President Trump has a simple economic platform: “Buy American and Hire American“; toward that goal all economic and fiscal policies are now directed to assist U.S. manufacturing companies and retain U.S. workers.  Period.

Two days ago Commerce Secretary Wilbur “Wilburine” Ross announced a 20% tariff, countervailing duties, on imported Canadian soft wood lumber.  Today, Pleasant River Lumber Co. in Jackman Maine announces their wood mills will now expand as a direct result of the beneficial impacts of even trade practices.

This is a big deal for this community.

MAINE – The Dover-Foxcroft-based Pleasant River Lumber company is expanding its Jackman sawmill in anticipation of increased demand for American lumber amid the U.S. government’s plans to levy tariffs on Canadian softwood.

In a media release Tuesday, Pleasant River Lumber said it is expanding its Moose River spruce mill in Jackman to add drying capacity this summer and hire up to 20 new workers for a second shift starting this fall.

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Art of the deal glaringly visible in less than one-half of a single day’s media cycle.  Simply amazing.  These phone calls are also further evidence of how much leverage the U.S. carries in the entire NAFTA Trade construct.  [White House Press Release]

Readout of President Donald J. Trump’s Call With President Peña Nieto of Mexico and Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada

Late this afternoon, President Donald J. Trump spoke with both President Peña Nieto of Mexico and Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada.  Both conversations were pleasant and productive.

President Trump agreed not to terminate NAFTA at this time and the leaders agreed to proceed swiftly, according to their required internal procedures, to enable the renegotiation of the NAFTA deal to the benefit of all three countries.

President Trump said: “it is my privilege to bring NAFTA up to date through renegotiation. It is an honor to deal with both President Nieto and Prime Minister Trudeau, and I believe that the end result will make all three countries stronger and better.”   ###

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It was only a few months ago when congressional democrat leadership were clutching their pearls because President-elect Trump held a phone call with the political leadership of Taiwan.  House and Senate Democrats rose to defend the honor of China around the precept of the Obama administrations’ acquiescence to the “one china” policy, and Trump’s audacity to call it into question.

Then something weird happened.

President Trump took office January 20th, and after many diplomatic contacts within the administration and their Chinese counterparts, President Trump and President Xi Jinping began to formulate a friendship.

April 5th/6th President Trump and President Xi Jinping met in Mar-a-lago for two days and the outcome has been historic and stunning cooperation between the U.S. and China.  China began pressuring North Korea to stop the military drum-beating. (more…)

In conjunction with the Trump administration releasing a tax reform outline, White House OMB Director Mick Mulvaney gives an interview to PBS to discuss the president’s goal of driving economic growth.

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Contrary to our initial reservations, Mick Mulvaney continues to be a considerable asset to the administration in communicating “big concepts” into portions that are easily digestible and understandable. Transferring big issues to easier points of comprehension is tough, and Mulvaney does a surprisingly good job.

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Hours before the Trump administration briefed 100 senators today on the issues surrounding North Korea, a more consequential announcement was made.

The jaw dropping announcement (hidden by U.S. media) appears to show just how long President Trump has been putting the North Korea strategy together.  However, before discussing that aspect, we review the Senate Briefing at the White House:

Today Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, presided over a meeting meeting to brief Senators.

The details of that meeting have not been made public because of their classification and sensitivity.  The meeting lasted about one hour and discussed various financial and military options available for pressuring North Korea to end its nuclear program. (link)

Here’s where it gets really interesting.

For months the media have, at random, ridiculed President Trump for not distancing himself from Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.  President Duterte has been cracking down on Filipino drug gangs in his country and his approach has been severe and extremely tough.  Indeed Duterte’s zero tolerance approach has been brutal.

However, shortly after his election, December 3rd 2016, President Trump chose not to refute Duterte for his approach toward confronting the Filipino drug gangs and drug epidemic.  The media were apoplectic.   Duterte responded by calling President Trump “a deep thinker“. Duterte said he was greatly pleased with the “rapport” he has established with the newly elected U.S. president. (more…)

Today Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Economic Director Gary Cohn held a briefing to outline the tax proposal of President Trump.  The overall plan is essentially the same as the plan he proposed in the campaign with some slight modifications on rates etc.

The biggest structural change is political and regional in the current proposal because the rates are lowered, but deductions are removed – including deductions for state and local taxes.  People who live in states/municipalities with income taxes, and who earn enough to carry a tax liability, would see their ability to deduct those state taxes removed.

Because of the UniParty nature of congress; and specifically because special interest lobbyists will write the final tax plan (if one ever surfaces) CTH is not going to spend much time in the analytics of this.  Personally I highly doubt there will EVER be a comprehensive tax reform package even created; the UniParty [lobbyists/Big Club] will not allow their control over taxation to be diminished.

Tax reform is a noisy issue sure to fill lots of media stories, but the end result will be no action.  If a legislative bill is ever created we’ll discuss then.  More than likely we will see small, individual tax bills targeting specific aspects of current tax policy.

Here’s two articles explaining the possibilities against the backdrop of this proposal:

Zerohedge analysis and CNN Money analysis.

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Earlier today President Trump signed an executive order directing Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to consult with local governments and tribes in order to review national monuments created by the Antiquities Act since January 1, 1996 – that are greater than 100,000 acres in footprint – and report back to the President on suggested legislative or executive action, if applicable, within 120 days.

The Antiquities Act of 1906 authorizes the president to declare federal lands of historic or scientific value to be national monuments by designating the “smallest area compatible with proper care and management of the objects to be protected.”

Since the 1900s, when the Act was first used, the average size of national monuments exploded from an average of 422 acres per monument. Now it’s not uncommon for a monument to be more than a million acres.

The designations of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in 1996 and the Bears Ears National Monument in 2016 are considered the book-ends of modern Antiquities Act overreach. Each monument is more than 1.3 million acres.

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During an AP interview last week President Trump first mentioned a possibility of complete withdrawal from the 25-year-old NAFTA agreement.   Today several outlets are reporting on a draft executive action to do just that.

BACKGROUND:  One of the problems with the NAFTA trade agreement (and most other trade deals) has been that no administration ever reevaluates them to measure their long-term impact since implementation.  It has been almost 25 years since Bill Clinton signed NAFTA (’94) and only now in 2017 is the Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross evaluating the current value and measuring the economic impact to the U.S. in current terms.

Associated Press: What about NAFTA? What’s the plan on NAFTA?

TRUMP: What would you like to know?

AP: I would like to know what your plan is in terms of renegotiating.

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In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Donald Trump Administration and Presidency.

This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

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