Tariffs are, at best, a band-aid, and come with a lot of negatives. I’d say it was like taking antidepressants to treat the symptoms instead of dealing with your problems that are making you depressed.
What we really need is to address the underlying illnesses of our economy, find the root causes and fix those. I’d say those are mostly in the government and financial sectors, so tariffs won’t fix them.
At this point, I think Trump should carefully and accurately weigh public opinion on the subject and develop his policy from the standpoint that generates the most votes in the most battleground states. I don’t see this as being a central plank in the conservative platform. I think we can quietly bend here, pick up much needed votes, and not really compromise on any of our core values. It’s just not a big deal to me either way. Winning is a big deal.
If other countries shut the US out of their markets the US has to respond. Ask Cisco how free China is with Huawei as competition.