I Agree With Rand Paul Completely, and He's Entirely Wrong
In response to Donald Trump’s tariff maneuvers, Senator Rand Paul has been arguing that presidents shouldn’t have the power to raise tariffs themselves. Taxing power belongs to Congress, and that’s where tariffs should be born. Trump’s tariffs result from the use of emergency power that Congress gave to the POTUS, and we shouldn’t normalize emergency rule. You can watch him say all of that here.
Every word of that is completely right. I don’t disagree with a single breath of it. I respect Rand Paul, and I’m inordinately fond of his dad. But it misses the point about how we got here, and why, starting with the fact that Congress gave away its taxing authority.
Congress delegated its authority;
Donald Trump used the authority that Congress gave him;
Therefore, Donald Trump is very bad, and what he’s doing is wrong.
The core sickness at the heart of the American republic is Congress, and we keep discussing that sickness by saying that Trump sucks. He’s doing what you gave him the power to do, and he’s not the first.
See also my recent post in which I described a time when Congress made something illegal, than asked the administrative agencies to explain to them what they had just banned. Congress has delegated its authority, over and over again, and the resulting political vacuum is a serious problem. But anyway, TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP.
American political discourse keeps taking a wide range of political pathologies and assigning them to the same account. Orange Man Bad, Orange Man Bad, Orange Man Bad, they explained, with drool running down their chins. Donald Trump is our deflector object, our national excuse. [Problem name here]; OH NO WHY IS TRUMP DOING THIS TO US.
The commandant of the United States Coast Guard spoke at a maritime conference, a few days ago, and he said that the organization he runs wakes up every day and tries to keep the doors from falling off: “The US Coast Guard is less ready today than any other time since World War II. We are on a readiness spiral. Today our fleet of cutters are in significant decline. We are in repair failure mode…No ship today gets underway without cannibalizing others for parts.”
See also, from one of his subordinates:
Serious question: Did all of those problems begin at noon on January 20, 2025?
Congress is completely unserious, totally disengaged, and so lazy it’s a miracle they manage to get dressed in the morning. Universities are sick and wounded. The global financial, political, and security order is riddled with pathologies. Most journalism is manipulative garbage. Conclusion: Something something Orange Cheeto Hitler something something. Like Christopher Eisgruber telling a story about healthy and high-functioning research universities that suddenly and for no good reason are under attack from Orange Devil Man, every “mainstream” discussion about Trump is an effort to not tell another story.
Does Ukraine have a plausible path to victory on the battlefield?
Oh, I guess you worship your Orange Cheeto Hitler, MAGA retard!
What are we going to do about $37 trillion in still-growing federal debt?
Oh, I guess you worship your Orange Cheeto Hitler, MAGA retard!
Or whatever. Pick your own topic. Response: Donald Trump is very bad.
At the risk of repeating myself, Trump shows up in the later chapters of the story. Anyone who rants at you about any form of [Trump is bad] in a story divorced from context is trying to not see the actual sickness.
We don’t have a mainstream political discourse. We have lazy ranting about a personality. It’s meaningless. Rand Paul, who I respect and agree with, is offering a less egregious form of this partial story, but if you think Trump’s tariff policy is a disaster, start with a real discussion of presidential tariff power in its current form. Oh no, Donald Trump is hitting things with the hammer we gave him. I don’t expect miracles, but it would be pleasant to have politics without relentless and insistent emptiness.
See also the speech from new Secretary of the Navy at the same maritime conference, with the observation that "China constructed more ships last year alone than we have since World War II."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zHJtOiaPCE
Smokin' hot, Chris. Rand Paul is right, unfortunately that's not the current paradigm.
I don't think Trump gets enough credit for being flexible. Now that doesn't mean he'll ever admit a mistake. But that doesn't mean they're mutually exclusive.
I think what many see as "chaos" is just a way for Trump to create options where none exist in the current paradigm, or where the options would take too long to implement to effectuate any meaningful change. In other words, he's trying to create an entirely new paradigm; one in which he determines the new "rules".
I have thought all along (and have said so from the beginning) that what Trump was trying to do is isolate China by bringing all the other US trade partners to the table, all at the same time, instead of "puddle-jumping" from one country to another, so he can play both ends against the middle, with maximum leverage to accelerate the process. In this way he gets other countries to obliquely do his dirty work vis-à-vis China. I actually think that's safer than an all out economic warfare with China. China will end up with no choice to capitulate because their economy, if you strip it naked, is a ponzi scheme. I think in this way we we head off any kinetic confrontation. Because, make no mistake, if China invades Taiwan that's just the opening act. I take them for their word, and I think every action they've taken in the last 20 years telegraphs that assertion.
I'm not saying that the 90 day pause was deliberate, although I could make the argument that that was the point. But that's not the point. The point is he gave himself that option that he would've not had otherwise if he didn't start the way he did.
And that's why Trump is a Rorschach Test; he creates chaos to create options that he can control and pivot from.
Some see it as 5D chess, and some see it as a Barnum and Bailey circus with dancing werewolf-boys and various other side show entertainers.
This is why i don't mind Trump; he's not an ideologue and just wants to get shit done.
More than i can say about any of our other leaders since Reagan. And let's admit Trump and all his shameless buffoonery was exactly the right medicine at the right time.
If not him, who else?