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Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump
« Last post by AATW on April 11, 2025, 09:09:55 PM »Why are you posting this?"The algorithm" spat it out this morning and I thought it was interesting.
All politicians lie of course, but Trump lies in an interesting way. Boris Johnson is similar in this regard. Him and Trump both lie like a young child does. My niece tells a story of a time she was baby-sitting for a friend, and one kid pushed another over right in front of her. My niece said "why did you do that?" and the kid said "didn't!". The kid obviously did it. She knew she'd done it. She knew my niece had seen her do it. And lied anyway. I find it bizarre when an adult does that sort of thing.
And the really interesting thing is Trump has managed to get this cult following who must at some level know he lies to them but somehow manage to convince themselves that he isn't. The term Orwellian is overused but I don't know what else to call it. It's literally the scene in 1984 when Winston sees 4 fingers held up but manages to convince himself he sees 5.
And here you are, right on cue, managing to convince yourself you see 5 fingers by pretending words don't mean what you know they mean. I like to think you're trolling and not actually that far gone, but I honestly can't tell.
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Had reasonable comprehension skills been applied to this one would see that the person being interviewed is saying that he approves of tariffs, and that tariffs are a good strategy. His disagreements are about the exact particulars of the tariffs. This opposes the narrative you guys have been arguing that America imposing tariffs on its trading partners is bad in general.Why are you lying? You know my posts are still there, right? You can just look at them. Like the one where I said:
The issue isn't that tariffs are bad, they're not good or bad - they're just a mechanism. The issue is very little analysis has gone into this, they've just used a blanket formula and used that to come up with some numbers. And Trump is doing it unilaterally without any of the checks and balances that should be in place in a functioning democracy.
The dude in the video calls what Trump has done a "terrible policy" and says it will do "real harm to Americans". He also explains what reciprocal tariffs actually are, and it isn't what Trump has announced despite him calling them that.
My issue isn't "tariffs bad". They aren't bad. But there's no strategy behind what Trump has done - well, there sort of is but it's based on a completely flawed premise that if country A is exporting more to the US than the US is exporting to country A then the country must be ripping you off somehow. That's far too simplistic when there are lots of countries and it's all so interconnected.
Another issue is that Trump is misusing emergency powers to set these tariffs without the checks and balances which should exist in a functioning democracy.
And every 5 minutes he changes his mind. First he announces the tariffs. Then there are rumours he's going to pause them, the White House say they're not looking at doing that and then 2 days later he pauses them. I saw an interview with a small business owner in the US saying she just doesn't know what to do right now because the policies keep changing. The market and businesses need stability and they're not getting it right now.
In brief: setting tariffs is complicated and should be done carefully and strategically. It cannot be reduced to an Excel formula.
