Trump Presidency

[fiksal]

I see this a bit simpler


people affected by tariffs or boycotts have to decide are they for them or against them

if they are for, then it's all fine.

if they are against and voted Trump, then it's time to wake up.

[matthewfarmery]

America will likely be going into a recession later this year,

JPMorgan Predicts Recession for Later This Year

JPMorgan believes the U.S. economy will enter a recession in the back half of 2025 as the impact of President Trump tariffs takes hold in the economy, Yahoo Finance reports.

Doesn't surprise me in the least, unless Trump tries to save face and does a U turn. But if this happens, let it, maybe then people will wak up and realise things are getting bad to worse.

LOL

Bessent Says Market Plunge Has Nothing to Do with Trump

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the stock market plunge has more to do with the emergence of China’s DeepSeek artificial intelligence tool than with President Trump’s policies, Reuters reports.

Said Bessent: “For everyone who thinks these market declines are all based on the President’s economic policies, I can tell you that this market decline started with the Chinese AI announcement of DeepSeek… What’s happening with the market I’d say it’s more a Mag 7 problem, not a MAGA problem.”

Bessent, who ran a hedge fund, noted that “Mag 7” refers to the shares of the so-called Magnificent 7 — a group of seven high-performing tech stocks.

The guy has no brain, then again, working for Trump and trying to spin stuff for him, does that to you. We all know its Trump, but to say its something else, just

[EGO_Aut]

I don't want to doubt the prophecies of the best, God-chosen, almost war veteran, and most intelligent president for life.

I am convinced that the US is industrially and economically prepared to compensate for the price increases so that the population does not have to pay for price increases.

[mr.WHO]

I am convinced that the US is industrially and economically prepared to compensate for the price increases so that the population does not have to pay for price increases.

Sorry to shatter your dreams, but the only way for US consumers and business to avoid major price increase and recession, one of those things needs to be true:

1) US internal market and industry must have spare surplus products that they cannot export anymore, so they have to sell it in US at a discounted price - that's obviously not possible as US wen't full "lets import everything and stop producing most stuff here".

Therefore point 2 must be done:

2) US dear-orange-leader-for-life beat Stalin and Mao by order of magnituded and manage to fully reindustrialize entire US...in one month.

That's impossible - opening factory takes a lot of time: 2-3 years for most basic stuff and 7-10 years for more advance stuff.


Basically US consumers are screwed, if tarris will stay - you will have 5-10 years of price increases and products shortages starting from next month or two - that's on very bold assumption that Trump now become genius economist / industrialist and implement 100 out of 100 perfect policies for for next few years.


I wish you best, but reality is that Trump and Republicans will be destroyed in midterms, if they stay on current course - simply because bad outcomes of Trump policies will materialize almost immediately, but any potential good outcomes might materialize 5-10 years in future.

Paraphrazing Trump, he did operate and finished the operation - he just failed to mention he operated with sledgehammer rather than with scalpel.

[jlehtone]

Paraphrazing Trump, he did operate and finished the operation - he just failed to mention he operated with sledgehammer rather than with scalpel.

Didn't Trump claim that tariffs will "make America wealthy again"?

The people in US will have to pay the tariffs, so they won't be the wealthy ones.
The US (country) will collect the tariffs and could become wealthy,
unless the old school king -- "we are the state" -- God Emperor (and oligark pals) pocket the moneys.

I.e. if "make America wealthy again" means "I get money" to Trump, then he did not lie but express his wish?

[felter]

Seen a few that are estimating that the tariffs will cost the average American up to 4K per year, so when you think on it in 4 years that's around 16K over Trumps time in power and for some of those that support Trump and voted for him, I'm going to guess that's probably more than a years wage for them that they are going to have to fork out, and they are still supporting him.

It's also starting, companies outside the US are beginning to pull their products from America, for example a big name Jaguar Land Rover are to pause shipments to America. Over the coming weeks, I can only see more and more names being added to that list. This fiasco does nothing for anyone, but at the end of the day the rest of the world will go on trading with each other while America will be left with no one to trade with. We are all reliant on each other, in this day and age, no one can go for it all by their lonesome.

[chew-ie]

I am convinced that the US is industrially and economically prepared to compensate for the price increases so that the population does not have to pay for price increases.

Sorry to shatter your dreams, but the only way for US consumers and business to avoid major price increase and recession, one of those things needs to be true:

1) US internal market and industry must have spare surplus products that they cannot export anymore, so they have to sell it in US at a discounted price - that's obviously not possible as US wen't full "lets import everything and stop producing most stuff here".

Therefore point 2 must be done:

2) US dear-orange-leader-for-life beat Stalin and Mao by order of magnituded and manage to fully reindustrialize entire US...in one month.

That's impossible - opening factory takes a lot of time: 2-3 years for most basic stuff and 7-10 years for more advance stuff.


Basically US consumers are screwed, if tarris will stay - you will have 5-10 years of price increases and products shortages starting from next month or two - that's on very bold assumption that Trump now become genius economist / industrialist and implement 100 out of 100 perfect policies for for next few years.


I wish you best, but reality is that Trump and Republicans will be destroyed in midterms, if they stay on current course - simply because bad outcomes of Trump policies will materialize almost immediately, but any potential good outcomes might materialize 5-10 years in future.

Paraphrazing Trump, he did operate and finished the operation - he just failed to mention he operated with sledgehammer rather than with scalpel.

IMHO that was a sarcastic post. Or I read it wrong

[EGO_Aut]

Yes, I was sarcastic. Sorry, I'll flag it next time.
The US isn't exactly known for efficient production. A shortage of skilled workers, powerful unions, and greedy lawyers are holding things back.
I feel truly sorry for the Earth. How wonderful it would be if we could finally solve climate change and bring peace. That would only be possible with a united, strong world. It's enough to make you cry.
But perhaps a collapse of the financial system is exactly what we need. Sometimes it's better to break something and rebuild.

[Observe]

Tariffs. I remember many decades ago when I visited Norway, it was hard to find American food items in the stores, because Norway had something like 200% tariffs on foreign agricultural products. The purpose was to protect Norwegian farmers from cheap imports. It is a balancing act between protecting local producers and participating in international trade. I don't know what Norway is doing these days in that regard. I understand EU countries have "open markets" with each other, but I'm not sure about the details.

I also remember since I was a young man (many decades ago), seeing American industry decline in favor of cheap labor overseas. At one point, Japan was the main culprit, until their standard of living made them less competitive with the likes of Taiwan, Korea, Malasia, etc. It keeps shifting to wherever the lowest wages, or highest government subsidies are. Politicians have been complaining about this for a very long time, but little to nothing has been done to address the problem.

Protecting domestic production with tariffs is nothing new. These Trump implemented changes are way overdue. Adjustments will be painful for everyone, including Americans. Until the day when there are international agreements on labor laws and wages, there must be tariffs imposed on imports to compensate.

Then if you add the mountains of crap products filling landfills, it becomes imperative that everyone stop buying and dumping products designed for obsolescence, to be discarded when marketeers tell us that what we have is outdated, even if it works perfectly fine.

But perhaps a collapse of the financial system is exactly what we need. Sometimes it's better to break something and rebuild.

Unfortunately, that is where we are at. Whether this results in a better or worse situation, remains to be seen.

Perhaps it would be best to set a cap on imports equal to exports. If China imports $200 billion from us, we will import an equal dollar amount from them. Any amount above the cap, would be subject to increasingly higher tariffs.

[Mailo]

Protecting domestic production with tariffs is nothing new. These Trump implemented changes are way overdue. Adjustments will be painful for everyone, including Americans. Until the day when there are international agreements on labor laws and wages, there must be tariffs imposed on imports to compensate.

Then if you add the mountains of crap products filling landfills, it becomes imperative that everyone stop buying and dumping products designed for obsolescence, to be discarded when marketeers tell us that what we have is outdated, even if it works perfectly fine.

The unemployment rate in the US today is ~4%. That's about the same rate as back in the 1950s, and 1960s, and below that of 1970-1990. How does that fit your narrative that jobs have been shifted to overseas and need to be brought back? Who will work in those jobs that are about to magically appear? Especially as the current workforce working all the menial jobs is being deported.
I know Florida has a novel idea to solve the issue by allowing 14 year olds to work night shifts, even on school days, but are you really satisfied with that?

These Trump implemented changes are way overdue.

Really? It was long overdue to raise tariffs on all imports from Heard Island and McDonald Islands? I guess the penguins and seals there have abused the US for too long by exporting ... fish? I guess?
Are you really ok that the people making these immensly impactful decisions don't even fact-check themselves before publishing them?
Also, the presentation of the tariffs contained a huge error, it listed a column as "Tariffs charged to the US" with percentages below, which we now know are NOT tariffs charged to the US, but instead the trade deficit excluding services (which they later admitted to when confronted about it). Granted, it might not have been a lie, they might have been incompetent enough to actually believe what ChatGPT or Grok or whatever AI they used to come up with this told them.
Also, haven't you wondered why Russia is not on this list? If you apply the formula the White House published that they used to calculate tariffs for everyone else, Russia should get 235% tariffs. Instead, they are one of only six countries specifically excluded (Canada, Mexico, Belarus, Cuba, North Korea and Russia).

But perhaps a collapse of the financial system is exactly what we need. Sometimes it's better to break something and rebuild.

Unfortunately, that is where we are at. Whether this results in a better or worse situation, remains to be seen.

Nebraskan farmers already know the answer to this, considering that many will lose their farms to large corporations.
If something better will arise from this, none of us will be around to see it, as it will take decades. Until then, we're all going to be worse off.

[Incubi]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQMvWczjWnY&t=4070s

Or just pick your flavor, it is all over YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_ ... s+off+2025

Again, I have to say that I am glad that I live in California, even if my county is red. California is the 5th largest economy in the world and despite the high cost of living, I am more likely to keep my life as normal as possible here than anywhere else in the US.

These are not thoughtful Tariffs; they lack nuance, and they lack data. Tariffs exist for reasons and sometimes it is for economic balancing, others are protecting national goods. Trumps "reciprocal tariffs" is nothing more than xenophobic senility.

Trumps "reciprocal tariffs" is not protecting homegrown goods; in fact, it ironically hurts it, as much of what is quality "Made in the USA" depends on imports. And Californias agriculture depends on both immigrants and exports to sustain itself. Obviously, I support the Made in the USA label, but only when it means something other than ignorance. Also, our 10% can be more than an 80% tariff from a poorer country. When dealing with different economies the value of the currency plays a large role. Reciprocal, my ass.

Did you know that Trump put tariffs on a population oof penguins? https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-t ... ay-2054649

The Penguins cannot afford the 10% tariffs of their guano exports so they will just have to find a use for it locally.

[Observe]

The unemployment rate in the US today is ~4%. That's about the same rate as back in the 1950s, and 1960s, and below that of 1970-1990. How does that fit your narrative that jobs have been shifted to overseas and need to be brought back? Who will work in those jobs that are about to magically appear?

The unemployment rate doesn’t tell the full story. Many of the lost jobs were manufacturing jobs—high-paying, stable, often union jobs. Those were replaced by lower-wage service-sector jobs. So yes, people may still be employed, but the quality of employment has declined for many. Some people have simply stopped looking for work altogether, and they’re not counted in the unemployment rate.

Entire towns and regions were hollowed out when factories moved overseas. The unemployment rate doesn’t show that in places like the Rust Belt, generational damage was done. When a town loses a major employer to overseas outsourcing, it affects schools, crime, mental health, and long-term opportunity, even if people eventually find new, often lower paid work.

So sure, the unemployment rate might be relatively low, but that doesn’t erase the very real impact of offshoring and deindustrialization. People didn’t just lose jobs—they lost identity, security, and a path to the middle class. That's what I'm talking about.

[EDIT] I forgot to mention, that Americas industrial might, was in no small way responsible for turning the tide during WW2. Guess who has the industrial might these days? Hint: It's not America and its not Europe.

If China decided to invade Taiwan or anywhere, the rest of the world might as well just fold up their tents and go home. This is an incredibly precarious situation that economic and trade "experts', along with greedy corporations and stupid, lazy politicians have brought us to.

[Warenwolf]

Tariffs. I remember many decades ago when I visited Norway, it was hard to find American food items in the stores, because Norway had something like 200% tariffs on foreign agricultural products. The purpose was to protect Norwegian farmers from cheap imports. It is a balancing act between protecting local producers and participating in international trade. I don't know what Norway is doing these days in that regard. I understand EU countries have "open markets" with each other, but I'm not sure about the details.

That was, and still is, a highly contentious political decision in Norway. The reason behind it is not the protection of local agriculture (in the usual sense), but rather ensuring that Norway has domestic food production in the event of a crisis. If the country were to get under embargo or war when fishing becomes risky, Norway would face difficulties feeding its population if all agriculture were lost. However, this decision is not popular throughout society, as it leads to the creation of cartels that control what products are available in stores, and prices are significantly higher on products that are sold just across the border for 30% less, even if they are produced in Norway (Norway is outside EU).

Point being is that this is a industry-specific tariff while clown show running the White House implemented tariffs on all trade using a formula not grounded in any macro-economic theory.

The unemployment rate in the US today is ~4%. That's about the same rate as back in the 1950s, and 1960s, and below that of 1970-1990. How does that fit your narrative that jobs have been shifted to overseas and need to be brought back? Who will work in those jobs that are about to magically appear?

The unemployment rate doesn’t tell the full story. Many of the lost jobs were manufacturing jobs—high-paying, stable, often union jobs. Those were replaced by lower-wage service-sector jobs.

Something tells me that you have missed the fact that automation would have done the same thing - the car factory line in Mexico employs fewer people than a car factory line in 60's USA. Also you fail to answer mailo's point - you don't have enough people to move all industry from China or Mexico to USA.
To your defense neither did White House think about those things - proper operational and implementation plans these days is considered a woke concept and Trump hates those.

PS: As to China being the big enemy - not sure it is these days. USA will not oppose China attempt to take over Taiwan just as it did not oppose Russia taking over parts of Ukraine. Furthermore Trump has managed impossible - it made China, Japan and South-Korea sit down and coordinate their commercial plans vs Trump's tariffs.

https://www.reuters.com/world/china-jap ... 025-03-31/

[Vertigo 7]

While we all know your response to invasion is capitulation, @observe, that's not what the rest of the world will do.

[clakclak]

The turnout for the protest in America today was encouraging. Some of these rallies were massiv.

[felter]

So what was the point of these so-called protests, I mean let me start off by saying Trump doesn't care, he is in charge, and he doesn't have to do anything that you say or want him to do. The time for you to protest was just after Jan 6th, the time to protest was against Fox News when it was spreading lies and disinformation about that election, the time to protest was when it became clear that the Supreme court was corrupt and open to bribery, the time to protest was when Trump was attending all of his many different court appearances, the time to protest was when the supreme court was deciding trump had immunity from prosecution, the time to protest was when the supreme court was deciding a felon and or insurrectionist was eligible to stand for president this is just a few of the times that Americans should have been standing up and protesting about what was going on, but you were all just sitting on your fat arses watching Netflix while eating your McDonald's and sipping on a coke to care. So now it is too late, you have made your bed, and we all have to sleep in it for the next 45 Months. Demonstrating against Trump now is just a pointless endeavour.

[Observe]

Demonstrating against Trump now is just a pointless endeavour.

Brings to mind words from John Trudell, a Native American activist.

We yell into their wind / They hear us but they don’t / It’s a game of echoes they’ve mastered. They build the stage for our anger / Direct the play of our pain / And we perform for them. They give us their streets to dance in / Their jails to sleep in / But never their thrones to sit in.

[Incubi]

So what was the point of these so-called protests, I mean let me start off by saying Trump doesn't care, he is in charge, and he doesn't have to do anything that you say or want him to do. The time for you to protest was just after Jan 6th, the time to protest was against Fox News when it was spreading lies and disinformation about that election, the time to protest was when it became clear that the Supreme court was corrupt and open to bribery, the time to protest was when Trump was attending all of his many different court appearances, the time to protest was when the supreme court was deciding trump had immunity from prosecution, the time to protest was when the supreme court was deciding a felon and or insurrectionist was eligible to stand for president this is just a few of the times that Americans should have been standing up and protesting about what was going on, but you were all just sitting on your fat arses watching Netflix while eating your McDonald's and sipping on a coke to care. So now it is too late, you have made your bed, and we all have to sleep in it for the next 45 Months. Demonstrating against Trump now is just a pointless endeavour.

During the times that you presented, no one felt they could do anything. But now we have lawyers standing against Trump, Newsom has not backed down, Kamala is vocal again, Obama is vocal still, and some of the star struck republicans are noticing his crap and feel betrayed. Also, as ****** as it sounds, his own fan base is about to lose money, they are beginning to make stand as well. While that seems performative at first, it means Trump is losing power. I think people feel that they are beginning to be able to do something now when everyone felt helpless. Others didn't think Trump could pull any of this of. For a while now protest was either beacons of validation to the extremes on the left or used as bait for the interest to the extremes on the right. And at any given protest either the Proud boys or the locals Antifa will show up with violent intent. Neither group cares what you think, only what they think and how they think it.

Fortunately, the only act of violence today that I am aware of is the Antifa showing up at the protest in UC Davis and smashed a table, tore down a tent, and assaulted a woman. leave it to them to give the right an excuse to say "See? See, the tolerant left" As if the American antifa are anything but fascist themselves. If you're on the left and disagree with 1% of how the Antifa think here, they will attack you too. I say American Antifa because apparently in Germany an antifa group behaves more legitimately and I should be specific on these boards about that? I am tired of the American Antifa representing the left the way they do here. I feel they are one of the reasons people voted red and got that idiot back in office in the first place.

[mr.WHO]

For a while now protest was either beacons of validation to the extremes on the left or used as bait for the interest to the extremes on the right. And at any given protest either the Proud boys or the locals Antifa will show up with violent intent. Neither group cares what you think, only what they think and how they think it.

Fortunately, the only act of violence today that I am aware of is the Antifa showing up at the protest in UC Davis and smashed a table, tore down a tent, and assaulted a woman. leave it to them to give the right an excuse to say "See? See, the tolerant left" As if the American antifa are anything but fascist themselves. If you're on the left and disagree with 1% of how the Antifa think here, they will attack you too. I say American Antifa because apparently in Germany an antifa group behaves more legitimately and I should be specific on these boards about that? I am tired of the American Antifa representing the left the way they do here. I feel they are one of the reasons people voted red and got that idiot back in office in the first place.

Treat antifa/proudboys as distraction - they are used by media to divert people attention from actual problem.
It was like that during 2008 financial crysis, will be the same now when Trump policies will start hitting everyone in a few months.

Those extremist groups are to distract and divide, so that center-left and center-right cannot work together, despite having much more common interests and values than with far-right/left.


Oh and Trump won't be different - the more of his policies will fail, the more he will get into this crutch - he will run out of anti-woke policies quite fast, so the next step will be implementing mirror-woke version of the Right (there are already signs of this, like Rubio with the cross on forehead).

As much as I'd like to talk sh*t about Democrats, it took them 5-10 years to devolve into clown circus - with this administration it's like 5-10 weeks

[clakclak]

[…]

Fortunately, the only act of violence today that I am aware of is the Antifa showing up at the protest in UC Davis and smashed a table, tore down a tent, and assaulted a woman. leave it to them to give the right an excuse to say "See? See, the tolerant left" As if the American antifa are anything but fascist themselves. If you're on the left and disagree with 1% of how the Antifa think here, they will attack you too. I say American Antifa because apparently in Germany an antifa group behaves more legitimately and I should be specific on these boards about that? I am tired of the American Antifa representing the left the way they do here. I feel they are one of the reasons people voted red and got that idiot back in office in the first place.

German Antifa groups are a variety of different groups with different degrees of willingness to participate in violence. These are German members of the EU parliament and these are members of Jugendwiederstand Berlin. Both are technically part of the umbrella term Antifa. I assume the difference is apparent from the get go. Also, Germany has more variety in the political ideology of Antifa groups, as Germany has three main ideological currents within the Antifa movement that often don‘t get along with one another (Pro-Palestinian so called Anti-Imperialists), (Pro-Israeli so called Anti-Germans), (those that believe the Israel Palestine conflict should not be of critical importance to Antifascism in Germany today). Then there is the interconnectedness of different groups that fluidly switch at times. Autonome might either also be part of Antifa groups or support them or simply ideologically feel part of the movement and thus show up to demonstrations or organize them und the term Antifa. Same goes for members of green groups and trade unions, football Ultras and so on.

From all I have seen online so far German Antifa groups are, over all, far bigger and better organized and integrated into the broader political left wing than in America (meaning political parties or individual politicians are openly sympathetic to the movement and giant trade unions with millions of members, like IG Metall and ver.di have Anti-fascist councils), but not generally less willing to employ violence.I think it has more to do with the German police and protestors alike having by now more than 50 years of experience with well organized large protests. Germany is not France, but it is the country that popularized the black bloc demonstration tactic. Also Antifa groups are far from the only regularly violent groups in Germany currently. Football Ultras and Hooligans have been around for quite some time now and the frequently engage in acts of organized group violence. Same goes for far right wing groups. All of this violence, be it left, right or sports motivated, rarely makes headlines, but if you go digging for it there is a constant flood of local news articles.