Ah, the simple joys in life. Wilburine Ross interviewed by Lou Dobbs… Sip slowly.
The general status of angst created by ordinary swamp review has a tendency to wear down a soul. It’s at the times when we feel surrounded we should reflect upon how lucky we are to have the T’Rex’s and Wilburines on our team. We’ve already won, our opponents just haven’t noticed yet.
This is more than a little funny. Senator Ted Cruz must not be having much success fundraising for his re-election campaign, as his latest publicity stunt outlines:
In essence, the architect of Obama’s Fast Track Trade Promotion Authority bill is using the border wall, which he is paid to oppose, as a tool to “gruber” his sheeple followers. Judging by the number of people responding to the tweet, he’s found a goldmine.
As many people are aware, Senator Cruz is part of the ‘controlled opposition’ ploy. As a dedicated UniParty benefactor of the U.S. CoC lobbying expenditures Ted’s role is to plow through the political field giving a crony-constitutional impression of one thing while loyally working to deliver the end result of the thing he optically rails against, like TPP or TPA.
The El Chapo/wall angle as a narrative and fundraising mechanism, is similar to the dead-end ploy previously exhibited by Senator Rand Paul in last month’s ObamaCare repeal narrative used as his fundraising tool. Both are fallacies of false choice. Both have no foundation in actual goal or intention. Both are ruses.
Having spent over 30 years deep in the weeds on the actuarial side of trade and economics, I can guarantee you there’s a generational need to completely reset all frames of reference when it comes to imports, exports, and U.S. trade principles in general.
It is no longer worthwhile even beginning a conversation around the arcane concept of “free trade”, especially when discussing commodities and agricultural trade. The “free market” was structurally disassembled years ago when multinational corporations began using the business end of agriculture to create investment and global profit via Wall Street.
The BIG AGRICULTURE legislative lobbying groups are funded -much like the U.S. CoC- with multinational corporations and multinational investment banks. Agricultural prices, formerly referenced on basic supply and demand principles have been bastardized through global purchases, and contracts therein, of U.S. farm products.
Simple question to understand the dynamic: “If there is such a U.S. glut of raw milk, then why has the 10-year price of milk skyrocketed”? Within the answer to that question you realize the product is not domestic. It is controlled by multinationals, exported under controlled contract, and the domestic price (you pay) driven by global trade not domestic production/consumption (supply and demand).
The inverse (import pricing) is also true. We’ve been getting screwed by the multinational interests of global trade for decades. This is NOT ‘free trade’. The BIG CLUB owns the process (inputs and outcomes) and manipulates the market in their interests, not yours. There simply is no “free market”.
[TRANSCRIPT] – 3:14 P.M. EDT – THE PRESIDENT: Busy day. They had a very busy day — had a good day. We’re doing well, very well. Things are turning around. I know they’re turning around for you folks, so I just want to welcome you very much to the White House — special place — America’s farmers and ranchers.
I especially want to congratulate Secretary — now I can say, Secretary Sonny Perdue, who was just sworn in as the Secretary of Agriculture — (applause) — sworn in by Justice Thomas. And it was a beautiful ceremony, and we’re going to celebrate a little bit later, and that’s great. We’re very happy. And you had a good vote too.
SECRETARY PERDUE: Yes, sir.
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How do you get congress to accept the NAFTA notification of intent letter? Why, you backstop the Canadian decision to undermine U.S. dairy farm exports by applying equity import tariffs and offsetting losses to U.S. manufacturers.
First stop, lumber mills. ie U.S. regional impacts, not coincidentally, represented by key Democrat constituents.
The congressional delegations from Washington State and Oregon happen to be mostly elected Democrats; and they happen to applaud the efforts; which means they are not able to criticize the approach. Hmm, it’s almost as if Wilburine and POTUS had a strategy or something. Nah, couldn’t be.
(Via CNN) These are the first tariffs imposed by President Trump, who during his election campaign threatened to use them on imports from both China and Mexico. The decision on Monday is bound to lead to a standoff and could stoke fears of a trade war between the US and Canada, two of the world’s largest trade powers.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said the tariffs, or taxes, announced Monday evening were being imposed after trade talks on dairy products fell through.
A very unusual report from Reuters announces the White House has extended an invitation for the entire U.S. Senate to come to the White House for a policy and security briefing on North Korea. The briefing is scheduled for 3pm Wednesday:
(Via Reuters) Top Trump administration officials will hold a rare briefing on Wednesday at the White House for the entire U.S. Senate on the situation in North Korea, senior Senate aides said on Monday.
All 100 senators have been asked to the White House for the briefing by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the aides said.
Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney appears on Bloomberg News to discuss the seismic, epic, thundershock confrontational clash that is about to take place between the Trump administration and the DC UniParty.
There are no adjectives capable of describing the scope and immeasurable scale of the battle that is about to transpire between the White House and the Democrat/Republican UniParty.
MONEY is where every entity within the full-swamp goes nuclear against President Trump and the administration. Despite all prior discussions toward this end, it is doubtful that more than one-in-a-million people can fully grasp the dynamic at play.
Because the procedural wonk is so inherently riddled with ten thousand tentacles of political schematics, I will defray the wonk-speak until after the video.
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If you are interested in deep political weeds, keep reading. However, if you have blood pressure issues or are concerned about your physical or mental health, STOP HERE and go enjoy life. Believe me.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions and DHS Secretary John Kelly visited the Southern border today and paused for an interview with Martha MacCallum:
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Almost simultaneously, OMB Director Mick Mulvaney gave an interview to the Associated Press where he outlines the White House priorities for the upcoming ‘bridge budget’ bill. The short-term budget (May through Sept 30th) is needed because congress never passed a budget from 2008 through 2017, and a continuing resolution spending bill expires on April 30th.
Following an earlier expansive press briefing by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, President Trump signs a memorandum in the Oval Office to outline launching an investigative trade memorandum on the steel industry.
[Transcript] 12:13 P.M. EDT -THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. We appreciate everybody for being here. It’s a historic day for American steel and, most importantly, for American steelworkers. Thanks, especially, to Secretary Wilbur Ross for helping to lead this critical effort. We’ve been working on it since I came to office, and long before I came to office. We’re going to fight for American workers and American-made steel. And that’s beginning immediately.
For decades, America has lost our jobs and our factories to unfair foreign trade. And one steel mill after another has been shut down, abandoned, and closed, and we’re going to reverse that. Other countries have made a living taking advantage of the United States in so many ways, as you know, and I’ve been talking about that for a long time.
Remember, nothing is ever disconnected – nothing is happening in a vacuum, every administrative action has a specific administrative policy at the effect level of the action.
♦President Trump has promised to rebuild our military assets. ♦Over the past several decades our big steel manufacturing capacity has dropped. ♦Today Secretary Ross announces efforts to investigate risks of import steel reliance. These three things are not disconnected.
[Transcript] 11:10 A.M. EDT – SECRETARY ROSS: Thank you very much for coming this morning. Last night, the Department of Commerce initiated an investigation under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. The technical caption is 19 USC 1862.
What that’s all about is that authorizes the Secretary of Commerce to conduct comprehensive investigations to determine the effects of imports of any particular item into the United States on the security of the country. This has been invoked a number of times before, most notably in the period of the Arab oil crisis some years ago.