Just to be perfectly clear, Mr. Trump, if you are standing in a room with an average American citizen, one of you is the boss and one of you is the employee. Can you guess which is which?
Which one hires and fires the other? Which one pays the other’s salary?
Furthermore, companies are taxpaying entities made up of citizens. You should not presume to govern by “hereby order”-ing them to do a damn thing. When precisely did you lose the thread of the game theory in play for continued buy-in? Cause it’s long gone, and you are likely going to suffer for this one.
The sense of the spoiled and petulant child having a temper tantrum at not getting his way amplified up another billion clicks on Friday when Trump was faced with China not only failing to cower and back down but actually fighting back against his Moar Tariffs move from earlier this month with Moar Tariffs of their own.
So, what did Trump do in response? He let loose what is likely to be the defining quote of his presidency: “…companies are hereby ordered to immediately start looking for an alternative to China…”
Whether the legal team tied into the cabinet can find some bullshit way of shoehorning some amended act to fit something like an executive power to make this seem a little less absurd isn’t the point. Can you even read that quote without imagining him wearing a general’s uniform and goose-stepping around a red square shouting it with spittle foaming on his chin?
The problem is the open infringement on a sense of democratic ideals. At the end of the day, “Laws be damned, you will do what I say, goddamit!” is where this leads.
“We’ll find a way to make this technically fit enough to stop the turd-polishers from getting nervous. Now you do what you are told!”
We’ll see how that one plays out, bro.
