To be perfectly fair, why should the Democrat politicians suffer over 50%+ of voters’ bad decisions? They tried, but facts, empathy and sane government was soundly rejected by voters.
After all this isn’t a coup, this is just the will of the people.
Domestic consequences of the 2024 US presidential election: the quickening
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After all this isn’t a coup, this is just the will of the people.
You’ve already thought more about it than they have. You need go no further than they want to solve the housing crisis by… deporting all the people who build the housing…
There’s no upside to deporting illegals. They are less criminal on average, than citizens, they pay taxes, they don’t use many social services, they do jobs Americans can’t or won’t, hell, they even vote republican now, apparently?
It’s spite and victim blaming, nothing else.
I don’t think anyone here needs this, but LegalEagle has a great explainer on tariffs and their expected impact, including historical examples of how it worked out.
Quite good and seems to get around all the bases.
View: https://youtu.be/_V8mE3xmtLw?si=LIyFvd_jKD_u5hZo
Quite good and seems to get around all the bases.
View: https://youtu.be/_V8mE3xmtLw?si=LIyFvd_jKD_u5hZo
Did he hear the part where they explain how a $12 increase in price of a $20 sneaker can mean a $48 increase at retail? (The numbers, they make clear, are of course guesstimates since it depends on the market and how much cost manufacturers and retailers are willing/capable of absorbing).
That’s of course ignoring the fact they also make clear: Tariffs won’t even begin to cover the cost of abolishing income tax. It’s just to finance more tax cuts for the wealthy. So your colleague will get a 50% more expensive sneaker and be lucky to get a couple hundred dollars a year in tax breaks. But if the last term is any indication, it’ll be MUCH more expensive.
The frustrating part, and the reason why I find it hard to not call republican voters either dumb or lazy*) is, we already went through this multiple times before. And one of them with the very same guy. We don’t have to guess or theorize, the outcome of every policy that Trump has actually bothered to put into words (or whatever you want to call what comes out of him), is well known.
If you aren’t just dumb, you were lazy because it wasn’t hard to know this stuff up front. I mean the sources LegalEagle uses on Tariffs are from republican economists in some cases. They can’t even claim partisanship.
*) Not entirely true - if you’re wealthy, I completely get voting for him. He will almost certainly be better for the very rich than Harris… But I don’t think MOST voters are likely to be so.
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Well, some did. :-/ Unfortunately, everyone gets to suffer for the myopia and bigotry of the few. Quite American, really.
Still, LegalEagle, and his partner Liz Dye, are quite entertaining and the video is well made, so even those who know quite well what tariffs mean, might enjoy it.
It also does a good job of covering, in a short time, all the knock-on effects like retaliatory tariffs and price-increases in non-tariffed goods. (Like the dryers increasing in price after washing machines were tariffed).
All things we discussed in the previous threads, but summarized and sourced.
I’m sure the primary reason Musk hitched his wagon to Trump is all the cases against his company on environmental impacts and concerns. Removing safe guards on pollution and waste would help him enormously. Which also goes to show Musk does not ACTUALLY care all that much about the environment. Unless he gets credit for it, I guess.
Yep, not arguing with you.
Liz actually touches on the regressive nature with the simple “Price of a toothbrush goes up, but you and Bill Gates both only need one toothbrush”. Very simple, but effective way of illustrating it.
Not to keep bringing up the LegalEagle video, but they have an example of how complex tariff law is, using a case of an importer debating if the things being imported counted as a costume or clothes, because those are tariffed very differently.
And you could just see how it played out. Someone thought they would excempt costumes from tariffs for whatever reason. Then some wiseass started classifying their clothes as costumes. So now there needs to be more laws to prevent people from shenanigans and creative classification of goods, to circumevent a tariff.
IOW, people are the reason we can't have nice things - like simple laws.
It's a form of spherical cow - in a perfect world, we could have simple laws everyone can understand. But it doesn't work when everyone is looking for an angle or edge.Edit: Specifically, this is the case they are referring to in the video:
https://rulings.cbp.gov/ruling/N246542
Its not about avoiding complexity, its about how laws get increasingly complex because we (the people in the system) keep trying to find loopholes. and a flat tariff wouldn’t be optimal for lots of reasons.
I know I take a couple weeks to get an even keel, my brain does NOT like the changes in rhythm. But since this is actually a sensible and beneficial proposal, it’ll never pass under Trump.
It’s not that you are wrong per se, but I think you’re glossing over the problem. One side has long since given up any pretense of actually governing or working in good faith with the other party.
When you have someone like McConnell (may he rot), who outright says he’ll vote and work against any proposal coming from the Democrats, even if it was something he wanted, what are you supposed to do?
It’s a lot easier to just obstruct and tear shit down, than it is trying to build something - especially in as complex a bureaucracy as the US federal government.
So I don’t think it excuses all of the failings of the Democratic Party, but it does make it an uneven battle.
Especially because Republican voters don’t have very high standards for their elected representatives. At least it would appear so by the atrocious and incredibly inefficient people that keep getting voted in. Meanwhile Democrat voters demand their representatives be effective, morally upstanding, respectful, forcefully, yet inoffensive. Or you’ll piss of at least one major segment.
Republicans are much easier to please because they just have a few pet issues you need to champion, and they’ll overlook all the corruption, sexual assaults, lack of results and whatever else the worst of the worst bring to the table.
Is it fear, or is it hate? Because some decisions seem to be made out of “it may hurt me, but it’ll hurt someone else more”.
But ok, some of it may be fear, it’s just so irrational and intolerant, that it really looks mostly just like hate.
It’s quite predictable what will happen.
The US will become weakened against states like China and Russia, then in 5 years, when Democrats got back in power after the Trump disaster, a big hack inevitable happens and Republicans will be out there screaming how incompetent Democrats are for allowing it to happen. Everyone will have forgotten Republicans closed down CISA and agree.
Only if you read VERY selectively. Even though Trump had almost no stated goals or policies, he failed many of them. His wall ended up being an added 80km, and Mexico didn’t pay for any of it. He lowered taxes, but only temporarily (except those for the wealthy of course), he didn’t get a Muslim ban through, he didn’t leave WHO, he didn’t repeal Obama-care, and he didn’t introduce a new, and way better, healthcare system.
Sure he has shown that voters are way more terrible and bigoted than we thought, and would vote for him almost regardless of what he says or does, but that is less a win for Trump and more a failure of the American electorate.
Hoping SoMe companies self-police is foolish anyway. It’s like expecting Meta or Google to be ethical about user data out of idealism.
I don’t expect the US to really lead on this, but I’d like the EU to tackle it with something akin to GDPR, with stiff fines if companies let obvious and reported misinformation flourish or get promoted.
I don’t expect the US to really lead on this, but I’d like the EU to tackle it with something akin to GDPR, with stiff fines if companies let obvious and reported misinformation flourish or get promoted.
Sounds like maybe FEMA needs MORE funding, not less...?
I can't help wondering if Trump forgot he owns some expensive real-estate in Florida? Aka. the state that got hit by 3 of the worst hurricanes in history within the last 7 years?
The most powerful person on earth, yet could likely not outmaneuver a wet paper bag, nor fight his way out of one. Sad!
I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised that the 4. Estate has proven as useless in holding the powerful accountable than the other branches of government, especially given their track record during his first term and his campaigns. But it is still disappointing.
Its also pretty fucking rich considering how right-wing media has had absolutely no problem pre-, post- and peri-judging people, but now that the President happens to have a number of highly publicized scandals, it’s suddenly gauche to mention he committed sexual assault at LEAST once, felonies multiple times and had a number of sordid affairs. Very convenient time for the media to suddenly decide it is inappropriate to wallow in past “indiscretions”.
In the end, it doesn’t matter. People already made up their minds what to believe. Anything supporting that belief will be accepted on almost no factual basis, anything contradicting it will need sworn affadavits, 3 different forms of evidence and an admission of guilt - and even then, it’s probably a conspiracy!
It must already be galling to hear the descendants (anchor babies…?) of a bunch of European immigrants talk about sending people “home where they came from”, but to be an actual native and have to defend your right to land your family lived on since before recorded history must be… Well, I’m not sure I’d handle it with very much grace. There’s a point beyond which you can’t even laugh at the sheer arrogance and presumption.
Its a good thing I’m not a minority, I’d probably end up on the news. I’m the whitest guy, and I’m pissed just by proxy. Don’t know how bad it would be if it happened to me!
I’m sure they have some plan to punish blue states and help red ones, I just can’t see it right now. Because yes, California is hit hard right now with wildfires, but it’s not like there weren’t several devastating disasters affecting Florida.
And given red states generally take more out than they put in, I’m morbidly curious how they’ll manage to tilt the balance.
Of course it might not be any more sophisticated than when they’ve tried to deny help to blue states in congress, and then come begging for federal assistance once their own state was hit.
It’s fortunate cognitive dissonance can’t manifest physically, or half of congress would be incapacitated, blood streaming from ears and eyes.
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I think that was a mistake. One thing you learn with children is, if their tantrums get results, they’ll pull that tool out anytime they don’t get their way. Even if you stand firm the next time they’re rolling around on the floor in the supermarket, they know it worked once before so…
Colombia just told Trump his tantrums get results, so any time they don’t do exactly what he wants, no matter how big or small, BAM, tariffs for you!
Sure, but Colombia just signed up for every Trump policy and demand, no matter how big or small because Trump will just wave the tariffs threat any time they don’t do exactly what he wants. At best you just made the pain worse because Trump knows you will cave given enough pressure.
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Except how many years does it take to build something like an advanced chip plant that competes with TSMC? Especially if you're starting from scratch in the US. 5 years? 10?
It's not that it wouldn't be good to diversify chip production (though I have some thoughts about moving it to the US...), but there's a reason everyone isn't building them.
I agree that it isn’t terribly likely this accident was the result of anything Trump did, at least in his current term.
But since MAGA is generous when dealing out blame to everyone else for things they had no hand in, I don’t feel too bad about loudly proclaiming this a failure of Trump.
After all, Democrat presidents get blamed for the economy on day 1, why should Trump not take blame for this after he’s had 10 days to fix things!
Well… that obviously depends on a lot of factors, but at the very least, a subcontractor from a private firm would need to be more efficient, all else equal, right? Because there’s a private firm acting as a middleman that presumably needs to turns a profit, so that introduces extra overhead.
It can make sense in some situations, especially for tasks that the government doesn’t have enough demand for. But it can certainly sometimes seem like there’s at least some outsourcing to private actors, that is not that different from cronyism or outright bribery.
What is the size of the US economy compared to Canada, China, EU and South America? I think the rest of the world will find ways to keep things running without American products. There are few categories where I would rate American products as best-in-class and without peers.Sanctions?
Tariffs war with an economy 10 times your size and 60% of your imports is one thing. Sanctions when you have no leverage over the banking system and your only alternatives ve trade partners are on the other side of an ocean is suicide. I'd expect Trudeau to go for that, but he's gone soon.
Maybe they could join BRICS.
I think Canada will be fine.
Right, but the point is, the US isn’t in a trade war with Canada - they’re in (or getting into) a trade war with everyone. And the US isn’t THAT large an economy that they can just take in the rest of the world without feeling the pain.The Canadian economy is about the size of New York. But considering our currency is collapsing....
So the US is risking losing business with basically every country, but Canada is losing business with one country
Aside from actual violent resistance (how old is Warren again), what are they supposed to do? The majority of voters obviously doesn’t care. At least not as much as they do about eggs or not having a female president.
Removing some of the exceptions for cheap goods from China is one thing that kinda makes sense (though it's probably implemented in an idiotic way, given it's, well, Trump).Yeah, because completely shutting down moving goods into the USA is going to fix its economy.
Also, even if this leads to more manufacturing in the USA, goods manufactured there that they want to export still have to abide to the laws and rules of other countries. If the Trump-regime does not want that, then the USA is going to become irrelevant very quickly indeed, only manufacturing and consuming its own goods. Back to the pre-colonial times, in a sense.
We have had similar problems in Denmark, where Temu and AliExpress are undercutting everyone else, including danish companies doing imports from China, because they can send you cheap junk, give you nearly free postage, and not pay customs. It makes it incredibly hard to compete with.
Additionally, there are TONS of safety violations in this crap, from using toxic chemicals to being choking or fire hazards. All the while people are becoming convinced they are being ripped off by stores because surely the $5 junk from Temu is exactly the same, and was vetted to the same degree, as the $20 item from a danish store. (Where the importer actually paid VAT and customs on importing it).
Letting China flood the west with junk products that are hazardous and when they inevitably break because, they're junk, they create mountains of waste, is not the way forward as I see it.
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Yeah, I'm following the r/LeopardsAteMyFace, and once in a while there's a post of someone just so incredibly oblivious you wonder how they figured out how to vote.
Like people who have undocumented people in their close family, and are now suddenly realizing they are ALSO covered by the "Kick out all the Mexicans" rhetoric. It's just amazing that people don't take 5 seconds to wonder "How might this affect me?". I mean it's a given they don't give a shit about how it affects people outside their immediate circle, but they apparently didn't even think how it would affect them PERSONALLY. Just mindblowingly dumb. And/or racist of course.
Every time you think Republicans have twisted the law to their advantage in the most absurd way, they come up with new ways to fuck with the system.
And it won't have any consequences, because apparently only Republicans are capable of good messaging and controlling narratives, because you can just imagine the screetches of outrage if Democrats simply decided that the next few months counted as 1 day. Why not go even more ridiculous and decide that for purposes of the budget, any increase in deficit is counted as a reduction, and claim a reduction of deficit after a bunch of tax breaks?
I mean if we're just deciding objective reality is just semantics, then sky's the limit.
And it won't have any consequences, because apparently only Republicans are capable of good messaging and controlling narratives, because you can just imagine the screetches of outrage if Democrats simply decided that the next few months counted as 1 day. Why not go even more ridiculous and decide that for purposes of the budget, any increase in deficit is counted as a reduction, and claim a reduction of deficit after a bunch of tax breaks?
I mean if we're just deciding objective reality is just semantics, then sky's the limit.
While the numbers DO reflect how people feel in the here and now, as they're being polled, I'm not sure how useful political polling is on the whole. If almost 50% of Republicans still approve of Trump's policies, even though R policies in general, and Trump's specifically, benefit WAY less than 50%, and probably a lot less than 1%, all it shows us is, most people aren't good at objectively evaluating how their politicians perform.
And if the satisfaction is entirely divorced from actual results and impact on voters, then it's really only good for honing propaganda messaging.
Yeah, even if Vance was supposed to be some kind of successor or way to control Trump, I highly doubt he’d be successful. He’s as charismatic as wet cardboard and Trump could turn MAGA against him in a heart beat. They’d happily eat him alive if Trump dumped him.
They can just impeach him, which I assume is largely the same mechanism other parliamentary democracies use. But that would require the republican part of the government to grow balls and actually do their jobs. I wouldn't hold my breath.
I expect a lot of politicians will suddenly find their spine when the threat has been safely neutralized, and loudly proclaim how they were JUST about to jump into the fight.
The problem is, millions of voters on the other side are saying the same thing about NOT opposing Trump…
The best would of course be if Republican elected politicians worked towards actual government, but that’s probably getting into fantasy territory.
I wondered at the strong rebound, given there was still 10% blanket tariffs, and a whopping 125% (or is it 145%?) tariff on China.
It feels like a lot of people suddenly went:
“Wait… don’t we import a lot from China? Can someone check how much? Really?! Oh shit…”
Well, frankly, service jobs aren't all necessarily better than manufacturing ones. Sure, some people like it, but I don't think a lot of people are dreaming of making low wage at McDonalds. They just aren't easy to outsource.
Meanwhile, manufacturing doesn't have to be menial, shitty factory work. You can in-source the manufacturing that requires training and skill, and the rest will presumably be taken over by automation and robots if it isn't already.
Of course there are degrees of service jobs as there are manufacturing jobs. And no matter what, Trump's methods are completely orthoganol to getting more industry back to the US, because it requires planning, stability and decades of work. None of which Trump and his cabinet is capable of, or interested in doing.
I have zero sympathy for MAGA farmers. They lived through his first term, where they needed bailouts due to his terrible policies. Now they are in line again, with their hand out.
I'm sure they'd agree, if there aren't consequences for your bad decisions, you'll never learn. So sorry, you shouldn't get a bailout this time around.
And look, this didn't exactly require clairvoyance to predict - it was basically everything he promised. Even the dumbasses who don't know how tariffs work, need just remember what happened a few years ago when the exact same thing played out.
Lastly, in regards to the moron in the article: How does he run a business that relies on importing feed, and has zero idea how tariffs work?! Did he honestly think the Canadian manufacturer would just eat the cost of the tariffs, when he says himself there aren't a lot of margin in the business? That they'd go broke just for the privilege of selling him his feed?! It's like Trump makes people turn off their brain!
A lot of Trump voters haven't personally felt any consequences from the chaos and disregard of laws. Yet.
Which probably goes to show, contrary to the "I didn't vote for this" posts, many DID in fact vote for this, and are only really becoming upset when they find out THEY have to pay the tariffs on their Temu purchases.
Someone posted that the US has spent 200 billion more at this point compared to last year at the same time. But with so many services and agencies either gutted or sabotaged, you kinda wonder how that’s possible.
DOGE sure didn’t help out anyone but Musk very much, though. (If anyone was ever that naive).
DOGE sure didn’t help out anyone but Musk very much, though. (If anyone was ever that naive).
I tend to agree. It certainly felt like the media was again trying to “both sides” the issue.
“Harris claims Trump is dangerous and Project 2025 is the manual for a fascist takeover” on one hand, and then
“Trump denies knowledge of Project 2025, says he’ll fix everything in 2 days” on the other.
There was little holding Trump accountable, or picking his absurd and impossible claims (or lies…) apart - you know, actual journalism.
The media seemed deathly afraid of being seen as partial, even as the MAGA voters would call them partial anyway because they weren’t sufficiently obsequious towards him.
“Harris claims Trump is dangerous and Project 2025 is the manual for a fascist takeover” on one hand, and then
“Trump denies knowledge of Project 2025, says he’ll fix everything in 2 days” on the other.
There was little holding Trump accountable, or picking his absurd and impossible claims (or lies…) apart - you know, actual journalism.
The media seemed deathly afraid of being seen as partial, even as the MAGA voters would call them partial anyway because they weren’t sufficiently obsequious towards him.
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