Economy

Some of you may know that I spent almost 20 years as a pilot’s crew scheduler for United Airlines. When I was there, we called it FIFO (First In First Out), some places such as cop shops and prosecutors call it “the wheel.” Basically, it means that when you come back from an assignment or day off, your name goes to the bottom of the availability list. As assignments are handed out, you climb the list, and when you get to the top, you get the next assignment. Not all that complicated, but fair and equitable. The Defense Department just released a detailed list of the 129 planned military construction jobs that are being affected by His Lowness pulling $3.6 billion from the Defense Department to put a rush order on his brainless vanity wall. Nattering Network Nabobs are already foaming at the mouth in anticipation of the politicians in the GOP up for reelection that are going to mutiny when they return to Washington over the millions of dollars, in some cases tens of millions of dollars of hard fought for pork that is being pulled from their states so Trump can fulfill a promise so empty even his core supporters didn’t believe it. But there’s an error in the way that the media is covering this story, and it’s a big one. The media is fixating on the 129 projects that are directly affected by Trump’s brazen cash and power grab. But the mistake is in limiting the coverage to only those 129 projects. In fact, every pending domestic military construction project is being affected by The Mango Messiah’s dunderheaded ploy. Here’s why. It turns out that the congressional military construction process uses a modified version of the FIFO list, or “The Wheel.” Military construction projects are planned years in advance for the most part, and then they go to the bottom of the list. As military construction funding is approved, it’s divvied up starting at the top of the list, and working downwards until it’s all gone. As items are funded, they are removed from the list, and the others move up, waiting for their turn. It’s a never ending process. Are you starting to get the picture? When the DoD pulled the funding from those projects at the top of the list, the projects themselves weren’t canceled, They were simply put on hold. Granting that Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats in the House will never agree to pass any more “emergency” military construction funding, in effect paying for the wall, those projects will remain on hold until either a court decides that Trump’s cash grab was unconstitutional and returns the money to the DoD, or until the next appropriations process rolls around. Those projects that just had their funding pulled for Trump’s Folly will now have to wait until next year for their funding, and that’s a problem. Because, like most things in Washington, military funding tends to move with the grace and speed of a well danced waltz. Military construction spending is basically a set amount every year. Senators and congressmen can calculate about how long it will take for their money to be approved, and start laying the groundwork for the money’s usage well in advance. If the spending for this year’s projects are being delayed […]

You know, there’s a good reason why The Pampers President always seems so calm, decisive, and self assured when acting as our President. For most men, no matter what their previous history, when they walk into the Oval Office for the first time, and sit down behind that desk, they realize that they now are the most important and powerful man in the entire free world, and that responsibility can be crushing. But Donald Juan Trump has spent his entire life as the most important and powerful man in the world, at least his world, and since no other world matters, what’s the sweat? Thank God that His Lowness is an economic savant, since he has the entire world economy to oversee. And that’s because, as the U.S. economy goes, so goes the world, right? And what is Trump’s grand economic master plan for the U.S.? Well, let’s see, he has Jamie Dimon predicting that every U.S. family is gonna blow an extra grand a year on necessities thanks to his trade war, he’s busy pretending that U.S. farmers are Stormy Daniels, and paying them off $18 billion to shut them up about his tariff effects, and he’s making U.S. consumers foot the bill for the Chinese to find out how good Mexican soy beans, Argentine beef, and Canadian seafood really is. Meanwhile, tariffs on imported steel and aluminum mean that the manufacturing sector is actually contracting instead of expanding. Iz genius I tells ya, iz genius! But as much as Trump may like to believe that the entire world revolves around his own, plump and overstuffed self, the truth is different. The world has become interconnected economically. Bill Clinton understood that when he negotiated NAFTA, and Barack Obama bloody well knew it when he negotiated the TPP, as a way to contain China in the Pacific rim. Not only can U.S. economic issues affect the global economy, so can global economic issues affect the U.S. economy. Right now, The $1 Store Caligula seems hell bent for leather to drive the US economy head first into a recession at 100 mph, but he isn’t the only thing that economists have to worry about. Right now, there’s this little kerfuffle going on in The United Kingdom. You might have heard of it, a little thing called Brexit, and it’s the biggest rage over there right now since the Beatles. A few years ago, Vlad the Imp took a fancy to the idea that a great way to demolish the European Union would be to have Great Britain suddenly pull up stakes and bail out of the EU the way that Trump bails out of Atlantic City casinos. He subliminally convinced a wacky white haired Brit with a Moe Howard haircut that this was the coolest idea since sliced bread, and the rest is history as it’s being written. The cherry on top was having the bowl topped dotard end up running the whole shebang, ensuring the maximum damage possible. The Brits who can count to twenty without removing their shoes and socks, and can remember to go inside when it rains are fighting BoJo tooth and nail. But the damage is already done. Even if Johnson and his pirates are made to walk the plank in the upcoming snap election, it is difficult […]

You’re a mean one, Mr Grinch   How The Grinch Stole Christmas Awww, it’s too bad that you’re such a total loser, but don’t feel bad, you won’t be going home empty handed. You’ll be leaving today with this copy of our home game! And yea, I mean that all of you are actually going to be able to play this game right along with us at home! It’s official. President Bone Spurs latest round of punitive 15% tariffs took effect at midnight last night. Soup’s on, and guess what? You’re in the pot. And as the New York Times is reporting, with this round of tariffs, the Trump administration has broken with decades of previous standing in how a trade war is fought when it comes to consumers. The way that most trade wars go, tariffs that the government imposes are called indirect tariffs, meaning that while consumers may ultimately see the effect, they don’t see the underlying cause. Tariffs are normally levied against things like steel and aluminum, a cost that the manufacturers see, and then pass on to the consumer. The price of your car itself didn’t go up, the cost of the aluminum used to make it went up. But not this time. If there’s one thing that everybody knows by now, it’s that subtle is not in Emperor Numbus Nuttus’ repertoire. Hell, this guy wakes up every morning with a ed foam ball over his nose. In this round, El Presidente Pendejo has placed the tariffs directly on consumer goods, the finished products that retailers unload from the truck and place directly on the shelves. These tariffs are on things like clothing, shoes, household items and consumer electronics. With one swift stroke of his Sharpie (safety catch on so he doesn’t hurt himself,) Trump has permanently laid to waste his shell game of saying that “U.S. consumers don’t pay tariffs, China pays tariffs.” He did this by removing the “middleman” manufacturer, who raised the prices to the retailer, who then passed them on to the consumer. Since it was the manufacturer who bore the cost, His Lowness could hide the original sin. But this time, it’s the retailers directly who will be paying those tariffs and passing the cost on to consumers, and you can bet your ass that they’ll be happy to tell their customers why the cost of their toys just went up. See, here’s the McGuffin. These new tariffs went into effect at 12:01 on Sunday morning. Any plane or freighter that departed China after that time is subject to the new tariffs. The Chinese don’t celebrate Labor Day, hell, they don’t even celebrate weekends! Those ships left last night, right on schedule, stuffed full of goodies for American consumers. And here’s the yang to that yin. Let’s just say that The $1 Store Caligula decides tomorrow to call the whole thing off, and signs an order dropping the latest round of tariffs. It doesn’t matter! Any of the ships that left yesterday, or leave today and tomorrow are still subject to the tariffs that were in force when they left the port of origin! Talk about the ultimate holiday shopping madness. Let’s play a scenario where Trjumpledork sees the error in his ways, and cancels the tariffs on, say Wednesday. That still leaves 4 days of full freighters and cargo planes worth of shit coming in at […]

What is your major malfunction numb nuts? Didn’t your mother hold you enough when you were a child?   Drill instructor Sargent Hartmann   Full Metal Jacket Having Trump take a road trip, especially to a summit, is like going away for the weekend when you have teenagers. As nice as it is to get away for a few days, once you get back you know it’s going to take a week to make the place livable again. Trump at the G-7 is not working out so well. For starters, everybody else in the family is treating him like the kid that they rather reluctantly let out of the corner for drinking from the toilet again. And then, Iran, you know, the aunt who thinks he’s an unruly brat who needs some serious discipline, shows up to rain on his parade as well. When a representative of a repressive theocracy gets treated like a rock star by everybody else in the room, because at least they think that they can talk sense with him, you wasted your time bothering to go. But there has been news concerning the US coming from the G-7 summit. For instance, today Trump announced a new trade deal “in principle” with Japan. First of all, we’re not in a trade war with Japan, so big whoop-de-do! Like all things with international diplomacy, the devil is in the details, and an agreement “in principal” has fewer details than a Trump infrastructure plan, whichever week it is. An agreement in principle is like going on a first date. you know the likely outcome is going to be a handshake, but even if there’s a kiss at the end, it’s no tongues. Especially coming from a guy who wrote the Nobel committee to tell them you deserved a peace prize. How can you take his word on anything?!? But the bigger news coming from the G-7 summit is Trump’s rather startling admission that he’s having second thoughts about his trade war with China. Yes, that was a banquet room size tray of dirty dishes you just heard hitting the floor. Of course, the White House is on its hind legs, trying to back Trump down from this ledge, claiming he was “misinterpreted.” I’m not sure how else you can interpret somebody basically saying “Maybe I fucked up.” No matter how you slice it, this is messaging at its worst, and a terrible gaffe from Trump. If another country declares a trade war on you, then you’re the innocent party, but once you’re in a trade war, you’re in it to win it. And if you declared the trade war, then the other country wasn’t playing by the rules, which makes you the innocent party, but as long as you’re in that trade war, you’re in it to win it. This is where Trump the President falls apart at the seams as opposed to Trump the failed businessman. In an identical situation in the business world, having painted himself into a corner by his own stupidity, Trump would simply yell for someone to roll a red carpet over to him, and strut across it directly into bankruptcy court. That isn’t an option here. Maybe my memory is faulty, but isn’t Trump the one who stood out on the south lawn of the White House a couple of days ago, gazed into the heavens, and loudly […]

It was only a few weeks ago when I wrote that Trump had long ago already lost his trade war with Chine. The two biggest takeaways I put in there to make my point was that Chinese President Xi Jinping had two built-in advantages over Emperor Numbus Nuttus. The first was that while Trump was powerless to control what the Federal Reserve Board did with the economy, Xi the dictator could manipulate both his currency and his economy at will. The second was that while Trump had to worry about any effects he had on the economy tanking his popularity for the election, Xi had no such compunction, in China the peasants don’t elect the President. I closed with the fact that if Xi got fed up with Trump’s bullshit, and felt that he could get a better deal with the Democrats, he’d simply engineer a U.S. recession by manipulating his tariffs to force Trump’s macho into retaliation. I’ll take my Nobel prize in clairvoyance now. What did Trump do just a week or so ago? Basically, he finally admitted that U.S. consumers are the ones who actually paid the China tariffs when he announced that he was delaying the start of the next round of tariffs until December 15th, after the Christmas shopping season. This should have bought Trump time for the continuation of his vaunted “negotiations” with China for a new deal, especially since they were practically willing to let him put condos up in Tianenmen Square if he’d just call off his tariffs. Seems like neither Wall Street or Xi Jinping got that memo. The stock market dropped more than 700 points last week on fears of a Trump recession, and Trump’s trade war with China. And then it dropped another 630 today after Trump’s latest Twitter fart against his Fed chair, Jerome Powell, and ordering US companies to start hunting up replacement sources to China for their goods and services. And apparently Xi isn’t interested in giving U.S. consumers a very Merry Christmas, seeing as how the Chinese don’t celebrate Christmas and all. Look, from everything I can see, there was no logically pressing reason for Xi to go ahead and slap another $75 billion in tariffs on the US today. After all, Trump’s tariffs are hurting both the Chinese economy as well as Chinese consumers. And with Trump desperate to cut some kind of a deal, any kind of a deal with China to stop a recession from screwing up his reelection chances, Xi’s safer bet would have been to continue to negotiate with Trump, and see how much more artificial sweetener Trump would put in Xi’s cup of coffee. But Xi went ahead and slapped another $75 billion in punitive tariffs on the U.S. today anyway. I can only draw one conclusion from this. And that is that Xi Jinping is sick of Trump’s shit, and is ready to suffer another 20 months of belt tightening to start a U.S. recession that will boot Trump out of the White House. Xi knew that Trump’s voracious ego would require him to strike back, no matter how blindly and stupidly, and he was right.You’ll notice that Trump waited until after the markets closed to announce his retaliation? It won’t matter. Wall Street isn’t going to forget these new rounds of tariffs […]

This is the era of “economic narcissism” in the words of Gene Sperling, an economic adviser to both Clinton and Obama, as Donald Trump wends his way to this year’s G-7 summit, all set to brag about how “incredible” and “phenomenal” the American economy is, and the rest of the world economy, isn’t. It’s all about grandstanding for the base. Washington Post: “The irony here is that Trump’s erratic, chaotic approach to the economy is probably the most significant economic risk factor in the world right now,” said Gene Sperling, who served in top economic roles during the Clinton and Obama administrations. “Their response is just to show even more erratic behavior. It’s economic narcissism. It’s economic policy by whim, pride, ego and tantrum.” The Dow Jones Industrial Average is bouncing up and down like a yo yo. On August 14, the day of the inverted yield curve news, it dropped 767 points, today it dropped 623, as China announced it’s own tariffs on $75Billion in U.S. goods. Anybody with the sense God gave a goat is filled with trepidation, but not Trump: he just plans to ignore everybody and bullshit his way out of these problems. Even as his aides warn of a business climate at risk of faltering, the president has been portraying the economy to the public as “phenomenal” and “incredible.” He has told aides that he thinks he can convince Americans that the economy is vibrant and unrattled through a public messaging campaign. And now the Liar in Chief is on his way to G-7, where despite his advisers worries, he’s going to gaslight everybody about how great everything is and is going to be. “It shows that Trump’s appearance will in reality demonstrate that the very nationalist agenda he will be touting is, thus far, a record of deep fraudulence and failure, covered up with lies,” per Greg Sargent, Washington Post.  With President Trump set to attend the Group of Seven this weekend, it’s already emerging that he has “shaken up” the schedule. Trump has called for a special meeting focused on the global economy, where he’ll tout his message about jobs and trade, while contrasting the stupendous Trump economy with Europe’s economic struggles. In other words, Trump will proclaim his “America First” agenda a smashing success, and throw that in the faces of our European allies. Trump’s obvious intention, then, is to rub those Euro-weenie elites’ faces in his alleged “America First” successes, which he has undertaken in defiance of them, as his supporters at home cheer. But the reality is that Trump’s “America First” agenda, particularly the trade war with China, is a key reason the U.S. economy is now at greater risk of tipping into recession. Even Trump’s GOP allies admit this. And Trump constituencies are bearing the brunt of those trade hostilities. What’s more, the tax cuts that Trump will boast about are not providing the economic rocket fuel Trump proclaimed. In pursuing them, Trump sold out on the economic populism he promised his supporters in 2016, embracing conventional GOP plutocracy in a way that benefited those hated elites far more than workers. Trump is nothing, if not ironic. Again, the people that he says that he’s committed to help, the workers, are the very group he’s hanging out to dry. He’s going to put on a performance for […]

Donald Trump’s fantasy explanation of how tariffs work might rouse the base to yet another cheer, which is what it was designed for, but now that pipe dream is going up in smoke as the reality of world economics hits home hard. Friday morning China announced it’s own imposition of tariffs of between 5% and 10% on $75Billion in U.S. goods. That announcement sent ripples through Wall Street, where the Dow Futures was glowing green, and then immediately flipped to red. Apparently, that threw Trump over the edge, because he immediately went for Jerome Powell’s jugular. ….My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi? — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019 Then the Toddler in Chief really threw a tantrum. We don’t need China at all, so there. Yeah, great idea. Let’s stop dealing altogether with the world’s second largest economy. Shrewd thinking. ….better off without them. The vast amounts of money made and stolen by China from the United States, year after year, for decades, will and must STOP. Our great American companies are hereby ordered to immediately start looking for an alternative to China, including bringing.. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019 Now American companies are ordered to find an “alternative to China.” Great. Is anybody in contact with economic powers on other worlds, Mars maybe? Because Donald Trump seems to have exhausted all the possibilities on this globe and so now he’s ordering companies to find markets elsewhere. And then there’s this tag along notion to the post office. ….all deliveries of Fentanyl from China (or anywhere else!). Fentanyl kills 100,000 Americans a year. President Xi said this would stop – it didn’t. Our Economy, because of our gains in the last 2 1/2 years, is MUCH larger than that of China. We will keep it that way! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019 We are “MUCH larger” than China. Not if we keep taking this pounding. And China timed this announcement perfectly. Jerome Powell was due to speak from Jackson Hole today and the announcement preempted his speech. Trump is also set to fly to the G7 summit later today and this was done to rattle him — which clearly worked. The man has the brains and instincts of a fruit fly. He reacts impulsively and immediately, without talking to anybody or getting a grasp on the issues. And this is his mind set flying off to an international summit? And things are a lot worse than you think. Mike Pompeo was making a lot of noise a few weeks ago and intimating possible military action against China. For some reason that didn’t get the press coverage it should have. Axios: When Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark Esper visited Australia earlier this month, they delivered an unequivocal message to senior Australian officials: The U.S. plans to forcefully push back against China’s destabilizing behavior in the Asia-Pacific. Some left those meetings with the impression that the U.S. was serious about confronting China militarily. Between the lines: This visit was important for the signals Pompeo and Esper sent, but didn’t get as much U.S. press attention as it deserved. (See Bloomberg’s Aug. 4 story here.) The bottom line: So if not a China trade deal, what then is left […]

Maybe Donald Trump’s Adderall dosage isn’t right, because the following tweets would seem to be the product of a hyperactive mind, tottering on the brink — especially when taken in tandem with his thirty-four minute rant on the White House lawn where he bragged about being the Chosen One. My proposal to the politically correct Automobile Companies would lower the average price of a car to consumers by more than $3000, while at the same time making the cars substantially safer. Engines would run smoother. Very little impact on the environment! Foolish executives! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 21, 2019 The Legendary Henry Ford and Alfred P. Sloan, the Founders of Ford Motor Company and General Motors, are “rolling over” at the weakness of current car company executives willing to spend more money on a car that is not as safe or good, and cost $3,000 more to consumers. Crazy! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 21, 2019 ….that when this Administration’s alternative is no longer available, California will squeeze them to a point of business ruin. Only reason California is now talking to them is because the Feds are giving a far better alternative, which is much better for consumers! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 21, 2019 This is probably Trump’s addlepated notion of a way to stave off a recession. Ain’t it a shame that it’s not only 1. incomprehensible, 2. the opposite of free-market principles, 3. illegal as hell, because the government does not dictate to automakers, or anybody else, how much they can charge for their products. But Trump thinks he really knows something about the auto industry. He believes that he was named Michigan’s “Man Of The Year” because of the burning desire of Detroit automotive machers to honor him, for his stellar contribution to the field. The award doesn’t even exist and Trump has done nothing to help the auto industry — except in his dreams and sound bites. PoliticusUSA: Donald Trump is showing signs of seriously losing his mind. There has been a great deal of hyperbole about the president’s mental state, and if one looks back over the last few decades, speculation about a president’s health has become a national hobby, but Trump’s tweet is very bizarre behavior. The Republican Party once accused Barack Obama of trying to nationalize the auto industry through a government bailout, but they say nothing when Trump tries to impose price controls on auto companies. The tweet was likely part of a half baked Trump pitch to derail a recession by spurring auto purchases. The only ideas that Trump is capable of [are] both un-capitalistic and un-American. He’s clearly flailing, worrying about the economy, and you can expect that to get worse before it gets better — and things are only going to get better economically when he’s gone.

Tensions in the farming community are running high. The Trump administration received a threat to staffers planning a tour of Midwestern corn and soybean fields. That prompted the Department of Agriculture to cancel the tour, according to an email Wednesday from Hubert Hamer, administrator of the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service. Bloomberg: The USDA’s crop-tour withdrawal comes about two weeks after farmers leveled criticism at Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue at a fair in Minnesota over President Donald Trump’s yearlong trade war with China, which has eroded demand and pressured already low prices. Trump’s overwhelming support in rural America was crucial to his narrow 2016 election victory and maintaining farmer’s backing is critical to his re-election. Just this week, the administration has taken criticism from agricultural interests for its handling of the Renewable Fuel Standard, the policy that mandates use of corn-based ethanol and soy-based biodiesel. On Tuesday, the Iowa Soybean Association sent a letter to Trump and Perdue, asking for a meeting to discuss the Environmental Protection Agency’s granting of small refinery exemptions, saying that the agency’s Aug. 9 announcement that it granted 31 waivers adds to the “economic pain Iowa’s farmers and biodiesel producers are experiencing.” The farmers erroneously bet on the wrong horse in voting for Trump and they’ve taken a hell of a beating. Many are in danger of losing their farms. They don’t want another bailout, they want markets to sell in. Trump’s travesty of a trade war has taken away foreign markets for soybeans, notably China, who now buys them from Russia. Isn’t that cheerful? Mexico, likewise, is dealing with Argentina, not just on duty free cars but on wheat, corn and soy, and that market is unlikely to return either. It’s no secret that farmers, a traditionally stoic group, are p*ssed, as they struggle for survival and Trump keeps handing out tranches of money, first $12Billion last year and he promised another $16Billion in farm aid last month. GOP fiscal conservatism at work, yes siree. And you may recall Trump’s aberrant comments in Council Bluffs, Iowa in June, when after the usual rag on “Sleepy Joe” and the boast about all the money pouring in from tariffs on China, Trump defined the plight of the farmers thusly. “They have not treated the Midwest well with broadband, with anything having to do with the word ‘computer.’ I look at some of those tractors and they don’t even hook up. They’re all set, but you don’t have the capability here in terms of your infrastructure.” That, friends, is Donald Trump improvising dialogue, which he thinks is witty, urbane, and original, when it is nonsensical and so off-point as to belong in another time zone. Trump stabbed the farmers of America in the back and he’s too stupid to know it. But they are not. Let’s see Sonny Purdue put a band aid on this mess, like Larry Kudlow is trying to do with the economy. The wheels are coming off the wagon, as Adam Schiff opined that they would, early on in the game. And Trump thinks his only problem with Iowa is Steve King? Hahahahahahahaha……

I’ll give the Democratic party credit for innovative and progressive thinking, hands down, any day. But witchcraft? Well, apparently Donald Trump thinks so. Take a look. Our Economy is very strong, despite the horrendous lack of vision by Jay Powell and the Fed, but the Democrats are trying to “will” the Economy to be bad for purposes of the 2020 Election. Very Selfish! Our dollar is so strong that it is sadly hurting other parts of the world… — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 19, 2019 Now this is an interesting approach to political analysis, I must say. Clearly, any signs of economic change, good or bad, are going to be reported immediately, and last month the inverted yield curve was reported. This economic indicator has preceded every recession for the past fifty years, so it is taken seriously. But Donald Trump, in his sublime ignorance of how the economy actually works, has now taken to blaming the “will” of the “selfish” Democrats for this dire economic flash point. Oh, and we willed the manufacturing sector to slow down the past two consecutive quarters, as well? So, let me see if I have this straight: the economy is a little bit like a spoon, and the Democrats are Uri Geller, and we can bend it with our minds — is that right? Wow, that’s impressive. Trump is off his nut this morning on the economy. He’s bad mouthing Jerome Powell, again, apparently oblivious to how he praised him to the hilt the day he chose him. Pres Trump Nov 2, 2017, announcing Powell as his pick for Fed chair: "He’s strong, he’s committed, he’s smart…I am confident that with Jay as a wise steward of the Federal Reserve, it will have the leadership it needs in the years to come.” https://t.co/JMHUVMxML2 — Karen Travers (@karentravers) August 19, 2019 Strong, committed and smart has devolved to “clueless” and “horrendous lack of vision.” Okey doke. But Trump has a vision, yes siree. Need more evidence President Trump is worried about the economy? He's calling on Fed to use the tools it normally uses during a recession:1) A full percentage point cut in interest rates (from 2.25% to 1.25%)2) Quantitative easing = Fed buying bonds to pump money into economy https://t.co/06TVjsCx4w — Heather Long (@byHeatherLong) August 19, 2019 Larry Kudlow informs us there is no recession, and we are glad to hear his views. We learned in 2007 exactly how much his economic opinion was worth, when he told us then, as he’s telling us now, not to worry about a thing. Maybe Kudlow could explain to us, why, if there’s no recession, Trump wants to employ the tactics that one uses during a recession to mitigate the fall? Just askin’.