“The most important gain from this agreement is retaining our access to the U.S. market and Canadians understand that,” Freeland said.
But there is a widely shared belief that Canada made concessions and the U.S. did not.
“The concessions were all from Canada and Mexico,” MacKay said. “All of them. The only thing that the United States gave up was more demands.”.. Roland Paris, a former foreign policy adviser to Trudeau, expressed relief that the deal is done but worried about the long-term relationship between the two countries.
“Canadians won’t forget Trump’s disgraceful treatment of Canada. Our economic partnership has been reaffirmed, but trust can’t be rebuilt with the stroke of a pen,” Paris tweeted... Canada could have lost 60,000 jobs in a trade war and taken a 1 percentage percent hit to its GDP — a significant drop because Canada’s economy is projected to grow just 2 percent next year
.. Ontario’s auto industry faced the biggest threat, but the sector welcomed the new agreement. The deal requires that 40 to 45 percent of a car’s content be built where workers earn $16 an hour. That is meant to bring production back to the United States or Canada and away from Mexico, where auto workers earn on average just $4 to $5 an hour.
.. The agreement also potentially restricts Canada and Mexico from reaching a free trade agreement with China and other “non-market” countries. If Canada or Mexico signed a deal with China, the U.S. could terminate its trade agreement with Canada or Mexico on a six-month notice. That may pose a problem for Canada which is eager to diversify its trade.
“It’s bizarre,” Charest, the former Quebec premier, said. “I have never seen anything like that in a trade agreement.”
Daniel Ujczo, a trade attorney with the Dickinson Wright law firm, said Canada and Mexico also must give the U.S. notice before starting those trade discussions and updates of all proposals made during the negotiations.“The clause achieves a key policy imperative for the US; namely, shutting China’s backdoor to North America through Canada and Mexico,” Ujczo said. “Japan and Europe, as well as the rest of the world, should be on notice that this may be the price of admission to a trade deal with the U.S.”
.. “I am a Canadian. I am polite and respectful. Even when I’m dealing with a hard business issue I don’t belittle people, I don’t insult them,” Rosen said. “As a Canadian, the whole approach that has been taken (by the U.S.) has been offensive and I don’t think Canadians will forget it.”
.. Trump’s mistreatment reinforces a worry among Canadians that their much larger neighbor is taking advantage of Canada, Heyman added.
Bothwell, the University of Toronto professor, warned of lingering damage to relations.
“Trump treated it like a real estate deal when he was a shyster in Atlantic City,” Bothwell said.
“But this is nation to nation. And that’s different. And it’s connected to other things,” he added. “Trump really doesn’t grasp that and doesn’t care.”
IMF Chief Lagarde Says Economic Outlook Is Dimming
International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde is raising alarm bells about the health of the global economy, saying international growth may have plateaued.
“For most countries, it has become more difficult to deliver on the promise of greater prosperity, because the global economic weather is beginning to change,” Ms. Lagarde said in a speech in Washington on Monday.
.. While other emerging-market currencies, from Indonesia’s to South Africa’s, have also experienced difficult declines this year, most emerging markets have avoided the acute turmoil of Turkey and Argentina.
If the crisis spreads, as some fear, capital could flood out of emerging markets, Ms. Lagarde warned, saying that IMF economists had estimated emerging markets could face up to $100 billion in portfolio outflows. In recent years, about $240 billion per year had flowed into those countries, so a $100 billion outflow would be a dramatic reversal.
.. Ms. Lagarde said another mounting concern is that threats to impose new trade restrictions have been carried out in a number of countries.
“A key issue is that rhetoric is morphing into a new reality of actual trade barriers,” Ms. Lagarde said. “This is hurting not only trade itself, but also investment and manufacturing as uncertainty continues to rise.”
.. countries have continued to pile on debt, which has tended to foretell slower growth in years ahead as the burden of debt service mounts. The total debt of the private sector has reached an “all-time high of $182 trillion,” Ms. Lagarde said, noting that the figure was 60% higher than in 2007.
How Trump Survives
NBC News and the Wall Street Journal polled his job approval. There was no appreciable change.
.. Why? The most important reason has to be the remarkable state of the American economy. On Election Day 2016, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 18,332.43. On August 29, it closed at 26,124.57. That is an increase of some 40 percent. Other indices show similar gains. Growth in GDP went from 1.5 percent in 2016 to 2.3 percent in 2017 and, helped by the excellent 4.2 percent number in the second quarter, is forecast for around 3 percent in 2018.
.. The fact that presidents are not responsible for the economy does not stop the public from assigning them blame or credit. And Trump deserves some credit. His pro-business attitude stirs the bulls’ animal spirits. His deregulatory and tax policies contribute to growth. Trump understands that he is riding the bull — and that his following will be strong for the duration of the journey.
.. The economic boom is crucial in understanding why Trump enjoys the 88 percent approval among Republicans that keeps him politically viable... Trump continues to goad, highlight, and benefit from an antagonistic news media. The overwhelmingly negative coverage of Trump paradoxically works to his advantage by driving his supporters to rally to his side. When the press gets a story wrong, Trump is vindicated. His voters have less reason to trust the elite media institutions they see as allied against them in a struggle over American identity... Media obsession with Trump and scandal helps the president in other ways. For one, the scandals are confusing and increasingly self-referential. Only political professionals and junkies can keep track of them. The headlines run together. The talking heads are background noise to men and women outside the bubble... The media fixation hands Trump the initiative. Because so much of the news is based on his Twitter feed, he can create storylines — and spark confusion and outrage — with the push of a button. This ability lets him shift attention from current controversies by creating fresh ones. The ongoing hysteria lessens the cost to Trump of each bad story. It also allows him to portray media institutions and figures as insiders contemptuous of Trump voters and eager to overturn the result of a presidential election.Democrats — and most Republicans for that matter — have yet to grasp the ideas of political economy that Trump intuits: government that privileges American citizens through
- tight labor markets,
- border security,
- trade reciprocity, and
- entitlements.
.. Nor do Democrats understand that American populism is not simply economic. It is cultural. It has long been associated with traditional values and practices, an unreconstructed patriotism, and support for law and order. No matter how well Democratic proposals might test, the party will not succeed at the national level unless it addresses and mollifies the social concerns of the white working class. Pelosi, Schumer, and Sanders have not tried.
Sam Harris & David Frum Dismantle Donald Trump’s Politics
The audio in this video is from Sam Harris’ Waking Up podcast, episode #65 — We’re All Cucks Now _ https://www.samharris.org/podcast/P7
Donald Trump got 3 things right:
- Crisis in American Rural Life
- The “inner cities” are having a revival, but the rural areas are struggling, and had not been heard
- The drug crisis
- Beliefs about Trade date back from times when other countries were democracies or small players
- Chinese trade imbalances have caused harsh dislocations
- We don’t have compensation like
- Immigration is described by economists as having no costs
- The costs (cultural) are born by the bottom 30-40%
But none of that suggests that Donald Trump is the right person to deal with these 3 issues.
There is a game-theorist idea that it might take a bull in the china shop to deal with our adversaries.
- Vested interests
Donald Trump is like a diamond that comes with a curse.
He is not cutting through bureaucracy. He is not confirming his appointments.
An undisciplined America aids adversaries.