kava

they won the election. now they are dismantling the levers of government. the goal is to weaken all other national institutions until eventually they can just ignore Congress or Supreme Court

or is there some other narrative

I believe a couple different things

a) he's intentionally weakening the US economy to both weaken establishment institutions and spread mass discontent. he wants people nice and angry and fearful for the future. so when he takes more extreme actions later on, it doesn't seem as bad. also he's probably preparing for some sort of riot movement that includes political violence in the next couple years. as the establishment gets weaker, he'll be in a better position to essentially ignore them. so for example Supreme Court says something unconstitutional? Maybe he just ignores it and enforces his will regardless

b) in the near future we may see a serious decoupling of the US economy from the world. maybe it's due a planned war or some other circumstance and this is in preparation for that. tariffs tend to cut off the economy from the outside world. it'll hurt less later on if we do some of it now

Brother, your economy is getting gigafucked by Trump either way.

If someone shoots at you, you don't shoot yourself in the foot to spite them. Canada is reliant on US trade. Cutting it off entirely would cause a serious economic shockwave that's hard to understate.

Nationalize US factories on their soil

This is extreme and could warrant an invasion from the US. Wars have been fought for less. Look at what happened to Guatemala when they wanted to take back some of the half off their farmland owned by Chiquita.

Canada is a mid-sized power but not really in a position to flaunt US power like that

they're speedrunning the 20th century

the tariffs are multi faceted

a- it's to create a hostile and confrontational diplomatic environment

b- to dramatically worsen the economic situation domestically. weaker economy, weaker establishment institutions. angrier people, extreme decisions become more palatable.

c- slowly prepare the US for a disconnect from the global economy. this way when the curtain comes down and there's another great war, it hurts less.

we're witnessing a slow moving coup. they're getting people nice and angry for the near future. it'll be important for the upcoming political violence

i come from a tariff heavy country. you want a sneak peak? inflation. shit is gonna get more expensive. that's it

there has to be a real fear of losing something, otherwise there's no pressure to change. they will never change voluntarily. and after they win/lose an election there is zero pressure to do anything

the best time to criticize is in the immediate lead up to an election

exactly. it escalates over time as things become normalized.

if there are 10 stages we're like at stage 3

in 2016 we were at stage 1. back then, Trump wouldn't dare have said "immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country" - that wouldn't have had a good reception back then. too on the nose. but you start with more subtle things and slowly you shift the overton window of what is and isn't socially acceptable

it's a treadmill and we're jogging

Yes, for most of my life I thought we would never get rid of the illegals for precisely this reason. They are so integrated into our economy that eliminating them would cause a huge fallout. Almost 15 million people here. And they're dramatically over-represented in specific industries.

So for example, you mentioned food. Agriculture, especially in the SW, runs on illegal labor. Construction all over the country runs on illegal labor. The people washing dishes at restaurants, the people cleaning up offices at night, the people working at landscaping companies, etc.

All of those industries are about to experience a severe supply shock of labor. This is going to mean increased prices for food, for landscaping, for construction, etc. Not only that, the services are going to be increasingly harder to staff. It's really hard to find an American willing to relocate to rural areas to dig holes. It's hard to find ones that are willing to pick fruit, etc.

Not to mention the effect that 15 million less consumers eating at local restaurants, buying products from Amazon, paying rent, will have.

And the worst part of it, the part that scares me, is that I'm certain Trump and his allies know this. They are entirely aware of the potential consequences of what they are doing. It does not take an economic savant to understand this and certainly Trump has some very smart advisors around him. So they are aware and they are doing it anyway.

What does that imply? That means they are willing to nuke our economy for this (throw in tariffs too while we're at it). And when I say nuke I mean nuke- there's no going back after this. We're causing permanent long-term structural damage. Why would he be willing to do this?

I fear because there's a lot worse on the horizon. Global war will overshadow the economic fallout from these decisions and will be pointed to as the cause of the near-future economic woes. Maybe I'm jumping to conclusions here, but this is not a good omen. It's sort of like suicidal people giving away all their money before they off themselves. It's a red flag.

I think we're fucked with a capital F

but as long as he’s hurting non-whites they will sit around giving each other rage handies and praising him

What I find fascinating is the right-wing illegal immigration latinos who support Trump. Up until now they've been saying "He's not going to deport us, he's deporting the criminals". I just read a news article about half of the people they've arrested so far did not have any criminal records.

White House press secretary goes live the other day and says "We're going to deport all of them. They're all criminals as far as I'm concerned"

I think people have this instinctual burning desire to feel part of an "in-group" and to hate against an "out-group". It's such a strong burning desire that people will jump through so many mental hoops even when they are in the "out-group".

Note that being illegal is not a crime. It's like when you get a parking ticket. It's against the law but it isn't a criminal violation. But of course the administration doesn't care and neither does the army of rabid Americans cheering on the destruction of the country.

Just saying, this sounds like a VERY expensive distraction from the fact that they’re working hard on robbing the US coffers blind…

Doesn't matter if the country goes broke. Something like 90% of immigration detention centers are privately owned. This whole thing is going to funnel hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars of taxpayer money right into the pockets of wealthy shareholders.