There’s finally been a deal struck with Canada covering the future of American trade, and of course, President Donald Trump tweeted about it.
In his world, he’s enacted a monumental change, ushering in some kind of previously mythical prosperity. We’ll have to wait and see how right he is. It’s hardly as though the odds are in the guy who doesn’t know what he’s doing’s favor.
Monday morning, he explained:
‘Late last night, our deadline, we reached a wonderful new Trade Deal with Canada, to be added into the deal already reached with Mexico… It is a great deal for all three countries, solves the many deficiencies and mistakes in NAFTA, greatly opens markets to our Farmers and Manufacturers, reduces Trade Barriers to the U.S. and will bring all three Great Nations together in competition with the rest of the world.’
Why does he capitalize words so randomly?
Anyway, as usual, his remarks on the situation gloss over key facts — like the fact that North American trade wasn’t hanging over some sort of cliff when he got here. He’s cast trade deficits as the United States losing massive amounts of money to other countries, but that’s just not how it works. A trade deficit simply means the U.S. imports more from a particular country than it exports to them — that’s all. There’s room for growth, of course, with such a deficit in place, but under NAFTA, the U.S. wasn’t “losing” massive amounts of money to Mexico (or Canada). He doesn’t get basic economics, having claimed as much in the past — and yet we’re supposed to trust him here?
Not likely. His actions are much of what pushed North America to a recent precarious position in the first place. His beloved tariffs aren’t some kind of silver bullet, although he basically claims as much.
Twitter response is below.
Featured Image via YouTube screenshot
