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The fact we still have to explain what a tariff is because the president of the United States keeps lying about what a tariff is (and nobody in his circle bothe
by tw04 2y ago
The fact we still have to explain what a tariff is because the president of the United States keeps lying about what a tariff is (and nobody in his circle bothers to call out his lies) pretty much summarizes the current state of the country.
- belter 2y ago[flagged]
- ceejayoz 2y agoAnd Nikola’s fraudster CEO. https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5219507-nikola-founder-says-he-was-pardoned-by-trump/amp/ https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5219507-nikola-founder...
- moshegramovsky 2y agoHow does this help bring down prices?
- bearcobra 2y agoSave a ton on the legal department if you don’t have to worry about being convicted of fraud /s
- moshegramovsky 2y agoI see :)
- perihelions 2y agoSupply & demand. More automotive CEO's => more supply => lower prices Federal criminal justice is basically a stealth tax
- moshegramovsky 2y agoRight! Thank you for clarifying :)
- dylan604 2y agoIt has nothing to do with price manipulation
- tobias3 2y agoMore scams means more supply of meme stocks which is good for the economy
- moshegramovsky 2y agoOh of course! Thank you for pointing that out :)
- nikcub 2y agoand the BitMEX founders: https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/28/trump-pardon-bitmex-crypto-exchange-money-laundering.html https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/28/trump-pardon-bitmex-crypto-e...
- belter 2y agoCorruption All the Way Down
- mptest 2y agoWhile freeing fraudsters, they're also black bagging PhD students for checks notes speaking ill of a foreign nation. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/03/donald-trump-new https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/03/donald-trump-new... It's busy work, this eroding civil liberties stuff. Nikola's convicted ceo is defended by the current AG's relative btw, and even less surprisingly, donated over a million to trumps campaign. Oh yeah and measles is back and we're not doing the flu vaccine next year. We're totally a serious country, not a rapidly waning oligarchy.
- pessimizer 2y agoVile, but that sounds like a favor for L.P. Jobs/The Atlantic, who were Ozy's biggest backers. I have no idea why else he would be commuting the head of a would-be anti-Trump center-left media empire. Just an affinity for financial scammers?
- andreygrehov 2y ago[flagged]
- ceejayoz 2y ago> “I think our tariffs are very good for us. We’re taking in tens of billions of dollars. China is paying for it.” We pay for it. https://apnews.com/article/ba54214acc644729947c98f4539afc05 https://apnews.com/article/ba54214acc644729947c98f4539afc05
- genter 2y agoIs it technically lying if he's too dumb to actually know anything and just spews whatever bullshit comes to mind?
- dailykoder 2y agoI wouldn't imply that he's too dumb. He just wants to sell it and make the actual dumb people believe that he is doing good for them.
- magicalhippo 2y agoThis quote from your source is even more direct: TRUMP: “The tariffs have cost nothing, in my opinion. ...And we’re not paying for the tariffs; China is paying for the tariffs, for the one-hundredth time.” — remarks on Aug. 18 to reporters in Morristown, New Jersey.
- spacechild1 2y agoWow, that's pure gaslighting. Shockingly, it seems to work. This guy still has an approval rating of 47% at the moment! Seriously, what's going on with this country?
- moshegramovsky 2y agoYou should read The Authoritarians. I can give you link if you want. But in a nutshell, a lot of people who have authoritarian tendencies believe that law and justice flow out of the leader. The leader is, therefore, literally above the law (since it emanates from him).
- bamboozled 2y ago[flagged]
- UncleOxidant 2y agoIt really depends on where you are on reddit. On r/news and r/technology tariffs are roundly criticized.
- enaaem 2y ago- He doesn't mean it - It's a negotiation tactic - I don't know what tariffs are
- gruez 2y agoWhat subreddit is this? All the posts you see on /r/all are consistently anti-Trump, tariff policy included.
- bamboozled 2y agoCheckout /askconvervative, since Trump has been elected it's a pretty interesting place to lurk. What I find really interesting is how many "conservatives" seem to think that it's fine if the rest of the world has a low opinion / doesn't want to buy American made products anymore. Like it's amazing to me that people think America becoming a nothing from a something is good. I'm not 100% sure how much of the views on there represent actual "conservatives" but it's just a fun yet frustrating sub to browse. Ultimately it will lead to more of the "we're hard done by attitude" that seems to have some popularity and eventually maybe lead to conflict depending on how bad the economy gets.
- donkeybeer 2y agor/flairedusersonly , the great bastion of freedom of speech, of course feels it "scary" to even allow anyone posting who hasn't been safely found to be part of the Inner circle. And even downvotes or the slightest disagreement from cultists already in the circle disagreeing must be "infiltrators".
- 2y ago
- enaaem 2y agoAs a former libertarian I used to argue against leftist why tariffs are bad. Funny how things have turned around.
- defrost 2y agoTariffs are an instrument in a trade flow process that can be used in many ways that can be contextually good or bad. The deal with these tariffs is the flip flopping, the high rates, the probable corrupt behind doors and under the table deals on where they are applied and where they aren't, etc. This might be of interest: Why Trump’s tariffs are better than you think — and much worse subscribe! https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/03/06/donald-trump-tariffs-impact-global-economy/ https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/03/06/donald-trump-tariffs-im... or read now, maybe subscribe later: https://archive.md/H46RG https://archive.md/H46RG From an outside PoV a disturbing fact of the Trump tariffs is they were put in force by executive order (OK), they were appealed for review (OK), there's a law that requires that appeal for review to be heard within a specific short time frame (OK) ... and recently the US Republicans passed a rider that offically " Stops Time " wrt to the passage of days to review Trump's tariffs ... ~ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43358343 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43358343 That's a bit weird, surely?
- dralley 2y agoMAGA is Maoism. They low-key despise most good things about Western civilisation: freedom of thought, rule of law, presumption of innocence, trial by peers - they want goon squads and struggle sessions against political enemies. They think the sayings of Dear Leader, and the knowledge that you're part of the Revolution are superior to affordability and availability of goods. They prioritize commodities, resource extraction and the nobility of working in agriculture over scientific research and advanced manufacturing.
- stanleykm 2y agoMAGA is not Maoism. Stop.
- 2y ago
- tgsovlerkhgsel 2y agoIt was a surprise to me that the article claims that tariffs are only on imports. I understand that usually tariffs are imposed on imports, but aren't there also cases where export is hit by a tariff, e.g. to discourage export to improve local availability or to hit a specific country with higher costs.
- mitthrowaway2 2y agoIsn't that generally called an export tax, not a tariff?
- ortusdux 2y agoShould we start calling tariffs 'import taxes'?
- daotoad 2y agoProbably. It would have made it a lot harder to sell to voters.
- dijit 2y agoYeah, that's probably smarter. Normally we presume having a proper word for a thing is more descriptive, but in this case because people aren't used to the idea: maybe being more verbose is the answer.
- addicted 2y agoLots of countries do call them import taxes, or import duties, or just duties. That’s where the term “duty free” that you see in airports comes from. But I guess until a certain influential individual started lying about tariffs, this wasn’t really necessary because no one was really confused about who paid the tariffs, because the people who knew about them clearly knew it was the importers paid for them and the people who didn’t understand how they worked had no reason to be confused because everyone who did would clearly explain that importers paid them.
- vasco 2y ago
- spacechild1 2y ago> (and nobody in his circle bothers to call out his lies) Not only that, they double down! There is this press conference with Karoline Leavitt where she claims that tarriffs are a "tax hike on foreign countries" and the reporter tries to explain to her that tarriffs are paid by the importer. She then acts insulted that he would dare to "test her economic knowledge". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYj9yyo8Tk0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYj9yyo8Tk0 I mean, these people apparently have a university degree. I don't believe they don't know what a tarriff is. But how can you be comfortable saying such stupid shit in front of a world audience?
- moshegramovsky 2y agoI find it pretty amazing that so many people are calling Karoline Leavitt a liar. She is the press secretary for the president of the United States. However, it's possible that mistakes have been made inadvertently. The stock market is down 5 trillion dollars, and the president must be very busy using his business prowess to deal with the situation (just like he did when he turned his casinos around).
- anal_reactor 2y ago> I mean, these people apparently have a university degree. I don't believe they don't know what a tarriff is. But how can you be comfortable saying such stupid shit in front of a world audience? It's simple. The way democracy works is that if you get 51% of votes (or something like that), you have absolute power. This means that the most effective strategy to "win" is to find some social group that happens to be 51% of the whole society, and focus on them. Actually, you don't need that. You need 51% of votes, not nation-wide support, so if your social group happens to vote more actively than the rest, you can win the election despite having minority support. Or you can use quirks of the voting system (gerrymandering, electoral college, etc.) to your advantage. And guess what social group is at least 51% of the whole society, easy to control, and won't mind you wrecking the country? Stupid and poor people combined. Stupid people are the majority and can be easily manipulated. Poor people can't lose anything, so they're willing to vote for any change whatsoever. By convincing the majority of stupid and poor people to vote for you, which is easy as long as you forgo your personal honor, you're pretty much guaranteed to win. The bottom line is, when a politician says something that isn't logical, it's not because they're uneducated, it's because their target audience isn't expecting logical arguments, but rather emotional ones. They're not addressing an intelligent conversation partner, they're addressing an elderly with dementia. There are seven million boomers with Alzheimer's in the US. And 1,5 million college teachers. It makes zero sense to focus on the latter group, if the former group is four times larger. That's an extreme example, but it illustrates the point. Source: this is how the "gays spread ADHD and 5G" party won election in my country. The good news is that after eight years they lost the majority in the parliament, but they still remain a monument to the monumental collective stupidity of my nation.
- downrightmike 2y agoThe president wears no clothes
- moshegramovsky 2y agoBiden had six or seven bankruptcies when he was a senator and people didn't say he had no clothes on. I think we can give the current president a little grace. EDITED: Trump had six or seven bankruptcies, not Biden.
- ceejayoz 2y agoDo you have a cite for this claim?
- moshegramovsky 2y agoSorry, I just looked and it's Trump who had six or seven bankruptcies. It seems like a lot of people are saying that Trump is a very chaotic and incompetent person who doesn't know how to manage money. Trump's leadership has already caused the stock market to lose five trillion dollars in value since the start of his term. Biden doesn't have any bankruptcies or personal scandals. Biden didn't pay off an adult film start before the 2016 election. That was Trump too. And Biden wasn't convicted of 34 felonies either. That was also Trump. It's weird because Trump promised to bring down prices on day 1, but I it sure doesn't look like he knows what he's doing. Or maybe Trump is a liar and a demagogue. Please take the 'demagogue' bit with a grain of salt, I hate to even seem inflammatory.
- downrightmike 2y agoGotta stop taking those red pills
- dekhn 2y agoI can't find any source that says this. It's hard to check for sure because there are lots of articles about the student loan bailout. But I was unable to find even a single source saying this.
- pessimizer 2y ago[flagged]
- mulmen 2y agoI think “they will pay the tariffs” is an incorrect explanation of tariffs in the sense that it’s exactly the opposite of how tariffs work. We have always had tariffs. Who is making the argument they are always bad?
- Freedom2 2y agoEver? In 2019: "Because of that, you’re not paying for those tariffs. China’s paying for those tariffs,” the president said, hours after announcing the new set of tariffs on Chinese goods. “Until such time as there is a deal, we will be taxing the hell out of China.”" - https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-slaps-10-percent-tariff-300b-more-chinese-goods-n1038311 https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-slaps-10-perc... In 2024 - "I am going to put tariffs on other countries coming into our country, and that has nothing to do with taxes to us. That is a tax on another country." - https://x.com/acyn/status/1827139464906600538 https://x.com/acyn/status/1827139464906600538
- 99_00 2y agoA single anecdote does not summarize the current state of the country. Assuming that something as complex as the state of a country can be summarized in any rational way.