Day 972 – Whatcha Gonna Do?

Day 972 – Whatcha Gonna Do?

Wednesday September 4, 2019

427 Days until the 2020 election and 509 days until the Inauguration

Three Things:

– A Chart on the Economy, that says it all

– The Three Cs

– The Bahamas

Let’s start with the Bahamas. They are wiped out. They don’t have the capacity to rebuild. Their economy is based on rum drinks and diving trips. If we don’t get in there and help them big time, the devastation, death, and suffering will increase exponentially.

Let’s move on to the Three Cs. In a new book out by Jim Mattis and Bing West (Don’t ya love that name? Bing West.) in which they talk about leadership they mention The Three Cs:

– Competence

– Caring

– Conviction

Keep that in mind and apply it to this president and his administration in everything they do.

Now let’s go to the economy. Here’s a chart. Remember Trump ran on the fact that he was going to greatly increase the economy and that Obama had done such a horrible job, and that he, Donald Trump, was the great negotiator and deal maker and that he would fix it all. 

Hey guess what? Obama’s numbers are better than Trump’s? How did that happen? (Hint: I refer you to the Three Cs above.)

Not only are Obama’s numbers better; Trump’s are going down. Like “MayDay! MayDay! Dive! Dive!”  bad.

The economic experts (What do they know?) say it’s pretty easy to figure out. Every time Trump slaps on tariffs the economy slows down.

Now this might be hard for some folks to understand but here’s a little tidbit of micro-economic thinking, in an example. See if you can figure it out. If you slap tariffs on steel then steel from outside the country will cost more. Got it? Okay good. Now if that steel goes into say American built cars what will happen to the cost of those cars? Why, and this is incredibly hard to understand for the president and his administration, the price of American cars goes up! Wow. Who knew? I can hear Donnie now, “When I put tariffs on steel the price of cars made in the U.S.A. went up, who knew? Did you know that?” (Yes, knucklehead anyone who didn’t sleep through econ 101 knew that. Oh? You didn’t even bother to attend? Got it.)

So now let’s review the effect of Trump’s meandering economic policy, if we can even call it a policy. U.S. goods made with raw materials, like steel, that come from outside the United States will cost more. This will in turn mean people will buy less of U.S. made goods and the economy will slow down.

Trump has put tariffs on all sorts of things coming from China. I guess this means he will have to pay more for his MAGA hats. China has slapped tariffs on the stuff we send to them. This means the Chinese will buy less of our stuff. Got it? Hey, but guess what else China is doing? They are lowering the price of goods from other countries. Guess what that means? It means the Chinese will buy stuff from other countries and not from us. Good going Mr. president. 

For some reason farmers are pissed off at Trump. I guess having their crops rotting in warehouses because they no longer have anywhere to sell has something to do with it. Here, have a MAGA hat. By the way it’ll cost a bit more, like 30%. But that’s the cost of winning.

In other news, there have been multiple reports on Trump’s foreign policies. The adjectives pretty much say it all: absent, mercurial, random, non-existent. In other words, there is no policy.

Odd thing is that’s kind of the same thing that comes up based on gun control.

Or anything else with this guy.

So whether it’s the economy, foreign policy, or anything else, ask yourself this:

“Is he competent?”

“Does he care?”

“Does he have conviction?”

I say he comes up empty on all three.

427 Days until the 2020 election and 509 days until the Inauguration

PS Sweet dreams are made of this. The ferry at Flores, Guatemala.