Tariffs Catch-All

  • Thread starter Thread starter BubbaOtis
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies: 4K
  • Views: 136K
  • Politics 
ChapelHillSooner said:
Trump is going about it in a stupid way but I will give him some credit in that we should have never allowed ourselves to be so reliant on China for these things.

The solution would be subsidies to build up US capacity for security purposes or at least create a reserve.

The dumbest move is what Trump is doing.
Click to expand...
Seems to me the better strategy would have been a Marshall Plan-like initiative in Africa, where these rare earth minerals are in abundance. We didn't do that, though (I can't imagine why), and we've now essentially ceded Africa to China via its Belt and Road Project. I don't blame Africa for jumping on China's capital, but it puts the entire continent in the hands of a modern day King Leopold, when we could have been working closely with them for our mutual benefit.
 
lawtig02 said:
Seems to me the better strategy would have been a Marshall Plan-like initiative in Africa, where these rare earth minerals are in abundance. We didn't do that, though (I can't imagine why), and we've now essentially ceded Africa to China via its Belt and Road Project. I don't blame Africa for jumping on China's capital, but it puts the entire continent in the hands of a modern day King Leopold, when we could have been working closely with them for our mutual benefit.
Click to expand...
That too but it is my understanding that we have plenty of them just not the mining and infrastructure to do so. There is also the environmental impact.
 
ChapelHillSooner said:
That too but it is my understanding that we have plenty of them just not the mining and infrastructure to do so. There is also the environmental impact.
Click to expand...
No, you're right, and I was too broad and sarcastic with my initial post. One of the reasons this whole China thing is overblown is because of how many rare earth minerals we get from Africa rather than China. My son is doing a project on this right now and it astonished me how reliant we are on Africa. But my takeaway from that was:

(1) How incredibly stupid it is (across multiple administrations) that we haven't launched a corollary to China's BAR initiative, but focused on economic and environmental justice;
(2) How even more incredibly stupid it is (under Trump II) that we're cutting USAID and such a huge percentage of our humanitarian aid to Africa at a time when China is wooing them more and more every day; and
(3) How even MORE incredibly stupid it is that Trump II would be revoking green cards from people like South Sudanese, which is almost certain to drive these highly vulnerable countries into China's sphere of influence.

Now, we don't get may rare earth minerals from South Sudan right now. But we get tons of them from Botswana, Mozambique, DRC, Burundi, Gabon. If it's South Sudan now, why would it not be those countries next? And who knows what underlying resources could bring South Sudan from a state of existential war and calamity into a modern nation? One of my great frustrations with Trump and MAGA is they can't seem to think more than two minutes into the future. Their worldview is 90% past, 9.9% present, and 0.1% future. And we're not operating in a vacuum. The Marshall Plan was insanely expensive, but there's no doubt whatsoever it was the best investment in the history of the modern geopolitical world. Why would we not learn from the good parts of history as well as the bad?
 
An even better solution would have been to use low-interest loans and subsidies to encourage US and foreogn companies to solvew raare earths and expand manuf in the US. As Biden was doing. Just expand those efforts and avoid the destrictive tariffs which were done mostly to subsidize a tax break for high net worth individuals and corps who would be fine with a 25% rather than 21% max tax rate.
 
nycfan said:
Although

Click to expand...

In other words he's too stupid to see that no one is kissing his ass and he needs to actually facilitate these conversations. Instead his fat ass plays gold while China is working. We can easily predict the end result here.
 
www.nbcnews.com

America's struggling wine industry is getting crushed by global tariffs and Canada's retaliation to them

Even if the tariffs were to be reversed tomorrow, one wine business leader said, it would take "at least a year, if not longer, for my industry to recover.”
www.nbcnews.com www.nbcnews.com


Ficeli also said Napa has become less affordable to visit in recent years. “A lot of us had to raise prices, because after Covid, pricing was insane, for especially getting glass,” she said.


Most wineries import bottles from China, she said, because U.S.-made bottles are substandard. The price of shipping them out of China also increased by “double or triple” the amount pre-Covid. “So most of us made price increases just to cover our cost increases,” she said.

But with Trump’s 145% tariffs on China having initiated a 125% tariff on products made in China coming into the United States, getting bottles from Asia has become cost-prohibitive. Throw in the 10% tariffs on European imports — under which American wineries buy French oak barrels to cultivate wine and bottle corks from Spain — and a financial quagmire has emerged.
 
discoveryalert.com.au

China’s Strategic Pivot from US to Canadian Oil Imports

Discover how China's pivot from US to Canadian oil imports reshapes global energy trade patterns and strengthens economic ties.
discoveryalert.com.au discoveryalert.com.au

The deterioration in US-China relations has fundamentally reshaped global oil trade flows. US crude exports to China plummeted from 450,000 bpd in 2022 to a mere 45,000 bpd by April 2025, representing a staggering 90% reduction as Beijing implemented its diversification strategy.

"The 2024 National Defense Authorization Act's port restrictions made US crude politically untenable," explains geopolitical strategist Li Wei, referring to congressional actions limiting Chinese vessels' access to certain US terminals.

Beyond pure politics, the shift reflects China's strategic calculation to reduce economic vulnerability. With tensions showing no signs of abating, Chinese refiners have accelerated their pivot to Canadian suppliers, viewing the northern route as more insulated from geopolitical investor strategies.

Canada's Expanded Export Capacity​

The timely completion of the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion has revolutionized Canada's export potential. The $21.4 billion infrastructure project added 590,000 bpd of capacity, enabling direct shipments to Asian markets without dependence on US Gulf Coast terminals.

The 980-kilometer pipeline network, incorporating 12 sophisticated pump stations, overcame formidable coastal mountain terrain to connect Alberta's landlocked resources with tidewater access at British Columbia's ports.

Cenovus CEO Alex Pourbaix underscored the economic transformation: "Our netback to Asia improved by $8.50 per barrel post-TMX, creating irreversible market momentum." This price advantage has catalyzed long-term supply agreements, including PetroChina's 10-year offtake contract with Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. (CNRL) for 100,000 bpd starting July 2024.
 
www.irishtimes.com

EU dismisses US demands on food standards and ties to China

EU standards, particularly in relation to food health and safety, will never be part of the negotiation, ‘not with the US or anyone else', European Commission says
www.irishtimes.com www.irishtimes.com

The European Union will not agree to sweeping changes to its food safety rules to suit American farmers and nor will the bloc agree to cut ties with China as the United States wants it to do, according to senior sources in Dublin and Brussels.

This suggests that agreement between the EU and US on trade, following the imposition of tariffs by Donald Trump, will be hard to reach.

The European Commission, which is the EU’s executive arm that sets trade policy, publicly repeated that the union’s high food safety standards are not on the table in any negotiations with the US.

“EU standards, particularly as they relate to food health and safety, are sacrosanct. That’s not part of the negotiation, it never will be, not with the US or anyone else,” a commission spokesman said on Tuesday.
 
www.independent.co.uk

Starmer told to accept Trump ‘free speech’ agenda to win trade deal

‘Good chance’ of agreement, says JD Vance – but a source close to the administration says his concerns over Britain’s hate speech laws ‘are still a red line’
www.independent.co.uk www.independent.co.uk

Sir Keir Starmer must embrace Donald Trump’s agenda by repealing hate speech laws in order to get a trade deal over the line, a Washington source has told The Independent.

The warning came after the US vice-president suggested a UK-US agreement may be close, with the White House “working very hard” on it.


He told UnHerd: “I think there’s a good chance that, yes, we’ll come to a great agreement that’s in the best interest of both countries.”

But a senior Washington figure, who has provided advice for the administration, claimed he is “obsessed by the fall of Western civilisation” – including his view that free speech is being eroded in Britain – and that he will demand the Labour government rolls back laws against hateful comments, including abuse targeting LGBT+ groups or other minorities, as a condition of any deal.
 
heelslegup said:
Trump thinks people from Japan and Francer are screwing US by not buying F-150 trucks to bnavigate narrow streets in Tokyo and Paris.
Click to expand...
I spent 13 years working for the North American joint venture of a German and a Japanese company, so we had plenty of expats working in various US locations including some backwater midwestern factory towns. Among the many things that puzzled them about the US (American football, food portion sizes, etc.) they never could understand why Americans would choose to drive a pickup truck as their primary vehicle.
 
altmin said:
www.independent.co.uk

Starmer told to accept Trump ‘free speech’ agenda to win trade deal

‘Good chance’ of agreement, says JD Vance – but a source close to the administration says his concerns over Britain’s hate speech laws ‘are still a red line’
www.independent.co.uk www.independent.co.uk

Sir Keir Starmer must embrace Donald Trump’s agenda by repealing hate speech laws in order to get a trade deal over the line, a Washington source has told The Independent.

The warning came after the US vice-president suggested a UK-US agreement may be close, with the White House “working very hard” on it.


He told UnHerd: “I think there’s a good chance that, yes, we’ll come to a great agreement that’s in the best interest of both countries.”

But a senior Washington figure, who has provided advice for the administration, claimed he is “obsessed by the fall of Western civilisation” – including his view that free speech is being eroded in Britain – and that he will demand the Labour government rolls back laws against hateful comments, including abuse targeting LGBT+ groups or other minorities, as a condition of any deal.
Click to expand...
Nothing says "this is a national emergency!!" like holding up a trade deal while asking another country to repeal laws completely unrelated to trade.

I hope these lawsuits against tariffs punch JD Vance right in the face.
 
The only way to describe President Trump's tariff policies is "rash, reckless incompetence." His fundamental misreading of the strenths of US vs China led to the rare earth fiasco and has placed the US in some stratgic danger for the timne being. If a Democratic President had shown this level of arrogant stupidity and endangered the US similarly, people would be dehmandiningis/her resignation.
 
The good new for US is that China will likely overplay its hand with Europe and Asia and blow the huge opportunity Trump's ineptness has given them
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top