One thing I like about Trump 2.0 compared to the earlier version is the mostly outstanding team he has put together.
Scott Bessent:
“Access to cheap goods is not the essence of the American Dream. The American Dream is rooted in the concept that any citizen can achieve prosperity, upward mobility, and economic security. For too long, the designers of multilateral trade deals have lost sight of this. International economic relations that do not work for the American people must be re-examined.
This is what tariffs are designed to address – leveling the playing field such that the international trading system begins to reward ingenuity, security, rule of law, and stability, not wage suppression, currency manipulation, intellectual property theft, non-tariff barriers and draconian regulations. To the extent that another country's practices harm our own economy and people the United States will respond. This is the America First Trade Policy.
We are identifying bad actors across a range of criteria, not just tariffs applied to our exports, but also non-tariff barriers, laws which unfairly apply fines to our exporters, government policies which undercut global competition and suppress wages and currency manipulation that enables persistent trade surpluses.
These are not the only metrics in which our global trading partners should be scored. That is increased burden sharing on security is critical amongst friendly nations. No longer should American tax dollars, American military equipment, and in some cases, American lives, be the sole bearers of upholding friendly trade and mutual security. Burden sharing is not a matter of offloading risk, but a matter of all benefiting parties having interest in the system. The shared interest ultimately strengthens the international system as the cost of disruption outweigh any benefits of dissolution.;”
I think your no plan comment is mostly hogwash.
