Friday, April 4, 2025

Here's Why Trump Will Win the Tariff Standoff

Here's Why Trump Will Win the Tariff Standoff

AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent made it clear in an interview with CNN that the era of trade imbalances is over, and under President Trump, the U.S. will no longer tolerate unfair treatment. 

During a discussion with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, Bessent confidently explained the administration’s position on tariffs and trade policy, signaling that Trump’s economic strategy is deliberate and well thought out.

When pressed on how the administration’s policies could impact the auto industry, particularly regarding vehicles made with foreign parts, Bessent was blunt. 

“If half the cars coming into the United States are foreign-made, that's hard to turn around overnight, as you know,” Collins said. “So what would you say to people in the auto industry who are worried about that timeline and how quickly that could shift?”

“Buy American,” Bessent said bluntly. He also clarified that the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) exempts certain vehicles and parts from the new tariffs.

Collins attempted to raise concerns from U.S. allies, questioning what the administration would say to countries like South Korea and Japan, which are now facing increased tariffs. Bessent’s response was direct: “Well, I would say they’ve been doing it to us for a long time. And, if they don’t like tariffs, then why do they have them?” His answer underscored the administration’s stance that America has been on the losing end of trade deals for too long.

As for whether the tariffs should be considered permanent, Bessent took a wait-and-see approach. “I think we’re gonna wait and see how this plays out,” he explained, suggesting that adjustments could be made based on how the policy unfolds.

Collins also asked about the possibility of retaliation from other countries. Some foreign leaders have hinted at potential countermeasures, while others have opted to observe before making a move. Bessent urged patience. “One of the messages that I’d like to get out tonight is everybody sit back, take a deep breath, don’t immediately retaliate, let’s see where this goes. Because if you retaliate, that’s how we get escalation.”

RelatedKevin O’Leary Slams Canada’s 'Sheer Stupidity' in Trade Standoff With Trump

When Collins pressed him on whether such escalation could turn into a full-fledged trade war, Bessent dismissed the idea. “Not a trade war. Depends on the country,” he said, before explaining that history favors the United States in such disputes.

“Remember that the history of trade is, we are the deficit country. The deficit country has an advantage,” he explained. “[The others] are the surplus countries. The surplus countries traditionally always lose any kind of a trade escalation.”

His message to foreign governments was clear: Acting hastily would be a mistake. “As a student of economic history or a professor of economic history, I’d advise against it,” he said. When Collins sought further clarification, he reinforced the point: “I would say that doing anything rash would be unwise.”

Bessent’s remarks leave no doubt that Trump’s trade policies are rooted in historical precedent and strategic calculation. While globalists may panic, the Trump administration remains confident that America is in a stronger position than its trade partners. And history is on our side.

Bessent's message is clear: Trump knows exactly what he’s doing.

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2025/04/03/heres-why-trump-will-win-the-tariff-standoff-n4938553?utm_source=thdailyvip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl

Democrats Had Better Start Panicking Over DOGE's Next Move

Democrats Had Better Start Panicking Over DOGE's Next Move

AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana

In a move that is likely to have many members of Congress on edge, Elon Musk is planning to have the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) look into how lawmakers have become “strangely wealthy” despite their relatively modest public salaries.

Speaking at a town hall in Wisconsin on Sunday night, Musk revealed that his team at DOGE will investigate how certain members of Congress have amassed fortunes that far exceed their official earnings. With the prospect of real scrutiny on their finances, those who’ve been cashing in on their positions have every reason to be nervous. 

One attendee at the town hall had asked Musk if DOGE had uncovered evidence of funds wired from the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). 

“They’ll [the government] send the money overseas to one NGO [non-governmental organization], then they’ll go through a bunch of them, and then I’m highly confident that a bunch of that money then comes back to the United States and lands in the pockets of the people you just mentioned,” Musk replied. 

“But it is a circuitous route. It doesn’t go directly, but let’s just say that there’s a lot of strangely wealthy members of Congress where I’m trying to connect the dots of, ‘How do they become rich?'”

Rank-and-file members of Congress make $174,000 annually. Last year, Musk — whose net worth is pegged at $330 billion by Bloomberg — helped kill legislation to raise congressional pay, then later supported an increase as a means of fighting corruption. 

Scores of lawmakers who have spent decades in Congress are millionaires.

Two of the wealthiest members of Congress are former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), with an estimated net worth of $250 million, and Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), whose fortune sits around $552 million. Of course, their situations are vastly different. Scott built his fortune before entering politics, co-founding HCA Healthcare — a massive hospital and medical facility network in Florida — as well as Solantic, a chain of urgent-care clinics. 

Recommended: Here’s What the Stranded Astronauts Have to Say About Trump and Musk

Pelosi’s immense wealth, however, is deeply tied to a series of remarkably well-timed stock trades that she and her venture capitalist husband, Paul, made with major investments in tech giants like Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Netflix. Her uncanny ability to make profitable trades has raised serious suspicions, with many believing that her position in Congress has given her an unfair advantage that ordinary Americans could only dream of.

“How do they get $20 million if they’re earning $200,000 a year?” Musk asked. “We’re going to try to figure it out and certainly stop it from happening.”

Faster please.


NYT Panics Over Religious Freedoms, 'Particularly Christian' Groups

NYT Panics Over Religious Freedoms, 'Particularly Christian' Groups

AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File

If there's anything more frightening than a Supreme Court "which has been receptive to claims from religious groups, particularly Christian ones," the New York Times has yet to find it.

"It has been almost three years since the Supreme Court last heard arguments in a case that turned on one of the religion clauses of the First Amendment," NYT's Adam Liptak wrote on Sunday, "a curious lull in what had been a signature project for the court led by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.: to bolster the place of faith in public life."

"The hiatus is over," Liptak noted, and according to Yale Law's Justin Driver, quoted in the story, "This spring’s trio of religion cases threatens nothing less than to raze foundational structures of American law and life."

“The Supreme Court this term could quite plausibly destroy the American public school as we have known it for the last several decades," he added.

Scary stuff, kids. 

Liptak looked at three religious liberty cases set to be argued before the Supreme Court in the coming weeks.

"The first one, to be argued Monday, asks whether a Catholic charity in Wisconsin should receive a tax exemption. In April, the court will consider whether a Catholic charter school in Oklahoma is constitutional and whether parents with religious objections to the curriculum in Maryland schools may withdraw their children from classes."

"Taken together," Liptak wrote, "the three cases will test the limits of the court’s assertive vision of religious liberty, which has been one of its distinctive commitments for more than a decade."

"An assertive vision of religious liberty" is a curious phrase to use for a nation established to protect liberty, particularly religious liberty, by the descendants of people who fled Britain in search of religious liberty.

"It's right there on the label," you might say.

Let's look at that scare phrase, "particularly Christian ones."

Liptak noted that "There has been one exception to religion’s winning streak at the court in the last decade: the justices’ rejection in 2018 of a challenge to the first Trump administration’s ban on travel from several predominantly Muslim countries."

But SCOTUS didn't reject the challenge on religious grounds; it rejected the challenge because the so-called "Muslim travel ban" was no such thing. Travel restrictions were placed on countries that were found by the State Department to be state sponsors of terrorism, including North Korea and, eventually, Venezuelan officials. The fact that the other countries were "predominantly Muslim" says more about certain people's tolerance and encouragement of terrorism and little or nothing about the First Amendment. 

I don't pretend to know how the Supreme Court will rule on any of the three cases mentioned in the NYT report. And while I'm no legal expert, at least two of those cases look to me like slam-dunk cases of religious liberty — no matter what religion the plaintiffs might be. There's nothing particularly Christian about keeping your kids out of classes you don't approve of, and the charity in question doesn't have to be Catholic to deserve a tax exemption. 

The case involving the Catholic charter school might be on shakier ground, but I have no problem with it. Not that SCOTUS listens to me, of course. 

Final thought: if it's Christian groups making successful appeals to justice from the Supreme Court, maybe it's because they're the ones with legitimate grievances concerning their First Amendment rights.

https://pjmedia.com/vodkapundit/2025/03/31/nyt-panics-over-religious-freedom-n4938441

There's Something Very Suspicious Going on With Those Tesla Protests

There's Something Very Suspicious Going on With Those Tesla Protests

AP Photo/Josh Edelson

You too can be reimbursed for up to $200, and all you have to do is protest Department of Government Efficiency chief Elon Musk from the comfort of a Tesla dealership. It isn't clear whether the offer from the left-wing Indivisible Project covers the cost of spray paint, keys, or bail, but money is fungible — so wink-wink, nudge-nudge, comrade. 

"Indivisible Project can reimburse groups for eligible expenses associated with your Musk or Us actions, up to $200 per group, per congressional recess!" the group's website reads, followed by a link to get the reimbursement form. 

But here's the kicker. Since gaining social media attention, the page has been removed — curiouser and curiouser — but the form is still online. I suspect the people who make their living this way, or at least enjoy a nice side gig or three, are involved with various online groups where direct links to reimbursement forms can be shared. 

That isn't me being paranoid. That's just me understanding how the internet works. 

Indivisible Project's parent organization — more on that in a moment — was founded and is run by the husband-wife team of Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin. Greenberg is your typical NGO type — nice upbringing, good schools, brief Capitol Hill career (with Tom Perriello [D-Va.] and at State). She followed up with the creation of an online anti-Trump publication called "Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda," and the establishment of the Indivisible Civics organization.

While DataRepublican doesn't show Indivisible Civics receiving any taxpayer money, it has received $5,424,005 from somewhere, with about half of those funds going to wages and salaries and another 10% to benefits. 

But here's where it gets fun. The fine print disclaimer at the bottom of the since-deleted signup page reads, "Indivisible.org is a joint website of Indivisible Project and Indivisible Action. Indivisible Project is a registered 501(c)(4). Indivisible Action is a Hybrid Polítical Action Committee. They are separate organizations."

That's legalese for "the parent organization (Indivisible Civics aka Indivisible.org) is legally and financially shielded from any stupid stuff people do with the money and encouragement of the new organization (Indivisible Project)." But again, money is fungible — so wink-wink, nudge-nudge, comrade. 

Back in the '80s, we called that "plausible deniability."

I haven't been able to find anything about where Indivisible gets its funding. What I did find was The American Prospect's Peter Dreier saying that Indivisible's goal is to "save American democracy" and "resume the project of creating a humane America that is more like social democracy than corporate plutocracy."

And the way to do that is by paying agitprop protestors with mysteriously sourced dollars to try and frustrate the will of the American people as expressed in the last election.

Do you know why the Tea Party had to be squelched out of existence by the Obama IRS and the RINO establishment? Because it was a genuinely grassroots movement against government overreach. Any form of protest is to be permitted or even celebrated — provided it enjoys the imprimatur of the Establishment or the NGO/Billionaire-class, assuming you can find a functional difference between the two.

https://pjmedia.com/vodkapundit/2025/03/31/today-in-astroturf-get-paid-200-to-protest-elon-musk-and-tesla-n4938448?utm_source=pjmediavip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm

Thursday, April 3, 2025

Elon Musk SHOCKS Crowd with BOMBSHELL Showing What Biden Was REALLY Up to with SSI and Illegals (Watch)

Elon Musk SHOCKS Crowd with BOMBSHELL Showing What Biden Was REALLY Up to with SSI and Illegals (Watch)

AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein

For years, people on the Right spoke out against Biden's southern border, going so far as to point out that Joe couldn't have made it any worse even if he was doing it on purpose. Keywords, doing it on purpose. And, of course, our pals on the Left and in the Democrat Party would accuse us all of being conspiracy theorists because it wasn't like these illegals were given social security numbers or voting or anything.

Except, well, that may not have been exactly true.

Watch this:

Post continues:

... people now telling you that Elon is stealing Social Security supported Biden’s open borders — scenes of which can be seen below.

Boy, oh boy, did Elon Musk drop a bombshell last night.

And if this is true, no WONDER Democrats are throwing such a hissyfit about Musk and DOGE looking at Social Security data. They don't care about protecting your private information, no, they are protecting their own backsides.

As usual.

Registering to vote.

Which is fascinating because even with that, Kamala lost.

Wow, just how unpopular are Democrats right now? Heh.

https://twitchy.com/samj/2025/03/31/elon-musk-shocks-crowd-with-number-of-illegals-with-social-security-numbers-benefits-who-can-vote-n2410727?utm_source=twdailyamvip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl