Donald Trump the Megathread part II - mod warnings in OP, Updated 18/03/25

dinorebel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324236#Comment_123324236

Same as Brexit then

For Petes Sake

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324805#Comment_123324805

The thinking is Trump is a big baby with a massive chip on his shoulder.

Everything is centered around his own personal grievences.

tom1ie

I’ll post this here also:

Can the great and the good in this thread educate me please. 
With regard to pharma, how do US tariffs have an impact on US companies based in Ireland? 
Let’s take Pfizer for example, they export to the USA and make certain drugs in Ireland that they export from Pfizer IRE to Pfizer USA. 

They will have to pay (potentially in the future) a 25% tariff to the USA government on the drugs they are importing into the USA from Ireland. 
They pass that cost onto the USA customer. 
The USA customer does not like this and reduces the demand for these drugs and actively looks for an indigenous drugs manufacturer to replace Pfizer. 
This process takes years as a new manufacturing plant would have to be setup to cater for the demand for the drugs in the USA and replace the Irish manufactured drugs. 
During this time Pfizer start selling into Canada, Mexico, Asia etc to cover the lower demand in the USA. 

Prices don’t increase (bar inflation of course) anywhere else outside of the USA because…..well why would they? 

In this scenario, why are Irish pharma jobs at risk?

Surely the only loser in this is the American consumer through increased drug and health insurance premiums?

10000maniacs

Trump was on there today saying these tarriffs are to keep imports out and to raise money for tax cuts.

Hmmm, isn't that an oxymoron?

Surely it's either one or the other? Can't have it both ways.

Will_I_Amnt

Hes happy to talk about extraordinary offers from other countries anytime

https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1907902500482535843?t=b4rU62K_QnN2H-x7DbK6DA&s=19

eightieschewbaccy

I do find it sort of funny that we're still trying to treat Trump as a rational actor at this stage.

Goldengirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123322651#Comment_123322651

That is exactly what dictators usually do.

At present he has created an alternate reality of " the enemy " which now includes EU because it is a strong voting block and doesn't align to his values .

This is nothing to do with economy and all about exerting control over democracies and institutions that have influenced world peace since the 1940s

I would not be surprised if indeed he did manage to somehow pull off another term in power , and / or he will most likely set it up so that one of his sycophants can continue on his autocracy after this .

I recognize this sounds like conspiracy but in order to be a CT it would have to contain more probabilities and maybes than actual situations and real life events .

Just remember how surprised we were over this side of the world when he became President in the first place , when he refused to speak out against extreme right wing racists , when he loaded the Supreme Court towards conservatism , when abortion rights were abolished in various US states , when he managed to wiggle out of numerous situations which would normally have ended a politicians career including sexual assault ,and treason inviting riot on the seat of government itself when he changed the rules so an encumbent or former encumbent of the White House was immune to prosecution ...the list is endless and is the road to autocracy .

Why the hell wouldn't he change the rules so he or his choice can be the next and continuing President of US ?

Kermit.de.frog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324958#Comment_123324958

This is all a starting negotiating position. He has already said today he is willing to do a deal with China on Tiktok in return for tariff relief.

For Petes Sake

Also, any future notion that you must bend the knee to Trump goes out the window. He doesn't give a rats and will do what he wants anyway.

Look at his two biggest European allies - Meloni and Orban. Just slapped them with 20% tariffs.

eightieschewbaccy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324991#Comment_123324991

Thing is he's approaching allies like he's a mob boss extorting a business. That's not gonna be as effective as he thinks I suspect.

LambshankRedemption

This is all a starting negotiating position. He has already said today he is willing to do a deal with China on Tiktok in return for tariff relief.

China may not be willing to do any kind of a deal after he acknowledged Taiwan as a sovereign state.

pad406

He's a bully. There are countless stories of his businesses screwing over the little guy after the work has been done.

He thinks that as he's now POTUS he can do the same to EU, Canada, Mexico, China etc.

Me thinks he's in for a very rude awakening

Widdensushi

Some quick back down again "offering to negotiate"boy who cried wolf is coming to mind.

circadian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324991#Comment_123324991

Existing and new trading blocs will quickly adjust to Trump's tariffs. There is plenty the US exports than can be obtained elsewhere. Return tariffs will be measured and thought out compared to his, what appears to be, chatgpt job.

Nobody is coming begging.

circadian

I honestly think this is all a grift. You'll have a hard time convincing me there isn't some insider trading with shorting the market and buying up again to pump the market.

The problem with this strategy is the market won't recover as trading partners no longer have any trust in the US.

joseywhales

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123322904#Comment_123322904

He never had supporters, he just had trolls with **** lives who want to bring others down to their level, turns out there a millions of them.

joseywhales

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123325006#Comment_123325006

Exactly they only way to deal with extortion is to plan an all out attack with everything you have at the moment of your choosing or be a slave to the extortionist forever

gormdubhgorm

Theory that Trump "Tarriff chaos" is a strategy to remake the Economic World Order, lowering the value of the Dollar but still having the Dollar as the world's reserve currency.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ts5wJ6OfzA

However, given that Trump/USA has lost trust with countries how will they be willing to join this new world order?

Kermit.de.frog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123325006#Comment_123325006

It will be because America is too important and exceptional a market.

You seem to be suggesting the EU should be tough. You do know you are saying that from a country that could be economically crushed with the stroke of a pen by Trump?

This is the connundrum now. We have Micheál Martin desperately telling the EU not to retaliate because of the consequences for us and the French saying the opposite.

Good for France. It won't be them who suffer most.

Even the most fanatical EU supporter must see the cracks here. It's not only Ireland that disagrees with France and Germany. Italy and Sweden have also been clear they don't want retaliation, they want negotiation to get these tariffs lowered or removed.

Why such stark differences? Because each country is exposed differently. Some have everything to lose and some have relatively little to lose.

This is as a big a test for the EU as the financial crisis. When times are good these differences don't have to come to light so sharply but when times turn bad that's when tensions come to the surface along with national self interest.

Already we are now at 100% tariff disadvantage with our largest trading partner compared to the UK.

This is not a good place for us. We need to get those tariffs down and the EU needs to negotiate that.

circadian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123325118#Comment_123325118

You are overestimating Trump's ability. He cannot crush our economy overnight as the multinationals that have invested here will continue to do so as moving operations in an extremely short timeframe would be orders of magnitude more expensive than simply weathering the storm.

greenfield21

What happened the Democrats? Oh wait yeah they were bought out by all the billionaire corporations. 🤣🤣

https://twitter.com/mazemoore/status/1907836058005295612

https://twitter.com/mazemoore/status/1907545423776031096

https://twitter.com/mazemoore/status/1907883583228051964

circadian

bUt ThE DeMoCrAtS!

Emblematic

What Trump is doing now was the standard left position not too long ago. Protect jobs and industry with subsidy and tariffs on foreign goods. Global free trade was the right wing position.

My name is URL

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123325165#Comment_123325165

If you are going to attempt rewriting history, at least do better than 'it's what the other side wanted'

How does that seem like a win to you?

thereiver

Trump is not helping the American consumer or the economy the stock market is down by trillions , when the stock price of a company go,s down it makes it harder to get cheap finance for factorys or other projects . 401k pension funds investment s are mainly based on the stock market .

If anyone advised trump on tariffs they are idiot .Russia is under trade sanctions do tariffs are not relevant in this case .

Neamhshuntasach

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324789#Comment_123324789

Well they ain't buying sh1t from penguins but they still tarriffed them.

Will_I_Amnt

Just gave me a little giggle 😃

https://twitter.com/donwinslow/status/1907911335557607513?t=CJWvAHhFP6p1iqBz8zHjdA&s=19

briany

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123324970#Comment_123324970

You treat irrational people the same as you treat rational ones, assuming the interaction is necessary. Act with calmness and consideration. This is borne out of caution and pragmatism when it comes to the irrational. You don't inflame the situation by matching their energy. Only at the point when you judge them to be completely beyond reason and are a danger, do you go for harsher methods.

This is how we should probably look at many countries' approach to the US right now. They're not going to run headlong into a trade war unless they feel this is the only option going forward. They're going to try for some sort of deal first and then just hope to god that Trump leaves office in 2028. I don't know if they'll get that wish, though...

CoffeeImpala

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123325118#Comment_123325118

Had Donnie been in a position to pull this twenty years ago it might have worked but other economies have grown and American exceptionalism is a thing of the past.

The EU should do nothing, there's a graph in the link posted by @gormdubhgorm that shows Germany by itself is more industrialised than the entire US. You have yet to explain how Ireland could be "economically crushed with the stroke of a pen by Trump". The majority of our trade doesn't go to the US and what we do export to them isn't easily moved.

As I understand it the consequences of retaliation are that Trump increases the tariffs on imports. It looks like this will speed up the devaluation of the dollar while increasing inflation in the US. Meanwhile the price of oil (in dollars) is dropping. The cost of energy has been the biggest problem for the EU in recent years. If its cost and the currency it's priced in are dropping, how is that bad for Ireland?

You're quite right, France won't suffer the most from higher import tariffs into the US. That'd be the US consumer because the US has become reliant on cheap imports due to the strong USD. They don't have the capacity to produce either the food or the goods they want.

I think you'll be surprised at how a common enemy will strengthen the union. This is both in physical defense against Russia and economic defence against the US. Brexit was a nice warm-up, those same negotiating structures are still in place.

Our largest trading partner is the EU. Last year we exported more to the Netherlands than the UK. Both of your points here are incorrect. If you can get a breakdown of our exports by US state maybe you can build an argument here.

REDBULL68

All t.v and everyone else going into meltdown, is just what was expected it's an obvious bluff ,countrys are already negotiating deals as we speak, this was the plan ,no way US could take tariffs both ways,all this bollix about thousands of people loosing their jobs ,media rubbish, watch the different countries meet in the white House and agree deals in the coming weeks ,a cunning plan .