𝐿𝒢𝓃𝒢 "not yet begun to fight"Apr 3, 2025

Ok. I'm a teacher. So let me break this down for you into very very simple ideas and numbers.

Let's say you run a sandwich shop. You sell $10 sandwiches. It's a very good sandwich shop. You sell a lot of sandwiches. In fact, I buy a sandwich from you every single day. In a week, I have spent $70 buying sandwiches from you.

Now let's say I am selling my car. You, the owner of the sandwich shop, need a car. I decide to sell you my car for the very very reasonable price of $700.

So here's the situation at the end of a week. You have sold me $70 worth of goods. I have received $70 worth of sandwiches. In return, I have sold you $700 worth of goods, and you have received $700 worth of car.

Any reasonable, rational person would look at that situation and say "that's a fair exchange". Both parties paid an amount of money equal to the value of the goods they now own.

But Trump is not a rational person. What he has decided this means is that you have somehow cheated me out of $630, because $700-$70=$630. Does this make sense? Fuck no. If anything, I got the better part of that deal. I now have $630, plus a belly full of sandwiches.

But it gets even worse. Then, because Trump's a-brain is filled with maggots, he further declares that since $630 divided by $700 is .9, that MUST mean you, the owner of the sandwich shop, have been imposing 90% "sandwich shop tariffs" on me the whole time. Does THIS make a lick of sense either? Also fuck no.

But wait, you're going to love this. Trump's "solution" to this is to decree that going forward, all sandwiches you sell me will be marked up a "reciprocal' 90%, making the total cost for a sandwich $19 instead of $10. He says this will be good for sandwich sales. Does THIS make any goddamn sense either? Jesus fucking Christ on a pogo stick no it fucking does not.

This entire idea is complete horseshit for what I hope you can now see are a whole raft of very very obvious reasons. Among them:

1. There never was a "sandwich shop tariff" to reciprocate
2. There is no rational reason for you to buy a car from me ever again
3. This will not make sandwiches cheaper
4. That's not how numbers work
5. That's not how any of this works

Now replace the car seller with America, and the sandwich shop with an island inhabited only by penguins. I wish I was joking.

Show threadHazel-Quercus 🟑βšͺ🟣⚫Apr 4, 2025
@Lana The idea is to turn us into an isolationist authoritarian state like Russia and destroying the economy serves that means. Crony billionaires can do extremely well in that sort of economy, even if as a whole their earning potential decreases with a smaller economy. The billionaires are trading some money for even more power. A weakened population economically, specifically a weakened relatively liberal upper middle class, helps his authoritarian vision, assuming that the people dont revolt in the process. This is coupled with agressively targetting 'liberal' civil institutions like media and independent judiciary, while attempting to create a police state.
Show threadPatrick Hadfield

@coppercrush @Lana I've been trying to understand what Trump's tariffs were about, because it clearly isn't trade.

Your explanation is the first I've read that makes sense. Which is the most depressing thought I've had for a long time.

Apr 5, 2025 at 5:02amWeb
Show threadHazel-Quercus 🟑βšͺ🟣⚫Apr 5, 2025

@patrickhadfield @Lana thank you!

I'm hoping that people internalize them following a playbook makes them predictable. Authoritarians are notoriously rigid; their strategy leaves them very little flexibility besides repression, which makes them weak. Once they make a move, like tanking the economy, they cant go back without looking like fools to everyone, especially their supporters, because 'strength' is the only quality that matters. This means they tend to compound their mistakes.