Today President Trump outlines an approach to head-off the anticipated retaliation from China over the increase in U.S. tariffs that began today. Whether this is structurally possible, or whether this is Trump’s attempt to diminish the leverage carried by Vice-Chairman Liu He, is an interesting question. However, the strategy is clear.
Overall U.S. inflation remains low relative to the economic gains from MAGAnomic policy. [Current CPI HERE].  GDP and wage growth are both exceeding inflation. As such, now is indeed the best time to confront China. President Trump notes this today in a tweet:

Inflation in the U.S. remains low overall at 1.8%…. now is the perfect time to hit Beijing with expanded tariffs.  However, President Trump knows China will retaliate through the multinationals on Wall Street.  President Trump knows China will specifically target the U.S. Agriculture sector. China will likely attempt to put pressure on Trump by refusing to buy U.S. farm product. The BIG AG multinationals will go bananas.
The BIG AG multinationals, those who control food/farm production, also control key Senators; they have been purchased through lobbyists. This is part of the Big Club approach/strategy.  Wall Street and the U.S. Senate will be aligned to support China; as a consequence President Trump needs to counteract their effort.
President Trump’s approach to counteract China’s strike against the U.S. agricultural community is visible in a series of tweets today.  I don’t necessarily agree with the proposal long-term, BUT I do understand the short-term objective…. optimum expediency.
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I can just picture the The New York Times gathering a team of actuaries, legal accountants, tax historians, advisers and financial consultants around a big executive office table, piled high with reams of papers and spent coffee cups, saying:

“We’ve got him now…. as soon as people understand: fixed asset depreciation schedules; and if the assets were depreciated legally using straight line or diminishing balance; then we move to whole-value equity pick-up, or minority interest accounting; before digging into section 1031 ‘like-kind’ asset exchanges; partnerships (limited or writ large), carried interest loopholes, pass-throughs, net capital losses/gains, seven-year income averaging and the difference between long-term and short-term capital gains”…

…or something.
Seriously, the ‘Trump-taxes’ story has to be the biggest, funniest, most well documented, and most absurd, ongoing snipe hunt in history.  “I was going to support President Trump’s re-election until I saw his depreciated amortization schedule from 1989″… said no-one, like, ever.
Could it be possible John Barron is still pulling this hilarious trick twenty-five years after the New York Times called Donald Trump “The Comeback King“?…
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The professional financial punditry can’t explain it.  Flummoxed academics run around bumping into walls amid economic numbers that continue to defy expectations.  All caused by a simple return to common sense ‘America First’ MAGAnomics.
Low unemployment (3.8%); wages growing (+3.2%); inflation stable (1.6%). These measures all have a cumulative impact on paycheck-to-paycheck Americans. Prices for durable goods are stable and wage growth is exceeding inflation. That means more disposable income in the middle-class…DUH. Which, when combined with the increased pay from lower middle-class tax rates, is exactly the intended outcome of MAGAnomics.

Today the BEA is out with consumer spending results for the first quarter that defy expectations.  Consumer spending on goods increases 1.7%. Overall spending +.09 in March, reaches highest gain in ten years. The deplorables are spending their higher wages.  Go figure.  Meanwhile core inflation drops to 1.6%.  The pundits are shocked.

(Reuters Headline) “U.S. consumer spending roars back, but inflation tame” – WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. consumer spending increased by the most in more than 9-1/2 years in March as households stepped up purchases of motor vehicles, but price pressures remained muted, with a key inflation measure posting its smallest annual gain in 14 months.

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In 2017, President Trump signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which established ‘Opportunity Zones’ to incentivize long-term investments in low-income communities across the country.  Today President Trump attended a conference to support the Opportunity Zone initiative. The conference aims to coordinate economic and social resources to stimulate growth in those areas.

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President Trump and FCC Chairman Ajit Pai are delivering remarks today on the U.S. 5G wireless network deployment.  Chairman Pai is expected to announce additional funding for rural broadband internet access.
In February, Trump called on U.S. telecommunications companies to boost their work to build faster 5G wireless communications networks, saying they were lagging and at risk of being left behind other countries’ efforts.  Anticipated start time 2:30pm EST
UPDATE: Video Added

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This is a rather remarkable statistic [Technical Data Here] Weekly unemployment claims dropped to 202,000 for the week ending March 30th.  That’s the lowest level of jobless claims since December 1959.  More people are working today than ever in U.S. history. [The DOL jobless claims statistic is not connected to the unemployment rate; the BLS unemployment report for March will be announced tomorrow morning.]

(Via CNBC) The number of Americans filing applications for unemployment benefits dropped to a more than 49-year low last week, pointing to sustained labor market strength despite slowing economic growth.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits declined 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 202,000 for the week ended March 30, the lowest level since early December 1969, the Labor Department said on Thursday.

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You might remember back in May 2018 when sketchy porn lawyer Michael Avenetti was releasing U.S. Treasury notifications on Michael Cohen received from an unknown source within the Treasury Department [See Here].  You might also remember when New Yorker’s Ronan Farrow wrote a sympathetic article after talking to the leaking treasury official [See Here].
As a result the Treasury Inspector General began an investigation.
John C. Fry, 54, was an intelligence analyst with the IRS’s law enforcement arm in San Francisco.
According to the North California U.S. Attorney’s Office (full pdf below) after searching for IRS activity reports related to Michael Cohen, Mr. Fry shared the information with creepy porn lawyer Michael Avenatti and was also a source for Ronan Farrow.
[scribd id=400201106 key=key-fk9HW5L4UiMg8E8oPlRw mode=scroll]
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CTH NOTES – There’s more here than currently surfacing…. I’m not sure what it is, but if you review the left-wing granular reporting carefully, (CNN HERE), there’s a bigger story hiding under the umbrella of this one.
The IRS has an Obama-era history of being weaponized by political activists inside the organization in concert with the Eric Holder’s DOJ.  The location of this story; plus a reminder that Eric Holder was hired by the State of California as their legal counsel; plus the participant Mr. Fry failing to accept a plea deal; equals: there’s someone/something larger attached to this story.  It just doesn’t past the initial review ‘sniff test’.
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The Chairman of the White House CEA Kevin Hassett appears on CNBC to discuss the strong January jobs report and economic indicators that were released last week.
Hassett is valuable, very valuable, because he is one of the few bean-counters who reviews current analysis through the prism of what is factually happening around him; as opposed to economic theory.  Because he accepts what I call ‘fluid-currentism‘ Hassett is one of the few analysts who (early on) started recognizing that under MAGAnomics (Main Street centric policy) inflation was no longer connected to the FED engagement.
To say acceptance of this ‘new dimension‘ puts Hassett on the cusp of leading economic review would be an understatement. Additionally, it makes his commentary exceptionally more valuable [listen to the segment at 02:50].  Hassett is pragmatic, positive, open to accepting all fact-based evidence, on point, and more importantly, accurate.

…”The booming economy is giving us the social justice that people want”… ~ Kevin Hassett

Unfortunately, most financial pundits are prone to talking down the strength of the U.S. economy. It’s maddening. They spend all day mining for coal nuggets while currently surrounded by diamonds.
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The heartbeat of MAGAnomics is Main Street USA.  Keeping in mind we have suffered through three decades of economic and financial policy that was specifically structured to the benefit of Wall Street (globalists) over Main Street (nationalism); back in 2015 and 2016 when Candidate Trump started to put specifics on his economic proposals we were able to map out some likely possibilities.

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All significant economic changes take years to fully mature.  However, because it was easy to identify where nationalist economic policy would run into conflict with the prior globalist data-trends, we were able to predict a series of economic disconnects.
The primary disconnect is where Main Street inflation, wage growth and GDP growth, would be disconnected from the Federal reserve monetary policy.  Any Fed action would impact Wall Street results (sad trombone); but the disconnect that was caused by 30-years of diminished Main Street value (U.S. investment went overseas), and would mean MAGAnomic policy would grow the internal U.S. economy regardless of the Fed action.
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Senator Lindsey Graham appears on Derp TV to discuss the latest in the government shutdown and his request for President Trump to declare a state-of-emergency to build the southern border wall.  Senator Graham notes he spoke to President Trump approximately 30 minutes prior to this interview:

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