Posted on 01/10/2016 7:53:21 AM PST by don-o
Republican frontrunner Donald Trump denied that he would impose a 45 percent tariff on Chinese goods coming into the United States as president, telling Fox News Sunday "I didn't say I would do it."
However, Trump told the New York Times this week he would "do a tax" on imported goods from China to restructure the relationship with the country, who he has constantly railed against on the campaign trail, and that it should be 45 percent:
"The only power that we have with China," Mr. Trump said, "is massive trade."
"I would tax China on products coming in," Mr. Trump said. "I would do a tariff, yes -- and they do it to us."
Mr. Trump added that he's "a free trader," but that "it's got to be reasonably fair."
"I would do a tax. and the tax, let me tell you what the tax should be ... the tax should be 45 percent," Mr. Trump said.
Fox News host Chris Wallace asked Trump about his proposal and wondered if such a high tariff would increase the prices for American consumers and further damage China's economy.
(Excerpt) Read more at freebeacon.com ...
OK 44
I am. Are you saying that Trump did not say what the source of the thread reports that he said?
“I am. Are you saying that Trump did not say what the source of the thread reports that he said?”
So actually seeing the interview, context, and intonation, and interaction with the interviewer is meaningless, then.
I saw it. I get to tell you what happened, not the other way around.
Don’t like it? You have no choice but to defer, or you look petty and I get to.laugh at you, which I am already doing.
Don’t kid yourself. He is a great negotiator. I was part of team that represented some of his creditors in the 90s.
I don't think that's going to serve him well as president in dealing with Congress or foreign nations.
If it’s Trump, he will understand his leverage. I prefer Cruz, but anyone who destroys the GOPe stranglehold is fine with me.
I doubt it since it's a whole different world. For example, how would a President Trump negotiate a deal on Planned Parenthood funding in a way that both sides would agree to?
There’s this thingy called a veto, and who says everyone has to be happy? Presidents have lots of power that can be used to make Senators and Congressmen happy or miserable in many, many ways. If Trump were to win, he’d probably have an R Congress (contra Rove) anyway. In any event, I doubt if he’d observe all the fatuous “rules” that make the RINOs impotent, e.g. I doubt that Trump would have patience with the filibuster.
Trump would have nothing to say about the filibuster. The Constitution gives each house of Congress the right to make the rules to operate their house. Nothing Trump can do about it.
There is plenty a President can do to exert pressure on Senators - appointments, funding, investigations, regulatory changes, etc. This a matter of practice, not formal legality.
You have your Constitutional order backwards on those. The Senate has to approve the President's appointments, not the other way around. The Congress is the one that decides what gets funded, not the President. The Congress can investigate the way the Executive is operating through its oversight function, but the Executive cannot investigate Congress unless there is criminal activity suspected. The President has no regulatory control over Congress. Unless you are suggesting that Trump would impose debilitating regulations on the citizens of this country merely as a way of exerting pressure on Congress...
NO I DON’T. The President choses whom he sends up. Both Congressmen and Senators want people they prefer sent up. So, who is sent up matters. Moreover, many appointments - the vast, vast majority - are not subject to Senate approval, but the positions are powerful, and individual Senators and Congressmen almost always want to exercise patronage influence on those, too. As for funding, perhaps you haven’t noticed the leverage Obama has had over what is included and not included in spending bills. No spending bill, btw, becomes law without a Presidential signature or a veto override, which is very, very rare. All kinds of Executive branch powers can be deployed to “influence” the contents of legislation and votes on legislation. The Executive branch, which the President controls, can certainly investigate any Senator or Congressman, and it has been done. Do you recall “Abscam”, for example? I’d bet that more than half the D caucus has committed felonies, but Rs have been timid about calling people like Reid and Rangel to account. Moreover, individuals and businesses important to members of Congress can be investigated. As for regulation, adding, modifying, or eliminating any regulation affects different people and entities in different ways. Members of Congress always have dogs in those fights. The Executive branch also has wide latitude in how it enforces (or not) regulations and how it writes rules for implementing them. Members of Congress are pressured about regulation all the time in lots of ways. The point is - and this only scratches the surface - there are many leverage points a President has as head of the Executive Branch that can be used to affect outcomes in all sorts of areas, including legislation. FDR, LBJ, Reagan, and Obama were not shy about using the existing powers of the Executive Branch.
If the Senate doesn't like who he sends up, they can kill it in committee by never giving the appointee a vote, or vote them down. In general, getting the appointments approved is a lot more important to the President than to the Senate - they are part of HIS team.
As for funding, perhaps you haven't noticed the leverage Obama has had over what is included and not included in spending bills.
Well, Trump wouldn't be "the first black president", so I don't think Congress would be too worried about opposing him. And do you really think the press would continue to paint Congress as the obstructionist as opposed to Trump?
The Executive branch, which the President controls, can certainly investigate any Senator or Congressman, and it has been done. Do you recall "Abscam", for example?
I specifically mentioned criminal cases as the one area where the Executive could investigate Congress. But they can't use criminal investigations as leverage to get Congress to do what the President wants... that is major league corruption, and if you think Congress would hesitate for a minute to impeach over something like that, you are delusional.
Moreover, individuals and businesses important to members of Congress can be investigated.
So now you want the President to use the power of government to investigate financial supporters of his opponents in order to pressure Congress... Abuse of power much? Who does that sound like?? Oh yeah, Obama.
Other than the fights over spending and appointments, everything else you are proposing would be an abuse of the power of the office. The fact that you are in favor of such, and seem to believe that Trump would take such actions if President, should give everyone a great deal of concern, both about Trump and about his supporters.
You are wrong on every count. In the handful cases when an appointment goes to the Senate, the President isn’t truly handicapped by the lack of a confirmed nominee. He just has someone in the agency or department run it on an interim basis, which can be indefinite. It happens frequently. Obama has preferred it because the people he wants to run agencies probably couldn’t be confirmed. Surely you know that. Individual members of Congress who lack the ability to influence appointments lose donors. You may not like it, but it’s true. Your funding comment is ridiculous. Trump controls the MSM narrative, and he has just hung Bill around Hillary’s neck because he doesn’t act like the patrician Bushes. He doesn’t play by the GOPe rules, and the MSM can’t control the narrative any more. Limbaugh has commented on this, too.
Among the many things you don’t understand is prosecutorial discretion. All that would need to be done would be to take some representative case of D and D aligned business corruption and prosecute. Hell, investigate Hillary, Bill, and Chelsea over any number of things, including the Clinton Foundation scam. None of that is an abuse. Bush wouldn’t do it, but Trump might, and even the possibility would sober many members of Congress up.
You also don’t know how tenuous the distinction between the use of power and the “abuse” of power is. Once the power is there, the distinction you think is so clear very seldom is. Because there are always “arguments on both sides”, the distinction is almost never clear to the public. The true solution is to eliminate the power in the first place - departments, agencies, regulations, the IRC, and more. Cruz clearly understands that, which is why I support him.
You are making some interesting Points regarding the Power of Congress against a President of the opposing Party.
My question is, if everything you say actually occurs in today’s Political World, why has Democrat President Obama gotten everything he ever wanted with both the House and Senate under control of the Republican Party?
Remember, Obama is the President who publicly attacks the Republican Congress shamelessly accusing them of anything and everything. Even then, they give him what he wants.
It’s quite a quandary thinking that a President Trump or even a President Cruz wouldn’t have the same success as Obama. Obama must be much more special than we ever thought.
That is true, but then why do presidents fight so hard to get their appointments confirmed? And more importantly exactly how does that give the president any leverage over the Senate?
Individual members of Congress who lack the ability to influence appointments lose donors.
Not hardly. They might get donations hoping they will block certain appointments, but no one gives a member of Congress donations hoping they can influence the president to appoint someone.
Trump controls the MSM narrative,
He does right now because it is in the MSM's best interest. He gives them high ratings and keeps the GOP race in a turmoil. But once elected, they will do to him what they do to every other GOP president.
Among the many things you don't understand is prosecutorial discretion. All that would need to be done would be to take some representative case of D and D aligned business corruption and prosecute.
Oh, I understand quite well. You are advocating for a president of the USA to selectively prosecute donors and businesses associated with certain members of Congress in order to blackmail them into doing what he wishes. With Trump's reported mob ties, that wouldn't be that unexpected. But no conservative would support that, and Congress would surely impeach if it could be proven. But even if it could not be proven, it would still be corrupt. I'm just surprised that Trump supporters are being so open about their acceptance of corruption like that.
Because you have the Dems united in support of Obama, and the GOP scared to death to oppose him in any meaningful manner. I think if Trump were elected, you would see Congress very united in opposing him. But even if not, this idea that Trump would just break the opposition to his will is ridiculous.
I think the only leverage Trump OR Cruz would have would be to veto the funding and keep vetoing it until they caved. But with both of them, there is a risk that the GOP and Dems would unite and override.
That would be the same Republicans Trump has been calling incompetent and losers? Yeah I'm sure they'll be falling all over themselves to advance a Trump agenda.
I doubt that Trump would have patience with the filibuster.
What will he do about it?
1. All prosecution is selective. You obviously know nothing about law enforcement. No one said anything about blackmail. If you investigate and prosecute, the goal is not to change someone’s vote; it’s to send him to prison. A few prosecutions, however, would have a salutary effect on the behavior of the other crooks in Congress. At present, on the D side especially, they think laws don’t apply to them, which encourages them to be lawless in every area. 2. A Senator who has no influence over appointments (try to think beyond the cabinet level) does lose donors. Every administration makes 10s of thousands of appointments, most to positions either no one has heard of or knows much about, but they are always important to certain interests. From a donor standpoint, the only thing worse for a member of Congress than zero influence on government personnel is being unable to get pork. 3. As for the media narrative, Limbaugh disagrees with you, and I think he knows just a bit more about the media than you do. Moreover, if you read more widely you would see MSM articles by leftists furious about how much free coverage Trump is getting. Further, if Trump were elected, it would be with a wide base of support, and, unlike your gelded GOPe Presidents, he probably wouldn’t shrink from threatening to “primary” Senators like McConnell if a Senator is doing what they are doing today. What we have forming on FR now is the usual election year circular firing squad.
Forgot to mention...a lot of Cabinet level appointments are used to pay off parts of the donor class (gasp)or send a “message” to make a political statement (as in the numerous affirmative action appointments of moderately competent to incompetent minorities). Sometimes the “battles” over those nominations are intended to serve a political purpose - as, for example, in giving the administration a chance to claim opposition to a nominee proves a hatred of [fill in the blank] by the opposition.
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