4 ms·

This seems to be the economic model conservative “populists” seem to hitching themselves to with the thrusting of these tariffs onto the American public

_heimdall 2y ago
That really raises the question of how we want to define "conservative" though. They aren't conserving what we already have (they're cresting new policy and abandoning trade partnerships already built). They also aren't supporting free trade. Maybe that isn't technically conservative, but its always been my understanding that free trade was a pretty big part of American conservatism (at least in recent decades).
- no_wizard 2y ago
  Free trade was core to both parties. Conservative is perhaps an overwrought term nowadays, but I also don’t like using the “left-right” terminology as it also suffers from lack of specificity. To which I conclude, this is apparently what the Republicans are offering up as their form of populist policy
  - _heimdall 2y ago
    Sure I'd agree there. I can get behind Republican/Democrat labels when people are trying to broad brush describe US politics. The left/right split doesn't make sense here (as you said). Liberal/conservative really doesn't fit either, the waters have gotten too muddied and many arguments I've seen made that should fit under a liberal banner get categorized as Libertarian or even Anarchist.
- csense 2y ago
  Tariffs aren't conserving the status quo. Rather, they're an attempt to return to an (allegedly) better past state. Specifically, a past state where foreign companies were unable to outcompete domestic ones [1]. It's also a policy going against internationalist norms (which encourage you to free trade even if it seems to be hurting you), and toward nationalist ones [2]. [1] A lot of people who like tariffs have a sense that our free trade policy was an honest attempt to play an honest game where a rising tide would lift all boats. But that didn't happen; instead of a win-win, foreign companies won big by cheating, and we lost. (And we did lose, at least if you ask just about anyone in the Rust Belt.) For example, tariffs of their own; subsidies; IP theft; currency manipulation; various abuses of their people with low wages; bad working conditions; low or non-existent safety / environmental standards; and totalitarian governments willing to shoot anybody who complains about any of the above. Trying to play fair to lift everybody's boats when everybody else is pouring water from their boat into yours isn't a recipe for success. It just makes you a sucker sunk by the cheaters -- too honest for your own good. [2] Again, there's a sense of grievance. Our past policies were honestly trying to unselfishly help the world, and other countries selfishly took advantage of us. So we're done being suckers; it's our turn to be selfish. If other countries don't like us being selfish now, well, they should have thought of that instead of being so selfish themselves before. Rightly or wrongly, that's really how the current administration thinks about many other countries. That attitude came out loud and clear in the Signal messages they accidentally sent to that journalist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHU5HDQL6F0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHU5HDQL6F0
  - no_wizard 2y ago
    I could get on board with tariffs on known bad actors like China, but they hit everyone needlessly. Europe has been a great partner, Mexico and Canada even more so The problem with any of these narratives is it burns decades of good relationships and allows our enemies, for lack of a better word, to fill any void that is left over. I’m sure China is trying to woo the EU right now as we speak, and I couldn’t blame the EU for not taking some of their possible proposals, as they now need to replace hundreds of billions of dollars of trade overnight Free trade with western/ US aligned countries actually works extremely well. China being the largest of the bad actors (but hardly the only one) is problematic, so I understanding targeting that, but not our historically close Allies
    - csense 2y ago
      I'm not really happy about this either, there's a strong case to be made for tariffs to be limited to enemies, rivals and economic cheaters. But on the other hand, the US's entire industrial base has fallen into complete ruin and needs to be rebuilt. Broad tariffs will help with that. I see both sides of the issue, and I'm not really sure which is right. But the political leadership has made its choice; now the rest of us are along for the ride. Personally I'm skeptical it will work out exactly as hoped, but I'm still decently optimistic it will put us in a better position than we had before. One good thing is that everyone's now on notice: Taking advantage or over-relying on the US now has consequences. It's no longer an all-benefit, no-risk strategy. Undoubtedly there will be short-term pain but that's the price of fixing the disastrous neoliberal trade policies that destroyed the Rust Belt.
      - wqaatwt 2y ago
        > It's no longer an all-benefit, no-risk strategy. Interesting when the US has benefited more from this system than almost anyone else. You have massive economic growth compared to almost all developed countries and (according to your words) don’t even have to work for it. Can hardly blame the rest of the world for US government/etc. failing to fairly distribute the value US is extracting from the global economy.
      - 2y ago

_heimdall 2y ago

That really raises the question of how we want to define "conservative" though. They aren't conserving what we already have (they're cresting new policy and abandoning trade partnerships already built). They also aren't supporting free trade. Maybe that isn't technically conservative, but its always been my understanding that free trade was a pretty big part of American conservatism (at least in recent decades).

no_wizard 2y ago
Free trade was core to both parties. Conservative is perhaps an overwrought term nowadays, but I also don’t like using the “left-right” terminology as it also suffers from lack of specificity. To which I conclude, this is apparently what the Republicans are offering up as their form of populist policy
- _heimdall 2y ago
  Sure I'd agree there. I can get behind Republican/Democrat labels when people are trying to broad brush describe US politics. The left/right split doesn't make sense here (as you said). Liberal/conservative really doesn't fit either, the waters have gotten too muddied and many arguments I've seen made that should fit under a liberal banner get categorized as Libertarian or even Anarchist.
csense 2y ago
Tariffs aren't conserving the status quo. Rather, they're an attempt to return to an (allegedly) better past state. Specifically, a past state where foreign companies were unable to outcompete domestic ones [1]. It's also a policy going against internationalist norms (which encourage you to free trade even if it seems to be hurting you), and toward nationalist ones [2]. [1] A lot of people who like tariffs have a sense that our free trade policy was an honest attempt to play an honest game where a rising tide would lift all boats. But that didn't happen; instead of a win-win, foreign companies won big by cheating, and we lost. (And we did lose, at least if you ask just about anyone in the Rust Belt.) For example, tariffs of their own; subsidies; IP theft; currency manipulation; various abuses of their people with low wages; bad working conditions; low or non-existent safety / environmental standards; and totalitarian governments willing to shoot anybody who complains about any of the above. Trying to play fair to lift everybody's boats when everybody else is pouring water from their boat into yours isn't a recipe for success. It just makes you a sucker sunk by the cheaters -- too honest for your own good. [2] Again, there's a sense of grievance. Our past policies were honestly trying to unselfishly help the world, and other countries selfishly took advantage of us. So we're done being suckers; it's our turn to be selfish. If other countries don't like us being selfish now, well, they should have thought of that instead of being so selfish themselves before. Rightly or wrongly, that's really how the current administration thinks about many other countries. That attitude came out loud and clear in the Signal messages they accidentally sent to that journalist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHU5HDQL6F0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHU5HDQL6F0
- no_wizard 2y ago
  I could get on board with tariffs on known bad actors like China, but they hit everyone needlessly. Europe has been a great partner, Mexico and Canada even more so The problem with any of these narratives is it burns decades of good relationships and allows our enemies, for lack of a better word, to fill any void that is left over. I’m sure China is trying to woo the EU right now as we speak, and I couldn’t blame the EU for not taking some of their possible proposals, as they now need to replace hundreds of billions of dollars of trade overnight Free trade with western/ US aligned countries actually works extremely well. China being the largest of the bad actors (but hardly the only one) is problematic, so I understanding targeting that, but not our historically close Allies
  - csense 2y ago
    I'm not really happy about this either, there's a strong case to be made for tariffs to be limited to enemies, rivals and economic cheaters. But on the other hand, the US's entire industrial base has fallen into complete ruin and needs to be rebuilt. Broad tariffs will help with that. I see both sides of the issue, and I'm not really sure which is right. But the political leadership has made its choice; now the rest of us are along for the ride. Personally I'm skeptical it will work out exactly as hoped, but I'm still decently optimistic it will put us in a better position than we had before. One good thing is that everyone's now on notice: Taking advantage or over-relying on the US now has consequences. It's no longer an all-benefit, no-risk strategy. Undoubtedly there will be short-term pain but that's the price of fixing the disastrous neoliberal trade policies that destroyed the Rust Belt.
    - wqaatwt 2y ago
      > It's no longer an all-benefit, no-risk strategy. Interesting when the US has benefited more from this system than almost anyone else. You have massive economic growth compared to almost all developed countries and (according to your words) don’t even have to work for it. Can hardly blame the rest of the world for US government/etc. failing to fairly distribute the value US is extracting from the global economy.
    - 2y ago