Tariffs In The News

[togor]

Oh and BTW Sam, Nacht und Nebel (a reference in my earlier post about INS deportation practices) has nothing to do with Krystallnacht, or as you put it, Crystal Night, which sounds like a ladies' gathering to discuss Swarovski collectibles! No, Night and Fog refers to something very different, and if you don't see it then maybe you're not the Nazi expert that you make yourself out to be.

[dryheat]

Venezurla is going down the drain for the usual reasons. It's full of S. Americans with no brains. Now that they are "economic refugees" they are probably going to move en mass to the U.S. and it will be our "duty" to take the poor things in.

[S.A. Boggs]

Tough read.... Boggs the Nazi expert is glibly calling people NAZIS (caps his) and saying "whatabout the abuse heaped on Trump supporters during the campaign?" And then the usual gibberish about Democracy being bad and Republics being good. Let's see what else....coal, taxing the rich being bad, foreigners with diseases crashing our borders, etc.

OK, integrating the entire paragraph, running it through filtering.....done. Sam dreams of an America where a select minority gets to call the shots for everyone (rich whites), who keep taxes low on themselves, and where the government decides winners and losers in the economy, presumably with folks like the ones in his corner of southern Ohio being placed in a preferred economic position. Competition from elsewhere in the world is kept at bay with tariffs and physical walls. Safe behind those barriers, the real America can once again reassert itself and proper social order (heavy on fundamentalist Protestant Christianity) restored.

I understand the attraction but it won't work, at least not without a huge decline in the standard of living in this country. The US is too integrated into the global economy for that to have a shot. Never mind the fact that it runs afoul of our basic laws, and would require a massive disenfranchisement of a majority of citizens to have a fighting chance. At a practical economic level, it simply won't work. The US economy needs too many raw materials and components that are available only outside our borders to function. In Trumpian terms, too many other countries have too much leverage over us. If we pull back, life here will collapse. The rich will have to send their money overseas or risk losing it. Capital flight is a thing that happens when the laws in a country turn sour (usually because of a dictator) and the rich come to that move-it-or-lose-it moment.

Boggs doesn't see it but his sentiment is exactly the sort of thing that sent Venezuela down the toilet--a certain faction, feeling that they have been getting the short end of the stick, invests unquestioned authority in the Strong Man who will break through all barriers to set things right.

Sorry Sam, it won't work. Trump's prescription isn't a cure. Trump is only going to make things worse. Like a doctor in Roman times treating a patient through bloodletting. Your dream of America also bears an uncanny resemblance to the land of Gilead, formerly part of the United States, in Margaret Atwood's book, The Handmaid's Tale. You've read the book? Perhaps are watching the TV series?

Notice how everything seems to reverse when Togor gets ahold of it? Me thinks he doth protest too much! Reminds me of the client who proclaimed, " I am clean, go ahead test me you won't find anything in my urine test!" 6 hours later and 5 Pepsi's he still can't go. Unfortunately Togor continues to spirt the same thoughts that my client refused to. By the way, the client was dirtier then a pig pen and took the trip back to the big house.
Sam

[togor]

Hey don't I deserve a little credit for actually parsing that dense single paragraph of yours? How many people here would do that?

And I didn't light you up for writing it because I understand what you're saying and why your saying it. But your ideas of how to fix things are as near-sighted as they are wrong. Your stuff won't work and no we shouldn't try it because it will just make things worse.

[S.A. Boggs]

Hey don't I deserve a little credit for actually parsing that dense single paragraph of yours? How many people here would do that?

And I didn't light you up for writing it because I understand what you're saying and why your saying it. But your ideas of how to fix things are as near-sighted as they are wrong. Your stuff won't work and no we shouldn't try it because it will just make things worse.

Why don't we just vote for the darn thing to see what is in it!
Sam