Ahead of another terrible day for international trading markets (and a “Black Monday” for US Markets) and the dollar’s value, there had been some hope that President Trump might reverse course on his tariffs. Or at the very least, some vocal supporters suggested that he tap the brakes (more on that below). However, at this moment, all the signals he is sending suggest it’s full steam ahead. This morning he posted the following to his Truth Social account:
Oil prices are down, interest rates are down (the slow moving Fed should cut rates!), food prices are down, there is NO INFLATION, and the long time abused USA is bringing in Billions of Dollars a week from the abusing countries on Tariffs that are already in place. This is despite the fact that the biggest abuser of them all, China, whose markets are crashing, just raised its Tariffs by 34%, on top of its long term ridiculously high Tariffs (Plus!), not acknowledging my warning for abusing countries not to retaliate. They’ve made enough, for decades, taking advantage of the Good OL’ USA! Our past “leaders” are to blame for allowing this, and so much else, to happen to our Country. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! Donald Trump Truth Social 04/07/25 06:49 AM [source]
Unless he blinks, which seems increasingly unlikely, we’re in for another wild ride today. So, I wanted to survey how Trump apologists are coping with this news. Like most human experiences, there’s a range of reactions.
Cope 1: The Full Circle
People often suggest that when you go far enough to one side, you end up on the other. Paid Russian stooge Tim Pool is an excellent example of this. The “dissolusioned liberal” has been a popular voice on the Alt Right for quite a while. His take: the President has done us a service by doing what the Left could not:
Personal wealth accumulation appears to now be “bad” on the Right. Weird that simultaneously the Trump administration is pushing for upper bracket tax cuts on individual wealth.
Cope 2. The 180
For those not ready to go full Pool, there’s the idea that it’s time to deal with temporary inconvenience to reach a bright future. Also, there’s a hint of “personal wealth accumulation is bad” in this too:
What makes this a 180 is that folks like Johnson spent the last few years complaining about the loss of… wait for it… money through inflation under the Biden administration. See this example of a post from Johnson from just a few months ago:
Or even further back where he was using high prices to… sell gold:
BTW, it’s now estimated that if all the tariffs stay at the promised rates they will lower a middle-income household’s family’s post-tax income any where from $1,700 to $3,800 a year (most likely more if they need to buy a major household appliance or car).
Ben Dreyfuss sums up the conflict at the heart of all 180’s really well in this x/eet:
Or, for my fellow ADHD travellers, here’s that in meme version:
Cope 3. The “Cmon”
As we have seen in comments here at OTB and other places, some folks are trying to use Bidenisms to not address criticsm:
’nuff said.
Cope 4. The Hedge
In this case, you acknowledge that things could go wrong (though defining “wrong” in the most extreme way possible) while hoping things go right. This allows you to say “I never said this WOULD work. I said it COULD work! And at least he did something….” See this x/eet from a noted racist and sexist err… I mean nativist galaxy brain.
Cope 5. The “I’ve lost control of my monster but maybe I can talk it down”
It’s pretty self-explanatory, and it’s something to watch its sub-phases play out across a range of x/eets and steps. In this case, we’ll go to one of Trump’s biggest fans from the world of finance (and in particular investments), Bill Ackman.
Step 1 is reasoning (Friday afternoon):
One would have to imagine that President @realDonaldTrump’s phone has been ringing off the hook. The practical reality is that there is insufficient time for him to make deals before the tariffs are scheduled to take effect.
I would therefore not be surprised to wake up Monday with an announcement from the President that he was postponing the implementation of the tariffs to give him time to make deals. President Trump has gotten the world’s and our trading partners’ attention and elevated the importance of resolving an unfair tariff regime that has harmed American workers and decimated our industrial base over many decades.
This is a critically important issue that needs to be resolved, and we finally have a president committed to getting this done. The problem, however, can’t be resolved in days, so why wouldn’t a pause make sense to give the president time to properly resolve this critical issue and to allow companies large and small the time to prepare for changes in their supply chains?
The risk of not doing so is that the massive increase in uncertainty drives the economy into a recession, potentially a severe one. One thing is for sure. Monday will be one of the more interesting days in our country’s economic history. [source]
This features a great mix of both praise (that the president is tackling an important issue) and reasoning (the timeline is too soon). Who set those timelines, Bill?
Step 2 is pleading mixed with praise and hedging (Sunday Afternoon):
The country is 100% behind the president on fixing a global system of tariffs that has disadvantaged the country. But, business is a confidence game and confidence depends on trust.
President @realDonaldTrump has elevated the tariff issue to the most important geopolitical issue in the world, and he has gotten everyone’s attention. So far, so good.
And yes, other nations have taken advantage of the U.S. by protecting their home industries at the expense of millions of our jobs and economic growth in our country.
But, by placing massive and disproportionate tariffs on our friends and our enemies alike and thereby launching a global economic war against the whole world at once, we are in the process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner, as a place to do business, and as a market to invest capital.
The president has an opportunity to call a 90-day time out, negotiate and resolve unfair asymmetric tariff deals, and induce trillions of dollars of new investment in our country.
If, on the other hand, on April 9th we launch economic nuclear war on every country in the world, business investment will grind to a halt, consumers will close their wallets and pocket books, and we will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate.
What CEO and what board of directors will be comfortable making large, long-term, economic commitments in our country in the middle of an economic nuclear war?
I don’t know of one who will do so.
When markets crash, new investment stops, consumers stop spending money, and businesses have no choice but to curtail investment and fire workers.
And it is not just the big companies that will suffer. Small and medium size businesses and entrepreneurs will experience much greater pain. Almost no business can pass through an overnight massive increase in costs to their customers. And that’s true even if they have no debt, and, unfortunately, there is a massive amount of leverage in the system.
Business is a confidence game. The president is losing the confidence of business leaders around the globe. The consequences for our country and the millions of our citizens who have supported the president — in particular low-income consumers who are already under a huge amount of economic stress — are going to be severely negative. This is not what we voted for.
The President has an opportunity on Monday to call a time out and have the time to execute on fixing an unfair tariff system.
Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down. May cooler heads prevail. [source]
He’s suddenly realizing that despite his praise (we’re 100% behind you Mr Trump) he doesn’t have control over this particular monster.
Stage 3: Find someone to blame (Sunday Night).
Remember Trump cannot fail, he can only be failed. So this has to be someone else’s fault.
Stage 4: Get a call from the White House (Monday morning).
It was unfair of me to lash out at @howardlutnick. I don’t think he is pursuing his self interest. I am sure he is doing the best he can for the country while representing the President as Commerce Secretary. It is not an easy job and we don’t know how the sausage was made.
I am just frustrated watching what I believe to be a major policy error occur after our country and the president have been making huge economic progress that is now at risk due to the tariffs.
I would love to be proven wrong and watch this approach to tariffs and/or their resolution be enormously beneficial to our country and the global economy. [source]
Again, ’nuff said on this one.
Stage 5: Sad acceptance while emphasizing that Trump cannot fail, he can only be failed (Monday morning).
The formula used by the administration to calculate tariffs made other nations’ tariffs appear four times larger than they actually are.
President @realDonaldTrump is not an economist and therefore relies on his advisors to do these calculations so he can determine policy.
The global economy is being taken down because of bad math.
This short piece by @AEIexplains it succinctly. A must read. https://www.aei.org/economics/president-trumps-tariff-formula-makes-no-economic-sense-its-also-based-on-an-error/
The President’s advisors need to acknowledge their error before April 9th and make a course correction before the President makes a big mistake based on bad math. [source]
As with the first term, it’s always the advisors who are at fault, not the guy that hired them. Funny how that works.
Cope 6: The dip until things get better
Not buy the dip mind you–just ghost your online presence. There’s the subtle way–see for example Elon Musk’s lack of engagement on this topic other than starting a flame war with Peter Navaro. Or just fully disappear like our own resident apologists. Let me be clear that I’m not asking them to post defenses (because we know they already don’t have any).
I realized that some folks hope they’ve given up. Based on previous history, I just can’t believe that. I expect that when things turn around, they will be back to pwn us libs. Here’s hoping they at least have the good grace to adopt new names to claim they never supported Trump or the tariffs and how things would have been economically worse under Harris.
Cope 7: Hear what you want to hear and disregard the rest (h/t to Paul Simon)
The final cope is best exemplified by the X/tter account Thomas Sowell Quotes, @ThomasSowell. The account announces: I’m not Thomas Sowell, but I share his quotes and key topics in news & politics. There is you’ll note a major key topic in news and politics at the moment: the tariffs. So of course he’ll go to a noted conservative academic for their thoughts… right?
Oh… huh. It’s not like Thomas Sowell has publicly discussed Trump’s current tariff plans in the last few days, right?
Weird… Browsing the feed, I see recent quotes from Sowell on race- and gender-based issues, not to mention why we all should be anti-union, but somehow, nothing about tariffs (or other economic topics). It’s weird how that works.
Whelp, that’s all we have for Trump apologists. As far as the rest of us, beyond sadness, at the moment our best copium is Black Humor, hence this post and one last X/eet from Stock Broker Eddy Elfenbein:
Stay safe out there y’all!
Update: I also need to acknowledge Trump’s own strategy for coping–negging his supporters. He posted this 30 minutes into the market crash:
Also, I’m sure everyone will be relieved to know that during this market crash, he has his eyes on the prize:
EXCITING!!!
Also those hopes of moderation that caused a momentary rally? Nope. Not happening:
(Yes, I will write about how a blue check social media post just caused a dead cat bounce… eventually).
