Apologies to Larry David--while this episode's ultimate final scene will be the epic humiliation of the main character, it will be a prolonged one.
While we can draw hope, and maybe inspiration, from recent successes in the efforts to prevent complete global disintegration and subjugation, we should not get ahead of ourselves. If we were keeping score, we would still be trailing, but at least we are on the board.
TarifFail
The tariff plan announced by the US' King D------d I the other day exhibits the three I's typical of Drumpfenreich 2.0: Ignorance, Incompetence, and Incoherence. The main problem is that, at a deep level, Trump believes that a trade deficit--the value of goods and services imported being greater than those exported--weakens the country, weakens our currency, and is clear evidence the other side is cheating on trade. The first two notions are false, and the third only true in certain cases. There are some countries, India being one, that use protectionist trade barriers to prevent imports and maintain its currency artificially high, but those measures weaken the countries' foreign investment and economic development instead of enhancing it. Beyond that, some countries subsidize certain domestic industries excessively, and those industries might be justifiable targets for tariffs of our own.
None of that seems to have been in the thinking of what is actually being imposed--just a shot across the bow of any country that trades with us, which will generate retaliation, either across the board, as we have done, or targeted specifically to hurt Trump-favored industries and regions. If these tariffs linger for long, they will be a recipe for stagflation, as jobs related to exports will be lost, consumers will pay more for everything, and accompanying that will be depreciation in the relative value of our currency--perhaps even the end of the US dollar being the preferred reserve currency, which would be a tragic loss of influence for us globally.
I suspect they will not linger. Our government's trade people say these blanket tariffs are not a starting point for country-by-country negotiation. I don't believe that for a moment, as Trump will want to play bully-boy and offer tariff concessions to those who give him goodies. Moreover, as the pain begins to deepen, he will be convinced that he needs to back off or lose political leverage as the midterms approach. Personally, I hope this is true, although the US public should get a taste of what his ignorance is producing before it ends, and then punishes his party appropriately anyway. Perception will drive reality.
Booker Rides, High and Dry
Trump believes, or seems to believe, that these tariffs are going to provide so much revenue that he can get the tax cuts he promised in his campaign, for things like tips and Social Security income. This is a delusion, but I suspect he will get the extension of the regressive tax cuts he was able to pass during his first term, enabled by compliant Congressional action on a budget resolution, followed by a budget reconciliation bill with phony projections, a very real and very large debt limit increase, and a host of damaging spending adjustments.
In this regard, Cory Booker's marathon speech of over 24 hours, facilitated by days of fasting and abstaining from liquids, is laudable but irrelevant to the bigger picture. It does show that Democratic representatives can, in extreme cases, use their words to capture the attention of the public for a short while. Going forward, I am looking for targeted attacks on specific individuals and policies, not so much overcoming strategic obstacles, though the Senate filibuster rules should prevent most harmful legislation from going forward. I suppose it will be beneficial for Booker's political status in the party, though I don't see it propelling him into a new national campaign. A moral victory is what he can provide for us.
Off-year Elections as a Side Gambit
D------d I proclaimed the other day through an executive order that voters must provide proof of citizenship, and that votes must be counted the same day, and some other nonsense, I guess. None of that will pass muster, as the constitution provides that the states run the elections, the Federal government just providing the dates of them and some of the other implementation of their results. He did come up with the threat of withholding all funding from those states that don't follow it, something I suggested might be possible to enforce some reforms, even that of the national Voter ID, which I support in the interest of ending, once and for all, disputes about who can vote--as long as the ID is issued, free of charge, to all citizens and has smart technology to support voters' maintaining their registration when they change residence. As for the rest of it, forget it.
The special elections in Wisconsin and Florida were a good indication of two things: some slippage in Trumpian support, but also the different electorate in off-year elections. Hard to be sure exactly how to parse the two effects separately at this point. There will be more of them this year, in Arizona for the replacement to the death of Democratic Rep. Raul Grijalva, and likely for the upstate New York district of Elaine Stefanik. Her nomination for the UN Ambassadorship was withdrawn when there was concern in White House circles that the Democrats would take one of the Florida seats and reduce further the narrow Republican majority, but that didn't happen. They will still probably put her up for a job, one they will consider important. Not the UN one, which they don't rate so highly--though it would be a tragic miscalculation to pull out of the UN as some idiots have suggested. See in the organization's history how the US got the UN to authorize forces in the Korean War when the Soviet Union unwisely was boycotting the Security Council.
What Trump didn't seem to get in his proclamation is that making voting more difficult will end up hurting his party, which has a higher proportion of low-information, low-motivation voters.
Signal of Incompetence
The scandal around the security lapse involved in the Signal text chat isn't about the attack on the Houthis that was discussed, as that is ordnance out the bomb bay, and they are basically a bunch of resilient pirates. Biden had them bombed also, somewhat unsuccessfully, and they will continue regardless of whether Iran makes a deal with Trump or not. The inclusion of The Atlantic's editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg in the chat was a hilarious error, one that will ultimately end Michael Waltz's job as national security advisor (though Trump will do it later, to cover the tracks), and Goldberg covered himself with respectability in the way he handled it.
The real point was the look behind the scenes at decision-making in Drumpfenreich: VP Vance is even more treacherous and evil than we knew, Hegseth just as blunt a tool, while the real power is vested in Stephen Miller as the Voice of Trump. His say-so makes all the difference; no one need question it. Miller is also the policy director for all the Project 2025-inspired discriminatory cuts Musk has sought to make. When Musk goes, and it will be soon, the vampiric Miller should be the focus for public calumny.
Hands Off! Demonstrations
The mass demonstrations planned for this weekend should be a good opportunity for those who are intended victims of Trumpian arbitrary violations of civil liberties to show themselves, protected by being surrounded by well-meaning people in safer status (i.e., natural-born citizens). It will be worth watching if there is focus on the demonstrations--around the assault on free speech, on job security, or just general hatred of Drumpfenreich--or not.
I would just advise attendees who may feel vulnerable to disguise themselves somewhat, and stay in crowds. There will be spies, and likely provocateurs from the other side who will try to create violence as a premise for authoritarian crackdowns afterward. Protect one another!
(No demonstration planned here in Italy, as far as I know.)
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