While we were rounding Cape Hirn last month, Viking showed the movie Master and Commander, starring Russel Crowe as the captain of a British Naval vessel who is chasing a Spanish galleon through the Southern Ocean waters, trying to capture its prize trade booty before peace got declared back home between their two nations. The concept of rushing to justify larceny rather than anticipating peace was somehow portrayed as noble and manly in an era that prized seamanship and daring-do. It was a classic case of ethnocentric might versus right bravado which may have been missed by those who prefer swashbuckling adventure to the serenity of not having your leg blown off by a stray cannonball. In the course of an upscale and light-hearted dinner in the captain’s quarters for the young officers (some of whom had barely reached puberty), Crowe asks his shipboard surgeon, Paul Bethany, which potato weavil on his plate he prefers. It is not missed by any viewer that even upscale dining in the days of global seafaring was a nasty piece of business. Dietary disease from fouled food stocks was just par for the course and worthy of post-prandial humor. When Bethany, a botonist intended to invoke Charles Darwin in the viewers’ mind, selects the more robust weavil on the plate (we get a close up of the grub), the captain exhorts his choice by reminding him that in the King’s Royal Naval Service, it is always their obligation to choose the lesser of two weavils. And the merriment goes on.
For some reason, that scene is on my mind as I contemplate in the middle of this full moon night about what is becoming of our global trade situation. King Donald has recommissioned the American fleet of privateers to go forth and plunder the unwary world of global commerce, not because it is right or deserved, but because he feels he can. And just like Russell Crowe must navigate the 90-foot waves of the Drake Passage, risking the lives of his young officers and hard-working, long-suffering sailors, King Donald makes merry as the master and commander of his ship of state for whatever vainglorious treasure he can encounter. The randomness and unproductive nature of seafaring piracy as national defense strategy is now transformed into the random and unproductive trade war that King Donald has launched.
The markets are in shambles as unprecedented (there’s that word again) volatility has drained the “prudent” savings of rich and poor and put those dollars into the pockets of professional traders who eat volatility for breakfast. The dollar is faltering as rational globalists wonder why it should any longer be a safe haven of value. The ultimate safe haven, U.S. Treasury bonds have also started to show stress cracks. The bond markets are the shoals hiding beneath the 90-foot waves, waiting to rip the hull out of the Trump Navy. Deficit spending may have made our nation great, but fucking with the U.S. Treasury market can permanently undo that greatness of two centuries in a matter of months. The Yuan stands ready with its arms open to the world of commerce, promising calmer waters to a world wholly dependent on global trade for its prosperity.
We have recently learned that the laughable basis for the Trump trade policy, compliments of Peter Navarro (a.k.a. Pseudo-Economist and anagram maven Ron Varo) was a Jerrod Kushner sourced novella called Death By China. Any self-respecting autocrat needs a foil snd despite the evils of Russia and North Korea and the Islamic fervor of Iran, the best antagonist out there for Trump is China. No bully likes to see bully #2 growing bigger and stronger. Who can’t get behind the threat China poses to the good old USA? So once King Trump wet his pants over the waves and shoals he consciously and wantonly sailed into last week on Liberation Day, the calmer waters of a trade war pause was the perfect time to remind the electorate that China (the new-age Spanish galleon laden with exotic spices and electronic toys) is the devil we need to attack before anyone sensible can declare peace. Where’s the fun in peace for someone with an open book of tee times and dinner guests to entertain?
I just took delivery last night at 10pm (what a world Amazon has created for us!) of my coco mat flower boxes for my fairy village redo. The box said “Made in China”. The box looked like it was packaged in China (they use tape to the extreme over there). I don’t think I paid 125% tariff on this purchase, but how would I know anyway? They were decently priced. I went to the Green Thumb Nursery in San Marcos earlier in the week to find something equivalent. That was not based on a “Buy American” philosophy since I know much of Green Thumb’s pottery is sourced from Vietnam, or so the stickers say. It was my lack of patience at work. Imagine being too impatient to await an Amazon delivery that can be tracked step-by-step? But Green Thumb had nothing like what I wanted and China, assisted by Amazon (fully paid for its services, I am sure) stood ready to deliver next day…even at 10pm. What about this picture is King Donald trying to fix? Amazon is one of the Mag-7 tech giants that has boosted the U.S. markets to the stratosphere and done it while enabling small business and serving Americans day and night. It’s not manufacturing and it’s not in the trade balance, but it’s profitable services are too subtle for King Donald to appreciate (perhaps due to the Bezos WAPO connection).
In the days of Master and Commander, war was waged with cannon and saber. But even then, the basis of war was booty. Today, war is fought with drones and tariffs. King Donald just declared war on China and wants us all to think it’s justified because they have sucked our trade balance dry as a coco mat. Anyone who has ever done business with China knows they just want to come into the modern world by working hard and making shit people like us want to buy and can’t find over here. We can either live without coco mat planters or we can accept that our prosperity and amazing infrastructure, as exemplified by the Amazon Prime way of life, make buying from China a good thing that keeps us and the world of commerce humming.
Meanwhile King Donald sits in his captain’s quarters with his band of filthy billionaire officers, measuring grub worms on their plates. I’m sure one of them will offer to eat one of the grub worms first a dollar, just like they did when they were kids. They are also undoubtedly betting that attacking China rather than the rest of the world will be perceived by the electorate as choosing the lesser of two weavils.