“Their entire economy will just implode without our money. It will hurt but ultimately these tariffs are what needs to happen for us to rebuild our country.”
Then he was telling me about how Bill Maher, this “super liberal Hollywood guy” met with trump, and how impressed he was, and how genuine trump was, and how Trump knew all about him, and oh my god guys trump is such a genuine guy. What you see is what you get, and he “actually cares about people”. Even the liberals (everyone to the left of Bill fucking Maher I guess) see how great trump is.
Anyway I kinda hate my dad and I wish I could leave this hellhole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Turtle_and_the_Monkey
This fable has been on my mind today. A turtle and a monkey find a banana tree. The turtle says that they should plant the tree in the turtle’s garden and they’ll share the fruits. The selfish monkey thinks it can outsmart the turtle. They agree to cut the tree in half. The monkey takes the top half of the tree because fruits come from the top of a tree. The monkey plants the top half of the tree and the turtle plants the bottom half. Over time, the monkey’s tree has wilted and the turtle’s tree has grown back to be full and bearing fruits. In the end, the monkey steals bananas from the turtle and then the turtle kills the monkey as revenge.
The tariff war is kind of like cutting the banana tree in half. America thinks that they have the high ground because they think that value comes from money and America controls USD, but China has the better material circumstance because they have the manufacturing capabilities. China wants to share the fruits, but America is selfish. You can see where this going.
I’ve been consuming a lot of rednote content recently and this feels spot on for the proud/nationalist vibes on social media, not undeservedly so
There’s this Terry Pratchett novel where there’s a revolt against the unpopular ruler of a city. The army secures the palace, the banks and other posh neighbourhoods. The rebels - who are mostly working-class and have a better idea of what actually matters - take over the markets, the industrial areas, the city gates (through which food comes in and goods go out) and so on.