All Things Trump: The Return Of The King

[Tero]

The case for
There are two main arguments for Trump’s 145 percent tariffs on China.

The first is about the trade imbalance. America has bought a lot from China over the years, and China has not returned the favor. To sell stuff there, American companies bend over backward to comply with Communist Party rules. Chinese companies don’t face the same barriers. Consider video games: U.S. companies have to censor their games to get into Chinese markets, if they can get in at all. Chinese developers ship their games to the United States replete with pro-China censorship.

Trump and his allies say tariffs will force China to negotiate friendlier trade rules with the United States. China can’t afford to lose America, its biggest customer, if it wants to keep its economy growing quickly. It will have to capitulate and allow more U.S. products into its markets.

The second argument is about national security. America relies on China for electronic chips, pharmaceutical ingredients and rare earth metals. (Beijing has suspended critical rare earth exports, and U.S. companies don’t have an alternative supplier.) At the same time, China is working to weaken the United States on the global stage, and America could go to war with China if Beijing invades Taiwan. The tariffs on China force the countries to decouple; companies will have to find other places, including within the United States, to source and make their products.

Two people on motorbikes, one with a child in a carrier strapped to her front, waiting near a crosswalk of a wide two-way road.
A rare earth magnets factory in Ganzhou, China. Keith Bradsher/The New York Times
Notably, these arguments — on trade imbalances and national security — are at odds with each other. If the trade balancers get their way, the United States could actually trade more with China. If the national security side gets its way, America will shut China out. Still, the administration has made both points at different times.

The case against
Trump’s critics make two main arguments against his tariffs — one on the merits and one on the tactics.

On the merits, they argue that a trade war with China will leave the United States worse off. China has built expertise and resources for manufacturing that no other country has — with advanced machine tooling, for instance. So it’s not possible to shift production to, say, Mexico or Vietnam and expect the same affordable goods. The cost of living will go up and the quality of life will go down.

NYT

[Brian Peacock]

Threatening those tariffs wouldn't have worked because no one would have believed it. Calculating a reciprocal tariff purely according to the size of a trade deficit? It was ridiculous, mocked by economists and serious people around the world.

So he had to actually do it, to prove that he would, and then pause them while deals are forced on panicking exporters.

And it's going to work, Trump is going to negotiate favorable trade deals in a matter of weeks or months. Without his shock and awe, things would be much slower. They'll be some shake ups in the short term, but Trump will get increased manufacturing back to the US.

Sure. Put enough pressure on Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Bangladesh etc and those sweatshop jobs will come flooding back to the US - and of course those countries have a trading surplus with the US, because very few people in those places can actually afford to buy US-made products. The other thing is that wages and the standard of living in those place are really really low, so if those jobs are coming state-side and those goods are going to be made in the US they're going to be significantly more expensive - unless companies can get away with paying the same kind of wages - which probably means that the poor American workers stitching the t-shirts and gluing training shoes aren't likely to be able to afford the products they're producing. How that's going to be good for the economy is something the idiots in charge obviously don't want to think about.

[Sean Hayden]

How much does it cost to make a 100 dollar pair of shoes halfway around the world? What’s to stop you making it here, besides much smaller profit margins, and is that what the left is saying: hey idiots they can’t exploit others for profit you better get with the program!?

[Tero]

Their dictator is getting paid. So he won't return the prisoner who Trump told him to keep before the press got there.

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cwy03j9vddlt
The two men became key allies after Trump began sending Venezuelan immigrants to the notorious Cecot prison in El Salvador

He accuses the deportees of being gang members, but critics say for many of them, there is little evidence of that

Trump also said he is "all for" sending criminals who are US citizens to the prison, if the law allows it

[Cunt]

https://x.com/ultrapepemqtter/status/19 ... 3929763169

Robert Kennedy Junior: We must address the root cause of why we are the sickest country in the world.
The poisoning of our food system is the cause.

"The principal cause is the poisoning of our food system. Epidemics don't happen for genetic reasons…
We're seeing them everywhere in every demographic…And the reason for that is our food.
No health secretary in history has ever addressed that. Everything else that people have done in the past is about deciding who's gonna pay for the mess…
Ultimately, they're all about moving deckchairs around on the Titanic.
The ship is sinking. Americans are getting sicker.
We are the sickest country on earth.
We had the highest death rate during COVID of any nation in the world.
We had sixteen percent of the COVID deaths and we only have four point two percent of the world's population…And the CDC was asked why did we have so many people killed?
CDC said it's because we have the highest chronic disease burden on earth.
The average American who died from COVID had three point eight chronic diseases…
If we don't address this core reason and everything else we do is just wormwood and bile.
It's meaningless. We have to address this and it's President Trump's priority that we do so."

I'm sure some highly loyal Demmies will still oppose this former Democrat politician, because 'orange man bad'. Funny how when he called out Fauci the way he did, the teeny little bureaucrat simply hid away from it, rather than claiming RFK was lying.

[Tero]

On the plus side, it will take Trump 1.1 million flights to send "all the foreigners home" to their countries. El Salvador can't take us all.

[Tero]

Nice guy: El Salvador has experienced democratic backsliding under Bukele, as he has dismantled democratic institutions, curtailed political and civil liberties, and attacked independent media and the political opposition. Bukele has been described as an authoritarian and autocrat. In February 2020, Bukele ordered 40 soldiers into the Legislative Assembly building to intimidate lawmakers into approving a US$109 million loan for the Territorial Control Plan.

[Cunt]

There does seem to be strong opposition to enforce borders, or illegal entry laws, fronted by the Dems.

Who could possibly oppose them, with their media, judicial and academic allies? Oh, right, the majority who are the actual rulers of the USA.

https://x.com/StephenM/status/1911251687647367318

Biden imported 15M+ illegals in 4 years.

Democrats believe each alien should get a lengthy federal trial before being sent back.

After we scour the country to find them.

Because they are all evading arrest.

A typical trial would take months to complete.

Not counting appeals.

This would mean even if we shut down our entire federal court system to do nothing else the process that the Democrats demand would take multiple centuries to complete.

Which Democrats understand. Because they don’t want any aliens removed. They want them all registered—to vote.

The judicial process is for Americans.

Immediate deportation is for illegal aliens.

If you break into someone’s house you don’t get to spend months or years debating your presence.

Trespassers must go. And they must go now.
8:54 PM · Apr 12, 2025
·
1.9M
Views

Good thing too. Some countries don't even allow their subjects to openly oppose demographic replacement.

[Brian Peacock]

How much does it cost to make a 100 dollar pair of shoes halfway around the world? What’s to stop you making it here, besides much smaller profit margins, and is that what the left is saying: hey idiots they can’t exploit others for profit you better get with the program!?

Resources, processing, distribution, transport, storage all have to be accounted for before assembly, which includes premises, energy, machinery, training, quality control, packaging, and staff of course - then there's the retail side with more distribution, storage, staff, display, advertising etc etc. There's a lot of costs. Volume sellers can probably afford to make less on each item than smaller or niche sellers. I don't think the left (well, me) is saying that it can't be done, that the US can't reboot the manufacturing base it's systematically outsourced to some of the poorest countries in the world, just that's it's unlikely shareholders will be happy to see their dividends go down - 'specially considering that about 90% of US listed company profits go on shareholder dividends and/or stock buy-backs.

[Cunt]

Many corporations seem satisfied to outsource their labour to countries with slave-labour which wouldn't be permitted in the markets they sell the stuff.

Those tariff moves would seem more respectful if they gave countries discounts for aligning with US priorities with regards to human rights. Just imagine if China was financially motivated to stop using slaves, or to allow freer speech, etc.

Charge more if their citizens are not treated as well as US citizens, I mean.

[Tero]

stonekettle
47m
Whaaaat?! If only we had known! If only we had been warned! No one could have predicted this! How?
Yeah, those Americans right now shocked and aghast Trump is just openly defying the Supreme Court and suddenly just now realizing there's literally no mechanism left that can make him comply, there are NO remaining checks and balances, and Trump is effectively a dictator backed by a massive military and a nuclear arsenal, that dumbfounded surprise is EXACTLY how we got here in the first place.

[Tero]

Free ticket only for the outbound flight. Trump not flying him back in.
megancollinswriter
3h
All this after a judge AND the Supreme Court ordered Trump to bring Kilmar home. The Trump admin says they're interpreting that order as meaning they must allow Kilmar back into the US "if he makes his way out of El Salvador," which nullifies Bukele's "smuggle him into the US" argument. The people in charge of these countries are playing dumb and perpetuating violence. Elected officials should join MD Senator Van Hollen in his plan to fly to El Salvador and DEMAND Kilmar's release. 3/3
https://www.threads.net/@megancollinswr ... ipgsc19Yyw

[Brian Peacock]

Many corporations seem satisfied to outsource their labour to countries with slave-labour which wouldn't be permitted in the markets they sell the stuff.

Those tariff moves would seem more respectful if they gave countries discounts for aligning with US priorities with regards to human rights. Just imagine if China was financially motivated to stop using slaves, or to allow freer speech, etc.

Charge more if their citizens are not treated as well as US citizens, I mean.

That's actually not a bad idea. Shame he pulled out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP), part of which offered the prospect of favourable export conditions to certain Pacific Rim nations that made marked improvements in their human rights records as assessed by the UN and WTO. But though much of the ground-work for that deal was laid by the Clinton and Bush administrations it was eventually signed by Obama in his second term - so it had to go because, you know, birther stuff and woke etc.

...The TPP will enter into force 60 days after all 12 signing countries ratify the agreement (or alternatively, 60 days after at least 6 of the original signatories have ratified the agreement, if those signatories together produce a combined gross domestic product (GDP) equal to 85 percent of the combined GDP of the original 12 signatories).

As described below, the TPP’s entry into force will trigger various legal and policy requirements and, in some cases, require the national implementation of legislation. The TPP will require participating countries to lower tariffs on specific goods and services. Most members will also need to reform parts of their domestic laws and policies relating to labor rights, financial services, and intellectual property and patents, among other areas.

Because of serious systemic labor rights problems in certain member countries, the United States negotiated additional bilateral agreements (known as Consistency Plans) with Vietnam, Malaysia, and Brunei that must be implemented to obtain TPP benefits with the US...

source

[Tero]

Trump is coming.
https://nypost.com/2025/04/14/us-news/t ... re-places/

[JimC]

Many corporations seem satisfied to outsource their labour to countries with slave-labour which wouldn't be permitted in the markets they sell the stuff.

Das Capital!