Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

There may be no winners of the game of Global Domination ™, and that is likely the best outcome.

Okay, players: jokers are wild, but with a twist: the entire deck is jokers. Since everyone at the table will have five Aces, nobody wins.

Welcome to the Trade War Poker Table: nobody wins, as everyone has the same hand of jokers.

This is not to say that exploitive, mercantilist “free trade” (no such thing has ever existed) is desirable, much less possible. We’re reaping the consequences of what was passed off as “free trade”: corporations gleefully gutted National Security to boost profits by offshoring everything that could be offshored.

Every nation can impose tariffs or limit imports by other means. Tit for tat tariffs, concessions, grand deals, side deals–everyone has access to the same deck of cards. Who wins each round of play is an open question, as is who wins the game.

There are several time-tested strategies in the game for Global Domination ™. One is domination gained by exporting far more than you import, building up treasure in the form of vast trade surpluses.

The problem with this strategy is eventually the nations being stripped by your mercantilist strategy wise up and limit your exports. There is only one way to get around this: military force, i.e. establish a Colonial Empire in which your colonies are forced to buy your surplus production (exports) via a bayonet in their back.

Absent force and a colonial empire, mercantilism is eventually defeated by its own success.

There is another way to play for Global Domination ™, and it’s the exact opposite of mercantilism: run large, sustained trade deficits by importing more than you export, which beneath the surface is a remarkable flow of trade: the importing nation “exports” its currency in size in exchange for goods and services.

Once this currency is “exported” in sufficient quantities, it becomes the dominant currency simply from its ubiquity, its liquidity (i.e. its quantity and ubiquity make it easy to trade everywhere) and its trustworthiness due to its wide ownership across global markets: since the currency is spread across the globe, the issuing nation no longer controls its valuation; that’s now set by the market.

This is Global Domination ™ via financing trade rather than by running trade surpluses by exporting tangible goods. Pick one, as you can’t have both: either export goods to run mercantilist trade surpluses, and build up a trove of other nation’s currencies, or “export” your own currency via sustained trade deficits so it becomes the global lingua franca of financing trade.

Due to the demands of the Cold War, this was the U.S. strategy in the postwar era. As I have often explained, the U.S. was not merely in an arms race with the Soviet Union; it was also in a war for influence and alliances. The strongest adhesive in alliances is self-interest; by absorbing the surplus production of its allies in Europe and Asia in exchange for dollars, the U.S. cemented alliances that essentially encircled the Soviet Empire.

This strategy was far more effective than open conflict, but it came with a cost. Just as the success of mercantilism generates its own undoing, so too does maintaining a reserve currency via trade deficits / exporting one’s currency. Should the issuing nation (in this era, the U.S.) decide to limit imports and reduce its trade deficit, its currency will slowly lose the global scale needed to sustain its market dominance.

This is Triffin’s Paradox, which I’ve addressed many times over the years: any currency–and the system for creating and distributing the currency–has two masters it cannot possibly serve equally: the domestic economy and the global economy. Any nation that wants to control the valuation of its currency cannot possibly achieve global financial dominance, as the only way to gain and maintain global financial dominance is to surrender control of the currency’s valuation to the market via exporting currency in such vast quantities that the global market sets the value.

There’s a profound irony in this. To manage the domestic economy, the state wants to control everything: the issuance of currency and its valuation via its relative abundance or scarcity, which is reflected in the cost of credit (i.e. interest rates) and asset prices.

But to gain the high ground in the global financial landscape, the currency must serve the global demand for a currency that is ubiquitous, extremely liquid and trustworthy precisely because its value cannot be reset by state diktat. The valuation of a truly global currency is constantly influenced by interest rates, bond issuance, demand and so on–all the features of a transparent marketplace.

The game of Global Domination ™ will never be decided by a deck of jokers. The real game is 5-card draw: you play the cards you’ve been dealt by Nature, history, culture and chance. Every nation has a spectrum of strengths and weaknesses, advantages and disadvantages. Some are rich in resources, some are poor in resources. Some have advantageous geography, some less so. Some have cultural coherence, others have diversity; each is a strength and a weakness.

In Nature, the winner is not necessarily the strongest or the one most blessed by chance. The winner tends to be the one with the greatest capacity and incentives for flexibility, experimentation, a level playing field (i.e. social mobility) decentralized capital and all the traits of fast adaptation: if not an appetite then at least a capacity for a continual churn of instability, failure and self-criticism, which are the necessary components of experimentation.

There may be no winners of the game of Global Domination ™, and that is likely the best outcome. Any form of dominance generates its own undoing.

*  *  *

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Ahead of President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff rollout on Wednesday afternoon—particularly the 25% tariff on vehicles and auto parts imported into the U.S.—reports surfaced last week of consumers rushing to dealerships to purchase vehicles already on the lot, as those would be exempt from the new levies. We suspect that if consumers are willing to flock to auto dealerships, they’re probably just as willing to stock up on their favorite Chinese-made products before the next round of tariffs takes effect this weekend and next Wednesday.  

Tariffs on Chinese goods are set to increase by 34% next Wednesday, on top of the existing 20%, bringing the effective rate to 54%. This will significantly impact companies heavily reliant on Chinese manufacturing (and other Asian countries), forcing them to absorb the cost or pass it on to consumers—setting the stage for sticker shock.

Goldman analysts Brooke Roach, Kate McShane, and others earlier today provided clients with a breakdown of Trump’s reciprocal tariffs: 

• On April 2nd, President Trump announced reciprocal tariffs. This includes a 10% tariff increase on all countries (excluding Mexico and Canada) and a higher rate of increase on select countries with trade deficits, set to take effect on April 5th and April 9th, respectively.

• We believe the most material impact to our retail coverage from the announcement is the increase in tariffs on key sourcing partners for retail such as Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Cambodia.

• China: Tariffs on China move to 54% (a 34% increase vs. the 20% tariff already in effect).

• Tariffs broadened to key sourcing partners: Tariffs on other key sourcing partners for U.S. retail are set to be implemented, including Vietnam (46%), Indonesia (32%), Bangladesh (37%), Italy (20%), India (27%), and Cambodia (49%). Imports from the European Union will also be subject to a 20% tariff.

• Canada and Mexico: The announcement maintains tariffs on Canada and Mexico. Exemptions under USMCA will remain, which exempt compliant products from the 25% tariff rate on both countries. Should current orders be terminated, USMCA compliant products would receive preferential treatment while non-USMCA compliant goods would be tariffed at a 12% rate.

• Material increase to softlines tariff rate overall: On our calculations, the announcement implies a ~38% weighted average tariff rate for total apparel and footwear imports to the U.S.

Given the tariff breakdown and timeline, Roach and McShane provided clients with a “China Tariff-O-Meter,” highlighting companies in their retail coverage whose supply chains are heavily exposed to China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Cambodia.

From their Softlines coverage, companies such as Warby Parker, Torrid Holdings, Groupe Dynamite, Nike, Yeti Coolers, and SharkNinja have high exposure to China and other Asian countries targeted by Trump’s upcoming round of tariffs. In other words, the products from these companies entering U.S. ports in the coming days will be subjected to sizeable tariffs.

In their Hardline coverage, companies such as Floor & Decor, Lowe’s, RH, Williams-Sonoma, Target, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Dollar Tree, and Five Below have elevated or high supply chain exposure to China or other Asian countries. 

Take note of the Softline and Hardline retailers listed above. If there’s a product you’ve been eyeing—whether it’s a new couch from RH or some Chinese junk from Five Below—now might be the time to buy.

To avoid paying higher prices for foreign goods, just buy American.

We also suspect searches for “American Made” will begin to rise.

Via VigiliantFox.com,

Dr. Mary Talley Bowden left Tucker Carlson visibly shaken after dropping a chilling COVID vaccine statistic that’s impacting millions of children right now.

Before her appearance on Carlson’s show, Dr. Bowden, a Texas-based ENT specialist, rose to prominence in the medical freedom movement by speaking out against vaccine mandates and advocating for early treatment options like ivermectin.

She gained national attention after she was suspended by Houston Methodist Hospital for challenging the prevailing COVID narrative.

Despite the backlash, Bowden has remained committed to the Hippocratic Oath, successfully treating an impressive total of over 6,000 COVID patients without a single death.

Before Tucker became visibly disturbed, Dr. Bowden pointed to data from the CDC’s VAERS system, explaining that over 38,000 deaths have been reported following the rollout of the so-called COVID-19 vaccines.

She said that under normal circumstances, such numbers would’ve prompted the FDA to pull the shots.

Instead, they pushed forward, adding the COVID vaccine to the routine childhood schedule, with the expectation that babies receive three doses by just nine months of age.

She added that the shots are still under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for children under 12—not fully FDA approved—and yet they remain on the official vaccine schedule.

Tucker was horrified when Dr. Bowden mentioned a disturbing fact: “According to the CDC, 9 million American children have gotten the latest version of these COVID shots,” she said.

Clearly caught off guard, Carlson asked, “Actually?”

“Yes,” Bowden confirmed.

“Still?” he pressed.

“Yes. Yes. 9 million [kids]—12% [of US children have been injected].”

Tucker, in disbelief, asked, “Wait, this is going on right now?”

“Yes,” Bowden replied.

“I think we voted against this,” Tucker said.

“Yeah,” Bowden confirmed.

“Correct?” Tucker stressed.

“I don’t know,” Dr. Bowden answered.

“You’re very diplomatic, but I’m just stunned to learn that that’s happening right now,” Tucker exclaimed.

“Could this be shut down?” he asked.

“It should have been shut down a long time ago,” Dr. Bowden answered. “And you know, what’s the—”

Tucker interrupted: “9 million babies have had COVID shots?”

“Yeah. Well, children. Minors,” Dr. Bowden clarified.

Tucker’s reaction at the end says it all:

Carlson was horrified when Dr. Bowden mentioned a disturbing fact: “According to the CDC, 9 million American children have gotten the latest version of these COVID shots,” she said.

Clearly caught off guard, Carlson asked, “Actually?”

“Yes,” Bowden confirmed.

“Still?” he… pic.twitter.com/ihkbx4zKeJ

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) April 3, 2025

The conversation took another dark turn when Carlson asked about the potential long-term consequences of these shots, to which Dr. Bowden pointed to a disturbing trend.

“I don’t see a ton of cancer in my practice,” she said, “but I do have friends at MD Anderson, and they said they’ve never seen anything like it. The young people coming in with very advanced tumors, I think that’s what we have to be worried about now.”

She explained that getting updated cancer data is difficult, but the anecdotal reports are piling up. “It’s hard to get up-to-date cancer numbers, but I’m hearing all sorts of things. There are probably people who have access to that data, but publicly, it’s hard [to get access].”

The conversation took another darker turn when Carlson asked about the potential long-term consequences of these shots. Dr. Bowden pointed to a disturbing trend.

“I don’t see a ton of cancer in my practice,” she said, “but I do have friends at MD Anderson, and they said they’ve… pic.twitter.com/muaMqzmwkS

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) April 3, 2025

This raises a profound question we must now consider as a society: What have we done?

In our rush to vaccinate every man, woman, and child, have we compromised the long-term health of a population that never needed these shots in the first place?

What data was ignored? If so, who made decisions to ignore that data, and will they ever answer for the consequences? It’s time for a serious conversation about accountability.

You can watch the full, eye-opening conversation below:

*  *  *

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The first stage of cuts to Health and Human Services (HHS) have begun with 10,000 employees slated to be fired in the coming weeks.  Pink slips have been replaced with emails and deactivated key cards as workers line up at HHS offices across the country to find out if they still have a job.  The establishment media is out in force to paint a tragic narrative of “public servants” who only want to do good for less fortunate souls no unable to fulfill their calling.  It’s all quite dramatic.

It’s hard to say when government bureaucrats suddenly became an army of charitable saints sacrificing themselves for the good of humanity.  The HHS currently employs around 82,000 people within 10 regional offices and the average income for a worker is around $100,000 with benefits.  The majority of them are pencil pushers and social workers, not doctors or scientists making grand discoveries in medical technology.  When they do get involved in medical study, disasters seem to follow. 

Keep in mind that the HHS was partly involved in the funding of gain of function research by EcoHealth Alliance, which, in conjunction with projects run by Dr. Peter Daszak and Dr. Anthony Fauci at the NIH, reportedly led to the creation of human transmissible coronaviruses at the Wuhan Level 4 Virology Lab in China (ground zero for Covid).  

The annual budget of the HHS is $1.8 trillion – It accounts for around 20% of all federal dollars spent every year and tracking where this immense pool of cash goes is far more complex than the shady operations of USAID.  The agency is, by any measure, a monstrosity.  Cuts are intended to hit the FDA, CDC, and the NIH, all under the umbrella of the HHS. 

A large portion of programs instituted by HHS tap into pandemic funds set aside during covid (yes, the covid cash is still floating around after 5 years).  This money goes to support numerous programs that the majority of Americans voted against, including DEI programs, illegal immigrant programs and gender affirming care programs (gender based care for minors was indeed pursued by the HHS).  

The point is, it’s not worth feeling sorry for these people.  When they had unmitigated power they abused it in grand fashion and everything that happens from here onward is pure Karma. 

Democrats in at least 23 states are taking action to sue the Trump Administration over the budget cuts and layoffs.  In the lawsuit, filed Tuesday, the states are seeking a temporary restraining order and injunctive relief to immediately halt the administration’s funding cuts that they say will lead to key public health services being discontinued and thousands of health-care workers losing their jobs.

The civil suits are unlikely to make much difference in the end, just as they failed to stop the cuts to USAID.  The HHS, now under the management of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is expected to undergo unprecedented changes in the coming months and a level of accountability the institution has probably never dealt with before.  

“The COVID-19 pandemic is over, and HHS will no longer waste billions of taxpayer dollars responding to a non-existent pandemic that Americans moved on from years ago. HHS is prioritizing funding projects that will deliver on President Trump’s mandate to address our chronic disease epidemic and Make America Healthy Again,” the agency said in a statement last week.

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

The inspector general for the Department of Defense is investigating Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over his use of the messaging app Signal.

Acting Pentagon Inspector General Steven A. Stebbins said in an April 3 memorandum to Hegseth that the probe would cover whether Hegseth and other military personnel complied with Department of Defense policies and procedures for using a commercial messaging application for official business.

“Additionally, we will review compliance with classification and records retention requirements,” he said.

A Department of Defense spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email, “Per our longstanding policy, we don’t comment on ongoing investigations.”

Hegseth has not reacted as of yet to the development.

Hegseth and other top U.S. officials in mid-March messaged on Signal about strikes in Yemen against Houthi terrorists.

The Atlantic released the messages after Jeffrey Goldberg, its editor-in-chief, was added to the chat group.

Hegseth and the White House have said no classified information was shared.

Developing…

TD Cowen analyst Michael Elias has explained to clients through multiple notes over the last month that Microsoft has scaled back on data center projects in the U.S. and Europe. This development is unsurprising, as readers have been aware of the emerging risks posed by the cheaper and more efficient Chinese DeepSeek (as noted on Jan. 27), prompting us to question whether AI data capacity will be achieved sooner than initially anticipated.

Another worrying sign for the AI bubble—or rather, a continuation of Elias’ reporting on Microsoft scaling back data center projects—comes from Bloomberg, which provides additional color on MSFT supposedly halting data center construction sites in Indonesia, the UK, Australia, Illinois, North Dakota, and Wisconsin. 

Here’s more from the report, citing people familiar with talks (list courtesy of Bloomberg):

• Microsoft recently withdrew from negotiations to lease space between London and Cambridge in the UK at a site being marketed for its ability to host advanced Nvidia chips, according to people familiar with the talks, who requested anonymity to discuss a private matter.

• The company has also halted negotiations for data center space at a site near Chicago, according to a person familiar with the talks.

• In some cases, Microsoft is delaying construction. For example, it has paused work on parts of a data center campus it owns about an hour outside of Jakarta, according to people familiar with the situation.

• Microsoft also has put on hold some planned expansion at a site in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin, part of a complex visited by then-President Joe Biden, according to another person.

• In London, Microsoft was negotiating to lease space at Ada Infrastructure’s 210-megawatt Docklands data center but has held off on committing to the project, according to people familiar with the matter.

Elias first raised concerns about Microsoft scaling back on AI computing capacity in a note on Feb. 24, in which he stated that Microsoft was terminating AI data center leases. This was followed by a separate note last week, in which the analyst reported that Microsoft had walked away from data center projects in the U.S. and Europe, amounting to a capacity of approximately 2 gigawatts of electricity.

“We continue to believe the lease cancellations and deferrals of capacity points to data center oversupply relative to its current demand forecast,” Elias said last week. 

News of the cheaper Chinese DeepSeek—a response to OpenAI’s ChatGPT—in late January, which is allegedly 40–50 times more efficient than other large language models, had Goldman’s Rich Privorotsky at the time proposing a new theme that spelled bad news for the AI bubble: “If you can do more with less, it naturally raises the question of whether so much capacity is necessary.”

The whole “do more with less” theme produced by DeepSeek sparked a debate that AI peak demand capacity could be reached much sooner than Goldman’s forecast of late 2026. 

Capex revisions next?

Year to date, Goldman’s AI and power baskets have gotten the memo…

Goldman’s China AI basket leads US AI baskets.

. . .

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

A massive darknet international pedophile child porn network calling itself “Kidflix” has been discovered and shut down by Europol.

Investigators stated that site shockingly had more than 91,000 child porn videos on it, with around three new videos being uploaded to its servers every hour.

Users were paying a fee for access to stream and upload their own videos of child sex abuse. They were able to make payments via cryptocurrencies to avoid a paper trail, and were given the incentive of earning tokens to spend on the site by uploading content.

Kidflix, one of the largest paedophile platforms in the world, has been shut down in an international operation against child sexual exploitation.

⏹️ Europol has supported authorities from 38 countries worldwide in shutting down the platform.

More: https://t.co/eoETaBNyBi pic.twitter.com/FPI9xkuTkE

— Europol (@Europol) April 2, 2025

Dozens of arrests were made, the agency announced Wednesday, noting that the network had around two million users and spanned across 35 countries.

The network was terminated at the direction of the Bavarian State Criminal Police Office in Germany.

One of the world’s largest pedophile networks, Kidflix, has been dismantled in a massive international operation against child exploitation.

Authorities from 38 countries, including the U.S., Canada, and Australia, collaborated in a global effort to shut down the platform.… pic.twitter.com/jQCpJxde8a

— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) April 3, 2025

German broadcaster NTV reports that 79 people have been arrested thus far, with around 1,400 further suspects identified.

The investigation spanned almost three years and has now concluded with thousands of electronic devices being seized and the servers of the monstrosity, located in both Germany and the Netherlands, being shut down.

The report notes that Europol officials believe those arrested not only watched and uploaded child pornography, but are also suspected of carrying out the sexual abuse of the children.

This isn’t even an isolated incident, these massive pedo operations are in play everywhere.

🇵🇱 OVER 1 MILLION CHILD P*RN FILES SEIZED IN POLAND

The files were uncovered during an extensive nationwide operation conducted by the Polish police.

They raided 112 locations, charging 75 suspects aged 16 to 78, with 31 in pre-trial detention.

Among the material were images… pic.twitter.com/ixfnO88ouv

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) November 12, 2024

𝗨.𝗦. 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗨.𝗞. 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗔𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗖𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗼𝗻 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗻𝗻𝗲𝘅, ‘𝗢𝗻𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗟𝗮𝗿𝗴𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗖𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗱 𝗣𝗼𝗿𝗻𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗽𝗵𝘆 𝗪𝗲𝗯𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗲𝘀 𝗚𝗹𝗼𝗯𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆,’ 𝗙𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗕𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘀𝗵 𝗖𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘁 𝗦𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗼𝗳… pic.twitter.com/9jHuscKLOT

— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) March 11, 2024

Still think child sex trafficking isn’t a problem Canada? You’ll want to give this a read…👇

Have you heard of the Canadian film company Azov Films?

Azov films was a Toronto based film company founded by Brian Way. The company was selling and streaming footage of naked… pic.twitter.com/g1MXUiXl8X

— 🇨🇦Unacceptable Canadian Girl🇨🇦 (@AreOhEssEyeEe) June 23, 2024

2 predators arrested & 9 children rescued in an ongoing investigation in SE Asia. 9 terabytes of data including child sexual abuse material were recovered at the scene.

1 terabyte alone can hold up to 1 million smartphone quality pictures, or thousands of hours of video. pic.twitter.com/Kvo1PVtaKv

— Our Rescue (@OURrescue) August 21, 2020

South Korean National and Hundreds of Others Charged Worldwide in the Takedown of the Largest Darknet Child Pornography Website, Which was Funded by Bitcoin@drawandstrike @catesduane @rising_serpent @almostjingo @tracybeanz @CarrollQuigley1 @dbongino
https://t.co/yZOOXyL7t6

— Headsnipe011 (@Headsnipe011) October 16, 2019

WATCH 🚨 45 People Arrested For Being Child Predators, Prostitutes, Human Traffickers, Child Traffickers & Wanting To Eat Children, Yes Cannibalism “Sheriff told us about a man who he said wanted to eat a child. Yes. Eat her as in cannibalism, And that was just one of the… pic.twitter.com/Na04RsreXG

— IlluminatiCoin (@naticoineth) February 22, 2024

Earlier this year, French police announced arrested 37 people and seized over a million picture and video files of child pornography from computers, tablets, smartphones, and even cameras.

According to The French newspaper La Dépêche reported that the operation, which began in November, involved 270 gendarmes, including 36 cybercrime specialist investigators.

🚨 ALERTE INFO – 37 PEDOPHILES ARRÊTÉS DANS L’EST DE LA FRANCE

Plus de 1 MILLIONS DE FICHIERS PEDOPORNOGRAPHIQUE

Sur la saisis ont retrouvent 60 ordinateurs, 290 supports de stockage externes, 27 téléphones portables, huit tablettes, quatre caméras

Plus de 270 ENQUÊTEURS… pic.twitter.com/fP0CWWslMr

— AlertesPedo (@AlertesPed0) January 27, 2025

A separate international operation last December also led to the arrest of 95 people in France in connection to a cross-border child pornography ring.

In that case, police seized hundreds of devices with an estimated 375,000 photos and 156,000 videos of child pornography, making up 217 terabytes of data.

#BellesAffaires 🖥️ Démantèlement d’un important réseau pédopornographique international via l’application #Signal, par la SR de Versailles et les gendarmes du @CyberGEND :
➡️ 570 gendarmes mobilisés
➡️ 500k photos/vidéos découverts
➡️ 95 personnes ont été identifiées en France pic.twitter.com/xTC1UsJm6Y

— Gendarmerie nationale (@Gendarmerie) December 21, 2024

While investigators have managed to rescue some of the children who were victims of these horrendous activities in each case, the numbers are always disappointingly low, and it’s clear many thousands more, if not millions are still suffering.

The level of evil is unimaginable.

Leftists will tell you it’s all just a big conspiracy theory though.

And in some cases they will investigate anyone who tries to expose it.

*  *  *

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

Three staffers on the National Security Council have been fired after journalist Laura Loomer met with President Trump in the Oval Office on Wednesday, where she presented him with a list of ‘disloyal’ employees, the NY Times reports, thanks to ongoing (and copious) leaks from the administration.

Mr. Trump may act on some of Ms. Loomer’s recommendations, two of the people said. Ms. Loomer walked into the White House with a sheaf of papers, which amounted to a mass of opposition research attacking the character and loyalty of numerous N.S.C. officials, two of the people said. She proceeded to excoriate them in front of their boss, the national security adviser Michael Waltz, who was also in the meeting. -NYT

The rest of the Times report amounts to a character assassination on Loomer, which was to be expected – writing that “Loomer’s rhetoric and actions have been so extreme that she has alienated others even on the far right.”

The White House meeting came after weeks of Loomer posting about various ‘disloyal’ Democrats within the Trump administration – including deputy national security adviser Alex Wong, who she says added a journalist from The Atlantic to a DoD Signal chat on behalf of his boss, national security adviser Michael Waltz (Waltz was in Wednesday’s meeting, according to the report). In posts to X, Loomer noted that Wong’s wife worked as a DOJ lawyer for the Biden and Obama administrations, and her father is a large shareholder in a Chinese satellite manufacturer.

The roughly 30-minute meeting with Loomer was held shortly before Trump’s major tariff announcement in the White House Rose Garden. Also in the meeting aside from Waltz were VP JD Vance, Sergio Gor – the head of presidential personnel, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, and White House communications director Steven Cheung, according to the NYT‘s leakers.

Loomer Responds

“I woke up this morning to learn that there are still people in and around the West Wing who are LEAKING to the hostile, left-wing media about President Trump’s *confidential* and *private* meetings in the Oval Office,” Loomer wrote on X in response to the news, adding that she would not divulge any details about her meeting.

I woke up this morning to learn that there are still people in and around the West Wing who are LEAKING to the hostile, left-wing media about President Trump’s *confidential* and *private* meetings in the Oval Office. I want to reiterate how important it is that people who gain…

— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) April 3, 2025

According to Loomer, there’s “More to come!”

“Exactly one hour before he received the termination email, Laura Loomer posted on social media about Mr. Schleifer, calling him a “Biden holdover.”

More to come! pic.twitter.com/ndc0qAXdf3

— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) April 3, 2025

* * *

We’ve sold a TON of these lighter / flashlight combos…

By Michael Every of Rabobank

Hoot Small-ly and Reverse Nixon Again

In line with the Churchillian tone I had struck, yesterday’s US tariffs were historic and suggest a world-wide battle. It remains to be seen in what form, with what outcome, but global bifurcation is again on the cards. The US raised its weighted-average tariff to 29%, the highest in over 100 years, and above the Smoot-Hawley tariffs of the 1930s. That’s staggering, not just for the US, or inflation or GDP, but for the global system built on the US as consumer of last resort for everyone else’s overproduction and the US dollar as the lubricant for that trade and the US financial assets everyone accumulates as a result.

The US assumed a non-tariff barrier with each trade partner leading to reciprocal tariffs as the simple function of the US bilateral trade deficit as a ratio of exports to it, e.g., Indonesia runs a $17.9bn trade surplus with the US and exports $28bn to it, so $17.9/$28 = the 64% assumed Indonesian trade barrier, which the US offered a ‘discount’ on down to 32%. On one hand, this is nonsense. On the other, it’s exactly what Ricardian theory says should happen under free trade: all bilateral flows should balance, with the composition of the basket shifting with comparative advantage. That it never does for the US shows the theory isn’t true; so, the US is using both hands to pull down the system ostensibly based on it. It’s critical to understand that before talking about the numbers below and hooting small-ly about Smoot-Hawley.

We got massive increases in tariffs on Asian exporters like Bangladesh (37%), Cambodia (49%), China (34%), India (26%), Indonesia (32%), Japan (24%), South Korea (25%), Thailand (36%), and Vietnam (46%). Moreover, these are stackable on top of pre-exiting tariffs, so China faces 54% at least, with the threat of another 25% for buying Venezuelan oil and another 25-50% for buying Russian oil. That is a dramatic escalation between the world’s two largest economies.

The EU fared slightly better (20%), but which is four times higher than what we had presumed in our own model assumptions.

Most others, including the UK, Australia, and New Zealand got 10%, a divide-and-rule tactic we’d expected, as did Latin America, the Monroe Doctrine also expected, especially if the US now offers dollar liquidity to help shift supply chains in that direction. But what then for Brazilian agri trade to China?

Nobody –except Russia(but that’s because it is under sanctions)– was overlooked: even a small island off Australia got a 10% tariff for its population of penguins, and the closest of US defence allies like Israel and the Philippines face 17%, while Iran only sees 10%. The only exemptions apart from Canada and Mexico were on steel and aluminium, autos, copper, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, bullion, energy and other minerals not available in the US; but the first three already have 25% tariffs in place, with the rest waiting for one.

The US postal de minimis loophole is also over for everyone with a tariff once systems are ready, except for bonafide gifts and items brought into the US while traveling. That upends a lot of e-commerce.

We now start the next phase of negotiation and/or retaliation. It’s hard to imagine the UK, Australia, or New Zealand will rock the boat, and the same is true for anyone getting just a 10% tariff. Indeed, Latin America may be rubbing its hands at the geostrategic windfall ahead.

But what about Asia? For example, will China allow CNY to move lower? Does that drag other FX down with it? Does the US then raise tariffs even higher? Or will China switch to domestic consumption, which would be inflationary? What are the options for Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and India? They can’t “trade more with China” unless it plays the US importer/consumer role, but it won’t want to import more. So, does all of Asia inflate domestically with the US, or sink into deflation? Or does everyone but China pivot to the US side vs. China?

We have already published a report on what we expect Europe to do and underlined the risks of escalation that risks rapidly moving from trade into other areas. Indeed, the US is already pressuring Europe to buy American weapons rather than local as it rearms: if Europe accepts, maybe the trade war and security issues are resolved in tandem; and if it refuses, Europe may face more US intractability on NATO, and trade, and energy, and perhaps even on dollar swaplines.

Another key point to stress is renewed talk of ‘dedollarisation’. Notably, US 10-year yields are going down, now at just 4.06%, even though inflation will almost certainly be seen and for some time. The DXY broad dollar index is dropping, and even Asian exporters hit by massive tariffs are only seeing slight selloffs in their FX. Indeed, JPY is rallying despite Japan being reliant on the US for its defense as well as exports, as is EUR, with Europe reliant on the US for energy and tech on top of security and exports. Crypto tumbled, but gold hit a new record high before dipping.

However, the initial FX reaction reflects repatriation of US assets; and it overlooks the CNY threat and that there can’t be a global system within which JPY and EUR can thrive without the dollar’s current role. That’s hard to accept, but it’s true.

An ECB speaker just said Europe has a unique opportunity to push the global use of the Euro. Yet besides requiring the issuance of Eurobonds, a huge hurdle, that would see Europe run capital account surpluses, as funds flood in, and matching current account deficits, as foreign goods flood in too. In short, Europe would follow the US in deindustrialising, financialising, and polarising just as it needs unifying and militarising. Yet Europe would also need a large military to have a true global reserve currency role, because those with such muscle won’t just roll over!

While US actions show it wants to stop the dollar being a lubricant for most exporters to it and conduit for financial assets back to them, it doesn’t want to lose its role in commodity pricing, and global trade, settlements, and debt. History shows a country can retain a global FX reserve even without a trade deficit, but it takes mercantilism to do it – which we are now seeing.

As I say, the implications are so large that markets don’t fully grasp them, or don’t want to. It’s one thing for them to have been forced to recognize that guns now matter as well as butter, but it’s another to realize life is now about gunship diplomacy (“We have 11 aircraft carriers: we get to say which currency commodities are priced in. Understand?”). Equally, macro models trying to capture what this means presume everything returns to mean and vast net trade deficits are absorbed by the system. If they don’t, the model breaks; here, the system does.

One may disagree with Yanis Varoufakis on many things, but he knows his economic history – which markets don’t. He begins a recent must-read (‘Will Liberation Day transform the world? The Nixon Shock set a radical precedent’) thus:

“My philosophy, Mr President, is that all foreigners are out to screw us and it’s our job to screw them first.” With these words, the US Treasury Secretary convinced the President to deliver a colossal shock to the global economy. In the words of one of the President’s men, the objective was to trigger “a controlled disintegration of the world economy”.

No, those words were not spoken by members of President Trump’s team in advance of their “Liberation Day” tariff splurge. While the “foreigners are out to screw us” certainly has a Trumpian ring, it was uttered in the summer of 1971 by then Treasury Secretary John Connally, who succeeded in convincing his President to unleash the infamous Nixon Shock a couple of days later.

Commentators should know better than to pretend that the shock Trump is now delivering is both “unprecedented” and bound to fail like all “reckless” assaults on the prevailing order. The Nixon Shock was more devastating than the one delivered today, especially for Europeans. And precisely because of the economic devastation caused, its architects achieved their main long-term objective: to ensure American hegemony grew alongside America’s twin (trade and government budget) deficits.

The success of the Nixon Shock in no way guarantees the success of Trump’s version, but it does remind us that what is good for America’s rulers is not necessarily good for most Americans or, indeed, for the world.

One of the smartest Nixon advisers, who helped to convince Connally of the need for a shock, articulated this point with brilliant clarity: “It is tempting to look at the market as an impartial arbiter. But balancing the requirements of a stable international system against the desirability of retaining freedom of action for national policy, a number of countries, including the US, opted for the latter.”

Then with one additional phrase he undermined all of the assumptions on which Western Europe and Japan had erected their post-war economic miracles: “A controlled disintegration in the world economy is a legitimate objective for the Eighties.”

And 10 months after giving this lecture, the man in question, Paul Volcker, rose to the Presidency of the Federal Reserve. Soon, US interest rates were doubled, then trebled. The controlled disintegration of the world economy, which had started when President Nixon was convinced by Connally and Volcker to dismantle the hitherto stable exchange rates regime, was now being completed with interest rate hikes that were far more devastating than Trump’s tariffs can ever be today.

Trump is therefore not the first President to seek the controlled disintegration of the world economy by means of a devastating blow. Nor is he the first to purposely damage America’s allies to renew and prolong US hegemony. Nor the first who was prepared to hurt Wall Street in the short run in the process of strengthening US capital accumulation in the long term. Nixon had done all that half a century earlier. And the irony is that the world the Western liberal establishment is grieving over today came into being as a result of the Nixon Shock.”

He concludes: “Every generation likes to think it is on a cusp of some historic transformation. But ours is cursed enough to actually be on such a cusp. So rather than focusing too much on the character of the man in the White House, we would do well to recall that the Nixon Shock was much more important than Nixon. If Nixon reshaped the world once, leaving it nastier and more unbalanced, Trump can certainly do it again.”

This Trump Shock is, again, a reverse Nixon: to take the US from trade deficits and financialisation back to raw US mercantilist power, using parts of the old system to do so. (As I have put it, using economic statecraft; or, using financial Fartcraft to shift back to Warcraft.)

That’s as: the US put sanctions on some Russian entities; Israel blew up the runway of the Syrian airbase Turkey is taking over; the US pours military equipment into the Middle East; the US senate pencils in $5 trillion in tax cuts over the next decade; and Elon Musk is rumored to be leaving the White House circle soon –stocks rallied (“No more DOGE corruption-cutting!”)– which he denied.

President Trump’s 25% tariffs on imported vehicles took effect overnight, with the first signs of impact materializing Thursday morning—i.e., shares of U.S. carmakers tumbled in the early cash session, and Stellantis NV announced plans to temporarily suspend production lines in both Canada and Mexico.

Bloomberg reported that the global automaker overseeing 14 car brands will pause production at its Windsor, Ontario plant for two weeks starting next Monday. Details about how long production lines in Mexico would remain offline were not disclosed.

“With the new automotive sector tariffs now in effect, it will take our collective resilience and discipline to push through this challenging time,” Antonio Filosa, head of the company’s North American operations, told employees in a memo earlier. He said the move will affect employees at “several” of the company’s U.S. powertrain and stamping facilities supporting Canada and Mexico operations. 

Bernstein analyst Daniel Roeska warned clients that a “25% automotive imports lasting beyond four to six weeks would likely have a chilling effect on the entire sector as [automakers] need to grapple with significant impact to the bottom line.” 

TD Cowen’s Itay Michaeli described the tariffs as “close to the worst case outcome vs. recent expectations,” while Barclays’ Dan Levy warned: “there are no ‘winners’ in the absolute – only relative winners.”

Upcoming production changes at some of Stellantis’ factories in Canada and Mexico are some of the first effects of Trump’s 25% tariffs on auto imports. The administration’s move is to revive America’s industrial base, and the only way to do that is to use tariffs to force companies to re-shore operations. 

Wedbush analyst Dan Ives told clients that “the concept of a U.S. carmaker with parts all from the U.S. is a fictional tale that does not exist and would take years to make this concept a reality.” 

CNBC noted, “Parts that are currently compliant with the USMCA trade deal will be tariff-free, but only until the secretary of commerce and Customs and Border Protection establish processes to impose levies on non-U.S. content.” 

In markets, automakers were pressured lower with broader main equity indexes. General Motors dropped 2.4%, Ford -2.2%, Rivian -3%, Lucid -4%, and Tesla -3.5%

An analysis we shared with readers on Tuesday, “Trade War Hits The Gas: Trump’s Auto Tariffs To Reshape Global Manufacturing,” provides more color into how the repercussions of the auto tariffs could be far more impactful than initially appear—impacting everything from dealership showrooms to global supply chains.

The move to restore America’s hallowed industrial core begins.