Trump's Terrible, Popular Tariffs

Plus: A listener asks if it should become the norm for all news outlets to require journalists to disclose their voting records.

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Trump's Terrible, Popular Tariffs

In this week's The Reason Roundtable, editors Matt Welch, Katherine Mangu-Ward, Nick Gillespie, and Peter Suderman counter the twisted logic of former President Donald Trump's recent claim that he would raise tariffs on all Chinese imports if he were to retake the White House.

00:24—Trump proposes more tariffs

15:24—Bidenomics and the weird economy

30:49—Weekly Listener Question

44:22—Senate hearing on social media harms

52:41—This week's cultural recommendations

Mentioned in this podcast:

"Can Free Markets Win Votes in the New GOP?" by Stephanie Slade

"David Stockman on Why Trump Can't Fix the Debt: 'This Guy Is Part of the Swamp,'" by Nick Gillespie

"Josh Hawley Thinks the White House Can Force an Aluminum Plant To Stay Open," by Eric Boehm

"On Economic Issues, the Populist Right and Left Share a Lot of Common Ground," by Veronique de Rugy

"The Bankruptcy of Bidenomics," by Peter Suderman

"Biden Considering Higher Tariffs on E.V.s Imported from China, Raising Prices for Americans," by Joe Lancaster

"Protectionism Ruined U.S. Steel," by Eric Boehm

"Americans Unhappy With Politicians They'll Soon Vote Back Into Office," by J.D. Tuccille

"How Will Reason Staffers Vote in 2020?" by Reason staff

"Who's Getting Your Vote?: Reason's Revealing Presidential Poll," by Reason staff

"Why Are Political Journalists More Scared of Revealing Their Votes Than Baseball Writers?" by Matt Welch

"Why Aren't Other Journalism Outlets Disclosing Their Presidential Votes?" by Matt Welch

"Show Us Your Vote!" by Matt Welch

"Mark Zuckerberg Is Not a Murderer, Mr. Senator," by Robby Soave

"Mark Zuckerberg Is Calling for Regulation of Social Media To Lock in Facebook's Position," by Nick Gillespie

"Is True Detective the Most Libertarian Show on TV?" by Nick Gillespie

"Enthusiasm, Curbed," by Nick Gillespie

"All Culture, All the Time," by Nick Gillespie

Send your questions to [e-mail]. Be sure to include your social media handle and the correct pronunciation of your name.

Today's sponsors:

• The world would be a better, freer, and happier place if constitutional protections for private property were taken just a tad more seriously. That's according to our friends over at the Institute for Justice, who have just begun releasing a new season of their legal history podcast, Bound By Oath. Bound By Oath tells the story of how the Supreme Court has cleared the way for government officials to abuse property rights: to trespass on private land without a warrant, to restrict peaceful and productive uses of property, to seize and keep property without sufficient justification, and much more. Featuring interviews not only with scholars and litigators but also with the real-life people behind some of the Supreme Court's most momentous property rights decisions, the new season explores the history behind today's civil rights battles. So plug Bound By Oath into wherever you get your podcasts, and start with Episode 1.

Audio production by Ian Keyser; assistant production by Hunt Beaty.

Music: "Angeline," by The Brothers Steve

What are we consuming this week?

Katherine Mangu-Ward

• Brewster's Millions

Peter Suderman

• Argylle

Nick Gillespie

• True Detective: Night Country
• Curb Your Enthusiasm, Season 12

Matt Welch

• Tracy Chapman & Luke Combs sing "Fast Car" at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards

---

Comments

[Fats of Fury]

A listener asks if it should become the norm for all news outlets to require journalists to disclose their voting records.

Why? They can easily lie about that too.

[SQRLSY One]

I've voted for Trump in ALL of the last 5,239 erections!!!

NOW will all the sore-in-the-cunt cunt-sore-va-turds listen to a DAMNED thing that I have to say?!?!

[Mother's Lament]

Shillsy votes a straight (D) ticket all the way down. It's his tribe you see.

[SQRLSY One]

Shot in the shoulder,
And you’re to blame!
You give revolt,
A BAD name!

I shouted out,
“Who killed Saint Babbitt”?
When after all,
It was YOU and ME!
I rode a tank,
Held a Trumpist’s rank,
When the Shits-Krieg raged,
And the bodies stank!

What’s my name?
Who’s on first?
And if I swallow anything evil,
Put your finger down my throat!

[InsaneTrollLogic]

Whatever, Shitsey.

[SQRLSY One]

Great article, Mike. I appreciate your work, I'm now willing to pay you $5/word to NOT put up your empty-headed comments!

[Fats of Fury]

So you're a journalist too? I hear there's an opening at "The Hihn Report".

[VULGAR MADMAN]

It’s going to be such a treat to observe these losers on Election Day.

I wonder if any of them will end it all?

[Don't look at me!]

Reluctantly.

[VULGAR MADMAN]

Pity Doctor Kevorkian isn’t around to help them.

[Minadin]

They've got a whole other reason to move to Canada this time.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Free suicide?

[VULGAR MADMAN]

Yay!

[Don't look at me!]

A listener asks if it should become the norm for all news outlets to require journalists to disclose their voting records.

We all know the answer anyway.

[CE]

Just start all your questions with, "I assume you're a Democrat, so what do you think about X....."

[Diane Reynolds (Paul. they/them)]

More like, "I assume you're a Democrat, now let me confirm that by looking at your Twitter feed."

[CE]

I'm not a fan of high tariffs (a tax on imports Americans buy), but apparently a lot of voters are.

I'm also not a fan of government overspending by two trillion dollars per year, but voters never get rid of the people doing it.

[Minadin]

NBC reporter shocked that Trump is polling so well compared to Biden:

"The economy is so striking because jobs are up, inflation is down. Voters aren't giving [Biden] credit for that."

https://news.yahoo.com/wow-nbcs-kristen-welker-shocked-080308522.html

[Diane Reynolds (Paul. they/them)]

Plus: A listener asks if it should become the norm for all news outlets to require journalists to disclose their voting records.

Really? This is the most interesting question we can muster from the grab-bag?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul. they/them)]

"Protectionism Ruined U.S. Steel," by Eric Boehm

Hopefully the economic analysis in this article is better than his Baltimore would be a clean, efficient, un-corrupt functioning metropolis if it weren't for the Jones Act.

[JesseAz]

Narrator: it was not.

Bumper sticker analytics. And I don't like the steel tariffs. But Eric writes like a freshman econ major destined to become a marketing major.

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

Boehm is a moron. Or is at least paid by Koch to write like one.

Probably both.

[VULGAR MADMAN]

Maybe he thinks he can get a berth in some billionaire’s bunker.

Possibly as sexual entertainment.

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

He should start practice greasing up to fit into his gimp suit.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Hmm. We spend about $17 trillion a year in consumer purchases. If we had a 10% national sales tax-VAT-tariff package we could actually balance the federal budget. Of course the bastards would still spend more and borrow. (And we would all get a 10% pay cut.)

[JesseAz]

Got a 10% pay cut under Bidens unchecked spending/inflation already.

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

So me democrats voted for this. They should be subject to paying reparations. And by reparations, I mean when we run short we just take what we want off of them as we find them.

This is consistent with policies democrats support.

[Fats of Fury]

I got a 10% national sales tax thanks to the so called conservative court. And Illinois is nowhere near balancing it's budget.

[Fats of Fury]

Reason wont be happy until every blue collar job is moved to China and everyone south of the border migrates here. Oh and weed.

[Don't look at me!]

You forgot the asssex.

[Vernon Depner]

Asssexual? I thought you said asexual!

[minnix]

Are you in favor of tariffs?

[Social Justice is neither]

Leftist writers of Reason are apparently too stupid to differentiate between offensive actions and defensive ones.

[Fats of Fury]

Long Live the King

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13048043/Charles-health-history-Kings-cancer-diagnosis-comes-prostate-operation-years-health-issues-chronic-neck-pain-broken-rib-sausage-fingers.html

Oops. maybe the next one.

[shadydave]

Tariffs are stupid, but of course they are a reaction the fact that places like China pay a fraction of the regulatory costs we impose on American businesses, gleefully ignore American intellectual property laws, have political reasons to sell certain products at a loss in order to make other countries reliant on it during shortages, and of course sometimes utilize what can best be described as "slave labor."

Some of those things we can't do anything about, and some we can but don't (like regulations and completely abandoning entire industries instead of at least making sure we have the ability to produce it domestically). But pretending like the idea of these tariffs is some sort of unprovoked protectionism is laughable.

[minnix]

Provoked or not, tariffs are taxes on the people. I can't say I'd ever be in favor of more taxes.

[TJJ2000]

Indeed. Any Tariff (tax) raising should either pay off debt or cut domestic taxes.

Signalling the tariff implementation difference between Biden and Trump. One did do domestic tax-cuts; the other doesn’t even speak of it.

[shadydave]

Neither am I. The problem is the current situation begs a response, and the available choices on offer from the two sides are 'tariffs' and 'the status quo.' If we, correctly, are against the former, well then what the hell are we gonna do to change the latter?

I see no good reason to offshore any industry 100%, when offshoring 95% achieves almost the same outcome in terms of price, supply and demand, but helps retain our ability to produce those goods should offshore supply issues arise.

[TJJ2000]

^THIS^ and it's amazing to hear on the podcast the writers totally acknowledge every part of this but their pure premise-bigotry keeps them from getting off the "free trade" bandwagon.

[LIBertrans]

Communist manifesto income taxes are stupid. They were foisted on voters as replacement for protective and sumptuary tariff exactions. China outsourced food production to the USA. Then after we helped Europe force tariffs onto them, used boycotts to get U.S. politicians to churn out international drug prohibition conventions, treaties and laws and start policing the world at gunpoint into more wars. Before Herbert Hoover did that to Germany in 1931, nobody had heard of Hitler. Two years later he ran the country thanks to U.S. Prohibitionism.

[Fats of Fury]

Biden tells crowd he recently met with Mitterand, former French president who died in 1996

https://www.foxnews.com/video/6346312827112

Maybe they'll meet again soon.

[Vernon Depner]

And he repeats the lie that cops were killed on Jan. 6.

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

I hope so. Perhaps a Hunter will OD and join them.

[InsaneTrollLogic]

That had to be one hell of a seance.

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[Diane Reynolds (Paul. they/them)]

Doing an evening check of my newspaper's main web page:

Trump articles:

The 91-year-old Republican suing to kick Donald Trump off the ballot 1 hour ago

How two sentences in the Constitution rose from obscurity to ensnare Donald Trump VIEW

Far-right Israel official suggests Trump would give more US support to offensive in Gaza

Biden:

Court weighs whether to let Biden approval of Alaska oil project stand

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

So much objective ‘journalism’. Are those form the Seattle PI?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul. they/them)]

Seattle PI (as cool as its old building was) is barely a functioning newspaper... I'm not even sure what its status is. There's still a website with stuff on it. But no, Times.

[Its_Not_Inevitable]

We need these "journalists" to disclose who they voted for. It's a mystery wrapped in an enigma.

[LIBertrans]

I proudly admit I voted Libertarian for four decades. Would've been five but the existence of the LP was a secret. I remember one LP commercial showing young people with toy balloons. It said nothing abt platform demands to repeal laws banning mostly harmless drugs and birth control, or ending draft laws that sent kids to be shot in Asia before getting a chance to vote. Nobody could use the word "pregnant" on teevee. Nixon emerged as the nexus of a violent criminal gang protected by impunity. College profs pretended there was no LP.

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

It’s 2024, they’re now the Biden tariffs.

[TJJ2000]

Ironically the biggest curse of the Tariffs is they should've never become the 'Presidents' tariffs to begin with.

Thanks to the Anti-USA Democratic-Trifecta.

The Reciprocal Trade Agreement Act of 1934 gave President Franklin D. Roosevelt Executive authority to levy tariffs and negotiate bilateral trade agreements without the approval of Congress.

Seems every violation of the US Constitution comes from Democrat-Roots.

[sarcasmic]

"Every tariff's sacred
Every tariff's great
If a tariff's wasted
Trump gets quite irate"

[TJJ2000]

Every domestic tax-cut sacred
Every domestic tax-cut great
If domestic tax-cut is implemented
Biden & Democrats get quite irate.

Ironically; Yours applies to both Biden & Trump whereas that one doesn't.

[sarcasmic]

Cutting taxes without cutting spending results in deficits, which is partly why $8,000,000,000,000 was added to the debt during Trump's reign.

[TJJ2000]

I agree ... you're pretty stupid to be lobbying for cutting tariffs instead of cutting spending...

[sarcasmic]

If the tariffs were for revenue I might agree. But they're not. Their purpose is to influence consumer behavior by increasing the price of imports. Leftists like to do this, they call it social engineering. Why do you defend leftist practices?

[TJJ2000]

What’s funny is you think domestic tax isn’t all about social engineering when most of it is wealth distribution.

More likely though is you just don’t care because you either want ZERO-tax for Imported goods while domestic has to carry on with the consequences of leftist practices or your clinging onto pointers for your TDS (I'd guess this one since you didn't seem to point even a speckle of blame at Biden increasing them and tried to call out Trump specifically).

[sarcasmic]

What's funny is that you think you know what I think, then proceed to argue against it.

[TJJ2000]

What’s funny is you think playing dumb about your own-point that the incentive is somehow suppose to make a difference in revenue collection actually made a point.

[sarcasmic]

Why do you say tax cuts are good, but defend using taxes to increase prices for things that poor people buy?

[TJJ2000]

LOL….. The ‘poor’ people?? The leftist calling-to-arms (gov-guns) whistle in practice.

Tax cuts are good. They just aren’t good when focused on one specific goods-channel getting ZERO-Tax and Domestic having to pickup the tab in full for a government who’s entire purpose is National Security concerning foreign markets/governments.

You’re not in favor of tax-cuts. You’re in favor of *special* favors for foreign nations at the expense of Domestic having to pick up their international governed-trade costs.

[sarcasmic]

I don't understand what that means.

[Uilleam]

You are an idiot who knows nothing about economics. That is not even remotely true you lying weasel.

[Sevo]

And if we (reluctantly) elected some doddering fool, he's immediately end them right?
When do they become "Joe's tarriffs", you steaming piles of TDS-addled shit?

[LIBertrans]

On tariffs, a 10% revenue tariff was before 1860 considered OK by Dems but denounced as (ugh) "Free Trade". Dems later promised that the Marxist income tax would obviate and replace protective tariffs. So the question is: Why not delete pages of income looting (which pits goons against your home) and replace some lost revenue with tariffs--a harm reduction tradeoff that transfers coercion to corporations. Would it be wise to outsource production of nuclear weapons and aircraft to China to please Katherine?

[VULGAR MADMAN]

Trump is polling better than in 2016.
At a certain point, stealing just isn’t possible anymore.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Are you going to kill yourself if he does?

[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

If Trump wins, you should kill yourself. Best thing for you really. Your comments are going nowhere.

[tracerv]

I just keep thinking about that Time article about the fix. Worries me.

[Mother's Lament]

Sure it is.
At some point they'll admit it and say "So fucking what, we're saving Democracy from Hitler v5.0. You can have your little elections back when you stop voting anti-establishment".
And it won't be just the Democrats participating. The McConnells, the Romneys, the Kristols and the Kochs, the Bushes, the Rubios, Lindsey Graham, Paul Ryan, the whole National Review crowd, ad nauseam. They'd all rather publicly disenfranchise the American voter than lose their racket.

[VULGAR MADMAN]

Be not afraid, because the DNC sure is.

[VULGAR MADMAN]

It would definitely help the environment.

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[Elmer Fudd the CHUD 2: Steampunk Boogaloo]

Hi Sarc. You just outed yourself with that one. I know you’re angry that I constantly call you a pussy. Since you didn’t have the guts to back up your drunken threat to kick my ass, and then spent months hiding from me.

Now you’re using this sock to call me a pussy. Except I’m not. So why don’t you nut up and come kick my ass?

We both know you won’t, right pussy? So fuck off back to your garbage can in your piss soaked alley. Or better yet, kill yourself.

[Uilleam]

And you're a drunk who has pickled his brain.

[Uilleam]

Stay where you are. We already have enough entitled little shitheads moving here as is.