Where we go from here (#3): Tariffs are taxes
There is hope.
In the reaction that we’re seeing everywhere, there is hope. Hundreds of thousands across the country are turning up to say “hell no.” People are showing up to town halls (at least when members of Congress have the courage to hold them) to tell the stories of how much destruction the DOGE debacle is reeking. Fantasists are expert at ignoring reality, but reality eventually catches up: There are no savings, really. All there is is destruction. When Reagan ran against Carter, the single question he focused was this: “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” The question we have to focus responds to DOGE directly: Is the government working better than it was four years ago? Is it doing its job more effectively? Are we getting more for less, or even more for the same amount? Has the department of government efficiency made the government more efficient? (Can we please build an index of government effectiveness, and track its collapse?)
In the messaging around tariffs, there is hope. Democrats have begun to frame the point clearly, but they need to double down on this clear messaging: A tariff is a tax. And it is a tax that burdens the middle class mostly.
The intuition doesn’t take a degree in economics to grasp. If a governor told her constituents that she was proposing a new 25% sales tax, but “fear not, business is going to pay that tax,” no one would buy it. Though in fact, economically, the actual incidence depends on demand and supply elasticities, no taxpayer would believe the governor’s argument regardless. “Business doesn’t pay sales tax,” every voter would say. “We do.”
Democrats need to say, as simply and firmly as they can: A tariff is a federal sales tax. Businesses don’t pay state sales tax; consumers do. Foreign governments don’t pay federal sales taxes; consumers do. Trump wants to cut the income tax on corporations and the most wealthy; he’s going to pay for it by raising the taxes on the middle class and the poor. That truth is hope.
(All this shows the deep corruption of putatively principled reform organizations like Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform: Look at their web page — not a single front page story about this senseless new federal tax. If you Google a bit, you’ll find Norquist before the election forgiving tariffs as a useful “negotiating tool.” What exactly are we negotiating with our Great Enemy to the North?)
Our challenge is focusing this message. But on that front, this week’s debacle among DC Democrats is not a reason for hope.
The filibuster was the Democrats’ one clear chance to focus America’s attention on the disaster that is breaking America’s government, and say “no.” They can’t say “no” forever. They can’t shut the government down forever. But this was the moment when Senate Democrats could have used the legitimate version of the filibuster — actually speaking on the floor of the Senate—to tell the story of this disaster.
So where are the defenders of the filibuster now? Why weren’t they using the tool for its one sensible purpose — actually holding the floor of the Senate to speak to the disaster that we all need to see? To explain it? To draw America’s attention to it? How can we have a system where Strom Thumond (D/R SC) can speak for 24 hours to block civil rights legislation, but no Democrat could launch an actual speaking filibuster to attack what’s happening now? I’ve long opposed the modern filibuster, where a single objection forces a bill to clear a 60-vote hurdle. But this is precisely the case when a talking filibuster makes sense. Why couldn’t 3 or 4 Democrats collaborate to hold the floor of the Senate, demanding some clear concession from the Republicans, and refusing to allow anything to happen before that concession is delivered?
Instead, DC Democrats got into a completely unforgivable fight between House and Senate leaders. Democrats in the House were united in their opposition to the continuing resolution; Senate Minority Leader Schumer caved; cable news was filled with outrage between the two factions.
This fight is inexcusable. If the Democratic Party can’t coordinate on something as fundamental as this, then indeed, it is time for a new, and more principled party. The only question DC Democrats should be asking is this: How do we fuel the public’s understanding of why Trump’s false populism will destroy America? How do we unite Americans behind a movement that demands an end to the corruption of America by money (oh, and btw: Elon has just promised $100M to a SuperPAC to primary insufficiently spineless Republicans), and the restoration of a government that actually works?
This squabble between House and Senate Democrats weakened that movement. I get the question is hard. (Jim Newell at Slate has a brilliant Janus-faced account.) What isn’t hard is this: It is political malpractice for Democrats to fail to coordinate, losing the opportunity to continue to build an informed and passionate opposition to Trump’s laying of waste to America and its government. This isn’t a f*cking game. If the politicians can’t put their egos to one side long enough to coordinate an effective response, then we are truly lost.
There will be harder questions to explain. I’m not yet sure how to focus those questions effectively. To law geeks, the President’s DOJ speech was a declamation against the rule of law. Former judge, former Scalia clerk, forever courageous Michael Luttig (@judgeluttig) puts it powerfully in this interview with Nicole Wallace.
The challenge is that however critical the “rule of law” is, the concept is too abstract to too many. The idea that we have a President suing a television network for $20B (with a “b”) because he doesn’t like how they edited an interview with a political opponent — while, at the same time, declaring that he is immune from suit, because, well, god forbid we burden the President with the distraction of litigation while he’s president!—is chilling. Or even more chilling, that he aims to shutter law firms that have worked against him.
At least to law geeks. I’m not yet sure how we make it terrifying to more. Let’s work on that. Find a protest, make some signs, let’s see what resonates.
