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In an aerial view, a container ship arrives at the Port of Oakland on Aug. 1, 2025, in Oakland, California.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images/TNS
Tariff ‘Mission Accomplished’ Hype Is Just That
Aug 26, 2025
On May 1, 2003, George W. Bush announced, “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended.” He was standing below a giant banner that read, “Mission Accomplished.” At the risk of inviting charges of understatement, subsequent events didn’t cooperate. But it took a while for that to be widely accepted.
We’re in a similar place when it comes to President Trump’s experiment with a new global trading order.
“Tariffs are making our country Strong and Rich!!!” proclaims Trump, making him not only the first Republican president in living memory to brag about raising taxes on Americans, but also the first to insist that raising taxes on Americans makes us richer.
MAGA’s mission-accomplished groupthink relies primarily on three arguments.
The first is that Trump has successfully concluded a slew of beneficial trade deals. The truth is that some of those deals are simply “frameworks” that will take a long time to be ironed out. But Trump got the headlines he wanted.
The second argument is a kind of populism-infused sleight of hand. The “experts” — their scare quotes, not mine — are wrong once again.
The White House social media account crows, “In April, ‘experts’ called tariffs ‘the biggest policy mistake in 95 years.’ By July, they generated OVER $100 BILLION in revenue. Facts expose the haters: tariffs WORK. Trust in Trump.”
But the high-fivers are leaving things out. The most-dire predictions of economic catastrophe were based on the scheme Trump announced on April 2, a.k.a. “Liberation Day.” Trump quickly backed off that plan (“chickened out” in Wall Street parlance ) in response to a bond and stock market implosion.
Saying the experts were wrong under those circumstances is like saying experts opposed to defenestration were wrong when they successfully convinced a man not to jump out a window.
The third argument, made by the White House and many others — that tariffs are working because they’re raising money — is a response to a claim no one made. To my knowledge, no expert claimed tariffs wouldn’t raise money.
The estimates of these revenues from Trump world are stratospheric. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick expects somewhere between $700 billion and $1 trillion per year. Last month, the government collected $29 billion. It’s likely this number will significantly increase as more tariffs come online and businesses run down the inventory they stockpiled earlier this year in anticipation of more tariffs to come.
Normally, Republicans don’t exult over massive revenues from tax hikes. But Trump’s defenders get around this problem by insisting that money is “pouring” and “flowing” into America from someplace else.
It’s true that tariff revenue is pouring into the Treasury, but that money is coming out of American bank accounts, because American importers pay the tariff. Even Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent cannot deny this when pressed.
So yes, tariffs are “working” the way they’re supposed to; the problem is Trump thinks tariffs work differently than they do.
It’s possible some foreign exporters might lower prices to maintain market share, and some American businesses might absorb the costs — for now — to avoid sticker shock for inflation-beleaguered consumers, but what revenue is generated still comes from Americans. Ultimately it means higher prices paid here, reduced profits for businesses here or reduced U.S. trade overall.
Sometimes, when pressed, defenders of the administration will concede the true source of the revenues, but then they say the pain is necessary to force manufacturers and other businesses to build and produce in the United States. It’s backdoor industrial policy masquerading as trade policy.
That, too, might “work.” But all of this will take time, no matter what. And, if it works, that will have costs, too. Manufacturing in America is more expensive — that’s why we manufacture so much stuff abroad in the first place. If this “reshoring” happens, our goods will be more expensive, and less money will “pour in” from tariffs.
It’s difficult to exaggerate how well-understood all of this was on the American right until very recently. But the need to grab any argument available to declare Trump’s experiment a success has a lot of people not only abandoning their previous dogma but leaping to the conclusion that the dogma was wrong all along.
Maybe it was, though I don’t think so. The evidence so far suggests that problems are looming. The dollar is weakening. Prices continue to rise. The job market is reeling. The stock market (an unreliable metric, according to MAGA, when it plummeted after Liberation Day) is holding on, thanks to tech stocks. The truth is we won’t have real evidence for a while.
It’s worth remembering that Americans don’t live by headlines and press releases and they don’t live in the macro economy either. Declaring “Mission Accomplished” for the macro economy won’t convince people they’re better off in their own micro-economies when they’re not.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.
Tariff ‘Mission Accomplished’ Hype Is Just That was originally published by the Tribune Content Agency and is republished with permission.
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U.S. President Donald Trump gestures while answering questions from reporters as he tours the roof of the West Wing of the White House on Aug. 5, 2025, in Washington, D.C.
Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images
To Trump, ‘Truth’ Is Only What He Wants It Be
Aug 25, 2025
You know the old philosophical question: “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”
Well, in President Trump’s America, the answer would depend on whether or not he wanted it to.
In a world where the only “truth” is found on Trump’s Truth Social, the only “facts” are alternative ones, and the only useful “theories” are conspiracy ones, there might not even be a tree. Or a forest. Or a sound.
This is the “reality” we’re all living in now: the president of the United States, long a fan of invention and propaganda, has co-opted and corrupted data, science, math, research, intelligence and facts for the purposes of presenting only what he wants to be seen.
On Friday, Trump fired Erika McEntarfer, a little-known statistician at the Bureau of Labor Statistics who until then had overseen the tabulation of the monthly jobs report. Not because her numbers were wrong, but because he didn’t like them, a fact he made clear in a Truth Social post later that day.
“In my opinion, today’s Jobs Numbers were RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.”
Of course, there’s zero evidence that the July jobs numbers were “RIGGED,” nor that McEntarfer was performing some kind of mathematical voodoo on them to undercut Trump. In fact, Trump loved the job she was doing just a month earlier. “GREAT JOBS NUMBERS, STOCK MARKET UP BIG! AT THE SAME TIME, BILLIONS POURING IN FROM TARIFFS!!!” he posted in June.
McEntarfer, of course, didn’t invent the jobs numbers. She merely calculated them. So this is a little like firing Isaac Newton for discovering gravity — apples fall off trees whether he wrote the law of universal gravitation or not.
This wasn’t the first time Trump’s attempted to proverbially shoot the messenger for saying things he didn’t like. It wasn’t even the first time this week.
On Tuesday, NPR reported that Trump ordered NASA to end two satellite missions that produce data on climate change and greenhouse gases — data that’s used not only by climatologists, but weather agencies, oil and gas companies, the Department of Agriculture, and farmers to measure carbon dioxide, plant growth, crop yield, drought conditions, and more.
Destroying these satellites and the data they produce won’t make the data any less real or important. But in Trump’s mind, I guess, if we can’t see it, it isn’t happening.
Last month, the Smithsonian removed references to Trump’s two impeachments from an exhibit at the National Museum of American History following pressure from the White House to remove an art museum director.
Back in January of 2017, he called the acting director of the National Park Service the day after he was inaugurated over a tweet the agency shared comparing his inauguration crowd size to another larger one. He reportedly asked him to share photographic evidence that his crowd was bigger than what the media was reporting, and the tweet he NPS originally shared was later removed.
In 2019, someone, presumably at Trump’s direction, comically altered a National Hurricane Center map with a Sharpie to reflect Trump’s incorrect predictions for the path of Hurricane Dorian. Trump had insisted it would hit Alabama, contradicting weather forecasts that said it wouldn’t, and then provided the clearly altered map as evidence he was right about its trajectory, even after Dorian spared Alabama and moved up the Atlantic coast. Science be damned.
This kind of data delusion and fact fiction is, on the one hand, very sad, the mark of a man too fragile, impotent and incompetent to accept reality or withstand criticism.
But it’s also self-sabotaging. Leaders who favor propaganda and lies over truth and facts not only intentionally mislead the public and distort reality, they undermine trust in every institution, including and eventually ones they may even need people to believe in.
We’re seeing this now with the Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy. After spending years pushing baseless theories about the dead child sex offender, the Trump administration now wants MAGA voters to believe there’s nothing to see there. The problem? The institutions saying there’s nothing to see there — the FBI and the Justice Department — are ones that Trump and MAGA have previously insisted cannot be believed.
Regardless of Trump’s philosophy that truth is malleable and facts are politically subjective, I promise you, a real world does exist — and in that real world, the July jobs numbers were bad, climate change is real, he was impeached, the 2020 election wasn’t stolen, and all kinds of other inconvenient truths persist.
Just don’t tell him that.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.
To Trump, ‘Truth’ Is Only What He Wants It Be was originally published by the Tribune Content Agency and is republished with permission.
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Beyonce fans, also known as the "BeyHive", queue in the rain for entry at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium ahead of her second performance on June 7, 2025 in London, England.
Getty Images, Alishia Abodunde
Cowboy Carter Tour: A Pop Culture Reckoning and a Blueprint for Resistance
Aug 25, 2025
When you walk out of a Beyoncé show, especially one like the record-breaking July 14 run in Atlanta, you don't just leave with a T-shirt and some grainy iPhone or Android footage for Instagram. You emerged from a three-hour-plus experience awe-inspired and different. And if you're paying attention, you realize you've just witnessed one of the realist, most radical forms of democratic resistance we have in American pop culture.
My wife and I have attended plenty of sports and entertainment events, from Broadway to the Super Bowl in Vegas. But nothing comes close to the communal, transformative energy that filled the Mercedes-Benz Stadium when Beyoncé took the stage. Cowboy Carter wasn't just another concert. It was a cultural event, a political rally, a spiritual experience, and a masterclass in creative sovereignty, all rolled into one.
The Cowboy Carter tour is the work of a mastermind. Beyoncé doesn't just perform. She constructs worlds. The stage was less a platform than a living, breathing canvas—part Afro-futurist utopia, part Southern Black church, part underground ballroom, all seamlessly woven together with the kind of precision and intentionality most directors can only dream about. Every visual, every transition, every note was a nod to Black artistic traditions, reimagined for a new era.
She moved through her catalogue with the sort of athletic dominance you see in the GOATs—MJ, Serena, Simone Biles. But what set this performance apart was how she bent the arena to her will. The transitions weren't just musical; they were narrative. Each song, each costume change, was another chapter in the ongoing story of Black resistance, Black joy, and Black love.
We live in a time when many celebrities dip a toe into activism, drop a hashtag, and call it a day. Beyoncé, though, doesn't just make statements—she builds worlds where those statements come alive and are inherently political. From the start, with "American Requiem," she establishes the tone for not just herself but for everyone in the building. And when she sang "Ya Ya," it wasn't just a club banger—it felt like a generational call to arms. You could see it in the faces of the women of color dancing in the aisles, the LGBTQ+ fans who found sanctuary in the ballroom vignettes, and the parents holding their daughters a little tighter during "Protector." The message landed: This country might try to break us, but we're still here. Still dancing and still loving ourselves.
I've been around long enough to know the difference between a moment and a movement. What Beyoncé did in Atlanta, across the U.S., England, and France was both. Her entire career has been a case study in how women of color, particularly Black women, shape, define, and sustain American culture—often without getting their due.
The Cowboy Carter tour wasn't just the thousands of fans, or the celebrities in the VIP section, or the TikTokers live-streaming every second. It was the sense that, for one night, Atlanta and every city visited was the center of the universe. Beyoncé made sure of it by honoring the host cities—its music, its politics, and its role as a hub for beautifully diverse brilliance and resistance. She contextualized the event, inviting relevant legends and making stadiums feel like the world's biggest family reunion.
But the proper flex? She made inclusion the main event. Ballroom culture, again, wasn't a sideshow. Black Southernness wasn't background—it was foreground. In a country still obsessed with erasing, ignoring, or co-opting Black culture, Beyoncé made it impossible to look away. She forced the mainstream to meet her, not the other way around.
I think it's important to note that Beyoncé’s tour isn't just about music. Instead, it just might be a suggestive blueprint for the next wave of democratic resistance. Cowboy Carter, from my perspective, is about agency. It's about the right to take up space, to demand more, and to refuse to shrink. The concert felt like it provided insight into the potential of untapped collective power.
She didn't preach, yet she didn't have to. Resistance was embodied in the choreography, poignantly seen throughout set designs, and in the unapologetic Blackness of it all. Beyoncé presented us with how freedom looks, how it moves, how it sounds. And she did it while staying in complete control of her narrative—a feat that's as rare in pop culture as it is in politics.
Personally, walking out into the Atlanta summer night, we could feel the aftershocks rippling through the city. People weren't just buzzing about the show; they were talking about what it meant. For Black and brown people, it was validation. For queer fans, it was a safe haven. For everyone else, it was a reminder—Black women are the architects of cool, the custodians of truth, the keepers of the flame.
Beyoncé's creative genius, her political sharpness, her cultural gravity—they're not just entertainment. They're a roadmap. Outlining a way to resist, build, and love ourselves when the world tells us not to do so. You can call it pop culture if you want. But make no mistake—what happened on the Cowboy Carter tour was democracy in motion, resistance in real time, and a reminder that the most radical thing you can do in America is demand joy and justice, all at once.
Rev. Dr. F. Willis Johnson is a spiritual entrepreneur, author, scholar-practioner whose leadership and strategies around social and racial justice issues are nationally recognized and applied.
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Alyssa West from Austin holds up a sign during the Fight the Trump Takeover rally at the Texas Capitol on Saturday, August. 16, 2025.
(Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman via Getty Images)
When Politicians Draw Their Own Victories: Why and How To End Gerrymandering
Aug 25, 2025
From MAGA Republicans to progressive Democrats to those of us in the middle, Americans want real change – and they’re tired of politics as usual. They’re craving authenticity, real reform, and an end to the status quo. More and more, voters seem to be embracing disruption over the empty promises of establishment politicians, who too often live by the creed that “one bad idea deserves a bigger one.” Just look at how both parties are handling gerrymandering in Texas and California, and it’s difficult to see it as anything other than both parties trying to rig elections in their favor.
Instead of fixing the system, politicians are fueling a turbocharged redistricting arms race ahead of high-stakes midterm 2026 elections that will determine control of the U.S. Congress. In Texas, Republicans just redrew congressional lines, likely guaranteeing five new Republican seats, which has sparked Democratic strongholds like California and New York to threaten their own gerrymandered counterattacks.
This isn’t democracy. This destroys democracy. It’s a corrupt game where politicians choose their voters — not the voters selecting their representatives, as enumerated in our U.S. Constitution.
We represent different parties, but we have both seen the severe damage gerrymandering has done to American democracy. At this point, less than 12 percent of House races are expected to be competitive in 2026. That means in nearly 9 out of 10 House districts, voters may not have a genuine choice of candidates or be able to vote in an election that politicians do not already fix. That translates into 385 of the 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives will be pre-determined. The result? Increased hyper-partisanship, little to no incentives for bipartisan compromise in Congress, and, most importantly, a vast majority of moderate middle voters (Democrats, Independents, and Republicans) like us whose voices and proposals are lost.
Fixing gerrymandering would put voters back in the driver's seat, ensuring their choices determine election outcomes and that elected officials are truly accountable to the people they serve. For the sake of our democracy, we need bold and bipartisan actions that put power back where it belongs: with the voters.
First, in the immediate term, all voters should make their voices heard. We should not settle for the status quo or mutually assured destruction by supporting either party's position to gerrymander. Attend a town meeting and contact your representatives to demand that they oppose all efforts to gerrymander by both parties. In recent days, a few political leaders, including Republican Governor of New Hampshire Kelly Ayotte and Democratic Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, have said ‘no’ to this mid-decade redistricting.
Second, Congress should pass redistricting reforms that prohibit partisan gerrymandering. These reforms should establish minimum standards for drawing congressional maps, which would require districts to be drawn using neutral, transparent criteria, such as equal population, geographic contiguity and compactness, and consideration of communities of interest and existing political boundaries.
Third, all states should adopt independent, nonpartisan state redistricting commissions, which would remove legislators from the process. Eleven states that already use independent or bipartisan redistricting commissions, and evidence shows these commissions tend to create fairer maps, increase electoral competitiveness, and boost voter trust in the process. Polls have shown strong voter support across the political spectrum for independent commissions.
Better yet, to make sure this reform takes hold nationwide and to prevent future gerrymandering battles from escalating, Congress should require all states to set up independent redistricting commissions. This latest escalation shows that it only takes one “bad apple state” to spark a multi-state gerrymandering battle. That is why Congress must act now.
There have been bipartisan reform efforts in recent years, including the Fairness and Independence in Redistricting Act and the Redistricting Transparency and Accountability Act. But in each case, Congress has failed to do what is best for voters, instead acting on its own cynical partisan interests. Passing and abiding by redistricting reforms requires compromise, cross-partisan collaboration, and courage – values that have been eroded by the effects of decades of gerrymandering. But this latest escalation of gerrymandering threats shows why Congress cannot wait any longer.
Benedict Arnold, Joseph McCarthy, and Elbridge Gerry (from whom we derive the term “gerrymander”) are all names that are vilified in American history. While gerrymandering has been around for centuries, it is long past time to retire this wretched and corrupt practice. It is a direct threat to representative government, democratic ideals, and American values. Beginning in Texas, we must unite and oppose all efforts by states to manipulate the outcome of our elections. Now is the time for We the People to demand that Members of Congress declare publicly whether they support reform or choose the corrupt old ways.
Charles Boustany (R-LA), a former U.S. representative serving Louisiana’s 3rd and 7th congressional districts, and Amb.
Tim Roemer (D-IN), a former ambassador to India and U.S. representative serving Indiana’s 3rd congressional district, is a part of Issue One’s ReFormers Caucus, a group of nearly 200 former members of Congress united to fix our broken political system.
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