Old guy ranting with his IQ printed on his cuff.
40
Trump would be a "no-better" in craps. He seems to want the economy to crash. Does he or friends of his own a lot of stock in hedge funds? Now to nuclear disarmament - that's the real craps game for the world!
5
Yes indeed. Donald Trump is delusional. He doesn't lie because he wants to hide the truth. He Tells it like he sees it. But what he sees is what he creates in his own sad deluded mind. He believes what he says regardless of how far what he says is from the Truth. The rest of the world see Trump and can't believe what they see and hear is really the person who was elected by the American voters. But as we saw before the 2016 election, what we saw was what we got. And still many seemingly sane people in the Republican Party still support this demented comic book character.
Now, isn't it time to invoke the 25th Amendment. This POTUS is not competent to lead the country by virtue of his inability to think critically and his inability to distinguish Reality from Fantasy.
21
Krugman is my favorite editorial writer, but this time I took strong exception to the setting in which he placed his comments about Trump. Specifically--no doubt overly sensitive, being by age an old guy--I fumed (and perhaps ranted) about this and for that matter any careless stereotyping by age.
The setting starts with "Imagine that you're listening to some garrulous old guy in a diner, telling you what's wrong with the world--which mainly involves how we're being victimized and taken advantage of by foreigners." Later, Krugman comments that the old guy's "opinions seem a bit, well, factually challenged."
Krugman accurately describes Trump. But why do it in the context of old guys in general, as a group. Each old guy, and each person male, female, young, middle-aged or old carries his or her own independent self. So please Krugman don't gray me or anyone else out of existence by meaningless stereotyping.
I suggest changing Krugman's setting to something like this: a garrulous old guy goes into a local diner or coffee shop, bringing with him or then buying The New York Times, The Washington Post, (heaven forbid) The Wall Street Journal, the Boulder Daily Camera, the Denver Post, etc. or alternatively, denying all print, goes online for thoughtfully collected and offered information. Is the person a policy wonk? Probably not. But well informed. Yes.
Where does Trump fit into this revised picture? He doesn't--irrespective of his age.
2
I'm surprised about all the sturm und drang around Paul correctly calling Trump a neutral descriptor of his advanced age: old. He's our oldest POTUS, and it shows.
9
Can we insist that our schools teach people the difference between Business and Governance? Between Capitalism and Democracy? Between "just a theory" and Scientific Theory? Trump's grammar is one thing, but his inability to make basic distinctions is wholly absent and painfully destructive.
17
It’s sad that Canada has to desperately look to alternative markets now that Trump has made us enemy number one. Free trade deals with Europe and Asia will help us pick up the pieces and redirect our goods, but in the end I just wonder why.
12
Quite frankly, I am sick and tired of hearing from the alleged 'forgotten folks', especially of the rich and/or Caucasian variety who believe that MAGA policies will benefit Americans. Please tell me how so?
Does a poisoned water table benefit our future children or get you a job which will disappear before it appears? How do we as a society pay for whatever necessary medical treatment for those affected by that water we must all drink? Are we content just making sure all of those folks so effected just die?
Does watered down, empty headed Trump University styled education of our children mean they will never understand the nature of real scientific & mathematical knowledge sufficient to save this planet and our future lives? What happens to you when you need surgery however, no one knows how to safely perform that procedure or cure you because some short-sighted individual decided 'God' didn't ordain such?
What will happen to America when all immigrants have been ousted? Does America go back to the Indians, from whom we stole this land? The American Indians will never be so lucky.
After we have sold off all public park lands to harvest the oil, where is our American future? At what point do the jealous haters get a real education, show compassion for all our people be they male or female, stop crying about what you think you deserve because of your skin color or bank account? What if women stopped having children or people refused to go to war, etc., then what?
18
The change will only happen when Trump's base is hurt by his policies.
10
I don't think so. Even when Trump's base IS hurt by his deeply misguided policies, he will simply blame Obama. Or Hillary. And his base will gleefully go along with such an explanation.
26
Point of Information:
I don't think that adding tariffs or banning the export of USA made bluejeans will make much of a difference to the Europeans. The jeans I've bought for years (Wranglers) are made in Guatemala. Who actually manufactures bluejeans in the US these days?
2
The last U.S. place that Levi made jeans was in Texas, but that moved to Costa Rica, but the profits still go to the Strauss Co. and remnants of the family.
1
Donald Trump's age may be a factor, however I find it really scary that he is a ranting narcissist sociopath with nuclear weapons. A younger version of this man is really just as scary.
19
The Tariffs were proposed to distract the country from the fact that children in our country were murdered and that gun control is required.
Nothing more. There will be no tariffs, but its clear they changed the message on the front page didn't they.
The 4th Estate needs to be smarter and stop reacting the every squirrel that comes along.
21
USA. The only place that a monkey can become President. Which is a very liberating thought in a way. We are indeed a different kind of place.
9
In less than a century, we've gone from the Scopes monkey trial, to a monkey serving as President. De-evolution, I guess. The GOP has seen quite a downhill slide, in going from Abraham Lincoln, to Teddy Roosevelt, to Dwight D. Eisenhower, to Ronald Reagan, and on to Donald Trump.
8
It was the author of "The Prince", I think, who opined that it is better to be feared, as a leader, than to be loved. Without going into the analysis of personality, which is involved in much of the evaluation of the President, and which really has no place in the debate on whether or not to impeach him, save the issue of competence, which is addressed in this editorial, it does seem that Trump adheres to Machiavelli's dictum somewhat. This creates the illusion of strength, which is perhaps utilized to obscure many of the attributes attributed to the barfly, or, rather "dinerfly". The issue of a "Napoleon complex", attributed to him, that is, the state of being out of touch with the populace which he governs, is not, probably, due to any delusion on his part, rather it is a product of his past acquisition of wealth. The "crackpot" idea of arming teachers is something which bears scrutiny, if only because of the 2nd amendment; an improvement upon it, since we now have this ultra-security problem in the schools, would be to make the know-how of using weapons compulsory for those of age who attend school, in a structured, secure setting, were it not for the fact that the point of education is just that, learning, hopefully in a scientific, liberal arts curriculum. That said, it would seem that a realistic solution would be to ban the hideous assault rifles altogether. Debate over this would, I think, dissolve the "crackpot idea". The same for nuclear weapons.
1
I am thinking of setting up a Trump rehab center for people like Krugman. 30 day cure with no Trump news.
I opened this column just to see if it Kim Jung Un or Donald Trump. I couldn't tell from the headline.
1
Of course Krugman is once again dead on. No one is a more devoted reader of the NYT than I am, but I do not understand why the NYT has not run front page stories with headlines such as, for example, "Trump Lies About Tariffs and Non-Existent Trade Deficit with Canada". And why are there not questions at WH press briefings asking Huckabee Sanders whether anyone has advised Trump since his rant of the "untruths" he recited. The press must confront all this loudly and relentlessly. Terrific OpEd pieces are not enough
28
the times will never come straight out and tell the truth about the GOP, or give column inches to dems
look at the papers over the last week. Count the number of articles about dems that aren't cutting them down. they don't exist
3
Everyone should stop and smell the roses before they are all gone...along with economic stability.
4
"Despite your best efforts to avoid being condescending..."
Paul, I don't think you ever try to avoid being condescending. It's part of your shtick.
2
Having "45" monogrammed on his cuffs simply shows the minority elected a narcissistic moron.
23
Typical elite, getting on the olds guys in the dinners.
1
Not just old guys in diners (spell much) BUT old guys having a rant based on nothing but a lot of fake data, lifelong biases, and the joy of listening to their own voices above the din of heavy china. And while we're at it, some young guys and women and old women with similarly held opinions based on nothing but the echo chamber of their ill-informed peers. There. I'd not even cut them some slack, as PK does, because they have other things vying for their attention and might not be making time to be informed before they spew their rants and then vote for the Ranter in Chief, an equally ill-informed multi-millionaire representing the billionaire class. So, pick on PK for pointing out the similarity of Trump and a group of his supporters (fake data, endless rants), but PK is generally pro-policies that would help the old guys in diners and Trump is not. I'll take the guy who points out my flaws while he gives me an assist to the old guy who mirrors my ignorance and shoves me two rungs down the ladder. Any day.
12
Paul--You truly are a garrulous old guy spouting nonsense.
1
You should stick to what you know. Oh! That's right! You know little about economics either!
1
but what if the "ranting, uninformed" are neither old nor guys...say, the hollywood smoke alarm chorus of political science wizards (and one woman who did not seem to know that her "inclusion clause" woke was old hat) or the op-ed smarties who know where to go for a trendy-tini after work but sill have no grasp, for only one example (in theses days of korea talk) the substance and conduct of the cold war?
what about "sanctuary cities" shouters (in the street, the academy and on cable couches everywhere) who are harming both the ideal of sanctuary and the integrity of already slumping cities (communites of laws in a nation of laws) with their one-size-fits-all sloganeering (so much easier than actual debate).
no offense to the remaining reporters who do their heavy lifting every day, (in battle and on wall street) traveling rather on foot than goolge but...c'mon the rest of yuz!...
remember when one of the big guys on this page chickenlittled an economic collapse if trump was elected? old guys in diners must've had some fun with that.
2
To predict that Trump would ruin the economy with his promise to run it like his businesses was a good bet. Only one year in, honey. Donald has plenty of time to do it. Tariff Wars! Tax cuts for Billionaires. Deregulation of financials and polluters. Sounds like the road to ruin is well in hand. We can't talk about climate change in the Pentagon, even in relation to naval bases that may be already in peril. Very sound. Prices of goods going UP and wages not. Again, all good? Are you high?
8
Trump is talking these issues up because of the House interim election next Tuesday in Pensylvania. After that election, his ravings will stop--on trade. Then he will start raving on another topic.
8
Hannah Arendt pointed out years ago that the mob will not desert the strong until the end; that the mob is ignorant and doesn't care; that the mob loves racist scapegoating,
More important, that the mob demands more of the tyrant as time goes by.
In examining the last several years, it is frightening since Trump's actions seem very well thought when compared with many modern strong men.
6
In the immortal words of Dilbert, “Ignorance is not an opinion!” Great column, Paul.
19
Ironically, Scott Adams, the man who writes the Dilbert cartoon strip, is a big supporter of Donald Trump......
2
I wish Paul Krugman had not characterised Trump as the "garrulous old guy". Just substitute "black" or "gay" for old and see if the ageism doesn't make you feel uncomfortable.
1
I wish those overcome with political correctness would pick one word out of a well-thought-out 800 word essay to blind themselves to the entire point of it. That is a sickness in liberal society. They have adopted the same purity that that they have long criticized the right for. It's intolerance, but since it's left wing intolerance it's OK.
(And the fact of trump's age in relevant in this case, but I guess it's still anathema to mention it.)
5
Old age comes to us all, unless we're lucky.
Facts get in the way of all the looting.
4
The majority of people who voted for him were either mostly ill informed and uneducated and thought that Trump was going to do magical things like revive the coal industry and bring back manufacturing jobs from overseas. I'll give them a pass for being duped but if those same people continue to support him they are either stupid or racist or a bit of both. Republicans overall are bad people.
19
Trying to revive the coal industry makes no more sense than trying to revive the typewriter industry.
13
Once again the President broadcasts a plan, based on untruths to shore up his ill informed base. I see significant similarities between this "poor you, I'll save you" talk and the Chinese Cultural Revolution and the manipulation of peasants by Mao. Shut down Universities, throw the professors in jail, send the "elite" to work in the fields and coal mines, keep foreigners out, forbid music, art, and culture of the past, in general attack those who were thought to be elite in order to keep the great leader sent by god in supreme power. In end the cultural revolution, and policies based on untruths and opinion failed those the greater claimed he wanted to help.
3
Thanks, again, Mr. Krugman. This is Lame, belligerent ignorance. Diners, sure, but most McDonald's at 10 am on weekdays are home to a group of aged, hat wearing men, spouting off to each other. They have been there forever, but now they are empowered by their leader, trump. Loud, instead of mumbling, now. Easy to lead ill-informed people. Democracy hasn't been perfected yet.
4
Dear Sir,
You are absolutely correct, for the one-thousandth time. I speculate that everyone who is going to be convinced by fact-based arguments has already been convinced (admitted speculation, but not unreasonable).
If you're going to convince the skeptics and deniers, I humbly suggest that addressing arguments to them based on whatever it is they believe would be, oh, say 1000X more effective. To borrow a quaint phrase from some past moment, you are preaching to the choir ... and it's getting to be just a wee bit like that garrulous old guy on the barstool.
Sincerely.
The Israelites had Elijiah and Isaiah. The French had nostradamus. The Greeks had the oracle at Delphi. Now it turns out, we Americans have a prophet of our own in H.L. Mencken. Way back in 1920 he predicted, “On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
11
Only the liberal elites are smart enough to pick a president? Let’s see, they picked Hilary Clinton! The worse candidate that the democrats have picked in 50 years. Oh, and Trump is no moron. He has out flanked the democrats at every turn and passed a major tax bill, brought North Korea to the bargaining table, grew the economy to over 3% from Obama’s pitiful 1.9% growth in his last year of office. But wait, there will be more...lots more!
2
I thought that Mencken quote came true when the Supreme Court appointed George W. Bush as President.
Has it come true TWICE in a generation?
6
Not many heads of state get called "a (deleted) moron" by their foreign minister but Trump deserves the accolade "greatest moron ever".
Thank you for pointing out that the U.S. has a trade SURPLUS with Canada, a fact I've tried to raise in comments before.
Trump is also unaware that Nafta gives equal access to Canadian resources as Canada itself enjoys, and Canada does not buy into American delusions that weakened environmental and labour standards are anything but harmful.
If Trump came to Montreal the executives of Hydro Quebec would be glad to take him to a locked basement room at headquarters. This super-secret room has one large throw switch. Over the switch is a sign: "Lights of New England/New York On/Off DON'T TURN OFF"
If Trump got stuck in his personal Trump Tower elevator he might just give a thought to the close integrations of the Canadian/U.S. economies.
7
Thankfully, the Republican majorities and thier incompetent king will be gone soon enough. Trump will have served his purpose of bringing down the Bush and Clinton dynasties, ridding our Congress of Republicion majorities and exposing the corruption, incompetence and hypocrisy of the Republican Party. We will be thanking Trump for many years to come.
5
Speak for yourself please. If Trump has his way, he’ll destroy the US. But maybe with “we” you mean “me and my fellow Russians”?
"But when this particular old guy controls the world’s largest military, nukes included, it’s downright scary."
Far scarier is the lack of checks on Mr. Trump's capacity to incinerate our world umpteen times over. The existential imperative of the hour is for the two individuals in control of the two houses of US legislature to find a way ti pry Trump's fingers from the nuclear button. If the unthinkable comes to pass, Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell will bear all of the responsibility.
6
Unfortunately for anyone who believes in nuance, we have a president who has no idea what it means and further, doesn't care. He's not a deal maker, just a run of mill bully with a talent for convincing people he is a big success and further that that success is transferable, apparently by osmosis.
Anyone who paid attention to the Trump University scandal should know better, but such is his genius for showmanship at the expense of scholarship that his many debacles and rip offs somehow go by unnoticed, presented as quirks or fleeting moments of failure in a stellar career?!? That the evidence mainly consists of a display of accessories -- look at my gold plated penthouse and my plane! - appears to be sufficient to convince the naive and lost that they've found a "winner" to believe in!
Of course, it's not surprising that the premise scaffolding his decision is false as that is par for the course particularly when it comes to his long held beliefs apparently based on the paranoid assumption that success leaves one open to relentless exploitation or so says a man who exploits every one who comes in contact with him and every situation to his own advantage.
7
Ironically, this is something I posted to Washington Post a couple of weeks ago. Your observations about Trump are dead on: "When I was a young man, fresh out of college, one of my first jobs was working as a wine salesman. One of my coworkers, a hard liquor salesman, was hit by a train and I was conscripted to run his territory which included some of the seediest areas that we served. I have always remembered having to call weekly on one of the worst of the dive bars in his territory which was dark and dank and reeked of urine and perspiration and stale tobacco smoke. There was one old pensioner who was a constant fixture at the end of the bar, drinking up his social security check on the cheap rotgut served there who constantly expounded on the affairs of the day, to no one in particular. This old coot's rantings do not differ markedly from the tweeted rants coming from the current occupant of the White House."
10
In "The Art of the Deal, Trump told us he exaggerates and says things that are not so. He also told us that he does not care what people think of him, and that people generally do not like conflict and shy away from it. So if people need to take a stand to disagree with him, they just won't. That is why he doesn't care about lying and making things up--people lack the courage to call him on it. Perhaps now that Americans should realize the significant dangers he puts us in, we will wake up and throw the bum out of office.
8
I believe the president has this power only if he can make the case that it is because of national security risk. If this is true re: his power to levy tariffs, it seems that companies that will be adversely affected should take this nincompoop to court and make him prove his case. Otherwise, I believe this power falls on congress.
2
Sorry but there is no judicial review of the trade law that Trump used to justify his actions. Most trade law decisions can be challenged. This one can’t. Of course Congress could act.,,,,,,,
1
Try to remember there are 3,000,000 FEWER nonsense listeners who vote than nonsense listeners who love the babbler.
And that's not nonsense, either.
1
Ask any NYC resident (of the past 40 years)-Trump is a bozo. Listen to his disgusting remarks about women on the Howard Stern show, read about his numerous lawsuits, he paid subs and suppliers 50 cents on the dollars, Trump U. I could go on.
This so-called billionaire has never believed in charity. Look around NYC.
Do you see a hospital, a library, a community center with the Trump name?
There are none. Only 8% of NYC voters cast their vote for him.
We knew. We knew that if he won the presidency, our nation might be destroyed. Fear mongering, rampant racism and extreme violations of the emoluments clause. Such winning.
12
So what?
Well, apparently those garrulous old guys and Trump among them need to believe in those analyses victimizing the U.S. The whole anthem about 'Making America Great Again' is founded on that belief. The same happened BTW with the Brexiteers in the U.K. (let's make again that Great Britain). The problem for them is that the world has become too complex, multipolar for real; no more represented by the easier divide of USSR (the bad guys) and the 'Free World'. Notice that we assist at the revival of that simple division: with alternative actors such as the Russians, the Chinese and the North Koreans. We condemn the 'Russian' bots but we ignore the C.I.A./NSA bots promoting these visions.
2
Why is this idiot president allowed to just decide to administer tarriffs? Doesn't he have to go through Congress? He is allowed to just make declarations when the idea hits him with no Congressional oversight? He is not the emperor of the United States no matter what he thinks. Hey Congress, when are you going to do your job and reign in this madman?
8
One of the reasons that so much of the Trump base, including many disenfranchised white industrial workers, is so susceptible to fact-free ranting, is that they correctly observe that all the establishment pundits, Republicans and Democrats alike, have presided over a system that has increasingly impoverished there lives over the past 40 years. Globalism has indeed hurt them and they know it. So from there perspective a tariff feels pretty good, whether or not it works. Stop calling them stupid, and start providing solutions.
4
Globalization is inevitable, and is being driven FAR more by technology than by ideology. What has really hurt the American middle class over the past four decades is not trade, but trickle-down economics and our utter failure to upgrade our educational system in this country, which continues to churn out millions upon millions of math dopes and science illiterates.
And then we wonder why they can't find good-paying jobs.
As Homer Simpson might say, 'D'oh!!'
3
I work as an engineer for a semiconductor company whose employees are 2/3 immigrants. I understand the globalism of that world. It is possible to globalize and still protect the working class. Germany has done a pretty good job. The U.S., very much including Democrats, never even tried. The Democrats are divided between financial technocrats who helped create the problem, and more left-leaning Bernie types (myself included) who would like to find solutions. Just decrying the stupidity of the masses is a cop out.
1
What does age have to do with it? Many SCOTUS members are over 80. This is a scurrilous comment by NYT.
2
only two members were over eighty (80) years old at last check.
1
Not only is he the ignorant racist old man ranting in the diner - his rants are more at place with an old man in 1978 ranting in the diner than 2018.
He is a dotard. Even the lunatic dictator of North Korea sees right through the bellicose mendacity of the fool on the hill.
11
of course the President invokes national security when announcing his (yet to actually materialize) tariff policies. this is the get out of jail card that allows him to get away with things that woud have to otherwise go through, you know, the government.
4
We live in a Banana Republic.
4
Okay, fellow Americans. I read The Atlantic, The Economist, The New Yorker, New York Review of Books, Mother Jones, Washington Post, New York Times, The Guardian, and watch Rachel Maddow. The information, the stance coming from the WH is blatant. Russians waltzing in and out of the Oval Office. Money for the Secy. of State to work on Russian interference ...which is not being used. Scandal upon scandal. Nepotism reeking of corruption. A person in the guise of our president flipping and flopping on questions of policy. A greasy, subtle slide toward authoritarianism. Shuttering of important websites of Federal information. Officials leaving the WH ... who is left? And all of these actions and behaviors are harming Americans. There are moments when I cannot breathe. And I do mean Americans - border to border, coast to coast, from the smallest rural communities to towns to cities. I am like a tornado, roiling, with impotent rage. I worked campaigns last year. I called and canvassed. I talked to young students who volunteered. I talked to seniors as I am. African-Americans, Asians. They know. Questions? Is trump in with the Russians and what will he get? What have they promised him? I know he and his family are getting money. But our Congress? Has it sunk to such depths that even knowledge of all this I have typed, and if I know it, they must, even all this, they will clutch this calamitous personality and accept him as procedural?
10
The 18th District, Pennsylvania, is having its special election next week to replace disgraced Republican Tim Murphy. Although the 18th has had a Republican congressman since 2002 and for all but 14 of the last 139 years, the race there is suddenly a toss-up. It is just possible that Trump's threat of tariffs on steel, in particular, has something to do with this election.
4
I'm not convinced that Trump "has a picture of world trade in his head that bears as little resemblance to reality as his vision of an America overrun by violent immigrants." I doubt he truly believes what he says. More likely is that he's continuing to hammer on his winning formula to this point, namely the vilification of everyone outside his disgruntled, misinformed base.
2
I agree with you, and love your essays, but I have a problem with your negative use here of the word "old". It falls in the same category as calling someone "fat". It's unfair to all the reasonable and caring people who are old.
44
As a Canadian watching the Trump tariff threat unfold in real time, let me share some contemporaneous notes: the more frightened we "foreign threats to American security" become, the more satisfying to "the base" of Trump supporters, clearly. That's all this is about and everybody knows it. Sadistic, ill-informed, self-harming and yet wildly popular with a large swath of the electorate.
70
Pretty thin gruel, even from Krugman. Perhaps it's just blindingly frustrating for a leftist former economist to see the economy surge after the regulatory state was just modestly restrained.
Krugman might do well to leaven his concerns over truth and nukes with a bit of retrospective, say 2009 through 2016. During that glorious period of liberalism Trump's predecessor:
Told us "if you like your plan....", "if you like you doctor....", and " your cost will go down on average $2500"
Allowed our nuclear arsenal decay while Russia upgraded.
Negotiated a path for Iran to develop its nuclear capacity as long as it finished after Obama left office; then tossed in 400 million in unmarked bills.
Did nothing to mobilize against the rampant cyber theft of business and military IP by China. His cyber failures even extended to an obscure email server secreted in a bathroom closet.
Did nothing to stay N Korea's march to an ICBM arsenal.
Weaponized the IRS and possibly parts of the FBI.
Made immigration as broken as possible for political purposes.
Made student debt as broken as possible for political purposes.
So spare us the hollow concerns about the old guy with nukes for now. Let's see first whether he can negotiate a deal deal with N. Korea, keep business growing, and maybe even convince our enemies he's not the pushover the last guy was.
1
I don't know how to deal with Canadian steel, but aluminum -- that's easy. Raise tariffs on aluminum all you like, and then import all the alumnium you want, from Alcan and other such companies. That's the metal they're selling. Doubtful if the White House knows the difference.
I'm seeing signs of hope. Teachers in West Virginia. Senate voters in Alabama. High school students in Florida. Who's next? US!!! Voters in primaries happening now and the general elections in November. We can send the crazy ranting old guy (guys) back to his forlorn seat at the end of the bar where he belongs.
2
Trump continues to display belligerent ignorance on everything and Republicans remain complicit puppets.
3
I suspect by now the READING public gets it. You should be having a conference call with that "whiny mitch from the senate" and the ignoramus Ryan from the House. THEY CONTROL what is left of the government. They have approved all of drumpf's choices for the various departments and now must decide whether it is THEIR agenda or the nation that is MOST VALUABLE.
2
It is very odd that Trump is complaining that foreigners charge American manufactures too little for their raw material. That the price should be increased to bring back manufacturing jobs. Somehow this logic escapes me. Like solar panels are too cheap, so we should raise the price to help employ more installers. Guess one needs to be a Republican for this to make sense.
4
I think the characterization of Trump as being old and misinformed is too charitable. There are a few things we know about him that cut across all his statements and policies. First, he's a disinformation machine and deliberately so. This because it is effective chaff against his critics and even the rule of law (so far), and it plays well with his poorly informed and seemingly ill-intentioned base. We also know that he commits himself to projects that provide him opportunities for personal (and family) profit. Then finally, we know he and his family have been colluding with Russian nationals and government figures for years.
We also now know how he negotiates: take something away, then negotiate a deal that benefits him, or walk away and leave a wake if ruin behind.
So his tariff plan is an attempt to satisfy these goals, with this method. It isn't at all about benefitting the American people generally. He may go forward with it, or walk it back. If the latter then that may have been his plan all along. In any case, it plays well to his base, so he personally has nothing to lose.
2
I love the simplicity and beauty of "belligerent ignorance". It is succinct, and has a certain elegance.
1
DJT needs to realize that the rest of the world will be fine without the USA but we will not do well without the rest of the world. This idea that the USA is somehow being victimized, being taken advantage of by the rest of the world, and that we are on our own, is harming our society and our relationship with the rest of the world. It has the potential to become self fulfilling. If this approach to foreign policy keeps up then at some point we will be alone in the world, and we will regret it.
5
The best we can hope for is that they do find some shiny objects for him (or maybe Meryl Streep could distract him...) And, that the rest of the world learns to ignore him, to the extent possible.
So it looks like the Europeans levy a 3% tariff on Harleys, bourbon, Levis, etc. Zero percent would be more consistent with free trade. And this is what is infuriating. The rest of the world has a different conception of free trade than we do. Canada, Mexico and Germany are described as old friends, but they're really frenemies that would not hesitate to put up a tariff to save some jobs. And I doubt PK is defending dumping of steel or any other good. There is a reason Bernie (and Hillary) do not sound like PK on free trade. The reason is the garrulous guy in the diner in Manchester or Des Moines, how his job went south of the border and how he trusted the establishment to retrain or protect him
Trump apparently wants Canadian concessions on NAFTA, but if Trudeau gives up on Chapter 19--the mechanism for arbitration--he would commit political suicide.
For many months I gave no credence to the notion that Trump was Russia's Manchurian candidate. Now, however, I have to accept that theory. He is doing everything he can to alienate our closest allies, while cozying up to Russia (as well as other brutal dictators). What more could Putin want?
6
what do Russians always want? a giant empire balanced on the back of the serfs, a warm water port, and parity with the French.
1
Three words: " Unfit to serve..."
- The Constitution 25th Amendment provides a remedy to protect us: impeachment. The behavior outlined in this piece alone is a living example of why it's time for Congress to act on it.
- If anyone thinks the Amendment is intended only to cover physical disability, consider the brain of a person who is behaving pathologically, whether or not such behavior is a deliberate fraud on the people or merely an inability to distinguish fact from fiction.
Call it "personality" or call it "disability"; either way it amounts to "unfit," rendering the midterm elections this November more important than ever. Our nation's future depends on their outcome.
4
Dr. Krugman, it was because both our political parties failed too many people who just wanted the government to listen and work for them. If it had, Mr. Trump would be nowhere near the Presidency. so, out of several possible paths ahead, I'll pick two:
One, Trump the mountebank keeps repeating lies over and over till enough people believe it and support him for a few more years, the country becomes more corrupt and we lose faith in Government and we get a period of chaotic governance.
Or two, as was heartening to discover among a whole lot of bad news, Italy rejected Berlusconi, a Trump predecessor. They picked worse but that is a failing of all political parties in Italy over decades.
The same will come true in England, Poland, and Hungary. People will discover extremist politicians lied to them when they leave the EU. A significant amount of qualified people go where they are more welcome, like the EU Doctors in England for example and the citizenry wonder what happened.
On and on in autocracies all over, except maybe Russia and China for now.
There are enough people with common sense in the world and here in the U.S. to show Mr. Trump and his political party of obstructionists, liars, and thieves the door. We'll know soon enough at the Polls in November and 2020.
2
I agree with the sentiments, but why use the really dated, old-time label "old guy"? Young guys like Richard Spencer and (pick one) any young beautiful-faced Fox News spokesperson can spew the same ignorant nonsense. On the other hand, some of the wisest, most seasoned, most informed and compassionate people in the world are "old." And they have worked on it. And they have lived it. And we can learn from them. Please, please, no more gross generalizations; you will get there yourself.
3
One character trait that seems to be common of right wing rulers is that they cannot be seen to have made a mistake, they must be seen as infallible otherwise they are weak. So they will spend extraordinary amounts of time and money propping up failed ideas and systems, simply because to abandon them will be an admission they were wrong. When you combine this with a president "whose thoughts are often just six fireflies beeping randomly in a jar" (as David Brooks put it) you have a very serious problem. Suddenly you are trying to straighten rivers because a random firefly beeped.
2
The problem we have with 45's ranting is a gullible population who respond to tough-guy speech, with little care for fact checking. Secondly, we have a Congress who are more concerned about reelection to their powerful cushy positions shilling for their corporate handlers than working for the Greater Good. Until Congress pulls up the reins and starts acting like grownups, we the people are going to get shafted. Many won't even realize it, thinking we're protecting our interests when in fact we are getting screwed.
4
If clueless, dangerously-wrong-about-many-things people can end up in positions of power and lead nations down hurtful paths (in many ways).... and average voters who are, pretty much by nature of modern living, the opposite of policy wonks (which would be ideal in a voter, no?). Then WHY aren’t we talking about how this current set-up fails the average human and our ability to advance civilization globally? Seriously, the bright shiny thing is Trump himself. We’re fools for not zeroing in on the real problem: that democracy works in a sloppy, zig-zag, inefficient way and it’s high time we fine-tune it. Let’s make it a better democracy. Let’s obsess over how. Let’s talk about it 24/7 on CNN instead of lost planes. Let’s pour money into an international manhattan project of how to improve governance itself around the world. It used to be a ranting old guys with swords... then muskets... then biplanes, etc. We liberals feel so righteous and shake our latte with anger in our Priuses as we listen to NPR. And Joe Redneck shakes his red bull in his truck to Rush. Trump’s just a symptom and we’re again missing the cause of our never ending ills: democracy is sloppy as hell. If it was not, we’d have no Trump in the first place. So HOW can we improve democracy? Dare to ask it. The average voter watches Netflix, not C-Span. The average leader is average. I say for one, begin to use limited, carefully introduced A.I. in domestic and global governance. Us humans alone are laughably bad.
1
Trump' s tariff on solar panels is already causing a plummet in jobs in what had been one of our fastest growing job sectors. The dame is going to happen with aluminum and steel. It is estimated these tariffs may save about 200,000 jobs, but will lose 4.8 million more. Meanwhile, international supply lines may very well organize themselves around us and will mo longer ne available to us as suppliers when we come to our senses. Meanwhile there will be higher priaces, fewer jobs and international and domestic disruption and damage because one ignorant and thinskinned man doesn't understand trade. Our majority GOP congress can stop this, but thinks it is enough to throw up their hands, abdicate their responsibility to defend even the economic interests of their own districts, and let the campaign rhetoric that they think pursuaded the uninformed of Trump' s electors, take us all to hell,
4
How many times do we have to hear this and not go nuts? Doesn't our president now finally flunk the "fit for office" standard? He is endangering the nation. What do we need? Speaker Ryan has the power and responsibility to step up to this emperor who has removed his own clothes and does not care. Krugman refers to Trump as an old guy spouting nonsense. But this old guy did more than rant when he sent missles in the past, an action for which he was praised, but was shown to be no part of a strategy. But nuking is quite a different action. Krugman is so ON TARGET here by pointing out the ignorance that governs the process leading to presidential action. It is horribly flawed, it personally reactive, and this should be the last straw for taking steps to initiate action to remove. Do we have to wait until bombs fall and look at each other and say - why? Why did "we" do nothing?. Who has the power to act. Paul Ryan for one. Paul Ryan, grow a pair. Stand up. This is beyond scary, and it's time for action by the only leaders who can take action - the Republican leadership.
4
His idiocy is so incoherent it is difficult to know whether someone has once again made the fateful mistake of thinking they could make him their useful idiot, forgetting that an idiot is an idiot, or whether instead he is just jabbering. It's like handing a loaded revolver to a cranky toddler on a sugar binge and hoping he shoots someone you don't like.
2
Donald Trump is an arrogant, ignorant, and lying prep school bully with nothing but an uneducated and /or willfully misinformed group of sycophants and GOP brown nosers to back him (and vote him into office). How can anyone with a whiff of intelligence or conscience give this idiot any credence? He is dividing and destroying our country and doing grave damage to our standing with our political and business allies, to human rights and human decency, and to the environmental progress we have championed at home and in the world. He is also doing egregious damage to the American worker and our economy and yet the GOP suck ups continue to support, encourage, and embolden him even after his outrageous statements, tweets, positions, and actions. The adage that you get the government you deserve is fulfilled here and now in the U.S. The Village Idiot and the Swamp of his making are on full display!
GET OUT THE VOTE!!!
5
Krugman's article brings facts to refute Trump's cock-eyed. "last person spoken to," hapless approach to leadership. I guess we could live with all that, were it not for the hair-trigger Trump reflex to assuage his anger and frustration by doing more stupid things.
His actions remind me of the "bumper car" rides Iloved in Coney Island as a kid. One "car" would hit another and another and pretty much caused the cars to careen wildly into other cars, resulting in a funny kind of chaos.
Trump's behavior is like that chaotic bumper car ride, but it's a kind of chaos that is not funny. And the bumper car ride lasted only 5-6 minutes.
4
Trump is not looking at his presidency from the point of view “I want to keep America strong for the foreseeable future.” He is primarily interested in how much money he (and his family) can make by taking advantage of his position as the President of the United States.
His record so far bears this out. He reminds me of the CEO's at General Motors that followed Alfred P. Sloan. These CEOs knew they were going to hold their job for 4 – 6 years. During that time, they were not building GM for the future. They were trying to leverage their offerings so that they could keep sales up enough so that they would get their big bonuses each year and a big stack of money when they retired. As a result, GM dropped significantly in sales and technology and the Japanese moved strongly into the U.S. automobile market. Trump is doing the same thing with the U.S. He will make money hand over fist, create more connections with the slime balls like he has worked with in the past, and leave the U.S. in a giant mess. And his undereducated base will suffer by far the most.
3
I had thought that the Electoral College would rescue our nation by performing the oversight seemingly the wise founders predicted could happen.
It was not just about slavery.
Our pundit is scared and so am I.
The USA's leadership if not existence is ... bye-bye conceivably in
worst case scenario.
This should even scare Putin in my very humble take, because chaos is not order nor security nor without consequences for
all, as Putin is no humanist ... I am recalling that scene of
Anthony Perkins thinking somebody signaling isn't dead, but it was a technology snafu.
1
Impeach! Convict! Imprison!
3
What the 'grown-up' people in the Administration now need to do is to co-opt 'Fox and Friends' to their cause... work out 'stories' they wish Mr. Trump to believe, and feed him these in small bites. Soon, the teetotal muttering old dotard will change his tune and adopt sober, normal, sensible policies.
2
What would happen if the NYT treated 45 as irrelevant, carrying only absolutely essential information about him as it relates to our country? It makes your job too easy to fill up our paper with article after article, editorial after editorial about his blabber, his staff, and his limitations. Why don’t you seek out ranking Democrats and plaster the NYT with endless articles about them? Interviews with how they’d approach trade, talks with North Korea, Israel, climate change, ...Let’s fill the pages with their ideas instead of this constant onslaught of 45. We know that helped him win the election. Let’s not give him this platform, which, as President, should be given, but which, as President, he only uses to promote himself.
3
Republicans created this monster, it's up to them to kill it.
3
We are in a dictatorship mood and people simply are missing it. everything he says he really believes it. I would not be surprised that his joke about Melania it is int he back of his mind. As a matter of fact i would not doubt he was involved with Hope Hicks. Think about
Trump is just the headlight on our collective downbound train.
1
After Trump goes (hopefully way before his term is up) we have to sit down and make sure this situation never happens again! The President of the USA is too important a position for us and the world to have an idiot in the Oval Office.
2
Gary Cohn, you said you "'might' resign" if Trump imposed tariffs.
While American citizens "might" have hoped for a firmer position by you, what are you planning to do now big Gar.
Your old firm boasts about its "principles." Do you have any?
2
More hysterical drivel from another pacifist leftist scared of his own shadow. Mr. Krugman should put on a new pair of pajamas and retreat to his safe space next to his teddy bear by his bed. Someone pat him on the head and tell him Mr. Trump is not a bad man.
1
We have ignorantly taken the invincibility of the Unites States for granted for so long it really is astounding we could exhibit such chutzpah. Every eon or so, it seems the US need a swift kick in the be-hind to wake it up to reality. In fact, we now have coined that overly used and abused term "wake-up call" to now apply to almost anything, except of course actually waking up.
Leave it to we Americans. That last big wake-up for US, especially we New Yorkers and Washingtonians, is now a generation old. What did we learn? To fortify skyscrapers, to in fact go on to build since 9/11/01 increasingly taller structures in Midtown. It's as if we are saying: I dare you to knock this one down. Yes, our attention-spans have been shortening with each passing decade it seems. To think that after all the US has been through in a generation it would renounce that resiliency by electing the most unqualified oaf imaginable as president, the United States must really be asking for it. Why not we all get ready now? Let US all collectively bend over, and wait for the next swift one to come our way. It's just a matter of time.
DD
Manhattan
3
I don't want to be rude or overstate educational status of an individual.
But when it comes to the President of our country-an exception needs to be made. It is simple that Trump is an individual who has been properly described as an idiot. His constant rants and clearly baseless claims to support absurd conduct via executive orders etc., leaves little room for doubt that we as a country have elected an idiot. So, Mr, Krugman explanation as to why Trump is so wrong matters little when trying to convince an idiot. Remember Trump does not read. It might be better if Mr. Krugman goes on Fox as Trump might then listen.
1
Trump is unfit to serve as are those he has surrounded himself with. I believe he has been bought by Putin who is the only one that benefits from his insane policies with trade, continued division in the U.S., the absence of any directive to the intelligence community to disrupt the continuing meddling in the elections or to at the very least make them pay a price for that activity and Trump's refusal to execute the sanctions against Russia overwhelmingly endorsed by congress. Ryan and McConnell remain silent and others actually defend this absence of leadership. The people in the flyover states that support this idiot have not yet been impacted by the healthcare destruction, the potential trade implications, immigration madness and the tax cuts that benefit corporate America and the wealthy at the expense of the rest of us. Instead of policy matters, Donald Trump is focused on enriching himself with half the people in the White House not even able to acquire a security clearance. Trump is wholly owned by Vladimir Putin. The complicit Republicans should be in jail for treason in the face of this continuing undermining of our national security. And the Trump supporters applaud the "successes" of the moron in the Oval Office. It's surreal.
4
How much more evidence is needed that he is a dangerous imbecile who lashes out when something 'occurs' to him. Nixon was a scheming bundle of paranoia, but you got the feeling he knew what was going on at least.
Not this bonehead.
5
All to often someone being interviewed asserts that Trump is keeping his promises to the people who voted for him and the interviewer does not follow up with any questions about validity of those promises. Trump's promises were stupid then and are stupid now, with precious few exceptions.
3
Paul Krugman could easily be describing himself -- he's a ranting old guy with an OP ED column on the Times Editorial page. Dr Krugman sounds more and more like the garrulous old uncle at the holiday table who spouts nonsense that the rest of his family ignores as they pass the turkey.
Instead of debating him on what he actually wrote, you chose to attack and insult.
I'm assuming you're a trump supporter.
Fortunately, Canada, Mexico and Europe know better than to take Trump either seriously or literally. They know, as apparently some professors have not yet figured out that nothing Trump says lasts long. Trade war? Tariffs? Just a tantrum. Red face, loud noise, all gone, thumb sucking, calm restored. He'll forget all about it. Never gonna happen.
"There is no chaos!" Trump says re: his White House staff. Sad to say, he would not recognize it if it slapped him in the face. One may be inclined to feel sorry for the idiot. NOT!
2
Old guy, Paul Krugman, knows nothing about business and trade as shown by his inaccurate editorial.
1
Gee, I thought the story might be about Vladimir Putin, who this weekend bellowed his version of "we will bury you" with new weapons. Or maybe the latest heir of the Kim line in North Korea, building nukes. No, I forgot -- it's the New York Times, where all things, all the time, are big, bad Trump. Then one wonders why it's called "fake news."
1
Paul is wrong on one critical fact. Trump isn't a garrulous old guy in a diner. He's an aging drunk teetering on a bar stool at a sleazy bar. Not even the other old drunks take him seriously.
3
Republicans have installed Stupid in the White House and now regret the wrecking ball he throws at trade? Sorry folks, you asked for it and elections have consequences. As Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission, pointed out: “We can do stupid too.”
1
Lie. Say, lie.
1
Do we pay for the monogramming on his cuffs?
53
Rather than in a “diner,” I picture Krugman’s belligerently ignorant old guy ranting from a bar stool “three sheets to the wind,” with the other patrons enjoying the entertainment so much, that instead of trying to take his keys, they keep telling the bartender to set him up with another “double.”
"If we go around threatening our most important allies with retaliation against policies they don’t even have, how can we expect them to trust us — or support us — on anything else?"
What have any of these jerks done for us lately..???
Please call falsehoods lies. A lie is a lie. Why make a liar into a falsehood teller? A liar is a liar.
1
"it’s downright scary," Says it all, every day is chaos and a reality show of idiocy. When are Republicans going to honor their oath of office?
1
" talking tough and stupid on trade in itself damages U.S. credibility"...
That's the funniest thing Mr. Krugman has ever written.
After a year of Trump "talking" it is hard to believe that anything about the "tough and stupid on trade" part that will further erode US credibility.
Not your most insightful column, Mr. Krugman.
Yep. He's willfully ignorant, mendacious, petty and mean-spirited, and he sits in the captain's chair.
Sadly, the reaction to this in Washington is to pretend it's not happening.
3
How much real condescension must Republicans have for the kind of average, bar stool guy Paul describes, if their standard bearer is a bold faced liar?
Along with worrying about the garrulous old man in the Oval Office we need to remember the millions of other garrulous old "victims of elite scorn" who think the so called president is doing a great job.
I keep looking for the silver lining: American democracy reawakened?
Young citizens finding their voices and their calls to duty?
Pundits and reporters who have taken up their pens and microphones with honesty instead of false equivalence?
Women voters realizing how much power they really have?
All that is on one side of the equation, on the other we still have the koch bothers and their ilk doing their best impersonations of Hitler's industrialists and backers; while turning our Nation into a feudal banana republic.
4
We are all ignorant about many things. No Renaissance folks these days. But those who choose to be ignorant are pathetic. I would really, really like to just ignore these ignore these fools. Maybe after November we'll be able to.
Hey Paul, "Who knew that global economics could be so complicated" !
Dr. Krugman, "You knew, that's who" !
Hope Hicks, soon to be in the wind - Jarrod - - - walking about - probably still reading stuff he has no clearance for -
Sarah - singing the chorus; "There's been no collusion" -
So, the Twitterer-n-Chief - all fired up and nobody to blame - decides that he'll hit China with Trade Tarriffs - - With absolutely no clue that "they" are far down the list of countries who supply us with Aluminum and Steel.
Of course, Ryan, is standing up for his big-buck-backers who do not want the tariffs, as they will hurt "their" investments - is poorly pretending to be "moral" . . .
Putin could not be happier, as his puppy begins to reek havoc on our NATO Allies . . . . .
"Doctor Mueller" . . . . "It's time to declare the patient DOA"
2
My question is why didn't " Trump’s display of belligerent ignorance" scare the heck out of those who voted for him? I still can't believe anyone with a shred of intelligence would even have considered voting for this vulgar, ignorant, mendacious charlatan. And, frankly, I'm still having trouble forgiving my fellow citizens who did; they've not only endangered this country, but actually the future of the whole planet.
5
Chelle, this is the problem with liberals and why Trump got elected. No one is allowed to have a different view from yours. Brace yourself for 8 years of Trump. We are re-electing him.
As brilliant as he is, even Dr. Krugman I think misunderstands this a bit.
He's certainly correct that Trump is pandering to the most ignorant people in our country.
But I disagree that Trump sincerely believes in this nonsense or anything else. He is a con man, a narcissist and a nihilist. He'll say or do whatever he thinks will sell to the most gullible people at that particular moment - this idiocy included.
The fact that he is succeeding says everything about the state of our country, where the GOP has been undermining education and critical thinking for decades, knowing their only path to power is a stupid electorate. It's a difficult and complicated world, and hard enough to succeed when you're actually trying with your best and brightest. We've stopped trying.
America’s President - not just a mentally unfit geezer but a true traitor, selling out and undermining American democracy to Putin and Russia, all to make sure he still gets loans from Deutsche Bank to prop up his glitzy, trashy, corrupt real estate business. (Cause American banks knew better than to give 45 loans on which he’d default.)
How long must we endure this assault on democracy?
Will 2018 give Congress the wake-up call and Democratic majority it deserves to address the elephant in the room?
Will the 35% of Americans fed by Faux News stay loyal to our traitorous President?
Will American democracy survive?
1
". . . threatening our most important allies with retaliation against policies they don’t even have. . ."
He exists in a distorted sense of reality. A psychotic break from reality.
One more note:
One of his favorite words (of many many few) is 'disgraceful'. Everything is disgraceful this, that, him, her; all 'disgraceful!'
Can't you just hear big Frank and Mom screaming this word down at a frightened little boy who has somehow failed, or come up short yet again and again and again? 'You are a disgrace, Donny!'
Many say they damaged him by sending him off to military clown school for miscreants, but no, the damage had be done, and for a long time, before that. That was simply the Trump's final solution.
Disgraceful. . .
Now we and the world are stuck with him.
1
Trump talks tough and stupid on pretty much everything that comes out of his mouth! He bald face lies about whatever will earn him brownie points with the clueless portion of his base AND about anything that he thinks makes him look good, regardless of it not doing so.
Despite all of our organizing efforts and protests, our national, state and local press have normalized his craziness, just by acknowledging his presidency and expecting appropriate behavior! He stands in opposition to every value we as a nation have. Most republicans do not approve of his behavior. Well, at least those not elected to congress, anyway.
It is not hard to figure out why the EU will retaliate by increasing tariffs on Harley Davidson motorcycles based in Paul Ryan's home state, and on bourbon primarily produced in McConnell's state. Our European friends may have done the people of those states some damage. But, they're likely doing our nation a favor. This is, after all, an election year.
Current congressional republicans will NEVER impeach Trump or stop their gridlock creating vise grip on congress. They are not patriots! Nunes is by far Trump's biggest lackey. Many others aren't very far behind. Enough is enough!
Grover Norquist advocates shrinking government to a size where it can be drowned in a bathtub. That may be what it takes to the republican party to get a measure of sanity back into government. Vote BLUE in 2018!!!
1
What's really scary is that the ranting old men could re-elect the ranter in chief in 2020
1
David, the "ranting old men" and the rest of us who voted for Trump will vote for him in 2020.
1
Emperor Donald the First seems to think that he is allowed to impose his requirements on anyone, but they may not express any preferences of their own. That is not going to win hm any friends, Many of our trading partners, and up until now allies, are going to tell him to go pound sand.
He thinks he can force "my way or the highway" on anybody and everybody. Not gonna happen. He is setting himself up for a black eye, administered in public. Bullies cannot see that coming until it arrives.
What a total loser you are, Donald the Dunce. #SAD.
And Mueller keeps on indicting and issuing subpoenas. Mueller Ain't Going Away ("MAGA").
1
Speaking of garrulous old guys...
"...No, we aren’t experiencing a huge wave of violent crime carried out by immigrants...
"...we know that he’s just as bombastic and clueless (with added racism) when it comes to crime...
...do you ever shut up long enough to understand what's really going on in the rest of the world - or even read your own paper
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/03/world/europe/sweden-crime-immigration...
"...gang-related assaults and shootings are becoming more frequent, and the number of neighborhoods categorized by the police as “marred by crime, social unrest and insecurity” is rising...
Yes - this is Sweden...
..................
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/opinion/krugman-europes-secret-succes...
"...But then a funny thing happened: Europe started doing much better... European nations with big welfare states, like Sweden and the Netherlands, do even better.
Yes - this is you talking about Sweden...
If you're going to rant like this - perhaps the Galaxy or the Westway...
2
A "45" monogram on his shirt cuff. Well, alrighty then.
This guy has some serious problems.
1
Why have we not removed this traitorous, foolish, petulant President from office?
What will it take to finally remove him?
2
"Maybe the adults in the administration, if there are any left, will find some bright, shiny objects to distract him"
Paul, I hope you aren't suggesting that the people who have left the administration were the "adults". Bannon, Gorka, and most of the rest of the rats who've jumped ship might be lucky to get out, but they are still infants when it comes to developing rational policies. The country is better off without them. Now, we just need to coerce the rest of policy dullards, like Miller, Cohn, Conway, and every last member of Trump's cabinet, possibly excepting Mattis, to leave, too. Not a one of them has anything to contribute to the country's well being.
And then, if not before, Trump himself needs to find an exit. If he has even a scintilla of precognition, he should see the Mueller train coming at him. He should cut a deal with them now that he'll resign to avoid jail time. It's clear that Trump thinks he's powerful enough to just fire Mueller at the right time, and this will all go away. But Mueller is nobody's fool. He has the safeguards in place to ameliorate that, even if Trump is foolish enough to try.
Time is running out, Mr. President. You need to act the rat you are and jump off this sinking ship while you can. Although, I'd love to see you do a good stretch at Camp Fed. You've earned that.
2
There is no need to worry about the bloviating blustery bullying buffoon temporarily occupying the Oval Office of the White House with nukes. No one ever died nor was wounded by a slurring angry tweet nor speech. Trump has spent a third of his time in office focused on profiting from whatever he is hiding from the American people in his personal and family income tax returns and business records.
As long as Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin is smiling and smirking while his puppet dummy stooge Donald John Trump is snarling and sneaking we are safe. The foes of Putin end up in prisons, hospitals, mental institutions, urns and coffins. Trump's gratitude to and fear of Putin will protect us. Putin is rumored to be the richest person in the world. Owning America will do that.
3
A ranting old guy without nukes.
1
"belligerent ignorance, tough and stupid, bombastic and clueless" All phrases that will be part of Trump's epitaph or in the history books relating this period of the American Dark Ages.
Okay, joke's over. Koch brothers, you can come out now. We need to get the government back to work. Rupert Murdoch, that was really funny, how you created that pretend news station that so many people thought was real! NRA, the way you tried to get everyone to buy more guns via the deaths of hundreds of schoolchildren using a weirdly worded 18th century law! And finally, Republicans, you really had us going on responsible government! You guys are hilarious. No, really. 'Cause this is all a joke, right?
2
Dean Wormer : "Fat , Drunk and Stupid is no way to go thru life." Well, we have a President who has proven that wrong.
2
You continue to relentlessly attack President Trump just because he's a chronic liar.
2
Enough with the agism, okay?
2
Credibility? What credibility?
Trump appears to think that "trade" means "I win, you lose." Since our NAFTA partners get something out of the deal (or they wouldn't have signed it in the first place), Trump thinks it's unfair. He complains about how much our trade agreements have cost us, but they've also cost our trading partners around the world. Yet all get something from the agreements or they wouldn't exist. It's called "trade" rather than "win/lose" for a reason, you ignoramus.
Trump truly is an ignorant
2
There was an old man from Queens
Who does whatever he deems
He can use nukes in a hurry
And the bodies they'll bury
America is great so it seems !
46
This new article from the St. Louis Federal Reserve examines the current state of US manufacturing and analyzes its global position and its competition with China: "Here’s Why U.S. Manufacturing Is Fundamentally Strong" [https://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/economic-synopses/2018/03/0...].
What supports the bar rant is a Republican shift from truth to blame and hate, from facts to shame and anger as the path to political success. Having built the scaffolding, Trump used immigrants to finish the new exterior. Hate became his label and his brand name became misstatements of bluster. Like the WWE (Linda Mahon has done a surprising good job at the SBA!), the crowds cheered! Stupid was installed as the permanent default.
Quick: name the Chinese smart phone that's leaping off the shelves in America. Name the Chinese car that is taking over the auto market. The apparel company. This knee-jerk blame of China misses the facts and ignores the real problems at the heart of America's manufacturing loss: the failure to capitalize old industries (using plants and facilities long past their prime, that produced inefficiently and couldn't produce products reflecting new innovations) and a failure to capitalize new industries. The "savings" from delaying capital investment by outsourcing and offshoring were the main drivers for the disappearance of American jobs--not the difference is wages--the difference in capital investment!
Canada is the biggest exporter of steel and aluminum to the US! With 20% of the market, it leads in both metals. China? Its share is 3% for each metal. Fact: 3% import rates will not sink an industry or economy.
Oh, the leading car in Chinese sales? Buick.
2
Isn’t he doing this just as a distraction from all the other chaos?
1
I blame two forces in American life for this abrupt turn toward mindless contempt for facts and the elites who master them: 1. fundamentalist religion - if the larger context of a political "dialogue" is the attitude that "I'm uniquely in possession of absolute truth concocted from an ancient collection of preposterous fairy tales with a hopelessly corrupted provenance” - well, you now have a national conversation based on comprehensive delusion. 2. The related, racist perspective of many conservatives that asserts that any tactic, no matter how extreme, is justified by their fears that increasing numbers of people of color will overwhelm "white culture". Facts, votes, truth, democracy itself - all must be subverted and made subservient to this racist, hysterical imperative. It's even worse than mere voter suppression. A majority of Republicans would support Trump if he tried to cancel the 2020 election. A third of the country cannot differentiate a reality show from reality. Facts, reason, logic, analysis - none of this matters, only the "narrative". Children of America, save us from the failed elders.
4
There are positive aspects to mainstream religions, such as charity and a sense community. But with fundamentalist religion, the first commandment is always, “Thou shalt be ignorant”.
1
What if, in his next fit of frustration and anger, he does the nuclear thing? What if, Republicans? You really want the whole planet to be destroyed just because you want to win everything? How about your big money people, they would really prefer to be annihilated than to get rid of this infantile president? Really?
1
There is nothing in this editorial.
Just anti Trump propaganda. President Trump can do nothing right in the author's opinion.
3
"Old Guy"? What a shame Krugman laces his article with repeated prejudicial references to Trump's age and the inclusion of a startlingly insensitive picture of his wrinkled hand. Of course Trump hangs himself with his every word and every policy statement. But sadly Krugman takes a small step in the same direction with this jeering op-ed piece.
1
Not exactly, sir.
Academic Spencerians--don't deny hard noses aka GOP ideologues, and what about their skinflint think-tanks.
Herbert Spencer makes hay out of Charles Darwin.
Social Darwinism is hugely influential.
Aren't Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand purveyors?
There is more than pragmatism there, there.
Krugman hits the nail on the head.
Over the years, my generation of the Vietnam/Civil Rights era has morphed from dedicated concerned activists for whatever position we believed in in the days of our youth to a bunch of garrolous opinionated old men. We have produced 3 Presidents and 1 Vice President who were Vietnam Draft Dodgers by choice and design and 1 Vice President who actually served in Vietnam (Gore) and 1 (Cheney) who had more important things to do.
All of these "leaders" of my generation have been subject to scandal whether it be of a sexual exploitation nature, one of condoning torture or of conducting questionable military escapades.
Since 1992 only one President has not been of my generation and he served with less scandal and more dignity, honesty and respect than any of my generation.
As a result this Vietnam Vet who also used college deferments in order to graduate from college first says to my own generation of now old men:
Get out of the way. There are better leaders and our time is past. Just look at the students in Florida if you don't believe me. They are the future. Our time has past. Trump unfortunately will be our political legacy.
3
Dear Mr. President,
The presidency is not about you or your Twitter feed; it is about governing the United States of America. Make it so.
Sincerely,
Patricia Brown
PS. Read Paul Krugman!
Does "a sharply higher dollar" mean a better exchange rate when converting to weaker currencies, like the Vietnamese Dong? Just wondering if there's some personal upside to POTUS madness.
Prof. Krugman-betrays unfairness towards septuagenarians."Bref, he is an ageIst. He should be reminded that De Gaulle returned to the Elysee almost when he was 70 to settle the Algerian conflict which had endured fpr 8 years, 1954-1962, and then amnistied OAS activists which brought peace.To call our president a "ranting old guy" is disrespectful and untrue. No president has been able to see his agenda on such a wide variety of issues succeed as Trump!And both are 1 percenters. Krugman shares 1 trait in common with other Times newspaper columnists: PK IS OUT OF TOUCH WITH AVERAGE AMERICANS, like Nancy Pelosi. To her a $2,000 tax break is crumbs. To my kith and kin, it is manna from heaven.Get over your resentment of Trump as c-in-c.Hypothesis is that you would rather he fail than see America succeed.Later for demeaning words like "old guy!" There are young fogies as well as old fogies!Prof. KRUGMAN should emerge from his buffer zone long enough to see how the other half lives,takE AS A ROLE MODEL the left wing BERKELEY sociologist who settled in Tea Party country in La. to see the folks lives, and wrote a fascinating book, "Strangers in their Own Land"which is required reading for anyone who wants to understand the movement!Krugman may believe that his elitist disparagement of us reflects the majority view of the citizenry. But the opposite is true.Time to get down with the folk, Professor Krugman.Find out how the working class lives and thinks.
1
The voters were warned by Madame Hillary Clinton !
But Hillary was not good enough for them, so they chose Donald J. trump who is the master of alternate facts, created an America that it is okay to lie because 45 lies all the time, there is no global warming because it snows in America`s ground in winter.
The earth is actually flat and this old man is the President who is a chaos master and only a few good man mistakenly took a job can`t run away any faster than they could to get away from him.
General H. R. McMaster is the prime example.
While Jared and Ivanka are still hanging around with no knowledge of the positions they hold and only into enriching themselves.
Only choise is to vote all out unless Bobby Mueller gets the then sooner !
3
The Manchurian Candidate is doing his job to wreak havoc among our allies.
A presidency is only as good as the people who advise the president. He has mostly surrounded himself with political no nothings who were chosen because of their wealth and unquestioned loyalty. The two or three who are capable are in a constant struggle of, "should I stay or should I go". He is isolated, angry, and believes he's being persecuted for being superior. There's a word for that condition and it isn't presidential.
1
Why is there anyone who does NOT assume Trump is Putin's Manchurian Candidate? Name any evidence he is NOT simply Putin's hand-puppet. What could be more brilliantly economical than installing puppet Trump in the White House in order to have him single-handedly ruin the American economy by launching an absurd trade war first, then an even more devastatingly stupid real war with North Korea for dessert? All "free" bonuses for Trump's boss Putin. When this story is told, Putin will have to be praised by historians as the most brilliant player of Russia's incredibly weak hand that was conceivable. Russia is just a pitiful little economy with a huge empty, mostly frozen landmass attached to it. Its GDP was half of little France's last year, only a third of Germany's, and about a twelfth of ours. Yet this pitiful little economy was able to bring America to economic disaster simply by putting a puppet in the Oval Office for "free." Makes the machinations of Hitler or Napoleon look like nothing.
1
A core principle of Trump and his base...hatred of the truth. So Trump advocates policies on trade and tariffs at odds with the truth. Well, there's a shock. Gee, could this tariff move be distraction? A distraction from all the chaos in the white house? Is there anyone left in the world that doesn't get it?
Trump's playbook is simple. When anything goes wrong, propose some new idea that is so crazy or stupid, that we have to pay attention to it and forget about discussing the last thing he messed up. He does this over and over and over and over and over again. So...if this trade tariff idea really goes south, Trump's response will be to propose something equally outrageous to send us all off on some new tangent. It's what he does.
As for the rest of the world...why shouldn't they join our circus? We Americans are a generous people. I for one have no problem with inviting the rest of the world to join us in celebrating the Trump presidency. After all, what could be more fun than a world wide trade war?
So.
1
So what happens if the day comes when Europe bands together and decides they don't need us at all? If they actually become our ENEMIES???? (Over something stupid that our president does.). All the tough talk and bluster in the world won't save us then.
Images of a garrulous old white guy pontificating at a diner reminds me of Professor Krugman's anguished prediction on November 9, 2016 that global financial would collapse and NEVER recover. We're still waiting, Paul.
Or, his prediction that The End of Civilization was fast upon us.
Or, his dizzying spin from Obama Keynesianism to Trump Austerity when deficits suddenly began to matter again early in 2017.
Yeah, lots of old garrulous guys at the diner. Some of them seem to watch a lot of NPR and CNN and thumb through the Op-Ed section of the Times.
On the issue of facts, Mr. Krugman, a real wonk should have $566 Billion on the tip of his tongue when he wants to chastise a charlatan. $500 Billion won't cut it in wonkville.
1
Albert, spot on
"For one thing, talking tough and stupid on trade in itself damages U.S. credibility"
But it makes insecure weaklings that watch FOX feel like THEY'RE strong.
2
Everyone knows how damaged our President is. Everyone talks about it all the time. Is there nothing we can do, really?
We can't get this man, this damaged, horrible man, out of office, all of us, together, can't do that? This embarrassment, this humiliation of a man, does our system not give us a way to rid ourselves of him? Must we bear him? For how long, until he does what harm?
It's reported that the man is "unglued". He is dangerous. Yet he leads the free world? Get him out.
1
I know trump is a traitor Paul. Tell us how we can use the state to promote export led industrialization. Please read Vivek fibber locked in place. For a bevel prize winner your reading seems a little thin
You can't fix stupid. And senescence is Trump's strong suit. Face it: America is ruled by an emperor, not a president. Trump's inane braying that is interpreted as pronunciamenti is merely the consequence of the death of American democracy. We are still technically a republic but one completey and utterly dominated by the megarich, megacorporate, megabanks and their hirelings called lobbyists. Trump is merely acting the role of emperor that he perceives--rightly--is his. Hope everyone likes it because we all enabled it by not reining in campaign finance.
1
Trump is a fly buzzing in a bottle bumping into glass walls. Where will he ricochet? No-one can predict, nor is it worthwhile to try.
Meanwhile the GOP Congress is doing what?
Easy to predict: What they have been bought and paid to do - help their wacko wealthies.
2
No mention of how this insane military budget increase was approved by pretty much every Democrat. So your party just enabled this man who you deem to be crazy with a lot more money to be careless with these nukes. You guys make absolutely no sense.
Professor, you have captured the man succintly. A "belligerently ignorant" man who "talks tough and stupid" - this is what 60% of non-Hispanic whites voted for in the last election.
We have met the enemy, and he is us ( the American electorate in the aggregate).
Let’s remember that this ranting old guy is president because he conspired with Russia to defeat Hillary and because the Republican terrorists in Congress enable him.
1
If you knew that your captain was inept and could not maintain equanimity and good decision making in a crisis situation, would you get on that airplane? Likewise, would you elect to have your surgery conducted by a neophyte doctor who had never performed any of the procedures before? Well, we have such an inexperienced and clueless person in the White House now. It’s not safe!
1
“Brutality begins where knowledge ends. Ignorance and compulsion appear simultaneously.” ~Charles de Kunffy.
Haven't we HAD ENOUGH OF THIS GUY (Trump??. SAVE US SOMEBODY!
1
If anyone residing near the East Coast of North America knows all we need to know about ranting old guys, it has to be Paul Krugman, assuming there is a mirror in his residence o out on the ward.
Nice summary of why things (messy, smelly, unwanted) are hitting the fan Mr. Krugman (we're gonna need a bigger fan!). There is talk DJT is the Manchurian Candidate, sadly it is not apparent who is pulling his strings. You don't have to look to Russia (although it is so terribly convenient), I think Mitch and Paul are getting more mileage out of Disaster Don than most. Except maybe the Kochs and Mercers and their pals. When blanket tariffs, or other such errant policy, smother the auto/aircraft/any industries Americans can look to Trump to give them a lift - because he's taking the whole country for a ride right now. But it is a very rough, dramatic, and unnecessary trip. You've got to ask yourself a question: "do I feel lucky?"
1
I just hope that everyone's fears about Hillary Clinton's emails have been fully resolved.
4
This is a side issue, and a fairly trivial one at that, but does anyone else think that "Fox and Friends" sounds more like the name of a Saturday morning TV show than a daily news and information program?
I'd love to know what kind of focus group results led to that title.
1
Cadet Bone Spurs wants to display his courage in a trade war.
2
Tariffs on steel and aluminium!!! Yet another attempt by the Trumpists to distract us from their real problems. Russia and MONEY .
2
Yes, but remember that the Republicans and Fox and Limbaugh have been doing this for decades. Don't be distracted by the idiot showman in chief.
We need to try to impose broad electoral defeat on GOP officials in the federal and 50 state governments.
1
I'm more afraid of the people who thought it would be a good idea to have a NY real estate grifter for president than Trump himself. What other "good ideas" will these folks have in the future ? Just last week one of these geniuses justified his vote on to NPR that the Trump business organization is among the biggest corporations in the world. In fact it's not even in the top 40 in the USA.
Paul, you're stepping around but not quite landing on a delightful portmanteau:
"bellignorance."
1
Dr. Krugman: President Trump is EXACTLY the goofy delusional uncle everyone tolerates at family gatherings.
OMG. That goofy uncle is now the leader of the free world.
This tariff threat is another example of Trump’s consistent and only method of negotiating. He acts like a crazy autocrat tough guy, threatening ridiculous actions getting the adults to plead for sanity. Other people come in to clean up the mess he created, they develop some sort of solution while he sits on the sidelines or at one of his golf courses. This has played out over and over with health care, taxes, North Korea, the Wall or North Korea. In the end, what ever happens, he declares victory as long as the world doesn’t end. That’s all there is to him.
1
Your man Trump needs a victory be it nuclear or trade.
Trade war of course only destroys the economies of the allies where as the nuclear option will destroy millions of lives and Trump with it.
There you go GOP, let him play his games like this ad infinitum as he spirals into the black hole of the Russian investigation. Or end all this nonsense now.
There will be no 25th amendment as his cabinet is as incompetent as he is.
This is not reality TV this is reality only the GOP is a fake party. They have abdicated their duty to "we the people" and work only for self enrichment on the billionaire trough.
Reality is biting, those that fail to do their sworn duty are traitors.
The clock is running out.
1
We deserve everything that we get from Trump. We voted for him, now let's have a good time!
I believe there is a large faction of our country that is some type of joyous that this pres' antics drive others crazy. And that is sick.
Chauncy Gardner, but worse- Chauncy was soft spoken.
I can not tell you how much I miss the boring, go to work and get it done, plain vanilla, no-drama Obama.
3
Not Making America Great Again. Rather Making America Hate Again.
1
Even though many of us are extremely busy, earning a living, and caring for our families, a lot of us could do a way better job, in the presidency, than donald jerk tRump. Besides being incompetent, he's never worked a day in his life. He's an abject failure.
2
25th amendment, folks!
3
I keep wondering what Hillary is thinking.
1
Trump and his crew has , in my opinion , taking a wrecking ball to the idea of american “ exceptionalism . The rest of the civilized world might now be realizing that the america that has been propagandized and propagated is far from a “ shining city on the hill “ . It has a corrupt , vile and violent persona that is now on full view . We have scammed the world just like Trump hood-winked his acolytes .
1
Here's a lovely definition for a word that might make a comeback.
Traitor: The word origin says it all: traditorem is the Latin word for "betrayer." Liar? Yes. Backstabber? Yes. True friend? Heavens, no. Traitors betray the trust of those who have faith in them or believe their promises. Traitor also applies to a person who betrays his country by committing treason: turning against his own government, perhaps by selling secret information.
Take note, ignorance is not bliss. Can you imagine what kind of life we would have if everyone was ignorant? Or better yet...how many ignorant people does it take to destroy a country? Evidently, just one. Tic tock, tic tock....time ends all things and no one lives forever. Ranting, ill-informed old guys are no exception.
3
This must have been what it was like in Ukraine when Manafort helped install a Putin stooge as leader. For years the treasury was looted, Russia helped itself to some territory, and all the time the Ukrainian people were told be patient.
Finally, with a great loss of life, they were able to chase him to Russia, where he sits, unable to return to Ukraine as there is a charge of high treason against him.
One tragedy of our American version of this Russian spy in the White House disaster is that the tax cuts will finally bankrupt the government, and there will be little money to help the poor and the powerless. For decades, Republicans will plead poverty and refuse to help fund things like senior housing, medical care, and food help.
This may look like a joke to the rich, as they cash their investor class checks, but the coming years look like a crushing nightmare for those not in the investor class.
Hugh Massengill, Eugene Oregon
2
Which shell is the pea under now? The immigrant shell? The North Korea shell? No, no.....it's the tariff war shell.....and the Trump con game rolls on and on and on............
1
Other smart guys agree:
“As democracy is perfected, the office of President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.” ― H.L. Mencken
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." — Bertrand Russell
1
Trump came up with this tariff thing to try to distract Americans from the big mess he and his family and cronies have made of the government and our international relations. It's all his little lizard brain could come up with at the time.
1
It boggles my mind — daily if I allow it — that a large minority Americans support and cheer on this whiny, aggrieved, infantile brat. Particularly mind boggling is that supposedly red-blooded all American men loudly rally behind someone who is a crude simplistic caricature of a true man. This man-child is the antithesis of the all-American man: spoiled, soft, fussy as a colicky baby, vain, a man who soils his diaper and expects others to clean up the mess, the impulse control of a three year old — but I preach to the choir here.
Now the real damage of having a toddler in the White House, all because der Dumpf woke up the other morning put out by — who knows what. Krugman is right: this is downright terrifying. Somehow though, I’m more troubled that our politics have become so warped, that this brat serves a purpose, can rally his base, and be cheered on by millions of our fellow citizens as he exults in threatening ruin and destruction. I never thought I’d see W’s administration as something to feel nostalgic for...
1
This country is being led by a manbaby who makes far reaching decisions based on his emotional feelings at the time. Where are the adults in the building? Oh right, they've all left their reputations and integrity behind to play the role of sycophant. It will decades to undo the damage this senile old man has done to this country.
1
Shorter version of all Krugman Op-Ed pieces on Trump since the election: (1) Trump is an idiot; (2) Trump's voters are idiots. While I happen to largely agree with both of these assessments, it doesn't elevate the quality of the analysis presented herein. If fact, it's mind-numbingly repetitious. Personally, I'd find it much more illuminating for Krugman to utilize his prodigious talents to elucidate the four decade long embrace of the neoliberal order by the Democratic Party (and the concomitant abandonment of America's middle class) that resulted in Hillary's defeat. Unless Krugman and all the other defenders of the status quo (the "Democratic Centrists," the Washington Consensus) address this core failure, I predict America is doomed to many more years of Trump or worse. Everything is not fine; America is not "already great." Lying to yourselves and others about this fundamental fact won't save the Democratic Party or the country. Then again, I suspect Bernie Sanders had it right when he noted that "Certainly there are some in the Democratic Party who want to maintain the status quo. They would rather go down with the Titanic so long as they have first class seats." Trust me when I say that you won't find either Krugman or the NYT's Editorial Board in steerage.
1
Look no the bright side, if this trade war escalates, Canada might invade Michigan, and Wisconsin. Good riddance.
2
If he only has the ability to raise these tariffs on the basis of national security - and if there ISN'T a national security problem- can't it be challenged by Congress or the Courts?
Ageism ranks right up there with sexism and racism. Cut it out.
42
Thank you. I posted the same thing.
1
Your vicious attacks on our President reveal the hypocrisy of your editorial rantings. I can't imagine what your editorials would sound like if the center-right were to slam Obama as often and as maliciously as your editorials slam our duly elected leader, President Donald Trump.
As a member of the 'forgotten' crowd we are finally getting heard by a man who is truly looking out for Americans and our interests. I applaud all the nonsense your writings spew as it continues to push more of my fellow citizens to conclude that you and the NYT are not representing the mainstream voters. Please continue to slant your opinions in the same manner, but realize that the mid-term election cycle will prove you wrong again.
10
What on earth are the criteria for a comment being a "Times pick"?
What on earth are the criteria for becoming a "Verified Commenter?"
The standards for both seem pretty much random. Given the abysmal quality of many of the comments in both categories, one would have to conclude that merit is not a criterion.
6
I'm honestly curious as to how you think Trump is hearing you and "truly looking out for Americans and our interests"?
Would you mind providing some specific examples? I'll warn you that I'm likely to disagree on some or all of your points, but I'd like to hear your side and avoid discussing generalities.
9
Well, the "center-right" did slam Obama often and maliciously. No one is claiming that Trump was born in Kenya. I also take issue with your use of the term "duly elected" leader. Trump lost the popular vote by over 3 million votes and the Russians hacked our electoral process to a point that Trump was elected by voters easily confused. He has mislead a base that can't even understand its own interests. As for the mid-term election cycle, if Professor Krugman is proved wrong, it won't be his opinions at fault. It will be the Russians, stronger and more brazen than before.
12
I am sorry, but I do not appreciate this column. Yes, it fun to read about what a lying, ignorant, idiot Trump is. It warms the cockles of our hearts. But that is not why we read Paul Krugman.
International trade is complicated. There's the trade balance, the current account balance, the balance of payments, etc., etc., etc. I do not even know what economists call the net flow of dollars in or out of the country which whould seem to me to be the most important parameter.
Now, some folks do not think Prof. Krugman knows a lot about some fields of economics, e.g. banking. BUT international trade is his specialty. For Pete's sake, he won a Nobel Prize for his work in the field. Why won't help us out by writing about some of the definition and basic ideas in the field. For example:
Was the net flow of money in the 1990's and 2000's in or out of the country?
How large was it as a percentage of GDP?
Did it effect private debt within the country?
Did it cause banks to get over leveraged?
Was it one of the main contributors to the financial crisis of 2008?
If this flow was out of the country and was bad for the economy, is there any way we can reduce it?
If we do reduce it, will that impede world trade because there will not be enough of the world's reserve currency outside the US?
And so on.
Give us a hand here.
71
Len, I'd suggest that you buy his textbook, "International Economics" (co-authored with Maurice Obstfeld).
I did.
1
CO, I realize that I could do that, but surely I do not have to read a textbook for the answer to my basic questions. Isn't that what Krugman's column is for?
3
Saddest thing: our constitution and traditional political practice (gerrymandering and Citizens United) over enfranchise that harmfully ignorant guy in the diner. His vote counts considerably more than society's highly contributing members. We desperately need to approach one person - one vote to reward knowledge rather than ignorance.
4
many observers still have a question: do some countries "unlawfully" subsidize the sale of products they export to the u.s., in "unfair competition" with u.s. made products? china? other countries with predominantly state-owned economies?
in other words, is there already a more limited form of trade war now going on, but without response by the u.s.? if so, is there an appropriate response by the u.s., other than broad-based tariffs?
"free trade", like "free markets", in general is a great policy to pursue. but isn't it a lot more complicated than that?
I can't be the only one that likes what Trump is doing with these tariffs. China isn't saying a word which means the intended effect has already happened without a single tariff applied. And Krugman - Canada, EU, and Mexico are fully aware and unconcerned with what Trump is proposing because they know it's simply to signal to China to end the dumping. Geez Krugman - the best thing an old ranting guy like you brings to the table is a sure prediction that the opposite effect of whatever you forecast is sure to occur.
So somehow, tariffs which won't affect China much at all will cause them to change their behavior!?! And the countries, like Canada, which are impacted will be unconcerned! And the lack of comment by China to something that doesn't impact them is hugely significant.
No, Chriva, unfortunately, you're not the only willfully ignorant person who will like Trump's trade war.
Really? You think that Canada, the EU, and Mexico aren't concerned about what Trump's proposing? You must be getting your "news" from Fox.
These countries aren't unconcerned, so there has been no "intended effect." Will you like it when millions of jobs are lost and it costs more for everything we buy?
At the base of the base sits a man who's mental faculties are highly compromised. This particular man-child has a severe case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder with more than a douse of being a sociopath. Am I a psychiatrist? Look, diagnose trump isn't rocket science. It's all there 24/7/365 for the world to see. He's afflicted. We suffer.
Trying to analyze his ill-thought out policy behaviors, as Dr. Krugman has done here, make for interesting yet depressing reading. Without placing a flashing WARNING: THIS MAN IS MENTALLY ILL above the column, the rest is an exercise in futility.
Is there a doctor (there than in economics) in the house?
6
Though this talkative guy who knows little is the de facto leader of the Free World, he's also beset by many stresses: more and more trusted aides are resigning and the Mueller probe is getting much closer to him and his family. So Trump lashes out in search of some control over his reality. He announces the huge tariffs on aluminum and steel.
It has been said many times before; if a man was so ill- equipped to be President of the United States it's Donald Trump. He's not insane but he's terribly insecure for a man of his age. He doesn't appear to have a clear moral compass, but instead reflects the convictions of whoever he's in the room with whether it be an actual person or Fox and Friends, because of his need to be liked.
Unfortunately for the country and our allies, the President has been more of a destructive than a positive force. And it's unfortunate, because he started out with dreams to help the poor working class and ran on that platform. But his weaknesses were apparent from the start, and an even weaker Congress has been unable or unwilling to put a check on his behavior.
4
But as I watched the Republican primaries, NONE of the people running were qualified to be President. I’m greatly relieved that none of the following won the primary: Jeb Bush. Ben Carson. Chris Christie. Ted Cruz. Carly Fiorina. Jim Gilmore. Lindsey Graham. Mike Huckabee. Bobby Jindal. George Pataki. Rand Paul. Rick Perry. Marco Rubio. Rick Santorum. Scott Walker.
The best man they had was John Kasich. But they didn’t choose him.
1
1) Dr. Krugman, to be complete, you should add to this article how many jobs we have lost due to trade.
2) Germany is known for manufacturing. They have faced the same globalization we have. They have invested in their workers and trained for high-tech manufacturing. After 35 years of Reagan trickle-down economics, we got and opioid crisis.
4
Harley's, bourbon and blue jeans sounds a lot like Trumpland. Is this on purpose? Meanwhile in the working world my electrician son supports his family because of the large (steel and aluminum dependent) commercial construction projects. Today he is out talking to his fellows on the job that voted for Trump.
5
Who knew that a guy who lied and made up stuff for a living, who has continued to lie and make up stuff since his inauguration, who looks right at the sun during a solar eclipse, who knew that this guy would be our biggest security threat in decades?
6
Before the election writers for the NYT described Trump supporters as undereducated, underemployed white guys with bad or missing teeth. Now Mr. Krugman talks about garrulous old guys. Does Mr. Krugman really believe that he and his political compadres represent America. Even the night before the election, that group predicted that Hillary was a 99% sure thing. They were also predicting the stock market and economy would tank. None of that happened. This past
week another NYT writer took a look at trade wars and indicated they often are mild and can be even productive. We do know that China has said they don't want a trade war and they would work something out. As far as nukes go, North Korea is said to be willing to meet with us and put stopping their nuke program on the table. We should also remember that during the Obama presidency, at least two high ranking Russians said the nuclear option was available and we didn't even get a hint that North Korea would stop their nuke program. The garrulous old guy may not be the only thing that is a figment of Mr Krugman's imagination.
Congress (that is, Paul Ryan) can stop this. There are probably enough Republicans and Democrats who would vote to override any Trump veto of a bill to put a halt to Trump's trade tariffs. But as usual Paul Ryan does not have the courage to confront Trump on this or on anything else.
5
and he hates NAFTA. Because NAFTA is a trade agreement that includes Mexico and Trump loathes Mexicans. Except the ones mowing the fairways at his golf courses. But they love him mucho! They are so happy to be in Nuevo Jersey working for Senor Trump.
Just watch this play out. Canada and Mexico will be so taken aback by the tariffs on their steel that they will throw in the towel and rewrite NAFTA to Trump's specifications. Then comes the Big Tamale: Mexico Will Build the Wall For Us as part of the deal!
If one of Trump's advisers told him that this scenario could actually play out he would believe them. No question.
2
Note to RNC and Republican "leader" in Congress
Please, PLEASE, save yourselves, your party, and the nation by ridding yourselves, and the rest of us, of this crime boss you call President of the United States. Donald Genuflect-To-Me Trump is not interested in governing. He created what he thought was a stepping stone to expanding his real estate empire using his sons as temp' executives. He also saw his unexpected win as an opportunity to line his pockets, and those of his appointees. Word has it he didn't really want to win as much as raise the visibility of his brand. But once in the Oval Office, it has been his reality TV show.
As PK, and so many other astute observers have noted — including the Times' own columnist, the insightful and eloquent Charles Blow — Trump has always been a man in chaos. His early mentor, Roy Cohn (infamous as Sen. Joe McCarthy's legal advisor) set this course in concrete for the young Trump.
Trump's reasons for creating chaos are numerous. But one thing is for sure; by creating chaos where it didn't exist, allows him to declare he is the only one who can fix it. His feeble-minded fan base is not into fact-checking anything he, or Fox or the other right-wing media gasbags, have to say. For them, it is like getting a full-body massage before their turn standing before a firing squad. "I don't care what happens down the road. Right now, I feel loved!"
GOP leaders, for the good of the nation, give Pence the WH keys before it's too late.
I love when a ranting old guy calls out other ranting old guys.
Us old, garrulous guys are everywhere sitting on our bar stools just in most of our cases to be in touch with what's going on, not to jamb our ideas down others throats as this bore named Donald on the other stool tries to do. You try to shut him out, but he is so loud and obnoxious that it is hard to do. Besides, we have met him in many places in our early life, the bully on the play ground now grown old, the boss that treats you like dirt and the guy on TV trying to sell you a rotten old car. So here he is again in your face, but now we do not have the option of ignoring him as he owns the bar and you don't want to leave somewhere that used to be nice. So what do you do? Kick the old codger out? Start a revolution of sanity? Drown him out in a chorus of boos? I will not let him get my goat, no I will not and there's got to be some sanity somewhere here.
3
What do you do? You impeach him, that's what. We must send a signal that Trump and autocrats like him are unacceptable in America.
1
If only we had been warned.
Wait. What?
4
Seems like T. Is thinking again only of himself....there are payoffs to his brand against his competitors!
2
Everything Trump thinks and says about trade he learned in 1970. That said the E.U. threatens to raise taxes on 3 luxury goods one of which, blue jeans, are mostly made in Mexico and Asia. The last original Dungeree maker closed last year and the equipment was sold to an artisanal maker of blue jeans. Is everyone in charge everywhere in a time loop?
1
I wish I could determine the percentage of people who believe what they read or hear without doing the slightest bit of research to back up the veracity of the facts in which they heard and now believe. Then, again, so many people read and believe the bible as the word of god without realizing how many scribes interpreted the aramaic scrolls written hundreds of years after the fact which were then again interpreted by a new generation of scribes based on the viewpoints of the church or the politicians of the day. Easy to see how the internet can replace the American values of our forefathers with nonsensical views that have no relation to reality.
4
I think there is a simple and logical answer to how Trump arrived at the tariffs: Putin and Russia. Trump doesn't think about how to fix things or how things work. He just repeats what he is told, whether it's Fox News or Russia. Trump doesn't care what the facts or truths are; he only cares what makes him look good and what would make him a buck or two, and to that end, he will travel long and far from any facts, reason, or decency. If you place Russia's interest at the core of this tariff thing, it all falls into place: adverse effect on US economy, adverse effect on US's standing in the world, adverse effect on the US government, etc. The real question is, what does the Russians have on the garrulous old man? What kind of devilish deal did he make with the Russians?
3
Everybody loves a deal wether it is a "Steal" at a garage sale or a bargain on Black Friday. The art of the deal is in the heart of all of us. Tarrifs certainly are one of the legitimate tools in the bag of trade negotiators. However, these tools have two sharp edges and need to be used with great discretion that can seem reasonable to all sides under the circumstances. The present Trump approach is not reasonable. Driving a hard bargain can be a virtue or foolish. This one is foolish.
1
This is just part of the trump ruse, keep people engaged with his nonsense while he picks our pockets. Once a con man always a con man.
2
All true, all scary. Perhaps the next time that the NYTimes tries to prove to its conservative critics that it isn't 'liberal' by obsessively trashing the Democratic candidate, they will think again. Telling us that a truth shading, manipulative politician like Hillary Clinton was the same as a pathological liar like Trump has put our country on the precipice. It's time for the NYTimes to own up to their culpability.
4
The really scary part is that 85% of Republican voters agree with him!
3
The seams that hold our nation together and the ideas on which we have structured our democracy are coming under unsustainable pressures from Trump et al. To relieve this pressure and stop this downward spiral we must commit our efforts to seeing that one term for Trump is the end. If conditions worsen to the point of being intolerable before that time we must fight for impeachment. There is no middle ground or meaningful comprise with Trump. Our plan "A" must be a change of leadership. Start now in that direction and work as though your way of life as an American depends on the result...it does.
2
As usual, Paul Krugman speaks the clear truth about Trump’s lazy incompetence. We have to put this tariff palaver in context, however. Trump is a con artist for whom truth and clarity are unimportant. Distraction is his goal—keep the suckers’ attention diverted from what he’s really concerned about: what Robert Mueller is about to uncover, and why neither he nor the State Department has lifted a finger to intervene in Russian interference in our electoral system. Trump is desperate to hide something vital to his political survival, and is using the con man’s trick of distraction to keep the American people off guard.
4
I would be curious to know how much of the "US" steel & aluminum industry is actually owned by foreigners. Our local steel mill is owned by a Russian company. So much for protecting our national security! Like the tax plan, the benefits of tariffs just may end up in pockets overseas.
2
Maybe Trump should put together the third episode of the White House Apprentice. Invite the cameras and Congressional representatives to a "pow-wow" and appear to endorse issues, as he did with immigration and gun reform. Then retreat to his FOX viewing room, call a few of his real advisers (like New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft), and do whatever they tell him to do.
2
--Also pretty scary when a garrulous old guy has a heavenly pulpit from which he just endlessly preaches to the choir. Are there, in fact, no benefits from evening out trade imbalances?
1
The list of adjectives need to describe the failings of our esteemed leader is mind boggling. Dumb is free and Trumps is taking full advantage. And even Ryan (who would ever believe it), is objecting.
This point-on paragraph says all that needs to be said: "Beyond that, is there any reason to believe that Trump’s belligerent ignorance stops with trade? Actually, we know that he’s just as bombastic and clueless (with added racism) when it comes to crime, and there’s no reason to believe that he’s any better on real national security issues."
3
Gotta say I'm so tired of discussions of trade without any mention of our failure to have a serious trade adjustment assistance program. If we want to be part of the world economy, the country has to pay the price and not place the burden squarely on the shoulders of those who can't afford a well connected lobbyist. Just another example of cost shifting by the "makers".
48
"Garrulous old guys' with nukes should have parts of Jennet Conant's biography of her grandfather, Man of the Hour, read to them. The 40's knew tough guys too and chemist James Bryant Conant was one of the leaders. The Manhattan project, partially of his instigation, built the first atomic weapons.Had President Roosevelt not marshaled the world's scientists, rather than drive them away as the current administration is doing, the Nazis would likely have built the bomb first. But a global effort organized by the US government managed the dropping of two bombs killing hundreds of thousands, and maiming more but seemingly ending the War. The attempts the scientific leadership made to put the nuclear genie back in the bottle, and the agony most, but not all, of the leaders felt, should give pause to any person in power.
2
Minor snit. “...US government managed the dropping of two bombs killing hundreds of thousands, and maiming more but seemingly ending the War.”
While this scenario is partially true with the usual added implied guilt. Consider that the heavy bomber fleet from the ended European war, joined with the pacific B29 fleet and the perfected napalm fire bomb would have easily rained far more death and destruction on the unremitting Japanese home islands.
There is a solution: Tuesday, November 6, 2018.
14
“ A ranting old guy with nukes”, written by a ranting old neo liberal supporting everything from Globalization to bailing out the banks, that has intellectually distanced himself from ranting old school liberals such as myself who have been reading this publication for sixty years. We miss you down here in the trenches Paul, your two most famous quotes remain “ they’re selling each other condos down in Florida”, accurately predicting the housing collapse, then you threw us under a bus when you supported bailing out Wall Street rather than Main Street, the quote supporting that was “ it would be so much worse”(without the bank bailout): the part you left out was it was worse and still is for those left behind by the policies of that decade.
4
Time for impeachment before Trump brings down the curtain on our country.
2
RE: Impeachment.
I know it is means waiting a bit longer but it would be imminently more satisfying to relieve him of his air and fuel in November 2018 and then of his low paying job in November 2020. More satisfying and more humiliating accompanied by Trump's soundtrack of claims of unfair and rigged elections.
1
This "ranting old guy with nukes" declared during his campaign - among other idiocies - that he loves, just loves the under-educated", and considers them his base.
To paraphrase a former president, the problem is not the economy, stupid, it is the education, stupid.
Unfortunately other countries that vastly surpass the K-12 education levels of the U.S. cannot export theirs to our shores.
If they could, #45 would put high tariffs on them as punishment of their "unfair advantage".
8
Trump's behavior is mysterious and stupid-seeming until you realize that he responds to the alt-right and their alt-world and its alt(ternative) facts. It doesn't matter that what he says does not respond to the facts or to science. What matters is that he scores points with them.
Nutty ideas may seem to be just that ... nutty ideas. Yet they have a bad history. Some 90 years ago a movement got going based on nutty ideas like Aryan superiority, the need for living-space, etc. and we know the consequences of that.
Probably the only real problem with this article is that Krugman gives a blind eye to the groups and tendencies that Trump responds to. He sees Trump but not the hand that moves him.
8
And birds go tweet...
2
This particular garrulous old guy is the biggest mistake of our lifetimes. This garrulous old guy is a fake president. A fake president who declares any news he does not approve of as fake. Until he sees fit to deal in reality he can in no way be considered a real and legitimate president. We for all intent and purpose are literally without realistically proper presidential representation in this country at this moment. Who in their right mind would have thought that in 2018 we would be entertaining perhaps the most absurd threat to democracy in the history of this republic?
8
Trump has come unhinged. Can we persuade Hope Hicks to come back, for national security reasons?
3
"Come on", Paul, "you're a social scientist (although modern mathematical and technically divorced economics, as opposed to Smithian moral philosophy and old ethical political-economics is low on the social scale, and high on the supposedly 'free-market' self-serving and hardly 'liberal democracy' "End of History", scale, as even Fukuyama had to later admit) --- so maybe you should look at the data".
All the data from the softer social sciences like; sociology, psychology, anthropology, and even behavior economics has already proven with real, not "fake data", that in a contest between; real deeply and extensively researched, statistically proven, and incontestable hard data vs. emotionally appealing self-interest guilefully presented within sophisticated propaganda, that powerful propaganda will beat powerful data every time."
"So, yes", Paul, "let's look at incontestable data --- and let's use the strength of the vast majority of Americans' faith that our country is a real democracy to alert them as Paul Revere, Thomas Paine, and others like Patrick Henry did "awake, awake, the (non British) Empire is coming", and as Pat would have cried-out if Tom had taken the Paine to edit his rallying call, "Give me Liberty (from Empire) or Give me Death" --- because the 'real fact', Paul, is that a disguised global capitalist EMPIRE has already; captured, controls, and "Occupies" our former country as the Nazi EMPIRE did to France, but with a dual-party Vichy 'fake regime'.
6
Thank you for ending with the nuclear thought. The possibility of missiliers following through on a Trump order to strike---who knows where---should keep us all up at night. The negligence of Congress to remove that power from the presidency threatens our very existence. We must implore the missiliers to prepare themselves for the moment when they must not follow orders.
3
This is a regression to the abnormal. Trumpism
Remember your three Rs
Repealing and Replacing Regressives
Dave
5
Let’s not forget that the owner of Fox is a foreigner who only got to the US with an ‘Einstein’ visa.
9
"Imagine that you’re listening to some garrulous old guy in a diner, telling you what’s wrong with the world — which mainly involves how we’re being victimized and taken advantage of by foreigners."
I've got a better one for you.
Imagine you're a working class person who lived in a poor crime ridden integrated neighborhood where your parents became victims of racially motivate attacks, leaving your father disabled. Then image one day you are able to move to a suburb with no fear of walking to the store in the evening. Then comes Krugman pronouncing that Trump supporters in W.Va. were racists while he (Krugman) enjoys a protected life in Manhattan in a city with one of the most racially segregated school systems in the country. Imagine Krugman telling victims of increasing crime rates in certain urban areas that all is well because the average rates have been falling (except for the last couple of years...) and that because all appeared well during one of his runs in a Manhattan park any insistence otherwise is just dog whistle politics.
Krugman truly has the conscience of a liberal.
Oh, and the the people in that suburb looked just like the folks in Chappaqua.
2
Understood.
But what are Republican tax cuts for the billionaires doing to solve the problems you write about?
The total debt today is $20 Trillion / 150 Million taxpayers = $133,000 per taxpayer.
With the Republican tax plan, the debt we can expect to have ten years from now is at least $30 Trillion / 150 Million taxpayers = $200,000 per taxpayer.
Over these ten years, someone earning $75,000 a year will get around $7,000 in tax reductions. At the same time their share of the increase to the national debt will be $67,000.
At least Democrats want to help with education, healthcare, job training, birth control, etc.
And Democrats are much better at fiscal discipline than Republicans. Look it up. Deficits went up under Reagan, HW Bush, and W Bush. Deficits went down under Clinton and Obama.
1
I look forward to the day when republicans like Ryan, McConnell and McCarthy try to distance themselves from this failed presidency. Their hypocrisy will be blinding.
6
We now know that the garrulous old guy in the diner and Donald Trump are joined at the hip. In fact, the guy in the diner votes for Trump because Trump's ridiculous rants are exactly the same as his. And guess what? They both get their information from Fox News, the Alt-right, Rush Limbaugh and their ilk.
I am sick of hearing the Trump supporters saying: Trump tells us what everyone is thinking but no one says out loud. That's honesty.
No, it is not honesty. It is bigotry, ignorance and incompetence. That is why we don't elect the garrulous diner guy to the highest office in the land.
I only hope that by November enough of these folks will wake up and realize that their hero is a crook, a reprobate and someone who is absolutely uncommitted to their interests. In fact, he is ruining our nation to serve his own selfish interests.
Vote in November as if your life depended on it. It does!
8
Ironically, we do not need "enough of these folks to wake up and realize their hero is a crook." We can win elections without the basket of deplorables, the garrulous old guys who are trump's cult. If democrats could settle on a hard-core, understandable, uniform and unifying message; combined with massive voter registration, get out the vote and poll monitoring efforts-- we can win. the numbers and the circumstances are in our favor. We just have to want it. Do we?
1
Paul, we should change your metaphor from the old guy ranting and raving in the diner to the old guy ranting and raving on the corner bar stool. He spouts out his nonsense to anyone who will listen but eventually everyone has moved to the opposite end of the bar and pleads with the bar tender to turn up the TV volume to drown out the old cuss.
Having been a bar tender, I can tell you that when the yammering becomes too obnoxious, you cut off his supply and tell him he should get a ride home. Now, if Congress exercised its power, they could play the role of the bartender and tell him the booze is cut off and its time to go home. But, instead our Congress just puts another drink of the front guy and pretends that he'll eventually sober up.
Note to Congress; these guys never sober up. And, if the guy repeatedly shows up night after night, eventually the loyal customers find another bar. I give you three guesses as to who the other customers represent in this metaphor and the first two don't count.
7
Why no mention of Peter Navarro? Is he not the PHD behind some of this ill advised economic propaganda?
It seems to me that Mr Trump's tactic, his only tactic, is to kick up a fuss like a spoilt child, knowing full well that he will get part of what he wants just to keep him quiet.......
Actually I said 'like a spoilt child' when I should have said 'a spoilt child'.....
3
Shame on you, Mr. Krugman, for this disgusting exercise in overt ageism. You could have made the same points without resorting to ageism. I want you or your readers to explain to me why ageism is so acceptable to you, but racism is not. What is the difference.
I don't know what's more frightening: That we elected this man, or that a substantial proportion of the U.S. electorate still supports him.
There's a lot of drunks on barstools out there....
10
Poor America..... the world watches incredulously, laughs and worries at his antics and wonders what he will do next. The reputation of the US is at an all time low- but your President strives to drive it even lower.
Poor America.....
5
Where has the United States that used to NOT be afraid of anything disappeared? The U.S. that used to OPENLY compete and WIN? That used to encourage everyone who would listen that open trade, democrracy and cooperation benefited ALL? Look at the results of 70 years of the championing of those policies today: the world is generally freer and richer than ever before, despite the latest surge in revanshism. THAT United States is what I grew up looking up to and admired and aspired to emmulate as a young African man. Today instead, it's all about banning, punishing, nuking and sneering at others. The U.S. is acting like a capricious, spoiled boy who doens't want to work hard on the football field but wants to win anyway and when he realizes that he's getting whooped grabs the ball and runs to his mama.
3
Some guy who claims to own it has run Trump out of 'his' Panamanian hotel so boy is he gonna' be mad! Oh, right, he's mad all the time already.
Trump is ignorant and bases his views on prejudice, slogans, and rants from right wing cable shows.
There is no interest in acquiring knowledge through study and analysis of facts and more importantly developing policies to reflect complex reality.
There is no concern to use the power of his Presidency
to help improve the lives of the average American.
He would even harm his own city New York by punitively increasing taxes there and cancelling the needed Hudson River train tunnel. In my opinion he is a deeply disturbed and vindictive sociopath who betrays his Constitutional responsibilities with a disdain and a disregard that defies belief.
He is a horror and more loyal to Putin and his money laundering business than to the American people.
2
Well done, "Real America." You've elected Grumpy Grandpa to lead us into the abyss.
2
I know its not fashionable to cheer our illustrious president, but I just love anything that makes the Paul Ryans of this world upset. Crazy grampa Don wants to blow up the world economy because some talking head on Fox convinced him that Canada is just as bad as China? Great Don! You hit that button.
Everyone knows that Donald Trump tells lies about people he doesn’t like and about almost every topic under the sun. His recent pronouncements about foreign trade deficits, tariffs and the value of trade wars are just the most recent example of Donald Trump’s non-stop lying.
Or, is it?
When someone possesses the correct information on a subject, but chooses to assert a totally different set of claimed facts, that act is a lie.
But what do we call it when someone has access to the truth, but opts not to utilize that access? The resulting false information which he spouts is not a garden-variety lie, if the speaker is too stupid to see the difference between an expert resource of information and a hack TV news propagandist.
Donald Trump tells many outright lies, and he also speaks falsely out of ignorance, laziness or maliciousness. We need a name for that second category of falsehood.
Trumphony?
3
"Factually challenged"
Well put.
Trump supporters are all about reducing the "bloat" they perceive to be the federal government. The rest of us are all about reducing the corruption and moral decay we perceive is Trump.
We have a dictator, a disgusting amoral racist dictator destroying the country for his short term gain and a congress doing nothing except retiring rather than supporting it. Too bad so few are trying to fight it.
4
Trump doesn't wear blue jeans, certainly doesn't drink bourbon, and never rode a hog. What's he care?
I feel like we're all stuck in the last act of Macbeth, in which the insane, isolated, fake king dares Macduff to take him down. Maybe Mueller is the Macduff, but it sure would be nice if the Republicans would wake up to this madness and invoke the 25th Amendment before he unleashes WWIII.
150
Love the apt Shakespearean reference!
2
The ranting old guy with Nukes, our 45th president is the only one capable of forcing a denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula where all the previous 5 presidents failed.
14
And he did what to in this imagined cause and effect, which BTW hasn't happened yet. Chickens and eggs and all.
3
Not so fast there. Like trump, kim has a history of running his mouth and making pronouncements.
3
How, exactly, has he accomplished that feat? Do the North Koreans no longer have nukes? Have anyone verified this? Perhaps they’re buying time in order to prefect their weapons? When the dear leaders of both our countries are on the same stage and shaking hands declaring an end of nukes, then either I’ll know the world can relax or it’s truly the end of times.
4
Very good points, but too many of our fellow citizens vote based upon feelings not reality. Hard to tell how or why little pouting Donald comes up with his thoughts and actions.
Whether he is smart or dumb, he does know how to play to many people's emotions.
3
Mr. Krugman, you say Trump lie about the U.S. balance of trade with Canada, using this example to make your point "...(Trump) declared that we have large trade deficits with Canada; actually, according to U.S. numbers, we run a small surplus." The reality is that there is a difference of opinion on the subject with Canada admiiting that the U.S. does have a deficit and the U.S. claiming the have a small surplus.
Statistics Canada citing the “different data sources and statistical methods” the two countries use" as the reason for this discrepancy.
“In 2016, Canada reported a US$24.4 billion trade in goods surplus with the United States, while from the US perspective this surplus was reported as US$16.3 billion, a difference of US$8.1 billion...It may be expected that the bilateral trade statistics of one country would mirror those of its trading partners. In practice, this is rarely the case, as countries use different data sources and statistical methods.”
Who's lying now?
Everyone knew (and knows) that Trump is unfit for office by almost any criteria. The real question is how to end this nightmare, and responsibility lies directly with the Republicans, namely Ryan and McConnell. They could tell Trump to resign for the good of the country, or he will be impeached and removed.
To do this would require integrity, courage, and willingness to do what is right for the country, not a specific party. Everyone in the House and Senate swore to uphold the Constitution -- they are not abiding by that oath, and are therefore responsible. It's really as simple as that, and history will make this clear.
7
It's tempting to state that the ignorant people opining from their barstools are responsible for their own ignorance and should not only know what they don't know, but know what they should know. However, part of the Real America are the folks who are up before dawn, tending the land or the assembly lines that produce the things without which none of us could have a viable existence. I myself count many such workers in my ancestral stock, including many who never finished grade school, much less high school, because they were needed on the farm or factory for reasons of their, and our, survival. My father had an eighth grade education, my mother did graduate from high school. I and my brothers were lucky because our parents were committed to all of us having a college education, and all of us then went on to get advanced degrees and a broader, more informed world view than our parents were able to benefit from. I will never stop thanking them for that. What I find inexcusable are not those who are ignorant because they didn't have the money, or freedom from 24/7, 365 days of working their tails off to afford to keep a roof over their heads, while producing the goods we couldn't live without, but those, like Trump, who had every advantage and opportunity to be well-informed and knowledgeable of the world and who either never absorbed the information or who considered it unimportant to their personal ambitions.
3
When I read about Trump's 'ideas', I get a mental picture of his first sit down with Putin.
I can only imagine the thoughts going through Putin's mind when Trump was talking with him, wondering how can I use this fool to my advantage without touching anything.
Since Putin wants Russia to be first on the world stage and the status of the US's so-called integrity undermined anyways and the US has always been in his way, what better way to help the US destroy itself than to have a wannabe like Trump, a con man being conned by his own ego and feeling of self-importance and worth,
On the comedy series Bewitched, actor Paul Lynn played the role as mischievous Uncle Arthur always tormenting helplessly against the witches, Darrin.
I can imagine Putin in the role of Uncle Arthur laughing his head off now.
As for his meddling in the election, he couldn't have pulled it off without the enormous help of ignorant Americans who don't read and only look at FAUX NEWS as their main source of news.
In football, the team and coaches look at films of their opponents for the next game, studying their weaknesses so they can be exploited
Putin didn't tell American voters not to pay attention, but he obviously has been paying more attention to us and our habits than we have been ourselves.
It was easy to plant fake news and have people read it and not cross check facts.
He knew of our notorious ignorance and especially our bias.
And he got to know Trump.
This was indeed a perfect storm.
4
In my discipline (psychology) when someone has a very distorted view of his/her world and then acts on that distorted view without first engaging in a "reality check," we say the person has had a psychotic break...
1
The really bad thing about Trump is his desire to create mistrust in everything. He is one of those people you may have encountered at work. He go's around spreading stories about others in the workplace so he can sit back and watch the chaos begin. When the chaos is the greatest so is distraction and he can then do things he wants without being noticed. The trade issue is an example of another distraction away from the INVESTIGATION. Trump doen't care about Trade, Health Care, Infrastructure, or even tax reduction unless it effects his bottom line. The presidency is seen simply as a way to increase his money while playing a game. He flaunts our laws because we let him.
3
It's pretty obvious by his policies that he's seeking asylum in Western PA.
2
Unfortunately, Trump has the type of slick snake oil salesman personality to continue the hating on 'the other" and millions of Americans will continue to support his delusional world view.
3
Maybe the proposed tariff on steel is not so irrational after all. In Southwestern PA next week on March 13 there is a special election to replace Congressman Murphy, who resigned. The election was predicted to be won by the Republican but is now too close to call or by some polls slightly favoring the Democrat. Although steel production in this area is no longer a driver of the economy there are many in the area who are bitter because of its decline and blame foreign competition. Trump is visiting the area this week to promote the Republican candidate on which a lot of outside money has been spent on an advertising barrage. It may be that the proposed tariff on steel is just to sway votes to the Republican and like many of Trump's proposals will vanish (after this special election, regardless of who wins).
4
Plenty of Trump supporters repeat what he says on Facebook and other social media sites. We have more access to news now than we did fifty years ago but it's still standard practice for a lot of people to hear only what agrees with their political/religious views. Trump and the GOP are exploiting people's fears to accomplish what they couldn't do if people had the facts at their fingertips.
For years Americans have believed that we spend too much on foreign aid. The truth is that we spend less than 5% of our budget on foreign aid. Many Americans picture welfare recipients as African Americans, single mothers, to be precise, with 6 children all from different fathers. The truth is that is not the case at all. We believe that all obese people are that way because they want to be and don't deserve access to medical care. We accept trade offs that other civilized countries don't: expensive health costs that leave many unable to get treatment they need so the health care industry can make billions and pretend that it does research or cares about our health. High college tuition and practically no vocational education which leaves current college students taking out loans for an education they ought to get in grades K-12.
America is that garrulous old guy at our dinner table. He's running the country and we put him there. And he'll stay there unless we vote some real adults into office: adults who will do the job rather than pander to their rich owners.
5
"...how can we expect them to trust us — or support us — on anything else?"
Good question, Mr. Krugman.
Let me take a shot at answering you.
See, our allies desperately need us (except for France under Charles DeGaulle, but ah, the French). The American taxpayer provides all our allies with the possibility of spending their revenue on cradle to grave welfare states because we supply the nuke umbrella which shields them from nasty realities, like aggression by the former USSR.
So, until our allies actually pay into our military alliance with a substantial portion of their own GDP, they need us Trump or not.
Our allies will support us because we are the only leader of the Free World. The only superpower, and the only bulwark, as flawed as we are, against our allies speaking Chinese or Russian.
If you have further questions, do not hesitate to reply here and I will again give it my best.
1
You may not be aware of this but France and the UK have nuclear weapons. Under Trump, we are quickly relinquishing our role as leader of the free world.
This tired old argument is nonsense since keeping everybody from having nuclear weapons was fairly successful. The alternative would have been disasterious to our own homeland. Having the status as the sole superpower was always a good idea for our own national security. The "Iron Curtain" created the necessity for our need to keep ahead of the Soviets. This plus England and France having a nuclear arsenal pretty much guaranteed that WW III would never take place. As Professor Krugman points out, we've benefitted tremendously from building up the devastated Western European theater right after the 2nd world war up through the present time. Frankly the general US workforce saw a huge boost for our historical economic cooperation with the Western nations of Europe. Trying to create an obstacle to continuing this trade policy is a recipe for another recession or as some economists fear, could cause another depression. We are no longer the only financial behemoth that holds the keys to affluency. China and Europe are far larger than an isolationist US,together, than we'd like to believe.
Then, to antagonise Canada and Mexico in our own hemisphere with tariffs and waste real money on the so-called wall is to inflict self harm needlessly. All these nations are our 'Friends'. Why are we trying so hard to alienate them and create unfriendly competition?! All this Bar Room crying spittle is just the rant of a frightened pretender to the American Presidency.
1
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
H. L. Mencken
1
There’s clearly only one way to deal with trump and republicans and that’s to get them out of office. While it’s incredibly important to point out their lies and the terrible things they are doing, a strategy must be created and put into effect to get people who are suffering and understand that they are suffering under trump and the gop, to vote. Disappointingly, Dems don’t appear to be effective along these lines. While it may not be the purview of people like Dr Krugman to be mobilizing voices, someone needs to do it. Fox News and the rest of the disgusting right wing media did the heavy lifting to get us where we are today, perhaps it’s time for the main stream media to help the country and its citizens to fight back. Something has to be put in place to get things going back in the right direction.
2
Paul, you are most likely correct, the tariffs are stupid policy.
What we (and our fellow developed democratic allies) SHOULD be doing is petitioning the WTO for China's immediate removal from that organization.
Then, we should rebuild the WTO from the ground up so it includes the safeguards for labor and the environment that were left out in the first place!
BUT, our respective corporations would never go for that, would they? They still hold out ever more desperate hope that they can make big profits in China.
Question about NYT's photo: Is that a real photo or a cartoon? If real: How many presidents (and which ones) also had embroidered shirts with the number on it?
3
"For one thing, talking tough and stupid on trade in itself damages U.S. credibility:" That ship sailed a long time ago, for me and plenty of others, this side of the wash. The chaos and larceny of the hanging chads farrago that ushered in the vacuous dim bulb that was Dubya, saw to that.
The fact that you managed to get someone in who makes him look like a combination of Cicero, Aquinas, Hume and (Samuel) Johnson, is a staggering achievement and firmly set the seal on your criminal loss of perspicacity.
3
Trump is a success. He is doing exactly what he was selected by Putin and the Russian oligarchy to do which was to destroy America and prevent a Clinton presidency and of course to stuff his own pockets until the treasury is bare.
First he is taking affordable health care from millions and millions, then by a massive deficit he transferred the nations wealth to those who already owned it, and now he will be destroying our economy and shall cause a depression.
Are you tired of winning yet? The Trump/Putin/GOP axis is not. They want our liberty and the rule of law and perpetual power. The next battle is the midterm elections. The Russians will be attacking and Trump will be not be defending the country nor will the GOP which always puts party over country but Republican voters who have opened their eyes may be voting nation first. In 2018 and 2020 we can clean the traitors out of government and fins a party to replace the GOP which will go the way of the Whigs, The alternative? The USA as a banana republic.
7
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
When you hear and see Sam Nunberg becoming unglued on TV you cannot help thinking about his old boss Donald Trump . Pundits immediately started speculating about his mental health and possible substance abuse . I do not understand why in the case of Trump we are so shy . Nunberg can mostly do damage to himself . Trump can do damage to his Country and the whole World .
5
If Trump was a Democrat the Republicans would have impeached him already.
Why are McConnell and Ryan doing this? Is no one investigating McConnell ?
2
Dwight McFee – McConnell and Ryan find DT useful for passing their agenda; they personally have much to gain.
Trump has an uncontrolled feedback loop. He says a falsehood about trade. Next day, Fox News repeats and amplifies it. Trump hears it, believes it is verified fact, so he increases his rant. Fox & Friends confirms his new views. Every process engineer knows you want a loop with feedback that dampens the swings. Trumps swings just get wilder and wilder.
2
I disagree that we should give a slack to regular joes who believe this president lies because they are busy with jobs and families. For so long the regular joes cast more votes on stupid shows like America got talent than in the congressional election and continue to complain about the outcome. All you need is to spend few hours every two years to look at local candidates and issues before you make up your mind, to tell me that they are so busy not to find this kind of time is not believable. The sad reality is that those who stand to benefit most from the tax cuts and other perks opposes the president, while his supporters are those who will suffer the most from his follies.
3
So what happened is that Trump realized there was a large enough group of know nothings to get him elected if he could get them to vote. At the same time he needed to discourage or suppress other not like minded voters from voting at all.
This all happened and trump was elected. Having a know nothing president is not necessarily tragic if he doesn't actually try to do anything. Unfortunately Trump may actually try to act out the fantasy of the garrulous codger on the bar stool and drop an atomic bomb on America's enemy in Iran or somewhere.
Therein lies the rub. Our American dumbness finally gets us all killed!
2
There are no adults left in the White House or in the Republican Party - just people who never grew out of the Me Me Me view of the world common to five year olds.
Most of them are just a little better at hiding it than Trump. They don't know how to share, they don't play well with others, and they have failed to progress. They learn nothing, they forget nothing, they respect nothing except their own aggrandizement, and nothing is ever their fault.
The failure of our democracy to recognize sociopaths and keep them away from power is going to doom us all.
1
Everyone’s crazy old uncle has the fate of our country in his hands. Believe me. So sad.
Dereliction of Duty on all fronts...time to remove from office!
Much as I dislike the thought of what his actions in this arena as well as others will inflict on Americans, especially the working class, it may be the time for a showdown has come. We as country have been bragging since the depression of the 1930's that a national train-wreck will never happen again. The banking meltdown? Self inflicted and self cured. Messing with a finely tuned global trade system? Not quickly fixable since there are so many players. Let this policy reverberate through the economy long enough and there could be riots. Do changes need to be made in trade agreements? continually but it's an evolutionary process built around consensus. Mr Trump may unwittingly force the American public to become the adults in the room
1
Someone who has been breaking the law by laundering huge amounts of foreign money through his shady real estate deals and favoring his lenders even when they are a hostile foreign power and conspiring to cover it up has all the reasons in the world to spew nonsense.
1
I keep reading the responses to "Trump Antics", and ask one question, did these people vote along with expressing the fears of a "Donald Trump White House" to their families, friends and co workers. Everything he has done was known before he got the job.
1
Does the election of Donald Trump prove our electorate have lost a sense of normalcy. Thanks to the GOP, Rupert Murdoch, Fox News and the long history of Republican policies, the US populace has lost its belief in democracy. They take over the state governments cutting funding for college. They convince the Red States to kill their middle class and higher education. It seems to cycle between each World War. War efforts bring back the middle and belief in democracy. Then after the wars end, the plutocrats among the GOP begin their campaign to destroy the middle. Rupert Murdoch dumbs down England, Australia and the USA. Too many people with too much ignorance. We have the talent to live harmoniously together. But no one can live in a world with crazy plutocrats hoarding everything.
1
What this country needs is more action and less distraction. I believe Trump gets himself into these feuds with everyone and everything because it distracts him from his obvious inadequacies and his petulance for illegal behavior. We do need to re balance our trade agreements but we don't need to have a trade war to do it, countries will cooperate. We do need to protect our country from foreign influence but attacking every other country in the world except the one that is attacking us, is counter productive. We wouldn't elect the grumpy guy at the end of the bar to be the dog catcher, we love animals too much, and he shouldn't be President either.
The depth of Trump's ignorance and the scope of his delusion is breathtaking. That someone so deficient holds the ultimate position of power in our democracy is appalling. This should be an object lesson for the future, starkly illustrating the high cost of an ill informed and under participating electorate.
2
For our childrens' and grandchildrens's sake, this disturbed, pathological individual must be removed from office.
VOTE in November for a Democratic Congress and encourage your family, friends, and associates to do the same for the good of the country.
3
Name me anyone, over eighteen and not confined to an institutions, and I will name you a better president.
1
The problem with the old man in that WI bar (or in your town) is that he does not care about your facts. If you catch him in a factual error, he will reply "Well, that's My Opinion." So there it is, you have your facts but he had his Opinions, which to him are more important, more real to him than any of your so-called facts.
Then all Fox & Friends or the NRA or InfoWarts has to do is affirm his Opinions, and he is right by affirmation. So there, you smarty-pants Liberals. Tariffs will fix those Canadians, or we'll make them pay for their own wall!
(That's my opinion, so I'm right, too.)
2
Terrible simple to understand his trade policy if he you take the MANCNHURIAN CANDIDATE reality. Everything he had done economically and in foreign policy results in the weakening of democratic values, and economic structures through out out still democratic nations of the WEST. At present moment if there is a trade disruption right wing candidates,, rabid nationalists and racists will be empowered. In every case it fits the Russian strategy of undermining the west, and the remaining democracies in Europe.
2
Ain't it amazing that the stable genius in the White House, who has never had anything to do with tariffs, international trade, job creation, etc. while building his ghost fortune (ever wonder why he is so terrified that somebody might see his tax returns?) is now an over night expert on these things? And that he doesn't need to know what the 'official' figures are on trade deficits, steel production, etc, because his really big brain can intuit those numbers better than the useless economists at the various departments who have spent their lives compiling these numbers?
This fourth grade dropout should never have been allowed to take a tour of the White House let alone live there. His views, if you can call them that, on virtually everything, are as solid as the views of a particularly dumb 9-year old kid who feels he has to prove how smart he is in order to get the respect he thinks he deserves.
Maybe something wonderful will happen when he visits the new US embassy in Jerusalem. Something like his getting drawn directly to heaven to sit in the lap of the Heavenly Father who would immediately rise and give his throne to his favorite human being.
Yes, I totally agree. But what, I ask, are we to do about it when 30% of the country agrees with him and his sycophantic Congress refuses to rein him in because they have their own agendas to pursue. Insanity apparently breeds insanity.
1
Another hard-hitting yet insightful opinion piece. Thanks.
Glad to see him following through on his promises, Obama never did.
1
It would be believable that this trade tariffs nonsense is merely the donald's distraction from the seriousness of the Mueller investigation. That however would require him to have an exit strategy from his verbose threats in picking fights over trade policy to his Wall that he continues to assert Mexico will pay for. This especially since he knows that the edge keeps coming closer as evidenced by the criminality of his children are being focused on. Together with his cronies' pleading guilty left and right it's only a matter of time before he gets caught up in the milieu grind personally.
The big unknown will be what he's more afraid of, Putin and Russian money laundering, or having to face impeachment charges. Mueller surely has those secret tax returns, and from the total defiance of the "Emoluments rule" to his ongoing profiteering hotels in exchange for direct favoritism, circling the wagons is down to just him.
The "games afoot." He'll be known as the greatest loser of all time.
1
Are you insinuating that Trump doesn't grasp the nuances of economic or trade issues? Whatever gave you that idea? I can only think of about 4356 things that Trump has said that make no sense whatsoever and demonstrate his total ignorance of the subject at hand. Any subject. All subjects actually. Oh never mind now I get it...
Is the real America is represented by garrulous old guys with their ignorant belligerence on display, along with sneering women like Dana Loesch, Kelly Conway and Sarah Huckabee, who parade lies with aplomb? It often feels that way...but then again, that’s part of the lie we are asked to believe.
What if the "garrulous old guy" DOES represent the "real America" in tone, and not substance? What if the current garrulous old guy is paving the way for a future populist leader that turns the diner discussion to "income inequality."
Garrulous old guys talking at diners might actually be what changes America for the good. I'll bet they vote.
1
It isn't Donald Trump. Fox News is ruling the country. Angry, gullible people are their weapons.
1
I think of our friendly foreign powers understand that Trump is only a temporary form of national mental illness that will be cured after 2020. And they also probably know that Trump may not even last until then if Mueller moves quickly enough.
1
This argument makes sense only if we presume Donald wants to be president of the United States. I'm not convinced.
He accepted the help of the Russians to win an election he had no chance of winning. He has an affinity for autocrats and an allergy to our traditional allies. Donald is working deliberately to dismantle the agreements and alliances that have sustained the West against economic and military challenge.
Donald has never criticized Putin and his administration has not implemented the sanctions Congress mandated.
We presume Donald is ignorant and untutored. But how do we know this isn't deliberate? How do we know Donald doesn't welcome Putin's help in staying in power? How do we know Donald, who isn't loyal to anybody, is loyal to this nation?
1
"Trump’s display of belligerent ignorance ought to worry us a lot."
From day one of his campaign, the gross display of ignorance was and remains virtually palpable.
2
Proposal to the faculty of the Wharton School:
Politely observe to Mr. Trump that he appears to have learned nothing during his time there. Flatter the president by recognizing officially that this reflects failure on the part of the faculty.
Tell Mr. Trump that the faculty does not feel any more entitled to the tuition his Dad paid than the small contractors he stIffs routinely for supposedly shoddy work.
Offer to refund of his tuition (Trump wins!) on the condition he return his diploma and deny he went to Wharton. (Say it was just fake news).
You you list the reasons why Trump came to his tariff decisions but you forgot the most important reason. Hope Hicks quit, and Donald was so mad that he decided to demonstrate his power. It’s really that simple.
1
I never felt that Krugman deserved the Nobel Price for economics, but he appears to get close to the one for Peace. Thank you, for his outspoken comments about the insanity of the current dictatorship in spe.
Trump is the poster boy for the Dunning–Kruger effect. He is a person with low ability who believes he is superior. He cannot recognize his own ineptitude due to his own lack of self awareness. Dunning-Kruger tells us that low-ability people cannot objectively evaluate their actual competence or incompetence. They are unable to so much as know what they do not know.
is a cognitive bias wherein people of low ability suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their cognitive ability as greater than it is. The cognitive bias of illusory superiority derives from the metacognitive inability of low-ability persons to recognize their own ineptitude; without the self-awareness of metacognition, low-ability people cannot objectively evaluate their actual competence or incompetence.[1]
What if the “ranting old guy” doesn’t really believe his own rants but is trying to impress people he thinks believes them?
This is not an untrodden path in history; it’s a recurring, self-reinforcing cycle where facts won’t matter. Nothing can stop it; it just has to exhaust itself.
I thought my opinion of Trump couldn't sink any lower. I was wrong.
I agree with the substance of your column.
My complaints is the tenor of the title talking about some "old guy." Enough with disparaging age. After all, he's only 6 years your senior, Mr. Krugman.
Our society already worships youth to an unhealthy degree and to the destriment of broad swaths of our society. Let's not push it with subtleties from political op-eds.
An interesting metaphor, Mr. Krugman. May I run with it?
Put your "garrulous old guy" in a BAR, Mr. Krugman. Face red. Glass in hand. Tie askew. Shirt not tucked in properly. A seedy old gentleman.
He gets arguing with some other man. A younger man. Quieter. The red face (of our garrulous old gentleman) gets redder. The voice gets louder. Forefinger jabbed repeatedly into the young man's chest. He tries to move away--murmurs a few placating words--but the old guy follows him.
Bartender looks up, frowning. What the. . . .? He signals to a third gentleman--standing near the wall. Must weigh well upwards of two hundred pounds. That gentleman moves quickly to our garrulous old guy.
We would call that man "a bouncer."
"Come on, sir--I think you've had enough to drink--no no!. . .I DO insist, sir--I DO insist. . .I think maybe you'd better sleep it off some. . . .. "
. .. as he walks the old guy out the door.
We, the American people, constitute "the bouncer." We've bounced many an ill-informed or incompetent president before.
I think the bartender is signaling to us right now.
"Mr. President. . .no no. . .we DO insist. . .. come on sir. . .come on. . . ."
Thanks. Good column.
1
I actually think a bar stool is quite a bit smarter than tRump.
Paul you put him in the diner because he doesn't drink, but I think we can put him on that bar stool as a dry drunk. He may not drink but he sure acts like some who does. If he was half in the bag when he spouts most of his nonsense it might be easier for a lot of us to take.
More and more now, as I read what you and many others have detailed in a deepening description of his severe psychopathology, I find my mind turning to the republicans in the house and senate who continue to countenance his repulsive and destructive behavior. I think we all know if he was in the corporate world he would have been fired long ago for gross incompetence. Yet McConnell and Ryan keep silent and do nothing. It doesn't really change anything that Ryan finally voiced opposition to protectionist tariffs yesterday. This is just the latest example, the latest symptom of his destructive, ignorant, belligerent behavior.
Months ago they should have reached across the aisle, formed a coalition, and made the trip to the WH to demand this very dangerous man's resignation, telling him if he does not do so, impeachment proceedings will follow.
That this has not happened is an indictment of the entire republican congress. As Trump is so fond of spouting, its disgraceful. But it's not all the things Trump's call disgraceful, but Trump himself who is a complete and utter disgrace.
I'm afraid that, until he is removed, we are, at this point, just rearranging duck chairs on the Titanic.
1
"Listening to a garrulous old guy spout nonsense is annoying in the best of circumstances."
Paul, short reminder: An old guy spouting pure nonsense won the election in American democracy.
So, that's one simple reason to do it right there. If you want to win in America, spout nonsense.
It works.
Feels like you have to squint fairly hard in the rear-view mirror to see the time when we looked to the US for leadership.
Tech, an industry whose power is well beyond its maturity, deals mainly in mood shifting and has seemingly forgotten all it knew about empowering and is now focussed on selling ways to nudge us.
Education, the real post war US multiplier, corroded by the very affluence that it created.
Finance, who left the snake-oil guys unchecked, decided the future can look after itself.
Race, still too scared of is lost instead of what is being gained (being Australian trust me I know more than I'd like to about this).
Guns...enough
Health care...best medicine that so few can afford
Environment, China can't build us a new one.
Democracy, excuses made in the name of winning, suspect readings of the amendments and district boundaries all to cling harder to diminishing bases. If your constituency isn't growing then maybe you need to think about that.
Like everything the answers are impossible if there isn't the will for change, but most of the above comes back to leadership.
Really hope that the US can pull itself out of its depression, slow-motion suicide...we miss the good example that you can be, that pushes us to be our better selves.
We had the humility to learn from you and it made us better, to learn from us doesn't mean you lose...failing to and you just might.
Forgive this rant...
Americans gave us Trump. And they'll do it again unless they re-learn the lessons Paleolithic humans had learned--that without unity we are prey to wild animals and to wild men of the forest. Do we need more apostles of certainty tearing down the lead candidate? Do we need "well meaning" people to behave like like a lynch mob? The answers are NO and NO, We'd better get that lesson through our arrogant skulls in time to tear down the walls of ignorance that imprison too many.
1
I am a Krugman fan, but I think the title and thesis of this column are ageist. Would it be OK to write "ranting black guy" or "ranting old lady?" And this is not just a point of political correctness. Implying that "ranting" as a characteristic that one might expect in an older man implies a prejudicial attitude.
I am that garrulous old guy in a diner, and I get a lot of flack for talking very loudly about how it's Trump and his gang is what's wrong with the world. Right?
Maybe we can cut some slack to those irascible, fact-challenged guys griping in the diner. But the thing is, their misinformation doesn't stay as hot air. It becomes votes for the irascible, fact-challenged Mr. Trump.
Having such an ignorant, selfish, pathological liar in the White House becomes part of a vicious cycle, as he feeds his supporters more of the same emotional but wrong material and they become even more riled up.
Democrats need to speak viscerally but truthfully. There are responsible ways of speaking about injustice and unequal opportunities. The difference should be finding real solutions, not scapegoats.
As I read this column, I realized that while the tone was critical, and the criticism on point, too much of our media messages about Trump treat him as though he is a rational person who is both committed to the job of a president and has some idea of what he is doing. The fact of the matter is that he enjoys the office of the presidency because of its high visibility. He gets to be filmed when he is walking to the helicopter. He can say nice things about world leaders when they visit and pretend he is their peer. He can demand loyalty among his White House staff and pretend that they aren't leaking their discomfort to the media when he isn't around. He can keep his son-in-law close in meetings where Jared should not be. He can make pronouncements whenever the news veers too far toward Mueller's investigation.
But we need to remember that this man, despite the 63 million who put him in office, is no president (if 63 million voted for a Hitler, should that be acceptable?). He does not preside. He is not interested in details or knowledge. He is interested in Donald J. Trump. Period. He is not worth discussing. His removal from office is.
Soon to be announced : Donald Trump joins the Flat Earth Society. Hardly a long stretch, for his recent declaration of a 'trade war' with US allies is a sure sign of his nhiilistic contrarian bent. Reminiscent of a teenager addicted to cutting rituals-- 'it hurts, but I can do it if I WANT to !' even though the welfare of millions of Americans hangs in the balance of his insanity.
In the end, his sycophantic followers in Congress will be the ones to blame when the real shooting wars begin. Hopefully future conditions will allow the equivalent of a Nuremberg trial to bring these fellow vandals to justice.....
How anyone can work with Trump and his capricious decision making remains a mystery. Tillerson and Cohn are not stupid men - but they think Trump is - so why do they stay? Is it dogged patriotism that keeps them at their posts to save America from this daily avalanche of dangerous, damaging and irrational decisions? Up until 2016, the USA was the big dog on two of the Earth's largest oceans - after just 12 months in office, Trump has handed half of the Pacific, both commercially and militarily, to China. And then, unbelievably, he took my breath away when he counter-proposed President Xi Jinping's stunning move to anoint himself President for Life - that America should consider that move too. Huh? Were it not for the fact he doesn't drink, I'd file that under 'Great thoughts while sitting on a stool and tanked on Budweiser.'
1
Well on the bright side, we are 410 days into the trump administration and he hasn't gotten us blown up yet. Only 1051 days to go.
1
Why is such ageism acceptable?
Why is fake news from the left acceptable but not fake news from the right?
1
Paul, this man doesn't care about starting a trade war. These tariffs and tough talk helps him, personally, with his base. He only cares about the politics of it and how it affects him. America; not so much.
I've given up listening to his nonsense on daily basis. His continued ignorance of economics and policy. You know what, the "crazy old dude" can say whatever he wants. It's those who continue to listen to him and support him are the ones to blame. His cult are the problem, unfortunately.
1
The Republicans are very happy to have Trump forward their evil agenda. Come election time, they will actually blame him in order to get re-elected. Let us hope Abraham Lincoln was correct: you can fool all the people some of the time but....
Chill out people...Didn't Trump promise early on, "I alone can fix it!" Groan!
Dear Pragmatist,
I beg to disagree. Geriatric politicians are not the problem, it's whether the person, young or old, possesses a keen mind.
Take my internist, for example, who will shortly be 94 and still going strong, still seeing patients, still curing them whenever possible. He is physically and mentally intact, possesses great knowledge coupled with so many years of experience that catapults him above so many other in his profession in terms of skill. And it's not just in medicine that he excels as his ability to think of solutions for any problem is remarkable.
As a member of the older generation, I have friends and associates in their 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. While some of them are limited by illnesses, most are not, most are in full stride exhibiting the same smarts and energy that were evident in their younger days.
Term limits...Yes, but age limits...NO!
130
I agree, let's avoid ageism. I had issues with Trump in the 1980s when he was in his 30s and 40s. It's not his age. I personally embrace an ageless attitude based on the writings of Dr. Christiane Northrup and Dr. Mario Martinez on the mind-body connection and how our thoughts about age impact our health.
3
The difference between the older population that you mention and Trump is that they learn from life and keep their minds open, Trump forms his "knowledge" from watching Fox news and is too lazy to read.
1
Most old people do not have a job since it is legal to lay them off to lower costs. Most old people do not have a pension because they were outlawed in the private sector decades ago. So if you had no job and no pension you would be ranting as well, so lets cut the old folks some slack.
3
How many of Trump's base read the opinions published in the NYT ? The problem begins with the base, who don't know or care how the system works. So long as they believe "their guy" is looking out for them, so be it. It must be right .
The dumbing down of America continues !
2
That 35% or 40% has been there for a century. They hated FDR and murdered JFK. The problem is that they gained control of the government in 2016.
It is a major error to call Trump ignorant. The problem is that he is not ignorant and his pronouncements each have a goal. The real problem is trying to figure out what he is up to. It is nice for Krugman to ridicule what seems to be random acts; it is dangerous to do so.
59
No. We can call him ignorant. Lack of knowledge is ignorance. That's all it is.
There is also willful ignorance, where one knows the truth but ignores out of convenience. This is something we see in the Republican party on issues from guns to civil rights to the economy.
Having a plan, a sly motive, a devious plot twist, does not relieve him of his self-inflicted ignorance or the celebration of ignorance by those who dislike imperative facts.
He is the President. He works for us - believe it or not. He not the King. We should not have to divine his blessed meanings as the imperial courts had to in order to interpret his meanings.
9
How is Trump informing himself? He doesn’t read, particularly briefing papers. Fox News?
9
Krugman is NOT ridiculing; he's stating REAL FACTS, not ALT facts...
10
Kim's advertised willingness to consider setting aside his nuclear weapons program surely is not good news for the White House's man-who-should-be-in-a-strait-jacket. The reason being it will provoke even-more wild and threatening tantrums from Trump's would-be "management style" and where Kim is such an obvious punching bag, tariffs are really old-hat, and one can only golf so much . . .
4
I have always thought Trump gets his attention-getting ideas from a guy at the end of a bar somewhere in Washington who is half in the bag, raging against the world, and full of simple, direct ideas to fix what he sees as every problem, whether you want to listen to him or not.
Now I see, thanks to Dr. Krugman, that HE is the guy in the bar.
21
Donald Trump has never thought to just let insults fly at him with no response. Living in New York City taught him that you have to answer tit for tat.
Having had a well-dressed smooth talker with lots of smiles and jokes but who never once tried to help black or Latino workers get a job, the American voter will stick with this brutally honest man who gets things done, like adding maybe three million jobs by this time.
Trump looks like he may end up solving the school shooting, immigration, and North Korea issues that progressive Democrats have refused to even look for real answers other than kicking the can down the road.
A brilliant summary of Trump world. I wish that Times reporters would routinely refute Trump’s completely false claims about, say, the nonexistent US trade deficit with Canada. What is really scary is that the tariffs seem to have come out of the blue as Trump became “unglued” by a bad week— losing Hope, and realizing that Jared is toast, His typical reflex is to create a diversion and make the world wait for him to deliver his verdict. And after reading Jane Mayer’s magisterial piece on Christopher Steele and The Russia case in the New Yorker. I am coming to the conclusion that this is what is really bothering him. (Hence his fury at ´Mr Magoo ‘). Looks like the Russians nixed Romney for State and got Tillerson, who is completely supine in front of Russian interference. It’s also clear that Mueller is working with laser like concentration and things are going to end very badly for Donald Trump. We can expect more and more diversions and an administration that seems to be playing three card Monte.
23
Krugman says: "we can’t expect them (ordinary Americans) to be policy wonks — although maybe they should have a better sense of what they don’t know."
He has a point, but the press could help a lot if it would deal more with facts than sensationalism. Sadly, the American press does not make it easy for ordinary, hard working Americans to be able to understand the issues.
The very best, most unbiased source of news in NPR and PBS which Trump would dearly like to de-fund.
8
I can't read these op-eds anymore. They bring flashbacks of my sleepless nights after our annual Thanksgiving gathering with Uncle Harry's read on the problems of the world. With Trump, every night is becoming sleepless.
6
Thee ARE other countries on this planet. I bet you'd have a much healthier outlook on this all-too-brief life if you'd give one a try. We are probably in for a string of conservative or Republican presidents, until the voters forget Barack the cool.
Paul: Thanks for the article. The reason is quite simple why I feel good after reading it. I am an old guy and I know a lot of old guys and none that I know are spouting nonsense. But then none of us are President of the United States either. Which begs the question: Will being old and spouting nonsense be future requirements to run for President? Most old guys like myself are talking and listening to young people especially millennials who are going to need all the help they can get to put the country back together again.
Maybe we should refer to him as "humpty dumpty Trumpty,"
10
Donald is basically a con man. He rants and raves on certain issues because his supporters respond to that. The Democrats had better learn how to respond too. It will of course need to be in more enlightened ways, but that part is easy, because you can't be less enlightened than Donald. But the point is that they have to respond, not just pontificate that such views are not politically-correct.
2
Many years ago inflation was running hot and, for a time (1-2 years), we were under wage-price controls. I was the economist for a company that manufactured electrical equipment. One of our largest customers for safety switches was U.S. Steel. After wage-price controls came off U.S. Steel announced 1-2-3-4 price increases on steel... and these were 6-7% increases! We announced price increases on our safety switches and U.S. Steel pushed back - strongly - demanding that we justify these unnecessary and exorbitant price increases. Well - guess what the biggest material component of a safety switch is?? You got it - steel! With these 10-25% tariffs this beggar thy neighbor craziness will run rampant throughout the economy!
4
Anyone out there think that his baseless rants may just be a tactic? The same nuttiness seems to have gotten North Korea to discuss giving up their nukes.
The condescending name-calling wonks ("old guy with nukes") may be missing a legitimate, but less-than-academic means (bravado, bluster, and bluffing) to desirable ends: a defused North Korea and better renegotiated trade agreements for the US.
Right.
Dream on.
Please tell the adult in Trump's adminitration to stand-up. Not one cabinet official will buck him on a consistent basis to tell the truth about the reality that Trympcould care less about.
2
We are rapidly transforming ourselves into a banana republic with nukes. When looking at the Presidency and the GOP in Congress, there is no longer any pretense that they believe in anything but racism, low taxes for the very rich, and general looting and grabbing by the well-connected. We now see that their claims about patriotism, morality, national debt, etc., are all fake.
6
At least most of the “garrulous old guys” I know can accept the fact that Russia is an enemy of America and that destroying trust in democracy is not a good thing. Trump.....not so much.
7
Maybe you can explain that to MikeS. who commented above yours, he seems to think we're all nuts but him an his buddy Trump!!
The left goes on and on and Trump is still President. No Russia collusion no impeachment no nothing. They just wait for the next Trump comment and all parrot the same nonsense. Meanwhile Americans are working, Americans investments are profiting and companies are once again investing in America. I hope the Liberal left continues to make Trump bashing their platform so they get beaten up at the midterms. No solutions just whining and complaining...sad
1
Trump is still president because nearly his whole party is terrified of the ignorant voters who comprise his base. They are more afraid of that than they are of ceding control our nation to a hostile foreign power.
1
What universe do you live in? All the economic gains made under Trump are continuations of trends that started under the Obama administration: jobs and the stock market. And, Trump handed out massive tax breaks that benefit mostly the wealthy with peanuts to the average tax payer - and in turn the corporations rewarded their share holders or executives and gave crumbs to their workers. Meanwhile he sticks his thumb in the eyes of our most reliable allies. Perhaps people like you who complain about liberals whining should start doing some homework and quit trolling. You'll be doing the whining when Trump and company do the perp walk.
It's hard to take a newspaper seriously when the article attached to this one claims something about American Democracy. Are you all unaware that we are a Republic? Seriously. For years I have heard the claptrap about how a democracy and a Republic are the same(they are decidedly not) and was hopeful we could move past this false notion when it was proven beyond a doubt that they are not the same when 3=2 of our last three Presidents won with a minority of the vote. It's time for this paper and the citizens of this country to understand the difference between a democracy and a republic, why the founders chose a Republic and what it means for 21st century politics. And for all of our sakes, stop instituting Democracies in foreign lands that end up with some sort of mob rule.
The major difference is the government in a Republican is bound to a constitutional document that grants/limits/dictates the rights of its citizenry. However, we often operate more as a democracy, a representative democracy, but still...it is easy to see why people use "democracy" to describe our form of government, especially given how the Republicans are using their control as the majority party to pound down minority input.
The problem today is that the current "leadership" have forgotten they are bound by the constitution and to uphold it as sworn by the oath of their office. Do you think Trump or many members of the Congress even know what its basic tenets are? When a president expresses admiration for a Chinese dictator who suddenly decides he can rule as long as he wants or puts forth that people should be punished severely without due process, we have a major major problem. And no, Kellyanne, it's not all hyperbole and you can't just wish away facts as "alternative" facts (please look up the definition of the word).
You prefer our current kakistocracy? It's just mob rule where the thieving mob happens to have all the money and so the power and interest in excluding 99% if the citizens from meaningful participation in their governance.
Our Declaration of Independence says the only legitimate government is that which has the consent of the governed. In what twisted way can you claim that a system rigged by a slave-state compromise like the Electoral College and corrupt gerrymandering (and SCOTUS-sanctioned voter suppression schemes in the states) is "consent of the governed"? Our system is now explicitly rigged to AVOID it.
No, we are not democracy. But how is de facto rule by the wealthy -- iow plutocracy-oligarchy -- in the interest of the majority of citizens? It is obviously not, and that your "republic" could be gamed so thoroughly by an already-rich mob gives it nothing to recommend it over a real democracy. You just prefer your own mob.
Water under the bridge, of course, but one might say, now that we have 242 years if experience, that given human nature and its usual reversion to greed and fear -- and its recent surrender to a corrupt demagogue -- that a republic must needs have a short life-span before corrupt players gain complete power and regular citizens have none. That's us now, wouldn't you agree?
Trump is the king of policy reversals. He has taken as many as 60 positions on 25 policies. Nothing he states is definitive and everything he states should be taken with a grain of salt. He consistently opens with a bang and then often backs off. It’s as if he is laying out an aggressive negotiating position which is not founded in fact. Oftentimes his crazy proposals end up melting away to nothing. You may think he is a policy giant who has enacted harmful changes across the board. I think he’s an incompetent fool who is ignored by most of those who actually implement policy.
1
So part of the problem is that Trump is an old guy? I have seem some ageism creeping into the NYT lately. The problem is not Trump's age or that of the people who voted for him - which is cutely implied.
I didn't vote for him but I get why people did. Of course he is incompetent. Rather, the problem is desperation and a country that worships money and material things and devalues people. And let's be frank, our previous president's disasterous foeign policy (I voted for him twice)is coming home to roost. Exhibit one: Syria and that debacle.
I wonder sometimes if Obama got a a free pass because he was at least charming and didn't channel Mussolini?
1
Thanks again for another accurate article. I am a 75 year old guy who is not sitting in a diner bemoaning the inequities of a government system. Realty is important to me and I do not believe things that are not true. And I actually read ....several daily newspapers, books, a thesis on foreign policy or maybe listen to a lecture on economics at a local university when the opportunity arises. It is good to be know what is actually going on in our world. To be "led" by a man who does not read, who prides himself in his ignorance, who seems to believe history started with himself and wants to re-write it is more than folly. It is the beginning of the end of a democracy that has lasted for almost 250 years....How long will our spineless congress people babble on about nothing before they act to stop this derailed anti-intellectual freight train?
14
When Trump is gone his like-mind supporters - of all ages and genders - will still be with us. We need a plan to help them unhook from their sources of anger and misinformation.
7
Trump accuses U.S. media as the "enemy of the people". As usual he's only partially right: Fox News is the enemy of America, unfair and unbalanced, much as the current occupant of the White House.
15
In medieval times when anesthesia didn't exist, dental practitioners extracting teeth dealt with pain by placing a patient's hand over a candle just before extraction. The idea was -- if you couldn't eliminate the pain of pulling a tooth -- you could at least distract from it by causing more pain elsewhere.
I don't know if using pain to alleviate pain contributed to dental health hygiene back then but this primitive approach to pain management seems like how Trump governs.
He "solves" every problem by creating a myriad of additional problems.
It sort of works. Experts say the human mind can only deal attentively with maybe 10 or 12 things at once. Any more and people edit out the less urgent or previous mental agenda items.
Last week with the rapid succession of White House fails -- the Porter blackeye, Kelly's Divine Comedy, Jared's diplomacy of dialing for dollars (rubles, shekels, yuans), Hopeless Hicks, Mueller's dragnet, Stormy Davis weather, Putin's bigger one, and the gun control/decontrol flop-- any sane person would be challenged to remember what day or country they were in. And at week's end, the Trump whirlwind became a Category 7 cyclone with Trump unilaterally -- literally single-handedly -- declaring war on trade.
Every issue morphs into a dozen more. Trump's hand is quicker than our eyes can see.
Blow calls him the King of Chaos but that hardly does Trump justice.
He isn't just the King of Chaos. He's become the chaos he always wanted to be.
8
Krugman says that "maybe [people] should have a better sense of what they DON'T know." Indeed. Benjamin Franklin spoke to this, as well:
Benjamin Franklin: "Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn."
The Joe Sixpack down at the local corner tavern who spouts that 'trade wars are good, and easy to win', has no desire to learn from history.
And Hegel spoke to that: "The greatest lesson of history is that people never learn from it."
7
With Trump, it is easy to believe that (to paraphrase Mary McCarthy’s famous remark about Lillian Hellman) every word he utters is a lie, including “and” and “the.” Dr. Krugman, however, usefully reminds us that a significant portion of what he says—perhaps as much as 25%, by my estimate—reflects not mendacity or malice but merely ignorance &/or stupidity.
3
Every day I just keep telling myself the pendulum can’t swing any lower and from here it can only go up. I’m still waiting, hoping and doing whatever I can to help make that happen... joining the student protests on 3/24, getting involved in local politics, encouraging young adults to get to the polls! I am hopeful and encouraged by this community of NYT readers for your educated and insightful comments.
8
If you think Canada is going to make concessions, you don't understand Canadian politics.
4
Just to be clear. Your comment should be pointed to Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly shown he knows nothing about politics -- Canadian or otherwise.
It is also worth pointing out that Trump is 72, obese and in declining health.
4
Well said Paul. After the so-called president is out of a job let's go find a nice bar and I'll buy you a drink.
3
Thank you, Paul Krugman - This was a terrific article which clearly explains the facts about our Embarrassment in Chief. I have no longer any respect for the Republican Party who prefer their support for a clueless, bombastic and racist President than they do for the majority of the citizens in the United States. Shame on them all.
17
I'd prefer a trade war to a nuclear war. Hopefully this will keep him occupied until Mueller finishes his investigation and he is indicted without enough time to prepare an excuse to bomb North Korea.
The only problem with this plan is that the GOP won't impeach the loony because they are also traitors to the country.
8
Short of the illegal, the only way Trump will get his just deserts is for a sea change election in November, followed by a rout in 2020. Followed further by a crumbling of his real estate empire into something resembling a slough of aluminum-sided single-wides on the outskirts of Passaic, NJ, or Lubbock, TX.
We voters can provide the first two. The third may be just revenge fantasy, but then, truth frequently out-stranges fiction.
Here's fantasizing to you. Cheers.
9
Now that Trump's name is being stripped from a hotel in Panama, he will soon announce 50% tariffs on the import of bananas and shrimp from that country. Trump will no doubt cite our national defense as the reason to protect U.S. industries supplying these strategic materials.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/05/world/americas/panama-hotel-trump.html
4
I’m not sure there is an answer to Donald Trumps newest outrage. It’s kind of like comparing Sanity to Insanity. The sane person sees the world as it really is minus Truth from Fiction. A native in a hidden jungle that has never seen an aircraft see’s a devil or a god. Is that native insane? No. They just don’t have the knowledge or experience to know truth, even when they see it. Sound familiar? Well folks, that’s my definition of our president. How hopeful does that make you feel that the person running the world sees an aircraft as a god or devil?
2
It's time for Trump to go. The real problem now is the GOP still covering for him, pretending he's "normal," when it is so obviously not true.
6
Trump's personality, lack of understanding of rule of law, and his 'go with the wind blow' ideas make him scary. If we as a nation were hiring a CEO to run a large corporation, you wouldn't put someone without the right experience and track record to run it, for fear you would lose the company. That's what we have with Trump. If you actually looked into what Trump's business dealings were in real estate, etc. you would realize he made a lot of mistakes and ran up a lot of debt. His fox like dealings and connections and mob like mentality, & family got him to where he is - not his intelligence nor experience.
What is even scarier though to me, is if you do prop someone up like this it's because you think you can manipulate or control him and also use the power behind the party. So the GOP figures they get their way now and their agenda goes through instead of the dems. Problem is their agenda is not the average American's agenda. They want to take away Social security, Medicare and Medicaid. They don't want one iota of healthcare for you and me, just for themselves in congress. They don't want to give tax breaks to us, that's why ours are temporary, they want it to go to their rich supporters and them. They want to cry "NO DEBT!!" when it's a dem in office, but they are happy to raise the DEBT for truly unpaid tax cuts. I got a tax cut which I will end up paying 10x for if I don't have my social security or medicare when I retire.
WAKE UP-vote out the GOP!
6
The longer this goes on the more I realize that we were lucky to have JFK during the Cuban Missle crisis, despite JFK’s personal foibles.
3
I can't help but think that the whole tariff debacle was Trump simply putting his thumb on the stock market scale. Somewhere I pray that the SEC is looking into some uptick in stock manipulation that correlates with his threat of tariffs and then his equivocating on them. (I suppose I wouldn't be so paranoid if all those people weren't against me)
1
We have reached a new low as a nation when the president of the United States gets his information from Fox and Friends. This would be funny if it were part of a situation comedy on Fox but this has serious consequences for all of us.
4
Could it be possible that the problems going on with Trump's hotel in Panama had something to do with his decision on tariffs? It seems that when he feels pressure in one area, he often lashes out somewhere else. There were reports that he had been ranting and raving in the White House just prior to announcing the tariffs. Maybe he was ranting because he was losing his only hotel property in Latin America? He's so irrational, it's impossible to guess at what motivates him.
3
There are so many things to worry about when it comes to this president, that it defies credulity. And you don't have to be a rocket scientist to know that his latest trade tariff idea is going to have disasterous effects on the U.S. -- not only because it will do nothing to improve our economy, but it will cost us the realtionships with our very close neighbors and European allies as well.
No doubt, in an effort to score immediate points with his support-base, he hasn't thought this thing through.
It's hard to believe that he would so willingly vacate the field and leave all economic trade and advancement to China, who will certainly waste no time in filling the void.
I don't understand this president any more than I understand why this country put him in charge in the first place.
And that is what's scary.
9
Trump's success has everything to do with making ignorant people feel self righteous about their ignorance. Exploiting the principle of ignorance as common sense not only explains his election, it also explains the die-hard support he receives in spite of the endless scandals and appalling performance of his administration. Fox News is at the heart of this propaganda campaign and we can be sure if there is ever a needless nuclear showdown, the network will be cheering Trump on as a fearless commander-in-chief.
3
Why does the press continue to call lies falsehoods?
5
POTUS policy would give China further trade advantages.
One more opinion piece warning us about Trump. Yes, we need to be very afraid, but let's also join a movement to replace the Electoral College with a National Popular Vote system. We need to make sure electing someone like Trump never happens again!
https://www.c-span.org/video/?440345-3/panelists-discuss-replacement-ele...
3
Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them --- Trump merely imagines his own greatness.
The NYT article "How to Get Your Mind to Read" (https://nyti.ms/2k0fPuk) was very interesting and certainly applies to the bombastic old man in the White House.
We all know that he does not read much at all - like his base - not because they can't read but because their knowledge base is so narrow and limited. They do not know HOW to read. Ditto for not knowing how to listen or watch TV news and fake news with friends.
Trump read and understand pesky briefings? You gotta be kidding!
As for the steel tariffs, trump was likely helping Jared and Carl Icahn out with some insider market moving tips. Or was he thinking about Christopher Steele? Or he is pulling a Chris Christie bridge-gate political adversary punishment stunt by inconveniencing NY/NJ voters and commuters by nixing a steel heavy tunnel project to punish Schumer. What does trump care - there are no tolls or traffic in the sky he travels in.
When will Wharton revoke trump's diploma? How embarrassing for them to have graduated a "belligerent" ignoramus.
It is a given around the planet that trump cannot be trusted on anything. The real question is - How will our allies ever trust the American voter?
4
Unfortunately Trump is worse than a garrulous old guy in a diner with nukes. The old guy in the diner might be angry and misinformed, but he'd likely understand that if he acted recklessly every living thing on the planet could die. Even if the old guy in a diner didn't like immigrants, or anyone he considered different, he'd seriously worry about how bad nuclear war would be for his family and friends. Simply put, it's very unlikely that garrulous old guys in diners throughout America are true narcissists and psychopaths like Trump. Trump's decision on tariffs is entirely unrelated to domestic policy just as his fawning over Putin and threats to rain nukes down on Kim Jong-un are unrelated to foreign policy or national security. It is what sets Trump apart from virtually every other politician that Americans have dealt with. It is the only reason that the likes of Jeff Sessions or Paul Ryan seem so reasonable. Sessions stated that he liked the Klan until he realized its members smoked marijuana, but he refuses to destroy the Constitution. Ryan lies every time a number comes out of his mouth, including the time of his only marathon, but he recognizes the danger of a trade war. Sessions and Ryan both have incredibly weak morality, but they're still unwilling to cross certain lines, and there are plenty lines garrulous old guys in diners won't cross. The same can't be said for Trump who will cross any line because he has no limits: He's a narcissist and a psychopath with nukes.
2
I get the 'old guy' metaphor. It stands for the uninformed, the shallow, the Archie Bunkers of our nation. (Who knew there would be so many? Who knew someone like this would ever actually 'win' the Presidency?) Actually, Archie had more integrity.
I spend a lot of time with veterans. Most of them are old guys (and gals) like me. Most get their news, if they get news at all, from Faux, which supplies them with a ready made argument for every 'liberal' position.
It's as if their brains have been contaminated by some kind of ugly virus that just keeps replicating. These people are my friends, but I have learned not to even try to engage with this contamination. It's like trying to reason with an active alcoholic or a person who has been brainwashed. Pointless, and it hurts you more than it does them.
Unfortunately, it's not just the 'old guys' we have to fear. It's very young folks too; look at young Luigi DiMaio of Italy, just 31.
The populists are the 'counterculture' of our day. It is sickeningly ironic, especially for those of us who lived through the 60s and 70s and were indelibly printed with the idealism of those decades.
An old guy is in charge, but I wonder if the young folks (globally) are the ones we really have to fear.
1
Mr Trump is playing to his audience and his audience doesn't get top secret briefings. Fox news plays to the same audience who take the news tailored for them to be gospel. Mr Trump simply delivers the sermon they want to hear.
As pointed out governing is a complex process and one which our President's track record indicates is beyond his inadequate organizational abilities. He has always been and will remain a mouthpiece for some known, but mostly unknown barn animals masquerading as human beings.
He had an excellent teacher from whom he learned well. He is shameless.
1
A man watching The Apprentice pops a fifth beer open when suddenly a ghostly form appears. In an other-worldly voice, GOZER: Choose. Choose the form of the destructor!
Heck, I worried when he spent too much time talking about chocolate cake. Everything he says, every rant he makes, every tweet he takes - I'm worried.
I hope that someone is assigned to monitor his tweets during the night, in hopes that he won't go through and carry out his ranting ideas or rambling delusional thoughts
Our problem is entirely due to the fact that the republican congress will not put a check on our drunk uncle.
We will have to do that in November
3
Thank you. Congress, Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell abdicated their constitutional responsibilities. Period, full stop.
Who pays attention to what a known blockhead says? No one thinks he makes sense except other blockheads.
What is more important is what are the Republicans in Congress doing/going to do? Americans are fed up with the clown who occupies the White House and his enablers. The world knows exactly what Trump is - a bizarre hairdo atop an empty skull with eyes perpetually staring into a mirror.
But real Americans and world leaders are dumbfounded to explain why Republicans who control the US Congress have not behaved like adults and put an end to the Trump farce of a presidency. What to make of Republicans?!
Better questions are, How quickly can we replace Republicans with adults? and, Will the "Republican Party" forever remain a synonym for "traitors"?
2
Trump's actions will result in retributions that could drive down the domestic price of bourbon. I can live wid it.
9
5 times, Krugman disparages Trump by calling him "old." Talk about pandering to stereotypes! It also makes no sense as argumentation--young, middle-aged, old, Trump was ever thus. And so will he be even when he's very old, like me.
7
He is old. I know because I am the same age. If he were young, and Krugman called him young, would you object? Trump is old now but he has always been subject to muddled thinking regarding reality. It has only gotten worse with age, I would guess. And, Krugman points out that old guys are supposedly the arbiters of politics and "reliable" voters,
1
Agreed—the ageism in this piece is actually kind of shocking. (Not as shocking as the daily news under trump, but still shocking.)
Well, somehow this "garrulous old guy" managed to get elected much to the surprise of mostly everyone including the "garrulous old guy".
7
somehow = gerrymandering, voter suppression, and Putin combined with false equivalence (Hillary is just as bad).
Too bad he was elected because he is a terrible President. Winning the Electoral College only made him more smug and less willing to learn anything new. He is leading us off of a cliff and the people who think winning an election makes one smart or good are mistaken.
1
By the Electoral College - not the people.
1
Professor Krugman isn't nearly terrified enough.
If Professor Krugman was more conversant with mental illness, he'd recognize a very common pattern. As the Mueller web tightens, POTUS feels powerless. Because he's insane, he responds to being powerless by asserting that he's all-powerful in some way, just as the lunatic on the corner will tell you he can control the sun's movement or that he's Jesus and Mary Magdalene in one body. And Mueller hasn't even revealed how Trump and/or the kids will be charged. Once that happens, this deeply troubled, ignorant, powerless man will almost certainly demand a show of his absolute power. He will attack N. Korea to "bloody their nose" and from that point, millions will die - unless he is stopped first. I don't know who or how but I pray he will be stopped before setting off one of the most horrendous disasters in human history.
108
An excellent comment Peter Quince. I also pray that he will be stopped and, having watched the Republican acceptance of his insanity, I do wonder if it is too late for that.
1
You have put your finger on my greatest fear, Mr Quince. In fairness to Mr Krugman, he's probably just as cognizant of the mental illness at play here but was restricting this particular column to the trade issues. Nevertheless, it's obvious that the logical conclusion is inescapable: Trump is just too mentally unstable to be trusted anywhere the nuclear codes. His combination of paranoia and delusions of grandeur will inevitably lead to him having to show the world just how great and powerful he is. Just look at the photo accompanying the article. What kind of man would have the presidential number embroidered on his cuffs? What is going to save us from this? The GOP-controlled congress? The special counsel? The generals? I believe our best hope now to remove this guy from the nuclear trigger is the cheese burgers that he supposedly consumes every day. Pete McGuire, Atlanta
Peter, you have to hope for a small island of sanity in the top brass who will have taken measures to circumvent calamity for the entire world.
Canada has a population one tenth of that if the US! What is he afraid of? Do Americans know that GM has auto factories in Canada? Many companies are owned by US companies. Treaties are monitored by international bodies. Trump uses falsehoods to cover up his lack of understanding and ignorance. Boogeymen under the bed. He’s probably angry at Canada’s immigration policies and environmental policies. And maybe Justin Trudeau!!
52
Trudeau agrees to stop flooding the US with poutine and maple syrup. Pena Nieto says no more subsidized jalapeños. Trump declares HUGE victory, says we are WINNING again! Problem solved.
41
One goes to bed every night hoping that someone in government in a position of power -- Mattis perhaps -- is preparing himself to countermand a Trump decision to launch an unwarranted nuclear strike on North Korea, Mexico or Canada.
But, of course, North Korea is plotting against us and Mexico is refusing to pay for the wall and Canada is still trying to sell us too much steel.
So one never knows.
.
28
"Beyond that, is there any reason to believe that Trump’s belligerent ignorance stops with trade?"
No.
The point is that the fact free ignorance he spouts makes too many people feel good. There is only one antidote to DJT's particular brand of willful ignorance. The ballot box.
Read Dr. K and others and wonder how we got here? The 40% of us who did not vote did it to us as much as the 28% who were foolish enough to vote for him.
I ask every person who complains about Trump one simple question, "are you going to vote in 2018?".
65
JDR1210 - You are also correct in your statement. People who don't bother to vote are equally at fault for the results of this one. I hope that they haven woken up but do not have complete confidence in hope.
3
As HL Mencken said, "Americans deserve what they get and deserve to get it real hard."
1
In medieval times when anesthesia didn't exist, dental practitioners pulling teeth dealt with pain by placing a patient's hand over a candle just before extraction. The idea was -- if you couldn't eliminate the pain of pulling a tooth -- you could at least distract from it by causing more pain elsewhere.
I don't know if using pain to alleviate pain contributed to dental hygiene back then but this primitive approach to pain management seems like how Trump governs.
He "solves" every problem by creating a myriad of more problems. It sort of works. Experts say our minds can only deal attentively with maybe 10 or 12 things at once. Any more and people edit out previous mental agenda items.
Last week with the rapid succession of White House crises -- the Porter blackeye, Kelly's Divine Comedy, Jared's diplomacy of dialing for dollars (rubles, shekels, yuans), Hopeless Hicks, Mueller's dragnet, Stormy Davis clouds, Putin's bigger one, and the gun de/control backflip-- any sane person would be challenged to remember what day or country they're in. And at week's end, the Trump whirlwind was now a Category 7 cyclone with Trump unilaterally -- literally single-handed -- declaring war on trade.
Every crisis morphs into a dozen more crises. Trump's hand is quicker than our eyes. Charles Blow calls him the King of Chaos but that hardly does Trump justice. He isn't just King of chaos.
He is the chaos he always wanted to be.
35
The setting is wrong. A garrulous old guy may also go to a local diner or coffee shop, bring with him or then buy The New York Times and read Paul Krugman, David Brooks, etc. Policy wonk? Maybe not. But well informed. Yes.
9
One is surprised to see the quote from Mr. Wilbur Ross. Surely he should know better. He has been a global investor and understands how global trade works. You cannot isolate a single product and load up on that. Why does he not try to explain that to Mr. Trump ? He is the Commerce Secretary isnt he ?
17
Mr. Ross has his own issues, given the fact he headed up the Bank of Cyprus, which apparently was the funnel point for laundered Russian money to Trump.
Mr. Mueller, I suspect, has Wilbur on his 'calendar'.
1
The idea that we are 'worrying' is an understatement - many of us are frantic. Trump is Trump, we all, including the GOP leaders, know that he is a serious wacko. That leaves the GOP and their donor class as being the responsible party for this disgraceful political, reality show. We may have a long recovery ahead of us.
Is the US waking up? Signs are good but Nov 6 still seems a bit too far out there. Lots of 'old guys' out there are dying off to be replaced by the young who are, with the woke women, beginning to press the political class.
20
If congressional Republicans won't impeach Trump for conspiring with Putin to undermine our democracy, maybe they'll impeach him for starting a trade war that winds up costing their billionaire donors and a lot of money.
18
The alternate facts groups within our country are engaging in a dangerous game. When opinions on a myriad of subjects are stated as facts, truth and common sense are corrupted and our country pays a price. In legal immigrants hounded and deported. In worthy infrastructure investments, such as the Hudson River tunnel, are threatened or cancelled. In out-of-date sections of our economy, such as coal mining, being touted as sacrosanct. To me, this is a result of the huge income gap in our country. The more money you have, the more out of touch with regular people you become. The Republicans make the argument that all people should be able to keep more of their income, seems fair, right? My question is, why are some in our economy making huge amounts of money, when so many are not making enough to live a comfortable life? Why are CEOs making hundreds more than their average employee? Rampant greed in our country is killing it. And our President and GOP controlled Congress is only helping to make it worse. Democrats, get out a simple fairness to all message, keep all Democrat candidates on that message. Joe Kennedy's state of the union response was brilliant. A simple description of our common American values and what government has stood for and can be again if we fight for it. The powers of darkness are in high dudgeon right now. Fight ! Fight ! Fight !
326
We listened to 8 years of non-truths about Obama and Clinton. Why would we think that the GOP will change its tune now and tell any kind of truth?
The day before election day, bars and cafes should be closed.
By doing so, Brexit would have been avoided and the election
of Mr. Trump problably too.
8
I almost never agree with Paul Krugman, and I am tempted to write something about an angry, ranting old guy economist, but in this case Krugman is dead right. This is one of the reasons I as a conservative could not vote for Trump. Besides repeatedly making inappropriate and bigoted comments, Trump is just too unmoored from reality. Let us hope that Trump's latest ranting is just theater for his populist base.
18
'Let us hope that Trump's latest ranting is just theater for his populist base.'
Trump's theater is for Trump.
He needs to feel he's in charge or his whole world will come crashing down around him.
That moment can't come too soon...
I grew up with a "drunk Uncle Don" who got uglier and uglier as his drinking advanced. He would rant at the Thanksgiving dinner table and then try to follow my sisters into their room. He was eventually banned from the house because my Mom, a die-hard Republican, valued her daughters more than saving face in front of her own sister. If only Republicans today would have the moral courage to do something similar to Trump.
19
In Trumpwold, "ranting, ill-informed, bombastic, and clueless (with added racism)" is described as 'telling it like it is'. His core voters think like him, watch the same TV programs as him, and see themselves in him.
15
Totally agree, but anyone with common sense (an oxymoron I know) would recognize that they don't want leaders that are like themselves, since most of us couldn't possibly serve as president - Trump included.
What we must ask ourselves is "what is Trump trying to accomplish here?". It seems to me, given that he announced the tariffs proposal with no discussion or preparation within his administration, after a horrible week where Mueller seems to be making substantial progress in unraveling Trump's relationship to Russian oligarchs, that Trump is simply trying to change the subject. He has waved a shiny object in front of the national press and it seems to have worked. The good news is that I doubt Mr. Mueller and his staff are discussing tariffs this morning.
19
The ones that voted for Trump, a minority by the way since facts do matter, will never admit that Trump is unstable, a fraud, and a bigot.
But I doubt that Trump actually cares if people are deported and children get separated from their parents. Trump doesn't pay attention to details.
Trump is playing the credulous for all they're worth and they will never admit this even to themselves. He is getting help from the pseudospiritual, and every conman that ever joined the conservatives.
Trump's lack of knowledge about firearms was on display recently when he needed to be told that assault rifles can be purchased everywhere. Without accurate information and scientifically established facts he's destroying the last vestiges of govt.
If we survive this until next year, then we can rebuild but even when he is gone we will still have to beat the enablers of his con and the ones who will never, ever, own up to him. Maybe they should twist in their own winds of change for awhile? I'd support those who want to return to a democratic society and those who want to rebuild our country based on equality.
Opponents of the current regime need to step forward in the red states and ask for help. Like in Florida from the children, or Kansas and Wisconsin. Take a stand and show that you want change!
16
Just more trade deficits are "imaginary problems" from a "garrulous old guy spout[ing] nonsense." Deficits do matter, markets are not efficient and economics is not science. Greenspan, an important 20th-century economist, thought there was no need to regulate markets; they were efficient and pricing would reflect full risk. His old man nonsense gave us the biggest financial calamity in history, something we haven't fully recovered from even today. I for one am done listening to economists. Navarro's in charge. And planning using fanciful economic models is in decline. Perhaps that's the real complaint here. Nasty column.
The tariff talk put an end to an embarrassing moment for Trump when the NRA told him off for talking commun sense gun control. Trump never spoke about gun control again and we now have to deal with tariffs and trade wars ... There is no rationale to this, just POTUS trying to extricate himself from another hole he created.
18
We have previously asked whether 45 should submit to an IQ test or a mental fitness assessment and seen the circus that issues from his Twitter account. But seriously, where are the gasps of dismay from our elected representatives? Or at least some raised eyebrows?
Are they fuzzy from an afternoon nap, afraid to object or even ask a reasonable question? Maybe just turned down those hearing aids. No knee jerk reactions to the irrational policy announcements or reversals? (Psst, we have figured out how to replace weak knee joints- but not spines).
Maybe are legislators are just, well, a bit confused or secretly worried they don't remember stuff very well anymore? All worth wondering, but while they keep mum and grip the gunwales (instead of the oars), I hope our citizenry is woke and ready to steer the boat toward a sea change of leadership in November.
I'm sure someone has calculated the median age of our congress and senate, but from my front porch in Ohio it looks like our delegation is mostly a bunch of old white guys. Term limits? Maybe we need age limits too. Please encourage your family, neighbors and coworkers to vote in the primary elections this spring AND the midterms this November
12
Assuming he really did go there, he's giving Wharton a bad name.
9
What bothers me most of all is that our leaders, i.e. Congress, the political parties both Democratic and Republican, etc. etc. have become so gutless.
Was it Christ who said: "if thy right eye offends thee pluck it out" ?
All we hear today is nothing but rhetoric and no action.
Our kids are being slaughtered, our women dishonored, our trade relations gutted, our health care dismantled, our prisons overflowing, the list goes on...
Yet we continue to do nothing about an electoral system so vulnerable to mischief, that a totally unelectable person holds the highest office in the land.
This situation is unacceptable, and we all know it.
15
"...Trump’s display of belligerent ignorance ought to worry us a lot."
Truer words have not been written on the topic. Elegant, efficient and thoroughly alarming.
3
Did you hear the interview of Wilbur Ross on "Meet The Press" this weekend? It was nothing short of terrifying. Mr. Ross made clear that as Commerce Secretary, he has no more influence over, or even knowledge of, what tariff policy will ultimately be than Mr. Krugman's duffer on a bar stool. We seem to have a government where policy is determined by what itch Donald Trump chooses to scratch at a particular moment.
2
Trump solved world peace according to the 'breaking news' headline on the front page of the digital, so everyone is always wrong about Trump.
Even Nixon did very good things, but he was still "a crook".
1
Trade war precedes depression according to Nathan Becker who runs series on Twitter about economics.
It is a good series.
modernmoneybasics.com is required reading for those who want to understand that Paul Ryan is absolutely over and over day in and day out saying stupid things.
The US Treasury is denied to the States as a set up furthering privatization which now makes a mean nation just to be mean.
2
"U.S. exports to the European Union enjoy an average tariff of just three percent" Hah! Good luck trying to get a U.S product approved for import into the E. U. They have a myriad ways other than tariffs to make it so time consuming and costly you would be well advised to to bother trying.
In spite of yours and most of the readers here contempt for Trump his ranting about unfair trade comes a lot closer to the truth then the "U.S. government Guide to Exporters" When you walk into a shopping mall (or most any trade show for that matter) in the U.S. you see how easy it is for foreign products to gain access to the lucrative U.S. market. Trump's says we are just suckers and most Americans with common sense are inclined to agree. When you can pull yourself free from your abstract economic graphs and formulas try taking a look around the local market place or any trade show in your area.
1
Walk down the street of any European capital, it looks like main Street, USA. American consumers demand goods from all over the world, and the world demands our goods too: iPhones, jeans, Harley's, our burgers, our bras, our jeans, our ubiquitous t shirts, our cosmetics, handbags, sneakers....
Common sense, my eye. For every seller, there is a buyer. Tariffs raise prices to buyers. If steel prices are higher, steel is more expensive, and cars etc. are more expensive. The consumer pays the tariff.
Instead of restricting steel from Canada, a country that poses no threat and is a force for good in the world, why not restrict oil imports? A $1 per gallon gasoline import tax would save energy, reduce carbon emissions, and drain funds from the likes of Iran, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Plus, it would enrich Texans!
When Trump talks about winning a trade war, he's talking about selling more than we're buying. He's so stupid that he thinks "selling" is "winning" and doesn't realize he was elected by consumers, not producers.
But he's also not stupid. He's smart enough to realize steel tariffs will result in more (if not better paying, unionized) jobs in steel factories. He promised to bring those jobs back. Democrats laughed at him, and offered no material policy to improve the lives of millions of Americans suffering from the economic dislocation to deindustrialization. The longer they are mute, the more Trump voters will feel vindicated.
Sure you see some American products but ask any U.S. exporter how many years and how much money it cost to gain market access. If a food product was involved they probably never gained access.
Also ask about constantly shifting maze of regulations designed to keep out competition
Instead of leading a defense of the nation against an actual cold (i.e., cyber) war, mounted by an actual hostile adversary, the current occupant of the White House mounts the barricades in a full-throated cold (i.e. trade) war -- against our friends and allies. But for Trump, friends and enemies are all alike -- it's not America first, it's America only.
2
I am trying to think of comparisons. Most Roman emperors had a shorter life expectancy. George III? Recently, when thinking of daft old men who governed terribly, I thought of Shakespeare's King Lear, but Lear was a figure one could at least feel a little sorry for, wandering around, spouting nonsense. If I was seated on a bar stool next to an old guy ranting, after about five minutes, I"d excuse myself to go to the ladies room and sneak out the back door. He won't go away--he'll be ranting until closing time, but we don't have to stay. In this election year, I hope the country simply gets up and leaves the dimness of the bar, and walks out into the sunshine, blinking. At least, I can dream.
4
The new reality is more terrifying than any novel ever written.
6
What is the purpose of criticism? To help change minds. Will minds change?
Yes. Considering who is in power, will it have good, or any effect? None. We're stuck with this unconscionable, garrulous old guy for another three years. We will have to suffer the effects of his crooked policies for another three years. Should we criticize him? Yes. But we should emphasize the course to follow to get rid of him in the next election He lied his way into the presidency! The people who voted him had just complaints but fell for his lies. We must emphasize what has to be offered to those people that they really need:
A 15$ minimum wage; free college tuition for state colleges; control of the runaway practices of banks that brought about the last recession; government sponsored health care. Criticism is good. Emphasizing it to the point of ignoring the truth is bad.
2
We will survive the coming disaster. Politically he will not, and I hope to see him live long enough to see watch evil work being undone by sane people. The best revenge after his fall will be to ignore him and rebuild our nation.
4
Krugman and other economists must help us solve our greatest problems; poverty, declining quality of life and criminal levels of inequality: this is the cause of so much 'ranting'.
The word 'populism' is thrown around alot today, but from my view its really just economics. If you gave people of your country a good and decent and quality life, then 'immigration' would not be the boogie-man of the day. Europe is different, because they have so much more immigration from very desperate people that arrive with nothing. How exactly do we expect Italy do deal with 600,000 new poor people? We're arrogant to think it's racism that drives this so-called 'populism'.
Trump is the braggart, soldier-wanna-be. He likes to think he's such a macho dude, with women wanting to be 'grabbed' by him. Nukes are just the final level of this vainglory.
No, we must solve economics. If technology and robots and computers all help us do things that used to take human work, then, what will we do as humans? Who will have a job and wealth and purpose and belonging? We don't face these issues well. They may seem too big. This is an unbelievable challenge. This is not a 'tipping point', this is life, community, reason, existence.
Our greatest sin today in inequality. How are we to become more equal? We move away from equality. Let's solve that. When we do, we'll quit electing realty-show host fakes that have absolutely no idea how to govern and no background in humanity, community and selfless love.
2
Trump watches Fox and Friends because his customers watch Fox and Friends. He is doing his market research. His customers laud their businessman president. Did I miss anything?
1
Best opinion pieces explaining Trump since the beginning of Trump. This brilliant essay says everything we need to know about this cancerous wart on the history of America. May it end sooner than later, and hopefully not from radiation fallout.
2
We all know now that Trump was a huge mistake (including all the GOP which said he was unfit for office prior to winning the primary who now silently know he is unfit.)
The blame is squarely on Congress. They have failed us in every way. Legislating? They ask Trump for the texts of the bills they will put to a vote.
Oversight? Instead, they have aped the President in discarding ethical behavior. Lying under oath? We approve this appointee. Hire your children? No problem. Ask how much Trump knowingly (vs unknowingly) colluded with a foreign country to win? Don't ask and shut down the investigation.
Our country was invaded by another in our election processes. This is every bit as dangerous an attempt at control as invading armies. And Congress is refusing to push our President to protect our nation.
Dereliction of duty? Yes, by both Houses and the WH
5
If we survive the madness that currently defines Washington, then historians are unlikely to be kind to the Republican Party.
They might describe the Republican Party as a political group organized around the principle that the greatness of the United States is best achieved by self-destructive activities implemented by the state. Fortunately, the Republican Party failed to achieve its goals.
1
Amazing so many people defending Donald Trump imposing a tax on American steel users. Where is Grover Norquist when we need him.
Do people not realize that a tariff on imported steel or aluminum is just a tax levied by the government on the things Americans purchase.
For every 41 million of imported steel,the Govt will get $250,000. That money will go not to the steel producers - but to the Govt. Come on GOP - you guys hate government and taxes.
It also puts a new floor in steel prices, so if foreign steel is currently 10% cheaper than imported steel, that 25% tariff now makes imported steel 15% more expensive than domestic steel - so domestic manufacturers can increase prices by 14% and still be competitive with imported steel. But can Ford and GM and GE and Boeing and Caterpillar, etc,. and all the other steel users absorb that cost increase or pass it on to customers. So imported steel goes up 25% and domestic steel goes up 15% - and the steel makers take home the bacon. Will they invest and grow their business - no - because they know the tariffs are only temporary.
Come on Grover Norquist - have a word with your boss.
241
"Come on GOP - you guys hate government and taxes."
As they have been demonstrating, not when it means more money to the military or to the shadow government of oligarchs who fund GOP congresspersons. Republicans only hate taxes that actually benefit average Americans.
1
Norquist is only opposed to taxing the rich people. The rest of us are fair game.
2
is Grover's boss Trump or Putin? Or both?
Remember when tariffs on imports from Mexico were suggested as a source of funding for the Great Wall? That was Trump's idea. It was rudely shouted down by people pointing out that American consumers would have to pay the tariff increment when they bought Mexican products.
This happened only a few months ago. But Trump can't remember that lesson.
His new tariff proposals would increase the cost of large, expensive items such as cars and appliances by 30-40%. Let the rude shouting begin!
1
As a Canadian I may be able to tell President Trump that the War of 1812 is over since December 1814 and we are not a threat to the national security of the USA.
1
No understanding of international trade, no attempt to even get informed on the factors involved ...
Remember when djt cut off opening relations with Cuba without a moment's consideration of the benefits which would have flowed to Florida, and which were so eagerly anticipated by Florida businesses and ports?
Yeah, Professor Krugman, you nailed djt, that fellow with "45" monogrammed on his cuff.
3
Whenever Trump sits down with the Democrats in front of cameras he always sounds reasonable calm and even virtuous.
He only needs to show a full deck for five minutes as Fox will pull from this reasonable moments to headline with. It’s starting to get very predictable and this should be easy for sane people to judge. The problem is only his base watch this type of reporting.
It would be helpful for if folks who never watch tune in Fox News because his base will never leave their security blanket it is their religion.
My point is I don’t believe Americans fully understand how propaganda can be so addictive and the President is a master at this theatre. Understanding this it might just get more people determined to throw this ranting old man with his nukes out along with the Republicans who support him.
1
Downright scary sums it up quite nicely. And that includes the enablers in the GOP as well as on Fox.
2
Trump ignores the truth because his supporters do as well. They believe what they want to believe. The tax bill will hurt Trump. I'm sure most if the supporters actually believe that. But they can't evaluate that because they will never see his tax returns. I mean anyone with half a brain knows that if it sounds too good to be true it must be. And let the buyer beware. It is amazing to me how many people will toss all time honored wisdom out the window and go along with whatever he says.
1
If ever I've seen a single silver lining in Trump Land, it's the statement here that the European Union is threatening a tariff on Harley Davidson, the worst polluter in New Hampshire, both air and noise. Many Harley riders claimed to have voted for Trump, so this would serve them right and the rest of us well. New Hampshire is the most forested state in the union, which means we have abundant wildlife--until these selfish bullies come along with their open pipes and illegal levels of noise. A tariff on their bikes would be justice. This sounds like a single-issue response, but when you are forced to live with airport-level noise coming by your house, you reach the point where you'd support anything that would minimize it in any way.
3
And Putin laughs some more as the US decides to put sanctions on its allies and itself. Unlike Russia though, Canada, Europe and Mexico actually make things Americans want to buy. America created the global economy and now Trump intends to destroy it.
3
I believe , if I've got my facts right, that this all might have arisen deep in the portals of his addled brain, in relation to an election in an area near Pittsburgh, which is in danger of going Democratic. Just think! The stock market falls 500 points, costing billions; we've alienated Canada and the EU; the House is up in arms, etc. All so that Trump -- or the GOP -- can win a puny election. Sound familiar?
2
Another great analysis of the terrible mess Trump has gotten this wonderful country into. We can only hope that the next election returns us to some semblance of sanity.
3
What is also scary is that Krugman and other leading Democrats have no clue of what to do about Trump, and have not yet even tried to gain such a clue, other than to wait until January of 2021 and hope for the best. Nor is there any real inkling of them realizing that such chickenhearted handwringing myopia helped Trump get elected in the first place.
3
Can democracy survive if large numbers of people operate with a lot of false information?
The main source of the false information that people hold about many issues is Fox ‘News’ and the conservative talk channels.
To complain about fake news coming from Putin is flagrant hypocrisy, if we do not recognize that the fake news coming from Putin is a small fraction of the fake new coming from another foreign born billionaire, Rupert Murdoch.
1
PK says "Donald Trump’s declaration that he’s ready to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum is bad policy, but in itself not that big a deal." Well, maybe not for PK, but it is pretty big for those who are affected. Canada actually imports more US steel than the rest of the world combined - even more than we export to the US which is more than any other country. We have intimately connected defence establishments. Canadian officers are in command at NORAD at times. We are obliged to share certain resources with the US if there are shortages. And the US is going to slap tariffs on our metals because we are seen as a strategic risk? That goes beyond ignorant. It is obnoxiously NUTS. This is not how you treat friends.
3
Based upon his most recent action and clear mood swings I dare not imagine what craziness will surround his future acceptance of Iran's compliance with the nuclear agreement. Tariffs are needed to protect the American steel and aluminum industry. Right. Withdrawing from the Iran nuclear agreement ...just because ...he can apparently say and do what he wants. The Mad King now inhibits the White House.
2
The problem is ourselves in accepting that it's OK for people with lives and responsibilities to not know facts. That's a society-sabotaging attitude if there ever was one. Being a policy wonk doesn't preclude knowing facts about current policy and affairs -- it's precisely because of our lives and responsibilities that there are government policies (obvious to those who allow themselves to think).
We err in giving people a pass because no one wants to be judgemental when really we need to be holding each other to a higher standard on the truth. As Krugman mentions, 'truth' gets confused with agreeing on an opinion. The distinction lost all the time in political discussion/argument.
This tolerance of both people fudging the truth to feel a certain way on a specific issue coupled with the confusion of the term 'true' with "that fits what I want to believe" is why we have a Trump. We need to stop that and stop it now!
A culture of people across the board who pride themselves on truth and knowledge is what we need to become. Being derogatory towards those who are not that may not get us there -- but, neither will being tolerant of ignorance get us there either. Signs of people breaking that mold are starting to show up.
Let's vigorously encourage the cultural change towards no acceptance of non-fact based thinking that promotes white male-dominated nationalism -- that is, if it's not too late for the damage that has occurred to our institutions, now in play.
428
Right on.
"The simple step of a courageous individual is not to take part in the lie. One word of truth outweighs the world"----Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
8
You are correct that public opinion must be based on real information. How, though, to get Fox and Friends to stop reporting misinformation? I have a dear nephew who disagrees with me fundamentally, based on spurious "facts" . When did information become a faith based exchange?
6
So the only kind of nationalism that is bad is the white male dominated kind? You call that " fact based thinking"?
1
What Trump is doing is he is alienating Canadians from Americans.Now when I shop I check to see if there is a Canadian alternative to buy.Also I have no desire to visit the US.Not a healthy situation.
5
We all know that Trump doesn't read his daily security briefings or any other briefings from the professionals in his own white house or government.
Instead, he gets his information and ideas from.... Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity. Fox & Friends.
They are not informed. They don't even attempt to research their assertions. They are opinionators, spouting whatever they just "feel" that should be true. They "feel" that U.S. Steel mills are shutting down because China is dumping steel, but since they are not informed, they fail to understand that there is a Global glut, an overproduction of steel, much of it from Canada, and very little of it from China. That, coupled with automation in the U.S. steel industry has displaced workers with robots and mills that don't automate are forced to shutter.
Sad, that we are controlled now by a bunch of uninformed so called newscasters who, if asked if they are journalists (Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh) will step back and say, "ah, no, I"m an entertainer." Thereby taking all the credit, but none of the responsibility.
10
"Trump ... can get comprehensive briefings on any subject, just by saying the word, but prefers to watch “Fox & Friends” instead."
The analogy to Trump's "base" voters is apt: In an age wherein anyone can use the internet to get real, factual information on any subject, they prefer Facebook "news," rants and raves on trivialities, and cat videos. Trump's continual cultivation of that "base" (and "base" should be taken in the sense of base metal, as in common, unrefined, not precious or valuable -- dare we say "deplorable"?) is continual manipulation of them. The one thing Trump knows is how malleable the underinformed are.
I was convinced before the election of 2016 that America had more sober minds than unnuanced ones, and I was right to the tunes of Hillary's 2.8 million win of the popular vote. The perfect storm of Russian election hacking, which notably was characterized by social media nonsense, coupled with Comey's last minute letter and prolonged hearings in a Republican Congress that ultimately found Hillary guilty of no wrongdoing -- they were distractions all along -- gave Trump an aberrational victory. It gave America a permanent black eye.
6
Sorry, I am getting tired of diagnosis. I want prescription. What’s going to happen 2 or 3 moves later on the international chessboard? How do our allies and our countrymen move to block the worst of this? I am tired, tired, tired of people in the press (and I like Krugman a lot) telling us what is. There is a place for that, but in an op-ed piece we need to think bigger about the future. What will be? Waiting.
4
You may understand the problems. Many don't. Many, like the GOP members of the Congress, refuse to face them. Thus, the diagnosis needs to be repeated.
OK, let's describe a trainwreck. This is letting a rich Economics student, who barely graduated, no academic honors, no awards, take over the air, sea, and rail transport of a country for a little test drive of an obscure theory he learned in a long forgotten (with good reason) economics college class five decades ago. What could go wrong? That class at Wharton was likely the only one he was fully conscious and awake for, in between the tennis and martinis. Please let's stop dissecting how bad this is and get to the heart of the matter; a bad student, lots of wealth, hears a theory and wants to know if it falls by itself in the woods, does it make a sound? We've been thru this before, remember? W had an MBA and was going to rescue American businesses, right? Someone forgot to add 2002 and 2007 into that high priced MBA equation, now didn't they? Forget about you, I'm planning for the crash.
3
The real tragedy is that "we" elected him. A guy like this won the electoral college. "We" also elected representatives who support and tolerate him. "We" earned this until "we" get up and vote both out.
10
There is no Republican "Majority"; It is entirely a construct of Gerrymandering, Voter Suppression, and Dark Money. Not only were more votes cast for Hillary, more have been cast for DEMOCRATIC congressional candidates in every recent election.
And my "vote" does not count, I did NOT have a democratic candidate for the House or the State Legislature for the past two election cycles.
The 2010 (Republican) "wave" in the state Legislatures was a creation of the Propaganda Organs and Dark Money. Thus the Gerrymanders.
The Malefactors of Great Wealth have BOUGHT our government, and I want it BACK.
1
The list of Donald Trump’s reckless acts and statements based on ignorance is very long, but this one is different: the Republicans in Congress don’t find it useful or negligible.
If Trump keeps this up, maybe someone on the Hill will say a word to Mike Pence about the Twenty-fifth Amendment or even start reviewing the grounds for impeachment.
4
Yes, professor, it's "downright scary". But what to do about it? The answer is absolutely nothing until Mueller finishes the job. Then maybe, just maybe, a few of the 'garrulous old men' in the U.S. heartland will indeed have a change of heart and refuse to back his party in November.
But more effective in changing blind support of Trump would be an economic meltdown that he could not blame on Obama. I believe such a meltdown is on the cards with debt levels (credit card debt, mortgage pressures, subprime car loans, student loans and household savings -- not to mention speculative margin positions) worse than those preceding the 2008 crash.
I believe an economic meltdown is the only event that can discredit Trump in ways that really matter to ordinary Americans. Sorry, but they need to go through a 'cold turkey' to emerge stronger. Pity the hapless victims of GOP policies.
5
I guess Trump has created some jobs. There are the trolls and bot makers who are out there defending every criticism and preserved slight of Donald Trump, just as if it was Trump himself. I don't know how much it pays but someone is clearly getting paid as clearly the level of discourse is higher than anyone would be capable of his "base" and the wealthy educated 1% who support him couldn't be bothered or have time for comments.
2
There is but one recourse in our situation. We must vote. November is our last best chance to save this dream.
9
The reason why the markets aren't spooked is because they know this is all grandstanding in order to win PA-18.
Yes, he's that ridiculous that he would suggest a trade war to win a single House seat.
5
Dear Paul,
I am breathless.
The tirade against Trump is a bit hysterical verging on the histrionic.
You get paid for your comments, I don't.
You may have read according to ABC news today:
The wreckage of a US aircraft carrier credited with helping save Australia from possible Japanese invasion during World War II has been found off the Queensland coast. In May 1942, the USS Lexington, along with 216 of its crew and 35 aircraft, was lost during the Battle of the Coral Sea, less than six months after Pearl Harbor.
The USS Lexington and its sailors are safe in our warm seas.
Mr Trump assured Prime Minister Turnbull that he would not impose tariffs on Australian steel.
Matters of integrity are not for my judgement.
Constructive criticism of Mr Trump is apposite.
Mr Trump has no worse fear than ridicule.
The press needs to stay calm and be polite.
A Ranting Old Guy With Nukes is fodder for his issues.
Henny Penny is ok, although I always carry an umbrella just in case.
A common prescription for those being bullied is to be polite to the bully.
Acquiescence is the most assured path to autocracy.
3
I voted for Hillary and am in no way a supporter of Trump, but a NY Times headline this morning declares that North Korea is entertaining the idea of giving up its nukes. Maybe Trump’s uniquely incoherent belligerence, rather than Obama’s cool sophistication, was needed in this case.
2
Bonzo - it was South Korea, not Trump who brought the revelation around. Trump's tweets are full proof that this possibility had nothing to do with him. We can't know if his childish behavior had anything to do with it. There is no proof of cause and effect at this point.
2
The last chapter of this story is still to be written. So hold your applause for the time being.
1
Or perhaps N Korea is totally dependent on Chinese support and this has nothing to do with the "Trump Show". The latter seems much more probable.
1
The Trump Doctine on everything is to sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. Parallels to the years near the Great Depression keep popping up, the last time there were massive tax cuts for the rich and when there was a trade war. Trump lives in his gilded palace (or weekends there constantly, crises or not) detached from facts and consequences, from truth, from norms, and from decency.
Anything that happens is Obama's fault, never his. Fox and Friends counter the informed reports of all the intel agencies on current threats to the US. Children are killed, Dreamers may be deported by the millions, people lose their desperately needed healthcare, Medicaid, Medicare, nutrition supplements, disability care. Trump shrugs. Nothing to do with him even when he is the one to take it away.
Russia attacks us. Trump shrugs. It's Obama's fault. Experts tell him trade wars are bad. Trump shrugs. Not in his reality.
This is what Republicans have been supporting fervently this past year. Enormous tax cuts for the rich, destruction of Dreamers, no compromises on anything whether it is gun laws, healthcare, immigration, Russian interference.
Expect the whirlwind. Russia, more gun massacres, a new Great Depression, even a war. Trump shrugs, tweets, watches TV, safe in his gold cocoon of delusion.
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The story of Trump getting the Korea's mixed up reminded me of the early George Carlin whose character reported the "partial sports scores", NY 6...
Claiming that Canada is a security risk so he can impose tariff's reminds me of a visit I made to a family years ago. The matronly hostess did not know where Canada is as she dished out her dinner specialty, hot dogs. She is white and middle class. Much of our older white middle class has been spoiled, and seriously dumbed down. She is also a voter. God help us.
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The dumbed down populace, yes, one of our largest problems. While China and India graduate more PhD's per capital, we push our students through school for a worthless degree (with the exception of those who can afford the private schools and Universities!).
As I asked my patient, a 17 year old HS Senior.. Don't you know where France is? Response, Is it in Paris?
We are a short sighted nation who will pay dearly for our stupidity.
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Trembling in fear, the overwhelming majority of Americans are held hostage by a paltry 35%...yet even those Republicans who know this truth, are aiding and abetting this outrage.
If we don't Vote Blue in the midterms, we'll have no one to blame but ourselves.
Ted Cruz recently told a group of supporters, Democrats are going to crawl over broken glass in November. Let's prove him right.
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The other networks, CNN, MSNBC, et all, should invite the Fox people to be guests and have cordial discussions about the issues. The Fox views may have some relevance but its views should be tempered with those of the main stream. It won't happen, but interesting to contemplate. Fox would not want to commit suicide in the ratings race.
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I can't think of one Fox personality with the chops needed to discuss the issues with main stream newscasters. It would be a complete rout and Fox viewers would call it fake news and declare that the Fox entertainers were ambushed.
I know it's important to be inclusive and try to heal the rift between the trumpsters and the never trump folks, but I think that the 30% is beyond listening. Their minds are made up and they don't want to be confused by the facts.
I’m reminded of old sci-fi stories of mind control through the television; now lobbyists run policy through commercials on Fox.
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Can a Staff-member with a shiny bauble distract him? Along the lines of Blazing Saddles and the Paddle Ball?
The President certainly merits the stage name “Le Pétomane” after 19th century French performer, Joseph Pujol.
In reflection, the Mel Brooks character Governor William J. LePetomane resembles “The Pres” in more ways than one.
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Did anyone notice that steel and aluminum tariffs has replaced the slaughter of school children in the national dialogue?
Maybe higher prices on steel and aluminum will cause increases in the cost of an AR15.
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Does anyone think the announcement of this trade tariff coincides awfully close to the special election of the 18th congressional district in Pennsylvania? Trump won the election there by 20 points but recent polling shows the Democratic candidate, Conor Lamb, with a slight lead. The election is March 13 so I would not be the least bit surprised that trump's policy position softens after that date. Just saying.
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Paul,
Together with what is going on in Europe, the Trump phenomenon may mean that Vladimir Putin is the most powerful man on planet Earth. He has come across an entirely new means of conquest: conquest by democracy. Or rather, conquest by subverting democracy. He installs the governments he wants by rigging their elections. Instead of conquering these countries with tanks, planes and missiles, he does it with Manchurian candidates supported by cyber attacks. Cheaper, less messy and less self destructive.
And with the US Electoral College, our presidential elections are particularly easy to rig.
Trump may not fully be a Manchurian candidate but with the cluelessness he's shown does he need to be? If you're Putin, and you can't gain full control of a country, sowing chaos is almost as good.
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And we have a clueless, uncritical thinking public that condones and excuses anything Trump says or does that hurts our democracy and reputation abroad. Trump and the servile Republican Party could have Putin and the Russian Army march in front of the White House in that grand military parade Trump plans and his adoring idiotic public would be screaming in agreement that this is how Trump Makes America Great Again.
The US has no one to blame but itself for where we are as a deeply divided nation of True Believers in Trumpocracy.
This is a very good article. Also Trump keeps talking about the trade in goods what about services like banking which the U.S. dominates globally?
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Hopefully next time Democrats will give the country a straight arrow, centered, centrist alternative who can actually win more electoral votes than Trump.
Lets not blame everyone but ourselves.
The fault is not in the stars but in our selves.
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DJT lives and functions within three bubbles. The most inner bubble is where he keeps to himself with his mobile phone with Twitter and Fox News on the TV; the second bubble allows only his immediate family and closest allies, or ‘yes’ men and women. The outer bubble, which he really despises but has no choice but to make an appearance from time to time, contains his base of supporters – enough of them to take advantage of a dysfunctional voting system. Outside of these three bubbles lives the majority of people on this planet.
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Assuming we survive the Trump era we will need to lessen the likelihood that such a disaster never happens again. The fall elections can help if the GOP is swept from power and Trump is impeached and removed from office. We must elect legislators who truly have the interest of all Americans in mind. They must be intelligent, sane and compassionate. Let's try electing a majority of women and see if it doesn't go much better.
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Many Americans have issues with cause and effect. Many have math issues too. Trump's enablers, GOP cronies who fear contradicting him, won't help.
If Trump says jump, they say, "How High?"
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The real problem is the 90% support the "Ranting Old Guy with Nukes" has among Republicans. Vice is virtue with these people. No matter how morally awful Trump is, the fact that he markets effectively to them by scapegoating immigrants and foreign countries for their home-grown problems is the real gift that he has.
Who cost white industrial workers their jobs? White executives maximizing their bonuses by offshoring, the very group behind the Republican money.
Who is the real establishment? Republican big money, which just gave itself a tax break while nakedly threatening to withhold money from Republicans that didn't give them that break.
Republicans don't want to live a world with higher taxes on the rich used to fund the college educations for their kids and healthcare for all. And so the U.S. goes backwards, rather than forwards.
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A new (paradoxical and terrifying) thought has occurred to me, especially in light of the recent information out of N/S Koreas - what if Trump's chaotic, uniformed, naive approach to diplomacy, treaties, trade, and security works (at least in this case of N/S Korea)?
It shouldn't, but it might. Then what are we to think and expect? More mayhem, more chaos, and certainly more (hopefully) dodged bullets that may not miss the next time.
I hate to root against peace and stability but I don't know what to do to combat this very dangerous moral hazard the country is facing.
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Great article Paul. I've always thought of him as the uncle that comes to Thanksgiving each year because he's family. I grit my teeth, look across the dining room table, and hope that some of the other adults in the room can diffuse the situation. (And maybe give him a ride home before something happens.)
Congress has this opportunity, but alas, I'm still waiting for someone to step up. Maybe they're gritting their teeth and looking across the table at us.
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A tariff focused on labor costs would make sense, because the advantage manufacturing has in China and Mexico is entirely from exploiting (not a word economists like) their labor. They and similar low-wage countries would bear the brunt of a tariff in proportion to the difference of their labor costs and ours...unless their workers were paid more, which would be a good thing. Canada, well we would owe them a reverse tariff.
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@cglymour pittburgh,
So your great idea is to eliminate the law of comparative advantage and shrink global trade. Good luck. LOL
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So there are two of you who know better than economists.
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Absurd. The effect of a tariff on labor would be equally destructive. You are deflecting.
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Mr. Krugman always points the finger to what is wrong in the US. He rarely recommends improvements. I am in Germany now, visiting my son who made his MBA in the English language at a well known German university at a cost of $ zero. Ok, I had to pay for his room and board in Frankfurt which was peanuts compared to the cost of his undergraduate degree from Fordham University.
Being in Frankfurt I have a hard time spending money on American made products, aside from expensive Red Wing shoes, Levi's jeans and cheap Gallo wine there is nothing else from the US in the local stores.
I think that most American manufacturers have priced themselves out of the international market. Unless the US reforms its health care system, its educational system, its local tax system and its legal system, all are substantially more expensive than in the EU, at least buy a factor of 4, the US trade imbalance will continue to grow.
Pres Trump may not know what to do, but Mr. Krugman should know and he should start the process to make America more competitive.
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@Henry Cutchogue
No American agricultural products, planes, personal computers and smart phones, construction equipment, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, ag tractors, auto components in Europe then? It must all be an accident then that Borg Warner a major US auto component manufacturer is one of the largest suppliers to Germany's auto industry.
And Krugman constantly recommends improvements.
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@Henry
Cutchogue
Just in case you have a problem finding US products in Germany.
https://www.german-way.com/travel-and-tourism/telephone-tips-for-germany...
https://www.caterpillar.com/hu/company/global-footprint/eame/germany.html
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@John Hartford
I am retired and I do not need a Caterpillar ditch digger. But I am looking for Goldtoe socks, Polo shirts and Hanes underwear. Any suggestions were I can obtain these American products near Frankfurt?
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"Trump who can get comprehensive briefings on any subject, just by saying the word, but prefers to watch 'Fox and Friends' instead..."
I can't stress this enough: The commercial success of Fox News is the foremost indicator of how America devolved to its current state of dysfunction. Without a successful Fox News, there is no President Trump. The central theme of that network is to tell their audience what they want to hear with no regard for reality. Enter presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Regardless of how a problem is addressed, it must be identified as opposed to just focusing on symptoms.
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You gotta admit, it’s been another effective diversion. So many cycles spent on this, instead of the important things going on.
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In the final analysis President Trump apparently considers himself the appointed high commissioner of his dominions at home and abroad with his people seeking deliverance after years of OBAMA-RAMA. Trump methodology based on his telepathic whims. Like a Buddhist monk only he can attain insight into reality. He has seen the future like Howard Beale in NETWORK: We're not going to take it anymore. USA today as the victim? Meanwhile old Europe considers the US President making too many assumptions and unfair demands not based on facts as confirmed by Paul Krugman. The ancient Greeks would be confused with the leader of this modern military Empire that may yet spring a leak by itself.
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It is truly sad we must rely on the "deep state" to save us from this "garrulous old guy" in the diner. Mr. Trump will continue to spew policy from his Twitter feed but effecting these policies, actually implementing them, will be much more difficult. I can only hope "slow walking" or "no walking" them is in our future.
As Prof. Krugman alludes, it's much more difficult to change the course of an outbound nuclear missle (or an inbound one).
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Remember in November.
It is more important than ever that we vote as if our lives depend upon it because they do.
Give control of Congress to the Democrats in November.
We get the government we deserve.
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All too frighteningly true. Yet here we sit, in our fact-based corner, just over one year into this escalating tragedy, venting our mounting frustrations to each other. And there they sit, millions still in their Fox-based corner, cheering Trump's every move. Meanwhile, the polar ice cap shrinks under record temperatures, nuclear-armed states taunt each other like school yard bullies, pseudo-religion invades the public sphere, the safety net comes under the crosshairs of a bought congress, etc., etc., etc. There is a palpable sense that this is utterly unsustainable, that something has to give. And it surely will. The only question is whether that occurs on November 6, or otherwise. And if otherwise, whether it will be survivable.
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Michael, the remedy to all this chaos engulfing the country is staring right at us: the Constitution. The Constitution provides the remedy of Impeachment; let's use it! The GOP, which is in control of Congress must act, and act now. It is a perfect legitimate remedy provided for in the Constitution.
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But not only are Trump's proposed tariffs on aluminum and steel wrong on the facts, they are also unconstitutional. The Constitution in Article 1, Section 8 clause 1 gives the Congress the sole authority to impose tariffs, i.e. excises and duties. But Congress has delegated to the president the authority to impose tariffs solely if necessary for national security. But Trump has made no case that national security requires imposing tariffs on Canada. Europe, Japan and South Korea, the biggest exporters of aluminum and steel. And in fact producers of military equipment say that the higher costs resulting from the tariffs will hamper production of military equipment thus undermining national security.
So on the facts Trump's tariffs appear to be wholly unconstitutional as well as economically unjustified.
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I agree, Harold. But the Constitution assumes separation of powers. With partisan politics, that separation no longer exists between the branches of government, but rather between the two parties. And with the GOP stacking the judicial branch with ultra-conservatives, the imbalance grows.
With any sane House, Trump would have been impeached by now.
8
Trump's excuse for this legally are security concerns which don't hold water, given the current economy and the fact that our allies are the ones most affected. China is far down the list.
4
Congress has not only abdicated their authority to impose tariffs and trade laws, it has abdicated their authority over declaring war....not to mention WH oversight and even legislation. When we have Congress asking the President to supply the texts of the laws he will sign BEFORE they write the bills.....exactly why is Congress even there?
2
It's not enough for Paul Ryan to resist (and McConnell?). They MUST take on the authority of Prime Ministers and make the current presidency into a ceremonial position (with bad ceremony at that!).
I've grown very weary of all the brilliantly-reasoned handwringing that makes no difference. Listening to reason (e.g., long-term consequences of action) isn't going to happen with short-sighted interest in the next election. They'll all be on the golf course with the king before they see the harm they've done.
I want to see nobility return to political calling. Standing for long-term care about and for what our children will have to live with (e.g., repairing another recession sooner than later)—standing for good policy—seems contrary to being "elected" (in a self-serving sense).
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As much as I dislike the current President, what you are talking about is a fundamental re-writing of our Constitution. That would require a constitutional convention and ratification of the changes by 2/3 of the states.
That is not something Ryan and McConnell can do by themselves (thank God!).
1
It is indeed scary to realize most of congresspeople from the the same party are still obedient to a man most of them dismissed as unqualified before his ascendancy. The US was renowned for having a strong congress; I suppose this was just an illusion more sophisticated presidents concocted as an excuse in diplomacy.
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Indeed. Congress does not provide oversight of the WH nor legislate--their two basic jobs. (When you ask the President to provide you the texts of the bills he will sign rather than crafting bills yourselves.....you are merely providing cover for a corrupt and inept president.)
And all those Congressmen who proclaimed Trump unfit for office prior to the election.....they are even more convinced now.
1
Trust me. We're all PLENTY worried.
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Me too! Very worried, and sad. Putin must be loving it, laughing his guts out!
Of course, having Trump as President is disturbing, not to mention the alarm over an irresponsible GOP Congress.
Maybe the problem is that we have hoped in the past that the candidates for President and for Congress would all have been screened for basic competency, relieving the voters from making that assessment for themselves. A task almost none of us are competent to do. And one made more difficult by disinformation and scurrilous attacks.
But it turns out the primary candidates competing with Trump were a pretty sad bunch, disposed of by Trump just by a sneer and a comic-book nickname.
It’s time more attention was paid to how these candidates arise, and some attention paid to their not just being figurehead yes men of limited scruples serving some billionaire cabal.
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When it comes to trade it is not only America being held hostage to the daily whims of Trump, it is the entire world.
For Canada and Mexico this comes at a time when we are renegotiating NAFTA (at Trump's insistence), and it only interrupts and delays the negotiations. And the worst part of it all, Trump could very well chase some other shiny object just days from now.
Frustrating, irritating and even threatening your longtime allies and trading partners as Trump is doing, will have long-lasting ramifications.
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All Trump wants is attention. We keep giving it, so he'll keep doing his crazy stuff.
45
Consider the alternative: ignoring Trump and his complicit family while they loot the treasury and bring us to the brink of W.W. III.
Unfortunately, the worst part is that he has an incentive to turn up the crazy over time to keep us tuning in.
Sadly, there are millions of 'garrulous old guys' of all ages and genders in this country who think that Trump standing up to those mean old countries who constantly take advantage of us is brave, courageous and bold. He's the guy in the silk vest and white shirt with the flat-brimmed black hat and long-barrelled pistol ready to step out into the street and defend us from the bad guys who are stealing from our national OK Corral. Trump, for these people, is someone whose fame, as well as his glory, should live long, and whose story should always be told.
But real life is not a TV Western, and imagining Trump as a modern day law and order 'hero' like Wyatt Earp is nonsense. Facing reality - the truth - is uncomfortable, though, and requires careful introspection and thought. So, when the truth meets the legend, these people are too eager to just be happy with seeing the legend.
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As soon as I read your words "brave, courageous and bold" I started singing the Wyatt Earp theme song. Am showing my age!
3
not only is Canada the larger exporter of steel to the us.....but the usa exports more steel to Canada than vice versa.
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I’ve said it many times. We are all better off when Trump is playing golf.
We should strike a deal with him. He plays golf. Everyone else will take care of that whole pesky governing thing he never wanted to do in the first place.
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Everyone else? Exactly who is that, Christopher?
In a Republican majority Congress, McConnell and Ryan have essentially abdicated from their roles, and the rest of them, for the most part, have fallen into line. (Those who object retire, instead of staying on and fighting.).
The Democrats? As a party, they seem to have left the building.
Christopher, lest we forget, even on the links the tRumpster is accompanied by a Secret Service agent carrying the "president's emergency satchel" aka the "nuclear football". Even when the prez is 4 putting the green on hole 15 at Mar-A-Lago the ability to destroy the world is just a brief step away. That really scares me.
2
Well, in this deal I want him to just stay at Mar-A-Go Go. I am sick to death of paying for his flights down and back. Last week-end it was just for a round of golf and a fundraiser where he floated the idea of wanting to be dictator for life. Why do we taxpayers have to foot the bill for such nonsense? Trump has already surpassed all of Obama's travel and I remember FOX News screaming non-stop about all of that - and Trump swearing he'd never play golf.
Sickening.
2
Is it not obvious that Mr. Trump's intent is to disrupt our economy while driving wedges between this nation, its trading partners and allies. Take a guess at which nation benefits most from these disruptions. Could it be Russia?
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Righto, Paul. But we did this. The people voted for him, knowing all this. The Electoral College confirmed the results, knowing that Russia tipped the election. Congress does nothing to impeach, though the Comey firing is clearly obstruction, what to say of emoluments. And the Cabinet doesn't invoke 25th, though he's clearly unfit. This is on us. Trump is the symptom, not the disease.
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No, a minority of the electorate voted for him, and the Electoral College does not confirm the popular vote result, it is a separate (though related) process. In this case (as in a few others in history) it actually overturned the result.
13
Exactly! Forget the niceties of the Electoral College. Trump is the American President because a large (very large) percentage of Americans voted him in. Even now, there is still a very large percentage of Americans who still support Trump and his ridiculous spur of the moment policies. Methinks America's problems are not only bigger than most intelligent and well-meaning people want to believe, they are only just starting.
2
Sorry. but the majority of the American voters cast their ballot for Hillary Clinton. Don't cast blame on those of us who voted for her. If we had a true democracy she would be in the White House, rather than the bilious orange-tinted old man who now occupies the Oval Office.
2
There are people of Trump’s age who are coherent, wise, compassionate, at the hight of their professional life, and are capable of functioning very well under circumstances that require leadership and character. In fact age often becomes an advantage for those who were decent and smart to begin with.
Trump’s age is the least of his problems. He’s demonstrated through his entire professional life that he lacks the qualifications needed to do the job he was elected for and should have never been trusted with the presidency , at any age.
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Let's hear for those of us who were old enough to have vote for JFK. Huzzah!
We can complain about Donald Trump. He is perhaps the worst president in history. But maybe Hillary would have been even worse.
Rather than complaining, however, both parties should be planning for better candidates for 2020.
One of my nonnegotiable demands for a presidential candidate is recognizing the limits to growth.
Krugman talks a lot about macroeconomics but almost never about one of the most important issues---the long run.
By the long run I mean several decades, long enough for the impact of global warming to be felt. In fact I believe we are beginning to feel it now.
Global warming is due to population growth. So we need to stop overpopulation.
For planet earth, we need to make family planning available. This is particularly true of Africa which is projected to double by 2050.
And for the US, we need:
1. A stop to illegal immigration and limits on legal immigration.
2. A one-child policy that encourages families to restrict their size to one or two children.
Fertility in the US has fallen below replacement levels, so we would not need the one-child policy except to compensate for immigration.
In addition, we need basic honesty among politicians. No more pretending that resources are unlimited, that we can admit unlimited numbers of refugees without destroying our own safety net.
People are dying in middle America because they do not have adequate health care.
It is sanctimonious and cruel for liberals to pretend this is not important.
12
I may not agree with one-child policies because they are not necessary, but I do agree with you that population growth and economic growth-at-all-costs must be reined in. And I agree that Hillary might have been worse, because so much more competent and effective. Still, I voted for her, and hope Trump will not, in the end, solve all growth issues by nuking half the world.
"People are dying in middle America because they do not have adequate health care.
It is sanctimonious and cruel for liberals to pretend this is not important."
Why, I thought the Republicans kept saying "we have the best health care system in the world," implying that our health care system doesn't need fixing or improvement. The status quo was just fine with Republicans in 2009 on. The Republicans were so, so against allowing millions of the uninsured to get health
insurance.
Global warming is not caused by population growth. it is caused by digging up fosil fuels and burning them, releasing carbon that has been sequestered in those fuels for eons. Please don't dress up anti immigration rhetoric as concern for the environment.
1
Krugman says the justification for Trump to impose the tariffs is obviously fraudulent, and it seems to me he has a point. Trump obviously alleges that they are necessary to protect national security only because he has to. Without that claim he has no authority to impose tariffs on his own and it would seem that because the claim is obviously ridiculous, it would seem that some of the people that are going to required to pay it, like American companies that buy foreign steel and aluminum to fabricate some finished steel goods have standing to challenge it in court and if they do, they just might win and save us from the consequences. And Congress I suppose could step in and pass a joint resolution that declares that the kind of threat to national security that Congress contemplated when it gave the President power to apply tariffs on his own does not now exist. Republicans if they don't like the tariffs should propose such a resolution. And see how the Democrats respond. It would be interesting to see if the Dems follow Trump or Krugman.
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The whole charade on tariffs is just an effort to tilt next week's PA-18 congressional special election. The GOP is hoping to fool the under-employed workers of that district into thinking that high-paying steel mill jobs will be coming back, thanks to Trump's proposed protectionist measures. Unfortunately, a large percentage of our population does not possess adequate critical thinking skills; this was made painfully clear in November of 2016.
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Even if steel was to come back in a big way, it would be made with AI and not a lot of 'real' workers. Trump never, ever talks about that. Tom Price said that was a problem way out in the future. Hahahaha!!! He's gone, by the way. Some people are really too corrupt and stupid to keep their cushy jobs. May that be true for Trump and Jared and Ivanka. They are a pestilence on our country,
2
All true. And what are the Republican politicians in the current US Congress doing about this? Nothing, other than pander to Mr. Trump's ego. All this is truly beyond belief. One hopes that this disaster will convince those voters who support Democratic candidates to vote at historically high percentages this coming November, but yet to be seen. Next to no one reads Mr. Krugman's fact-based expertise in his columns on macro-economics and political economy. The average voter spends most of his/her "leisure" time watching the utter nonsense on television or perusing the even worse nonsense available on mobile devices.
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