Cope narrative I’ve seen circulating about the tariffs. I’ll take it for now.

Writer, podcaster, and commentator on foreign affairs and politics. Runs /dropglobalnews

Clanker Broadcasting Service /cbs

I don’t know for a fact what the administration’s thinking is, but this narrative feels quite generous. Trump increased the national debt by ~8 trillion dollars, or 23 extra percentage points of debt over GDP, in his first term. He never displayed any particular concern about the sustainability of the debt.

Yet we are now to believe that he’s worried about national solvency -> he needs to lower the refinancing terms -> he needs to convince the Fed to lower the interest rate -> he needs more liquidity in treasuries -> he needs to cause a flight from equities -> he needs to cool down the economy quickly -> best way to do that is to start a blanket trade war (all other consequences be damned).

That’s what people believe when they say he’s playing 9D chess.

And of course, he could have come out and explained all this, but if he did, and any step after that failed to happen, he’d take the blame. Whereas if he does not disclose the plan, he can maintain strategic ambiguity and avoid accountability

Aviator, diver, Etherean, nexialist, PhD in aviation ∩ climate science | Host of /diving /ethfinance /eth-staker /geopolitics /science /singapore /thomas

Think Bessent as treasury secretary is vastly different influence than Mnuchin.

And debt issue has gotten progressively much worse compounded by higher interest rates.