The Exchanges

Q Tim, what's your, what do you think more broadly about what Trump is doing with this trade war in China? Any takes on China, Taiwan, and just how Americans should look at, hey, maybe we have to buy some more high quality products. Maybe we don't get things on Timu as cheap with these, you know, 850 dollar exemptions, et cetera.

A I think roughly Trump's instincts are correct. I think the, the way that the tariffs rolled out seemed to be incredibly chaotic. I think that's a huge problem with a lot of what the Trump administration does. They seem to have the correct instincts, but you, they have like a very sloppy rollout, right? Like everything's a hard launch. Everything's incredibly, I don't know that things are messaged the right way. The whole Doge thing was, is A little bit of a fiasco because the messaging seemed off, like nobody was out really talking about what they were doing and why they were doing it. Um, you know, I, I don't know how well this works, you know, I mean, you have a very integrated global economy. You guys know more about that than I do. Are you able to unwind that? And if you do, you have to unwind it in certain areas and certain areas you're going to have to allow To probably remain relatively stable and consistent, right? I mean, if you listen to Ray Dalio, he talks about like a disaster coming for with monetary policy, right? The whole unwinding of these economic and political structures kind of happening at once. I don't know. I think, I think Americans do over consume a lot of crap. I think cheap goods aren't necessarily the highest Um, organizing principle of life. I think people have been sold the idea that cheap goods are more important than having a stable functioning j…

AI assessment note: “I think roughly Trump's instincts are correct. I think the, the way that the tariffs”

Q It's the opposite of inclusion. What has happened?

A It's the establishment trying to preserve itself by shutting out certain ideas and certain people and, you know, giving very ceremonial nods to, you know, play up your Indian-ness, play up this, play up that. But, you know, it's like when you, the CIA goes and she goes, I'm the first female drone pilot. And a lot of Americans are going, what exactly is our national security interest in a drone strike in whatever country? And do we need to be doing this? And should the money be better spent somewhere else? But instead of having that conversation, it's always ends up being hijacked. So this DEI to me just seems like a way for a lot of the same establishment people to keep their power and influence by offering these very optical Uh, advancements to people that may, you know, pay lip service to certain ideas, but when it comes down to it, they're very loyal to the same power factions that, you know, have always kind of driven the narrative in our country.

AI assessment note: “It's the establishment trying to preserve itself by shutting out certain ideas”