John Bolton - March 14, 2025


Donald Trump vs Ronald Reagan on tariffs - Fascinating!


Episode Stats

Length

5 minutes

Words per Minute

172.76141

Word Count

874

Sentence Count

70


Summary

Trump vs Reagan when it comes to tariffs. The difference between Reagan and Trump on tariffs and why free trade is the way to prosperity for all nations. It's not a long video, but I think it's rather educational.


Transcript

00:00:00.040 Hi, it's John, and welcome to the channel. It is still March the 14th. It is 1246 p.m.
00:00:05.600 I do have my big blue mug of coffee right now. I want to do a quick video here. I think this will
00:00:10.380 be rather educational, and I want to play a couple of videos for you. Donald Trump versus Ronald
00:00:17.200 Reagan when it comes to tariffs. If you're a Canadian, you know we're dealing with the turmoil
00:00:22.060 of Trump tariffs right now. The Europeans are going to be dealing with this as well. The Chinese
00:00:26.700 are dealing with this as well, but I thought it'd be rather educational to see the difference
00:00:31.500 between Donald Trump and Ronald Reagan, who they called the great communicator. Now, Donald
00:00:37.100 Trump has been very one-note on this, the same message over and over and over again, so it's
00:00:42.520 nothing you haven't heard recently. But we're going to go back to 1987. Now, a lot of Republicans
00:00:48.420 in the United States, a lot of conservatives, see Ronald Reagan as the ideal president. Now,
00:00:53.380 whether you agree with that or not is not important for this, but you're going to get a real indication
00:00:58.040 of the difference between Donald Trump and what Ronald Reagan believed when it came to
00:01:03.040 tariffs. So I hope you enjoy this. It's not a long video, but I think it's rather educational.
00:01:07.220 Thanks for watching. If you liked the video, by the way, give it a thumbs up, and please
00:01:10.880 subscribe to the channel. We're over 13,000, and I appreciate you being here.
00:01:15.460 I know many people from Canada that are good friends of mine, but, you know, the United States
00:01:21.920 can't subsidize a country for $200 billion a year. We don't need their cars. We don't
00:01:28.760 need their energy. We don't need their lumber. We don't need anything that they get. We do
00:01:36.440 it because we want to be helpful, but it comes a point when you just can't do that. You have
00:01:40.920 to run your own country. And to be honest with you, Canada only works as a state. We don't
00:01:46.620 need anything they have. As a state, it would be one of the great states anyway. This would
00:01:52.000 be the most incredible country. Visually, if you look at a map, they drew an artificial
00:01:57.000 line right through it between Canada and the U.S., just a straight artificial line. Somebody
00:02:02.500 did it a long time ago, many, many decades ago, and makes no sense. It's so perfect as a great
00:02:13.200 and cherished state. Keeping, oh, Canada, the national anthem. I love it. I think it's
00:02:19.820 great. Keep it. But it'll be for the state, one of our greatest states, maybe our greatest
00:02:25.260 state. But why should we subsidize another country for $200 billion? Of course, it's $200 billion
00:02:32.280 a year. And again, we don't need their lumber. We don't need their energy. We have more than
00:02:37.380 they do. We don't need anything. We don't need the cars. I'd much rather make the cars
00:02:41.100 here. And there's not a thing that we need. Now, there'll be a little disruption, but it
00:02:47.600 won't be very long. But they need us. We really don't need them.
00:02:52.780 Now, that message of free trade is one I conveyed to Canada's leaders a few weeks ago, and it
00:02:58.760 was warmly received there. Indeed, throughout the world, there's a growing realization that
00:03:04.600 the way to prosperity for all nations is rejecting protectionist legislation and promoting fair
00:03:10.740 and free competition. Now, there are sound historical reasons for this. For those of us who lived
00:03:16.700 through the Great Depression, the memory of the suffering it caused is deep and searing.
00:03:21.920 And today, many economic analysts and historians argue that high-tariff legislation passed back
00:03:27.760 in that period, called the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, greatly deepened the Depression and prevented
00:03:33.400 economic recovery. You see, at first, when someone says, let's impose tariffs on foreign
00:03:38.980 imports, it looks like they're doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs.
00:03:45.760 And sometimes for a short while it works, but only for a short time. What eventually occurs
00:03:51.540 is, first, homegrown industries start relying on government protection in the form of high tariffs,
00:03:57.100 they stop competing, and stop making the innovative management and technological changes they need
00:04:03.180 to succeed in world markets. And then, while all this is going on, something even worse occurs.
00:04:09.680 High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries and the triggering of fierce
00:04:15.040 trade wars. The result is more and more tariffs, higher and higher trade barriers, and less and less
00:04:20.820 competition. So, soon, because of the prices made artificially high by tariffs that subsidize
00:04:26.800 inefficiency and poor management, people stop buying. Then the worst happens. Markets shrink
00:04:32.480 and collapse, businesses and industries shut down, and millions of people lose their jobs.
00:04:38.080 The memory of all this occurring back in the 30s made me determined when I came to Washington
00:04:42.560 to spare the American people the protectionist legislation that destroys prosperity. I'll keep
00:04:49.460 you informed on this dangerous legislation because it's just another form of protectionism,
00:04:54.120 and I may need your help to stop it. Remember, America's jobs and
00:04:59.800 growth are at stake. Until next week, thanks for listening, and God bless you.