If there is anyone who didn’t quite understand the quote: “there are trillions of dollars at stake”, in the context of the 2016 election, well, a letter today from the biggest EU economic nations will provide greater context.
Additionally, as you absorb the position behind their claims, never forget how much foreign governments spend in lobbying the U.S. congress for legislation adverse to the interests of U.S. workers.
Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain are claiming the U.S. congress has no right to reform the U.S. tax code because the reforms undercut their ability to hold an advantage over the U.S. in multinational trade deals.
This quote is particularly enlightening:

[…]  The letter argues that proposed changes to the U.S. tax code could give American companies an advantage over foreign rivals.

The Globalist Position: ‘All your tax code are belong to us.’  Yes Alice, the election of President Trump, and the specific economic and trade policies within his platform, are an existential threat to decades long multinational schemes.

CNN MONEY – Germany, France, Britain, Spain and Italy have written to Treasury Sec. Steven Mnuchin, arguing that tax bills passed by the House and Senate run afoul of treaties and could distort international trade.

“It is important that the U.S. government’s rights over domestic tax policy be exercised in a way that adheres with international obligations to which it has signed-up,” the letter states. It was signed by the countries’ finance ministers.

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USTR Robert Lighthizer is attending the World Trade Organization (WTO) summit in Argentina.

[…] Ahead of the meeting, the United States blocked efforts to draft a joint statement emphasizing the “centrality” of the global trade system and the need to aid development. Its opposition has raised concerns that the WTO will not be able to accomplish even modest goals, such as addressing fishing and agricultural subsidies, at the conference. (Reuters)

The Ambassador’s opening remarks to the conference are below and include Lighthizer rightly informing the WTO that the Trump administration believes they have strayed far away from trade issues and are now, essentially, uni-focused on litigation.  He’s right.

[Transcript] “I would like to start by thanking the government of Argentina for hosting MC11, and Minister Malcorra, Director General Azevedo, and their staffs for their excellent work. We appreciate all the effort over many months that go into creating a conference of this magnitude.
In the brief time I have, I would like to make a few basic points.
First, the WTO is obviously an important institution. It does an enormous amount of good, and provides a helpful negotiating forum for Contracting Parties.  But, in our opinion, serious challenges exist.
Second, many are concerned that the WTO is losing its essential focus on negotiation and becoming a litigation-centered organization. Too often members seem to believe they can gain concessions through lawsuits that they could never get at the negotiating table. We have to ask ourselves whether this is good for the institution and whether the current litigation structure makes sense.
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Yesterday we pointed out the reasons why the New York Times was making up ridiculous claims about President Trump replacing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson – SEE HERE –
If you are paying attention to the comprehensive Trump Doctrine you can specifically see how President Trump and T-Rex are an incredible partnership. [The swamp hates that.]

(Tweet Link – Instagram Link)

Additionally, if you expand the Trump/Tillerson geopolitical strategy circle of administration officials to include: U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Defense Secretary James Mattis and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, you really begin to see the most effective foreign policy team we have ever seen.
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Back in 2015 we described the basic principles behind MAGAnomics. CTH continually reminds people that for most Americans under age 45 they have NEVER seen, or participated in, a fully functional U.S. economy. There’s a reason for those reminders.
The Main Street economy is like a train that has sat idle for three decades. MAGAnomics is that train’s engine. President Trump’s ‘America-First’ economic policy agenda is the starter fluid and the super-fuel.
After the initial blast of quick-start is applied, the engine ignites, coughs, backfires loudly, clears out the cylinders… then slowly -awakening- it begins to auto-sync… It winds up as the internal energy builds… Then comes that first, familiar and glorious roar:

Remember, this economic engine has not yet been put into gear.  She has gained more than 3% GDP growth while tuning herself.  Once this glorious American industrial machine gets moving, there ain’t much that can ever stop it…
The prior usurping economic control agents starved her of fuel to shut her down.
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There’s a big con job just over the horizon.  All of the elements are there.  The timing, the platform, the personalities, the discussion topics, etc., it’s a familiar script.  CTH would like to direct attention to this interview which took place last night on Laura Ingraham’s new Fox News show.  Listen carefully to three elements:
♦On Tax Reform – on one side of Rubio’s ‘full-throated‘ mouth he wants higher taxes on corporations 22% -vs- 20%. In the almost the same breath, inside the same argument, he says “it’s not their (the government’s) money”.   Try to reconcile that.
♦On DACA – [Remember, three months ago President Trump gave congress six months to fix DACA]  Rubio says the “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” (DACA) program is not the “Dreamers”.  What? Yes it is. The childhood arrivals ARE the so-called ‘dreamers’.
♦However, much more importantly, listen to what is said on “chain migration“.  Ingraham asks if Rubio supports “chain migration”.   Rubio says no, then immediately says: “I’ve always agreed to limiting chain migration to immediate family members”. WHAT? That is chain migration.

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I’m getting really sick and tired of economic analysts talking down the U.S. economy even when they are surrounded with resoundingly good news.  These economic control agents are furious that President Trump is deconstructing their decades-long lies; and showing just how manipulated the U.S. economy has been – by elites, to the detriment of the middle-class…. I digress:
Despite the devastating hurricanes in August and September the Third-Quarter GDP grew at a revised upward rate of 3.3%. Third quarter growth was initially reported at 3%.

BLOOMBERG – The U.S. economy’s growth rate last quarter was revised upward to the fastest in three years on stronger investment from businesses and government agencies than previously estimated, Commerce Department data showed Wednesday.

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President Trump’s geopolitical economic strategy is most often talked about regarding trade, China and resetting a massive U.S. trade deficit therein.  However, a critical part of that strategy, generally overlooked by U.S. media, is the relationship President Trump is building with India.
Expanded economic engagement with India creates more than just bilateral trade opportunities. A strengthened relationship, and possibility of moving India to the top of the trade priority list, also creates leverage toward China and ASEAN partner nations.
While most were paying attention to Thanksgiving’s ‘Black Friday‘ shopping; China quietly, lowered U.S. import tariffs.  BIGLY.  See Here [ <– That’s a big ‘effen deal]
Chinese media watch President Trump’s ongoing engagement with India far more closely than U.S. media watch it.  Chairman Xi Jinping and his economic advisers know the scale of risk inherent to their economy with a growing U.S./India trade relationship.

NEW DELHI, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) — Ivanka Trump, the daughter and adviser of U.S. President Donald Trump, has arrived in India for the annual global entrepreneurship summit, foreign ministry officials said Tuesday.
The summit scheduled to held in the southern city of Hyderabad Tuesday is being co-hosted by India and the United States.

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CTH has been looking, unsuccessfully, for China SME’s who have insight on the DC lobbying angle by Chinese foreign nationals and the hidden story of how the Trump administration might be confronting that aspect.
Gordon Chang briefly touches on that note during a discussion segment on the overall outcome of President Trump’s 12-day visit to Asia.
Apparently, if Chang’s sources are accurate (likely they are), the notification by POTUS Trump toward Chairman Xi Jinping, of the lobbyist warning did take place [Video 02:25].

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The foreign influence lobbying is a critical element for us domestically in the larger geopolitical strategy.  Chinese nationals pay our congressional representatives millions of dollars to purchase U.S. foreign policy.  CTH is cautiously optimistic this is a key element of Robert Mueller.
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Go through the archives and you’ll note a strategy unfolding that few, including us, could fully conceptualize when it first appeared.  Way back when candidate Trump first began to put his economic plans into platform outlines the subtle signature was there, but few were paying attention.
In order to reverse three decades of middle-class economic erosion, there were indicators that Trump’s strategy was a radical change in approach.  In essence the strategy was to split the economic policy into two areas and sequence the policy: highly-consumable goods (first) and durable goods (second).
Both product sectors have historically been viewed and approached by economic policy makers using a single financial strategy.  That singular approach gave rise to Wall Street benefiting and Main Street suffering.  Investment-class gained; middle-class suffered.
Trump outlined an approach –albeit vaguely– that was multidimensional.
His policy would first target multinational corporations, using the U.S. Treasury (Mnuchin) to weaken their grip and influence; simultaneously, he would use energy policy to drive down domestic prices in highly-consumable products (fuel, food, energy sector).  These sectors are not measured in fed inflation indexes; however, if lowered, these facets of consumer spending can also increase the amount of disposable income available for workers.
In essence, expand the economy by lowering the aggregate cost of living for the middle-class who live paycheck-to-paycheck.  Use monetary policy, fiscal policy and trade policy), to entice domestic investment and create jobs; and ultimately put upward pressure on wages.
That’s where we are now.
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$64 billion of the current annual trade deficit with Mexico stems from the auto sector alone.
For over a decade auto manufacturers have moved to Mexico in order to import parts from Asia, assemble and install them, and then ship the completed cars into the U.S. through NAFTA without duties (tariffs).
The U.S. auto ancillary business groups (parts suppliers) have been pushed out of competition in the auto sector by this corporate profit strategy.  Thousands of U.S. jobs have been lost in both the plant assembly and the ‘auto-parts’ manufacturing sector.
CTH has called attention to this bastardized supply chain for years.  Foreign auto-parts, made by foreign workers, assembled into U.S. owned manufacturing, and sold as U.S. automobiles. The weird supply chain and assembly process is essentially a multinational corporate scheme (in the auto sector) which exploits one of the loopholes in the 25-year-old NAFTA agreement.
If the assembly plant was on U.S. soil the foreign (mostly Asian) parts would be taxed as imported parts.  However, so long as the assembly is in Mexico (or Canada), the origin of the parts is currently irrelevant, and the finished automobile crosses the border into the U.S. avoiding the taxes using NAFTA.
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