Friends, pretty soon the Supreme Court will be in a position to rule on the constitutionality of President Trump's sweeping (and sometimes rather fickle) tariffs on a host of countries. If SCOTUS pulls the rug out from under Trump, a vast, and lucrative, architecture of tariffs will come crashing down. Probably Trump could reconstruct parts of it by other means, but billions in revenue would have to be refunded, and, more importantly, Trump himself would be humbled and other countries would take his threats much less seriously. I don't know anything about the legality and constitutionality of tariffs, but I would hate to see DJT emasculated at this critical hour!
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn4jyk9jyv3o
In other news, something is happening in the polls: Trump's popularity/favorability is flagging. Why now, though? The MSM despises him, sure, but nothing new there. Is it shutdown related? Maybe. Are economic and employment worries coming home to roost? Possibly. Has the anti-Trump hate machine simply dialed up its intensity, because it's election season? Could be. Whatever the cause, unfortunately these trends mean that Republicans are less likely to win big on Tuesday, and they may not win anywhere. Brace yourself for some progressive smugness, therefore!
https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/approval/donald-trump/approval-rating
Dr. Waddy from Jack: But, but wait: Trump is a dictator is he not and since when do dictators submit their decrees to a forum of berobed legal academics?! Why any dictator (say like Hillary) would have made of such a body a rubber stamp for his policies even if he had tolerated its very presence in HIS country. So there.
ReplyDeleteI think President Trump's main purpose in the very effective use of tariffs is to correct imbalances in our trade relations countenanced in the past by apologists for U.S. economic and productive prowess. He has also used them to exert "friendly persuasion". He knows that when we refrain from such use, other, far less benevolent countries ,will be pleased to do so. Power truly does "abhor a vacuum" in this less than ideal world.
The "American" far left, devoted as it is to the "fundamental transformation "of an "erring and evil America" , holds American economic power, the engine of the blessedly highest standard of living ever known on this old earth, to be , by definition, condemned by its failure to relent in the face of Marx's irrefutable vision of a scientifically guaranteed "just" future and Lenin's murderous urging of " well why wait for the inevitable , let's force it now!" Of course that view got a thorough trial in the 20th century and was more than proven catastrophically wrongheaded . Its advocacy today in those who choose to do so, is indicative of , at best, smoky dorm room baloney and at worst of knowingly totalitarian intent.
Those national decision makers who have already acceded to President Trump's proposals for more "equitable" trade relations, have affirmed in their cooperativeness the wisdom of our President, who is tempered by his life with a visceral understanding of the ways of this often unforgiving world and of the inevitable dynamics of power. What good fortune for the world (and many of these leaders know it) that such strength accrues to the proven most benevolent big power in world history.
I do not at all mean to suggest that businesses negatively effected by President Trump's tariff policies are foot soldiers for the America hating far left. Far from it: they affirm the maxim "the business of America is business". I would suggest that for a limited time those businesses caught off guard and undeservedly disadvantaged by the President's tariff policies be indemnified by the U. S.
I'm confident that should Scotus disable the President's tariff policy(s) he will find other ways to alleviate the trade imbalances so very long and cynically worked upon our overgenerous country. And he will identify other means of applying persuasive U.S. power to situations inviting or requiring our intervention. "America first" is his maxim and that is a principle which has often worked to the benefit of the world.