President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

Of course he put us into a trade war with China. An China came back fast and ruthlessly this morning, announcing $50 billion of tariffs of their own, including US agriculture and US airplanes from Boeing. They waited less than a day after the U.S. put out its list. It will hit Republican Congressmen's districts and cause blowback, so clearly it was targeted (for example soybeans, for which China is a big market). Their minister said, "If you want a trade war, we are comfortable dealing with you. If you don't want one, we will listen. ... within reason."

The third-grade negotiating tactic is going to create turmoil and end up with us no better off -- likely worse off. There is a reason why this was 19th century (not 21st Century) economic policy. It's a war that nobody wins, and that is going to be exacerbated by the fact that today we live in a globalized world for which it is difficult to track countries of origin for things. Trump (and Peter Navarro, the idiot pulling the puppet strings on this one) is in over his head. And he's just wrong on his reasoning for why it is a good thing. At best, tariffs go through, and the price of things goes up here, hitting already-strapped consumers of goods and materials.