What happens when the most powerful country in the world elects a reckless, self-centered man as president who thinks he is being cheated, won’t listen to fact based, sane advisors, and wants to force EVERYONE to bend the knee to him?
We elected this person to be our president. He is domineering, corrupt, vindictive, stubborn, listens to conspiracy theorists, believes things that are not true, thinks he and the country are one and the same- and that he and the country have been mistreated, and he uses absolutely everything in his power that he can for his corrupt advantage.
Oh, and wait for it….what happens when you compound that power by removing checks and balances?
We are getting that answer.
Keep in mind that tariffs are really about Trump making deals to enrich himself and consolidating his power. Those are the big goals Trump has in mind. Once you realize that, everything Trump is doing makes perfect sense.
TRADE WAR TANKS THE STOCK MARKET
On Thursday, April 3rd, Trump ignited a global trade war by imposing tariffs on almost every single country on planet earth, even islands (check out McDonald Island) that are uninhabited by human beings and have nothing but penguins living there. Stocks fell like dead bodies off a cliff.
On Monday, April 7th, 2025, US stocks fell for the third straight day. The Dow, S&P and Nasdaq were sharply down as a direct result of Trump’s trade war. 6 trillion dollars down since he began his tariff war and 11 trillion dollars down since he was elected. The market crash was not limited to the US. It was global.
Trump said he alone could fix it. Instead it seemed that he alone would wreck it. His supporters claimed this was his way of setting the table for great deals for America.
On Tuesday, April 8th, the US stock market rallied briefly about 1000 points on the rumor that Trump was making deals. But that hope faded when Trump reiterated that he was not giving in. More importantly, even if Trump makes deals, massive and irreparable damage to our economy and our relationships with other countries has already been done. New alliances are already forming between Europe, China, Japan, and South Korea.
All Americans will feel the effects of Trump’s trade war in significantly higher prices. It is currently estimated that every American family will pay around $4,000.00 more for goods they purchase annually because of Trump’s trade war.
The truth is that Trump took a perfectly good US economy that was recovering from a pandemic and threw it away, smashed it, shattered it, splattering ketchup on the wall.
Let’s see… when have we heard about something like that before with Trump? Oh wait! Remember Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony before the House January 6th Select Committee?
“I first noticed there was ketchup dripping down the wall and there was a shattered porcelain plate on the floor,” she said. “The valet had articulated that the president was extremely angry at the Attorney General’s AP interview and had thrown his lunch against the wall.”
Hutchinson said she grabbed a towel and started wiping the ketchup off the wall to help the valet.
“There were several times throughout my tenure with the chief of staff that I was aware of him either throwing dishes or flipping the tablecloth to let all the contents of the table go onto the floor and likely break or go everywhere,” Hutchinson said, referring to Trump.
TRUMP CHANGES HIS MIND… SORT OF
Why did Trump set a global trade war into motion in the first place? Does he really believe the whole world has taken advantage of us as he said on the campaign trail when he promised to impose tariffs and his supporters cheered him on?
European tariffs on our goods were around 1.5 % before Trump imposed an across the board tariff of 10% on every country. They were about the same for our tariffs on European goods before Trump had his so-called Liberation Day. In other words, our country had established reasonable global tariff balances based on our unique import/export ratios with each country. Trump blew that all up.
So, why? Why did he do that? Does he really believe our country is being cheated? OR is this about creating opportunities for himself to wheel and deal? He says this move will be good for the average working American because companies will re-shore EVERYTHING to America. He says this is the way to undo NAFTA global free trade agreements. But given who Trump is, it is far more likely that he sees this as another opportunity to enrich himself. Trump totally gets off on being the big guy who gets to be the center of attention, the guy everyone calls “sir” and must beg to get a deal from him.
Regardless of his underlying motive, he has created global damage that will continue to directly impact and hurt average Americans including anyone who has a 401k, farmers, small business owners, people in need of Medicaid and who live on their social security checks as well as average American consumers who will pay more for most household goods and cars. Even Trump’s ultra wealthy supporters are angry about these tariffs. The Koch brothers and other super wealthy Libertarians who helped Trump get elected have joined a lawsuit asking the courts to stop Trump from continuing his trade war. The lawsuit alleges that Trump’s declaration of a fiscal emergency was baseless. That claim of emergency was the basis for his power to impose these tariffs.
New Civil Liberties Alliance, a conservative legal group, filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on Thursday for imposing tariffs on Chinese imports. [Fox Business News]
Maybe the good news is that Americans have gotten a brief lesson in tariffs. Most Americans understand now that tariffs are taxes and these are some of the highest taxes that have ever been imposed on the American people in the history of our country.
Many worried Trump supporters watched their 401ks blow up in real time as the stock markets tanked. Along with that, their hopes and dreams for retirement tanked. At this point Trump has pulled back with a 90 day pause which at first caused the market to recover and shoot up. But then it became clear that Trump would refuse to back down when it came to China and that China was dug in. Our country and China are now locked in a global trade war. Neither side seems willing to give in. Markets moved down once again after this realization sunk in.
Equities are struggling after a huge rally yesterday following the tariff time-out for most of the world, except China. The S&P 500 opened about 2% lower today following yesterday’s huge rally and has steadily fallen. We’re currently down around 5% as we round noon. A step back after yesterday’s rocket ship move was not unexpected, but the consistent move lower today is showing a large shadow of uncertainty remains.[New York Stock Exchange]
Globally, and most significantly, our country will never be trusted by other countries again the way it was before Trump pulled this stunt.
As a guy from the rough and tumble world of real estate, Trump may only understand hard power. But soft power creates global alliances and partnerships, trust and faith, good will between countries. Trump just trashed our global soft power. It takes a long long time to build trust. It took a second to wreck it. All it took was Trump’s announcement on so-called Liberation Day.
WHY THE BOND MARKET WAS THE LAST STRAW
The bond market has always been the safe haven for investors who feared an uncertain stock market. But the bond market’s stability relies on the idea that our nation is a rule of law nation that is not subject to the whims of a king or dictator. Trump blew up that reliability. The falling bond market was the reason Trump finally decided to pause most tariffs for 90 days.
As we have seen, Trump has been destroying not only the stock market, but other institutions that took decades to build. Trump/ Musk and DOGE abruptly ended cancer and other innovative science research by firing people working on these problems. Trump has also turned our country into a pariah country that Canadians and others don’t want to visit and where scholars don’t want to do research anymore. Medicaid is about to be cut if the Republican budget passes, which means that many nursing homes will close because they rely on Medicaid. Our pubic school system has been severely damaged by DOGE. Veteran services and social security are at risk. Remember when Trump had covid and had to be hospitalized in his first term? He was given experimental monoclonal antibodies that saved his life. Musk’s DOGE even fired the physician/scientist who created the antibodies that saved Trump’s life.
Americans will become more upset as Trump continues the destruction he is wreaking on our institutions, our economy, our social safety net and he continues the global economy trade war chaos he has unleashed.
- 37% of Americans approve of the job the president’s doing on the economy, with 52% giving him a thumbs down.
- Trump’s handling of the federal workforce? 41% approval and 54% disapproval (-13).
- Trump’s handling of foreign policy? 40% approval and 54% disapproval (-14).
- Trump’s handling of the economy? 40% approval and 55% disapproval (-15).
- Trump’s handling of trade? 39% approval and 55% disapproval (-16).
- Trump’s tariffs help or hurt the economy? 22% say it helps and 72% say it hurts it. (-50).
Americans will be deeply, personally, and tragically affected by the damage he is doing whether or not there is a rally in the stock market.
HOW DID TRUMP’S WEALTHY BACKERS REACT?
Bill Ackman, a billionaire backer of Donald Trump has urged the US president to pause his recently announced trade tariffs, or risk “a self-induced, economic nuclear winter”.
Amid market turmoil, hedge fund manager Bill Ackman said the president should take three months to allow countries to renegotiate their trading relationships with the US.
On Monday, Mr Ackman’s warning was echoed by another prominent Wall Street figure, with JPMorgan Chase chairman Jamie Dimon saying that Trump’s tariffs risked pushing up prices for Americans.
Despite the shockwaves, the American president has defended his new import taxes, saying “sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something”.
He says the move will boost his country with new jobs and investment, but economists warn that prices could rise for Americans and spark a trade war.
Share prices in Europe and Asia continued to plummet on Monday, as markets react to the sweeping, global tariffs announced by Trump last week.