Day 65 (or 45) – Econ Forecast

Wednesday, March 5, 2025

We didn’t listen to the Trump speech. We spent most of the time in a French bistro. The reviews said it was romantic. ???The reality was it was noisy, but the food was outstanding.

I listened to Larry Summers earlier in the day. As an economist he’s pretty good. As a person? Not so much. He asked the basic question about Trump’s tariffs, “Who do they benefit?” or “How is this advantageous to Americans (or Canadians, or Mexicans.) 

He went o to explain that when it comes to production of things like cars you have to think in terms of regions: China, Europe, North America.

The U.S. car manufacturing does not exist by itself. It is tightly woven into Canada and Mexico. One has to think regionally. But this would be hard for Mr. Trump to understand as he doesn’t grasp basics like how tariffs work or what the words Pearl Harbor refer to.

What is shocking is that no one in his administration or in the Republican Congress seems willing or able to tell him. The only one who did was President Macron. And then we saw Trump give that goofy grin and shrug. As soon as Macron left The Oval Office the orange one was back to his old lies about the amount of aid the U.S. had given to Ukraine. Now, he’s cutting off not only aid but intelligence. 

And the ambush of Zelenskyy in the White House? OMG! Shocking, disgusting, and criminal.

Meanwhile the reality or even the suggestion of tariffs sent the stock market tumbling. Eggs are still much more expensive than under Biden. Children are dying from measles. A disease that had been labelled “eradicated” in 2000. And yet the sycophants continue to pretend that this is normal.

Right wing media has been touting the idea of “the deep state,” and there is one person in particular that JD Vance and his backer Peter Thiel are listening to. That fellow is all about destroying the government and installing a CEO (or as he says “Dictator.”) and that people need to get over it.

While animals are not being feed in Iowa and are starving to death, and illnesses are breaking out in this country and the world people are starting to understand that the “deep state” is a lot of dedicated people doing things to help the world and society and our country. Without them things are getting worse. 

What will it take? A general pandemic? A depression? “Authorized” thugs beating people in the streets?

Some have said, “This is not what we voted for.” Others are saying, “Give it time.”

What happened to all those promised fixes on Day 1?

Vanished.

There are PR campaigns to say that they are going to have no taxes on tips, but the bill the Republicans have doesn’t mention that. Doge says they’ve rehired the ebola folks, but the reality is they haven’t.

As our economy shrinks and our influence in the world does too what will happen? It’s hard to know for sure but one thing is certain. Whatever it is we will be less of a country because of it. 

We are shrinking militarily, economically, diplomatically and morally. There is a cabal of people who have been listening to each other for years. They speak in code. They have signs. Look at Pete Hegseth’s chest, he has a giant iron cross on his right pectoral. Turns out it’s not an Iron Cross but the cross of The First Crusade. A popular symbol with white Christian Nationalists. There is the continual talk of getting rid of “the deep state,” and it turns out that they are scientists and people who know how to make the government work.

I remember Michael Lewis writing in “The Fifth Element” that a Fox News host had a farm and he was having a ribbon cutting for some expansion he was doing. There was a woman standing nearby the ceremony and he asked her what she was doing there. She told him she was from The Department of Agriculture and she was the one who approved his loan that he was so proud of. He didn’t realize that the Department of Agriculture worked through local banks to approve low interest loans to farmers. This would be part of the “deep state” that these right wingers want to get rid of. Not entirely mind you, their banking buddies are slobbering over the billions of dollars in low interest loans the Ag Department has. Imagine if they can get in there and jack up the rates?