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  • Current Events & Politics Moderators: deficiT | tryptakid | Foreigner

US Politics the 2025 trump presidency thread

Jen X said:
We should shut your power off.
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Your leaders are threatening to. There will at least be tariffs on it from what I'm seeing

We're so sorry for our crazy uncle.

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It's just one example of how the world is interconnected. It's not as if the US could build new powerstations to cover the loss in capacity in a reasonable time-period.

Someone noted that Donald Trump has placed a moratorium on permissions to build renewable energy facilities.

I appreciate that Britian is an island so has many more places to build off-shore wind farms but the price of the energy they provide is dropping precipatly. I'm the first to point out that you can't presume the wind will ALWAYS be blowing and that a mix of sources is needed, but it's no longer the case that the energy is costly. They are also the quickest and cheapest to construct.

To rule out renewables doesn't seem in the interst of the consumers - it's in the interest of the oil and gas industries. Here in the UK, the price of gas triples in just a few years. I don't expect to see that in the US, but I don't see energy getting cheaper.
 
4DQSAR said:
I note that Canada and Mexico are instituting retaliatory tarriffs. China already paid tarriffs but these have been increased so China has also instituted tarriffs on US products. I don't think this is a surprise to anyone. The stock market responded but figures from a few days are not a good long-term indicator. It's when inflation feeds through the the American consumer that people will understand that tarriffs don't affect the profitability of businesses, they affect the cost to the consumer.

Last week I mentioned that one result of the war in Ukraine was that unaligned nations who had bought Russian systems had witnessed the underperformance. Certainly a number of large buyers have been looking elsewhere. Being the worlds biggest arms exporter, this would initially seem like an oppotunity to increase that market share.

But I see India has noted that US politicians were and are dictating how and where US arms SOLD to other nations can be used. You might wonder how they could do so. Well, with those big, high-tech systems, you don't just buy the item(s), you buyl a package that includes spares and support. So there is a long-term partnership between buyer and seller. Failing to bow to US political pressure could see the vital long-term support be stopped.

It appears that India has chosen not to purchase the F35, possibly the most expensitve piece of materiel that the US exports (I don't know if nuclear submarines are exported - if so, they would be the more costly). One of the reasons given was that if politicans in the US can dictate how and where India employed it's F35s, it essentially makes them unreliable for non-technical reasons. In a worst case scenario, worse than useless since if they DO have F35s, they don't have the alternative.

Right now Russia isn't even able to built enough of it's modern F35 competitor (the Su57) in significant numbers. So India is actually after buying the right to produce the Su57 under licence. That way even if the design is Russian, they can operate their varient without that long-term relationship.

I'm sure there are many factors involved and I'm not asserting that political interference was the only reason for them choosing to manufacture a licenced design. But it will take time so see if other unaligned nations who might have bought US arms will be looking elsewhere.

Once again, it just shows that geopolitics is complicated.
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It seems like it would make a lot more sense to focus on revitalising American manufacturing first before putting tariffs on imports, and ideally they might not even be necessary in that case. Of course, that’s a much bigger project. Would be more worthwhile than Stargate though, imo.

This is why I am inclined to believe that both parties care more about accruing individual wealth as politicians than improving the lives of Americans.
 
you would think, eh?

the cap (a liberal policy research and advocacy group) estimated that the chips and science act, the inflation reduction act and the iija combined to spur over 30,000 investments, both public and private. it was a historic investment in the u.s.

the chips and science act was a nearly $300 million investment in semiconductor manufacture and research in the u.s.

do you think that these types of investments in the u.s. improve the lives of americans more, as much or less than a giant tax cut - for people who already have more money that one person could need in 10 lifetimes - and tariffs on chinese candian and mexican goods?

alasdair
 
i literally laughed out loud :)

"it should not be possible to be this good at being this bad at your job. like at some point you think they'd screw up the process of screwing everything up. but, no. they're like the henry ford of ruining shit."

alasdair
 
Your guys inflation will rise. Even our politicians were shocked i think. We wouldn't treat an allie like that so I guess we're a bit naive.
We are already looking to Europe and Asia for trade to shut out the USA.
We have the natural resources so I don't expect it to get to bad.
He's not making your country look good though. Every country has ties to Canada and we have no enemies until now i guess.

1812 deux
 
It was funny hearing him say that an idiot signed the current agreement we have when it was him that signed it.
He gave Mexico a break but not us? If he's really trying to take Canada it won't happen. I haven't seen Canadians this United in a long time.
Wall Street will dictate the tariffs though. Trump is just the front man. He is an idiot though and I'm actually surprised he got in twice.
 
www.bbc.co.uk

Trump tariffs: US expands exemptions to Canada and Mexico tariffs

Trump said he was granting the two US neighbours a temporary exemption on tariffs that he imposed two days ago.
www.bbc.co.uk

I note Donald Trump is now rolling back tarriffs on certain goods. I didn't specxifically mention automobile manufacture but as I understand it, partly finished vehicles cross the US-Canadian boarder several times duing production so would have been subject to multiple tarriffs.

While it's good that he realizes that tarriffs are a complex subject, other nations are now going to be less confident in US policies being changed without notice. So they are likely to seek to diversify their exports. It's not going to attract investment if businesses have no way of knowing if the rules will suddenly be changed again. I suspect that it why the Nasdaq is down. Nobody is about to invest billions and years building a new factory only for the rules to change making the investment uneconomical. Investment is a long-term option and generally building new factories take several years.

I know that a few years ago Donald Trump complained that European nations weren't buying US automobiles. Well, there is a very simple reason for this. While the US tends to have wide, straight roads, Europe is criss-crossed by much narrower lanes and tracks - the result of the road newwork having grown for hundreds of years. Many reviewers pointed out the simple fact that many US automobiles simply weren't suited to the range of roads commonly encounted by drivers in Europe.

It's nobody's fault. It's simply the case that smalller European designs still work in the US while the opposite is not true.

But it was asserted that European buyers were purposefully not buying US build vechicles, which simply isn't the case.

It's also worth noting that while US drivers complain of fuel prices. Europeans pay about 40% more for fuel when compared to US buyers. So fuel efficiency is far more important.

I suppose one way the US could increase sales of automobiles would be to subsidize the price of fuel in Europe. But I don't think that's likely.
 


(edit) I realize that the Trump Presidency is not the primary focus of this Q&A with Sam. However, there's a lot in here about politics, propaganda, and issues affecting the US and the whole world. Also some good advice on staying sane in this crazy world.
It seemed as appropriate to post it here as anywhere.
 
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trump retreating from his disastrous tariffs and trade war moves. good.

looks like all is not super well in the trump-musk marriage either as he's starting to retreat there also: Trump tells cabinet secretaries they, not Musk, are in charge of staff cuts

"WASHINGTON, March 6 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump told his cabinet members on Thursday that they, not Elon Musk, have the final say on staffing and policy at their agencies, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The billionaire Tesla CEO and his Department of Government Efficiency will play an advisory role only, Trump said, according to the source. Musk was in the room and told the cabinet he was good with Trump's plan, the source said."

alasdair
 
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