Round Two

For Your Wallet

You REALLY believed you voted to lower the cost of groceries and gas?

I have a deal on a bridge in Brooklyn you are going to love.

It ain’t just sick birds and what eggs cost. It’s most of your produce that will become dear. Thank the tariff on Mexico. Oh, and the deportation of agricultural workers, of course.

But, that’s okay. Because even when gasoline starts costing 25-75 cents per gallon more (because of the tariff on crude oil from Canada), you won’t be able to find a car at a reasonable price or parts for it at any price (tariffs on both Mexico and China) to drive to a store able to remain in operation. Or to school. Or work. Or soccer practice. Which is fine, because when you start walking instead of driving, you can cancel your fitness club membership. And, maybe, find a bike in good condition at a neighborhood garage sale or in Aunt Sally’s attic.

“…the new tariffs Trump pledged will be virtually inescapable for Americans as businesses are poised to pass along the higher costs they face…to consumers.” Elizabeth Buchwald and John Towiighi, CNN

During the Election 2024 cycle, Trump repeatedly claimed there were no wars during his first administration. He meant the ones with guns and tanks and missiles and lethal airborne agents. He waged international war on many nations, for various commercial reasons and usually on a battlefield groomed to his advantage by previous administrations. Victory was always claimed, although the results in fact were a bit messy—as so often is the case after heated battle.

A tariff is a tax placed by one country on goods from another country. It is an economic weapon designed for defense. Trump deployed them in his first administration and promises to repeat the tactic against our three biggest trading partners when he resumes office. Which is kind of fun when you remember how he praised himself for “negotiating” the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement that ended that sort of counterproductive headbutting during his first administration. Yes, he intends to try to welch on his own deal.

“There is near unanimous consensus among economists that tariffs are self-defeating and have a negative effect on economic growth and economic welfare, while free trade and the reduction of trade barriers has a positive effect on economic growth.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariff

I’m not saying the guy is a one-trick pony.

Nope. He’s got several.

All of them benefit just one person.

Him.

We just witnessed his clever Above the Law Trick. Try to admire him as he dismantles the Department of Justice and disembowels the Federal Bureau of Investigation.