manipulated patse (esp. when it comes to things he doesn't care about), and so this is someone else playing 4D chess through him?
For all the accusations of fascism, nobody seems to remember that a key feature of fascism is a corporate-cabal shadow government that legitimizes its activities/policies by puppeteering the "real" government to both execute and justify them.
That's what German industrialists were hoping to achieve through Hitler, but they didn't end up with anything like it.
That was more or less the case during Trump's first administration. I think a lot of normie Republicans were hoping for a repeat of that. The ones that aren't in denial are being gravely disappointed.
How can somebody even entertain the idea is able the hold the concept of Chess, much less 4D, while at the same time being aware he nominated Matt Gaetz for Attorney General...Let that sink in for a while...
"In 2020, Gaetz was accused of child sex trafficking and statutory rape. After an investigation, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) decided not to charge him. In December 2024, the House Ethics Committee released a report which found evidence that Gaetz paid for sex—including with a 17-year-old—and abused illegal drugs during his tenure in the U.S. House of Representatives."
What matters is loyalty. The chess being played is for full unitary executive power, essentially making Trump an autocrat. Everyone bends the knee to him, or is too powerless or afraid to oppose. Like what has happened with Putin in Russia.
The worse they are, the worse their other prospects are, and so the less power they have that wasn't granted by Donald Trump. It looks to me like this is about loyalty, which is about Donald Trump gaining more personal power.
Classic supervillain mistake - hiring incompetent minions. Sure, they're loyal. But they don't work.
hard to attribute to competence what you can attribute to malice. just as law firms are being squeezed for $600 million of services through extortion, this is Mafia mentality as well where first something is held hostage and then negotiated for. given the parties involved, I would even assume that there is personal benefits staked in this, and lots of insider trading of course
Completely agree no 4D chess here. Just a guy that wants to keep the attention on him, one day is kissing Russia's ass, the next day when "peace" is failing, it's tariffs, etc etc no strategy at all, just a show to stay on first page day after day.
It's more than that. What you say is true about his character, but there is also a playbook to keep power. The autocrats copy one another. And he has people like Steven Bannon who are strategizing how he can serve a third term.
Yeah he’s obviously in no state to decide on policy. We don’t know who is running things but it’s not him, a number of factions moving the direction a little bit in their favor whenever they get the opportunity. And of course there is massive insider trading going on too.
Genuinely curious what your take is on Biden's competency during his presidency.
Waay better.
Interesting. Even with Biden seemingly confused on stage so often and slurring his words?
I'll have to look closer at Trump's public appearances.
My take is Biden sounds old. The sitting president sounds brain-damaged and unquestionably is in no condition to be making such impactful decisions. The wavering we see right now is because the different factions making the decisions are struggling against each other.
Occams razor. It's Donald Trump, I've known he was a joke since the late 80s. In middle school. Baffling to see millions of people think reality TV is real and give him nuke codes.
I knew he was a joke in the lates eighties at middle school - in the UK. Baffling indeed. I am US citizen now - equally baffling on some days...
It's infuriating to rational thought but watching videos of Trump supporters talking about why they support Trump in spite of him hurting them makes it clear where his support comes from - it's a rainbow coalition of the discontented. Obviously the editors will pick the most provocative videos/sound bites but it's a pretty consistent picture.
> It’s Donald Trump. He has absolutely no idea what he’s doing
He knows exactly what he is doing[0], and the rest is designed to distract voters from noticing
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43661680
[0] https://www.dataandpolitics.net/70-million-in-60-seconds-how...
Trump is determined to be remembered by history for his bold moves and "greatness". There is no 4D chess here. There is no such thing as 4D chess.
At best, he's using these tariffs as a temporary means to exert pressure and watching how others respond to them, almost like acting like the crazy man with a gun to make people a little more willing to negotiate terms more favorable for the gunman. At least as a matter of intent, anyway. The actual effect is another matter.
What I don’t understand is why Scott Bessent is going along with these harebrained schemes. He supposedly was the big brain genius who devised the trading scheme that George Soros used to break the pound. Surely he anticipated the outcome of Trump’s plan.
If I was charitable to Trump, I would think that he genuinely wants to move manufacturing back to the US, and is likely being supported by the military faction of the government. There is a decent chance of a hot war with China in the future, and you really can’t win wars if you can’t build stuff at home quickly. As things currently stand, China can vastly out produce America in the event of a war
A war with China would be over in about 15 min with both sides utterly destroyed
Instead of coming to Trump for pledges of political loyalty those companies should instead come to Europe to be able to make business again freely.
I wouldn’t count Europe as a reference of a free market at all. Regulations and bureaucracy are rampant.
A free market requires regulations in order to operate. Regulations require a bureaucracy in order to be effective.
> Regulations require a bureaucracy in order to be effective.
That's a very European point of view (though not uniquely European, it's also shared across many other cultures, e.g. in East Asia). The US has done pretty well with private rights of action. In fact, because our culture is so conservative and anti-authoritarian, centralized bureaucracies are rather quickly defanged or grossly underfunded. The most recent example is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and more quietly the FTC. Democrats would have done much better to roll back judicial expansion of the Federal Arbitration Act and devolve "regulation" back to states and private class actions, rather than to create the CFPB and elsewhere double-down on anemic, extremely inconsistent, and often highly partisan agency regulators.
Where private rights of action tend to fail is when they concern inchoate or non-individualized harms, like you often see in environmental protection law. Then what you get is complete paralysis, such as with real estate development; largely because its the process, not the end-state determination of rights, that private actors weaponize. But when they're firmly anchored to property rights, personal injury or loss (including fraud), etc, they seem to do as well as centralized regulation. And in the US, they arguably do better, because of our political dynamics.
USA is not anti authoritarian. It is pro-authoritarian and consistently so.
Conservatives are dismantling environmental protection, but it has nothing tondo with freedom or being anto authoritarian. They just dont care about consequences as long as their donors can earn more money in the short term.
Yet also, US seems to be crumbling and rhe source of instability. They may succeed in exporting their dysfunction to Europe, but it did not happened yet.
> That's a very European point of view (though not uniquely European, it's also shared across many other cultures, e.g. in East Asia).
No, that's a very Smithian Economics point of view, an economic philosophy which underpinned most of American capitalism's history.
True, but everything should be done in moderation. We could definitely do without ESG mandates and such, and even the European Commission has publicly recognized the need to debloat the European Union a bit.
If you don’t want to deal with a capricious regulatory environment, Europe is not the place you want to go.
> Europe to be able to make business again freely.
I mean… Europe isn’t particularly well-known for being particularly business friendly. There’s a lot of good there for sure but there’s also a lot of barriers. And I say this as a Canadian who is also disappointed by the overall business environment at home.
These companies could choose to invest in the US instead and not have to worry about any of this.
Tariffs are only usable as extortion if the companies have outsourced the manufacturing that gutted our middle-class.
Externalizing variables comes with risk. This risk should be factored into planning in the future. Just because a politician in the 90s promised cheap labor through globalization, a president 30 years later can flip the script
I'm not downvoting you, because I think you make an argument that many would make.
"Tariffs apply to imports, so produce locally instead".
The argument unfortunately has 2 flaws;
A) local production is expensive (which is why manufacturers fled decades ago.) If it is reintroduced here those goods remain expensive.
B) most things are not made in one place. Steel comes from here, electronics from there, energy from somewhere else, and so on. Even farmers use imported fertilizer, machinery and so on. Since the Tariffs are on "everything" (not just finished goods) they drive up the cost of local manufacturing even more.
A long-term strategy to increase local production makes sense. But it has to be done in a targeted way so as not to harm everything else. Typically it starts with finished goods, then slowly working down the food chain to improve the supply of parts making up those goods.
Exemptions on finished goods (like electronics) kills any gain. He might have, for example, exempted electronic parts. Which would then incentivize assembly to be local. Once you have local assembly you could look at say packaging, and so on.
The approach taken though doesn't lead to the outcomes being touted. Tariffs at country level are dumb. Excempting finished goods is dumb. Tariffs on things that can't be made locally (like coffee) is dumb.
That's before we talk about stability and certainty. For Tariffs to work you need both, and neither are in play here.
What’s interesting to me is that in this horribly corrupt state of affairs we find ourselves in, there are thousands upon thousands of smaller businesses that are not able to seek redress the way a megacorp like Apple or Nvidia can. Your run-of-the-mill office furniture importer doesn’t have the same ability to book up a dinner and pay the requisite multi-million dollar lobbying fee as a Silicon Valley magnate. In the before times, these folks would form interest groups and lobby Congress as a unified front, but at the moment it seems as though that doesn’t work anymore. It doesn’t take imagination to see a highly noncompetitive, post-capitalist future where only the goods from megacorps are exempted, and the goods from medium sized businesses are taxed to oblivion, destroying any semblance of free markets.
Mid-cap stocks peaked two days after the election and have been free falling every since. [0]
Most of small businesses supported Trump.
https://www.barrons.com/articles/small-business-owners-voted...
They are getting exactly what they voted for. I have a hard time feeling any sympathy for anyone who is being hurt by Trump who voted for him.
If this is an attempt at blackmail it appears to be failing. It's only been a few days and Trump has already unilaterally capitulated on several major positions. Unless he's blackmailing himself, the 'plan' is backfiring.
"Trump to investors: My policies will never change" - https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-investors-my-policies...
You don't know what capitulations are happening behind the scenes
No, so far we only see the very public capitulations coming from the Trump administration. We're also seeing a lot of signaling, also very public, from every other major economy that they are prepared to move on without the US.
If we translate this into negotiating at a used car dealership, I don’t think it would look that different. Of course everyone is going to project strength in public communications. Doing otherwise would put them in a worse negotiating position. You have to make your opponent think you’ll do something drastic, or else they won’t budge. So you have everyone yelling about how they’re doing something drastic. Just like the first salvos at a used car dealership - dealer sets a ridiculous price, buyer declares they are going to walk away.
By the way I don’t think this is 4D chess. More like basic classical international relations. It just looks more like the 1800s than the 2020s, which makes people confused. It doesn’t take any particular cleverness to enact basic negotiating strategies. It just takes a lack of caring about collateral damage.
> more like the 1800s than the 2020s
No need to go that far. 1970s would suffice.
Can you tell me more about what you mean here? I feel like world wars were the transition point between realism and “liberal order” ideology. I’m curious what change you see happening where the transition point is 1970s.
Given Trump's persona would you expect him to be hush hush about capitulations to him?
I would expect him to post "Tim Apple came to kiss my ass great guy I will allow him to make great computers in America!"
Some of it maybe straight up bribes, aided by Trump's crypto-stuff.
What worries me more is a promise of cooperation helping Trump identify people to put into concentration camps.
There could have been deals/agreements behind the scenes. This is not a republican "first". The democrats did the same to get Facebook and other social media to censor news. Trump is literally playing their book but with his style.
Anyone who can not see the obvious difference in substance, intent, scope, and scale is either willfully ignorant or seriously lacking in reading comprehension and reasoning skills.
Requesting curbs on rampant disinformation is not even close to the same thing as crashing the economy to extort our closest allies and major business and industry players.
Yikes
Censorship is censorship.
Who are you to decide what is or isn't disinformation?
Who is anyone?
I prefer to do my own critical thinking.
It is also well documented that Meta's rampant censorship extends far beyond "disinformation".
https://web.archive.org/web/20250411170102/https://www.drops...
Who are you to decide what is or isn't disinformation?
You can ask this question about any belief or position on a topic. We each decide for ourselves the answer and society decides this through its elected leaders and the judiciary. All societies regulate speech.
A request to not amplify disinformation is NOT censorship. A threat of legal or military action is.
Of course there are edge cases, but blatant and hard-debunked falsehoods such as "The earth is flat", "Contrails are chemical spraying", Russia did not attack Ukraine", "Vaccines cause autism", "Auschwitz and Dachau were not concentration camps where people were killed" are all disinformation, and they are disseminated for the very specific purpose of undermining trust and the capability of western societies to survive, for the purpose of implementing authoritarianism.
If you evidently expect a society to unilaterally disarm and do nothing, you are part of the problem.
I think it's good to consider what the implications are if Hanlon's razor fails... but I'm not giving up hope that this is all just a result of the incompetence of Trump and his administration either.
Hanlon's Razor is worse than useless if the target is aware of the principle. Then they can be malicious and play it off as incompetence. Which works especially well when they are also surrounded by genuine incompetents. They can also be, and often are, malicious and incompetent.
It's like saying "if it's white, fluffy and has four legs, never assume it is anything but a sheep". If the wolf knows you're applying that logic, what happens next?
Hanlon's razor is a great counterbalance to peoples' natural inclination of assuming people aren't dumb. The problem is when people divorce it from that context and assume it applies in general.
Which didn't really work since what exactly are US tech companies giving Trump in exchange for eliminating tariffs?
And are only large corporations expected to play? I import shopping bags from Chinese manufacturers from my store, like millions of other small businesses do. What exactly are we supposed to offer Trump?
Buy a meal at Mar-A-Lago, $5mil a plate.
The second worst part is the actual food on the plate is just a dumped out bag from McDonalds.
> And are only large corporations expected to play? I import shopping bags from Chinese manufacturers from my store, like millions of other small businesses do. What exactly are we supposed to offer Trump?
You'll eventually be buying them, for more than you pay now but less than the imported price, from a large US company that bribed whoever Dear Leader is at the time, for exemptions.
Bribes. Obvious bribes. Over and over. How many millions do you spend on your Mar-a-Lago memberships? How many nights do you pay for empty rooms in Trump hotels?
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intell...
Sorry, but what would have been the consequences of the tariffs on Chinese imports? Do you imagine American citizens having to pay twice or more for an iPhone (or not getting one at all) because of Trump? Not being able to afford a new laptop, because of Trump? Not being able to buy all the cheap consumer electronics, because of Trump? The "blackmail" (except it's simply the consequences of his own actions) goes two ways here- see also the TikTok debacle: or how to explain to hundreds of millions of enraged Americans that they cannot use their favourite social network because of Trump.
I think the most probable outcome is that Trump causes enough trouble to incite the whole country against him.
I don't see him completing his term. He's going to be impeached.
If he's impeached, it will be after midterms change the composition of the house. He will be acquitted in the Senate though
It's theoretically possible that the Republicans will also want him removed from office. Right now it feels unlikely. If he had kept the random crazy tariffs high and that resulted in some financial disaster that was more likely. But he changed his mind and the markets seem to be recovering (so much for we lost trust and it'll never be the same again).
The rich have always blamed others for the growing wealth gap.
Americans often point to outside forces instead of holding the government accountable.
Years of messaging have trained people to support tariffs, spending cuts, and even anti-immigrant policies—despite the need for labor.
The real issue isn't spending, it's taxation. And we've let China ignore WTO rules for too long. Trump should've targeted tariffs at China alone—but he is the president, not me.
Specifically, what WTO rules are your saying China has ignored?
I am just going to go with Google AI on that one
China's WTO compliance record is often criticized for several reasons, including violations of market orientation principles, state-led industrial planning, excessive subsidies, and non-transparency regarding subsidies. Furthermore, China's policies on forced technology transfers, intellectual property protection, and governmental procurement have also faced scrutiny. Here's a more detailed look at the specific WTO rules China has been criticized for ignoring:
Market Orientation and State-Led Industrial Policies: China's approach to economic development, characterized by state-led industrial planning, is seen as inconsistent with the WTO's principles of market orientation and non-discrimination.
Subsidies and State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs): China's extensive use of subsidies for domestic industries, including SOEs, and its failure to make timely and transparent notifications of these subsidies, are major points of contention.
Forced Technology Transfers and Joint Venture Requirements: China has been criticized for requiring foreign companies to transfer technology to Chinese firms as a condition for market access, which violates WTO principles of fair trade and market competition.
Intellectual Property Protection: China's record on protecting foreign intellectual property rights, including trade secrets, has been a long-standing issue, with concerns about theft and lack of enforcement.
Discriminatory Trade Practices: China's policies on governmental procurement, discriminatory standards for technology, and restrictions on market access in services sectors have been criticized for hindering fair competition and market access for foreign companies.
Failure to Reciprocally Open Government Procurement: China has been criticized for not fully reciprocating the government procurement concessions it pledged as part of its WTO accession agreement. Retaliatory Use of Trade Remedies:
China's use of trade remedies, such as anti-dumping and safeguard measures, has sometimes been seen as retaliatory and inconsistent with WTO princip
(They were also supposed to let Visa and Mastercard in)
Also Capital Controls are a big one. You can't get your money out and I have read several times people are forced to spend more money in China to get part of their money out.
More Google AI
China maintains strict capital controls, limiting the flow of money in and out of the country. These controls affect both individuals and companies, with restrictions on repatriating profits and capital. While there are annual limits for individuals, businesses also face specific procedures and conditions before they can repatriate profits, according to INS Global Consulting. Elaboration: For Individuals:
Annual Limits:
Chinese residents have an annual limit of $50,000 USD equivalent for transferring money out of the country, says Wise.
For Companies (FIEs - Foreign Invested Enterprises):
Capital Account Regulations:
China's "closed" capital account means companies must comply with strict rules when moving money in or out, according to CNN.
In Summary: China's capital controls are a complex system that limits both individual and corporate capital movements. While there are some recent efforts to relax controls, they remain a significant factor for businesses and individuals operating in China, requiring careful planning and compliance with regulations before any money can be moved out of the country.
https://sccei.fsi.stanford.edu/china-briefs/chinas-use-unoff...
Targeted tariffs don’t have an effect because products are reimported from china via other countries like Mexico.
He was impeached twice already with zero impact. No one is forcing him to leave office.
About 30-40% of the country will stand behind the cult of Trump no matter what he does. With that power, almost every single Republican politician is afraid of getting primaried. Trump has already been impeached twice and it went nowhere.
It's crazy that the election hinged on such small proportions of the population, that the result for Trump was prison or wealth (through further lawlessness) and the result for USA was a chance for middle-of-the-road socialism vs a rapid descent into being a fascist regime.
Crazy knife edge.
You're kidding yourself (or you've been misled) if you think there was a chance of anything approaching socialism from a Harris administration. Even granting the benefit of the doubt that "middle-of-the-road socialism" was what she meant by "opportunity economy", there still stands the fact that construction is complex, and takes coordination between interests at scale where destruction is simple and can be done (apparently) unilaterally.
Per Churchill, “To build may have to be the slow and laborious task of years. To destroy can be the thoughtless act of a single day.” .
This assumes that he has more power than the tech companies on the everyday life and I wonder if that is really the case. As I'm not located in the states, I'm very much interested to hear from a US resident if that is really the case.
>This assumes that he has more power than the tech companies
lol
Even the San Francisco city council is bullying American tech companies and tech executives.
The power of US tech companies is vastly overstated.
The biggest mistake tech companies have done over the past 2 decades is not spending enough money lobbying. Every other industry manages to stay under the radar by continuing to pay both sides. Tech industry never got involved in politics so they were easy targets for politicians on minor issues.
> The biggest mistake tech companies have done over the past 2 decades is not spending enough money lobbying.
What does "enough" look like?
I mean given that they are in tech, the biggest mistake was being located in a city or state. I can understand that they have to deal with the US government (any company anywhere in the world have to deal with it) but they don't have to deal with San Francisco/California. They choose that position and they don't deserve sympathy for being passive about it.
A tech company can’t shoot me with impunity under “qualified immunity”. Put me in jail, harass me because I don’t look like a belong in my own neighborhood, take my property under civil forfeiture without a trial…
You're right about these most serious adverse outcomes, but don't forget what could happen if you (say) randomly get your Big Tech account locked/suspended/banned for some reason that was ultimately erroneously flagged by an AI, and then cheerfully executed at scale.
The examples you provided are more fundamental and I won't trivialize them, but making you lose your "keys to your own digital space" is a very real power they have over you.
Okay? I lose my Google account and lose my Google Photos, they are also backed up to iCloud and One Drive and vice versa. All the music I bought back in the day from iTunes is DRM free and has been since 2009.
I lose my Amazon account, so what?
> This assumes that he has more power than the tech companies on the everyday life
How?
From the perspective of a citizen’s everyday life who sees that their life is getting more expensive and consumes information from a curated essentially list - eg. Instagram, fb etc - from the operator of that platform. I don’t think that the average person in the states - like in my European country - watches tv or buys a newspaper. In this context is the PR and hence effect from the government more than that of the tech companies ?
As an American, I regret to inform you that you're trying to use logic to understand a situation where it seems like logic wasn't used (in terms of the economic impact). These are the same fuckwits that tried to claim a trade deficit is the same as a tariff.
There is no plan. Talk tough, reverse under pressure, rinse repeat. Anyone surprised must not have watched season one which aired in 2019.
The "smart trumpers" I know have already staked out the entire range of possible outcomes:
1) He is completely restructuring global trade and decoupling us from China which is tough but necessary medicine because our biggest geopolitical adversary cannot be our largest trading partner
2) You can't believe half of what he says, he's all bluster, he's addicted to deals and will sign some fake deals to score a domestic win and we will resume status quo
Like yeah - sounds smart, but which is it?
2 ignores all the damage caused in the meanwhile
1 is wrong because if he wanted to decouple us from China he'd lower tarrifs on other countries especially close allies
Right so nothing he is doing is smart or makes sense, and the "smart" people who try to put intellectual scaffolding around his actions get repeatedly disproven by his subsequent actions...
Thinking the status quo will return so easily is like Putin pulling out of Ukraine and saying "So we're back to 23rd January (Edit/Correction: February) 2022, right, friends?".
The trust in the US (dollar) hegemony has now been eroded, and will probably continue until a purge of the regime of idiots (not just the oust of one idiot...).
Well yes, either position was dismissibly stupid.
No president is going to ride out a self-imposed multi-year global trade reconfiguration triggering inflation, shortages and unemployment.
Nor is putting the genie back in the bottle possible now and so even if you return to status quo trade policy, you've now spooked the world re: reliability of US as partners, US dollar, US debt, etc.
Worst of both worlds really. Incredible self owns over and over.
The goals are petty profit, some extortion, some illegal trading. Destroying 80% of the value of the US isn't meaningful if he gets to own a lot more of the remainder. Everything is profit for the broke real estate conman of 2015.
Neither. They're unwilling to concede he's run out of the Kremlin and the chaos and damage is the only purpose. The only reason he backs down on any of it is because he can't afford not to, so he's doing the usual brinksmanship, instructed by whoever's telling him to axe those obscure aviation safety committees (someone has detailed info), and probably hoping he can flee to Moscow at some point.
I don't think he'll be let off the hook, though. He's tasked to ruin us well below 'status quo', even for people diligently not paying attention.
3) It's a plan for him to (unconstitutionally without Congress) create such enormous Import Taxes on the American people that they replace the eeeevilll federal Income Tax. This situation will magically persist indefinitely as people continue to buy and produce in the same pattern as before for no reason.
He has a plan, it is called Project 2025. Trump appointed the authors of the Project 2025 plan and they are executing it. Here is the chapter on trade and tariffs, authored by Peter Navarro who is currently Trump's senior counselor for trade and manufacturing.
https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_CHA...
If Trump is America's Napoleon III, who is the world's modern Otto von Bismark?
I'd nominate Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni. As authoritarian "president for life" since 1986, he's demonstrated some savvy statecrafting amid Africa's resource wars and ethnic violence, making the country a point of stability and economic growth on the continent.
(Of course, he's got plenty of negatives on the record too. But I think in the game of "Great Man History", he's already left a big legacy.)
I'm curious as to why you chose Napoleon III. The context under which he rose to power seem quite different from Trump's. America isn't in the middle of a 60-years long revolution/counter-revolution cycle. What are the similarities?
Thin-skinned, seeks popular acclaim as a substitute for respect from the old money he despises, erratic and contradictory policy strategies.
Hate to say it, but perhaps it is Putin. Not a perfect parallel but he seems to be playing Trump skillfully.
Million dollar "dinners' seem to help.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intell...
Import Chinese battery: 145% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Chinese laptop: 20% tariff
Import Chinese battery inside Vietnamese laptop: 0% tariff
Truly this will bring back American manufacturing!
The factories will be disassembling the laptops, taking out the batteries. Then the empty laptops will be sent back to China. That will increase exports to China as well.
That's another patronage angle. When the feds buy Lenovo laptops, they have to comply with TAA. So they ship the laptops to Texas, "materially transform" them, package and ship to the customer.
You can be sure some crony owns the company that screws the display and puts stickers on the laptop with minimum wage workers.
The plan is to make every country and CEO grovel at the feet of the boss to be exempted from the tariffs. I’d say it’s corruption, but it’s more like a protection racket.
I wonder what these companies had to offer?
It's far from the only place the policy is incoherent. They fired the top ranking officer at the US base in Greenland for having the temerity to tell their host nation "I do not presume to understand current politics, but what I do know is the concerns of the US administration discussed by Vice-President Vance on Friday are not reflective of Pituffik Space Base."
> the policy
The evidence is "incoherent" because the hypothesis is wrong. A policy for America isn't there.
In contrast, everything becomes exceptionally coherent if you instead ask what the policy is for Trump's personal goals: punishing disagreement, amassing wealth, rewarding apparatchiks, and always being in a room full of flattery.
There is no planned strategy. Planning requires learning about entire systems, and Trump isn't smart enough to do that. He can only act on things placed before him. If he sees foreigners making money by selling into the US, he has to raise tariffs on it. There is no second order, third order, or any deeper level of understanding of what's going on. It's purely superficial action, on things Trumps eyes sees, not what his brain sees. There is no brain in there that can predict what would happen if tariffs were raised. He can only raise tariffs.
To be smart is to have systemic understanding, and Trump & the Republicans are incapable of that.
It's exactly what happened in his first term, when he got rid of the nation's pandemic preparedness because why would anyone ever need that, right?
> "assuming one even exists"
I actually doubt it does. Everyting is just too chaotic to be a strategy.
Agreed. I think at this point we can discard the assumption of 4D chess.
(This is not to say that there aren't some Project 2025 plans in the background that parts of the administration are aiming to push through.)
The plan: What if we ran the richest, more powerful country on history as if it were a giant meme stock geared to benefit those in charge?
Every company that wants an exemption has to pay. It's a personal tax system.
> it’s difficult to discern any coherent U.S. strategy—assuming one even exists
Not sure why there is a presumption that one exists or that its coherent. With even the slightest critical eye its easy enough to discern that this isn't about economic policy or trade and that the proposed "policy" doesn't make any sense. The guy in charge of this stuff is either seeing what he can get away with, fucking with people, or building a narrative...
that is to say what you are watching isn't "real".
It feels like we just hired a recent graduate, who is an egotistical know-nothing, to manage our databases. And he just decided to migrate all of the DBs to the cloud in the middle of the day without testing it, or checking any metrics. Now he wants to fail some of them back and thinks that should be "a cinch" but doesn't actually understand how anything works under the hood.
> assuming one even exists
Why would you assume that?
I don't know why people keep expecting Trump to be different than what he has consistently shown us for all these years. There's no subtle plan. There's no long-term plan. He's cranking the levers immediately available to him for the drama, as he has always done.
People around him may have ideas and plans. They can sometimes get him to agree to one of these, but it never lasts long.
I mean, his rich friends made 340 billion in the stock market chaos. So I suspect there is at least a vague plan, but it has nothing to do with anyone but himself and those who support him getting richer. But that's the only plan I think Trump has ever had in his entire life, or will ever have.
Like he's just not that deep. He's an incredibly shallow, inexperienced, dim, incurious old man who has never worked a job in his life, never built anything, never did anything. He arrived on top and his greatest achievement in life was managing to not lose it, in a country where it is specifically very hard to do that.
And hearing his supporters talk about how strong he is is just objectively hilarious. Man looks like 4 steepish flights of stairs would kill him stone dead.
I don't like him either, but it's not like accomplished nothing: https://www.cnbc.com/2010/11/09/Donald-Trumps-Best-and-Worst...
There are some failures in there but also some wins, like buying air rights for. Heap and making effective use of them.
You found a puff piece from 2010 to extoll Trump?
(It appears to be a promotional piece for a "CNBC Titans" episode featuring Trump.)
I try to assume good intent, which includes not writing off the odd things people post as bot-generated, but in this case, attributing this to a bot is quite a positive spin.
Maybe it's a puff piece, but it contains examples of what he did with his life and businesses. You couldn't write an article like that after 2015 or so without it being influenced by his disaster of a political career.
My point is, he didn't just sit on daddy's money, he actually pulled off a couple of savvy moves. There are plenty of other things to criticize him for.
> his disaster of a political career.
45th and 47th president of the USA as a disaster seems to be setting the bar unbelievably high for failure.
Why would you want an article on someone that excludes context from their most impactful and most visible decade? It's true that an author today, who knows about his 2024 conviction for fraudulently overstating the value of his properties, would bring a much more skeptical eye to claims about what a success they were. Did he seem to be making better deals in 2010 because he was better at it then, or because nobody was looking as closely at whether they were really good?
Because the first guy I replied to claimed Trump never did anything earlier in his life but inherit money, and I wanted to provide examples of how that isn't true.
The Tiffany's transaction definitely happened, and no landowner in Manhattan has left money on the table like that since. As scummy and self-promoting as he is, he changed the real estate market in NY and made some investments that paid off in the 70s and 80s.
I think that puts to rest this idea that he just rested on daddy's money and then lost money on his Atlantic City casinos, or whatever.
(Standard disclaimer that he has always sucked, and maybe he never made a good business move after the 80s.)
Did the Tiffany's transaction definitely happen? Is there any independent verification of Trump's claims that he obtained their air rights under favorable terms because other developers were leaving money on the table?
“Well, it’s still 145%, but Apple and Nvidia are exempted because their stock prices might take a hit.”
That's a massive misread. You are confusing the direction of influence between secondary public stock markets and federal executive orders.
The tariffs are supposed to strengthen self sufficiency, and discourage imports of stuff the US can do on their own.
Chip manufacturing, (which by the way is often only the manufacturing and not the design or IP of the chips), is an exception for whatever reason, may be labour costs, but it may also be that chips are a mineral heavy and diverse product, so it's one of the few products where autarky isn't feasible or very rewarding.
And there would be situations without exemptions where the US may have been incentivized to import the raw materials and rebuild megachip factories, of which there are only like a dozen in the world, creating a huge output inefficiency due to political reasons on two fronts.
Exceptions are reasonable.
> Exceptions are reasonable.
If there were an actual strategy, exceptions would have been clear from the start.
When it comes to global impact, can you even confidently say you're being strategic? It almost feels like staying tactical is the only viable strategy - there are simply too many variables. The chances are high that any strategy you come up with is doomed to fail.
I'd say it's clear that none of it was thoroughly thought through at the least.
I think its crystal clear there is no actual plan.
Did you link this implying "this is the plan?"
Cause this talks of a gradual implementation of tariff to avoid scaring the markets, which is as far from what happened as it's possible.
Much like Russia's overnight transition to a market economy in 1991, which opened the door to oligarch pillaging of national resources, 2 successive economic crises and a bond default, and 2 brutal wars in Chechnya.
Something tells me Trump's top economic advisers aren't based in the US, just as Yeltsin's strings weren't being pulled from Moscow.
Many people in trump's circle might have one or more plans but that is not the same thing as trump having or there being "a plan."
That's how corruption works in a banana republic. Good things for my friends, hell for everyone else. It is the furthest you can be from free trading capitalism that the US was preaching while it was good for them.
it’s difficult to discern any coherent U.S. strategy—assuming one even exists
The strategy is to keep everyone unsure what might come next.
It's like in boxing. When you hit your opponent and leave them confused and uncertain what you might do next, you use that to your advantage and keep on hitting. It's how you "win."
As if there are any winners here.
He isn't really hitting an opponent though, he is mainly hitting the U.S.
If Trump has learned anything, it is that the US is a lot easier to bully than others. He is convicted of a felony, he talks down to his own voters, abandons his biggest promises (repealing ACA and building a wall) and they still let him lead the country!
>The strategy is to keep everyone unsure what might come next.
If the goal is to encourage investment into US manufacturing, then that's the exact opposite to the strategy he needs - investment requires stability and confidence that the N-year investment will eventually pay off. Nobody will invest due to tariffs if the tariffs might disappear tomorrow.
His goal is to create confusion; to "flood the zone".
Him and his cronies know when that flood is coming and can profit from it.
It's only confusing if there is any expectation that he is working for the good of anyone else.
they thought it up and published a report back on it in nov 2024.
here's the plan, you can use it to advise your investments:
https://www.hudsonbaycapital.com/documents/FG/hudsonbay/rese...
the media is garbage and they can't cover anything well enough to inform. but i bet clicks are up!
So firstly if this is the theoretical underpinning the White House should be messaging that instead of what they've been saying. Also I've read that report before (this and some other reports have been referenced in media I have listened to) and I wouldn't say they are following it closely, if this was their plan it's already gone well off the rails laid out here.
Edit: to be more specific it literally talks about the potential pitfalls of unilateral tariffs, suggests imposing them over time, etc. There's a lot of stuff in there the US did so but also a lot that they did not follow (and also there's just stuff that is outside the scope of this fairly short document). I think part of the reason the tariffs caught people so flat footed is even well informed people assumed this would be how they were implemented and got the rug pulled out from under them on "Liberation Day"
It makes sense if you understand how Trump became president. He'll test something (through a tweet) to his audience and then amplify or kill it based on the response. It worked great with 50% of the US population or so; it doesn't seem to be working at all with the Chinese political elite.
Things like threatening Canada and Greenland's sovereignty, unilaterally tanking stock markets and levying huge tariffs on western trading partners are not popular with his voters.
What they want doesn't matter anymore, these moves are about splitting the western economic and military alliances, a goal Russia has had since the 1960s.
As a thoughtful person, you've got to learn to curb your instinct to make sense out of things like this. It's a waste of calories.
> but Apple and Nvidia are exempted because their stock prices might take a hit
They already took a hit - which they monetized by both ways
To understand this, I think you have to neither overestimate or underestimate Trump and Musk.
Both Trump and Musk seem be to essentially ideologues, visionary tough-talkers, who have actually succeed (or appeared to succeed) to various endeavors through having underling who work to shape their bluffs into coherent plans. This works well for various as long as the delicate balance of competent handlers and loud-mouthed visionaries is maintained.
The problem is the process of Trump winning, losing and then winning again all him to craft an organization and legal framework to put forth he vision uncorrected, unbalanced and lacking all guardrails.
And that's where we are.
> It’s not clear whether Jamieson Greer is actually steering this, or if any of it was thoroughly thought through.
We know for sure that Greer isn't steering this. Greer was testifying before a congressional committee when Trump announced huge changes to tariffs on China. Greer hadn't even been told.
If there is a strategy it is probably dominating the news cycle with this chaotic bullshit, while they navigate towards the real goal in the shadows.
It's not in the shadows, they're breaking everything that can oppose them to try to make the US an autocracy. It's right out in the open.
chaos is the strategy
The strategy is to sow fear and uncertainty to drive capital from stocks to government bonds and drive down the bond yield. Bessant is pretty clear about this. Once they get the bond yields down and refinance a lot of the short term debt into longer term debt they free up operating budget. Combine with Elon’s DOGE cutting costs and Lutnick raising some capital from tariffs, and it is a pretty good strategy. I don’t agree with Trump’s policies generally nor am I American, but this is a good short term strategy.
It's not a good short term strategy at all. If that's really the goal, their left and right hands need to have a chat because one of them's going to make the deficit way worse, so if the other's goal is to "free up operating budget" by reducing debt service they really ought to get on the same page, because anything "freed up" is going to be eaten by the other bullshit they're doing.
Besides, this is a wildly expensive way to go about it. The harm to receipts from the economic uncertainty will blow a hole in the federal budget and leave states reeling (to say nothing of the "other hand" making cuts at the IRS, which will also be a net cost)
Great strategy, except its not working. Bond yields are up (probably because foreigners and foreign countries are selling US bonds). DOGE cost cuts are insignificant. Raising capital from tariffs doesn't seem to be working because they're really taxes, and Americans don't like taxes.
This is exactly the strategy but it is failing miserably.
The reason for the pivot was because the 10-30 year yields didn't come down, the price on the 30 year got crushed. The 30 year almost went back to the lows.
There was literally no flight to safety. Completely the opposite.
It seems like there was a flight to safety but then China started dumping bonds. I think we are witnessing the ‘war’ in trade war!
> I don’t agree with Trump’s policies generally nor am I American, but this is a good short term strategy.
This strategy has failed spectacularly, as bond yields are still up and treasuries are sold like crazy. US treasuries are no longer seen as safe havens. People rather invest in gold or treasuries from other countries which are not led by a corrupt government. Buying US treasuries is now seen as "lending Trump money", and since Trump runs the US economy exactly like he ran his companies, where IIRC he defaulted on debt at least six times, US treasuries are now a rather risky investment.
Can we use Occam's Razor and assume that nobody knows what would be the optimal tariff rates and if you don't have a reliable mathematical model the only choice you are left with is experimentation and A/B tests.