Dispatch from Bizarro World
by digby
From Trump’s rambling, disturbing press conference yesterday:
We have a massive trade negotiation going on with China. President Xi is very much involved; so am I. We’re dealing at the highest levels and we’re doing very well. We’re — we’re doing very well. In the meantime, we’ve taken in billions and billions of dollars in tariffs from China, and from others. Our steel industry has come roaring back, and that makes me very happy. I think we’ll have to build a steel wall, as opposed to a concrete wall, because we have steel companies again. There’s something awfully nice about that sound…
So now we have everything so beautifully handled. We need to have, however — we need border security. And all of this security, if we do what I think what the Democrats want, all of the border things that we’ll be building will be done right here in the good, old USA by steel companies that were practically out of business when I came into office as President. And now they’re thriving. You call up the heads of U.S. Steel, and I could name 10 companies. If you look at what’s going on with the steel industry, it’s almost a miracle. It was a dead industry. We need steel for defense. We need steel for a lot of things. Steel and aluminum.
But those industries were in deep trouble. The steel industry was almost dead, and now it’s a very vibrant, vibrant industry…
I know you’re not into the construction business. You don’t understand something: We now have a great steel business that’s rebuilt in the United States. Steel is stronger than concrete. If I build this wall, or fence, or anything the Democrats need to call it — because I’m not into names, I’m into production. I’m into something that works. If I build a steel wall rather than a concrete wall, it will actually be stronger than a concrete. Steel is stronger than concrete. Okay? In case you — you can check it out.
Listen, if I build a wall, and the wall is made out of steel instead of concrete, I think people will like that. And here’s the other good thing: I’ll have it done by the United States Steel Corporation, by companies in our country that are now powerful, great companies again. And they’ve become powerful over the last two years because of me and because of our trade policies.
US Steel’s stock price is down 47% in the last year.— Alan Rappeport (@arappeport) January 4, 2019
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