Here's a very recent - as in a few minutes ago - example of that:In its latest assessment of the world economy, the International Monetary Fund emphasizes the toll that President Trump’s America First trade policy has taken on the global economy. From a situation of a synchronized global economic recovery in 2018, the world has now moved to one of a global economic slowdown. It has done so as investors both in the United States and abroad have held back on investment decisions due to heightened uncertainty as to future trade arrangements.Judging by Trump’s continued hardline stance on the Chinese trade issue and by his recent threats to impose punitive import tariffs on European automobiles, he either doesn’t appreciate how damaging his trade policy has been for both domestic and foreign investor confidence, or he is willfully ignoring the consequences. Instead, he chooses to blame the Federal Reserve for raising interest rates in December and for its reluctance now to cut interest rates more radically and to engage in a new round of quantitative easing.While using Powell as a punching bag might be a smart political ploy in the run-up to the 2020 election, it is doubtful that it will do much to boost the U.S. economy. Indeed, it’s all too likely that such hectoring will make it more difficult for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates, even if there were a reasonable case for so doing, for fear of appearing to be bowing to political pressure. It also likely will have the effect of further undermining investor confidence in the economy’s long-run performance by highly politicizing a key economic institution.At a more basic level, there is no empirical support for President Trump’s repeated assertions that, if only the Fed had not raised interest rates in December and if only the Fed was now more aggressive in loosening monetary policy, the U.S. economy would now be growing in excess of 3 percent.Rather, most mainstream economists would subscribe to Milton Friedman’s view that monetary policy operates only with long and variable lags. They would also subscribe to the view that the main factor now holding back U.S. and global economic growth is not an excessively restrictive Federal Reserve but rather President Trump’s contribution to an uncertain economic environment.
....My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?
And another thing . . . I thought Xi was his friend. This outburst is no doubt of a piece with the VSG's pattern of insulting and humiliating others and then assuming they'll still come to the table to cut a "beautiful deal."
But to characterize a Federal Reserve chairman as an enemy? File this one under "hyperbole has consequences."
What has prompted this latest bit of throbbingly purple invective is China's utterly unsurprising announcement of a fresh $75 billion in tariffs on additional US products.
Which spurred not only an indulgence in take-my-ball-and-go-home pouting, but an authoritarian insertion of the government into the affairs of private-sector businesses that make their decisions based on what serves their own interests, such as profitability, streamlined supply chains and efficient use of resources:
Our Country has lost, stupidly, Trillions of Dollars with China over many years. They have stolen our Intellectual Property at a rate of Hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year, & they want to continue. I won’t let that happen! We don’t need China and, frankly, would be far....
....better off without them. The vast amounts of money made and stolen by China from the United States, year after year, for decades, will and must STOP. Our great American companies are hereby ordered to immediately start looking for an alternative to China, including bringing..
7:59 AM - 23 Aug 2019
....your companies HOME and making your products in the USA. I will be responding to China’s Tariffs this afternoon. This is a GREAT opportunity for the United States. Also, I am ordering all carriers, including Fed Ex, Amazon, UPS and the Post Office, to SEARCH FOR & REFUSE,....
....all deliveries of Fentanyl from China (or anywhere else!). Fentanyl kills 100,000 Americans a year. President Xi said this would stop - it didn’t. Our Economy, because of our gains in the last 2 1/2 years, is MUCH larger than that of China. We will keep it that way!
Suddenly, this becomes about fentanyl.
I am now utterly convinced that Donald Trump, in addition to having the most stunted maturity level of any public figure in US history, is none too bright. He clearly has no grasp of free-market economics.
And, no, none of the alternatives being considered on the fringes - William Weld, Joe Walsh, Jeff Flake - are the least bit viable. And any Democrat presidential candidate is a walking disaster.
We are so hosed.
It is so very late in the day.
Money, not brilliance, matters in what America has become.
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