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Richard Wolff on Trump’s Tariffs: “It’s a Crock!”
The economist explains what's wrong with Trump's aggressive policy, why the reversal may be even worse, and answers: Are we headed for recession?
April 11, 2025
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In a week of market turmoil, we need a real expert to explain WTF is going on with Trump, tariffs, reversals, and crashes. So we’re talking to Useful Idiot-favorite, economist Richard Wolff, who sheds light on a tumultuous week and gives a fascinating lecture on what Trump should be doing to save the economy, and why he won’t.

Useful Idiots: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent just gave a speech saying ‘yes, the market is tumbling, but too bad, Wall Street. It's not your turn. This is the era of Main Street.’ This is the Trump administration's message now: The stock market has taken a huge hit, but that's because we're focused on restoring Main Street. How do you respond to that?

Richard Wolff: This is all advertising noise. It has nothing to do with anything. The reason that Wall Street is yelling is that they don't want to be pinched. They're perfectly happy to have Mr. Trump do most of the things he wants to do. But they don't want to pay even this much of a fee for the benefits.

Let me give you an example. When Mr. Trump was president the first time, the only basic economic achievement was the tax cut of 2017, an enormous tax cut given to corporations and the rich. The thirty years before 2017 were an enormous and unprecedented redistribution of wealth and income from the bottom and the middle to the top. If ever you didn't need a tax cut for those people, it was then.

The only opposition to it that the Democrats could achieve was a sunset. It would expire this year, 2025. And so Mr. Trump has an urgent need, which all of Wall Street understands. He can't allow that to happen because they would all blame him.

So that's what he's about to do. And the major way he thinks he can do that is by savaging public employment through all the firings, and by income from tariffs. I want people to understand this means that the Republican Party, which for a hundred years has branded itself the anti-tax party, has overnight become the mammoth tax-imposing economy, because a tariff is just a tax. And so what they're achieving is huge increase in taxes and firing large numbers of public employees. That's what it's about. The Main Street/Wall Street nonsense is pure fluff and shouldn't detract anyone from the underlying realities.

Useful Idiots: Trump announced [on Wednesday] that he’s authorized a 90-day pause and a substantially lowered reciprocal tariff of 10% during that period. Help us make sense of what he’s doing here.

Richard Wolff: I'm mystified. In my wildest imagination. Since I've just explained about uncertainty – I'm blown away – it's just incredible what he's doing. It’s beyond anything I can give you a rational answer for because this is no longer a rational behavior pattern.

Useful Idiots: ‘Incredible’ like incredibly stupid?

Richard Wolff: Yeah incredibly self-defeating. It undercuts any calculation. Even Jamie Dimon said that the uncertainty is the issue. This is just revving up uncertainty by cutting it down, making it not effective for ninety days. Everybody has to wonder: what happens at the end of ninety days? Another thirty days? Another twelve? I mean, this is beyond words.

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Subscribe to watch or listen to for the full interview with Professor Richard Wolff where he gives his prediction for the future of the US empire, the rise of BRICS, and answers the question: are we headed for a recession?

Plus, catch this week’s Thursday Throwdown: Fox News Reluctantly Criticizes Trump’s Tariff "Capitulation"

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Sanctions Are a Form of Warfare

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

But if you read corporate media outlets like the New York Times or Washington Post, you’d find a much different story. Both papers this week published headlines that were hastily changed when they realized they were being a little too truthful. See if you can tell the difference:

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"Shameful" New York Times Changes Headline to Protect Sanctions

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

But if you read corporate media outlets like the New York Times or Washington Post, you’d find a much different story. Both papers this week published headlines that were hastily changed when they realized they were being a little too truthful. See if you can tell the difference:

The ...

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Free preview: Matt Taibbi Exposes Russiagate Bots

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Good to be part of the community. I think that Aaron and Katie do a brilliant job in these hellish times when such great in - depth research and reporting are essential.

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Even Hillary Clinton is Turning On Israel
After Trump makes tentative peace with Iran, the walls crumble around Israel and Netanyahu

When you’ve even got arch-Zionist Hillary Clinton making fun of you and throwing you under the bus, the ride is over.

This week marked a historic moment as Trump finally struck a peace deal with Iran in which the US gives up a whole lot more than it gets in an apparent admission of losing the war they started. But somehow even more striking has been the turn against Israel.

After weeks of rumors that Trump’s relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu has become tumultuous, JD Vance came out and said what the admin’s clearly been thinking.

“You have seen people within Bibi’s cabinet who have come out and attacked the deal and in some ways very personally attacked the President of the United States. My message to them would be twofold.

Number 1: If I was in the Israeli cabinet, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have left anywhere in the entire world.

Number 2: What is your exact proposal? You’re a country of 9 million people. You can’t just kill your way out of solving every single national security problem that you have.”

And after Vance shocked Israel and the world with this statement, other former Israel cronies followed suit. Even Hillary Clinton.

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Trump Accidentally Tells Iran He's Secretly Stealing Their Oil
Plus, a grown adult congressman pretends to be on the phone to avoid a question (and gets caught)

“Are you concerned, Mr. President, about the latest inflation number which came out this morning?”

A simple enough question from a reporter unravels Trump into first ripping off a line on inflation that is now haunting every Republican member of Congress in press conferences, and then into a somehow worse slip of international piracy secrets.

“No, I love it, the numbers were great,” Trump says. “You know what I really love? I love inflation. You know why? Because as soon as this war is over, you know I can say it now… something you didn’t know…”

At this point you can see in his eyes that he considers the moment. It’s not too late to stop himself, but the thrill of spilling is too good.

“Did you know we’ve been taking out millions of barrels of oil? Nobody knows it. You know who doesn’t know about it? Iran.” He thinks quick. “Until right now.”

And the fallout’s been immediate. Mike Johnson and Republican congresspeople all the way down are being forced to dodge questions from reporters about why Trump loves inflation (we watch one guy embarrassingly get caught faking a phone call while running away). And even worse for the MAGA camp, Energy Secretary Chris Wright got blasted in Congress when pressed on whether he was aware that the US has been illegally stealing millions of barrels of oil from Iran:

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The Most Antisemitic Event of the Year? Watch the American Jewish Committee's Global Forum With Us!
Plus, former Biden and Obama official Brett McGurk wants you to "put aside the horrors of Gaza" for a while...

Subscribe to support Useful Idiots and watch our Friday Free-for-All:

Did you know that Congress is working on a new plan to “distance” the US-Israeli relationship by slowing US aid to Israel and replace it with a “financial partnership”? A partnership which has the power to not only increase the amount of money and weapons the US sends to Israel but also future-proof it from being dismantled by future presidents and lawmakers?

And do you know who invented this plan that allows members of Congress to become more independent from Israel?

Let the words of GOP Rep. Marlin Stutzman speaking on CNN enlighten us all: “This was actually something that came from Prime Minister Netanyahu.”

This, and a whole slew of other remarks that will make your skin crawl were topics of what many people are calling the antisemitic events of the year! The American Jewish Committee’s Global Forum, where Zionists gave speeches on and cheered for things that, if we had said them, would get us immediately kicked off YouTube for being antisemitic.

From bragging that the “Jewish coalition” spent five million dollars to oust Thomas Massie and control US elections, to explaining that Jews can now use AI to “manage and control” social media content, to laughter at John Fetterman’s celebration of Israel’s pager attacks in Lebanon that killed and blinded children and civilians, it was one antisemitic trope after another.

And no condemnations from the Fraudfather over at the ADL yet…

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