President Donald Trump, in a classic display of strategic whiplash, announced that he’ll be hitting pause on his much-ballyhooed reciprocal tariffs — for 90 days. Which feels oddly specific, like the geopolitical equivalent of someone saying, “I’m taking a break from caffeine... but only until the end of this semester.”
Ninety days. Just long enough to sow confusion and get absolutely nothing done.
This, of course, raises the obvious question: how exactly are we supposed to "bring back American industry" if we keep yanking the plug every time the bathwater gets a little hot?
One of the few semi-coherent justifications for tariffs was to strong-arm corporations into plunking down factories in rustbelt towns — places like Youngstown and Toledo — where they might just hire someone who’s seen the inside of a high school gym that wasn’t turned into a Dollar General.
Sure, prices would go up, but that was the point. “No pain, no gain,” they told us, while winking at the donor class and hoping no one looked too closely at their stock portfolios...
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| Source:Matt Lewis with a humorous & yet accurate look at President Trump's trade policy. |
From Matt Lewis
After selling the pain as patriotic, MAGA pundits are left justifying a policy their guy couldn’t finish — with takes so bad, they deserve a second life.
In the wake of reciprocal tariffs landing with all the finesse of a cannonball dive into a hot tub, President Trump has decided to pause them temporarily for most countries (while raising China’s tariffs to 125%).
The problem? This past week Trump’s army of talking heads and Twitter commandos has pushed his “no pain, no gain” theory like it was the Sermon on the Mount, all while insisting this was the economic tough love America needed. So while Trump struts around declaring victory, as if this whole thing was a masterclass in geopolitical brinkmanship and not a half-baked tantrum, his loyal foot soldiers are left twisting in the wind — on record, parroting laughable justifications for an industrial policy plan their guy now clearly doesn’t have the guts, or attention span, to complete.
I’ve got the receipts. And before these painfully awkward justifications get quietly shuffled off to the great memory hole where bad takes go to die, allow me to immortalize a few of the more inspired defenses that were trotted out to sell this mess...
From Matt Lewis
"Sam Stein, Andrew Egger, and Ben Parker react to Trump’s latest chaotic tariff announcement in a Truth Social bleat, including his stunning 125% tariffs on China and sudden U-turn on tariffs for dozens of other countries. Markets are surging, but confusion remains."
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| Source:The Bulwark according to President Trump: tariffs are goodbad His word, not mine. |
From The Bulwark
"FOX Business host Larry Kudlow discusses countries flocking to the U.S. to make a trade deal with President Donald Trump on 'Kudlow.'"
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| Source:FOX Business Larry Kudlow trying to put his best spin on Donald Trump's supermarket (pun intended) mess and attempted cleanup. |
From FOX Business
"On Wednesday's "Carl Higbie FRONTLINE," Carl talked about President Donald Trump's 90 pause on tariffs. "
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| Source:Newsmax I will give Carl Higbie credit for 1 thing: the ability to say what he says without breaking out in laughter. Which makes him well-qualified to be the anchor of Weekend Update for Saturday Night Live. |
From Newsmax
And from The New Democrat earlier today:
"Could you imagine Donald J. Trump as an Army general? Neither can I, simply because you actually have to have real, professional qualifications, just to get into the U.S. Army, let alone even become an officer, like a lieutenant, let alone not just an Army general, but a general whose in charge of a command. Unlike President of the United States, where you just have to be 35 years old, born into America, or to an American parent, who was born in America and win the Electoral College. But let's take President Trump's lead here and also play make believe.
So Donald J. Trump... I'm sorry, (natural mistake) U.S. Army Command General Donald J. Trump, decides to attack Canada (after his twin brother President Ronald J. Trump just gave the order to invade Canada) and he decides to send let's say 10,000 soldiers over the Canadian border into British Columbia, 1 problem:
General Trump doesn't have any air cover and the Royal Air Force just blows his tanks and soldiers away. Why? Because General Trump didn't bother to check to see whether or not Canada even had an Air Force, let alone had fighter jets and bombers near their border with Washington State. So his troops get blown away, even though right before that he thought he had a brilliant plan and was celebrating with a Diet Coke and quarter pounder with fries.
This is what Donald J. Trump is like as a leader. He think he has a brilliant idea in his head, or it he thinks it sounds cool, or something... he always makes big decisions based on the last person that he talked too. To use a football analogy: every political and policy play that President Trump ever calls, is the hail mary: "Let's just throw the ball up for grabs and see what happens", with no thought whatsoever put in to see what would the consequences be if they decide to raise the cost of living in America by 10, 20, 30, 40, 50% and whether that would lead to a recession or not...
From The New Democrat
Just to let our readers know: a lot of what you see here is how the Right (center & far-right) are reacting to President Trump's pause in his trade war.
I think Matt Lewis has the key point here:
"This, of course, raises the obvious question: how exactly are we supposed to "bring back American industry" if we keep yanking the plug every time the bathwater gets a little hot...
When people can't make up their mind about what to do... like start a trade war, (just to use an example) a lot of times they'll get caught in-between 2 competing ideas of what they should do and they get stuck:
They don't understand the consequences of going either way
They don't have enough information on what they should do
Haven't bothered to think about what they should do
Or my personal favorite: they simply don't know what the hell that they're doing.
I mean a President of the United States, who is looking at a debt of 500-hundred-billion-dollars in New York City, because of how they ran their business... who went bankrupt 7 times before becoming President of the United States, who is now in-charge of the economic policy of the United States of America. Think about that.
Just to respond to 1 point that Carl Higbie said: hearing a man talk about the need for "national sacrifice", in talking about the President's trade policy, from a millionaire, is like hearing a farmer talk a about the need for better neuroscience, or a neurosurgeon talking about the need for agriculture policy. And of course there are exceptions to every rule. But Mr. Higbie simply doesn't know what he's talking about here. Which makes him well-qualified for Newsmax, or to serve in the Trump Administration... if he wants to make more money.
I mean sacrifice for a millionaire, is like maybe staying home 1 night a week, going out 1 night less every week... perhaps cooking their own meal 1 night a week. Sacrifice for middle class people who are worried about losing their 401K, or their job, means maybe taking out another mortgage, not buying a new car that they need, maybe taking another job to pay for your kid's education, etc... that is real sacrifice.
The President of the United States seems to disagree with what both Larry Kudlow and Carl Higbie said:
"Trump says he decided on 90-day tariff pause because people were 'yippy' and 'afraid'
"They were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid," he said Wednesday, referring to the market unrest that unfolded following his "Liberation Day" tariff announcement a week ago...
From Yahoo News
So Trump news right now, is like the ambitious prosecutor looking for a promotion and are so desperate to get 1 and maybe they just flip a coin to decide who they should indict. They apparently don't even talk to each other and as a result, take their own bullshit (to be frank) to the air, or on social media, because they think what they have to say at that time, will get them though the moment. The problem is, they have all these commentators not just sharing their own spins on the Trump tariffs, but none of them are even plausible, let alone make sense.
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