Tabby Wednesday
- Via the BBC: Trump poised to reshape global economy and how world does business. By the way, anyone who thinks of themselves as “conservative” and actually knows what the word means should be in opposition to such sweeping, poorly considered changes to the global economic order.
- Via The Atlantic: No Tariff Exemptions for American Farmers. Well, why should they? I hear that tariffs are great! Liberation Day is upon us.
When Trump started a trade war with China in 2018, China switched its soybean purchasing from the United States to Brazil. By 2023, Brazil was exporting twice as much as the United States. Trump compensated farmers with lavish cash payouts. The leading study of these effects suggests that soybean farmers may have received twice as much from the Trump farm bailout as they lost from the 2018 round of tariffs, because the Trump administration failed to consider that U.S. soybeans not exported to China were eventually sold elsewhere, albeit at lower prices. The richest farmers collected the greatest share of the windfall. The largest 10 percent of farms received an average of $85 an acre in payouts, according to a 2019 study by the economists Eric Belasco and Vincent Smith for the American Enterprise Institute. The median-size farm received only $56 an acre. Altogether, farmers have been amply compensated in advance for the harm about to be done to them by the man most farming communities voted for.
See, that there is pure market capitalism at work! It also proves that global markets don’t exist and that tariffs lead to greater domestic production, lower prices for American consumers, and more revenue for the federal government!
The winning is almost unbearable!
- Via The Athletic: ESPN’s Pat McAfee and others amplified a false rumor. A teenager’s life was ‘destroyed’. One of the things that struck me about this altogether terrible story is the “bro-yness” of it all, which includes a lot of irresponsible joking about serious topics, and which is steeped in a casual sexism that appeals to a broader social misogyny. It is also linked to a very online approach to information that is not good at filtering for truth. It is a story very much of our current era and therefore is disturbing on numerous levels.
- Via WaPo: Waltz and staff used Gmail for government communications, officials say
A senior Waltz aide used the commercial email service for highly technical conversations with colleagues at other government agencies involving sensitive military positions and powerful weapons systems relating to an ongoing conflict, according to emails reviewed by The Post. While the NSC official used his Gmail account, his interagency colleagues used government-issued accounts, headers from the email correspondence show.
But her…oh hell, you know the drill.
Former Costa Rican President and Nobel Prize winner Oscar Arias said on Tuesday that the U.S. had revoked his visa to enter the country, weeks after he criticized U.S. President Donald Trump on social media saying he was behaving like “a Roman emperor.”
Arias, 84, was president between 1986 and 1990 and again between 2006 and 2010. A self-declared pacifist, he won the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in brokering peace during the Central American conflicts of the 1980s.
[…]
In February, Arias had on social media accused the current government of President Rodrigo Chaves of giving in to U.S. pressure, as the U.S. has sought to oppose China’s influence in the region and deported migrants from third countries into Central America.
“It has never been easy for a small country to disagree with the U.S. government, and even less so, when its president behaves like a Roman emperor, telling the rest of the world what to do,” he said on social media in February.
Well, sure, can’t have some Nobel Peace Prize winner calling out the president for acting like a dictator! It just forces him to act like a dictator!
Imagine Waltz’s annoyance when his browser is suddenly full of pop up ads for random powerful weapons systems, especially after he has already bought one.
It’s fun watching Republicans who have long touted the virtues of free trade bend over backwards to avoid criticizing the orange god-emperor. They used to rationalize it by saying the tariffs were simply a tool for bending other countries to his will, and that he wasn’t really going to follow through on them (even though that argument rests on the idea that those other countries aren’t smart enough to know he’s bluffing, that Republicans have it figured out but those foreign leaders somehow haven’t–a game of chicken isn’t of much use if you know who’s going to swerve). The fact that they’re now falling back on the “short-term pain” argument is an implicit admission that they know he’s serious this time and that they’re willing to toss aside all the economic beliefs they once claimed to champion to fall in line.
I have not been a fan of the McAfee show. Part of his goal seems to be getting on guests to say “edgy” stuff just to create controversy. Making fun of people seems to be important. Finally, just dont care for the costuming ie the wife beater T shirts. I am sure his defense will be that it was just guys being guys but in reality the large majority of guys, adult guys, know you just dont spread unsupported rumors about teenagers. Hope this hurts his ratings but it probably helps. Hope she wins a lot fo money.
Steve
@steve:
Is McAfee “a big, sappy softy” as he claimed? I would argue that he’s a vile, miserable excuse for a “man” who shouldn’t be allowed around children. Personally, I’d vote for public horsewhipping and his insurer denying his claim on the lawsuit from the woman who he slandered.
I suspect my acquaintances in the Lifer’s Club would enjoy a conversation with him..