Trump Trade: DC Needs to Do Just About Everything Differently
Welcome to Washington, D.C.
We have for decades been told that DC is filled to overflowing with Experts. They know things. They understand things at a level We the Plebes can not fathom.
Whenever We the Plebes raised our voices in protest to things DC was doing - the Experts patted us on our heads and told us to simmer down our dim selves.
Well as it turns out, never has an emperor been more naked than has this one.
Potentate DC has for half-a-century-plus been proudly strutting up and down Pennsylvania Avenue and K Street - completely garb-less.
DC has expertly managed us - into $20 trillion in debt.
DC has taxed and regulated us so thoroughly, our economy basically stopped consistently growing at a decent rate more than a decade ago.
Yet, counter-factually, DC has for decades insisted on not enforcing our immigration laws - thereby importing tens of millions of mostly uneducated, unskilled people into our job pool.
Shocker - wages stopped rising…forty years ago. And we have nearly 100 million Americans left entirely out of the workforce.
‘Twas DCs collective cluelessness, corruption and condescension - spilling out and over the land and all over all of us for…ever - that forced We the Plebes to deliver the loudest-of-all-messages.
Behold President Donald Trump.
President Trump - is causing the DC Experts to lose their collectivist hive mind.
Every time Trump does something differently than DC has always done it - the DC Experts freak out in allegedly high-minded disgust. And We the Plebes…shrug, smile snidely and say “Exactly.”
And perhaps nowhere is the chasm between DC and Reality greater - than on trade.
What DC has for so long called “free trade” - isn’t anything remotely resembling free trade.
Actual free trade - is free on both sides of the ledger. We allow other nations government-free access to our market - and they allow us government-free access to theirs.
This isn’t what happened with DC “free trade.” For decades, we gave other nations government-free access to our market - and they piled up government impediments to us accessing theirs.
This #FakeTrade nonsense - is what led to the massive trade deficits to which Candidate Trump repeatedly referred.
This #FakeTrade inanity gave employee-hiring employers located inside the US - yet another reason to relocate outside the US. Which meant hundreds of thousands of fewer jobs here.
Trump repeatedly chastised the DC Experts for negotiating bad trade deals. That DC wasn’t exploiting the US’ massive market muscle to maximum advantage.
Trump roundly dismissed as dumb the multilateral trade deals DC insisted on cutting - as yet another way DC diminished the US' negotiating power.
Trump promised much better, less-government-on-both-sides trade deals. And Trump promised one-on-one bilateral deals. Which would force each partner to deal directly and exclusively with us - and our huge economy.
The DC Experts - laughed off all of this. And bizarrely, stupidly, called Trump “anti-trade.”
You know, Trump - the guy who build a multi-billion dollar global business cutting deals and making trades. That guy - is “anti-trade.”
Well, if there is one thing Trump is (thank God) - it is steadfastly undaunted. Certainly not by the starkly nude DC Experts.
Trump and his appointees and staffers have pressed forward with their actual-free-trade approach. And look - it’s working. Like gangbusters.
U.S. Trade Deficit Shrinks as Global Economy Gathers Strength
The Washington Post here in April - has it backwards. The US economy is far and away the world’s largest. As we repair ourselves - we repair the world. More domestic production - means a shrinking trade deficit. Which means a much-more-rapidly growing US economy. Which is better for us - and the rest of the planet.
Trump’s actual free trade - has continued to improve our situation.
U.S. Trade Deficit Shrank in August as Exports Rose: “Rising exports and falling imports shrank the United States’ trade deficit in goods and services to the lowest level in nearly a year, data released Thursday by the Commerce Department showed. The trade deficit - the gap between what the United States imports and what it exports - narrowed to $42.4 billion in August, down $1.2 billion from July.”
That’s fantastic international news. And how are things going domestically?
US 2Q GDP Growth Revised Up to 3.1 Percent
US 3Q Economic Growth Raised to 3.3%
Well that too is a most pleasant trend.
Especially considering that Trump-predecessor Barack Obama’s eight years in power - during which we had a whole lot of Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), DC “free trade” - produced not even one year of even 3% Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth.
The DC Experts - still absolutely do not get it.
World Trade Boom Sails Into 2018 as Trump Threatens Barriers
Yet again, you DC Dolts: Trump threatens barriers - as part of the negotiation to get other nations to get rid of theirs.
Trump has spent the year threatening barriers - but never actually imposing them. Why is that? Because the countries he’s threatening with barriers - are instead dropping theirs.
And as we’re seeing, all over the planet - it’s working.
Hence the “world trade boom.” Not despite Trump - because of him.
Trump’s threats of more government on our side - result in less government on their side. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Next thing you know - there’s a “world trade boom.”
A “world trade boom” the clueless DC Experts note - but are utterly incapable of understanding why or how it came to be.
Call it Trump Trade. Call it Anti-DC Trade. Call it actual free trade.
Call it what we’ve called it for years and years - Zero-for-Zero. Meaning zero government on our side - and zero government on theirs.
Whatever you call it - thank God Trump is doing it.
Because it works.
This first appeared in Red State.