admittedly I was shocked china and usa even went to the table.
belter•3h ago
Here are my predictions, since it's only fun when we make them before time:
- This will not survive for more than 8 days, until the next unhinged
tweets from you know who.
- Scott Bessent will resign within the next 90 days.
- Massive insider trading, prior to this announcement, will be discovered by journalists worth their name.
- China realized that delay tactics would work in its favor.. The worst
the economic impact on the US the better deal they will get.
watwut•2h ago
No way Bessent will resign. He will be a praised genius hero regardless of results. Until someone manages to convince Trump that Bessent is not loyat. Then he will go, again, regardless of results.
belter•2h ago
He almost did it before but is trying to save his career. This initiative was probably an ultimatum on his part.
In the meantime, he defended Trump policies publicly. These leaks are just about Bessent, just like all the others, wanting to avoid public blame while also keeping the benefits of working for this particular government.
I'm surprised too. Given the bargaining positions, the question is what of ours did Trump give away to get China to agree. Or maybe long-term China is just happy to go back to things being calmer after Trump showed exactly how much they have us by the balls?
I thought this guy was prepared to just ride his bomb all the way down to the ground. In retrospect that was a bit foolish because he actually can't sit still, despite being such low energy in general (lol, another typical old person behavior pattern).
Is "the deal" entirely just market manipulation and flooding the zone with shit then? Or maybe Trump got more resistance than he planned to from the Fed, so now the goal is to try again in a few months? After he's figured out how to destroy that institution too, so he can mash the inflation button to paper over the markets again. (sheesh I would have never thought I'd be thankful for the Fed, strange times indeed)
aaronbaugher•49m ago
It's not that surprising if you understand that Trump has never been anti-trade. The goal of the tariffs has always been "balanced trade": getting other countries to renegotiate the imbalanced trade deals setup by previous administrations of both parties for the benefit of their friends who made bank on the imbalance.
Whether or not we agree that "balanced trade" is a good idea or his methods are a good way of getting it, that's been the stated goal from the start, contra the media hysteria. Other countries aren't stupid, so they know that, and while they're naturally reluctant to give up the sweet deals they've had with the US consumer market, they don't want to give up access to that market. That gives that market a lot of power in the discussion, power which simply hasn't been exercised before now because the people at the top liked the status quo.
mindslight•24m ago
"Balanced trade" is still just a term from the Trump fictional universe though, alongside other nonsense like needing physical goods making for a stronger bargaining position. Outside of the fictional universe "balanced trade" means very little, because it doesn't take into account services, imaginary property, or our special ability to trade away long-term IOUs in a currency that we can arbitrarily devalue when need be.
I do completely agree with the foundation of the argument that our privileged position as the world reserve currency has been used to hollow out our industrial base, put the screws to labor, and gut the distributed main street economy. But if you want to right the ship you have to get "up" correct first, and the Trump fictional universe definition of "up" is very obviously not correct.
Actually achieving this specious metric of "balanced trade" would mean basically destroying the economy we do have. So this administration claiming this as their metric of success means it's very hard to tell if/when they will/would abandon it to pull out of a death spiral.
palata•3h ago
Doesn't that mean that Trump lost his bet (again)?
watwut•2h ago
No, it means art of the deal worked as intended, all economy problems are due to Biden. Trump, Bessent, Vance, Navarro, they are still all strong geniuses who made China to back down.
Reality does not matter.
inverted_flag•2h ago
So still nothing substantial yet, just more chaos.
mensetmanusman•1h ago
The deflation in China has forced their hand. America has such a stronger hand here.
belter•19m ago
They both raised tariffs approximately the same on each other, and lowered by the same exact amount on each other. Nothing changed other than a promise there might be another meeting in the future.
incomingpain•3h ago
admittedly I was shocked china and usa even went to the table.
belter•3h ago
- This will not survive for more than 8 days, until the next unhinged tweets from you know who.
- Scott Bessent will resign within the next 90 days.
- Massive insider trading, prior to this announcement, will be discovered by journalists worth their name.
- China realized that delay tactics would work in its favor.. The worst the economic impact on the US the better deal they will get.
watwut•2h ago
belter•2h ago
From the 4 of April: "Top Trump Official So Freaked Out by Tariffs, He Wants to Quit" - https://newrepublic.com/post/193634/donald-trump-treasury-sc...
watwut•2h ago
Like, common.
belter•14m ago
mindslight•1h ago
I thought this guy was prepared to just ride his bomb all the way down to the ground. In retrospect that was a bit foolish because he actually can't sit still, despite being such low energy in general (lol, another typical old person behavior pattern).
Is "the deal" entirely just market manipulation and flooding the zone with shit then? Or maybe Trump got more resistance than he planned to from the Fed, so now the goal is to try again in a few months? After he's figured out how to destroy that institution too, so he can mash the inflation button to paper over the markets again. (sheesh I would have never thought I'd be thankful for the Fed, strange times indeed)
aaronbaugher•49m ago
Whether or not we agree that "balanced trade" is a good idea or his methods are a good way of getting it, that's been the stated goal from the start, contra the media hysteria. Other countries aren't stupid, so they know that, and while they're naturally reluctant to give up the sweet deals they've had with the US consumer market, they don't want to give up access to that market. That gives that market a lot of power in the discussion, power which simply hasn't been exercised before now because the people at the top liked the status quo.
mindslight•24m ago
I do completely agree with the foundation of the argument that our privileged position as the world reserve currency has been used to hollow out our industrial base, put the screws to labor, and gut the distributed main street economy. But if you want to right the ship you have to get "up" correct first, and the Trump fictional universe definition of "up" is very obviously not correct.
Actually achieving this specious metric of "balanced trade" would mean basically destroying the economy we do have. So this administration claiming this as their metric of success means it's very hard to tell if/when they will/would abandon it to pull out of a death spiral.