The trade war begins... then pauses (02-03-2025--Hour1)

[00:00:04] What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to 3 on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to thepetekalendershow.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support. Don't mess with me, Porkchop. What day is this?

[00:00:32] It's February 2nd. Groundhog Day. It's actually not Groundhog Day. That was February 2nd. It was, yeah, it was the weekend. And apparently we're going to get more winter, if you believe the oversized rodents prediction, which I do not. But I do support going out and watching the movie Groundhog Day because it is such a fantastic movie, a very philosophical movie.

[00:00:59] I'm a big fan. So if you haven't seen Groundhog Day, go check it out. If you haven't seen it in a while, you should see it again. It's a really good movie. And again, a very philosophically deep movie and funny too. All right. So is everybody enjoying the new trade war? How's it? How's everybody surviving? Right? Have you stocked up on avocados and tequila and Canadian Club?

[00:01:27] Nobody stocks up on Canadian Club. No, I'm kidding. But not really. I guess maybe some people do. Canadians, probably that are living here. But I am curious in all of the North American trade war. I'm curious, why are they getting hit with higher tariffs than China? What's the deal with that?

[00:01:57] You know, just separate from the question of are tariffs good or bad? My view is that they are generally not good. I understand. I understand it's a negotiation tactic, Pete. You don't understand the president's at 70 dimensional chess level. I get it. I understand the art. Well, I know the arguments that are made to, you know, support the tariffs that Trump is threatening all over the place.

[00:02:28] By the way, I don't believe those arguments when people make them to me because it always really always comes down to one thing, which is I trust Donald Trump. I believe that what he's doing is fantastic and then he will reverse course and that's all part of the plan. And you believe Donald Trump and that's that is your prerogative. You are free to do so. So I actually think that there's more to it than that. I mean, I understand the use of the tariffs.

[00:02:59] I understand the use of the tariffs. For leverage in a negotiation of some kind, I do understand that. I don't know if that's solely what they're being used for. And. And the only person that does is really Donald Trump. So anybody who says that they know that that's the purpose, like that's just an article of faith that you are taking and that, again, you are free to do so.

[00:03:30] I have much less trust in elected officials and why they do what they do and that sort of stuff. So, again, you're free to believe whatever you want to believe on this stuff. I do think, though, that Donald Trump's past as a lifelong Democrat. I think that is actually part of what's going on here as well.

[00:03:56] He came up during a time when the Democrat Party was a protectionist party for the labor unions and all of that. And so I think that kind of formed his thinking on the economics of tariffs.

[00:04:14] I've seen people say, oh, well, if you do all of the tariffs and then you you couple that with a wind down or elimination of income taxes, then we would be able to fund the government. And I understand, like, sure, show me the numbers on that. I would believe that to be possible. I don't know what the tariffs would need to be.

[00:04:40] I don't know all the countries you would need to slap them on and what products or whatever. But I'm open to the argument to see to see those figures. But here's the thing. Again, I am a resident of Realville, as Rush Limbaugh used to call it, and I don't see the income tax going away anytime soon. At the federal level, I don't see that happening. If it does happen then and we fund through tariffs.

[00:05:08] OK, like that would be a way to fund the government. Sure. Now, all of that being said, you know, Donald Trump has been using these things in order to or the threats of tariffs in order to get stuff that he wants out of these countries to get concessions. Are they big concessions? Not sure yet. I mean, I'm not sure what's going to shake out with the.

[00:05:32] With the Canadian situation, the Mexican situation seems pretty clear. Right. It's about securing that border. And right before we got on the air, they the Mexican government announced that they were going to send 10,000 troops to the U.S. border in order to to help stymie illegal immigration. And so Trump said he would be delaying the tariffs on Mexico, which he had said would be 25 percent.

[00:06:02] The Chinese tariffs are only 10 percent. Again, I'm not really clear why China gets a favorable deal like that when Canada gets a 25 percent tariff. But OK, whatever. So delay tariffs on Mexico for one month to allow for negotiations because the Mexicans have promised to send 10,000 troops to the border, which they already did.

[00:06:26] By the way, like I remember them saying that a couple of weeks back that they were going to be sending troops to the U.S. border to help control immigration. So I like I I'm not sure is this an additional 10,000? It didn't read like that when I read the statement. So it just seems like this is the same 10,000. Also, we are going to work on preventing the weapons trafficking back into Mexico.

[00:06:54] That was one of the the concessions, if you will, that Trump gave to the Mexicans, which if you're Mexico and you see all of these firearms coming into your country from across the border, they want that to stop. And so we should work with them to stop that. Absolutely. We should not allow arms smuggling to go across the border into Mexico. So I agree with with with Trump agreeing to that, quote, concession, if you will.

[00:07:24] There is also an idea that that this is simply a marketing effort. That you you make the demands, you get some kind of, quote, concession, something that the Mexicans were already interested in doing when Trump was coming in anyway, you know, put the troops on the border.

[00:07:48] And then you give Trump the win, quote unquote, and then he gets to market himself as. You know, making this great deal. So there's that component going on again. You don't have to pick one of these things as the reason or the objective. You can you can believe that there are multiple things occurring at the same time, that there are different benefits.

[00:08:17] For example, for the Canadian one, I don't see anybody talking about this or hear anybody talking about this, which is that the, you know, Justin Trudeau up there, you know, resigned and the liberal party that's in control. Like they suspended parliament there. They're there like out of session. So they're not equipped to be responding very quickly to any of this because their government is a wreck because of Trudeau. And there's been this guy. What's his name?

[00:08:43] Pierre Polly, they are probably, they do something or other. And very impressive guy. Conservative Party. And when Trudeau, I should say before Trudeau announced his resignation. This guy, the conservative opponent to Trudeau, he was doing well in the polls. The Conservative Party was was tacking up in the polls. He was he was gaining a lot of momentum.

[00:09:12] And when Trudeau resigned, his support now has been Paul of his support has been declining. And so there is an opportunity for him to actually turn this to his advantage for internal politics. You always got to keep in mind, right? Like there's the international stage and we're looking at the international stuff. Sure. And we're focused because we're Americans. We don't believe anybody else exists. It's our birthright. Right. And so like we're like focused on our internal politics.

[00:09:41] But these other countries have their internal politics as well. Marco Rubio talked about this before he went down to Panama, which, by the way, turned into a very good deal for us. And I would submit for Panama as well. Not so good for the Chinese, which Crimea River commies worked out a great deal with the Panamanians. So there are again, I just caution against the false choices.

[00:10:08] The binary choices that, oh, it's either this or it's that. And that's it. It's not it. There are a lot of different moving parts to all of this. And now at least we have Trump acknowledging that prices will go up. Tariffs are inflationary. Prices are going to go up. But here's the thing. We're just looking at it from our side. Yes, it's going to go up for us. It's going to be painful for us. But it's also going to be painful for the other countries. Right. They have to deal with that, too. This is why you want to avoid trade wars.

[00:10:36] And by the way, sometimes trade wars turn into shooting wars. So you want to watch out for that, too. All right. I hope you had a happy holiday season. But tell me if something like this happened at your house. Your family and friends are gathered around. Maybe y'all are in the living room. You're laughing, swapping stories, reminiscing. And then somebody says, hey, dad, remember those old VHS tapes? Did you ever get them transferred? And then the room gets all quiet. All eyes are on dad who says, oh, you know, well, I've been meaning to.

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[00:11:29] And next year, instead of talking about those memories, imagine gathering the family to watch them together. Talk about a memorable gift. So do what I did. Trust the experts at Create a Video, conveniently located in Mint Hill, right off I-485, and online at createavideo.com. So Donald Trump put out a social, a tweet or something, whatever. A comment, 741 a.m.

[00:11:56] Quote, I just spoke with President Claudia Scheinbaum of Mexico. He didn't write this. He didn't write. I know, you know how I know he didn't write this? There are not randomly words capitalized. You know? And he didn't call her some name. Anyway, I just spoke with President Claudia Scheinbaum of Mexico. It was a very friendly conversation wherein she agreed to immediately supply 10,000 Mexican soldiers. Oh, no, wait.

[00:12:26] Soldiers is capitalized. And border soldiers. So, okay, maybe he did write it. Separating Mexico and the United States. These soldiers will be specifically designated to stop the flow of fentanyl and illegal migrants into our country. Country capitalized. We further agreed to immediately pause the anticipated tariffs for a one-month period, during which we will have negotiations headed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Treasury Scott Besant, and Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnik, and high-level representatives of Mexico.

[00:12:55] I look forward to participating in those negotiations with President Scheinbaum as we attempt to achieve a deal between our two countries. Hey, do you remember the USMCA? Remember that thing? It replaced NAFTA. Remember? It was like the best deal ever. Remember? Jim Garrity writing at National Review. He said, Up until now, imports from Canada and Mexico largely entered the US market either duty-free,

[00:13:25] so no tariffs, or at average, ad valorem. In other words, in proportion to the estimated value of the goods or the transaction involved. Tariff rates less than 1%. This was arranged under the US-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement, the USMCTA, or the USMCA, which Trump signed into law on January 29th, 2020, and that he touted as the largest, most significant... Wait a minute.

[00:13:57] Well, he couldn't have signed it into law on January 29th, 2020. I thought it was before that, because he was gone by the 20th of 2020. Anyway, he called it the largest, most significant, modern, and balanced trade agreement in history. All of our countries will benefit greatly. One of the advantages was its clarity and policy certainty. It ran 301 pages, it laid out the US tariffs on thousands of different kinds of goods, and they were all set at zero.

[00:14:27] With the new tariffs, Trump has violated the treaty that he signed into law, a treaty that his White House called a, quote, tremendous victory for American workers, farmers, manufacturers, and businesses alike. But again, there's a one-month pause now. At least for the Mexican side. Back in 2018, Peter Navarro, then President Trump's National Trade Council director, confidently assured Fox Business Network's Maria Bartiromo

[00:14:57] that no country would retaliate against American tariffs on their goods. He said, I don't believe any country in the world is going to retaliate for the simple reason that we are the most lucrative and biggest market in the world. They know they're cheating us, and all we're doing is standing up for ourselves. End quote. Jim Garrity at National Review says, this might shock you, but it turns out that other countries' leaders don't believe that they are cheating us, and that we're just standing up for ourselves.

[00:15:26] They think the new administration just picked a needless fight. They think the administration is breaking its promises, and they think that the Trump administration has set everybody up for economic disruption and higher prices on goods and energy, and retaliation came swift and hard. The Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, announced plans to impose 25% tariffs against $155 billion worth of American goods.

[00:15:54] Like the American tariffs, our response will also be far-reaching and include everyday items like American beer, wine, bourbon, fruits and fruit juices, including orange juice, along with vegetables, perfume, clothing, and shoes. To me, the big news there is that we actually make all that stuff still? That's impressive. I did not realize that we were still making that stuff, and exporting it, too? That is amazing. I mean, well, orange juice. I did know that. And bourbon.

[00:16:24] I did know, and, okay, American beer. I did know, yeah, I did know that. That does make sense. But perfume? That's interesting. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina just to quick drive up the mountain? And Cabins of Asheville is your connection. Whether you're celebrating an anniversary, a honeymoon, maybe you want to plan a memorable proposal, or get family and friends together for a big ol' reunion, Cabins of Asheville has the ideal spot for you

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[00:17:23] choose from 13 cabins, six cottages, two villas, and a great lodge with 11 king-sized bedrooms, Cabins of Asheville has the ideal spot for you for any occasion. And they have pet-friendly accommodations. Call or text 828-367-7068. Or check out all there is to offer at cabinsofashville.com and make memories that'll last a lifetime. A couple of messages here to Pete at thepetecalendarshow.com. This from Tom, who says,

[00:17:53] Pete, I forget the economist who said it, but the quote is something like, if goods don't cross borders, armies will. Yes, that is always a concern when you start ratcheting up pressure like this. You know, trade wars can lead to shooting wars. Mike in Mineral Springs says, correct me if I'm wrong, but during his first term, didn't Trump levy a 25% tariff on goods imported from China

[00:18:22] with negotiated loophole cutouts for companies like Apple, which President Biden, in one of his rare lucid moments, left in place throughout his term. So if that's true, the 10% new tariff is being added on top of the existing 25% tariff on goods imported from China. Love your show. I do recall that he did slap them with tariffs and Biden did not remove them. I do know that that occurred. So maybe that explains why the 10% is only 10%,

[00:18:49] but to our neighbors and ally of Canada, it's 25%. By the way, there is a quote here from an economist, prominent economist, mind a year ago said, the tariff gun will always be loaded and on the table, but rarely discharged. Of course, strategic and national security issues around China will remain. Another differentiated view that we have is that Trump will pursue a weak dollar policy

[00:19:19] rather than implementing tariffs. Tariffs are inflationary and would strengthen the dollar. Hardly a good starting point for a U.S. industrial renaissance. The economist who said that, Scott Besant, Trump's Secretary of Treasury. There is also, by the way, there is something here. Have you heard? I was not aware

[00:19:45] of this tariff mechanism. It's called the de minimis. Yeah, the de minimis tariff loophole. So, the vape company, Juul, J-U-U-L, they put out a statement today that said, you know, an American technology and innovation company commends Trump's efforts to protect American citizens through increased enforcement of trade laws

[00:20:15] and border security. This includes closing the so-called de minimis tariff loophole, which allows Chinese exporters to smuggle products into the U.S. with scant oversight or inspection. Over the past four years, criminals have used smugglers' tactics to exploit this loophole and flood the U.S. with illegal Chinese vapor products, which now account for approximately 70% of the market. This key provision of the America First trade agenda empowers our

[00:20:44] law enforcement agencies to stop the flow of illegal Chinese vapor products and further secure our border. So this, as I understand it, something like anything less than $800 is allowed in or something, and so China has created, like China specializes in black markets. Like this is what they are really good at doing, is figuring out ways to get around all of your rules and laws so they can get their garbage into your country. And so

[00:21:15] they've been exploiting this de minimis loophole with vape products, which people inhale. I'm not sure you're aware of how that works. It's like a, it's a nicotine substitute and, like, I find it odd, like, also that Juul, recall, they got, like the, I think it was the FDA under maybe Biden, somebody slapped them down and said, you can't have these flavored products. So Juul, I think, had created

[00:21:45] the, like, the product, the vape thing, like the market was created by Juul, an American company, and they had these different flavor vapes and they got smacked down so they can only offer, like, menthol and tobacco flavor. And, because all the other ones are, you know, they're trying to entice kids to vaping. Meanwhile, the Chinese are flooding the market. Check out behind the gas station counter. Next time you're in a gas station counter, at the counter, take a look behind.

[00:22:15] And see all the different vape products that are up there. Those are all not Juul. So, yeah, they're exploiting the loophole. Much like they exploit other countries with their Belt and Road Initiative, which Panama had signed on to. And now, they're looking to get rid of it. After a visit by Marco Rubio, our new Secretary of State, and the threat of massive tariffs

[00:22:44] against Panama over the way Panama is treating American companies through the Panama Canal, which, I always find it important to point this out, as President Trump does as well, Americans built that. America built it. Paid for it. Built it. It cost tens of thousands of lives. People died like crazy building the Panama Canal. And if you don't know what the Panama Canal is, let's just say it connects us to like half the planet.

[00:23:14] Because before, because it's one big landmass, like from the top of Canada all the way down to the bottom of South America. And so by cutting, through Panama, we got a waterway that allowed us to save weeks of travel time for our ships. And that includes our military. They don't have to go all the way down around South America. They could just cut in half. Now, I'm not aware if the fear

[00:23:44] has ever materialized that like cutting it in half would mean like the bottom half of South America would just kind of drift off and like go down to Antarctica. I'm not aware of that ever happening. But yeah, we just, we cut right through it. And we owned it. And then Jimmy Carter gave it back. Sorry. sold it back for one crisp, clean American dollar. One dollar. Gave it back. And Panama

[00:24:14] has been bending the knee to the Chinese because the Chinese see this as a very important strategic funnel point. And they are, it's a choke point. And they are correct. They are absolutely correct. Which is why America, and apparently Donald Trump, the only president to realize this, should value its importance as well. So Panamanian President Jose Raul Molino said his country would not renew

[00:24:44] its agreement with China's Belt and Road Initiative. You'll hear it referred to as BRI or BRI as I call it. Following a visit from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a move that'll make it the first Latin American country to leave the BRI initiative, the Belt and Road Initiative. Molino, speaking to reporters yesterday after Rubio's first foreign trip as America's top diplomat, said he believes the agreement is due for renewal

[00:25:13] in a year or two. I'm not really sure. Well, I haven't checked the paperwork on that thing. Yeah, when does that expire? I'll have to go back and go through my desk drawer and find it. But he says it should expire. He said he would study whether it can be finished earlier or not. The news is a blow to Beijing, which views Panama as critical to its foreign influence efforts in the Western Hemisphere. Chinese businesses operate ports near the Panama Canal,

[00:25:43] which the United States owned and operated until moving control to Panama in 1999. Brazil also considered joining the Belt and Road Initiative late last year, signaling a desire to align with the Chinese Communist Party. The country abandoned those plans soon after, however, with officials expressing fear about signing long-term agreements with Beijing. Which is, that is wise because as communists, we all know commies lie.

[00:26:12] all right, if you're listening to this show, you know I try to keep up with all sorts of current events and I know you do too and you've probably heard me say, get your news from multiple sources. Why? Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with Ground News. It's an app and it's a website and it combines news from around the world in one place so you can compare coverage and verify information. You can check it out at check.ground.news slash Pete. I put the link

[00:26:42] in the podcast description too. I started using Ground News a few months ago and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The blind spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself check.ground.news slash Pete. Subscribe through that link and you'll get 15% off any subscribers I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only

[00:27:11] helps my podcast but it also supports Ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. Russ sends in a tweet or a message on the Twitter machine who says he re-watched Groundhog Day last night and he totally had forgotten the scenes where Phil does so much to prevent the death of the homeless guy. I have heard the movie depicts 38 days but he actually spends 10 years repeating that day. I wrote him back and I said I remember reading and I

[00:27:40] did not get the stuff because technically today isn't Groundhog Day but I've got a bunch of analyses of that movie and I recall one of them saying that it was like a thousand years that the movie actually takes place so he relives that one day like in this purgatory reliving the one day to learn the purpose of life basically and it could have been a thousand years.

[00:28:09] Anyway, so and then as a giver, Russ says you only ask one thing of us every day, don't break anything while you're gone. Based on the last several weeks, I think we all need a refresher on what that means. Yes. They all are incorrigible. Let me see here, this is from Good Wahoo. My understanding is Trump initiated tariffs of 10% on China because Trump already put tariffs on China in the first term and they are still in place. Biden kept

[00:28:39] them also from a practical sense, believe as we have such a huge trade deficit with China relative to Canada and Mexico, so 10% brings in just as much and actually probably more, also less impact on consumers as so many things are made in China. And then I had another message from Timoteo. Who said, considering China uses a lot of slave labor, there should be such a high profit margin that they can lower their prices 10% to continue selling in the U.S. with no change in prices for the U.S. consumer.

[00:29:08] It just depends on how much they want the business. Also, I'm not jumping on the commie bandwagon, but Trump enjoys occasional divergence from the truth as well. Yes, that's true. When I say commies lie, though, I mean, it is fundamental. The entire philosophy is based on lies. So, like, everything about it is deception. And so, that's why I say the rule number one of communism is commies lie.

[00:29:38] You can never trust anything that they say, nor should you. Steve says that apparently avocados will now, henceforth, be called americados. That's regarding China. Saw this story over the weekend. A medical device used in hospitals has been found hosting a backdoor.

[00:30:08] This is software lingo. Paving the way for an unauthorized user to remotely control and tamper with equipment. equipment. So, this is the stuff, this is the monitor that, like, when you're in the hospital and you're hooked up to the machines, this is the monitor. And so, it is, it has been found to have a, quote, backdoor and data and even control of the machine itself

[00:30:39] has been affected. So, like, the data has been going out from these machines. The threat was discovered in three different versions, firmware versions, for a patient monitor called the Context CMS8000, also sold as the Epsomed MN120, which can display a user's vitals, including heart rate. No, including heart rate, sorry. According to an advisory from

[00:31:09] the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CESA, which is weird because I thought, like, their main mission was, to just spy on and then get shadow banned conservatives on Facebook. I thought that was the system that was spending all their time doing. The equipment from China-based Contech Medical Systems was mysteriously configured to connect to an IP address for a third-party university with no connection

[00:31:38] to the manufacturer. They have not named the university. So, some university, some place, I don't know if it's an American university or foreign or what, but this university has the IP address and it's going to them. The backdoor enables the IP address at the unnamed university to remotely download and execute unverified files on the patient monitor. In addition, the same backdoor automatically sends

[00:32:08] patient data to the IP address. quote, this is from an advisory from the FDA. Once the patient monitor is connected to the internet, it begins gathering patient data including personally identifiable information or PII or as I call it, PI, as well as protected health information or PHI, as I call it, PHI. So, PII and PHI.

[00:32:38] They also exfiltrate or withdraw the data outside of the healthcare delivery environment. It's unclear why the third-party university was not named, but CISA learned of the backdoor when an unnamed security researcher tipped them off. The agency then tested the three firmware versions and noticed the anomalous network traffic which the security researcher had flagged and CISA concluded the backdoor was not a legitimate way

[00:33:08] to use the patient monitor. When the function is executed, CISA says, files on the device are forcibly overwritten preventing the end customer, like the hospital, from maintaining awareness of what software is running on the device. So they can actually put stuff into the device too. So think if you're a high-value target, let's say. Federal agencies are advising healthcare providers to prevent the patient monitors from connecting to the internet at all.

[00:33:37] So unplug any ethernet cables or disable the wireless connections. So the patient vital signs are only observed by a caregiver or healthcare provider in the physical presence of a patient. But yes, let's keep trading with China. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast. So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also

[00:34:06] become a patron at my Patreon page or go to the Pete calendar show dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening and don't break anything while I'm gone.