Red_Dragon wrote: 

Ok, really: what does Putin have on @realDonaldTrump? Russia has attacked our election, invaded Ukraine, slaughtered innocent Syrians, and yet Trump does Russia’s bidding while alienating our allies who stand with us. Which country is the American President working for?

‘We should beware of the demagogues who are ready to declare a trade war against our friends—weakening our economy, our national security, and the entire free world—all while cynically waving the American flag.’

 kurtster wrote: 

Trump announced he was imposing tariffs of up to 24 percent on imported softwood lumber, retaliation for what he said were increases in tariffs on U.S. dairy products sold in Canada.

Canada has long maintained a high tariffs on most dairy imports. The duty on milk is 270 percent. One exception was “ultrafiltered” milk and other protein-rich dairy ingredients used to make dairy products such as cheese and yogurt. North American free-trade rules do not cover these ingredients, so U.S. dairies have developed a big business selling such low-cost products to dairies in Canada.

That changed about a year ago, when Canadian dairy farmers persuaded regulators to create a new lower-priced class of industrial milk as an incentive to get dairies to produce protein substances in Canada, using Canadian milk. U.S. imports fell in 2016, and continue to decline.

 kurtster wrote: 
Yes, it would require a decent attention span to explain that in a Tweet.  Apparently, the Canadian dairy industry has been in decline for a while since a supply-management system went into effect.  Here's an interesting article about the state of affairs; it's about 6 months old but it seems relevant to today's goings-on.

 Proclivities wrote: 
That is correct. 

What he should be saying is that we cannot export any dairy products to Canada because with 300% (270%) added to the price before any middleman / processor markups and the additional VAT on top of the final retail cost makes the product unsaleable before it even crosses the border.  A perfect example of protectionism on behalf of Canadian dairy farmers.

But that requires a decent attention span, so ...

 Proclivities wrote: 
Sounds about right.  Shooting off that poop hole without studying anything has become the norm in this country.  It's like Idiocracy come to life!!!

 R_P wrote: 
So his reasoning behind that statement is based purely on the fact that she is a porn star?  How brilliant.  My god when will these morons vacate the premises????

Rudy Giuliani rips Stormy Daniels: Porn stars have no credibility

Some might argue the same for moralizing lawyers or politicians. Presidents even.

 R_P wrote: 
"Killing our Agriculture"? 
U.S. total exports of agricultural products to Canada totaled $24 billion in 2017, our largest agricultural export market. Leading domestic export categories include: prepared food ($1.9 billion), fresh vegetables ($1.9 billion), fresh fruit ($1.6 billion), snack foods nesoi ($1.3 billion), and non-alcoholic bev. (ex. juices) ($1.1 billion).

U.S. total imports of agricultural products from Canada totaled $22 billion in 2017, our 2nd largest supplier of agricultural imports. Leading categories include: snack foods ($4.2 billion), red meats, fr/ch/fr ($2.3 billion), other vegetable oils ($2.0 billion), processed fruit & vegetables ($1.5 billion), and fresh vegetables ($1.4 billion).

Anyhow, they don't "charge us" anything for our dairy.  He's deliberately ignoring the fact that tariffs are paid by the importer (and ultimately the consumer), not the exporter.

 R_P wrote: 
i'd like to see a "scorecard" of these tariffs, from both side's perspective.  Too much of this is anecdotal, one-offs.  The only thing i do know is the US imports a lot more than it exports.  

edit, the deficit is not primarily from tariffs...but labor costs.  one PR war i would support is showing how foreign labor is underpaid.  

Trump will ask athletes who kneel during anthem to recommend people for pardoning
 
 
 
No, the above article didn't come from The Onion. 
 
So let me understand this correctly... the price to end someone's practice of kneeling during the National Anthem is to provide Trump with a laundry list of people incarcerated unfairly so that he can consider pardoning them? This is his idea of quid pro quo? He isn't genuinely interested in anyone's plight but is trying to dangle a carrot to stop the kneeling which he views as a direct affront to him. 
 
Wow... all I can say is plz, plz, plz Mueller wrap up the investigation and bring out all the skeletons to help kick-start the impeachment process as this guy doesn't deserve to be in office one day longer. The damage he is inflicting on his position and this country is indescribable. I for one can't wait until the end of his term to see him removed.

The paranoid style of politics embodied/exemplified...

So how much wreckage can Trump create in a week's time?
 
More than any of us can shake a stick at.

Well, there goes another National Monument. Huell Howser did a great show on this beautifully unique section of land
which had been preserved for future generations. Because of Zince's insatiable thirst for fossils fuels, another priceless
piece of OUR land has been taken away from us so they can rip out some more carbon. It was a really nice place. 

 

 kurtster wrote:

Look, I know my last post in response to yours was LONG.  Please understand that while I have taken some snarky potshots at you in the past, my epic responses to you are a sign that I respect you and take your opinions seriously. When I disagree with you, I try to back up my opinions. I think we're all a bit too old to just spit out unexamined and unsupported opinions. 

I don't agree with your takes on the economy, politics, and Trump. I DO agree with your anger at the way some industries and people have suffered over the past 10-15 years. I think that the federal government could have done more to provide help with transition to more efficiency, new production methods...or something. I think you might agree with that notion too. 

But Trump isn't doing anything to help the people and companies that have suffered. Part of the problem is that the economy changes and technology changes industries—which makes it hard for any American president to combat industrial downturns. 

Trump's tariffs aren't going to help American workers overall. And for all Trump's crowing about the economy, HE DIDN'T DO THAT. 

 kurtster wrote: 


I saw the headline and teaser this morning and immediately thought of you, kurster, as well as your posts about the changes you've seen in the Cleveland area.

You're right: things change. But Trump's tariffs are an attempt to halt that change. The president of Stripmatic, Bill Adler, has rolled through many changes in the past. He adapted and automated part of his production to meet low-cost Chinese competition. And he's no stranger to the damage that tariffs can do. From the WaPo article I pointed you to: 


Adler is a veteran of an earlier bout of protectionism, the 2002 steel tariffs, which pushed one-fifth of U.S. metal-stamping businesses into collapse, according to the Census Bureau. Stripmatic laid off a handful of workers and froze hiring for four years...Sales stagnated for several years, but Adler hung on. 
Stripmatic was trying to diversify into the food-processing industry and reduce its dependence on the automakers, but Trump's tariffs killed that opportunity:
"But times would have been better if he had landed that big food- processing-equipment contract. Rising labor costs in China and Stripmatic’s increasing efficiency gave him a real shot at a major win. He (Adler) blames Trump’s trade policies for costing him the job and for imperiling Stripmatic’s future, as almost one-quarter of his sales come from abroad.

“Our customers source on a global market,” he said. “I’m going to be at least 30 to 40 percent disadvantaged on steel. . . . I’ve lost my competitive advantage.”

Here's another takeaway from the piece—a bird's eye view of the tariffs' effects: 


“That is absolutely the lesson,” said economist Phil Levy, who worked on trade policy in the George W. Bush White House. “It is a supply chain. The administration has favored the first link over the later links in the chain. The net effect helps neither American manufacturing nor national security.”


I have to ask you to back up some of your assertions with evidence: 

1. "He tried so hard to make us accept that the glory days of US manufacturing were over and never, ever coming back."
I assume you mean Obama. When/where did he state that? Because I don't remember Obama saying that. 

And by the way: how are you measuring glory days? The US is producing more in manufacturing than in the recent past, but that increase is due to more automation and fewer jobs for people. 

2. "Things overall haven't been this good in nearly 2 decades."


You seem to think that improvements in the economy, employment levels and manufacturing are due to Trump's policies. Which ones? Not the tariffs—again, from the WaPo piece. Do you seriously think that Trump's tariffs are going to bring back the steel and coal industry back to the levels they reached in the 60s? 

In a $20 trillion economy, 10 jobs may not seem significant. But Trump’s frequent use of tariffs has sparked protests from farmers and industry groups that will be hurt by the administration’s import levies or retaliation from U.S. trading partners. The cumulative cost of the president’s higher import taxes will be a net loss of more than 400,000 jobs, according to a new study by the Trade Partnership, a pro-trade research consultancy.


If you think the economy is great now, kurster, THAT'S DUE TO OBAMA. Trump hasn't come up with any coherent positive economic plans. The tariffs have barely been implemented, if at all. They're not going to have an effect on the overall economy for months. The tax "reform" might have spurred more corporate investment, but the economy was on its current trajectory long before Trump took office. 


3. "The US has the capability to manufacture and grow almost everything we need domestically.  Keeping our money in our own country instead of giving it away with the insane trade imbalances will make us both stronger and wealthier as a country, peacefully without war."

The reason manufacturers were buying imported materials including aluminum and steel was because those imports were cheaper and/or made more closely to the specifications of domestic manufacturers.Global supply chains are not costing this country jobs, they're adding jobs. There are some American companies that can't compete with cheaper foreign competitors, but they are replaced by American companies at another point in the supply chain. The use of imported materials cheaper than domestic counterparts makes a savings for companies like Stripmatic and creates opportunities for new American companies. The global supply chain is a lot more complex than you realize.
And I don't think you understand trade balances. An American trade imbalance with another country, say France, is not a sure sign that we are getting ripped off. It's a sign that American consumers are buying more goods and services from France than French consumers are buying American goods and services. 

4.  "Remember when Biden famously said we will spend our way out of bankruptcy ?"


Doing quick googling here. Apparently Biden was referring in 2009 to the proposed health care reform, aka the ACA. Not relevant.  Where do you hoard these dusty nuggets? 

5. "Sure, there's going to be winners and losers in this transition, same as it ever was.  But there are going to be a hell of a lot more winners than losers if we keep the course we are now headed on."

Do you have any evidence to back up that last sentence? And no, a White House propaganda piece—sorry, press release—doesn't count. Look: Trump's tariffs are the government's interference in domestic manufacturing markets. That kind of interference is almost never more efficient or more productive than the tariff-free markets. 

6. "So many coal mining jobs were lost simply from the decline in steel production in the US. Probably just as many jobs lost due to the closure of coal fired electricity generation stations."


I tip my hat to you for having thought about these issues. You have strong opinions. I think it would be better if you googled and found research to back up your assertions...or changed your opinions to acknowledge the evidence refuting your ideas. 

American steel and coal jobs have declined mostly because of increased automation (mini-mills and strip-mining). Coal jobs recently have also been hammered by the rise of fracking-generated natural gas and decline in Chinese demand for American coal. 

 Once and for all: Obama didn’t crush US coal, and Trump can’t save it
...

Then between 2011 and 2016, it (the coal industry) absolutely cratered. US coal production dropped by 27 percent. Domestic demand fell 30 percent. Demand for exports dried up.

...

 Houser et al.  set out to put some numbers on it...the Columbia Center on Global Energy Policy released a superb report on this subject back in April 2016, authored by Trevor Houser, Jason Bordoff, and Peter Marsters.

They did so by comparing coal’s actual performance with 2006 Energy Information Administration projections, corrected for the decline in overall demand (which the EIA, like everyone else, completely failed to anticipate). Then they did the same for natural gas and renewables. Finally, they “explored how each fuel’s share of total interconnect-level generation varied in 2016 from what the EIA had projected.”

Comparing projections with actual performance, they were able to quantify how much of coal’s projected market share was eaten up by competitors (and other forces). Here are the culprits, the leading brigades in the “war on coal,” listed by size:

1. Natural gas: 49 percent
2. Lower-than-expected demand: 26 percent
3. Renewable energy: 18 percent
4. Obama regulations: 3 to 5 percent

Steel's decline was about technology, not trade

"In the four decades beginning in the early 1960s, the steel sector lost 400,000 jobs — a five-fold drop, according to Allan Collard-Wexler, assistant professor at Duke, who examined the history of the industry using detailed census data.

Initially, “we thought this was going to be all about trade,” he said.  He was in for a surprise. 

Even though jobs disappeared, actual steel output declined by a small amount, roughly 20 percent — nowhere near accounting for the loss in jobs.  Steel production wasn’t leaving the United States as much as it was just requiring fewer workers.

“It was increases in the productivity of the steel industry that are generating this huge drop in employment,” said Collard-Wexler.

Specifically, something came along called the minimill – essentially a process for recycling scrap steel and turning it into higher quality steel. 

It was more efficient and cheaper. “Recycling steel is a less-intensive process than smelting it from scratch,” he said.

This innovation drove a lot of steel mills out of business. Specifically, the least productive and least efficient mills. The old mills that remained in business were the ones that could produce the highest quality grades of steel.

At the same time, Collard-Wexler said, wages for the remaining steel workers rose significantly. “Steel workers today are much better paid than they were in the past.”

For Margaret McMillan, the story of American steel is a symbol of what has happened throughout the manufacturing economy. “Technology has played a huge role in changes in the manufacturing sector and in other industries as well,” she said. “It’s added value to the economy, consumer goods prices are lower because of technological progress.” "

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