Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting!
NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets.
Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.
what do you do when the next guy after Trump is also an idiot? You slowly move away from the US and invest in other countries.
That is among what people talk about when they mention the long term damage Trump is doing to the US. The US is no longer a rock solid ally, people and companies will look elsewhere for their investments when they can.
On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote: "America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
Americans love this shit. They want to be the big boss and they obviously love bullying and throwing their weight around. Everyone, including the EU is praising him, giving him these wins and hoping he goes away.
Don't get me wrong, I hope he dies, yesterday. I hope US can snap out of it. But I don't think they will. Have you heard what JD Vance has to say about Europe?
If we don't stand up to this shit we are going to get crushed. We are going to get crushed by not only US, China has been taking our cake for a while now, this is making them salivate.
On July 29 2025 02:04 Fleetfeet wrote: It seems clear to me.
UK sells thing to burger king Burger King pays import tax Burger King makes the consumer pay 5% of that import tax Burger King pays 5% themselves because they're royalty The remaining 5% must have incorporated into the UK's original cost of good in order for them to be competitive.
It isn't a singular final sale, there aren't only two participants. There are at least three - UK, Burger King, final consumer.
Thank you, I didn't think it was that hard to get because it's obviously a vast oversimplification but I don't think it's unfounded to say that in some of the cases with some of these goods this will happen, and the underlying conclusion that this is a much better deal for the US then EU seems pretty simple to me, but who knows, I do have issues understanding stuff apparently.
Why is it a better deal for the US, in your eyes? Tariffs are not a good thing to have on imports, your taxing your own people to make the goods they buy more expensive.
Now you can certainly have situations where as a country your ok with that to protect/promote your own local businesses from cheap foreign competition but then its still a bad thing, just a bad thing your willing to accept as a consequence. And Trump isn't even encouraging domestic production with this.
Is it a worse thing for Europe? it doesn't cost them money directly. I might make them less competitive with other countries towards selling in the US except everyone is under tariffs so no one takes the advantage there.
So why do you think the US got the better end of the deal here?
I don't think the US citizens got a better deal, since the US government isn't very keen on spending this tariff revenue for their betterment, but Trump looks (and to me it's hard to deny it) as a great deal maker, he gets 15 % of everything imported to the US from EU, more investment and more energy sales. EU, as clearly shown in the quotes above doesn't get anything other then him backing down from another arbitrary number.
I think the EU citizens did, in a few different ways.
Short term, sure, EU feels less impact since they aren't imposing the tariffs. The impact will, however, be felt in the companies that are now having less business, when things get more expensive, if there is a similar good that is produced in US or in a less tariffed country, EU company loses that business, perhaps lets some people go if they can't find that revenue somewhere else.
US is a uniquely rich country and a lot of goods EU produces are premium and luxury goods, some people will cut back on French or Italian wine or cheese, those producers get sell less to the US.
I don't really get, honestly how is this even a real question, if it is followed through as it currently stands, US gets 15 % tariff, 600 B in investments and more energy sales, maybe (likely) the EU institutions shoot it down, but if EU worked like US currently does and Kings word is law, we would get a terrible deal.
Yeah, that is what I distinguished quite a few replies ago.
I think everyone except a few right wingers around here thinks tariffs are bad for the US overall.
I have never said anything other then this is good for Trump, it's what he wanted and what he got. Imposing tariffs without getting tariffs back.
To re-iterate, bad for:
EU exporters (less business inevitably if the tariffs stick) US citizens (functionally 15 % tax on everything coming from EU) EU citizens (they work for the companies who will lose business)
Good for:
Trump (because he likes tariffs and he imposed them with no consequences)
The bolded part makes sense only if you think that it is the European exporters who pay the tariffs...
Here's a video discussing studies that looked at the effect Trump's previous tariffs had:
For the most part, the American competitors increased their prices to match the price of the imported goods...
On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote: "America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
On July 29 2025 23:41 Gorsameth wrote: what do you do when the next guy after Trump is also an idiot? You slowly move away from the US and invest in other countries.
That is among what people talk about when they mention the long term damage Trump is doing to the US. The US is no longer a rock solid ally, people and companies will look elsewhere for their investments when they can.
Part of the problem is that it's not another idiot we all have to worry about, it's a more deliberate fascist, and there isn't really an opposing party to that.
The idea that Europe has time to act slowly, or that a more aggressively fascist US won't strongarm them is misguided imo.
On July 29 2025 02:04 Fleetfeet wrote: It seems clear to me.
UK sells thing to burger king Burger King pays import tax Burger King makes the consumer pay 5% of that import tax Burger King pays 5% themselves because they're royalty The remaining 5% must have incorporated into the UK's original cost of good in order for them to be competitive.
It isn't a singular final sale, there aren't only two participants. There are at least three - UK, Burger King, final consumer.
Thank you, I didn't think it was that hard to get because it's obviously a vast oversimplification but I don't think it's unfounded to say that in some of the cases with some of these goods this will happen, and the underlying conclusion that this is a much better deal for the US then EU seems pretty simple to me, but who knows, I do have issues understanding stuff apparently.
Why is it a better deal for the US, in your eyes? Tariffs are not a good thing to have on imports, your taxing your own people to make the goods they buy more expensive.
Now you can certainly have situations where as a country your ok with that to protect/promote your own local businesses from cheap foreign competition but then its still a bad thing, just a bad thing your willing to accept as a consequence. And Trump isn't even encouraging domestic production with this.
Is it a worse thing for Europe? it doesn't cost them money directly. I might make them less competitive with other countries towards selling in the US except everyone is under tariffs so no one takes the advantage there.
So why do you think the US got the better end of the deal here?
I don't think the US citizens got a better deal, since the US government isn't very keen on spending this tariff revenue for their betterment, but Trump looks (and to me it's hard to deny it) as a great deal maker, he gets 15 % of everything imported to the US from EU, more investment and more energy sales. EU, as clearly shown in the quotes above doesn't get anything other then him backing down from another arbitrary number.
I think the EU citizens did, in a few different ways.
Short term, sure, EU feels less impact since they aren't imposing the tariffs. The impact will, however, be felt in the companies that are now having less business, when things get more expensive, if there is a similar good that is produced in US or in a less tariffed country, EU company loses that business, perhaps lets some people go if they can't find that revenue somewhere else.
US is a uniquely rich country and a lot of goods EU produces are premium and luxury goods, some people will cut back on French or Italian wine or cheese, those producers get sell less to the US.
I don't really get, honestly how is this even a real question, if it is followed through as it currently stands, US gets 15 % tariff, 600 B in investments and more energy sales, maybe (likely) the EU institutions shoot it down, but if EU worked like US currently does and Kings word is law, we would get a terrible deal.
Yeah, that is what I distinguished quite a few replies ago.
I think everyone except a few right wingers around here thinks tariffs are bad for the US overall.
I have never said anything other then this is good for Trump, it's what he wanted and what he got. Imposing tariffs without getting tariffs back.
To re-iterate, bad for:
EU exporters (less business inevitably if the tariffs stick) US citizens (functionally 15 % tax on everything coming from EU) EU citizens (they work for the companies who will lose business)
Good for:
Trump (because he likes tariffs and he imposed them with no consequences)
The bolded part makes sense only if you think that it is the European exporters who pay the tariffs...
Here's a video discussing studies that looked at the effect Trump's previous tariffs had:
For the most part, the American competitors increased their prices to match the price of the imported goods...
1. No bolded part in what you quoted. 2. The post you quoted quite clearly states the 15 % tariffs is paid by US customers 3. "For the most part" is doing a lot of work here, how many, how long will they do that, why would they do that long term? Do you have any sources that this happened since the tariff shit started?
Also, your video is from 9 months ago about China - US trade war from the first term, in the world with a flat 10 % tariff on everything coming in to US, it seems wildly outdated.
Next, it very clearly stated that Trump's washing machine tariff resulted in those companies opening plants in the US. Now, the video is mostly talking about the effects in the US, but those factories that Samsung and other companies opened in the US knocked off jobs in South Korea, thus hurting their economy.
It also stated that steel and aluminum tariffs forced companies to move from China back to US, so in the case we are arguing about this would again hurt EU because it would lose investment.
Then it went into how the 25 % Truck tariff is still in place, decades later, again, this makes the current situation where most people arguing here are saying "they'll go away in the next administration". Oh, really, is that why Biden left the Trump China tariffs on and added some more?
Maybe next time watch your whole video, not just the part up until you get to your "gotcha" quote. (sorry, I saw your username and had to thrown in a snarky remark xD)
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
He may or may not make it to the end of his term despite that, but it's worth calling out regardless.
OK, sorry, I haven't seen the latest one, I still think it's pretty insane that he's within 1 % of where he was in his last term at the same time, especially since this Epstein thing has been going on for like a month now and is the first thing that I have noticed to erode his base and stick, at least for a little bit.
On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote: [quote]except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
He may or may not make it to the end of his term despite that, but it's worth calling out regardless.
OK, sorry, I haven't seen the latest one, I still think it's pretty insane that he's within 1 % of where he was in his last term at the same time, especially since this Epstein thing has been going on for like a month now and is the first thing that I have noticed to erode his base and stick, at least for a little bit.
Maybe I'm misreading (not well rested), but it seems like he's doing much better at this point in this term on approval.
It wasn't publicly obvious that he was trying to obstruct the Watergate investigation until June 1973, which is when his approval rating dipped to the 30-40% range.
He resigned in August 1974 after exhausting every possible avenue to prevent the release of the Oval Office tapes, at a 24% approval rating.
Not saying this to get anyone's hopium up or to say it's inevitable Trump will resign within the next year, just that approval rating polls have a tendency to lag somewhat behind a scandal. I speculate it's because supporters will say "well let's give them a chance to respond to this and maybe it'll blow over" before it's too blatant to ignore anymore.
Honestly, American polling never made much sense to me, I know quite a few Americans personally and professionally and the fact that more then a third of US citizens are consistently and always on board with Trump regardless of the insane shit he pulls has always seemed insane to me.
I don't think polling is everything, I threw the figure of him being better off now then in his first term because that's my feel for it and because the last figure I saw was around that, but I don't think it's end all be all of what's happening in the USA, you guys know much better, obviously.
The Nixon comparisons seem wrong to me, we are living in a vastly different times, in Nixon's age Republicans were way, way more principled and you could shame them, there was no cult of Nixon.
Beside that, Trump was impeached, twice, it never went all the way through exactly because of his cult, I think at least one Senator said they voted not to impeach because they were worried about their safety. And that was 5 years ago, now, he has his own private army he's funding to the tune of $140 B.
I don't think he's going away any time soon, only death can remove him from power, be it in a direct presidential role or as the figure behind the throne if someone finds the guts to actually tell him no on the third term.
On July 30 2025 02:59 Jankisa wrote: The Nixon comparisons seem wrong to me, we are living in a vastly different times, in Nixon's age Republicans were way, way more principled and you could shame them, there was no cult of Nixon.
People supported Nixon for the same reason they support Trump, the Southern strategy gave hopes to racists and misogynists that all of the social gains for minorities made throughout the 20th century (and 21st in Trump's case) would be reversed. There's a reason a quarter of the country stood by Nixon even after it was beyond obvious he was a crook. Trump will still probably have a 30% base even after the Epstein files come out (and I'm confident they will).
On July 29 2025 02:04 Fleetfeet wrote: It seems clear to me.
UK sells thing to burger king Burger King pays import tax Burger King makes the consumer pay 5% of that import tax Burger King pays 5% themselves because they're royalty The remaining 5% must have incorporated into the UK's original cost of good in order for them to be competitive.
It isn't a singular final sale, there aren't only two participants. There are at least three - UK, Burger King, final consumer.
Thank you, I didn't think it was that hard to get because it's obviously a vast oversimplification but I don't think it's unfounded to say that in some of the cases with some of these goods this will happen, and the underlying conclusion that this is a much better deal for the US then EU seems pretty simple to me, but who knows, I do have issues understanding stuff apparently.
Why is it a better deal for the US, in your eyes? Tariffs are not a good thing to have on imports, your taxing your own people to make the goods they buy more expensive.
Now you can certainly have situations where as a country your ok with that to protect/promote your own local businesses from cheap foreign competition but then its still a bad thing, just a bad thing your willing to accept as a consequence. And Trump isn't even encouraging domestic production with this.
Is it a worse thing for Europe? it doesn't cost them money directly. I might make them less competitive with other countries towards selling in the US except everyone is under tariffs so no one takes the advantage there.
So why do you think the US got the better end of the deal here?
I don't think the US citizens got a better deal, since the US government isn't very keen on spending this tariff revenue for their betterment, but Trump looks (and to me it's hard to deny it) as a great deal maker, he gets 15 % of everything imported to the US from EU, more investment and more energy sales. EU, as clearly shown in the quotes above doesn't get anything other then him backing down from another arbitrary number.
I think the EU citizens did, in a few different ways.
Short term, sure, EU feels less impact since they aren't imposing the tariffs. The impact will, however, be felt in the companies that are now having less business, when things get more expensive, if there is a similar good that is produced in US or in a less tariffed country, EU company loses that business, perhaps lets some people go if they can't find that revenue somewhere else.
US is a uniquely rich country and a lot of goods EU produces are premium and luxury goods, some people will cut back on French or Italian wine or cheese, those producers get sell less to the US.
I don't really get, honestly how is this even a real question, if it is followed through as it currently stands, US gets 15 % tariff, 600 B in investments and more energy sales, maybe (likely) the EU institutions shoot it down, but if EU worked like US currently does and Kings word is law, we would get a terrible deal.
Yeah, that is what I distinguished quite a few replies ago.
I think everyone except a few right wingers around here thinks tariffs are bad for the US overall.
I have never said anything other then this is good for Trump, it's what he wanted and what he got. Imposing tariffs without getting tariffs back.
To re-iterate, bad for:
EU exporters (less business inevitably if the tariffs stick) US citizens (functionally 15 % tax on everything coming from EU) EU citizens (they work for the companies who will lose business)
Good for:
Trump (because he likes tariffs and he imposed them with no consequences)
The bolded part makes sense only if you think that it is the European exporters who pay the tariffs...
Here's a video discussing studies that looked at the effect Trump's previous tariffs had:
For the most part, the American competitors increased their prices to match the price of the imported goods...
1. No bolded part in what you quoted. 2. The post you quoted quite clearly states the 15 % tariffs is paid by US customers 3. "For the most part" is doing a lot of work here, how many, how long will they do that, why would they do that long term? Do you have any sources that this happened since the tariff shit started?
Also, your video is from 9 months ago about China - US trade war from the first term, in the world with a flat 10 % tariff on everything coming in to US, it seems wildly outdated.
Next, it very clearly stated that Trump's washing machine tariff resulted in those companies opening plants in the US. Now, the video is mostly talking about the effects in the US, but those factories that Samsung and other companies opened in the US knocked off jobs in South Korea, thus hurting their economy.
It also stated that steel and aluminum tariffs forced companies to move from China back to US, so in the case we are arguing about this would again hurt EU because it would lose investment.
Then it went into how the 25 % Truck tariff is still in place, decades later, again, this makes the current situation where most people arguing here are saying "they'll go away in the next administration". Oh, really, is that why Biden left the Trump China tariffs on and added some more?
Maybe next time watch your whole video, not just the part up until you get to your "gotcha" quote. (sorry, I saw your username and had to thrown in a snarky remark xD)
Ad 1. The bolded part in your earlier post.
Ad 2. And yet your posts constantly contradict that. The US government taxing its citizens to then give them that money back wouldn't make them any better off unless it was done through a wealth transfer from the wealthier to the poorer part of the society.
Ad 3. That's what the studies show, so I'm not sure what "doing a lot of work" you're talking about.
The bottom line is that the Americans were much worse off due to the tariffs. Yes, new jobs were created, but each of them cost the US a ton of money.
On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote: "America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
Americans love this shit. They want to be the big boss and they obviously love bullying and throwing their weight around. Everyone, including the EU is praising him, giving him these wins and hoping he goes away.
Don't get me wrong, I hope he dies, yesterday. I hope US can snap out of it. But I don't think they will. Have you heard what JD Vance has to say about Europe?
If we don't stand up to this shit we are going to get crushed. We are going to get crushed by not only US, China has been taking our cake for a while now, this is making them salivate.
I understand what you are getting at, and I am saddened to see people take such a reflexive approach to dismissing your concerns. I often find people hate Trump so much they don't let themselves internalize what is going well for him and they refuse to view the world through the deeply tragic and broken culture that dominates political power struggles. Trump didn't win because he had a good plan to make people's lives better. Similarly, Trump's "wins" do not necessarily need to improve American lives either. The goal of his negotiations is to harm other countries and position himself to acquire more wealth, fame, and power.
Whether Trump is an idiot or not, it is impossible to escape how much harm he has managed to do to various countries and political efforts. People can label him however they like, but the effect he has on the world will not be diminished by our own condescension.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
I might be a huge pessimist, but I think there is no reason to think this will stop any time soon. He just got elected. In 2016 we had "but Hillary won the popular vote". He won it now. He won with immigrants. He's still sitting at better approval rating then in his first term at the same time despite doing much more drastic shit.
Americans love this shit. They want to be the big boss and they obviously love bullying and throwing their weight around. Everyone, including the EU is praising him, giving him these wins and hoping he goes away.
Don't get me wrong, I hope he dies, yesterday. I hope US can snap out of it. But I don't think they will. Have you heard what JD Vance has to say about Europe?
If we don't stand up to this shit we are going to get crushed. We are going to get crushed by not only US, China has been taking our cake for a while now, this is making them salivate.
I understand what you are getting at, and I am saddened to see people take such a reflexive approach to dismissing your concerns. + Show Spoiler +
I often find people hate Trump so much they don't let themselves internalize what is going well for him and they refuse to view the world through the deeply tragic and broken culture that dominates political power struggles. Trump didn't win because he had a good plan to make people's lives better. Similarly, Trump's "wins" do not necessarily need to improve American lives either. The goal of his negotiations is to harm other countries and position himself to acquire more wealth, fame, and power.
Whether Trump is an idiot or not, it is impossible to escape how much harm he has managed to do to various countries and political efforts. People can label him however they like, but the effect he has on the world will not be diminished by our own condescension.
I found it embarrassing, particularly Light's copium.
To just take one small aspect of the damage Trump/Biden has done, there isn't a viable plan from the opposition party for women to regain their bodily autonomy in our lifetimes.
Think about that. People were born with a right that they lost under a Democrat president and neither of the two parties they are supposed to vote for is offering a viable path to getting that right back before it's irrelevant for them personally.
They'd be righteous to demand that right back with a gun pointed at anyone denying it to them.
On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote: "America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Tariff = lose-lose is an oversimplification. For example the EU's 10% tariff on cars. Is the EU also too stupid to realize that tariff = bad or perhaps they think the protection it offers to domestic auto companies outweighs any negatives to their consumers? Clearly the EU thought it was "good" to have a tariff against US cars but if a US tariff against EU cars is automatically bad then I'd like to hear some reasoning for the discrepancy.
On July 30 2025 10:20 GreenHorizons wrote: To just take one small aspect of the damage Trump/Biden has done, there isn't a viable plan from the opposition party for women to regain their bodily autonomy in our lifetimes.
Think about that. People were born with a right that they lost under a Democrat president and neither of the two parties they are supposed to vote for is offering a viable path to getting that right back before it's irrelevant for them personally.
They'd be righteous to demand that right back with a gun pointed at anyone denying it to them.
What does the political party of the current president have to do with SCOTUS making that ruling?
On July 30 2025 10:20 GreenHorizons wrote: To just take one small aspect of the damage Trump/Biden has done, there isn't a viable plan from the opposition party for women to regain their bodily autonomy in our lifetimes.
Think about that. People were born with a right that they lost under a Democrat president and neither of the two parties they are supposed to vote for is offering a viable path to getting that right back before it's irrelevant for them personally.
They'd be righteous to demand that right back with a gun pointed at anyone denying it to them.
What does the political party of the current president have to do with SCOTUS making that ruling?
On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote: "America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it.
EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us.
German steel? Dead.
German cars? Made in Hungary.
German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania.
German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders.
except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government.
Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care?
Here are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand?
Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Tariff = lose-lose is an oversimplification. For example the EU's 10% tariff on cars. Is the EU also too stupid to realize that tariff = bad or perhaps they think the protection it offers to domestic auto companies outweighs any negatives to their consumers? Clearly the EU thought it was "good" to have a tariff against US cars but if a US tariff against EU cars is automatically bad then I'd like to hear some reasoning for the discrepancy.
On July 30 2025 10:20 GreenHorizons wrote: To just take one small aspect of the damage Trump/Biden has done, there isn't a viable plan from the opposition party for women to regain their bodily autonomy in our lifetimes.
Think about that. People were born with a right that they lost under a Democrat president and neither of the two parties they are supposed to vote for is offering a viable path to getting that right back before it's irrelevant for them personally.
They'd be righteous to demand that right back with a gun pointed at anyone denying it to them.
What does the political party of the current president have to do with SCOTUS making that ruling?
To shift/misrepresent the blame. As to why GH purposely added that phrase, I think it's because Democrats are politically further to the left than Republicans, which means if anyone was going to ditch their establishment party in favor of socialism, it would be liberals/progressives, not MAGA/conservatives. Therefore, if GH is looking to increase support for socialism, it might be more practical to target the faults of the Democrats, rather than call out Republicans who can't even say the word "socialist" without vomiting or crying.
EPT
