Trump Doctrine: “We’re America, [itch bay]”

Discussion in 'Politicants' started by Tenacious D, Jun 11, 2018.

  1. CardinalVol

    CardinalVol Uncultured, non-diverse mod

    I've not dug enough to tell you whether they are fair or not. I have no clue. I am opposed to tariffs usually in principle because I think they hurt more than they help. That's just my belief. But, it's always worth work looking to renegotiate.
     
  2. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    A better deal being out there for us doesn't mean the current one is unfair. The better deal could be unfair. These are complicated things that he approaches like a bull in a china shop. As I have noted, the us protects it's timber industry jealously from canada, and there are similar fishery issues. Narrowly focusing on dairy and ignoring all context is not good and will cause hardship in the long run. It's simple hubris to think nothing will ever hurt us, and stupidity to think that someone else suffering more makes our pain less.
     
    gcbvol likes this.
  3. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    I think there are specific circumstances where you want to see an industry persist. For instance, we want there to be some kind of us steel industry, even of it would be cheaper to just import it all. As a matter of security and resiliency. Food supply can be part of that same thinking. Pretty sure we have tariffs on sugar, to protect us sugar. Not doing so led to the collapse of the sugar beet industry, I believe, which used to be a major crop and industry in the midwest
     
  4. CardinalVol

    CardinalVol Uncultured, non-diverse mod

    I get there are some areas where they need to be there. Food/national security would be an exception to my thinking.
     
  5. Volst53

    Volst53 Super Moderator


    What lead to the sugar beet collapsing wasn’t due to outside forces it was within.

    The United States protects and allows a sugar cartel by not allowing competition even domestic production. A small handful of farms controls nearly all of the market.

    That’s why a lot of chocolate and candy production has went to Mexico and Canada.

    Sugar is artificially higher due to our own government.
     
  6. Volst53

    Volst53 Super Moderator

    The issue is that a lot of our policies on food actually are hurting food security. It’s loaded with cronyism.
     
  7. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    Never cross the sugar cartel. A wildlife biologist taught me that.
     
  8. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    That's surely true. But I would wield a sharp blade, not a warhammer, when fighting that.
     
  9. Volst53

    Volst53 Super Moderator

    We need to encourage more diversity and localized food production.

    We need more small farmers exemptions like the USDA has on poultry.
     
  10. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    I agree. A lot of environmental problems spring from industrial farming.
     
  11. Tenacious D

    Tenacious D The law is of supreme importance, or no importance

    All of your points are entirely valid and fair.

    A better deal doesn’t mean that the current one is unfair, but neither does it make it fair, or most fair, or at all times mostly fair, either. The trouble with “fair” is that is in entirely subjective, and will obviously be seen through the respectively biases lenses of each side, and even uninvolved others. A $150B trade deficit with the EU is unfair, and by any reasonable standard, IMO.

    The EU won’t agree that it is.
    China won’t agree.
    Germany won’t agree.
    Canada won’t agree.
    Mexico won’t agree.
    South Korea won’t agree.

    Americans (the smart ones) will absolutely agree that’s unfair - and that’s a perspective that some don’t seem inclined to fully consider, even as we’re stupidly footing the bill for it.

    And it’s only that last group who elects a POTUS, and ultimately or should matter.

    These are all complicated things, as almost anything is - but some primary or macro-view things are simple and straightforward, too. If Germany or South Korea want to make it more difficult for US-based automotive manufacture’s to sell cars in their countries, I find little sympathy when we do the same to them, or in some other industry of theirs.

    How, exactly, will Trump’s focus on dairy hurt anything in the long run? First, he’s perfectly correct about their practices, and secondly, if they don’t want to abide by our tariffs on timber, then they can simply sell timber to someone else. But that’s not an option - you know it, I know it, Trudeau knows it and Trump knows it. What do you think Canada’s going to do, in the most far-flung and worst-case scenario that you can imagine? Stop trading with us? Declare war? They’ll be crushed - literally, will watch their economy quickly ground to powder - without us. What is it that you fear could occur, here? Hurt feelings?

    Who thinks that nothing will ever hurt us?
    I think that slowly bleeding us financially dry and decimating our middle class in making unbalanced trade deals, demanding that we alone pay for the lion’s share of the defense of the free world, and bankrolling any global wealth distrubution / bribery scheme (eg Iran Deal, Paris Climate, etc.) - not to mention our own internal system of taxation - has done a damned fine job of introducing many Americans to the thought that we can be hurt, and are countinuing to be hurt, if we continue to allow for these things, and they continue unabated.

    THE question is this:
    Should the POTUS be first and most concerned with what brings the best and greatest benefits to the US, or not.

    If yes, then you should be cheering Trump’s seeking to address these things.

    If no, then your goals and viewpoint no more align with Trump’s or the vast majority of the American people’s, and I can understand both how and why his actions would make you angry.
     
  12. Volst53

    Volst53 Super Moderator

    Processing is the issue.

    Being a small producer and having to go through a usda kill floor takes you out of the market.
     
  13. Tenacious D

    Tenacious D The law is of supreme importance, or no importance

    Another way to say this is:

    “America is only special when it comes to handing out cash.”

    Or

    “Americans placing their wants / needs above anyone else’s is always wrong.”

    Or

    “America is bad, and everything they do is bad. Because America.”

    Or

    “America has infinite amounts of money.”

    Or

    “America became and continues to be the richest and most powerful nation to ever exist by pure chance and happy accident, they don’t deserve it, and should simply be fair in surrendering it, so as to not make anyone, anywhere, or at any time feel bad in admitting the obviousness of those inarguable truths.”
     
  14. NorrisAlan

    NorrisAlan Founder of the Mike Honcho Fan Club

    When I read "America First in All Things", at first blush, it appears as "gimme mine, [uck fay] you". I know that is not how I should take it, but that is how it comes across to me.

    I prefer "Earth First in All Things" since it is the only one we have, and we are not getting another one any time soon. Call me a tree hugging hippy Utopian dreamer, I don't care, but I do think that my children's children are in for a world of hurt with the "Us (not US, but Us) first, them second".

    I agree that if a deal is unfair (and I don't see any trade deals as being completely unfair to the US, we just have an appetite for cheap goods and have most of the money, so of course we are going to have a trade deficit, just because of our spending habits) we should renegotiate. But Trump, as always, attacks every nail with a 10 pound sledge, no matter what it is or where it is.
     
    NashVol11 likes this.
  15. Tenacious D

    Tenacious D The law is of supreme importance, or no importance

    The United States is the single greatest safeguard for the promotion of peace and prosperity of this planet, and every living thing which inhabits it.

    Similarly, it’s being blunted or weakened by atrophy - no matter whether outwardly or self-inflicted - is its single greatest threat.
     
  16. Volst53

    Volst53 Super Moderator


    Besides the debt, they’re more likely to inherit a better world.

    There’s certainly some issues but I don’t think we’re trending in the wrong direction.
     
  17. VolDad

    VolDad Super Moderator

    1) What?

    2) Agree
     
  18. NorrisAlan

    NorrisAlan Founder of the Mike Honcho Fan Club

    Time for Alan's Poor Analogy Show:

    You have a basketball team, and you have a guy that scores 40 points a game, but the rest of the teams sucks nuts and scores less than 5 points a game each.

    So, you trade and draft until you have 4 other guys that are much better, and thus your primary guy no longer can score 40 points a game, but only scores 32 points a game, but the other four players score 20 points a game each.

    Which is the better scenario?

    Just because the US is falling back to the pack doesn't mean we are being weakened so much as the rest of the world is catching up to us. We cannot be the top dog forever, and while I think we should try as hard as we can to stay top dog, I don't want the only reason to be because we are stepping on anyone trying to get a better piece of the pie. A better off world all around is a better, more stable world.

    And I think Trump is simply throwing rocks at everyone, destabilizing things far more than I thought possible.

    I hope he is right and we get everything he wants, and I will happy to be wrong. But I don't think I am.
     
  19. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    You assume trump's tactics must be in the best interest of the us. They are not. He could be factually correct, but his behavior and tactics alone are detrimental.
     
  20. gcbvol

    gcbvol Fabulous Moderator

    100%. We need to get past this thinking it's okay for the US to do something while telling everyone else it's off limits. US trade position is a real concern with several countries; let's negotiate. The problem is Canada is not the trading partner to highlight. We have and still enjoy a trade surplus with them. We'd have a bit more credibility if we were engaging trade partners where we have large deficits, and doing so with measured diplomacy. Trump's behavior toward Canada is classic bullying. Canada is probably America's 'best friend' from a geographic perspective, yet we're trying to give them a wedgie when we already have their lunch money. Wildly misplaced and misplayed.
     

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