Trump's Wall & The Art of the Deal

As I write this, about 20% of US Government employees are either furloughed or working without pay. This partial shutdown is occurring due to a disagreement over one item: funds to build a border wall along the US-Mexico border. President Trump, who initially said that he would "proudly" take responsibility for any shutdown, has since blamed the Democrats. He has accused them of not wanting border security, i.e. "open borders", not caring about crime that immigrants supposedly bring, and being motivated by the desire to deny him "a win".

The truth is that no Democrats support what he claims that they support. While it is true that Democratic Congressmen have in the past voted to fund walls along the border, those barriers, which in great part still stand today, were part of a broader plan for border security and immigration policy.

No one believes that there shouldn't be a border, or that we shouldn't screen people who want to immigrate to the United States. What Trump's opponents do believe is that our immigration policies should be more humane and that the process should be more expedited than it is today.

The Wall itself (when referring to Trump's idea of a wall at the border, I will capitalize Wall), however, isn't part of an integrated immigration and border security policy. Trump's policies (if you can call them that) are more often than not slogans that garnered excitement and applause at his campaign rallies in 2016. Trump may be incoherent, ignorant and incompetent, but one thing that he is good at is reading a crowd and feeding them lines that will keep their interest and stoke their enthusiasm. Trump tapped into a vein of bigotry that ran through significant portions of the electorate. Immigrants, especially those who entered the country illegally, were a convenient scapegoat for many of the problems perceived these people. When Trump needed to convince the immigrant-haters that he was their guy, did he craft, with the help of experts, a thought through plan for securing the borders? No, he found a simplistic, easy to articulate applause line: that he would build a "big, beautiful, Wall". This Wall was predicated on bigotry and became a "campaign promise" because repeating it over and over fed into the feedback loop between Trump and his supporters that was a typical Trump rally. Since being elected, the Wall concept (stretching the meaning of the word "concept") hasn't gained any more solidity. It's still a vague and nebulous thing wherein the specifics change depending on Trump's mood. In addition, illegal immigration has been steadily decreasing over the last decade. And there's much evidence that the criminals and drugs aren't coming in over the supposedly unprotected border, but by sea, through tunnels, smuggled in trucks. Budgets for monitoring and interdicting this illegal activity have been reduced since Trump was inaugurated. He has focused exclusively on a Wall. Trump has also not addressed how the Wall will deal with the long river border between Mexico and Texas, or all the private land that will have to be seized through eminent domain.

Trump has always promoted himself as a great deal-maker, it was one of the things that many of his supporters claimed would make him a great president. He appears to have no inclination to actually negotiate. Negotiation in good faith requires that you give something up, or give something to the other party to get what you want. But he has proved that for him, making a deal means making a demand and then digging in his heels until the other side acquiesces. The same with bipartisanship. For him bipartisanship is the other party doing what he wants. What's ironic is that, back in February, a bipartisan deal was on the table. The Democrats were willing to fund a border Wall in exchange for a path to citizenship for people in the DACA program. Trump refused to sign it because it did not include several other immigration-related things, such as an end to family-based migration (what he called chain migration ).

Trump doesn't have a plan for border security, he has an ego-driven desire for "a win" by getting funding for an applause-line campaign promise based on bigoted assumptions. He doesn't know how to deal, he has a toddler-level "understanding" that tantrums are a great negotiating tool.

Tariffs

What is a tariff? Simply stated, a tariff is a tax that a nation places on specific imports.

Usually the purpose of a tariff is to protect domestic producers. For example, American widgets retail at $10/dozen. On the other hand, Panamanian widgets retail at $7/dozen. Labor costs in Panama are lower, or perhaps Panama is subsidizing Panamanian widget manufacturers. If quality is comparable, American consumers of widgets will purchase Panamanian widgets. This will cause American widgets makers to lose business, perhaps closing widget plants and the widget workers losing their jobs. If the U.S. places a $5/dozen tariff on Panama-made widgets, then Panamanian widgets become more expensive than American widgets. There are several possibilities for what happens next.

All American widget purchasers could now switch to American suppliers, saving $2/dozen. The Panamanian widget companies would need to find another market for their widgets. If this happens, there is every possibility that the price of American widgets will increase, since the pressure of lower-priced Panama-sourced widgets has been eliminated. American widget purchasers, as well as anyone who purchases a product that contains widgets, will be paying higher prices. There is also the possibility that American widget producers won't have the capacity to replace the Panamanian production. In this case, Americans will be paying the higher price of the Panamanian widgets that now include the tariff. The government will certainly be collecting the tax from the Panama widget companies, but who is really paying? The consumer, of course. There is no scenario where the widgets, whether domestic or imported will decrease in price.

Then there's the specter of retaliatory tariffs. Panama will undoubtedly be issuing tariffs of their own, say, on fleegles. American fleegle producers will likely see the demand for their exports to Panama go down, as Panamanian fleegle buyers find cheaper alternatives.

Tariffs can be warranted in the case of a domestic industry competing with imports that are being sold below cost (kind of like the Walmart strategy!), or for propping up a fledgling industry. Rarely do  across-the-board tariffs make any sense.

What tariffs aren't good for is providing an inflow of "billions of dollars" from the country on whom tariffs are imposed. They cause chaos and confusion and are a blunt instrument for international trade relations.

Unfortunately we have a President who doesn't understand in the slightest how tariffs work.

Why I Won't Vote for ANY Republican

Once upon a time I voted for the candidate irrespective of party. I voted for Republicans, I voted for Democrats, I voted for Libertarians, I voted for Independents. I agreed with some of the things that Republicans did and disagreed with some of the things Democrats did. I voted according to whom I thought would best represent or lead my state, district, city or the nation.

That all changed for me after the 2008 presidential election.

The mission of the Republican Party, during the presidency of Barack Obama, changed from principled opposition to obstruction at any cost. And the cost turned out to be pretty steep: acceptance of the radicals of the Tea Party fringe as mainstream; acceptance of the virulent strain of bigoted and racist hatred of a black man who dared to run for president, including the claim that Obama was not a United States citizen, promoted vigorously by now-President Donald Trump; and a program of digging in their heels and mindlessly opposing and obstructing everything that President Obama did. This obstruction was fairly easy to spot, it required no interpretation or speculation, but was stated clearly by none other than the Majority Leader of the United States Senate. It was expressed throughout Obama's terms by dozens of fruitless attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and culminated in McConnell's refusal to confirm, or even hold a hearing for, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland. Republicans at every level of government seemed to be on board with this and Republican voters seemed to buy into the apparent racism and irrational hatred for Obama.

In 2016, when Donald Trump was elected President, it got even worse. Trump built upon the mindless and overblown demonization of President Obama, Secretary Clinton and liberals in general that prevailed among many Republican voters and made it the centerpiece of his governing style. He emboldened white supremacists, neo-Nazis and others and exacerbated the already deep divisions within the country. The mainstream Republicans could have stood against the worst of his impulses while still supporting his policies (if you could dignify his brainless meanderings as "policies") that they agreed with, but they didn't. The Republican Congressional leadership, as well as state-level Republicans only intensified their support for Trump. They were prepared to prop him up, no matter what outrages and idiocies he perpetrated, as long as they could get conservative judges and tax cuts for the rich. And they continue to prop him up in the face of graft and corruption on an unprecedented scale, as well as incompetence and ignorance in virtually all matters.

Now we hear that in two states, Michigan and Wisconsin, Republican lame duck sessions of state legislatures are in the process of passing laws that restrict the power of incoming Democratic elected officials, officials who are replacing outgoing Republicans. The same thing happened in 2016 in North Carolina. Here is Lincoln, local Republicans pushed through a charter amendment restricting a Democratic mayor, who had already declared that he would run for re-election, from running again. Our Republican governor has used his own funds to "primary" other Republicans who would not vote in lockstep with him. So, when "the people" speak by voting out Republicans, the Republicans petulantly change the rules so that the will of "the people" is circumvented.

While theoretically there may be decent Republicans out there, and some may be good for their states, cities, the nation, anyone who aligns themself with the Republican Party, has by default, aligned themself with all of the sins enumerated above. Someday the Republican Party may heal itself, but that day has not yet come.