simple question. why hasn't it been done? It is all about total costs, period, end of story. Not the govts job to "care" about where American companies choose to locate. Again, all you people with this simpleton mindset enjoy their trips to Wally World, new shoes for momma once you let her out of the kitchen, clothes, Sams, toys, electronics. You have an I phone or smart phone? You willing to pay $2K for said phone instead of $1K? seriously. how's your TV, Laptop, AV Equipment. You digging that Guac along with your Mexican beer or tequila?Oldbear83 said:
J.R."Manufacturing is not coming back to any extent."
BS.
Any type of business can exist if there is demand and opportunity.
The demand exists, it just takes our government caring more about American businesses than foreign lobbyists.
April 2nd Reciprocal Tariffs
264,951 Views |
3836 Replies |
Last: 1 day ago by Adriacus Peratuun
Amazing, the closer we get to specifics, the more your position falls apart under its own contradictions.Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
It's always interesting when someone starts by saying "you make valid points" and then proceeds to paint those same points as part of a morally bankrupt conspiracy.
Globalists sure love throwing the conspiracy label at everyone who disagrees with them. Want to throw in the Nazi and Fascist labels for good measure?
Let's clear the fog.
You're swinging wildly between metaphors about cars with no chassis and baskets full of eggs, but the real issue is that you're not offering a coherent alternative, just a grab-bag of grievances and a call to tariffs as if they're a Swiss army knife for all economic sins.
Coherent Alternative: use tariffs to punish countries who use tariffs to gain advantage over our industries. Use tariffs to level the playing field in core industries. You act as if responsive behavior is wildly outlandish. Hiding our heads in the sand is the outlandish.
Tariffs are simply one aspect of a massive global realignment. Stop subsidizing other countries defense. Stop subsiding other countries economies. Use that money to reduce taxes, reduce debt, and smartly rebuild key industries. Rebuild infrastructure that is decades out of date.
Healthy broad based growth is not anathema to growth.
Yes, the U.S. needs to scale back outdated regulations. Yes, we need to reform education and workforce training. I've said exactly that. But none of those facts magically make broad-based tariffs a smart or effective policy response. Tariffs aren't a stand in for industrial policy, nor do they replace the hard work of investing in domestic competitiveness. They're a blunt instrument, and they come with blunt consequences, higher prices, global retaliation, and supply chain disruption that doesn't build resilience, it undermines it.
Every country uses tariffs without issues but once the USA does the same the sky is falling?
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just how much you lack a fundamental understanding of the U.S. economy. The U.S. is not a single-engine service economy, it's a global leader in high tech manufacturing, aerospace, biotech, agri-business, finance, energy, and digital infrastructure. You talk about resilience and diversification as if the U.S. has none, while standing on the shoulders of the most diversified and dynamic economy in the world. What country has a broader base of globally competitive sectors? Spoiler: none.
You white knight for new free trade economy and point to farming and energy? LOL
You ask what happens when the world stops "paying for the U.S. service economy"? Simple: it doesn't. The U.S. isn't leeching off the world. It provides the world's reserve currency, the largest consumer base, technological leadership, capital markets, global defense architecture, and innovation capacity. That's why our partners sell here, why capital flows here, and why Trump has any leverage to negotiate tariffs at all. You're complaining about the system while standing on its foundation.
Every day the world plots to break free from the USA service economy. From BRIC onward. The USA's rise to global economic power is due to size, due to being the only world power whose industrial base wasn't decimated by WW2, and due to being the world's biggest bread basket. Everything you listed is a result of the foregoing not created on its own. We were bigger, had better natural assets, and got a huge head start after WW2. And we lost much of it by being naive. "If we simply trade nice so will everyone else." History says: false. "A good referee like the WTO will make everything better." History says False. But the best part is your argument that the USA's economic roof is instead its foundation. False. Ultimately farming and ranching is our foundation. The ability to feed our own people independently and have huge amounts to ship overseas is our single greatest asset. Why do you think China covets our farm land? No food and none of your financial sector matters. No food and none of your high tech IP matters.
As for your moral turn, accusing me of profiting off others' misery and asking for my address to send me a bill couldn't be more ironic given my companies are net exporters and bring millions back the U.S. each year. Maybe I should send you a bill for carrying your ass. You want tariffs to punish cheaters, rebuild domestic industry, reduce inequality, level the playing field, and realign global power. But you haven't explained how any of that works in practice, only that you're angry, and someone must pay. It's also driven by a blind loyalty to a candidate and the narratives not facts of the decisions he's made. It's okay to admit he's making mistakes.
Here is some truth. You hate tariffs because they might impact your export business. Simply be forthright enough to admit that you are a free trade winner. Fair trade might drop your numbers. Somehow most countries in the world protect industries from predatory practices and the world economy doesn't crash but if the USA does similar it is disaster [per you].
In practice: France tariffs our farmers, we tariff their wine industry. Germany tariffs Boeing, we tariff Mercedes and Audi. You act as though using platitudes when other countries use tariffs is effective and sound practice. History laughs at you.
And let's not romanticize those "2 out of 3 offshored industries" you say could return if we just removed "government millstones." Even if they could operate competitively, that doesn't mean they would be labor intensive, or employ workers in the numbers or at the wages you imagine. Manufacturing has changed. And your answer "bring it back anyway" amounts to raising prices on every American household to chase a fantasy that doesn't scale, not to mention structural limitations even if we thought we could. That's being extremely naive and destructive.
You first argued that manufacturing is too labor extensive and thus too expensive in the USA and now argue that it is less labor intensive and few jobs will be realized? Which is it? And the argument that "we can only recover some of the jobs lost so why bother" is very telling.
So yes, the world cheats. Yes, countries subsidize and manipulate. But the response isn't economic self harm against EVERYONE, It's enforceable trade rules, coalition-building, direct negotiation, modern industrial policy, and investment in the tools that make us competitive, not just punitive taxes that we pretend are a strategy.
Because the WTO has been such a huge success for the USA?
I'm giving you strategies to bring manufacturing back, as well as long term economic opportunities. You're throwing narrative poo against the wall and blaming the dog. But if the best you've got is "tariffs because the world sucks," then what you're offering isn't policy. It's just resentment.
your narrative: continue doing what hasn't "real world" worked in decades. But you love the theory. All the current economic success to which you point is the interest on post WW2 income. No part of the modern economy arose in isolation. If we don't preserve and invigorate the basics, the advanced will eventually fail.
Food, water, energy, medical, & core manufacturing allow everything else to thrive.
Let's start with your claim of offering a "coherent alternative." Tariffs are not a coherent economic strategy, they're a reaction, not a solution. You want to use them to punish cheaters, level the playing field, restore domestic industry, balance trade, and fund national revival all at once. That's not policy, that's a wish list held together by grievance and nostalgia.
Every country uses tariffs you say, but you ignore scale, structure, and context. Other countries use targeted, strategic protection, often in conjunction with industrial policy, trade diplomacy, and state support. The U.S., under Trump, has largely wielded tariffs as political weapons, unilaterally, inconsistently, and often against allies. There's a difference between a scalpel and a hammer. You're defending the hammer.
You mock the idea that the U.S. is diversified, yet in the same breath, you admit our economy leads in energy, agriculture, tech, and capital markets. You can't argue we're a one-trick pony and then rattle off half the global economy. The "service economy" strawman you keep dragging out is just that. The U.S. still has the second-largest manufacturing output in the world behind China. The idea that we abandoned manufacturing is factually false. What changed is how manufacturing works: more machines, fewer people. You hate that reality, but pretending it's not real won't make it go away.
Your historical revisionism is also tired. Yes, the U.S. had a unique post-WWII position. That's called first-mover advantage, which was created due to worldwide destruction of production capacity, and we turned it into a global architecture of trade, security, and finance that lifted us and half the world into higher standards of living. The fact that China or BRICS want to break free of it is not proof that we've failed, it's proof that power invites competition. Your solution of pulling up the drawbridge isn't strategic resilience, it's economic surrender disguised as toughness.
You accuse me of resenting tariffs because I might lose some export margin? Well, what owner wouldn't in this erratic and unnecessary economic environment, mostly self imposed by a misguided administrative policy? But that's only a small part of my concern. We've opened the door to our competitors to fill our leadership role. We're selling job fairy tales and protecting a small employment sector by casting the costs on ordinary working families. I've been in and around many of the world's economies and I see how protectionist policies destroy countries and keep people in poverty, not lift them up. You can revel about nostalgic eras of the last, but those were much poorer standards of living and small economies.
Here's the truth, I don't oppose tariffs categorically. I oppose tariffs as a default strategy, wielded as a political crutch, and illogically and blanketedly applied, rather than used as part of a larger, disciplined economic vision. If your claim is that France tariffs our farmers, so we should retaliate, great. That's literally what trade dispute mechanisms exist for. That's how you negotiate, not how you remake an economy.
And here's where your internal contradiction fully collapses (which you erroneously characterized mine), one minute, you argue that manufacturing is too labor-intensive and can't come back unless we protect it. The next, you argue that it's already capital intensive and not that many jobs would return. So which is it? Because if it's capital intensive, then tariffs won't "bring jobs back", they'll just redirect investment into automated facilities that create fewer, more specialized jobs. So tell me, who are we really helping?
Also, you wave off the WTO and multilateral institutions as if we've tried everything and nothing worked. But the truth is we haven't invested in domestic competitiveness, not in the kind of worker training, R&D, infrastructure, and local manufacturing ecosystems that countries like Germany and South Korea built. You blame globalization, but the actual problem is lazy U.S. politics that used free markets as an excuse to do nothing while other countries paired trade with strategy. That's not globalism's fault. That's ours.
Lastly, your whole foundation is farming analogy is dramatic but misleading. Yes, food and energy security matter. No one disputes that. But they're not the endgame, they're the floor. You don't win the 21st century with wheat and oil. You win with semiconductors, AI, advanced materials, resilient supply chains, and global alliances. And those don't come from shutting the world out, they come from outcompeting it.
So no, I'm not defending the status quo. I'm defending the idea that if you want to change the system, you'd better do it with real tools, measurable outcomes, and policies that scale. Not with bumper stickers like "tariffs for fairness" and "bring back the basics" with no roadmap beyond "fight everyone and hope it works out."
You are simply rehashing your prior arguments.ATL Bear said:Amazing, the closer we get to specifics, the more your position falls apart under its own contradictions.Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
It's always interesting when someone starts by saying "you make valid points" and then proceeds to paint those same points as part of a morally bankrupt conspiracy.
Globalists sure love throwing the conspiracy label at everyone who disagrees with them. Want to throw in the Nazi and Fascist labels for good measure?
Let's clear the fog.
You're swinging wildly between metaphors about cars with no chassis and baskets full of eggs, but the real issue is that you're not offering a coherent alternative, just a grab-bag of grievances and a call to tariffs as if they're a Swiss army knife for all economic sins.
Coherent Alternative: use tariffs to punish countries who use tariffs to gain advantage over our industries. Use tariffs to level the playing field in core industries. You act as if responsive behavior is wildly outlandish. Hiding our heads in the sand is the outlandish.
Tariffs are simply one aspect of a massive global realignment. Stop subsidizing other countries defense. Stop subsiding other countries economies. Use that money to reduce taxes, reduce debt, and smartly rebuild key industries. Rebuild infrastructure that is decades out of date.
Healthy broad based growth is not anathema to growth.
Yes, the U.S. needs to scale back outdated regulations. Yes, we need to reform education and workforce training. I've said exactly that. But none of those facts magically make broad-based tariffs a smart or effective policy response. Tariffs aren't a stand in for industrial policy, nor do they replace the hard work of investing in domestic competitiveness. They're a blunt instrument, and they come with blunt consequences, higher prices, global retaliation, and supply chain disruption that doesn't build resilience, it undermines it.
Every country uses tariffs without issues but once the USA does the same the sky is falling?
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just how much you lack a fundamental understanding of the U.S. economy. The U.S. is not a single-engine service economy, it's a global leader in high tech manufacturing, aerospace, biotech, agri-business, finance, energy, and digital infrastructure. You talk about resilience and diversification as if the U.S. has none, while standing on the shoulders of the most diversified and dynamic economy in the world. What country has a broader base of globally competitive sectors? Spoiler: none.
You white knight for new free trade economy and point to farming and energy? LOL
You ask what happens when the world stops "paying for the U.S. service economy"? Simple: it doesn't. The U.S. isn't leeching off the world. It provides the world's reserve currency, the largest consumer base, technological leadership, capital markets, global defense architecture, and innovation capacity. That's why our partners sell here, why capital flows here, and why Trump has any leverage to negotiate tariffs at all. You're complaining about the system while standing on its foundation.
Every day the world plots to break free from the USA service economy. From BRIC onward. The USA's rise to global economic power is due to size, due to being the only world power whose industrial base wasn't decimated by WW2, and due to being the world's biggest bread basket. Everything you listed is a result of the foregoing not created on its own. We were bigger, had better natural assets, and got a huge head start after WW2. And we lost much of it by being naive. "If we simply trade nice so will everyone else." History says: false. "A good referee like the WTO will make everything better." History says False. But the best part is your argument that the USA's economic roof is instead its foundation. False. Ultimately farming and ranching is our foundation. The ability to feed our own people independently and have huge amounts to ship overseas is our single greatest asset. Why do you think China covets our farm land? No food and none of your financial sector matters. No food and none of your high tech IP matters.
As for your moral turn, accusing me of profiting off others' misery and asking for my address to send me a bill couldn't be more ironic given my companies are net exporters and bring millions back the U.S. each year. Maybe I should send you a bill for carrying your ass. You want tariffs to punish cheaters, rebuild domestic industry, reduce inequality, level the playing field, and realign global power. But you haven't explained how any of that works in practice, only that you're angry, and someone must pay. It's also driven by a blind loyalty to a candidate and the narratives not facts of the decisions he's made. It's okay to admit he's making mistakes.
Here is some truth. You hate tariffs because they might impact your export business. Simply be forthright enough to admit that you are a free trade winner. Fair trade might drop your numbers. Somehow most countries in the world protect industries from predatory practices and the world economy doesn't crash but if the USA does similar it is disaster [per you].
In practice: France tariffs our farmers, we tariff their wine industry. Germany tariffs Boeing, we tariff Mercedes and Audi. You act as though using platitudes when other countries use tariffs is effective and sound practice. History laughs at you.
And let's not romanticize those "2 out of 3 offshored industries" you say could return if we just removed "government millstones." Even if they could operate competitively, that doesn't mean they would be labor intensive, or employ workers in the numbers or at the wages you imagine. Manufacturing has changed. And your answer "bring it back anyway" amounts to raising prices on every American household to chase a fantasy that doesn't scale, not to mention structural limitations even if we thought we could. That's being extremely naive and destructive.
You first argued that manufacturing is too labor extensive and thus too expensive in the USA and now argue that it is less labor intensive and few jobs will be realized? Which is it? And the argument that "we can only recover some of the jobs lost so why bother" is very telling.
So yes, the world cheats. Yes, countries subsidize and manipulate. But the response isn't economic self harm against EVERYONE, It's enforceable trade rules, coalition-building, direct negotiation, modern industrial policy, and investment in the tools that make us competitive, not just punitive taxes that we pretend are a strategy.
Because the WTO has been such a huge success for the USA?
I'm giving you strategies to bring manufacturing back, as well as long term economic opportunities. You're throwing narrative poo against the wall and blaming the dog. But if the best you've got is "tariffs because the world sucks," then what you're offering isn't policy. It's just resentment.
your narrative: continue doing what hasn't "real world" worked in decades. But you love the theory. All the current economic success to which you point is the interest on post WW2 income. No part of the modern economy arose in isolation. If we don't preserve and invigorate the basics, the advanced will eventually fail.
Food, water, energy, medical, & core manufacturing allow everything else to thrive.
Let's start with your claim of offering a "coherent alternative." Tariffs are not a coherent economic strategy, they're a reaction, not a solution. You want to use them to punish cheaters, level the playing field, restore domestic industry, balance trade, and fund national revival all at once. That's not policy, that's a wish list held together by grievance and nostalgia.
Every country uses tariffs you say, but you ignore scale, structure, and context. Other countries use targeted, strategic protection, often in conjunction with industrial policy, trade diplomacy, and state support. The U.S., under Trump, has largely wielded tariffs as political weapons, unilaterally, inconsistently, and often against allies. There's a difference between a scalpel and a hammer. You're defending the hammer.
You mock the idea that the U.S. is diversified, yet in the same breath, you admit our economy leads in energy, agriculture, tech, and capital markets. You can't argue we're a one-trick pony and then rattle off half the global economy. The "service economy" strawman you keep dragging out is just that. The U.S. still has the second-largest manufacturing output in the world behind China. The idea that we abandoned manufacturing is factually false. What changed is how manufacturing works: more machines, fewer people. You hate that reality, but pretending it's not real won't make it go away.
Your historical revisionism is also tired. Yes, the U.S. had a unique post-WWII position. That's called first-mover advantage, which was created due to worldwide destruction of production capacity, and we turned it into a global architecture of trade, security, and finance that lifted us and half the world into higher standards of living. The fact that China or BRICS want to break free of it is not proof that we've failed, it's proof that power invites competition. Your solution of pulling up the drawbridge isn't strategic resilience, it's economic surrender disguised as toughness.
You accuse me of resenting tariffs because I might lose some export margin? Well, what owner wouldn't in this erratic and unnecessary economic environment, mostly self imposed by a misguided administrative policy? But that's only a small part of my concern. We've opened the door to our competitors to fill our leadership role. We're selling job fairy tales and protecting a small employment sector by casting the costs on ordinary working families. I've been in and around many of the world's economies and I see how protectionist policies destroy countries and keep people in poverty, not lift them up. You can revel about nostalgic eras of the last, but those were much poorer standards of living and small economies.
Here's the truth, I don't oppose tariffs categorically. I oppose tariffs as a default strategy, wielded as a political crutch, and illogically and blanketedly applied, rather than used as part of a larger, disciplined economic vision. If your claim is that France tariffs our farmers, so we should retaliate, great. That's literally what trade dispute mechanisms exist for. That's how you negotiate, not how you remake an economy.
And here's where your internal contradiction fully collapses (which you erroneously characterized mine), one minute, you argue that manufacturing is too labor-intensive and can't come back unless we protect it. The next, you argue that it's already capital intensive and not that many jobs would return. So which is it? Because if it's capital intensive, then tariffs won't "bring jobs back", they'll just redirect investment into automated facilities that create fewer, more specialized jobs. So tell me, who are we really helping?
Also, you wave off the WTO and multilateral institutions as if we've tried everything and nothing worked. But the truth is we haven't invested in domestic competitiveness, not in the kind of worker training, R&D, infrastructure, and local manufacturing ecosystems that countries like Germany and South Korea built. You blame globalization, but the actual problem is lazy U.S. politics that used free markets as an excuse to do nothing while other countries paired trade with strategy. That's not globalism's fault. That's ours.
Lastly, your whole foundation is farming analogy is dramatic but misleading. Yes, food and energy security matter. No one disputes that. But they're not the endgame, they're the floor. You don't win the 21st century with wheat and oil. You win with semiconductors, AI, advanced materials, resilient supply chains, and global alliances. And those don't come from shutting the world out, they come from outcompeting it.
So no, I'm not defending the status quo. I'm defending the idea that if you want to change the system, you'd better do it with real tools, measurable outcomes, and policies that scale. Not with bumper stickers like "tariffs for fairness" and "bring back the basics" with no roadmap beyond "fight everyone and hope it works out."
Reality check:
If you are the Bush brand of Globalist, you lost the Republican Party in the 2016 primary and you aren't getting it back anytime soon.
If you are the Obama brand of Globalist you lost the 2024 election and are bleeding support among Hispanics, AA, unions, and Gen Z.
Populism won. Nationalism won.
And they are winning in Italy, Hungary, etc. and gaining huge ground in France, Germany, etc.
Your argument that you are for change but not the current change is really an argument for no change by making the process unpalatable via constant unnecessary detours.
At this point Sloppy ugly change is FAR better than no change.
The USA doesn't need a scalpel. It needs a chainsaw.
Keep your fingers clear and stop the Berkeley Orange Man Bad routine.
Miller: Woodrow Wilson gave us the income tax. We shifted from taxing foreign countries to taxing domestic industry. President Trump is bringing back the historic platform of our party.. that revenues to our treasury should be powered by taxing foreign imports not taxing domestic… pic.twitter.com/Q6O7wSH0p9
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 3, 2025
JUST IN: 🇨🇳🇺🇸 Chinese President Xi Jinping is emerging as the winner of Trump's trade war, WSJ says. pic.twitter.com/xzzCzh6FIF
— BRICS News (@BRICSinfo) April 5, 2025
Adriacus Peratuun said:You are simply rehashing your prior arguments.ATL Bear said:Amazing, the closer we get to specifics, the more your position falls apart under its own contradictions.Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
It's always interesting when someone starts by saying "you make valid points" and then proceeds to paint those same points as part of a morally bankrupt conspiracy.
Globalists sure love throwing the conspiracy label at everyone who disagrees with them. Want to throw in the Nazi and Fascist labels for good measure?
Let's clear the fog.
You're swinging wildly between metaphors about cars with no chassis and baskets full of eggs, but the real issue is that you're not offering a coherent alternative, just a grab-bag of grievances and a call to tariffs as if they're a Swiss army knife for all economic sins.
Coherent Alternative: use tariffs to punish countries who use tariffs to gain advantage over our industries. Use tariffs to level the playing field in core industries. You act as if responsive behavior is wildly outlandish. Hiding our heads in the sand is the outlandish.
Tariffs are simply one aspect of a massive global realignment. Stop subsidizing other countries defense. Stop subsiding other countries economies. Use that money to reduce taxes, reduce debt, and smartly rebuild key industries. Rebuild infrastructure that is decades out of date.
Healthy broad based growth is not anathema to growth.
Yes, the U.S. needs to scale back outdated regulations. Yes, we need to reform education and workforce training. I've said exactly that. But none of those facts magically make broad-based tariffs a smart or effective policy response. Tariffs aren't a stand in for industrial policy, nor do they replace the hard work of investing in domestic competitiveness. They're a blunt instrument, and they come with blunt consequences, higher prices, global retaliation, and supply chain disruption that doesn't build resilience, it undermines it.
Every country uses tariffs without issues but once the USA does the same the sky is falling?
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just how much you lack a fundamental understanding of the U.S. economy. The U.S. is not a single-engine service economy, it's a global leader in high tech manufacturing, aerospace, biotech, agri-business, finance, energy, and digital infrastructure. You talk about resilience and diversification as if the U.S. has none, while standing on the shoulders of the most diversified and dynamic economy in the world. What country has a broader base of globally competitive sectors? Spoiler: none.
You white knight for new free trade economy and point to farming and energy? LOL
You ask what happens when the world stops "paying for the U.S. service economy"? Simple: it doesn't. The U.S. isn't leeching off the world. It provides the world's reserve currency, the largest consumer base, technological leadership, capital markets, global defense architecture, and innovation capacity. That's why our partners sell here, why capital flows here, and why Trump has any leverage to negotiate tariffs at all. You're complaining about the system while standing on its foundation.
Every day the world plots to break free from the USA service economy. From BRIC onward. The USA's rise to global economic power is due to size, due to being the only world power whose industrial base wasn't decimated by WW2, and due to being the world's biggest bread basket. Everything you listed is a result of the foregoing not created on its own. We were bigger, had better natural assets, and got a huge head start after WW2. And we lost much of it by being naive. "If we simply trade nice so will everyone else." History says: false. "A good referee like the WTO will make everything better." History says False. But the best part is your argument that the USA's economic roof is instead its foundation. False. Ultimately farming and ranching is our foundation. The ability to feed our own people independently and have huge amounts to ship overseas is our single greatest asset. Why do you think China covets our farm land? No food and none of your financial sector matters. No food and none of your high tech IP matters.
As for your moral turn, accusing me of profiting off others' misery and asking for my address to send me a bill couldn't be more ironic given my companies are net exporters and bring millions back the U.S. each year. Maybe I should send you a bill for carrying your ass. You want tariffs to punish cheaters, rebuild domestic industry, reduce inequality, level the playing field, and realign global power. But you haven't explained how any of that works in practice, only that you're angry, and someone must pay. It's also driven by a blind loyalty to a candidate and the narratives not facts of the decisions he's made. It's okay to admit he's making mistakes.
Here is some truth. You hate tariffs because they might impact your export business. Simply be forthright enough to admit that you are a free trade winner. Fair trade might drop your numbers. Somehow most countries in the world protect industries from predatory practices and the world economy doesn't crash but if the USA does similar it is disaster [per you].
In practice: France tariffs our farmers, we tariff their wine industry. Germany tariffs Boeing, we tariff Mercedes and Audi. You act as though using platitudes when other countries use tariffs is effective and sound practice. History laughs at you.
And let's not romanticize those "2 out of 3 offshored industries" you say could return if we just removed "government millstones." Even if they could operate competitively, that doesn't mean they would be labor intensive, or employ workers in the numbers or at the wages you imagine. Manufacturing has changed. And your answer "bring it back anyway" amounts to raising prices on every American household to chase a fantasy that doesn't scale, not to mention structural limitations even if we thought we could. That's being extremely naive and destructive.
You first argued that manufacturing is too labor extensive and thus too expensive in the USA and now argue that it is less labor intensive and few jobs will be realized? Which is it? And the argument that "we can only recover some of the jobs lost so why bother" is very telling.
So yes, the world cheats. Yes, countries subsidize and manipulate. But the response isn't economic self harm against EVERYONE, It's enforceable trade rules, coalition-building, direct negotiation, modern industrial policy, and investment in the tools that make us competitive, not just punitive taxes that we pretend are a strategy.
Because the WTO has been such a huge success for the USA?
I'm giving you strategies to bring manufacturing back, as well as long term economic opportunities. You're throwing narrative poo against the wall and blaming the dog. But if the best you've got is "tariffs because the world sucks," then what you're offering isn't policy. It's just resentment.
your narrative: continue doing what hasn't "real world" worked in decades. But you love the theory. All the current economic success to which you point is the interest on post WW2 income. No part of the modern economy arose in isolation. If we don't preserve and invigorate the basics, the advanced will eventually fail.
Food, water, energy, medical, & core manufacturing allow everything else to thrive.
Let's start with your claim of offering a "coherent alternative." Tariffs are not a coherent economic strategy, they're a reaction, not a solution. You want to use them to punish cheaters, level the playing field, restore domestic industry, balance trade, and fund national revival all at once. That's not policy, that's a wish list held together by grievance and nostalgia.
Every country uses tariffs you say, but you ignore scale, structure, and context. Other countries use targeted, strategic protection, often in conjunction with industrial policy, trade diplomacy, and state support. The U.S., under Trump, has largely wielded tariffs as political weapons, unilaterally, inconsistently, and often against allies. There's a difference between a scalpel and a hammer. You're defending the hammer.
You mock the idea that the U.S. is diversified, yet in the same breath, you admit our economy leads in energy, agriculture, tech, and capital markets. You can't argue we're a one-trick pony and then rattle off half the global economy. The "service economy" strawman you keep dragging out is just that. The U.S. still has the second-largest manufacturing output in the world behind China. The idea that we abandoned manufacturing is factually false. What changed is how manufacturing works: more machines, fewer people. You hate that reality, but pretending it's not real won't make it go away.
Your historical revisionism is also tired. Yes, the U.S. had a unique post-WWII position. That's called first-mover advantage, which was created due to worldwide destruction of production capacity, and we turned it into a global architecture of trade, security, and finance that lifted us and half the world into higher standards of living. The fact that China or BRICS want to break free of it is not proof that we've failed, it's proof that power invites competition. Your solution of pulling up the drawbridge isn't strategic resilience, it's economic surrender disguised as toughness.
You accuse me of resenting tariffs because I might lose some export margin? Well, what owner wouldn't in this erratic and unnecessary economic environment, mostly self imposed by a misguided administrative policy? But that's only a small part of my concern. We've opened the door to our competitors to fill our leadership role. We're selling job fairy tales and protecting a small employment sector by casting the costs on ordinary working families. I've been in and around many of the world's economies and I see how protectionist policies destroy countries and keep people in poverty, not lift them up. You can revel about nostalgic eras of the last, but those were much poorer standards of living and small economies.
Here's the truth, I don't oppose tariffs categorically. I oppose tariffs as a default strategy, wielded as a political crutch, and illogically and blanketedly applied, rather than used as part of a larger, disciplined economic vision. If your claim is that France tariffs our farmers, so we should retaliate, great. That's literally what trade dispute mechanisms exist for. That's how you negotiate, not how you remake an economy.
And here's where your internal contradiction fully collapses (which you erroneously characterized mine), one minute, you argue that manufacturing is too labor-intensive and can't come back unless we protect it. The next, you argue that it's already capital intensive and not that many jobs would return. So which is it? Because if it's capital intensive, then tariffs won't "bring jobs back", they'll just redirect investment into automated facilities that create fewer, more specialized jobs. So tell me, who are we really helping?
Also, you wave off the WTO and multilateral institutions as if we've tried everything and nothing worked. But the truth is we haven't invested in domestic competitiveness, not in the kind of worker training, R&D, infrastructure, and local manufacturing ecosystems that countries like Germany and South Korea built. You blame globalization, but the actual problem is lazy U.S. politics that used free markets as an excuse to do nothing while other countries paired trade with strategy. That's not globalism's fault. That's ours.
Lastly, your whole foundation is farming analogy is dramatic but misleading. Yes, food and energy security matter. No one disputes that. But they're not the endgame, they're the floor. You don't win the 21st century with wheat and oil. You win with semiconductors, AI, advanced materials, resilient supply chains, and global alliances. And those don't come from shutting the world out, they come from outcompeting it.
So no, I'm not defending the status quo. I'm defending the idea that if you want to change the system, you'd better do it with real tools, measurable outcomes, and policies that scale. Not with bumper stickers like "tariffs for fairness" and "bring back the basics" with no roadmap beyond "fight everyone and hope it works out."
Reality check:
If you are the Bush brand of Globalist, you lost the Republican Party in the 2016 primary and you aren't getting it back anytime soon…
Populism won. Nationalism won.
And they are winning in Italy, Hungary, etc. and gaining huge ground in France, Germany, etc..
Amen
Popularism is winning and populism is democracy
Marshal smashed Pelosi on this at the debate at Oxford
THANK YOU!!!!!Adriacus Peratuun said:But all is well in gated communities in bedroom burbs.Redbrickbear said:Mothra said:This is the problem. Even if Trump achieves his goal of removing all tariffs (something I am cool with), if the end game is to return manufacturing to the US, that's just never going to happen within the next 2 years. It's why most manufacturing interest groups have come down hard against the tariffs. It will take at least 5 years and huge capital investments to achieve that goal. And that will of course result in much more expensive products, as not only will capital be required, but you will also be paying the American worker with his union dues a LOT more money than some dude in Vietnam..Johnny Bear said:
I have confidence/faith this revolutionary strategy will ultimately succeed long term, but my biggest concern is how long it will take for it to happen and whether or not voters will be willing to wait it out. Everyone can rest assured if dims retake power over the course of the '26 and '28 elections we will immediately return to the endlessly printing money plus increasing the debt like there's no tomorrow strategy and we will be right back to mortgaging future generations while on an inevitable path to national bankruptcy. Hoping and praying the inevitable long term benefit of Trump's strategy - if given the time to succeed - will at least be starting to be felt by the masses before they turn back to the people that got us into the incredible mess in the first place.
So what's the plan?
Just give up? Back to the unsustainable status quo?
We have tried it the other way for 40-50 years… and what we got was 50% of Americans living in debt, massive destruction of our manufacturing base and civil society, political tension (possible crisis), vulnerable supply chains stretched across the globe, the rise or Communist China as a peer competitor, a New Gilded Age of economic inequality
Sometimes think some Baylor folks haven't driven through rural Texas or an inner city in a decade.
So much wrong there.J.R. said:simple question. why hasn't it been done? It is all about total costs, period, end of story. Not the govts job to "care" about where American companies choose to locate. Again, all you people with this simpleton mindset enjoy their trips to Wally World, new shoes for momma once you let her out of the kitchen, clothes, Sams, toys, electronics. You have an I phone or smart phone? You willing to pay $2K for said phone instead of $1K? seriously. how's your TV, Laptop, AV Equipment. You digging that Guac along with your Mexican beer or tequila?Oldbear83 said:
J.R."Manufacturing is not coming back to any extent."
BS.
Any type of business can exist if there is demand and opportunity.
The demand exists, it just takes our government caring more about American businesses than foreign lobbyists.
No one who actually runs a company only looks at the current price.
But you do also seem to have bought hard into scare tactics and pessimism.
The people who built America would have laughed at you.
I have run very large factories (not sneaker or clothes, but high tech electronics from PCB fab, PCBA, Backplanes, metal, injected molded plastics, full system assembly....servers, routers, phones, set top boxes, CT and MRI machines, military products, laptops) all over the world in my corp. days, including most of Asia , Mexico, Europe, US, Canada. I think I know how it works.Oldbear83 said:So much wrong there.J.R. said:simple question. why hasn't it been done? It is all about total costs, period, end of story. Not the govts job to "care" about where American companies choose to locate. Again, all you people with this simpleton mindset enjoy their trips to Wally World, new shoes for momma once you let her out of the kitchen, clothes, Sams, toys, electronics. You have an I phone or smart phone? You willing to pay $2K for said phone instead of $1K? seriously. how's your TV, Laptop, AV Equipment. You digging that Guac along with your Mexican beer or tequila?Oldbear83 said:
J.R."Manufacturing is not coming back to any extent."
BS.
Any type of business can exist if there is demand and opportunity.
The demand exists, it just takes our government caring more about American businesses than foreign lobbyists.
No one who actually runs a company only looks at the current price.
But you do also seem to have bought hard into scare tactics and pessimism.
The people who built America would have laughed at you.
This isn't a chain saw, this is swinging wildly in the dark with a blunt axe. And I keep repeating my solutions so you understand I'm offering actual answers. Solutions that have not been tried domestically, at least to the level needed, a recognition of failures of policy and initiative by government and business. You're beating your chest with political narratives and platitudes.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are simply rehashing your prior arguments.ATL Bear said:Amazing, the closer we get to specifics, the more your position falls apart under its own contradictions.Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
It's always interesting when someone starts by saying "you make valid points" and then proceeds to paint those same points as part of a morally bankrupt conspiracy.
Globalists sure love throwing the conspiracy label at everyone who disagrees with them. Want to throw in the Nazi and Fascist labels for good measure?
Let's clear the fog.
You're swinging wildly between metaphors about cars with no chassis and baskets full of eggs, but the real issue is that you're not offering a coherent alternative, just a grab-bag of grievances and a call to tariffs as if they're a Swiss army knife for all economic sins.
Coherent Alternative: use tariffs to punish countries who use tariffs to gain advantage over our industries. Use tariffs to level the playing field in core industries. You act as if responsive behavior is wildly outlandish. Hiding our heads in the sand is the outlandish.
Tariffs are simply one aspect of a massive global realignment. Stop subsidizing other countries defense. Stop subsiding other countries economies. Use that money to reduce taxes, reduce debt, and smartly rebuild key industries. Rebuild infrastructure that is decades out of date.
Healthy broad based growth is not anathema to growth.
Yes, the U.S. needs to scale back outdated regulations. Yes, we need to reform education and workforce training. I've said exactly that. But none of those facts magically make broad-based tariffs a smart or effective policy response. Tariffs aren't a stand in for industrial policy, nor do they replace the hard work of investing in domestic competitiveness. They're a blunt instrument, and they come with blunt consequences, higher prices, global retaliation, and supply chain disruption that doesn't build resilience, it undermines it.
Every country uses tariffs without issues but once the USA does the same the sky is falling?
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just how much you lack a fundamental understanding of the U.S. economy. The U.S. is not a single-engine service economy, it's a global leader in high tech manufacturing, aerospace, biotech, agri-business, finance, energy, and digital infrastructure. You talk about resilience and diversification as if the U.S. has none, while standing on the shoulders of the most diversified and dynamic economy in the world. What country has a broader base of globally competitive sectors? Spoiler: none.
You white knight for new free trade economy and point to farming and energy? LOL
You ask what happens when the world stops "paying for the U.S. service economy"? Simple: it doesn't. The U.S. isn't leeching off the world. It provides the world's reserve currency, the largest consumer base, technological leadership, capital markets, global defense architecture, and innovation capacity. That's why our partners sell here, why capital flows here, and why Trump has any leverage to negotiate tariffs at all. You're complaining about the system while standing on its foundation.
Every day the world plots to break free from the USA service economy. From BRIC onward. The USA's rise to global economic power is due to size, due to being the only world power whose industrial base wasn't decimated by WW2, and due to being the world's biggest bread basket. Everything you listed is a result of the foregoing not created on its own. We were bigger, had better natural assets, and got a huge head start after WW2. And we lost much of it by being naive. "If we simply trade nice so will everyone else." History says: false. "A good referee like the WTO will make everything better." History says False. But the best part is your argument that the USA's economic roof is instead its foundation. False. Ultimately farming and ranching is our foundation. The ability to feed our own people independently and have huge amounts to ship overseas is our single greatest asset. Why do you think China covets our farm land? No food and none of your financial sector matters. No food and none of your high tech IP matters.
As for your moral turn, accusing me of profiting off others' misery and asking for my address to send me a bill couldn't be more ironic given my companies are net exporters and bring millions back the U.S. each year. Maybe I should send you a bill for carrying your ass. You want tariffs to punish cheaters, rebuild domestic industry, reduce inequality, level the playing field, and realign global power. But you haven't explained how any of that works in practice, only that you're angry, and someone must pay. It's also driven by a blind loyalty to a candidate and the narratives not facts of the decisions he's made. It's okay to admit he's making mistakes.
Here is some truth. You hate tariffs because they might impact your export business. Simply be forthright enough to admit that you are a free trade winner. Fair trade might drop your numbers. Somehow most countries in the world protect industries from predatory practices and the world economy doesn't crash but if the USA does similar it is disaster [per you].
In practice: France tariffs our farmers, we tariff their wine industry. Germany tariffs Boeing, we tariff Mercedes and Audi. You act as though using platitudes when other countries use tariffs is effective and sound practice. History laughs at you.
And let's not romanticize those "2 out of 3 offshored industries" you say could return if we just removed "government millstones." Even if they could operate competitively, that doesn't mean they would be labor intensive, or employ workers in the numbers or at the wages you imagine. Manufacturing has changed. And your answer "bring it back anyway" amounts to raising prices on every American household to chase a fantasy that doesn't scale, not to mention structural limitations even if we thought we could. That's being extremely naive and destructive.
You first argued that manufacturing is too labor extensive and thus too expensive in the USA and now argue that it is less labor intensive and few jobs will be realized? Which is it? And the argument that "we can only recover some of the jobs lost so why bother" is very telling.
So yes, the world cheats. Yes, countries subsidize and manipulate. But the response isn't economic self harm against EVERYONE, It's enforceable trade rules, coalition-building, direct negotiation, modern industrial policy, and investment in the tools that make us competitive, not just punitive taxes that we pretend are a strategy.
Because the WTO has been such a huge success for the USA?
I'm giving you strategies to bring manufacturing back, as well as long term economic opportunities. You're throwing narrative poo against the wall and blaming the dog. But if the best you've got is "tariffs because the world sucks," then what you're offering isn't policy. It's just resentment.
your narrative: continue doing what hasn't "real world" worked in decades. But you love the theory. All the current economic success to which you point is the interest on post WW2 income. No part of the modern economy arose in isolation. If we don't preserve and invigorate the basics, the advanced will eventually fail.
Food, water, energy, medical, & core manufacturing allow everything else to thrive.
Let's start with your claim of offering a "coherent alternative." Tariffs are not a coherent economic strategy, they're a reaction, not a solution. You want to use them to punish cheaters, level the playing field, restore domestic industry, balance trade, and fund national revival all at once. That's not policy, that's a wish list held together by grievance and nostalgia.
Every country uses tariffs you say, but you ignore scale, structure, and context. Other countries use targeted, strategic protection, often in conjunction with industrial policy, trade diplomacy, and state support. The U.S., under Trump, has largely wielded tariffs as political weapons, unilaterally, inconsistently, and often against allies. There's a difference between a scalpel and a hammer. You're defending the hammer.
You mock the idea that the U.S. is diversified, yet in the same breath, you admit our economy leads in energy, agriculture, tech, and capital markets. You can't argue we're a one-trick pony and then rattle off half the global economy. The "service economy" strawman you keep dragging out is just that. The U.S. still has the second-largest manufacturing output in the world behind China. The idea that we abandoned manufacturing is factually false. What changed is how manufacturing works: more machines, fewer people. You hate that reality, but pretending it's not real won't make it go away.
Your historical revisionism is also tired. Yes, the U.S. had a unique post-WWII position. That's called first-mover advantage, which was created due to worldwide destruction of production capacity, and we turned it into a global architecture of trade, security, and finance that lifted us and half the world into higher standards of living. The fact that China or BRICS want to break free of it is not proof that we've failed, it's proof that power invites competition. Your solution of pulling up the drawbridge isn't strategic resilience, it's economic surrender disguised as toughness.
You accuse me of resenting tariffs because I might lose some export margin? Well, what owner wouldn't in this erratic and unnecessary economic environment, mostly self imposed by a misguided administrative policy? But that's only a small part of my concern. We've opened the door to our competitors to fill our leadership role. We're selling job fairy tales and protecting a small employment sector by casting the costs on ordinary working families. I've been in and around many of the world's economies and I see how protectionist policies destroy countries and keep people in poverty, not lift them up. You can revel about nostalgic eras of the last, but those were much poorer standards of living and small economies.
Here's the truth, I don't oppose tariffs categorically. I oppose tariffs as a default strategy, wielded as a political crutch, and illogically and blanketedly applied, rather than used as part of a larger, disciplined economic vision. If your claim is that France tariffs our farmers, so we should retaliate, great. That's literally what trade dispute mechanisms exist for. That's how you negotiate, not how you remake an economy.
And here's where your internal contradiction fully collapses (which you erroneously characterized mine), one minute, you argue that manufacturing is too labor-intensive and can't come back unless we protect it. The next, you argue that it's already capital intensive and not that many jobs would return. So which is it? Because if it's capital intensive, then tariffs won't "bring jobs back", they'll just redirect investment into automated facilities that create fewer, more specialized jobs. So tell me, who are we really helping?
Also, you wave off the WTO and multilateral institutions as if we've tried everything and nothing worked. But the truth is we haven't invested in domestic competitiveness, not in the kind of worker training, R&D, infrastructure, and local manufacturing ecosystems that countries like Germany and South Korea built. You blame globalization, but the actual problem is lazy U.S. politics that used free markets as an excuse to do nothing while other countries paired trade with strategy. That's not globalism's fault. That's ours.
Lastly, your whole foundation is farming analogy is dramatic but misleading. Yes, food and energy security matter. No one disputes that. But they're not the endgame, they're the floor. You don't win the 21st century with wheat and oil. You win with semiconductors, AI, advanced materials, resilient supply chains, and global alliances. And those don't come from shutting the world out, they come from outcompeting it.
So no, I'm not defending the status quo. I'm defending the idea that if you want to change the system, you'd better do it with real tools, measurable outcomes, and policies that scale. Not with bumper stickers like "tariffs for fairness" and "bring back the basics" with no roadmap beyond "fight everyone and hope it works out."
Reality check:
If you are the Bush brand of Globalist, you lost the Republican Party in the 2016 primary and you aren't getting it back anytime soon.
If you are the Obama brand of Globalist you lost the 2024 election and are bleeding support among Hispanics, AA, unions, and Gen Z.
Populism won. Nationalism won.
And they are winning in Italy, Hungary, etc. and gaining huge ground in France, Germany, etc.
Your argument that you are for change but not the current change is really an argument for no change by making the process unpalatable via constant unnecessary detours.
At this point Sloppy ugly change is FAR better than no change.
The USA doesn't need a scalpel. It needs a chainsaw.
Keep your fingers clear and stop the Berkeley Orange Man Bad routine.
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
ATL
This isn't a chain saw, this is swinging wildly in the dark with a blunt axe. And I keep repeating my solutions so you understand I'm offering actual answers. Solutions that have not been tried domestically, at least to the level needed, a recognition of failures of policy and initiative by government and business. You're beating your chest with political narratives and platitudes.
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Well done
This isn't a chain saw, this is swinging wildly in the dark with a blunt axe. And I keep repeating my solutions so you understand I'm offering actual answers. Solutions that have not been tried domestically, at least to the level needed, a recognition of failures of policy and initiative by government and business. You're beating your chest with political narratives and platitudes.
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Well done
Waco1947 ,la
JUST IN: 🇺🇸🇪🇺 Elon Musk calls for the United States and Europe to establish a "zero-tariff" system and a "free trade zone." pic.twitter.com/SbBpultMas
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) April 5, 2025
Let's pull on that thread a little...Oldbear83 said:So much wrong there.J.R. said:simple question. why hasn't it been done? It is all about total costs, period, end of story. Not the govts job to "care" about where American companies choose to locate. Again, all you people with this simpleton mindset enjoy their trips to Wally World, new shoes for momma once you let her out of the kitchen, clothes, Sams, toys, electronics. You have an I phone or smart phone? You willing to pay $2K for said phone instead of $1K? seriously. how's your TV, Laptop, AV Equipment. You digging that Guac along with your Mexican beer or tequila?Oldbear83 said:
J.R."Manufacturing is not coming back to any extent."
BS.
Any type of business can exist if there is demand and opportunity.
The demand exists, it just takes our government caring more about American businesses than foreign lobbyists.
No one who actually runs a company only looks at the current price.
But you do also seem to have bought hard into scare tactics and pessimism.
The people who built America would have laughed at you.
You are right, this is not a today-thing. How long does it take to move operations from outside the US to inside? You really think they are spending the money they told Trump? By the time they even start a new factory we are past mid-terms. During the 2028 election cycle they MAY be able to open doors and start with logistics.
Or, they are paying him lip service, jacking up prices and waiting him out. You think Vance has a shot if this continues? If people can't retire or lose their jobs with 28 years in, I know several.
At least for Electric Vehicles and anything that supports space exploration...boognish_bear said:JUST IN: 🇺🇸🇪🇺 Elon Musk calls for the United States and Europe to establish a "zero-tariff" system and a "free trade zone." pic.twitter.com/SbBpultMas
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) April 5, 2025
You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
Black Monday 1987 vs. 2025
— Jesse Cohen (@JesseCohenInv) April 5, 2025
The bears are getting louder. pic.twitter.com/JI6PtcoNM7
A powerful & simple question by historian Victor Hanson: why do so many of our trading partners have high tariffs & trade barriers, yet consider Trump’s tariffs illegitimate and harmful? Of course, TDS makes America’s elites robotically denounce everything Trump does. pic.twitter.com/XqKcvM0zMa
— Fabius Maximus (Ed.) (@FabiusMaximus01) April 5, 2025
You're struggling to comprehend. I'm not saying tariffs are the goal, I'm saying the goals aren't achievable through tariffs. These tariffs aren't intended to create freer trade, or level the playing field (fair trade), they're intended to force companies to change where they operate by being excessively punitive. If the result is lower tariffs in host countries, great, but it still requires us to be competitive against their domestic enterprises or other trade avenues to offset the trade imbalance. But again, not even that is the intention.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
And if my responses seem all over it's because your arguments are all over the place with false dichotomies, historical revisionism, political framing, an occasional dash of economics, and some pot shots (it's fine, I'm a big boy).
Feel free to set some guidelines as to what timelines and metrics we are benchmarking against. As far as apologies, I'll happily send $1000 to whatever you'd like as mine. If you have to apologize I'll just take the words as sufficient, especially if there's a recession. I'd prefer everyone keep their bucks.
And you are struggling to understand. Your "minor adjustments to business practices and procedures to build an economy that works for everyone" [done with scalpel level precision] is whistling past the graveyard. A half century rut won't be escaped absent a massive adjustment. The tipping point has been reached in the populace to demand that massive change. Denying that fact is like try to pull a 747 out of a 30,000 foot nosedive at 500 feet above ground level. We passed the point of comfortable adjustments. We are at the point of uncomfortable fundamental change. New Economy and Old Economy are not easy bedfellows. One need only look to the EU policy wrangling that lead to Brexit. But it isn't some unachievable goal. See Japan and Taiwan. We face a far tougher task but simply throwing our hands in the air and saying nothing can change if it causes discomfort for the folks currently most comfortable is wrongheaded. The out of work coal miner and factory worker don't care if you have to take a 4 year lease on your new Range Rover instead of a 3 year lease. They don't care if you only take 6 vacations in 2025. They don't want platitudes or some pittance. They want their lives back. And they have many disaffected friends who feel similarly for one reason or another.ATL Bear said:You're struggling to comprehend. I'm not saying tariffs are the goal, I'm saying the goals aren't achievable through tariffs. These tariffs aren't intended to create freer trade, or level the playing field (fair trade), they're intended to force companies to change where they operate by being excessively punitive. If the result is lower tariffs in host countries, great, but it still requires us to be competitive against their domestic enterprises or other trade avenues to offset the trade imbalance. But again, not even that is the intention.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
And if my responses seem all over it's because your arguments are all over the place with false dichotomies, historical revisionism, political framing, an occasional dash of economics, and some pot shots (it's fine, I'm a big boy).
Feel free to set some guidelines as to what timelines and metrics we are benchmarking against. As far as apologies, I'll happily send $1000 to whatever you'd like as mine. If you have to apologize I'll just take the words as sufficient, especially if there's a recession. I'd prefer everyone keep their bucks.
You keep looping to business metrics, benchmarks, and similar. You can't [no one can] spreadsheet and policy & procedure the way to success. You are assuming a numbers solution. I am arguing that the upcoming change is more fundamental. It is societal alignment level. The disaffected massively outnumber the country club crowd. The promise of a new modernized economy that saves the day has been sold to those people repeatedly. They no longer buy the rhetoric. And it is rhetoric. Even Japan and Taiwan have substantial old economy links.
You are the Bahktiar government in January 1979. The Social Democrats & Mensheviks in February 1917.
You are talking policy when the situation requires dire action.
You ignore the obvious.
Do note that you think a donation equals an apology. It doesn't.
How about the person who is wrong on 8/31/2025 admits their error on a thread on this board?
If we are mired in depression or still fighting a tariff war on that date I will gladly admit error.
If this round of adjustments is substantially in the rearview mirror and the market blip is rolled past will you do the same?
Redbrickbear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:You are basically making the same arguments that have been made for 30 years and have proven to be erroneous in practice. Real world trumps [pun intended] theoretical economics.ATL Bear said:These questions rely heavily on simplified assumptions (political narratives), false binaries, and an outdated understanding of how manufacturing fits into a modern economy.Adriacus Peratuun said:Questions:ATL Bear said:
Low skill manufacturing isn't coming back. And even if it did it would be low wage work and serve no economic purpose other than higher prices and increased worker risk for low pay. That was the preponderance of the oft sighted 60,000 - 90,000 factory loss (heck of a range there BTW).
Bringing manufacturing back is a capital not labor exercise, and the type of manufacturing we need is not only skilled labor, but highly skilled labor which is not only in short supply, but requires a reorientation of our education and training matrix domestically to address the short and long term lack of resources. That's before we even address the scale required to mass produce like our global competitors, the deregulation required to even contemplate it, and the supply chains necessary to execute.
Manufacturing employment beyond engineering, IT, and specialty technicians is on the bullet train of obsolescence. Why we would go to war with the world economically to try and protect it is beyond me. Don't protect, create and innovate. That's what always made us better.
1) for people whose basic skill set aligns with manufacturing work and not "create & innovate", what exactly are they to do for employment?
2) if the USA can cost effectively run automotive assembly plants, why can't it also run automotive component manufacturing? HVAC manufacturing [easily brought back]? Similar?
3) is the USA's national defense better by destroying the manufacturing base?
4) why did the USA create an economic environment that lead to offshoring tech manufacturing?
5) how many items do you own that are created by basic manufacturing skills? Cars, HVAC, appliances, etc.?
6) how many items do you that utilize tech manufacturing? Phones, cars, computers, pads, etc.
7) how often do you make phones calls, utilize the internet, etc.?
Throwing shade on manufacturing as part of a balanced economy is very 1990s.
1) For people whose basic skill set aligns with manufacturing work and not "create & innovate," what exactly are they to do for employment?
First I'd say make some effort to up-skill, but second with a long term unemployment rate of 3-5%, I'd say keep working as they are now. The myth of suffering is greatly overstated. Of course you're assuming manufacturing jobs are inherently accessible to the "basic skill set." That may have been true in 1955, but today's advanced manufacturing jobs require technical proficiency, digital fluency, and adaptive learning. The path forward isn't protecting jobs that no longer exist, it's expanding access to training, apprenticeships, and skilled trades that align with the demands of high-tech industry. Protecting obsolete roles keeps workers trapped in economic limbo. Empowering them through modern upskilling creates mobility.
2) If the USA can cost-effectively run automotive assembly plants, why can't it also run component manufacturing? HVAC manufacturing [easily brought back]? Similar?
Because assembly and component production are not the same thing. Assembly plants often benefit from logistics advantages, market proximity, and automation, making them viable in the U.S. Components, on the other hand, are part of a global, just-in-time supply chain with cost sensitive parts often manufactured at scale abroad. Simply asking "why not?" ignores economies of scale, labor intensity, material costs, regulatory burdens, and existing supplier networks. We can't rebuild the entire system by fiat.
3) Is the USA's national defense better by destroying the manufacturing base?
This is a straw man. No one is arguing for the destruction of the manufacturing base. The argument is to modernize it, invest in defense critical industries, dual use technologies, and resilient supply chains. Protecting commodity production like textiles or toaster ovens has nothing to do with national defense. Strategic reshoring of pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, and rare earths? Absolutely. But conflating that with blanket manufacturing protection is lazy geopolitics.
4) Why did the USA create an economic environment that led to offshoring tech manufacturing?
Because multinational corporations pursued profit and efficiency in a globalized system we helped architect. This wasn't some deep-state plot, it was the logical output of comparative advantage, currency dynamics, foreign labor markets, and demand for lower consumer prices. The solution isn't isolationism, it's building a domestic ecosystem that's attractive to high-end production, which includes stable policy, workforce investment, deregulation, and competitive tax and infrastructure systems.
5) How many items do you own that are created by basic manufacturing skills? Cars, HVAC, appliances, etc.?
Plenty. But owning them doesn't mean they need to be made here, or that we benefit from doing so. Global specialization allows the U.S. to lead in innovation while importing goods that are lower margin and labor intensive. There's a difference between using a product and needing to produce it locally. It's called economic efficiency, and it's a feature, not a flaw.
6) How many items do you own that utilize tech manufacturing? Phones, cars, computers, pads, etc.?
All of them, and this actually supports my point. These are the types of manufacturing that are capital-intensive, IP driven, and require high-skill labor, the very sectors we should be focused on strengthening. Trying to preserve low wage, low skill production to satisfy a nostalgic vision of factory floors doesn't move us forward. Investing in these tech heavy industries, supply chain resilience, and workforce capability does.
7) How often do you make phone calls, utilize the internet, etc.?
Constantly, which proves my point. Our economy is increasingly digital, decentralized, and service oriented. That doesn't mean we don't need manufacturing, but it means we need the right kind of manufacturing, embedded in future facing industries, not revived mid-century models. BTW, China's economy has been maturing in this direction as well. Less manufacturing employment and greater service orientation.
As for your "1990s" jab, if anything's outdated, it's the belief that manufacturing = national greatness and that trade protectionism can reverse 40 years of structural, capital, and technological change. The real danger is not moving forward and doubling down on a vision of the past that no longer maps to economic reality. Making the working and middle class pay for that folly through tariffs is downright 1890's.
How many decades of a failing imbalanced economy are necessary for you to admit the error?
Or it simply, "I am a winner in the new economy, screw those other folks. Let them eat cake."?
But you have to remember even in a rigged system there are people who benefit tremendously
And will greatly resist any change.....even much needed positive change.
The old Regime in France & Russia had to change....instead they dug in their heels and prevent peaceful change...economic and political...and got violent change instead.
Printing trillions of dollars and running hup unsustainable trade deficits has benefits for a small well connect group of college educated Americans...you can zoom in on their zip codes and see that...they will dig in to prevent real systemic change
Yeah but are these trade deficits just consumers making choices, or something actually nefarious? Taiwanese people have to pay out the wazzu for American goods, so obviously they don't buy much, and we obviously buy a ton of their semis.
What is wrong with that? How does punishing their and our economies solve it?
How to liberal pic.twitter.com/fSlJijMeiE
— Damani Felder (@TheDamaniFelder) April 5, 2025
Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
Trumps plan is clearly working? How do you figure?
I think you're living in fantasy land.
Redbrickbear said:Mothra said:This is the problem. Even if Trump achieves his goal of removing all tariffs (something I am cool with), if the end game is to return manufacturing to the US, that's just never going to happen within the next 2 years. It's why most manufacturing interest groups have come down hard against the tariffs. It will take at least 5 years and huge capital investments to achieve that goal. And that will of course result in much more expensive products, as not only will capital be required, but you will also be paying the American worker with his union dues a LOT more money than some dude in Vietnam..Johnny Bear said:
I have confidence/faith this revolutionary strategy will ultimately succeed long term, but my biggest concern is how long it will take for it to happen and whether or not voters will be willing to wait it out. Everyone can rest assured if dims retake power over the course of the '26 and '28 elections we will immediately return to the endlessly printing money plus increasing the debt like there's no tomorrow strategy and we will be right back to mortgaging future generations while on an inevitable path to national bankruptcy. Hoping and praying the inevitable long term benefit of Trump's strategy - if given the time to succeed - will at least be starting to be felt by the masses before they turn back to the people that got us into the incredible mess in the first place.
So what's the plan?
Just give up? Back to the unsustainable status quo?
We have tried it the other way for 40-50 years… and what we got was 50% of Americans living in debt, massive destruction of our manufacturing base and civil society, political tension (possible crisis), vulnerable supply chains stretched across the globe, the rise of Communist China as a peer competitor, a New Gilded Age of economic inequality…
I already told you. The only thing that will work reverse the trend is austerity measures. And that won't happen until a crash.
Tariffs and trade wars will do absolutely nothing to solve the problem. They will only make it worse.
Aren't you clever purposefully ignoring the immediate followup sentence.Mothra said:Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
Trumps plan is clearly working? How do you figure?
I think you're living in fantasy land.
Related to Chuck Schumer?
And then he went full Super Fly TNT meltdown.Adriacus Peratuun said:And you are struggling to understand. Your "minor adjustments to business practices and procedures to build an economy that works for everyone" [done with scalpel level precision] is whistling past the graveyard. A half century rut won't be escaped absent a massive adjustment. The tipping point has been reached in the populace to demand that massive change. Denying that fact is like try to pull a 747 out of a 30,000 foot nosedive at 500 feet above ground level. We passed the point of comfortable adjustments. We are at the point of uncomfortable fundamental change. New Economy and Old Economy are not easy bedfellows. One need only look to the EU policy wrangling that lead to Brexit. But it isn't some unachievable goal. See Japan and Taiwan. We face a far tougher task but simply throwing our hands in the air and saying nothing can change if it causes discomfort for the folks currently most comfortable is wrongheaded. The out of work coal miner and factory worker don't care if you have to take a 4 year lease on your new Range Rover instead of a 3 year lease. They don't care if you only take 6 vacations in 2025. They don't want platitudes or some pittance. They want their lives back. And they have many disaffected friends who feel similarly for one reason or another.ATL Bear said:You're struggling to comprehend. I'm not saying tariffs are the goal, I'm saying the goals aren't achievable through tariffs. These tariffs aren't intended to create freer trade, or level the playing field (fair trade), they're intended to force companies to change where they operate by being excessively punitive. If the result is lower tariffs in host countries, great, but it still requires us to be competitive against their domestic enterprises or other trade avenues to offset the trade imbalance. But again, not even that is the intention.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
And if my responses seem all over it's because your arguments are all over the place with false dichotomies, historical revisionism, political framing, an occasional dash of economics, and some pot shots (it's fine, I'm a big boy).
Feel free to set some guidelines as to what timelines and metrics we are benchmarking against. As far as apologies, I'll happily send $1000 to whatever you'd like as mine. If you have to apologize I'll just take the words as sufficient, especially if there's a recession. I'd prefer everyone keep their bucks.
You keep looping to business metrics, benchmarks, and similar. You can't [no one can] spreadsheet and policy & procedure the way to success. You are assuming a numbers solution. I am arguing that the upcoming change is more fundamental. It is societal alignment level. The disaffected massively outnumber the country club crowd. The promise of a new modernized economy that saves the day has been sold to those people repeatedly. They no longer buy the rhetoric. And it is rhetoric. Even Japan and Taiwan have substantial old economy links.
You are the Bahktiar government in January 1979. The Social Democrats & Mensheviks in February 1917.
You are talking policy when the situation requires dire action.
You ignore the obvious.
Do note that you think a donation equals an apology. It doesn't.
How about the person who is wrong on 8/31/2025 admits their error on a thread on this board?
If we are mired in depression or still fighting a tariff war on that date I will gladly admit error.
If this round of adjustments is substantially in the rearview mirror and the market blip is rolled past will you do the same?
Are you actually serious with this reply? You're talking like we're in the middle of some 1930s breadline collapse. Like the U.S. economy has been in freefall and people have been scraping for survival for 30 years. Have you actually spent time with people living through real, systemic poverty? Or visited countries where upward mobility is a fantasy, where capital access is non-existent, and where economic opportunity is limited to political connections or inheritance?
Let's get grounded for a second.
You talk about people "getting their lives back." From what and from when exactly? A factory job in 1983? The exact moment when everything was perfect and frozen in time? There is no golden age and whatever moment you're trying to return to came with fewer choices, fewer rights, and far less mobility than what exists now.
Japan and Taiwan? I'm glad you brought them up.because both modernized with strategic industrial policy, smart public/private coordination, and global trade engagement, not tariffs and tribalism. They invested in the future, they didn't declare war on the present.
Is the current system perfect? Of course not. But even with those flaws, there is no country on Earth with a greater capacity for someone to change their circumstances, to learn, invest, move, reinvent, or recover than the United States. That's not nationalism. That's just economic reality.
But here's what really gets me. You seem to think that a certain kind of job, in a certain kind of town, at a certain wage, is not just desirable, but somehow owed. And that if the market doesn't provide it, then everyone else needs to be taxed, tariffed, and punished until we warp the entire economy around that fantasy. What kind of populism is that exactly? Because it's not pro worker or pro U.S.
There's a difference between advocating for better opportunity, and demanding that we break the system because it didn't preserve the exact world someone expected. That's not justice. That's resentment. It's ironic, but your own revolutionary vision sounds an awful lot like a collectivist uprising. Tear down the elites, punish the system, rally the disaffected with promises of rebirth through disruption. Are you sure you're not just rediscovering Marxism with better branding?
As far as the bet, let's agree that in 6 months we'll revisit the data. If we see higher inflation, a persistent trade deficit, flat manufacturing job growth, and retaliatory measures all while capital continues to hesitate we can agree that's not realignment. That's economic self-harm. I'll own it if the opposite happens. And of course the loser posts their apology. Did you actually think that needed to be clarified??
The hard part is Trump is so erratic he's just as likely to see the tanking and pull back the tariffs, change course and I guess we're left with a draw? One thing's for certain, he'll claim victory regardless.
You can bathe in your righteous indignation as much as you like.ATL Bear said:And then he went full Super Fly TNT meltdown.Adriacus Peratuun said:And you are struggling to understand. Your "minor adjustments to business practices and procedures to build an economy that works for everyone" [done with scalpel level precision] is whistling past the graveyard. A half century rut won't be escaped absent a massive adjustment. The tipping point has been reached in the populace to demand that massive change. Denying that fact is like try to pull a 747 out of a 30,000 foot nosedive at 500 feet above ground level. We passed the point of comfortable adjustments. We are at the point of uncomfortable fundamental change. New Economy and Old Economy are not easy bedfellows. One need only look to the EU policy wrangling that lead to Brexit. But it isn't some unachievable goal. See Japan and Taiwan. We face a far tougher task but simply throwing our hands in the air and saying nothing can change if it causes discomfort for the folks currently most comfortable is wrongheaded. The out of work coal miner and factory worker don't care if you have to take a 4 year lease on your new Range Rover instead of a 3 year lease. They don't care if you only take 6 vacations in 2025. They don't want platitudes or some pittance. They want their lives back. And they have many disaffected friends who feel similarly for one reason or another.ATL Bear said:You're struggling to comprehend. I'm not saying tariffs are the goal, I'm saying the goals aren't achievable through tariffs. These tariffs aren't intended to create freer trade, or level the playing field (fair trade), they're intended to force companies to change where they operate by being excessively punitive. If the result is lower tariffs in host countries, great, but it still requires us to be competitive against their domestic enterprises or other trade avenues to offset the trade imbalance. But again, not even that is the intention.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
And if my responses seem all over it's because your arguments are all over the place with false dichotomies, historical revisionism, political framing, an occasional dash of economics, and some pot shots (it's fine, I'm a big boy).
Feel free to set some guidelines as to what timelines and metrics we are benchmarking against. As far as apologies, I'll happily send $1000 to whatever you'd like as mine. If you have to apologize I'll just take the words as sufficient, especially if there's a recession. I'd prefer everyone keep their bucks.
You keep looping to business metrics, benchmarks, and similar. You can't [no one can] spreadsheet and policy & procedure the way to success. You are assuming a numbers solution. I am arguing that the upcoming change is more fundamental. It is societal alignment level. The disaffected massively outnumber the country club crowd. The promise of a new modernized economy that saves the day has been sold to those people repeatedly. They no longer buy the rhetoric. And it is rhetoric. Even Japan and Taiwan have substantial old economy links.
You are the Bahktiar government in January 1979. The Social Democrats & Mensheviks in February 1917.
You are talking policy when the situation requires dire action.
You ignore the obvious.
Do note that you think a donation equals an apology. It doesn't.
How about the person who is wrong on 8/31/2025 admits their error on a thread on this board?
If we are mired in depression or still fighting a tariff war on that date I will gladly admit error.
If this round of adjustments is substantially in the rearview mirror and the market blip is rolled past will you do the same?
Are you actually serious with this reply? You're talking like we're in the middle of some 1930s breadline collapse. Like the U.S. economy has been in freefall and people have been scraping for survival for 30 years. Have you actually spent time with people living through real, systemic poverty? Or visited countries where upward mobility is a fantasy, where capital access is non-existent, and where economic opportunity is limited to political connections or inheritance?
Let's get grounded for a second.
You talk about people "getting their lives back." From what and from when exactly? A factory job in 1983? The exact moment when everything was perfect and frozen in time? There is no golden age and whatever moment you're trying to return to came with fewer choices, fewer rights, and far less mobility than what exists now.
Japan and Taiwan? I'm glad you brought them up.because both modernized with strategic industrial policy, smart public/private coordination, and global trade engagement, not tariffs and tribalism. They invested in the future, they didn't declare war on the present.
Is the current system perfect? Of course not. But even with those flaws, there is no country on Earth with a greater capacity for someone to change their circumstances, to learn, invest, move, reinvent, or recover than the United States. That's not nationalism. That's just economic reality.
But here's what really gets me. You seem to think that a certain kind of job, in a certain kind of town, at a certain wage, is not just desirable, but somehow owed. And that if the market doesn't provide it, then everyone else needs to be taxed, tariffed, and punished until we warp the entire economy around that fantasy. What kind of populism is that exactly? Because it's not pro worker or pro U.S.
There's a difference between advocating for better opportunity, and demanding that we break the system because it didn't preserve the exact world someone expected. That's not justice. That's resentment. It's ironic, but your own revolutionary vision sounds an awful lot like a collectivist uprising. Tear down the elites, punish the system, rally the disaffected with promises of rebirth through disruption. Are you sure you're not just rediscovering Marxism with better branding?
As far as the bet, let's agree that in 6 months we'll revisit the data. If we see higher inflation, a persistent trade deficit, flat manufacturing job growth, and retaliatory measures all while capital continues to hesitate we can agree that's not realignment. That's economic self-harm. I'll own it if the opposite happens. And of course the loser posts their apology. Did you actually think that needed to be clarified??
The hard part is Trump is so erratic he's just as likely to see the tanking and pull back the tariffs, change course and I guess we're left with a draw? One thing's for certain, he'll claim victory regardless.
Clearly you have never been in a country undergoing upheaval [economic or otherwise].
In the last 50 years alone: Iran, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Venezuela, El Salvador, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chile, etc. Go back a little further and you get Singapore in 1965.
Ultimately any system that doesn't work for the masses will fail.
Reworking a system is often good……see Singapore, see El Salvador.
The people will gladly tell you that they do have a right to eat, a right to provide for their families, a right to a home and shelter, a right to safety, a right not to have their jobs shipped overseas. Anyone supporting a system that is failing a huge chunk of the populace on those basic needs is basically in self-denial.
You are making similar arguments to the ones that the Peronistas made last year in Argentina………fundamental change will destroy everything. The risk is too high. The Peronistas were wrong, so are you.
The USA has to rebalance trade. High risk is justified. But you are clearly overstating the risk.
Fortunately, the results will play out very publicly and who is right/wrong will be readily apparent.
No further rehashing of the same arguments needed. I will check back on 8/31. Enjoy your week.
The estate tax developed during feudalism. The sovereign (king) owned all the land and doled it out to loyal supporters (lords) in exchange for annual tribute in the form of tribute - ongoing rent + pledge of knights & soldiers in a time of war. When a lord died, the "estate" reverted back to the sovereign UNLESS the heirs paid a tax....an estate tax....to keep it. The premise of it all is that no one owns land except the sovereign. Anyone who "owns" land does so at the discretion of the sovereign.The_barBEARian said:Assassin said:We are losing our farms rapidly, over 140,000 farms in 5 yearsFrank Galvin said:Sean's take would surprise many American farmers. The idea that we don't grow our own food is absurd.Assassin said:
Great take on what is going on in the USAAmerica has become addicted to cheap foreign baubles and easy money (i.e., fake fiat currency) at the expense of its long-term economic health. We allowed ourselves to be transformed from a cast iron economy which made things into a largely paper economy which depends on the good… pic.twitter.com/kGJetkN2YK
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) April 3, 2025
https://www.fb.org/market-intel/over-140-000-farms-lost-in-5-years
Whoever invented the estate tax deserves to burn in human excrement for all time.
Prior to the Trump tax cuts the estate tax hit families with as little as $2 million in property.... that destroyed more family farms than China could ever dream of!
So, yeah, it's an odious tax completely at odds with a free-market system.
this is bad, the globalists will tell us (despite a years-long shortage of commercial trucks....)boognish_bear said:JUST IN: 🇺🇸 General Motors to increase US truck production following Trump's tariffs.
— Remarks (@remarks) April 3, 2025
Yeah, it's recto-cranial inversion = tariffs are always bad, never a tool for anything except self-destruction, etc.... If that were true, then all of our trading partners who've used them to create trade surpluses with us would have already collapsed and we'd be enjoying the fruits of full employment, balanced federal budgets, etc.... How's that worked out for us so far?ATL Bear said:The U.S. once relied on tariffs before the income tax. But this wasn't because tariffs were ideal, it was because the federal government was smaller, and the economy was simpler. As industrialization advanced and our economy grew more complex, tariffs proved inadequate and regressive, and that's precisely why we moved toward income taxation. Not because of trade surpluses, but because we needed a more stable, equitable, and modern revenue base.whiterock said:ATL Bear said:You simpletons are absolute economic idiots. Making the working and middle class pay for their own economic demise through higher prices is one of the most evil ironies I've ever heard of. The jobs of the future are not manufacturing jobs, and using the false premise of trade deficits as "cheating" to push the job fairy tale is dtraight devious.whiterock said:Redbrickbear said:whiterock said:Mothra said:So, in other words, this is about damaging other countries' economies more than helping our own. It will take years to change supply chain and manufacturing base, but at least over the course of the next two years we can damage their economies worse than they can damage ours. In the meantime, the American people take it in the shorts.whiterock said:muddled thinking. the purpose of tariffs is to address a trade deficit, which will benefit domestic manufacturers and jobs. Whether they are reciprocal or not depends on the nature of the abuse happening, e.g. look at the way China relocates production & transshipments to avoid existing trade restrictions. This is particularly true when it comes to trade subsidies (which many countries do) and non-tariff barriers to trade like the EU VAT.Robert Wilson said:Mothra said:So, when I first saw the list, I thought it was actually a reciprocal tariff based on the tariffs imposed by other countries, and I thought it might not be so bad.boognish_bear said:
Not sure if this is accurate across the board or not… Comments seemed to indicate soThis guy cracked the tariff formula:@orthonormalist
— Geiger Capital (@Geiger_Capital) April 2, 2025
It’s simply the nation’s trade deficit with us divided by the nation’s exports to us.
Yes. Really.
Vietnam: Exports 136.6, Imports 13.1
Deficit = 123.5
123.5/136.6 = 90% pic.twitter.com/fDOMoQwzKt
However, if this is truly the formula Trump used - which is based apparently on trade deficits - this is not a reciprocal tariff but instead a tariff that tries to get manufacturing to come back to the US - something that is likely never gonna happen in any large numbers.
In short, the Trump admin is misleading the American people by labeling this a reciprocal tariff. That's just a wholly false statement.
Such an entirely ridiculous and unnecessary move, and it's going to come back to bite him. Kiss the midterms goodbye. We are going to lose the House and the Senate. So dumb.
I hope Republicans who didn't skip Economics 101 will block this deal.
I'm with you. I could get on board with reciprocal tariffs. If we are instead enacting huge one sided tariffs just to counteract trade deficits, that's insane.
if you are going to pick this fight you have to smack hard coming out of the gate, to effectively deny entry to our market unless concessions are made. Your opponent, who has investments in an existing supply chain has to make hard decisions about whether he is going to abandon the supply chain or open up his own market to your goods. Sure, the wealthier countries will have at least theoretical options to consider, but it will take years for them to restructure and in the meantime they will incur more damage to their economy than they will inflict on ours (by virtue of having a trade surplus with us).
our position is quite strong and concessions from trade partners are a matter of when not if.
Such a silly strategy.
The silliest strategy of all is doing nothing and accepting the status quo, which is what you are advocating.
There are a lot of people in American who see nothing wrong with the status quo
They walk out of their expensive homes in their expensive neighborhoods and see nothing wrong with the current spoils system or how the economic pie is divided up
They are going to learn (by the ballot box or the bullet) how wrong they are
The red light is flashing...and the American electorate is signaling (potentially dangerously) revolutionary impulses
[America's newly elected president may be a demagogue and a populist, but what he is above all is a revolutionary.
In hoping to make America great again, Donald Trump promises to introduce a fundamental, comprehensive and rapid transformation of American political, economic, social and cultural institutions. Such a massive change is what we mean by the term "revolution."]
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/4976570-america-has-elected-a-revolutionary-will-he-succeed/
The aversion to tariffs is a foremost luxury belief of the upper classes. THEIR careers are not impacted by a flood of cheap foreign goods……
If you understood why we have income tax vs tariffs today, it was instituted specifically so the working class didn't have to carry so much of the tax burden, and it could be transferred more to the wealthy.
This joker went to war with the world on trade all at the same time. Straight insanity!
Recto-cranial inversion there. We went to an income tax because we were a manufacturing powerhouse running consistent trade surpluses (which limits tax base if one depends on tariffs). But we've run consistently trade deficits since the 1970's (which creates the converse problem). So cutting payroll taxes and using tariffs to offset directly benefits WORKING CLASSES and fosters more manufacturing jobs (which pay more than flipping burgers and doing ride-share).
Doesn't matter how smart one is if one works so hard to remain obtuse on macroeconomics. Note Sargon' reference in my prior post about the distribution of GDP being overweighted in finance and real estate. Do you seriously mean to suggest that it's a good idea to become a nation whose business model is rent-seeking? That's one consequence of continuing the globalist model.
We agree we needed more tax base. Where you get lost is on why part. And the math is pretty simple - trade surpluses constrict tax base when tariffs are your primary source of revenue. Growth of government is indeed a factor with respect to needing tax base, but not relevant to the issue/effects of tariffs. (and it's not like all those countries with whom we have trade deficits lack multiple layers of income tax, VAT, sales tax, etc....or have smaller governments than us....) Your argument here simply does not square with reality. Why can't we ALSO have tariff revenue like our trade partners do? (answer: tariffs are not about revenue - they are about driving jobs into your economy.)
Suggesting that we should now go backward by cutting payroll taxes and replace that revenue with consumption taxes on imported goods isn't reform, it's regression wrapped in populist language. Tariffs, again, are paid by consumers, not foreign governments. And low and middle income households spend a much higher proportion of their income on goods, especially imported ones, than taxes. So replacing income or payroll taxes with tariffs doesn't shift the burden upward it shifts it downward, onto the very working-class households you claim to protect.
LOL This is such self-serving framing (will it always be populist to enact policy beneficial to little people?) to support a weak argument - you lambaste tariffs as a tax on consumers, then waive away the offset (cutting income taxes commensurately) with a subjective "regressive." Again, all those people running trade surpluses with us do it, and they have the manufacturing capacity (tax base) to tap into.
You point out that our economy is too weighted toward finance and real estate type industries, which we may agree that we need more strategic manufacturing, but where we part ways is in your diagnosis of the cause and your prescription for the cure. The shift in GDP toward those types of industries isn't because of trade liberalization, it's because of underinvestment in physical infrastructure, education, and worker training, along with poor regulatory policy that has redirected capital away from it.
Good grief, man, stop parroting globalist arguments and think. WHY did that underinvestment occur? (because we structured the international order to run structural trade deficits.) Educate yourself on the impact of the USD as an international reserve currency (which GUARANTEED that finance, stock market, real estate would become the reservoirs for foreign capital inflows). We run a trade deficit that hastens the demise of better paying manufacturing jobs in favor of lower-paying service jobs. The profits of deficits flow back into our capital markets (banking, stocks, bonds, real estate, etc....) rather than into manufacturing. We literally built a system to incentivize rent-seeking rather than reinvestment in productive capacity. And you defend it, advocating to tax the public more for "investments" in physical infrastructure, education, and training. I'm a fan of de-regulation, but that alone will not fix our problem.. Neither will spending more on those other things do any good, either, as long as trade partners keep calibrating their tariff regimes to offset our investments. You are doubling and tripling down on a losing hand.
Slapping tariffs on foreign goods doesn't fix that. It doesn't rebuild domestic capacity, doesn't retrain workers, and doesn't rebalance capital allocation. It just raises prices and introduces more friction.
Dear God, look at the internal contradictions in your statements. We are over $4T in direct investment headed elsewhere now headed here, and yet you say "it doesn't rebuild domestic capacity." And how do you exploit that investment in production without hiring workers? And that's before we get to the false premise that the policy at play is aimed at turning us into a closed system (it isn't). It is patently aimed at forcing corporations to move greater percentages of their supply chain back inside US borders.
And no, manufacturing jobs aren't inherently "better" than service sector jobs unless they're backed by strong productivity, innovation, and export potential. A subsidized job assembling parts in an inefficient supply chain isn't more dignified than a job in logistics, IT, or energy. The goal shouldn't be to revive 1955, it should be to build an economy with sustainable employment opportunities, not obsolescence.
Sigh. That statement would only be true if service jobs paid the same as manufacturing jobs, which they don't.
If you want to cut payroll taxes to help the working class, fine let's have that discussion, although it compounds the issue with the entitlements bankrupting us. But replacing them with tariffs, the most regressive, inefficient, and distortive form of taxation, is not the answer.
As long as your analysis presumes that tariffs are nothing more than a tax on consumers, you will continue to lumber on in ignorance.
So no, this isn't recto-cranial inversion. It's just a refusal to buy into the idea that tariffs are anything more than a political gimmick dressed up as economic strategy.
Victor Davis Hanson asks a simple yet profound question about tariffs:
— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) April 4, 2025
“If tariffs are so destructive of their economies, why is China booming?”
You won’t hear any of the critics of Trump’s reciprocal tariffs even consider that question.
That’s because they don’t really care. pic.twitter.com/RVbr40HH9y
No.ScottS said:boognish_bear said:Watters: What kind of manufacturing are you talking about returning here?
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 4, 2025
Lutnick: What's going to happen is robotics are going to replace the cheap labor… pic.twitter.com/k9UPNhuvU1
ALL manufacturing jobs are going to be robots??
And somebody has to build the robots.
And somebody has to run the robots.
But even if the rise of robotics means there will be no more jobs for people, why wouldn't we want those robots to operate inside of our borders? Wouldn't we want those robots to be here, producing goods here? The policy critics are arguing that we should continue to import, and let those countries reinvest their profits rather than production here. We don't need any production. Money is money, right? Doesn't matter if one produces goods or services. Right?
You can tax profits on financial returns. Sure.
you tax the wages on the clerks, too.
But if those robots are located here.....we can tax the raw materials flowing to the production lines. We can tax the buildings where robots operate. We can tax the robots. We can tax the energy that powers the robots. We can tax the lubrication on the robots. We can tax what the robots produce. This is bad, the globalists argue....so bad we must put in place incentives for foreign countries to do all that work.
It is truly amazing to see otherwise intelligent people turn into blithering idiots when the word "tariffs" enters a conversation.
look at our top 5 largest trade partners, all running surpluses with them. 4 of them have already made offers to drop tariffs if we drop ours. Only China is pushing back.Redbrickbear said:If that was the case then the Chinese foreign minister would not be screaming bloody murder...and he isMothra said:Red's idea that this is going to hurt China is absurd. China is going to make a killing on this.Porteroso said:That is a great personal policy for you to have as an individual, but it is a long term restructuring policy of the global economy policy to have, as a country. The question has to be asked, what evidence is there that America will be better off if we effectively close ourselves off to global trade?Redbrickbear said:Porteroso said:It will all trickle back to the consumer. Whether you pay more for made in USA, or more because Chinese goods are 54% more expensive, you are paying more. Tariffs are effectively a tax upon consumers.ScottS said:...except the tariffs Trump put on are paid by other countries. Could it be past to the comsumer, yes but you might just buy something US made instead. You don't have to pay the tariff.boognish_bear said:JUST IN: 🇺🇸 JPMorgan says President Trump's tariffs are the largest US tax hike since 1968.
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) April 3, 2025
Pay more so Americans can have better jobs? Count me in
Not to mention you are going to pay no matter what system you chose.
Even without tariffs you pay....in the real life sense of societal break down and via helping Communist China rise to be a world power.
There is no free lunch....and even free trade has its long term costs....and those costs will come due
As I've said, if this ends up being mostly tariffs on China, and we get better deals with most other countries, I can be for that. But as it was proposed, it's a declaration of economic war upon the free market, and that will not go well.
Lost in this is what Republicans used to say was a core value: the free market. If Trump does negotiate in good faith and get many countries to eliminate their tariffs upon US goods, the free market will benefit. If he does not negotiate, and no matter what a country like Vietnam says (they say they will eliminate all tariffs on US goods.... that's a wrap, right?), he goes forward with tariffs, this will be a major blow to free trade not only globally, but especially in the USA.
No President or Congress has ever taken it upon themself to declare war on free trade, not even the most liberal. To have this done by a Republican, and backed by conservatives, is yet another total flip flop driven by the GOP's total admiration for their Dear Leader.
[China's foreign minister has accused the US of "two-faced" behaviour, condemning the imposition of tariffs on Chinese goods and warning against the "law of the jungle" that could emerge from Donald Trump's "America First" policy.
Speaking at the sidelines of China's annual parliamentary gathering, Wang Yi said China would "firmly counter" US pressure. "No country should think that it can suppress China and maintain good relations," he added.
Wang's comments came days after the US president announced an increase on tariffs on Chinese imports.]
Then look at where we have the most aggressive tariffs employed. Why are so many places with such small amounts of trade hit with such extraordinary tariffs? (check the relationship many of those countries have with China).
One could argue that the whole program being run here is economic isolation of China, to freeze them out of a quarter of the world economy by making it effectively impossible for them to not just transship but to move production to escape our tariffs. Only by investing HERE will China be able to play in the US market. Why does China not want to do that? (because they want the jobs in China rather than America.....)
Thank you. The US has a debt issue, one that Trump played a big role in creating as he spent in line with Biden and Obama. But as you say, the system was not on the brink of collapse. Market correction? Sure. Reallocation of fund with some tough questions? Sure. But, even the 2008 correction or the 91 recession was not a collapse of the system.ATL Bear said:And then he went full Super Fly TNT meltdown.Adriacus Peratuun said:And you are struggling to understand. Your "minor adjustments to business practices and procedures to build an economy that works for everyone" [done with scalpel level precision] is whistling past the graveyard. A half century rut won't be escaped absent a massive adjustment. The tipping point has been reached in the populace to demand that massive change. Denying that fact is like try to pull a 747 out of a 30,000 foot nosedive at 500 feet above ground level. We passed the point of comfortable adjustments. We are at the point of uncomfortable fundamental change. New Economy and Old Economy are not easy bedfellows. One need only look to the EU policy wrangling that lead to Brexit. But it isn't some unachievable goal. See Japan and Taiwan. We face a far tougher task but simply throwing our hands in the air and saying nothing can change if it causes discomfort for the folks currently most comfortable is wrongheaded. The out of work coal miner and factory worker don't care if you have to take a 4 year lease on your new Range Rover instead of a 3 year lease. They don't care if you only take 6 vacations in 2025. They don't want platitudes or some pittance. They want their lives back. And they have many disaffected friends who feel similarly for one reason or another.ATL Bear said:You're struggling to comprehend. I'm not saying tariffs are the goal, I'm saying the goals aren't achievable through tariffs. These tariffs aren't intended to create freer trade, or level the playing field (fair trade), they're intended to force companies to change where they operate by being excessively punitive. If the result is lower tariffs in host countries, great, but it still requires us to be competitive against their domestic enterprises or other trade avenues to offset the trade imbalance. But again, not even that is the intention.Adriacus Peratuun said:You are all over the place.ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:Adriacus Peratuun said:ATL Bear said:
I thought your "one-trick pony" comment was a joke at first until I realized just
Your attempt to backhandedly insult by aligning me to Obama or Bush ignores the reality of my actual position being a Milton Friedman/Rand Paul economic conservative/libertarian. Something obviously at odds with this neo-socialist national populism we're pivoting toward. You're no longer debating policy, you're issuing a tribal ultimatum. Populism won, so every policy idea that doesn't involve a chainsaw must be ignored. That's not governance. That's destruction without direction.
Populism isn't a strategy. It's a mood. And moods don't solve structural problems. They win headlines, sure. They flip some elections. But winning an election doesn't automatically make your ideas workable, it just gives you the burden of proving they are. And history (recent and distant) hasn't reflected well on these approaches. So far, the chainsaw approach you're celebrating has delivered higher inflation, fractured alliances, erratic trade policy, and economic volatility with no measurable plan to translate grievance into durable prosperity.
If "sloppy, ugly change" is the new bar for economic policy, then congratulations, we've lowered the standard to vibes and slogans.
You think you're cutting out dead weight. What you're actually doing is gutting systems that underpin our currency dominance, trade leverage, capital markets, and alliance network. All because you want to spite a theory you never took the time to understand. I really don't think you understand what this "reshaping" means at a practical level for America.
And no, this isn't "Orange Man Bad." It's "Show Me the Policy." If you can't articulate how tariffs, deglobalization, and punitive economic tactics actually scale, reduce inequality, or strengthen our economy without jacking up costs on the very people you say you represent, then all you've got is an aesthetic of rebellion. That's not revolution, it's just a rebrand of failure.
I'm not defending the status quo. I'm giving specific solutions and arguing for competence over chaos and outcomes over applause lines. You don't like how things have been run? Fair. So show me what works better, and make sure it survives contact with math, markets, and the modern world.
Identifying your politics with the Son of Dr. No (Ron Paul) [the only Republican in Congress to vote against Reagan's budget]. Paul also demanded withdrawal from the UN & NATO but you espouse the value of multilateral organizations (a position neither Paul would agree on but which Obama & both Bush Ps would support).
You ask for the policy endgame but already adamantly oppose it. How can you oppose it when you claim to not know it?
Is default disagreement (BTW a very Ron Paul approach) the norm?
And you continue to jump to the same weird conclusion…..that tariffs are the goal instead of the tool.
The goal is Fair Trade. Fair Free Trade is best. But Fair is more important than Free.
Personally, I don't care if Trump drags Trudeau into a back room and bludgeons him with a bowling pin if it results in Fair Trade. Tariffs are the 2x4 that Trump is using to get the donkey's attention. It clearly is working.
The entire world is discussing trade parameters. If the tariffs are equally effective in forcing new trade arrangements more favorable to the USA [i think it is likely], how can you argue with the methodology?
You still haven't agreed on how the incorrect party [end of Summer] apologizes.
And if my responses seem all over it's because your arguments are all over the place with false dichotomies, historical revisionism, political framing, an occasional dash of economics, and some pot shots (it's fine, I'm a big boy).
Feel free to set some guidelines as to what timelines and metrics we are benchmarking against. As far as apologies, I'll happily send $1000 to whatever you'd like as mine. If you have to apologize I'll just take the words as sufficient, especially if there's a recession. I'd prefer everyone keep their bucks.
You keep looping to business metrics, benchmarks, and similar. You can't [no one can] spreadsheet and policy & procedure the way to success. You are assuming a numbers solution. I am arguing that the upcoming change is more fundamental. It is societal alignment level. The disaffected massively outnumber the country club crowd. The promise of a new modernized economy that saves the day has been sold to those people repeatedly. They no longer buy the rhetoric. And it is rhetoric. Even Japan and Taiwan have substantial old economy links.
You are the Bahktiar government in January 1979. The Social Democrats & Mensheviks in February 1917.
You are talking policy when the situation requires dire action.
You ignore the obvious.
Do note that you think a donation equals an apology. It doesn't.
How about the person who is wrong on 8/31/2025 admits their error on a thread on this board?
If we are mired in depression or still fighting a tariff war on that date I will gladly admit error.
If this round of adjustments is substantially in the rearview mirror and the market blip is rolled past will you do the same?
Are you actually serious with this reply? You're talking like we're in the middle of some 1930s breadline collapse. Like the U.S. economy has been in freefall and people have been scraping for survival for 30 years. Have you actually spent time with people living through real, systemic poverty? Or visited countries where upward mobility is a fantasy, where capital access is non-existent, and where economic opportunity is limited to political connections or inheritance?
Let's get grounded for a second.
You talk about people "getting their lives back." From what and from when exactly? A factory job in 1983? The exact moment when everything was perfect and frozen in time? There is no golden age and whatever moment you're trying to return to came with fewer choices, fewer rights, and far less mobility than what exists now.
Japan and Taiwan? I'm glad you brought them up.because both modernized with strategic industrial policy, smart public/private coordination, and global trade engagement, not tariffs and tribalism. They invested in the future, they didn't declare war on the present.
Is the current system perfect? Of course not. But even with those flaws, there is no country on Earth with a greater capacity for someone to change their circumstances, to learn, invest, move, reinvent, or recover than the United States. That's not nationalism. That's just economic reality.
But here's what really gets me. You seem to think that a certain kind of job, in a certain kind of town, at a certain wage, is not just desirable, but somehow owed. And that if the market doesn't provide it, then everyone else needs to be taxed, tariffed, and punished until we warp the entire economy around that fantasy. What kind of populism is that exactly? Because it's not pro worker or pro U.S.
There's a difference between advocating for better opportunity, and demanding that we break the system because it didn't preserve the exact world someone expected. That's not justice. That's resentment. It's ironic, but your own revolutionary vision sounds an awful lot like a collectivist uprising. Tear down the elites, punish the system, rally the disaffected with promises of rebirth through disruption. Are you sure you're not just rediscovering Marxism with better branding?
As far as the bet, let's agree that in 6 months we'll revisit the data. If we see higher inflation, a persistent trade deficit, flat manufacturing job growth, and retaliatory measures all while capital continues to hesitate we can agree that's not realignment. That's economic self-harm. I'll own it if the opposite happens. And of course the loser posts their apology. Did you actually think that needed to be clarified??
The hard part is Trump is so erratic he's just as likely to see the tanking and pull back the tariffs, change course and I guess we're left with a draw? One thing's for certain, he'll claim victory regardless.
What plan? He won't even commit to keeping the tariffs. His #2 Elon is now talking free trade. Who is going to invest in factories when they don't know if the tarrifs will last the rest of the week?
If the message is to build in America how the hell are we going to have free trade?whiterock said:look at our top 5 largest trade partners, all running surpluses with them. 4 of them have already made offers to drop tariffs if we drop ours. Only China is pushing back.Redbrickbear said:If that was the case then the Chinese foreign minister would not be screaming bloody murder...and he isMothra said:Red's idea that this is going to hurt China is absurd. China is going to make a killing on this.Porteroso said:That is a great personal policy for you to have as an individual, but it is a long term restructuring policy of the global economy policy to have, as a country. The question has to be asked, what evidence is there that America will be better off if we effectively close ourselves off to global trade?Redbrickbear said:Porteroso said:It will all trickle back to the consumer. Whether you pay more for made in USA, or more because Chinese goods are 54% more expensive, you are paying more. Tariffs are effectively a tax upon consumers.ScottS said:...except the tariffs Trump put on are paid by other countries. Could it be past to the comsumer, yes but you might just buy something US made instead. You don't have to pay the tariff.boognish_bear said:JUST IN: 🇺🇸 JPMorgan says President Trump's tariffs are the largest US tax hike since 1968.
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) April 3, 2025
Pay more so Americans can have better jobs? Count me in
Not to mention you are going to pay no matter what system you chose.
Even without tariffs you pay....in the real life sense of societal break down and via helping Communist China rise to be a world power.
There is no free lunch....and even free trade has its long term costs....and those costs will come due
As I've said, if this ends up being mostly tariffs on China, and we get better deals with most other countries, I can be for that. But as it was proposed, it's a declaration of economic war upon the free market, and that will not go well.
Lost in this is what Republicans used to say was a core value: the free market. If Trump does negotiate in good faith and get many countries to eliminate their tariffs upon US goods, the free market will benefit. If he does not negotiate, and no matter what a country like Vietnam says (they say they will eliminate all tariffs on US goods.... that's a wrap, right?), he goes forward with tariffs, this will be a major blow to free trade not only globally, but especially in the USA.
No President or Congress has ever taken it upon themself to declare war on free trade, not even the most liberal. To have this done by a Republican, and backed by conservatives, is yet another total flip flop driven by the GOP's total admiration for their Dear Leader.
[China's foreign minister has accused the US of "two-faced" behaviour, condemning the imposition of tariffs on Chinese goods and warning against the "law of the jungle" that could emerge from Donald Trump's "America First" policy.
Speaking at the sidelines of China's annual parliamentary gathering, Wang Yi said China would "firmly counter" US pressure. "No country should think that it can suppress China and maintain good relations," he added.
Wang's comments came days after the US president announced an increase on tariffs on Chinese imports.]
Then look at where we have the most aggressive tariffs employed. Why are so many places with such small amounts of trade hit with such extraordinary tariffs? (check the relationship many of those countries have with China).
One could argue that the whole program being run here is economic isolation of China, to freeze them out of a quarter of the world economy by making it effectively impossible for them to not just transship but to move production to escape our tariffs. Only by investing HERE will China be able to play in the US market. Why does China not want to do that? (because they want the jobs in China rather than America.....)
President Trump is completely SILENT:
— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) April 6, 2025
It has now been over 36 hours since the last tariff headline from President Trump.
No mention of any potential tariff deals, phone calls, or delays in tariffs.
“Reciprocal tariffs” will officially go live at 12:01 AM ET.
President Trump…
If Trump remains silent, countries will respond.
— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) April 6, 2025
We are still at the point of "hopes" that tariffs are just posturing. Volatility is here to stay.
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