Trump Sunday Show Idiots: Let The Penguins Eat Tariffs!

We watch so you never have to!

This weekend, while some were on the streets giving the Trump administration the metaphorical middle finger or in theaters enthusiastically clapping for the Chicken Jockey from A Minecraft Movie, anyone millennial or older was also watching their fourth “once-in-a-lifetime” financial crisis begin to unfold.

Doing one heckuva job, Donnie…

So, how did the Trump administration handled its tariff myths smashing head-on into the concrete reality of financial rules on the Sunday shows?

Let’s dive in!

Marie Bessent-oinette Continues His Les Misérables Prequel

Last time we wrote about Trump’s Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, we were not very kind. Bessent continued to confirm our conception of him on this week’s “Meet The Press” on NBC.

When host Kristen Welker pointed out that the immediate fallout of Trump’s tariffs was the biggest two-day crash since the 2020 COVID pandemic, and Trump’s insistence that people just need to “hang tough” for an undetermined amount of time, Bessent refused to acknowledge reality.

BESSENT: Well, again, I — I reject that — the assumption — there doesn't have to be a recession, the — who knows how the market is going to react in a day, in a week?

Bessent is partially right in that there doesn’t have to be a recession. But because these tariffs are self-inflicted wounds by a dumbass capable of bankrupting casinos, here we are. But Bessent meant “recession is a choice” in the same way that Kanye West once loudly proclaimed “slavery was a choice” (until former TMZ staffer Van Lathan called Kanye on his bullshit).

Bessent’s utter cluelessness came out when Welker pointed out people’s fears as they watch their 401Ks disappear:

BESSENT: I think that's a false narrative. Americans who want to retire right now, Americans who have put away for years in their savings accounts, I — I think they don't look at the day-to-day fluctuations of what's happening.

Telling Americans not to worry about “day-to-day fluctuations” as their lifetime savings vanish is dismissive and out of touch. Retirement isn’t theoretical. Rent, medicine, and dignity are very real things for average Americans. Trump promised economic prosperity on “day one” and instead has delivered chaos with help from minions like this gajillionaire, who sold his historic “Pink Palace” mansion in Charleston, South Carolina, last month for $18.5 million plus some contents of the house.

CC BY-SA 4.0 by P. Hughes

Tariff The Penguins!

CNN’s “State Of The Union” asked Trump Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins about the length of and logic behind Trump’s tariffs. Jake Tapper, in a delectable moment of condescending bitchiness, decided to ask about the most perplexing of them, the ones directed at penguins.

TAPPER: You're imposing a 10 percent tariff on the Heard Island and McDonald Islands. The Heard Island and McDonald Islands have zero human inhabitants. They have zero exports. They have zero imports. They do have a lot of penguins. Why are you putting import tariffs on islands that are entirely populated by penguins?

ROLLINS: Well, I mean, that -- come on, Jake. Obviously, here's the bottom line. We live under a tariff regime from other countries. We have too long seen...

TAPPER: Not -- the McDonald Islands is not imposing...

ROLLINS: The idea that America goes first -- I mean, come on. Whatever. Listen, the people that are leading this are serious, intentional, patriotic, the smartest people I have ever worked with. I did not come up with the formulas. I'm the ag secretary. I studied agriculture at Texas A&M.

Well, that’s the worst endorsement for Texas A&M alumni outside of former Gov. Rick Perry and former Rep. Louie Gohmert.

Rollins, as some may recall, was the genius behind the idea that the fix for egg prices is for everyone to suddenly start raising chickens at home.

Congrats on lowering that bar to subterranean levels, Brooke Rollins!

Welcome To The Sweatshops, America!

This was in Wonkette’s main stock market post today, but it’s worth making fun of again. Trump’s Commerce Secretary, Howard Lutnick, continued his undefeated streak of showing he’s never met a real American on CBS’s “Face The Nation.”

When Margaret Brennan asked about supposed factory jobs coming back (which would take years) and Lutnick’s previous admission that automation would still not bring factory jobs, Lutnick zeroed in on his dystopian view of American workers.

LUTNICK: But the key is, who's going to build the factories, who's going to operate the factories, who's going to make them work, great American workers. You know, we are going to replace… […] …the armies of millions of people – well, remember, the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little, little screws to make iPhones, that kind of thing is going to come to America.

Yay! We all get to work at Foxconn Plants! Does that mean we all get grueling slave labor jobs and all the free jumps into anti-suicide nets we want? USA! USA! USA!

Just kidding, it’s never gonna fucking happen. For a thousand reasons.

We Can’t Be Mean To Russia!

Former George W. Bush crony turned Trump sycophant White House Economic Council Director, Kevin Hassett, was on ABC’s “This Week.”

When host George Stephanopoulos noted a curious omission in Trump’s tariff chart, Hassett’s explanation was very telling.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Why did the president not include Russia on the list of countries who are facing tariffs?

HASSETT: There's obviously an ongoing negotiation with Russia and Ukraine, and I think the president made the decision not to conflate the two issues. […]

STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, I'm asking a different question: Why? And I just want to know why---

HASSETT: Would you literally advise that you go in and put a whole bunch of new things on the table in the middle of a negotiation that affects so many American and Ukrainian and Russian lives?

STEPHANOPOULOS: Negotiators do that. Negotiators do that all the time.

HASSETT: No, no, that's not appropriate to throw a new thing into these negotiations right in the middle of it. It's just not. […]

Ukraine — you know, the other party in these “peace” talks — got a 10 percent tariff.

Have a week.

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