• doc
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      385 days ago

      Frustratingly his constant repeating of this backwards understanding is working. It’s starting to widely take hold and resistance in the face of constant misinformation is breaking down. I heard in the last week NPR and the BBC repeat the “foreign country will pay” as fact, not a quote, with no effort to correct or clarify.

      What’s the saying? Repeat a lie enough and it becomes reality?

    • @[email protected]
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      785 days ago

      I honestly can’t decide if he just really doesn’t know or he’s this consistently dishonest. It’s hard to pick cuz I have trouble believing he could be that consistent about anything.

    • @[email protected]
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      4 days ago

      Neither do the people whom who voted. This is why an educated population is very important

  • @[email protected]
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    2125 days ago

    Yes, the country known for driving scooters instead of cars will start buying SUVs that don’t even fit the streets in many cities

          • @[email protected]
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            104 days ago

            *banh mi

            But yes, so very delicious. So fresh too.

            SUVs won’t work in Vietnam, not when you have Grab and scooters everywhere. It might become a rich person thing to drive around in those awful yank tanks but that’s hardly a market.

            This just sounds like the VN government is just making a nothing deal sound good for Trump. Americans paying tariffs for incoming VN products versus Vietnamese paying nothing for incoming American SUVs? A product that most Vietnamese won’t find useful at all?

            Ugh.

            I want some bread now…

            • @[email protected]
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              94 days ago

              Oops, wrong spelling!

              But uh, yeah, I agree, Trump got played, SUVs will take off in Vietnam as well as McDonalds did.

              Trump is an actual idiot.

              Not like, ad hom insult idiot.

              He is just actually an idiot.

              He still doesn’t understand what a trade balance even is, or that services/digital goods we export aren’t part of that number.

              He’s a spoiled brat that’s gotten as far as he has by being an abusive narcissist who csn just buy his way out of everything with daddy’s money.

            • @[email protected]
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              134 days ago

              Literally banh mis and other Vietnamese basically street food, pho, stuff like that, is why McDonalds didn’t take off.

              Vietnam has some truly tasty and cost effective cuisine, and McDonalds was largely only eaten by corpo types just as a flex of how much money they have.

              Its less nutritious, less tasty, and more expensive than what the Vietnamese have been eating for 100s, 1000s of years.

              • @[email protected]
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                4 days ago

                From what I understand, it’s all pretty cheap too. So the profit margins for McDs were probably thinner.

                • @[email protected]
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                  4 days ago

                  Last time I read a breakdown report on it, yeah, it was something in the range of…

                  A typical street vendor banh mi has more actual like weight of food in a sandwich than a McD borgor, and the McD borgor is also between 2x to 4x as expensive, depending on exactly where you are in Vietnam.

                  Also, lol, the vastly most profitable part of a McD meal is the soda, and then fries.

                  Like a drink that costs you $3.00 at McDonalds costs them fractions of a penny.

                  And… HFCS soda just has not worked too well in any Asian markets, basically.

                  Thats how you end up with like, Diet Cucumber Coca Cola in Japan, lol, a lot of Asia already also has a lot of great drinks, such as boba tea… and just actual tea, etc.

      • @[email protected]M
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        4 days ago

        …what? Being good off-road, or on bad roads, is [supposed to be] the entire point of SUVs.


        Edit: Okay, okay, I get it. Language changes and “SUV” doesn’t mean what I want it to mean. I’m well aware that I’m No True Scotsman-ing, but that doesn’t make me any less mad about it! 😠

        A representative sample chosen from among the replies wrote:

        A truck maybe. Most SUVs are just big chunky road cars.

        SUVs are supposed to be trucks with seats in the cargo area!

        first-generation Toyota 4Runner, a real SUV, shown with the top removed so that it looks like a pickup truck with a seat in the cargo bed

        All the car-based junk they build these days aren’t real SUVs, and shouldn’t exist because they’re objectively inferior to station wagons and minivans.

        Every SUV ought to be an acutally-off-road-capable one, and the only people who should buy them are ones who actually take them off-road.

        • WalrusDragonOnABike [they/them]
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          44 days ago

          They’re just a classification meant to evade certain regulations to sell worse cars based on a few metrics regarding things like clearance. Given the point is to avoid having to make a decent car…

        • monkeyflower jelly bean
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          124 days ago

          @grue yeah, so the commercials say. The ones I’ve driven haven’t been particularly better than sedans except higher clearance… making them more likely to rollover or break axles instead of scrape oil pans.

        • @[email protected]
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          Its true that around the origin of SUVs, yes, this was the point, and many could… not offroad as well as a specifically off road geared vehicle, but could offroad a lot better than a sedan.

          But, now its been 20ish years, and broadly, manufacturing standards / quality control are shit ass fuck tier bad, everything is desiged to break just after your warranty expires, and are also intentionally engineered to be nightmares to try to self repair, or just literally impossible to do this due to ‘everything’s computer!’ (unless you also want to hack your car)…

          … so those offroad capabilities are functionally no longer present, beyond I guess all wheel drive as a mode.

          Really, these days, an SUV is just a minivan that seats less people, doesn’t have a sliding door, costs a fuckton more, has better ground clearance, and ‘looks cooler’.

          Pretty similar MPG.

        • @[email protected]
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          4 days ago

          With their weight and the lower profile tires that come stock, and how they’re kinda just like regular cars but bigger in every way except where it counts, they really aren’t. Their single big advantage is the ground clearance but many actually have bodies that come surprisingly low. One the OG Ford Rangers would be great, but only if it had 4x4 because all those RWD only trucks, especially when they have nothing in the back, are essentially worthless due to the total lack of traction. They’re also super long, which makes maneuvering difficult in tight spaces so obstacles you could have gone around are now barriers you have go through. Besides, my BRZ doesn’t explode when it hits a pothole or touches a gravel road and in fact does quite well, even when it was lowered by an inch. Hilariously, unlike many vehicles the BRZ comes with a metal skid plate by default to protect the oil pan from the road.

          Trucks and SUVs are terrible. Body on Frame vans and smaller unibody work vans are incredible but most people are too stupid and/or insecure and vain to buy them instead.

        • @[email protected]
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          14 days ago

          Supposed to be, according to markering. Isn’t. I think only half of SUVs sold in the US even have 4 wheel drive. This is fine because in the US most pickups and SUVs are just massive pavement princesses anyway.

    • flandish
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      85 days ago

      don’t be surprised when the capitalists see this obvious issue as an “opportunity” for development of bigger streets etc. ie: profit.

  • Bob Robertson IX
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    905 days ago

    I have never once heard anyone ever refer to an SUV as a ‘Large Engine Vehicle’. Am I just unaware, or is this trump being a complete idiot again?

    • @[email protected]
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      255 days ago

      He didn’t actually say this, someone with access to his TS/Twitter account did. They don’t know wtf SUV stands for and probably made it up.

      • @[email protected]
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        114 days ago

        So they also have to imitate his illiterate misuse of title case for Important Words, random quotation marks for “emphasis”, and littering of SHOUTY WORDS, not to mention his bizarre self-aggrandized tone and his ridiculous ways of ending messages that he thinks makes them look more important? Thank you for your attention to this matter.

          • @[email protected]
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            94 days ago

            Debatable who’s using Titlecase improperly, the Ones actually using it to convey Meaning and structure a Sentence, or the Ones afraid of Capitalisation and Compoundwords slightly longer than Banana. #Mikrofonfallenlassgeräusch

            • @[email protected]
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              44 days ago

              Live Winnie The Pooh:

              “When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.”

    • Caveman
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      34 days ago

      The term large engine vehicle sounds like came from the same guy that coined big dick energy

    • @[email protected]
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      125 days ago

      I’d say it is an obvious way to try to confuse BEV with LEV… To sell more ICE-cars…

  • socsa
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    394 days ago

    Does Trump actually think that Vietnam pays the tariffs?

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    Why would Vietnam be paying the tariff on Vietnamese goods going into the US? I swear the definition of a tariff changes every time I see it mentioned.

    • @[email protected]
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      264 days ago

      He’s always said that tariffs are paid by the exporting country to the importing country. He’s wrong of course, but at least he’s consistent.

      • @[email protected]
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        54 days ago

        It’s not wrong, it’s a lie. He does absolutely know how tariffs work, but he also knows that most Americans don’t, I can promise you, if you ask a dozen random strangers who pays the tariffs, you will end up hearing the presidents words.

  • @[email protected]
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    264 days ago

    So he’s putting tariffs on Vietnamese imports but exports are unburdened… So he’s basically creating a trade deficit? The thing he railed against months ago?

    • @[email protected]
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      204 days ago

      I don’t think i follow your logic, theoretically this would reduce the trade deficit. The US would be importing less from Vietnam because the people in the US have to pay 20% more, and the US would be exporting more to Vietnam as the price of the US good would be cheaper then they were before with no duties.

      The US would be exporting more and importing less so the trade deficit will go down.

      I don’t think that’s how it will work on reality as even with that 20% goods produced in Vietnam will still be cheaper then those made in the US. Same with US goods in Vietnam, where even if they don’t cost any more then the equivalent Vietnamese good due to tarrifs, they’ll still cost a lot more due to labor and shipping costs.

      • @[email protected]
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        24 days ago

        Yep I had that backwards in my head. Could this actually end up not being terrible? Don’t wanna give him any credit but I’m not read up on economics.

    • @[email protected]
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      54 days ago

      I stopped trying to make sense of fascist’s activities based on policy, morality, or even consistency, and now see them as doing or saying whatever is most advantageous at the time, even if it directly contradicts their previous assertions. Now their actions almost always make sense and are very predictable.

      You can’t reason with people like this, only maneuver them into a position where what you want is also most beneficial (or least detrimental) for them.

    • @[email protected]
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      74 days ago

      The worm eats well done steak with ketchup. Statistically he should have choked many times.

      *I have zero data to back this claim, just an assumption that it would be more likely to choke on shoe leather

  • @[email protected]
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    284 days ago

    “I hate communists!” except the one that buy my Large Engine Vroom Vrooms. Thank you for your attention on this matter.

  • FundMECFS
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    I’m so confused? Why would Vietnam agree to a one sided “free” trade agreement.

    Assuming trump has wildly oversimplified the details to sound better than they are.

    • @[email protected]
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      Because they get cheaper tariffs on exports to the US, in the knowledge that they don’t want to import much at all from the US, so it makes Trump think he has something when he has nothing.

    • @[email protected]
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      75 days ago

      US goods will be cheaper in Vietnam compared to other countries in the region. US companies will be more likely to invest in Vietnam compared to other countries in the region. If 20% is low relative to where their regional competitors end up it’s not a bad deal. I don’t think a lot of US produced goods compete with local products so its not likely to cause domestic industry much problems.

      • @[email protected]
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        24 days ago

        Quite a few companies in China have been outsourcing to Vietnam to avoid tariffs during the first Trump administration. They didn’t reverse course after the Biden administration increased tariffs further.

        Even if Trump didn’t touch the 25% special tariff on Chinese goods, 20% alone justifies doing so.

    • @[email protected]
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      225 days ago

      For Vietnam a bad deal is probably better than no deal. But also, don’t believe anything Trump says.

    • @[email protected]
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      54 days ago

      Some countries are caving to US on war. Some on trade. VN was threatened with 46% tariffs. The 40% transhipment rate is something easily avoided. I doubt VN will import more from US. VN making a deal can still provide best value apparel to US

    • @[email protected]
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      54 days ago

      I suspect they are “caving” a lot like Mexico and Canada “caved” earlier-the request made is already fulfilled.

  • @[email protected]
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    455 days ago

    Every single Vietnamese person I’ve known has only driven motorcycles or scooters, because the roads are already too congested to handle large vehicle traffic. I know autos are available for hire, but realistically is it even worth owning an American SUV in Vietnam?

      • @[email protected]
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        24 days ago

        Surprisingly probably a lot. My Vietnamese coworkers always go on about how its hard to go back and visit because it costs a lot over there now and how it isnt the place they left

    • GingaNinga
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      165 days ago

      I’ve been to HCM city and the streets are a river of scooters. These numbers are definitely off but I remember a tour guide saying there were something like 14 million people and 16 million scooters or (I forget the actual numbers). I gotta go back there it was so much fun. Amazing food, nice people and the best coffee i’ve ever had.

      • Track_Shovel
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        84 days ago

        Crossing the street in Vietnam is the weirdest experience: you just slowly shuffle out, and this literal sea of mopeds parts around you like a school of fish around a shark

    • @[email protected]
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      45 days ago

      Toyota hilux is the large car of choice there from what I saw. Dual cab for the family, rear tray for goods carrying and enough off road capacity for when the rain or jungle gets out of hand.