Freitas with a nuanced take on Trump and tariffs

Nick Freitas, a conservative in the Virginia House of Delegates, expresses an interestingly nuanced point of view re: Trump and tariffs. In the video below, Freitas says:

• Trump does indeed seem to be using tariffs as a negotiating tactic, thus putting Freitas in that school of thought.
• Trump himself is arguably against tariffs: as evidence, Freitas notes that when countries back down from the threat of tariffs and agree to Trump's business terms, Trump removes the tariff threat right away. (Kevin's note: the press sees this 180º and immediately attributes it to Trump's being mercurial and flip-floppy instead of looking more deeply at the principle behind the actions.)
• Trump recognizes and is not ashamed of the fact that the US remains the world's economic and military superpower—a state of affairs not changing anytime soon. Tariffs are a way of leveraging this power.
• Countries cannot be friends: countries can only have interests, and the US needs to act in its own interests.
• The danger of Trump's using tariffs as threats is that other countries might conclude that having the US dollar as the world's reserve currency may not be in that country's best interests, which is how you end up with organizations like BRICS.
• Tariffs are like chemotherapy: you don't do chemotherapy because it's good for you: you do it because it's bad for the cancer. When the cancer is gone, you stop the chemo. So it is with tariffs.

Freitas says other things as well. Watch the video. On 2X speed if you're impatient.