On the topic of Tariffs, Trump himself will say the place where China is really abusing us is stealing our technology and intellectual property.
No one will dispute that is a real and valid problem (well, probably China).
If Trump wanted to address that and if he was a mature and civil person, he should have started an initiative involving all of the other countries that are getting their technology ripped off in the same manner to come up with a strategy for calling China out and resolving the issue.
That way we would be fighting what is clearly "a good fight" (for a good cause that is simple to understand and support from a global perspective) with the added strength of our allies... and as a bonus, we would be shoring up our relationship with our allies while also hurting the world view of China (they are image conscious!) in the name of clear and common fairness! "Moral highground" is a good place to be (and has played a major role in making the US great after WW2) and we have not coached this fight in a manner to be able to claim it!
Instead, we have China finding alternate suppliers of many products the US has traditionally sold to them. True, this is easier with some products than others, but if you are in a business that sells a lot to China and they can out source it to a different country, you are screwed because once the tariffs are over, China has no reason to go back to buying from the US.
If it was restricted to just China, we would still have the support of our allies, but since tariffs are being applied to other countries in a haphazard fashion, it undermines the story-line that this is about technology/intellectual property theft. Because Canada and Germany (and the rest) don't roll-over for Trump, he feels compelled to "show them who's boss". Basically, Trump's insecurity and need to be "King of the mountain" is clouding the view of what was right in his actions. Diplomacy requires that you allow leaders of other countries to, at least, appear as leaders to their country-men. If you require that they cow to you, you are essentially requiring them to destroy even the appearance of sovereign status and forfeit the respect of their country-men and any future in politics.
Will we win the trade war (I think it is fairly called a trade war at this point)? It will be interesting (and tragic) to watch. I think the straight up dollars are on our side, but the other question is how much suffering are China and the US willing to endure.
I have been impressed by the loyalty of the US workers who are willing to "take one for the team" and tough out their own economic misfortune from the tariffs. I don't know what percentage of workers they represent and how long before they start rethinking it, but I admire their resolve (even though I, personally, think it is misguided).
However, the Chinese people have a long history of compliance to whatever their government dictates to them. Communism is much more efficient than capitalism in the context of making your people eat poop with a smile on their face!
Consequently, I am not at all sure that having the $ balance sheet on our side is adequate to win, and even if it is, I do not believe China will be quick to admit defeat.
I hate to have a "doom and gloom" perspective, but I believe even if we do "win" it will ultimately be a "lose-lose" scenario with both countries emerging the weaker for it.
The only obvious winner will be Russia. We handed them their ass at the end of the cold war, but now that they have conceded that they cannot out-perform us, they are doing their best to undermine our success (as well as the success of modernized European countries) in order to make Russia more relevant.
Undermining the credibility of election processes, generating refugees (by supporting Syria, as one example) in Europe to overwhelm the resources of advanced countries, promoting hatred of these refugees; it all makes Russia more powerful on a relative scale.
