By Paul Wallis
February 5, 2025
DIGITAL JOURNAL
Beijing on Tuesday fired a return salvo in its escalating trade war with the United States, slapping fresh tariffs on everything from American crude oil to agricultural machinery - Copyright AFP STR
Some people may not know how truly weird these trade wars are. The world clearly refuses to play ball with Trump’s various shots in the dark. There’s a bit more to it than that.
The basics:
Trade generates revenue for governments and businesses. Every bit of business generates local trade, logistics, etc., generating state and country revenue.
This vast trade-related range of economic activities also generates jobs and profits for businesses so people can survive and grow the economy.
If governments reduce their revenue by blocking trade, they have to borrow.
Just about everyone associated with the Trump administration does business overseas.
These are super-rich people with major personal financial assets all over the world. Those assets could be very vulnerable if other countries retaliate to US trade policies or the super-unpopular foreign relations epic button-pushing by the administration. Sanity? None.
Assets can be frozen. Assets can be taken by court orders. It’s not that much of a mystery to those who miraculously moved on from grade school. I do mean grade school because most of this idiocy is truly infantile.
You can see the suicidal nature of the trade wars in lock step with foreign policy. The process of systematically and monotonously antagonizing America’s allies, notably Europe, is so stupid it must be deliberate.
You couldn’t possibly annoy so many people by accident.
There are perceptions albeit stupid perceptions to be had:
America First means isolationism. Cute, except isolationism has destroyed every country that’s ever tried it. See China, Japan, and Korea in the 19th century for details.
We can have our own medieval America. Except you can’t because you barely produce anything worth mentioning locally and US product quality puts a huge strain on tact in conversations. If you want to go back in time about 1000 years, that’s how.
China’s way behind. No, they’re not and they certainly won’t stay that way. Antagonizing all the sciences isn’t such a good move either, because the guys that make your tech need to make a living. They’d prefer to do that in a country that isn’t totally anti-science, anti-people, and anti-decent wages. The loss of IP alone is likely to be incredibly expensive. It will also compromise future tech. There are plenty of other countries ready to accept US science refugees, too.
Don’t expect the markets to like any of it. People worry about their money, including much bigger stakeholders. Want to see Apple at 10c a share? The futures market and short selling can do that. The US dollar could take a hit, too. Never mind BRICS. Sanity is a commodity in this environment.
A hit to the US credit rating would cost billions per day overnight. Making America look utterly incompetent is definitely not a good idea.
The physical and social state of America has been appalling for decades. It’s a rundown museum of 19th-century unsolved disasters in many ways. Nothing is changing at ground level except the anxiety. “Government of the criminals, by the criminals, for the criminals” isn’t likely to help much.
What’s “pro-American” about any of this mega-cluster? There has yet to be a mention of poverty and the real state of American society. All of this is an ongoing added cost to that famous charity the American people.
Credibility is extremely low. The vast costs in various Trump administration initiatives don’t make fiscal sense. Penny-pinching USAID just looks cheap and nasty which it is.
The lack of contact with reality at any level is staggering. It’s not even a month since this Petting Zoo for the Pointless took office.
It could be the Neutered States of America soon enough.
____________________________________________________________
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.
Beijing on Tuesday fired a return salvo in its escalating trade war with the United States, slapping fresh tariffs on everything from American crude oil to agricultural machinery - Copyright AFP STR
Some people may not know how truly weird these trade wars are. The world clearly refuses to play ball with Trump’s various shots in the dark. There’s a bit more to it than that.
The basics:
Trade generates revenue for governments and businesses. Every bit of business generates local trade, logistics, etc., generating state and country revenue.
This vast trade-related range of economic activities also generates jobs and profits for businesses so people can survive and grow the economy.
If governments reduce their revenue by blocking trade, they have to borrow.
Just about everyone associated with the Trump administration does business overseas.
These are super-rich people with major personal financial assets all over the world. Those assets could be very vulnerable if other countries retaliate to US trade policies or the super-unpopular foreign relations epic button-pushing by the administration. Sanity? None.
Assets can be frozen. Assets can be taken by court orders. It’s not that much of a mystery to those who miraculously moved on from grade school. I do mean grade school because most of this idiocy is truly infantile.
You can see the suicidal nature of the trade wars in lock step with foreign policy. The process of systematically and monotonously antagonizing America’s allies, notably Europe, is so stupid it must be deliberate.
You couldn’t possibly annoy so many people by accident.
There are perceptions albeit stupid perceptions to be had:
America First means isolationism. Cute, except isolationism has destroyed every country that’s ever tried it. See China, Japan, and Korea in the 19th century for details.
We can have our own medieval America. Except you can’t because you barely produce anything worth mentioning locally and US product quality puts a huge strain on tact in conversations. If you want to go back in time about 1000 years, that’s how.
China’s way behind. No, they’re not and they certainly won’t stay that way. Antagonizing all the sciences isn’t such a good move either, because the guys that make your tech need to make a living. They’d prefer to do that in a country that isn’t totally anti-science, anti-people, and anti-decent wages. The loss of IP alone is likely to be incredibly expensive. It will also compromise future tech. There are plenty of other countries ready to accept US science refugees, too.
Don’t expect the markets to like any of it. People worry about their money, including much bigger stakeholders. Want to see Apple at 10c a share? The futures market and short selling can do that. The US dollar could take a hit, too. Never mind BRICS. Sanity is a commodity in this environment.
A hit to the US credit rating would cost billions per day overnight. Making America look utterly incompetent is definitely not a good idea.
The physical and social state of America has been appalling for decades. It’s a rundown museum of 19th-century unsolved disasters in many ways. Nothing is changing at ground level except the anxiety. “Government of the criminals, by the criminals, for the criminals” isn’t likely to help much.
What’s “pro-American” about any of this mega-cluster? There has yet to be a mention of poverty and the real state of American society. All of this is an ongoing added cost to that famous charity the American people.
Credibility is extremely low. The vast costs in various Trump administration initiatives don’t make fiscal sense. Penny-pinching USAID just looks cheap and nasty which it is.
The lack of contact with reality at any level is staggering. It’s not even a month since this Petting Zoo for the Pointless took office.
It could be the Neutered States of America soon enough.
____________________________________________________________
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.
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