Attention Walmart Shoppers, and literally everyone else in US America! Almost everything you buy is about to get just a little bit more expensive since President Impulse Control decided to impose a 10 percent tariff on the remaining $300 billion of Chinese imports. Hooboy, are we tired of winning yet?
The message was delivered in the usual manner, and without informing our Chinese negotiating partners in advance.
...We look forward to continuing our positive dialogue with China on a comprehensive Trade Deal, and feel that the… https://t.co/04vCkhSUG1— Donald J. Trump (@Donald J. Trump) 1564680371.0
Making diplomacy great again! Trump prefaced his announcement by speculating that China and Iran had simply decided to wait him out, "drooling" at the prospect of being able to "rip off our beloved USA like never before" if a Democrat wins in 2020. But it wasn't all bad -- at least he managed to wait until Mnuchin and Lighthizer were back from negotiating with their Chinese counterparts in Shanghai before losing his shit and blowing up the deal on Twitter!
Trump spent months mollifying the big money market guys by promising that a great new trade deal with China was just around the corner. Wowed by his steely acumen and giant manly hands, China had promised to start buying massive quantities of US agricultural products. Or was it a vow to get serious about preventing intellectual property theft? Wait, maybe they were going to execute all the fentanyl smugglers.
Oh, whoops! Apparently it was NONE OF THEM, KATIE.
...buy agricultural product from the U.S. in large quantities, but did not do so. Additionally, my friend President… https://t.co/Dt2e5SIGd1— Donald J. Trump (@Donald J. Trump) 1564680370.0
And that asshole is still out there swearing up and down that the Chinese pay all the tariffs and we'd all be so much richer if we just cut out China entirely and started making our own running shoes in America again.
Trump says this about China, which is the US's largest trading partner by a significant margin: "If they don't want… https://t.co/uLFAYJ111m— Aaron Rupar (@Aaron Rupar) 1564690932.0
Which is all well and good, except here in America wages are stagnant and people who can afford to eat, and pay rent, and shell out for health insurance, and still buy a pair of $15 American-made socks are thin on the ground.
China has not yet announced what its next move is, but safe bet it will be retaliatory tariffs. Which the Chinese will pay if they want our stuff, just as we pay to import Chinese goods. Because SHUT UP YOU DEMENTED LOON, THAT IS HOW TARIFFS WORK. Except the Chinese can just turn around and buy their soybeans from Brazil and Russia, who are only too happy to pick up the slack in the market. And then American taxpayers can pick up the tab for that one, too, since there is no way on God's green earth that the GOP is going to blow off Iowa farmers during a presidential year, especially with Joni Ernst on the ballot.
Let's see how the markets looked for the day.
Graphic via CNN Money
WOOF.
Oh, hey, remember that fun time on Wednesday, barely 24 hours before the Stable Genius had his tariff temper tantrum, when the Chairman of the Federal Reserve announced that he was cutting interest rates because we're in a trade war and no one knows whether it's going to peter out or blow up the entire economy because some idiot with no impulse control can't stay off Twitter? (We might be paraphrasing. A little.)
Once more with feeling now ... TRADE WARS ARE GOOD, AND EASY TO WIN.
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