Each day of Donald Trump’s second presidential administration has felt like the scene in “A Christmas Story,” where Ralphie speeds to the bathroom to use his “Little Orphan Annie” decoder ring to spell out a gravely important, super-secret message. After some considerable suspense, Ralphie, of course, finds out that he’s been duped by the hand of Big Advertising. Despite feeling like life-or-death in the moment, the message piped to him over the airwaves is ultimately meaningless bull. That’s precisely what it’s like to wake up, check your phone and find out that Trump has once again spouted off some new, seemingly horrific policy that, in reality, has zero actionable planning to enforce it.
One of the latest and most confounding of Trump’s plans is an addendum to his crippling tariffs. As part of ongoing trade wars, the Trump administration placed a 10% baseline tariff on all imports into the United States, with China, Mexico and Canada hit with additional tariffs, all of which have fluctuated since Trump postponed his initial proposal. These levies on goods and materials are obnoxious and have the consumer paying the price, but at least they had an identifiable (if petty) reason for existing.
