The Atlantic

“What has the country gotten for all of this chaos? Nothing. Trump tarnished the United States’ long-standing trading relationships and boosted the cost of imports, and evidently won zero concessions in return,” Annie Lowrey writes:

"If a stock-market swoon, or even a recession, does not frighten Trump, the prospect of a 2008-style meltdown apparently still does. And so the gargantuan trade war is back off, for now," Jonathan Chait writes:

As markets tanked in response to Donald Trump’s tariff announcement last week, far-right influencers swiftly argued in favor of broad austerity measures, “suggesting that Americans do ‘not need’ consumer electronics such as cellphones and video-game consoles,” Charlie Warzel writes. “Other MAGA devotees and some Fox News hosts have conscripted tariffs into the culture wars … On X, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and a faction best described as an anti-woke tech commentariat posted long threads, proclaiming the tariffs a Trumpian masterstroke.” https://lnkd.in/e7VpdKYF “This combination of blind faith, reactionary ideology, and endless justification have less in common with any kind of politics and policy than they do with genuine conspiratorial thinking—a kind of QAnon 2.0 for finance,” Warzel writes. “As in QAnon, a sprawling network of conspiracy theories about a nefarious cabal referred to as the ‘deep state,’ Trump is made out to be a hero, pulling the strings and playing multidimensional chess to deliver political salvation to his devotees.” “Both QAnon and the legion of tariff true believers share an unabiding faith in Trump, ascribing his erratic governing style to a master plan,” Warzel writes. “Similarly, ardent supporters of Trump’s tariffs have refused to see any of the plan’s glaring flaws … Either the sell-off is part of a necessary cleansing of the American economy or it’s a blip, the result of Trump playing chicken with world leaders.” “Above all, the prime directive for both QAnon and the tariff truthers is the same: Trust the process,” Warzel writes. Just as QAnon promised a Great Awakening, “the tariffs also offer the promise of an imagined utopia.” “That sufficiently motivated people might break with reality is by now somewhat predictable in American politics. But what’s far more uncertain is what happens when reality punctures the protective bubble of cognitive dissonance,” Warzel continues. “Few events have the power to pierce the veil, but a global financial crisis could be one of them. What happens if the true believers are confronted with a truth they can’t look away from? History suggests it won’t go well.” Read more: https://lnkd.in/e7VpdKYF 🎨: The Atlantic. Source: Getty.

While life for working-class Americans deteriorates, pundits and politicians on all sides watch from a safe, comfortable distance, Xochitl Gonzalez writes. https://lnkd.in/epTezUss America is suffering a “class apartheid,” Gonzalez argues: The systems that hold this country together are dominated by members of what she calls a “comfort class”: people who are born into lives of financial stability, graduate from college with little to no debt, and, in turn, can advance in influential but low-wage fields, such as academia, media, government, and policy work. “Their disconnect from the lives of the majority has expanded to such a chasm that their perspective—and authority—may no longer be relevant,” Gonzalez writes. “People with generational wealth pull the levers on a society that they don’t understand,” Gonzalez continues. “Nearly every aspect of society has been designed by people unfamiliar with not only the experience of living in poverty but the experience of living paycheck to paycheck.” This dissonance between the powerful and the rest of America “can be seen above all in the rise of Donald Trump, who won again in part because he—unlike Democrats—didn’t dismiss the ‘vibecession’ but exploited it by addressing what people were feeling: stressed about the price of eggs.” Exacerbating this is widespread class dysmorphia. Pew has classified 30 percent of American households as low income, and 19 percent as upper income. Yet a 2024 Gallup survey found that only 12 percent of Americans identified themselves as “lower class” and just 2 percent as “upper class.” “No one wants to be perceived as poor, and no one rich ever feels rich enough,” Gonzalez continues. But what really sets the comfort class apart is its sense of financial security. This also explains why its members tend to vote differently: “Someone who feels they don’t fundamentally need to worry about money if things go south will be more willing to vote on their values—issues like democratic norms or reproductive rights—than someone whose week-to-week concern is how inflation affects her grocery budget,” Gonzalez writes. Read more: https://lnkd.in/epTezUss

Even Trump backing down can't break the MAGA-tariff delusion, Charlie Warzel writes.

“The president is not only destroying America’s hard power, its soft power, but the credibility of the American brand,” Ambassador Rahm Emanuel tells David Frum. Watch their full discussion on the premiere episode of “The David Frum Show”: https://lnkd.in/erdpQhFY

When Korean skin care arrived in the United States several years ago, it became the stuff of legend among beauty enthusiasts—for both its quality and its price. New tariffs against South Korea could upend its affordability, Nancy Walecki reports. https://lnkd.in/eqPgiJEB Found in Korean products such as sunscreen, Korean snail mucin promises to hydrate skin and improve fine lines, and prompted a buying frenzy when it became available to U.S. consumers. But Trump’s 25 percent hike on goods imported to the U.S. from South Korea—in addition to the administration’s repeal of a customs loophole used by certain K-beauty exporters based in Hong Kong—has skin-care enthusiasts springing into action. “If you love your glow, get it now,” one skin-care influencer said on TikTok. “This is your last chance before it becomes unaffordable.” “Americans’ love affair with K-beauty was fostered by many years of free trade with South Korea, when our mucin came free of additional fees,” Walecki writes. “If people have been buying K-beauty products because they love K-beauty (or K-pop or K-dramas), a price hike might not matter. But if they decide Korean products haven’t done that much for their skin, maybe they’ll switch to Neutrogena.” Part of K-beauty’s appeal is its price point. These products also contain ingredients that are uncommon in U.S. skin care, but that some American consumers swear by—Centella asiatica (Asiatic pennywort), rice water, and ginseng extract. “For skin-care aficionados, K-beauty was an ideal trifecta: a product that feels luxurious, seems effective, and is relatively affordable,” Walecki writes. Trump’s policy will apply only to imported K-beauty—and a handful of major K-beauty manufactures have already opened U.S.-based factories. But one researcher Walecki spoke with expects that other Korea-based companies will wait about a year to evaluate these tariffs before they consider relocating to America. Still, if the tariffs do succeed, “and more K-beauty is soon made in America, the industry could lose its major selling point: it is not made in America,” Walecki continues. Read more: https://lnkd.in/eqPgiJEB 🎨: The Atlantic. Source: Getty.

Jules Feiffer, the comic-book artist who died in January, taught Art Spiegelman many things. But one particular strip of his mastered the art of space and time:

In the premiere episode of “The David Frum Show,’ Rahm Emanuel shares the lessons he learned as White House chief of staff during the 2008–09 financial crises—and his assessment of where Democrats can advance from here. Watch and subscribe:

Investors are losing trust in the United States and its political system, Annie Lowrey writes. There’s one fix—a simple, if not easy, one: Get rid of the tariffs.