The Sting, Trump Style

I've had a change of heart about retaliatory tariffs on America. Hear me out.

The official line is the usual guff. Protect American jobs. Punish China. Rebalance trade. Nod solemnly to rustbelt towns gutted by globalisation. But peel back the bunting and it’s all theatre. The economic logic collapses on contact. Tariffs are taxes. Importers pay them, pass them on, and prices rise. Food, clothes, electronics, tools, vehicles – if it’s made abroad, and most things are, it’ll cost more.

And not just finished goods. American factories rely on foreign parts. They bring them in, assemble the final product, then ship it out. Those parts are now more expensive – and the exports less competitive. A double blow. Costs up, sales down. The workers Trump claims to protect? Left to swing. And he knows it.

But here’s where it gets clever – or at least, revealing. While voters are waving flags and blaming foreigners for the price hikes, the calm hands with capital are getting ready to pounce. The markets tumble. Panic kicks in. Cautious savers, pensioners, small investors – they start dumping stocks at a loss. And waiting at the bottom, with dry powder and a shopping list, are the usual suspects. Hedge funds. Political cronies. The sort who play golf with the people who started the fire. They buy low. They always do. Once the smoke clears and the noise dies down, they sell at a profit – and then have the gall to lecture the rest of us on free enterprise and responsibility.

But that’s just the side hustle – bear with me. The real goal is political. This isn’t mismanagement. It’s sabotage, carefully orchestrated sabotage. The aim isn’t to fix the economy – it’s to use it to get a 3rd, 4th, 5th term (not necessarily for Trump). To turn pain into propaganda. The worse things get, the more the faithful harden. Not with doubt, but with conviction. Failure doesn’t weaken the story – it strengthens it. If the system’s cracking, it must be because the enemy’s fighting back. This strategy is the only logical explanation for the shit-show.

It’s the authoritarian playbook. Break something. Blame someone. Offer yourself as the only solution. Undermine institutions. Mock expertise. Turn the press into the villain. And economics? That’s no longer about policy or prosperity. It’s subservient now – twisted into a stage prop to stoke anger, deflect blame and maintain power.

The goal is not prosperity. The goal is control. And for the architects of the chaos, it’s win-win. If the politics fail, the money still gets made. But if the politics succeed, the mask comes off. It won’t be long before innocent people start disappearing in the middle of the night – quietly, bureaucratically, Kafka-style – under the banner of national security and law and order. It’s devilishly clever and relies on an ignorant base.

And all the while, the ordinary voter – the one this theatre claims to champion – gets kicked in the teeth. Prices rise. Wages stall. Small businesses fold. Exporters lose ground. And still, the story is spun: blame immigrants, blame minorities, blame the “woke”, blame China. Anything but the culprit. It’s the oldest grift there is. Start the fire, sell the water, blame the neighbours.

And don’t imagine this is just an American joke. We’ve lived it here. Brexit, which was pitched as freedom, delivered economic self-harm and left its champions utterly unrepentant. The promised benefits never arrived - because they never existed. Yet the faithful cling on, muttering about shadowy cabals and unseen saboteurs, convinced that every failure proves just how deep the conspiracy runs and how badly it was handled. Reform's poll numbers are climbing as the naiive become ensnared.

None of this is accidental. It’s a business model. Crisis creates opportunity. Markets dip, assets change hands, and the gap between rich and poor yawns wider. And while the public are bickering over statues and bathrooms, the real war – the class war – rumbles on behind the scenes, quiet and ruthless.

Meanwhile, allies are pushed away, supply chains unravel, retaliatory tariffs are slapped into place. Jobs go. Prices rise. The cycle continues.

Retaliatory tariffs only make things worse for America – and play directly into Trump’s hands. They give him the scapegoat he needs to keep the MAGA base angry and loyal. Yesterday's reaction to China's retaliatory tariffs proved that, with Trump saying China has panicked. China doesn't panic - it plans 100 years in advance.

Negotiation is futile. Trump doesn’t want resolution – he wants collapse. There’s no silver bullet here, unless one counts turning the other cheek, to borrow a phrase from a certain first-century Jewish philosopher and mystic. Politicians facing elections, like Carney, might do well to frame the tariffs as necessary action in the face of a bully. That would win votes and flatten the Canadian right in one go - not a bad strategy for a Canadian, but not for anyone not facing re-election.

And then there's the convenient outrage over Elon Musk. The backlash isn’t about free speech or Teslas – it’s rooted in his role in hollowing out institutional safeguards, particularly through his flirtations with crypto manipulation and control over communications platforms. DOGE, once a joke, now serves to erode trust in regulation and shift attention. And yet Musk is paraded by Trumpists as a truth-teller exposing corruption. It’s classic inversion – the arsonist praised for smelling smoke. But what’s being burned down isn’t fraud – it’s the last remaining safeguards against it. Musk isn’t a rebel. He’s a diversion – one more illusion in a rigged performance where billionaires pose as victims and the public picks up the tab.

Trump’s tariffs aren’t economic policy. They’re pantomime for the masses and a raid for the elite – not just opportunism, but looting dressed as leadership. It’s The Sting with worse tailoring and no charm – only this time, you’re not watching from the safety of a cinema seat. If this is the road ahead – stunts, slogans and smash-and-grab economics – then we’re not heading for recovery.

Does Trump know this? Certainly. Is he the architect? Hardly – he’s the chaos muppet, stumbling through someone else’s blueprint. If he gets a third term, would he last? Doubtful. Once he’s served his purpose, they’ll discard him like the punchline he’s become.

We’re heading for something far darker.