Latest / Politix / Liberation Ruining The Nation

Transcript

Liberation Ruining The Nation · Politix

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is part of the reason why when things happen outside this trade,
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: tariff,
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: whatever realm,
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: and Democrats don't react or they have a mealy-mouthed reaction,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like,
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: if you're not willing to be bold on this issue now,
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: you don't actually believe,
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: like snatching people up off the streets and sending them to El Salvador,
• 0:18
  like Democrats are being much better on tariffs than they are
• 0:20
  on that question.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: Do you really think that in 22 months,
• 0:23
  people are going to be like scrutinizing what you said about
• 0:26
  snatching people up
• 0:27
  off the streets and that you're actually going to be on the
• 0:28
  wrong side of that issue?
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, everyone.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: You're listening to a free preview of the Politics Podcast.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's Liberation Week here at Politics.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: So we're going to talk through Donald Trump's fun new global trade war.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: What's happening?
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: What to expect under various scenarios?
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: Is there any going back?
• 0:51
  And how are Democrats doing as Donald Trump's big money backers
• 0:55
  head for the hills?
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: We'll try to answer those and other questions this week.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: So if you want to hear the whole conversation,
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: just go to politics.fm and upgrade your subscription.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Hey everyone, welcome to the Politics Podcast.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Brian Boyler.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Matthew Glacius.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: So this week, I guess we're doing it.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: We're touching the hot stove.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're liberated.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Except for that hand, which has been on the hot stove for almost a week.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Skin's all melted, boiling.
• 1:27
  There's some deranged man in a golf shirt holding my hand on
• 1:30
  the stove until my
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: bone begins to char.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: I was out of town for a wedding this past weekend.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe it's just projection, but it felt...
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: It was like spooky or eerie.
• 1:44
  So I wasn't in Washington where everyone I think is kind of
• 1:47
  aware of what's
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: happening and have some sense of the implications of it.
• 1:51
  And I also wasn't in New York City where I think also the word
• 1:56
  is getting out about this.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm watching people just go about their business like normal.
• 2:01
  And it reminded me of watching the Chernobyl miniseries on HBO
• 2:06
  where all the people
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: in Pripyat watched
• 2:09
  the Chernobyl plant meltdown and like didn't realize that they
• 2:11
  were already cooked.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: But maybe that's a little fatalistic and you can talk me down.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, I think it is worth being clear.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I got, you know,
• 2:28
  I saw a lot of snark from political obsessives being directed
• 2:33
  at Trump's Wall
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Street backers from people who were like,
• 2:38
  how could you be surprised that he did this thing that he said
• 2:41
  he was gonna do?
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: And Jeff Stein from The Washington Post,
• 2:45
  who I know and who I used to work with and who did a lot of
• 2:48
  good reporting on
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Trump's tariff plans during the campaign,
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: did some of this as like,
• 2:53
  you could have saved yourself a lot of money by subscribing to
• 2:57
  The Washington Post,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: et cetera.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: But so I want to clarify,
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: though,
• 3:01
  that what Trump announced on Liberation Day is in fact
• 3:05
  different from what he
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: campaigned on in a way that was –
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 3:13
  one thing is that like Trump has never been known as like a man
• 3:16
  of his word or a
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: figure of extreme constancy.
• 3:21
  So the idea that his actual tariff policy would deviate
• 3:25
  somewhat from his stated
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: campaign pledges,
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: was completely reasonable.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then a lot of people who supported Trump,
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: a lot of business people,
• 3:36
  assumed that it would deviate in the direction of being more
• 3:39
  sensible than what he promised.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: But what he actually did was the opposite,
• 3:45
  because he said in the campaign that he wanted to do a 10%
• 3:51
  across-the-board tariff
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: on every country.
• 3:56
  And then he also said that he wanted to do tariffs that were
• 3:58
  higher than that on China.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then in the weeks before the tariff announcement,
• 4:05
  there was this notion that what he might announce was a program
• 4:08
  of reciprocal tariffs,
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 4:10
  So that like he would levy tariffs on foreign countries to the
• 4:15
  extent that they put
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: tariffs on us.
• 4:18
  Most people,
• 4:19
  I think on Wall Street,
• 4:22
  interpreted that reciprocal tariffs idea as good for them.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you look up what foreign countries' tariffs are,
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: almost every country's tariffs on the United States are lower than 10%,
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: So reciprocal was understood to be backing off the 10% pledge.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: And if you look at the countries that are higher than 10%,
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: which you can do.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's on Wikipedia.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's out there.
• 4:49
  It's overwhelmingly super poor countries in sub-Saharan Africa,
• 4:54
  plus I think Belize.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: And they're not that much above 10%.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody really cares.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to say nobody cares if you put a 14% tariff on Lesotho.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not –
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: important to Wall Street.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's not macroeconomically significant.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: It would be weird.
• 5:11
  It's weird to like lash out at random sub-Saharan African
• 5:15
  countries with poor state
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: capacity who are relying on terrorist revenue.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: But Trump didn't do that.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Trump did not
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: do reciprocal tariffs and Trump didn't do the 10% global tariff.
• 5:27
  What Trump did was a 10% global minimum tariff plus higher
• 5:32
  tariffs on other
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: countries that he characterized as reciprocal,
• 5:37
  but they're based on this demented formula where he's taking
• 5:43
  the trade deficit that
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: we have with foreign countries and
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: dividing it by the total volume of US imports from that country.
• 5:52
  And so he's coming up with things like 17% tariff on all
• 5:57
  exports from Israel,
• 5:58
  even though Israel actually tried to preempt this by reducing
• 6:02
  their tariffs to zero.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: But that has no impact on the formula.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: it's just,
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: it's a much more dramatic,
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: it's frankly stupider than anything that was in the mix.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's more extreme than the 10% global tariff.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: They claimed that there's some much more elaborate math behind it,
• 6:24
  but they just put two constants in and one of the constants is
• 6:28
  four and one of the
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: constants is one quarter and they multiply the two of them.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: So if you,
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: my son's doing fractions in a fourth grade,
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: if you multiply four by a quarter,
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: you get one.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: So if you multiply anything by one, you get the thing itself.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just this dumb fraction.
• 6:50
  Stephen Miller says that the fraction represents the implicit
• 6:54
  force of non-tariff barriers.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Stephen Miller doesn't know what he's talking about.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: So there's just a real shock, I think, at what's happened here.
• 7:04
  But I don't think anyone snarking at these guys was necessarily
• 7:11
  saying or intending
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: to convey,
• 7:15
  you should have been able to anticipate exactly this or
• 7:18
  something very close.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: But I think it's reasonable to be like,
• 7:22
  you're taking a bet on somebody who either intentionally or
• 7:25
  through ignorance
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: mischaracterizes what tariffs are.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 7:30
  And I think now we're in a situation where Trump is either
• 7:33
  through ignorance or malevolence,
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: mischaracterizing what a trade deficit means.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 7:39
  And I think it's reasonable for people who are meant to protect
• 7:44
  hundreds of
• 7:44
  billions of other people's dollars as like people who manage
• 7:49
  risk to take a gamble
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: on that guy was really stupid.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: And like,
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: we should be okay calling them stupid.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't mean it's like, okay, I'm glad you're speaking out.
• 8:01
  I hope you use your resources and your connections to try to
• 8:04
  fix some of this now
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: that you realize that you got it wrong.
• 8:07
  But like,
• 8:07
  maybe you shouldn't be like the president of JP Morgan or whatever.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 8:13
  I think what you're saying there is like much better actually
• 8:18
  than a lot of the
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: literal snark that I've seen.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because what you're getting at, right, is that,
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Donald Trump is a bad person, right?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like he's very dishonest.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe he doesn't know what he's talking about.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: At any rate, says things in public all the time that are not true.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: And he has this personalist leadership style in which he's not,
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: like amenable to open debate or structures.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: And like that is dangerous, right?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because so stocks have been crashing for days.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: But as we're recording Tuesday morning,
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: they're going back up based on some,
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: good news rumors from Scott Besant that maybe Trump will back off this.
• 9:07
  And like,
• 9:08
  I think the point that you want to make that I want to make is
• 9:10
  that like.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Structurally,
• 9:14
  Donald Trump is like a bad man who is leading a cult-like
• 9:18
  political operation whose
• 9:21
  only real through line is that he's trying to secure legal
• 9:25
  impunity for himself and
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: his followers and dismantle any kind of –
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: constraints on his action.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that is bad.
• 9:35
  The way that he tanked global financial markets over the past
• 9:40
  few days is an
• 9:42
  example of the kind of bad thing that can occur when a
• 9:46
  mercurial madman is just
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: empowered to act on his whims.
• 9:54
  And if you can get him to back down off of this,
• 9:57
  that doesn't actually fix the problem.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: I would add one small thing to this,
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: which is like...
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not like he's just delivering on his promises.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's... Like he's not doing that.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: No, you had to have some understanding of his character.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: And like...
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: If you understood him to be a bad man who's sort of power mad,
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: what is the value of a tariff to him?
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not just that he is under some...
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: delusion about the Gilded Age and how great things were back then.
• 10:35
  Donald Trump exploits every tool available for his own personal
• 10:39
  benefit or to
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: punish people,
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: to bring people to heel,
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so I remember throughout the campaign,
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: people like you and me being like,
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: if he gets in,
• 10:47
  he's not going to use the tariffs as like some
• 10:50
  re-industrialization tool or as some
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: alternative to the income tax or supplement to the income tax.
• 10:56
  He's going to use the tariffs to extort favors from US
• 10:59
  corporations and extort
• 11:02
  trading partners for,
• 11:03
  for better terms and maybe even just for personal money,
• 11:07
  right?
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Like throw some money into my Bitcoin thing and we're good.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if you had that kind of understanding of his character,
• 11:17
  it was crazy that anybody with anything on the line would
• 11:20
  support him in any way.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: And they were all like, now we got this.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: We understand better than you.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: And like, no, you didn't.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, I,
• 11:31
  I tweeted something nasty at Bill Ackman because he's like I
• 11:34
  think one of the more
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: reprehensible of these guys.
• 11:37
  But that doesn't mean that I want Bill Ackman to just slink
• 11:40
  away and do nothing.
• 11:41
  Like I want him to use whatever clout he has left to atone and
• 11:45
  fix – I mean Ackman
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: has been an asshole consistently since the campaign started.
• 11:51
  But I mean I just think that it's like the danger – sorry,
• 11:55
  I shouldn't say the danger.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: One danger that I am currently –
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: Concerned about is that,
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: so like Trump just now tweeted that,
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: talks are going well with Korea on reaching a new trade deal.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so,
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 12:14
  I think there's a chance that like Trump will feel that his
• 12:18
  hand was a little
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: burned by the stove,
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: will roll this policy back in many different ways,
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: will,
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: say he won concessions.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, like we've been talking about this for months now.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: But like.
• 12:32
  The first iteration of Canada-Mexico tariffs,
• 12:36
  like Trump announced,
• 12:37
  markets freaked out.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: And then like within a day,
• 12:40
  those tariffs were delayed for a month because there was going
• 12:42
  to be a new fentanyl
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: task force,
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then because that worked for Trump –
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: he like pushed forward with it.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: And before Liberation Day,
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: people can forget this,
• 12:55
  but like the stock market was already down before Liberation
• 12:58
  Day because of
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: increasingly aggressive tariffs on Mexico and Canada.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: But it was like, had been like,
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: slowly going down.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: So then Trump went bigger with Liberation Day.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then there was a huge collapse.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: And now I think he may back off the brink, right?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of people are going to say if he does that,
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: if the market goes back up,
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: if most of these tariffs don't actually end up being implemented,
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: because countries strike deals,
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: it's going to be like,
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: Trump showed the haters again, right?
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: And what I want people in the business world to recognize,
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: to think about,
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: is like,
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: if this was a guy from a left-wing political party...
• 13:44
  You know,
• 13:44
  like,
• 13:45
  what would you be saying about this kind of seesawing,
• 13:48
  right?
• 13:49
  Even if the seesaw kept landing in places you were ultimately
• 13:53
  sort of comfortable with,
• 13:54
  right?
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: it is not good for the global economy that every morning,
• 14:02
  trillions of dollars in wealth bounce up and down based on
• 14:05
  Donald Trump's tweets.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 14:08
  That like Bloomberg,
• 14:09
  like I've got,
• 14:10
  you know,
• 14:11
  the terminal app because I'm a columnist there.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: And like they have just like tariff updates constantly.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is like not healthy.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 14:20
  Like business people should be thinking about business
• 14:24
  considerations and like the
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: government should be trying to govern the country.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: And Trump is, you know,
• 14:34
  not totally indifferent to substantive and political risks when
• 14:39
  he does things.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: He has some ability to shift course.
• 14:43
  But each time he feels like he's gotten away with something,
• 14:47
  he goes for more.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: And he's gotten away with a lot of
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because of January 6th, fundamentally, I think more than anything else.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: And like, he's really, really, really emboldened now.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: He's trying always to empower himself.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: He's doing things that are destructive.
• 15:08
  Even when you get him on like,
• 15:10
  two steps forward,
• 15:11
  one step back,
• 15:12
  like that's one step forward.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, it's very bad.
• 15:17
  And I think this,
• 15:19
  Ackman this morning was like backing off his criticisms of Trump.
• 15:24
  Not really,
• 15:25
  but you know,
• 15:25
  he was doing the like flatter the dear leader thing.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like you got to listen to Scott Bessett.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 15:30
  if you can use this to strike deals and get other countries to
• 15:33
  reduce their barriers,
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: like that's great.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And like, it's not great.
• 15:37
  It's better for Trump to strike deals and back down than for
• 15:40
  Trump to like plunge
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: the world into it.
• 15:45
  But like the only actual solution here is for Congress to
• 15:50
  reassure control over trade policy.
• 15:52
  But more than that,
• 15:53
  to like have a president who has some integrity and
• 15:57
  intellectual discipline.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like we can we can do this for years.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: But like that,
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 16:03
  if you look at the famous stories of like how Argentina went
• 16:06
  from being a rich
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: country to a poor country,
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: it's not like one day they made a bad policy.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's this trajectory of like statist control over trade and,
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 16:20
  granting of special favors to different companies and like
• 16:23
  giving subsidies to
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: offset the harms of different things.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the course Trump has us on.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: I agree.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Like to your point,
• 16:32
  I'm pretty certain if Bernie Sanders had implemented anything
• 16:35
  remotely like this,
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: had he become president,
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: there would be an impeachment underway right now.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: And like he'd face higher than average risks of being assassinated.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: Like it would be really- Yeah, there'd be a coup.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: I mean- Yeah, you know, and I think what you're getting at is that
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: and it militates actually for more,
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: like Twitter harassing of people like Bill Ackman,
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: is you want them to be saying something else fundamentally,
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: which is like,
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: Our judgment about this guy was wrong.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: He's got three years and nine months left in his term.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: But in that time,
• 17:21
  he needs his tariff authority revoked and he needs to be slow
• 17:24
  walked by Congress.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: And as he backs down,
• 17:28
  Congress needs to make sure that this isn't part of a cycle the
• 17:31
  way we started
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: getting into with Mexico and Canada because –
• 17:38
  The on-again,
• 17:41
  off-again nature of the policy is itself extremely harmful.
• 17:45
  And like – in fact,
• 17:49
  in a way,
• 17:50
  it's probably worse than if he was just like,
• 17:52
  this is the policy.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's not going anywhere, right?
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean the original 10% policy I think was stupid.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, you could plan around it.
• 18:04
  Lots of countries over the course of world history have put
• 18:07
  like sort of misguided
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: taxes in place for one reason or another.
• 18:12
  It would be a bump to different things and it would make most
• 18:17
  people worse off,
• 18:19
  but not like.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: if you think about,
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: if you take it super duper literally,
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: it's like the imports are like 18% of GDP.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so if you increase their cost by 10%,
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: that's like a 1.8% bump in the price level as a one off.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: So like, that's not good.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: But the world would move on from something like that.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now,
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: politically,
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: of course,
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: Democrats would be like,
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: you were supposed to make groceries cheaper,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: and you made them 1.8% more expensive,
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: which would be a totally fair hit.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: It would be a dumb policy.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: But if you're Tim Cook,
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: You'd just be like, I don't know, man.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to try to release another phone.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like it has no impact on your actual planning.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like the costs pass through or they don't.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: And life goes on.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: This, like...
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's going to be a 20% import tax on German-made machine tools,
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: so I can't build a factory.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: But also,
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: maybe there won't be,
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: but maybe it'll be impossible to import clothing from Southeast Asia,
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: so I should build a factory.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: But also, maybe there won't be, because...
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: They're going to strike a deal.
• 19:37
  Like that's- All development that relies on any foreign input
• 19:41
  is essentially frozen
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: while they wait to figure out what the fuck the policy is going to be.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: Including- Is worse than if it's like,
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: we know this is about negotiating new trade agreements,
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: or we know this is about like revenue and re-industrialization.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like,
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: you can't do anything under these terms,
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: including like the China part,
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: which I think is actually less-
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like less subject to like political disagreement in the United States,
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: but more hinges on...
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 20:14
  if you actually want companies to like diversify their supply
• 20:18
  chains away from China,
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: then you need to convince them that it's permanent,
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 20:25
  Like I think a lot of Democrats actually would support that
• 20:28
  kind of measure,
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: maybe,
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: but it's like you would have to see and like pass laws.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: So...
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing,
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 20:38
  you're talking about Ackman because he's been vocal about this
• 20:41
  on Twitter in a
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: confusing way.
• 20:43
  But like Elon Musk reportedly was in a tizzy to try to stop
• 20:49
  this before it happened.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: And he failed.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 20:52
  he used his access to the president to route information around
• 20:58
  Peter Navarro,
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: to like try to intervene,
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: to like warn him that the financial market reaction to this would be
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: And like Trump told him no.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: So Musk has not only obviously been a big supporter of Donald Trump's,
• 21:11
  he's in particular been a big supporter of Donald Trump's
• 21:16
  efforts to dismantle any
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: kind of procedural,
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: obstacles to his whims.
• 21:25
  Like that's been the essence of – because like Doge as a
• 21:29
  concept existed in various
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: different forms.
• 21:32
  And at one point it seemed like it was going to be a kind of a
• 21:36
  private sector-led
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: like blue ribbon commission,
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: right,
• 21:39
  that was going to come out with like big recommendations that
• 21:42
  would be guaranteed a
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: floor vote in Congress,
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: something like that.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: And Musk has pivoted hard in like not that direction, right?
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: What Doge is doing is –
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: scouring the statute books,
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: trying to find the most dramatic,
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: vaguely legally defensible way to immediately cut spending,
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: regardless of what the cuts are on,
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: So like,
• 22:06
  they have cut contracts from the Department of Education to do
• 22:11
  program evaluation
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: of Department of Education spending.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: Which from an efficiency standpoint is crazy.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: But from a like,
• 22:19
  does the language of the contract allow you to cancel the
• 22:21
  contract standpoint makes
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: perfect sense.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: And like what Musk was just bit by here is exactly that.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like exactly that, you know, Trump maximalism.
• 22:34
  And like he needs to understand or the people that he is
• 22:37
  working with need to
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: understand that like that is a bad idea.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like in a normal process, right?
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like in Trump one,
• 22:50
  some guy in the chief of staff office would have lied to Trump
• 22:54
  and just said to him like,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: no,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: no.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: You can't just assert national security authority in total bad faith.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: and raise these tariffs.
• 23:05
  Like there has to be like a bonafide reason requiring like a
• 23:08
  years long study and
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: sign off of the civil servants at the Treasury Department.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and then like that wouldn't have happened.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: But now it's the opposite.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody's like, yeah, you know what?
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: The Supreme Court is very deferential to national security claims.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: You could just make stuff up and do whatever.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: And like Elon has been encouraging that.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: He's been fostering that.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: He's been defending that.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: He's been telling people in the Congress that that's good.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: And like that is why Elon
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: he now has been unable to course correct on this.
• 23:41
  Like,
• 23:41
  because Trump is a disaster and this is a bad way to run the government.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 23:46
  like we're dealing with a billionaire egomania problem here
• 23:50
  where like Musk doesn't
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: realize that the concept of autocratic rule is bad.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: He just thinks that maybe Trump is a bit of an idiot.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: And if he had been in charge, there would have been no mistakes.
• 24:00
  But of course,
• 24:00
  Doge has been out there making a ton of fucking mistakes too.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: And like, I feel like that's what the,
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: what the blinders are, right?
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's not,
• 24:09
  it's not that this is the sort of thing that would make someone
• 24:11
  like Elon Musk
• 24:12
  reconsider his understanding about the value of legitimate
• 24:17
  democratic rule,
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: He just wishes that,
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: somebody else were president with the same basic will to power,
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: just a better brain.
• 24:28
  But like,
• 24:29
  although I also think that a thing that keeps happening with
• 24:32
  Trump is that,
• 24:35
  um,
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: elite actors on the right underestimate him.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of people,
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: starting with Paul Ryan,
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: kind of adopt this view that's like,
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Trump's a bozo.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: I don't love the idea of our political party being led by a bozo,
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: but it is what it is.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: This bozo is in charge.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: And since he's a bozo,
• 25:02
  I'm going to come in and use flattery and manipulation and get
• 25:05
  him to do what I want.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that,
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: I think that the record just reflects that,
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Trump is much smarter and shrewder than people think.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: And he's, like, genuinely dangerous.
• 25:20
  You know,
• 25:20
  and like and like and like,
• 25:22
  oh,
• 25:23
  you know,
• 25:24
  he lost the election.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: He wants to make these like false elections.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: this was Mitch McConnell's time in the battle,
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: like after after Ryan was done away with was like,
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: OK,
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: Trump lost.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: He's off, you know, talking this bullshit.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: This will be like my opportunity to ease him off the stage.
• 25:40
  And like it wasn't like Trump sees the rope that McConnell gave
• 25:45
  him and he didn't
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: hang himself with the rope.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: He hung Mitch McConnell.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:49
  I look like I,
• 25:49
  I,
• 25:50
  I,
• 25:51
  I view this as a kind of like low cunning and extensive will.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: I like,
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: I would,
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: I would not use the word smart to describe this dude,
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: but,
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: but yes,
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: like they underestimate his willingness to take incoming and,
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: create problems if at the end of the fight, he gets his way.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: And like,
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: it's probably too late now,
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: but like what Paul Ryan did is kind of slink away and say,
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: like,
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: I can't vote for Donald Trump anymore.
• 26:21
  I've not seen him say,
• 26:22
  I made a mistake in thinking that I could control him.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I've watched the next person,
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: the next person,
• 26:28
  the next person convinced themselves that they could succeed
• 26:31
  where I failed.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: And what I need Elon Musk to know is that it's not winnable.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: But this is what I mean by smart though.
• 26:39
  Like something that I hear all the time and you see in people's
• 26:44
  actions that they
• 26:45
  believe it is that like Donald Trump is incredibly susceptible
• 26:49
  to flattery.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: And like I just like I don't think that that is true.
• 26:56
  I think that the record reflects the fact that Donald Trump
• 27:01
  understands that
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: putting that out there as a meme about himself is incredibly powerful.
• 27:08
  Because it means that everyone who disagrees with him about
• 27:11
  something that he's doing—
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: like frames their disagreement in this like maximally positive way.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 27:18
  the only people who I have heard actually say the thing that
• 27:22
  you're saying,
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: because they tried it too at the beginning,
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: is Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi.
• 27:28
  You know,
• 27:29
  like their first reaction to Trump taking office in 2017 was to
• 27:32
  be like,
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: This is amazing.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like we've got someone who's broken with the free market dogmatism.
• 27:40
  And I should actually say,
• 27:41
  it wasn't just them,
• 27:42
  like Bernie Sanders did it too.
• 27:44
  There was a lot of like,
• 27:45
  oh,
• 27:45
  how refreshing we're going to do this big infrastructure bill.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: I remember when they took the house in 2019,
• 27:50
  I was like hoping that they were just going to charge at him to
• 27:53
  like dig up all of
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: his corruption scams,
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: blah,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: blah,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: blah.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: no,
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_01: we're going to go to the White House and offer him $2 trillion to do an
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: infrastructure bill.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like-
• 28:03
  But to me – and I think this is something that people should
• 28:06
  think about more
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: because it's like why didn't that work,
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 28:11
  It's not because Donald Trump is a ideological purist
• 28:16
  libertarian ideologue.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 28:20
  Like it didn't work because Trump is in fact not this like
• 28:27
  easily flattered bozo.
• 28:29
  No,
• 28:29
  he smells weakness when people do that and then he asks for
• 28:32
  more and comes for more.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not just that he smells weakness.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's just that like he understood what they were after.
• 28:39
  Like I don't think the analysis was like – it is often true
• 28:44
  that like you can
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: actually get more – as a congressional Democrat,
• 28:47
  that you can get more spending out of a Republican president
• 28:51
  than you could on a
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: kind of a party-line vote.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: And,
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: they came with this playbook that,
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: people say,
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: works on Trump,
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: and you,
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: puff him up and talk about,
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: what a great deliverer he would be,
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: et cetera,
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: et cetera,
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: et cetera.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: But,
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: he understood that at the end of the day,
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 29:10
  Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer were going to try to defeat him
• 29:12
  in the 2020 election.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like, it's partisan politics.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: And he wasn't going to help them do that, you know, and he didn't do it.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: And, like, Musk came in and, like, who knows, you know, like,
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: Elon has gotten a lot out of this relationship.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's not like- Well, he's lost $200 billion.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just saying it's not like it's a sucker play on Musk's part,
• 29:34
  but it's just like also not true that like Trump is going to
• 29:39
  turn the wheel over to him,
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: to J.D.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: Vance, to Mitch McConnell, to Bill Ackman, to anybody.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: We don't totally understand what he's after, but like he is-
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Maintaining his power.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: He cares a lot about that.
• 29:56
  What I've noticed is that the people who end up humiliated by
• 30:01
  him are the ones who
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: play the game that you're talking about.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: And when the rare kind of like liberalish leader who's obviously not –
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: like rival Trump for power because nobody really rivals the US for power,
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: at least as of April 8th,
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: 2025.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: But like Macron,
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: Mark Carney in Canada,
• 30:20
  like there are leaders who have figured out that telling Trump
• 30:26
  no and basically
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: saying you're an asshole gets you to a better place than Trump.
• 30:34
  then kind of like small-scale caving,
• 30:38
  cutting losses,
• 30:39
  trying to flatter him.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: That path leads to this sort of recursive exploitation or extortion,
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: whereas we have bottom lines and we're not going to cross them,
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: or we have red lines and we're not going to cross them.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if he respects it.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure it makes him angry at some level,
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: but he ends up treating them in a better way and in a more like –
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: normal kind of relationship.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know what I mean?
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: maybe,
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: I,
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think we'd like know exactly where,
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: where things are ending with Canada or with Denmark,
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: or with anything else.
• 31:16
  But,
• 31:17
  you know,
• 31:18
  I mean,
• 31:18
  I,
• 31:18
  I,
• 31:19
  I think that you have to say,
• 31:23
  like,
• 31:24
  if you are a
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: right-of-center business leader who,
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 31:32
  generally thinks they prefer Republicans to Democrats and
• 31:37
  certainly prefers
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_00: moderate Democrats to left-wing Democrats.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you know...
• 31:45
  Just like say that you disagree with Trump about trade policy
• 31:49
  and that it's bad and
• 31:50
  that you are hoping to find politicians to support who will
• 31:53
  advocate for better
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: trade policies.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: This like, I'm sure the leader will da-da-da-da-da.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like, I don't totally understand why Trump
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: has this view about bilateral trade deficits that he keeps articulating,
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: but he really has articulated it for decades.
• 32:12
  Even though he veers far from this course on a day-to-day or
• 32:16
  week-to-week basis,
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: depending on what's going on,
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: he does always return to it.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's wrong.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is not how the world works.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's not reflective of anything.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: Part of the problem that's bedeviling these people though is like,
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: They can look ahead three years and nine months.
• 32:36
  They suspect,
• 32:38
  I think rightly,
• 32:39
  that Trump will not be impeached and removed.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so irrespective of what happens with this
• 32:48
  trade gambit and the market sell off and now we're going to
• 32:51
  negotiate these tariffs down,
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: is that on the other side of that,
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_01: he's still going to be fucking president.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: And they, you know, now they know that he'll come for them.
• 33:02
  Wait,
• 33:03
  but that's where,
• 33:04
  like,
• 33:05
  I think the point that,
• 33:06
  like,
• 33:09
  as far as I can tell,
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: the people who have responded to Trump in like a normal way,
• 33:15
  like normal politics is if the leader of a country is somebody
• 33:20
  who you agree with
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: on some topics,
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: but disagree with on other topics,
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: you just say that.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: And like,
• 33:27
  I have just like actually not seen the evidence from any corner
• 33:32
  that like there's
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: some problem with that,
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_00: that Trump has some like secret way of saying,
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: Getting at you.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_00: like,
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: I think that if Trump tomorrow phones up Mark Carney and is like,
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: here's some collaboration that I want to do about like uranium and,
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: American nuclear power plants and China or whatever.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: And like, it seems like a reasonable idea.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I think they would just do it.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: you know, just like operate on dual tracks.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like it seems okay.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like in an interesting way,
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: like one person who maybe nails this better than some is like Netanyahu,
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: who just like continues to make Israeli policy in like a regular way.
• 34:29
  Like he didn't pretend that he was okay with a 17% tariff on
• 34:34
  Israeli exports.
• 34:37
  He said,
• 34:39
  if you want to have reciprocal tariffs of zero,
• 34:42
  like we can do that.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: But like Trump didn't say yes.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so they, I don't know, like they just disagree.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know,
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 34:51
  like Trump isn't turning off US military support for Israel any
• 34:55
  more than any other president.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: In some ways that's a unique situation.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's also – it's not just the U.S.-Israel thing.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's that Trump is legitimately,
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: even with these tariffs,
• 35:04
  I think part of the reason Netanyahu was so surprised is that
• 35:07
  like if you had to
• 35:08
  guess who Trump was going to exempt from these – I mean that
• 35:11
  was my guess too.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: Israel, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Hungary, right?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: And except for Russia, he didn't exempt any of them.
• 35:20
  And so they might have a little bit more leeway because he sees
• 35:23
  them as part of the future.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas like he –
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: He wants to own part of Denmark.
• 35:31
  So we should probably pause here and on the other side of the
• 35:35
  paywall talk about
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_01: like what potential paths forward because,
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: all this market sell-off has been anticipatory.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's like people see that he announced the tariffs.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: They know what this means for future supply, for future wealth.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: They're anticipating a big slowdown and so there was a sell-off.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_01: But like we haven't actually reached the –
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_01: like the macroeconomic or fiscal part of this story yet.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: So let's talk about that on the other side.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: And if you want to hear that part of the conversation,
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: go to politics.fm and upgrade your subscription.