Tariffs and Shipping

[tengineer1]

Ship owners were concerned about tariffs before. Now they can do some planning.
https://www.reuters.com/business/trumps-reciprocal-tariff-plan-amplifies-risk-ocean-shipping-chaos-executives-say-2025-04-02/

[ombugge]

How much pain can the US economy and consumers take before the Republicans turn on Trump, like they did on Nixon?

[ombugge]

Looks like small, or even unpopulated island, whether in the Arctic or Tropics, haven’t escaped the eagle eyes of Mr. Trump, his staffers and advisers:

What exactly Donald Trump has in mind when he Wednesday introduced a 10% tariff on the Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard is unclear.

The fuzzy question why Donald Trump imposes a 10% reciprocal tariff on Svalbard and Jan Mayen is unanswered. Screenshot from White House fact-sheet

The sub-Antarctic Australian external territory of Heard and McDonald islands, mostly populated by penguins, face a similar 10% tariff from Donald Trump like the Norwegian Arctic islands.

But they somehow managed to miss their newfound friends:

Two dictatorships in Europe are excluded from Trump’s global-hitting sweeping tariffs; Russia and Belarus.

Maybe dictatorships are “flavour of the day” and the aspiration of this administration?

Source: Trump slaps tariffs on Arctic islands with almost no export

PS> Apparently China is NOT favoured. Maybe not enough of a dictatorship to be in the good book with Trump?

[tengineer1]

@ombugge

How much pain can the US economy and consumers take before the Republicans turn on Trump, like they did on Nixon?

This people in the USA now are different from the ones in the Nixon era. They turned on Nixon when they found out he was a crook. The current crowd voted for a guy who tried to over throw the government. It’s a different USA now.

[Binbag_the_Saylore]

I am only surprised by the fact that Donald had actually heard of the Heard & McDonald rocks!

[ombugge]

Far from me to speculate about the future, but I think that:

• At first “everybody” will try their luck at flattering Trump to get favours and getting nothing by scorn in return.
• When the first shock is over “everybody” will realize that talking to Trump only makes him feel more self-important, invincible and like the “King of the World”.
• They will start talking to each other about a new world order without USA at the top.
• After some time a multi-polar world order will emerge, with China (as leader of the BRICS countries (- Russia), the EU countries (with UK, Norway, Turkey and possibly Canada as associated members) and maybe other groupings of countries (AU, ASEAN, MERCOSUR etc.) taking the lead in the world.
• The US$ will be replaced with a basket of currencies (Euro, RMB, Yen, £, SFr.>) as the major trading currency
• USA, (with Don jr. as dictator) MAY form a group with other dictatorships, like Russia, Belarus, Venezuela etc., or just try to go it alone in splendid isolation.

Impossible BS you say??, Well those who live long enough will see.

Someone else appears to see the same scenario (more or less):

Alternative front page:

From The Economist newsletter today: (For subscribers only]/q

Zanny Minton Beddoes
Editor-in-chief

Watching President Donald Trump’s Rose Garden performance yesterday, it was hard to believe what I was seeing: flawed economics, inaccurate history and cockamamie calculations used to justify the most wrong-headed and damaging policy decision in decades. Mr Trump’s “Liberation Day” was more like ruination day. Our cover leader in most of the world predicts that these mindless tariffs will cause chaos. Almost everything Mr Trump said this week—on history, economics and the technicalities of trade—was deluded. He has long glorified the high-tariff era of the late 19th century. In fact, it was the painstaking rounds of trade talks in the 80 years after the second world war that lowered tariffs and led to unprecedented global prosperity, including for America.

The country that created, and has gained mightily from, the global trade system is now trying to destroy it. The question for countries reeling from the president’s vandalism is how to limit the damage. We argue that they should focus on increasing trade flows among themselves, especially in the services that power the 21st-century economy. There is no avoiding the havoc Mr Trump has wrought, but that does not mean his foolishness is destined to triumph.

After I spent last week in China, it is even clearer just how crazy Mr Trump’s plan is. You might think that these are anxious times in the country that America sees as its main adversary. In fact, our reporting from Beijing reveals a very different picture. Our cover leader in Asia spies a big beautiful opportunity for Xi Jinping. It is true that China has come out badly from Mr Trump’s Rose Garden rant. The new total tariff level could reach around 65%—a blow to China’s economy.

But Mr Xi has been preparing for today’s chaotic world ever since becoming the country’s leader in 2012. His push for greater self-sufficiency means that China is now less vulnerable to America’s economic chokeholds. To grasp this opportunity, the Communist Party needs to stop persecuting the private sector. The economy will also need more stimulus to boost domestic consumption, and more determined efforts to stabilise a long-struggling property market. As America puts up walls, China has a chance to reset trade relations around the world. Whether it seizes the moment depends on one man: Mr Xi. But the fact the opportunity exists owes much to another: Mr Trump.

My next stop is Washington, DC, this weekend. Maybe I’ll find out if there is any method to the madness.

[ombugge]

He probably don’t know about the Norwegian dependencies of Svalbard and Jan Mayen either.
Somehow they have ended up on a list of countries and territories (from CIA?)

PS> Don’t know if Bouvetøya appears on the list as well. (It also belong to Norway):

Bouvetøya (Bouvet Island)

[Steamer]

@tengineer1

It’s a different USA now.

Considering how many of our main bearings have been either spun or wiped, chances are we are listening to the nation’s death rattle.

[Binbag_the_Saylore]

A better one than uninhabited penguin colonies…
BIOT - 10%
No, not the French town near Grasse - the British Indian Ocean Terr.
Otherwise known as Diego Garcia, exclusively populated by U.S. military.
I’m shocked, shocked, I tell you…

[bunker305]

About time a president put those Woke penguins in their place. All they do is teach DEI and CRT. They helped Hillary delete her emails, cover up Benghazi and her role in Pizzagate. They teamed up with Jugo Chavez’s ghost to steal the 2020 election, sold the laptop to Hunter Biden and are card carrying members of the Deep State. And their use of pronouns along with their obvious support of trans book readings in schools they should have known they had it coming.

[Binbag_the_Saylore]

He’s tryig to coerce the penguins into being his Greenland invasion/occupation force!

[jdcavo]

@ombugge

just try to go it alone in splendid isolation

I was going to commend you for the Warren Zevon reference and then realized it probably wasn’t that.