Well there’s been a ton of economically retarded things Trump has done that you could have slagged him for, but you never bothered to post those and you would have certainly had our support.
I’m not sure what the history is, but in the recent spurt @Malathor hasn’t posted anything remotely offensive, and most of the rest of the thread has acted immaturely by attacking him rather than points he’s made. Not a very impressive showing.
It’s almost like the forum’s post history doesn’t exist.
How’s that working out for you? No comment on any of those firings?
Yep, just commenting on economics, you see!
So above it all.
Also curious what your thoughts are on these:
Trump says he’ll just seize the land for the wall.
And this,
But I guess your answer will be: doesn’t matter, got tax cuts.
You are a fake Libertarian. Libertarians should be outraged by Trump.
Anyone with a memory longer than that of a mayfly remembers his shit. Don’t be disingenuous.
My comments are based on what he and others have posted today, which was stated in my first sentence.
I don’t know his or your posting history, but didn’t see anything remotely objectionable today except the kneejerk vitriolic response.
I personally don’t have the time or interest to read another poster’s history before deciding how to engage their current comments.
So to change the subject back to the original topic.
- China’s adherence to the spirit of WTO rules is marginal at best.
- China is an oppressive totalitarian dictatorship, which imprisons millions of its own citizens in gulags, illegally occupies territory, and seeks to promote its own model of totalitarian controlled capitalism abroad.
- Although the US benefits from free trade with China, China benefits much more from free trade with the US.
Starting a trade conflict with China makes a lot of sense to me, in terms of long term geopolitical thinking. Of course the challenge is carefully managing it so you maintain some level of global support and don’t back China into a corner, and it will require masterful diplomacy from the president to pull it off HAHAHAHA NOPE.
But the central thesis of a lot of posters on this thread - that a trade conflict with China is fundamentally a moronic strategy - doesn’t pass muster to me. The fact that a moron is implementing is for moronic reasons does not make it an inherently moronic policy (ad hominem fallacy).
Having said that I’m very sympathetic to the idea that positive engagement is a better strategy - it has after all done a lot to pull Chinese citizens - who are human beings just like us - out of poverty. But over the last 15 years it just hasn’t worked at all in terms of liberalising the Chinese government.
I get what you’re saying, but we already had a better approach in place. The TPP wasn’t perfect but it did establish a group of countries operating in sync against many of China’s excesses in trade. Withdrawing from the TPP did much more to hurt efforts to reign China in than any good that could possibly come from these tariffs. I can’t take tariff arguments seriously when there are better alternatives for anyone willing to consider them.
I agree, I’d forgotten about TPP. TPP combined with anti-China tariffs would have been brutal for China.
I used to be a free trade absolutist, stuff like this paper has tempered my thinking:
The way trump is doing tariffs was the dumbest, most moronic way possible. Manufacturing here is way more important than raw materials. Steel and aluminum tariffs are what a 5- year old reminiscing about 1970 Pittsburgh would do. While yes we needed to level the playing field with China, but it’s been done ass-backwards and is hurting us more than helping. TPP would have been wonderful, not just for trade but for IP protection and American influence as well. There was a lot in there outside of specific trade agreements that was incredibly beneficial to America. Obama did it right.
So then you blindly berate all the people who HAVE dealt with the the poster. Who KNOW his history? Nice work.
And just to be clear, I did have issues with the TPP. Had it been implemented I’m sure I’d have plenty of issues with it as well. But nothing as bad as the damage the current tariff approach is causing.
Yes, constantly getting sucked into whataboutism is why I left. Your post is a perfect example of it, it’s typical of boards that are overwhelmingly skewed to one side or another. The purpose of it is to drive away dissenting viewpoints. I’m not going to bother anymore. If you want to know what I think on most issues you can just check out what Rand Paul supports since I normally agree with him. Don’t like it? Shrug.
Malathor, I’ve been harder on you than most, and I’ll try to be cool in the future.
But simple acknowledgement of objectively bad stuff being done by Trump would go a long way towards earning some goodwill.
Say whatever you like, but don’t act all surprised when other people call out your disconnect with reality. Rand Paul indeed.
Trump is an odious buffoon about a whole host of things. Things I do not think he has been a buffoon about are the economy and foreign policy. I fully support his approach to NK, China and pulling troops out of the Middle East. To me those outweigh the rest, but I fully admit that I am incredibly cynical when it comes to politicians. My expectations are rock bottom. It comes with being a Libertarian most of my life. YMMV.
I’d agree. I opposed the TPP, in specifics but not in objectives. I particularly have very strong objections to the way that we were shoehorning in the worst of US IP law.
Because, let me be clear, I loathe the state of US IP law. I find things like software patents absurd and abusive. The way patents are used as a legal bludgeon to stifle competition and innovation and further entrench corporate behemoths is objectionable to me on a moral and practical level. The provisions in the TPP, and how they were added by corporate interests excluding public advocacy, were extremely odious to me.
So, yeah, I was opposed to the TPP as it existed. However I was in favor of such an agreement, and the objectives it pursued aside from the IP stuff.
The way that it was jettisoned, combined with the tariffs, have weakened the US position regarding Asia and Africa. Countries there have and will continue to realign themselves with Beijing as the US has shown to be an unreliable partner. (Lets also add the threat of blackmail regarding US forces and their deployments abroad. Demanding payments, otherwise we take our ball and go home does not play well, and undermines our role in keeping shipping lanes open).
A combination of all the above has handed Beijing what they most desired, and pushed up their economic leadership in the east by a decade or more. China has long term thinking and has been executing a plan. Whatever you may say about them, and many of the negatives are absolutely true, their investments in infrastructure in Africa and SE Asia are not a mistake.
Mark my words, when we look back in a few decades at China being the dominant global economic power and wonder when that happened, that turning point is now.
But you supported Mattis, and Trump’s foreign policy was so at odds with probably the greatest US general of modern times, that he resigned in protest over that policy.
In North Korea we have them concessions and cancelled our joint exercises with the South Koreans, and we have received litteraly nothing in return. It’s a repeat of Clinton in the 90s.
In terms of economics, he started a tradewar, and now we are paying socialist handouts to farmers. He pulled out of critical trade agreements, and now we are pained to lose agricultural marketshare to other nations who are part of the TPP.
Doesn’t matter; got tax cuts.
If Mattis isn’t willing to go along with pulling troops out of the Middle East then good riddance. I’m generally against military interventions, I thought Dems were too at one point but I guess that’s changed. If so, it’s one more reason to dislike Dems.
NK isn’t going to give up its nukes, ever, as long as that regime lasts. The best we can hope for is talks, meetings, and photo ops instead of an actual Nuclear war. So far, so good.
I noted the Trade war with China being risky. If it gets us to a better trade framework, then it will have been a big success. Remains to be seen how that turns out, but I understand the motivations. Go read the paper I linked to, it’s eye opening.