Because Donald Trump's stupid trade embargo has us reading shipping charts, we now know that 40% of containership traffic between Asia and the U.S. has been canceled. That means a shortage of consumer goods, which will push prices higher. At the same time, the business environment is too unpredictable for companies to plan. Meanwhile, Trump is reorienting the American economy to a corrupt oligarchy—as he rakes in billions in bribes off his crypto. Plus, Hegseth wants to clear out a chunk of the top brass, U.S. attorney nominee Ed Martin forgot to say he's been on Russian-state media outlets more than 150 times, and the DNC absolutely should not be posting about Kamala at the Met Gala. JVL joins Tim Miller. show notes HuffPost on the trucking company buying Trump's crypto coin The NYT on Trump family business deals JVL on the Ashli Babbitt payout NPR story on Trump voters in Emmitsburg, MD
Chapter 1: What economic challenges are we facing?
Rand Paul, God love him, is the only one that seems to... Mike Pence. Mike Pence is talking about it. We'll get back to Mike Pence. But I mean, of the current members of the party, they're all just going along with this. It's a little bit hyperbole because we have some kind of vestigial... capitalism still going, but like, that's what they're trying to reorient it towards.
You know, what's funny is there's, there's one outlier in all of this and that's crypto. Yeah. Right. And on, on crypto, uh, this administration wants to be way out into the future. Total deregulation. Total deregulation really unleashed the animal energies, right, of the animal spirits of the crypto, which of course is perfect because crypto is nothing, right?
It is, of course, Trump would be into crypto because crypto is just air. Like there is nothing there. It's hype. It's what he's good at. Right. Right. And there's no underlying value. And here's the thing, Tim, we're going to talk about corruption at some point. Yeah. It's easy to understand it through the lens of just naked corruption.
It's harder to understand at the level of just mass destruction of the American economy because that's coming.
The Berlusconi system would be understandable. I could tell Italy didn't thrive under it, but it's like, okay, we're going to give favored companies some kickbacks. It's what Spiro Agnew got in trouble for. We're going to direct a friendly company, give them the construction project, I'm going to get a kickback. This is like old school corruption. Yeah.
But like the old school corruption of, okay, I'm going to give a carve out to this trucking company because they put money into my shit coin is like being combined with the reorienting of the global economy.
Yeah, the mass destruction driving the dollar down, the dollar is down against every major world currency. It's down significantly against some of them. The Asian currencies are getting stronger.
There are some guys in logistics like Ryan Peterson from Flexport have been sounding the alarm on this, saying that the end result of this is that China is going to wind up buying American companies out of bankruptcy. And that this entire scheme is going to end up with China leading the world order. Well, that's exciting.
Great. Now I can't decide. I'm so tempted. Do we want to do China first or crypto first? Let's just put a pin in China. We'll come right back to it. Because the crypto corruption is still going. Because this is also part of the New York Times story. It was hard to pick which my favorite anecdote was. I went with the trucking company, but this is pretty good too. Our buddy Donald Trump Jr.
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Chapter 2: How is the Trump family involved in recent corruption?
That's Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash the bulwark to get free shipping and 365 day returns. quince.com slash the bulwark. Sad Sarah's not here, our other co-host on The Next Level, because she would really like this better than you, probably. But can we sound like 1990s Republicans for one second? Sure. We do have some concerns about the national debt that is related to all this. I had missed this.
One of America's closest allies, Japan, was threatening to fire off the ultimate financial weapon against DC in trade talks, dumping the U.S. debt. Japanese finance minister... Katsunobu Kato, whose country is the biggest holder of U.S. Treasury, said on Friday that selling the assets is a card on the table in tariff negotiations.
While we're doing worst-case scenario outcomes and spiraling, the fact that we are carrying all this debt, if we have interest rates rising and other countries that are holding our debt pissed at us, doesn't put us in the strongest situation.
Tim, do you know who the five largest holders of American debt are?
JVL, obviously I don't know the answer to that.
Japan with $1.1 trillion.
Do you know this off the top of your head or did you prepare for the podcast?
I prepared for the podcast, Timothy. Japan at $1.1 trillion. China at just under $800 billion. The United Kingdom right behind them at about $720 billion. Then Luxembourg just around $400 billion. And then Canada at about $380 billion. Mark Carney coming to the White House. So we have actively worked to piss off and go to war against four of the five biggest. Well, I guess three or more.
Who are you not including Luxembourg in the UK? You don't think Luxembourg feels any affinity for their friends in Denmark who are being who are being.
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Chapter 3: What impact will tariffs have on the economy?
He had some associations with neo-Nazis he called extraordinary. He forgot to include the fact that he was on the VDARE, which is a white nationalist site. He was on their podcast a couple years ago. Anyway, Trump puts out a bleat saying that Ed Martin's going through the approval process for U.S. Attorney, according to many, but in particular, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,
His approval is imperative in terms of doing all that has to be done to save lives and make America healthy again. Why would the U.S. attorney for District of Columbia, who has like real law and order responsibilities and has like massive responsibilities, you know, assuming that they cared about corruption and public corruption and all that, which they don't. Why would RFK Jr. care about this?
And the best theory I could come up with, JVL, is that Ed Martin had sent a letter to a medical journal editor probing whether or not their journal is too partisan when it comes to various scientific debates. So I guess they want this guy in, essentially, so he can bully...
Like universities, medical journals, anybody that does not go along with like whatever the anti-vax, anti-DEI, anti-woke, any members of their agenda. Like they want this man as U.S. attorney to bully people. His association with white nationalists, January 6th rioters, et cetera, be damned.
I mean, not be damned, but because of it. Because of it. Right. And this is one of the things we see, and this is not a new observation for me, is that the most reliable and pliant people are often the most compromised. And so a guy like Ed Martin has no individual standing, right? The only thing he has to offer is total loyalty. And so people like that are useful, right?
Every authoritarian regime has people like this, right? And I think that RFK sees that and understands it. And it's not good. It's not good. I mean, you know, the administration is digging in on going after Harvard.
Like a high class, like a Ted Cruz type, right? Like a Harvard graduating lawyer that didn't go into politics, but is in, you know, is a FedSoc person. You put them in a U.S. attorney slot. They're not going to put their name. Maybe they might do some ridiculous stuff, but they don't put their name on some letter bullying a random medical journal because RFK wants to.
And if they're like, if they need to leave the job, it's fine. Perkins Cooey or somebody will hire them on the way out. You know, like they'll be fine. Like Ed Martin has no other like, you know, potential options. Like this is it. Like he is a mega loyalist, a mega hatchet man.
This and a speaking slot at CPAC. Like, that's all this guy has. But guys like that, again, are useful. And guys like the Ted Cruz type are dangerous to a regime because they can't be counted on 100%. maybe 98%, maybe even 99%. But you do have to worry that they wind up like, you know, that lady lawyer at Justice Department who resigned instead of, you know, pulling the Eric Adams charges, right?
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Chapter 4: How is the market reacting to economic instability?
His policies on a range of social issues in particular are just not my cup of tea. But that said, he maintained his integrity throughout this whole process. You might not like some of the policy views he put, he signed in Georgia. The Georgia is doing pretty well as a state, but he maintained his integrity the whole time. He ran for reelection 2022. Trump tried to primary him.
You know, he did go to a Trump event. Like he had a couple of things I wouldn't have done, but overall he was never out there doing Lindsey Graham, like post hoc apology for Donald Trump. He never wavered on the 2020 election being won by Joe Biden. He confirmed the, et cetera. He did essentially what you would want a conservative Republican to do.
And all these guys that did suck up to Trump, that did trade in their integrity. Went back to him like, Brian, we could use you now. Like your little independent streak might help us in 2026 because it's probably going to be an ugly year for Republicans. You run against John Ossoff.
I bet we could win enough of those suburban Atlanta Republicans who have been disgusted by Trump to vote for you that we can get the Senate seat. And yesterday, Brian Kemp said, no, no, thanks. And I can't get inside Brian Kemp's head. But what I assume, based on talking to folks around him and Andrew Edgar also talked to some folks, it's just like, A, being in the Senate right now sucks.
They don't actually do anything. They haven't passed any laws. But B, you can't run for Senate with Donald Trump as president and maintain your integrity. You would have to go along with some, you would have to alibi Trump on at least some
element of all this crazy shit we've been talking about there's just no path to doing it otherwise as a republican and so he's not doing it and so i want to say good on you brian kemp and in the same category i'll give you the floor for mike pence he received the jfk profile and courage award last night dreamy jack schlossberg combed his hair he issued sex jokes he presented mike pence the award you're not ready to do it you're not ready to attaboy either of them
I want to... Can we talk about Kemp for a second? I mean, I don't want to belabor it if it's not interesting. No, let's do it. I agree with like 95% of that. Okay. And yet, he didn't go far enough for what the moment demanded. I agree with that. I think the moment demanded more. I have sympathy for him in a way I don't for like Chris Sununu. Yeah.
Because I think Kemp is weirdly more principled than Sununu. Oh, yeah.
I mean, Kemp, again, he maintained his integrity. All I said was he maintained his integrity. I didn't say he did everything right. He didn't lose Cheney. I'm not ready to build him a statue. Sure. But Chris Sununu is going on CNN, doing the panels, spinning for Trump. You never saw Brian Kemp doing that shit.
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