randominternetperson

mfryd said:

foregoneconclusion said:

mfryd said:

foregoneconclusion said:

randominternetperson said: What happens when the Sec of Homeland Security orders her U.S. Customs and Border Production officers to collect tariff revenue from ships in port after a court as said those tariffs are null and void?

That would be obvious obstruction and contempt of court. A federal judge could potentially have U.S. Marshalls arrest officials involved in that. 

One issue with that is that the U.S. Marshalls are under the Dept. of Justice.  The Dept. of Justice is under Trump.

This can make it problematic for the courts to enforce rulings against the wishes of a sitting President.

U.S. Marshalls serve both the DOJ and the Federal judiciary. Separation of powers = judge doesn't need sign-off from DOJ. 

There are theoretical issues and practical issues.

From a theoretical standpoint, the Marshalls listen to the DOJ and Trump can't set tariffs.

From a practical standpoint, a Marshall's paycheck comes from the DOJ, and the Marshall's chain of command work for the DOJ.  This administration has a history of firing people who follow the law when it conflicts with Presidential orders.  Thus, a Marshall might be fired for attempting to enforce a court order against the Trump administration.  We have seen this in the US Attorney's office of the Southern District of New York, where they went through six high ranking officials who refused to follow an illegal directive.

Furthermore, the US Supreme Court has ruled that a sitting President cannot be charged with a crime for any official acts.  Executive orders and directives fall into that category.  Additionally, any official acts can't be used as evidence in a court of law, even after the President leaves office.

Let's look at a hypothetical situation.  Imagine a foreign government can't buy arms from the US because they have a history of supporting terrorism. They decide to offer the sitting President lucrative personal real estate deals, and a $200 million jet as an "incentive" for him to change US foreign policy to allow that country to purchase weapons.  Suppose they structure the deal, so that the Jet is technical given to the US Government, with the stipulation that when the President leaves office the jet goes to a private organization run by the retired President (i.e. his "presidential library").   Imagine that in this hypothetical situation, the President agreed.   

In the past, this would have been considered a bribe.  The President could have been charged with a crime while in office, or after he let office.  Under the new supreme court ruling the President is immune from prosecution for accepting bribes while in office, and after he leaves office.

Similarly, suppose someone donated a million dollars to the President in order to get a pardon for her son's tax fraud conviction.  Again the President is immune from prosecution.  While the person making the bribe can be prosecuted, you can't use as evidence that the President pardoned her son.  This makes it challenging to prosecute people who bribe the President.  Strangely, you can prosecute for attempted bribery, but if the President accepts and acts on the bribe, you can't use those actions as evidence in court.

The bottom line is that even if it was a crime for the President to defy a court order, he cannot be prosecuted for it, and the US Marshalls would have no jurisdiction over the President.

Very well said. The on-going corruption is disgusting. Clearly and unambiguously the most corrupt administration in U.S. history. And the most shameless.

Also, if push comes to shove, the executive branch (or even just Homeland Security, which is responsible for collecting tariffs) employs a lot more "guys with guns" than the judiciary does. I mean if we end up with U.S. Marshals being called in to stop customs officials from collecting tariffs all bets are off. 

spheric said:

ssfe11 said:

The Founding Fathers knew a dictator or a king wannabe would sooner or later come to power so they devised a series of checks and balances. The Courts have spoken!  

The courts have spoken on a lot of issues, and the administration has proven time and again that they just don't give a shit. 

What happens when laws are clear, courts have decided, and neither is enforced? 

This is the scary part. 

What happens when the Sec of Homeland Security orders her U.S. Customs and Border Production officers to collect tariff revenue from ships in port after a court as said those tariffs are null and void?

What we learned in high school is that check and balances would have Congress use their impeachment powers to rein in the executive branch. Good luck with that.

I'm going to so be pissed and relieved when, in the near future, Trump "suspends" this one and the price of AAPL surges back. Pissed because the profit all his insider-trader cronies will make; relieved because I have so much invested in AAPL.

I wish I were so confident that his corruption outweighs his idiocy that I could afford to put my money where my mouth is (by acting like an insider trader knowing he's going to orchestrate a market boost for AAPL soon). Instead I'm just going to keep holding on and ride out the Trump chaos.

Alrescha said:

JMaille said:

People need to stop thinking this way.  It is not the other countries or the companies importing the products that pay the tariffs.  It is the American Consumer that pays the tariff.

Worth repeating.  The consumer pays for *everything*.  Tariffs?  Repairable phones?  Power supplies for every device?  An SD card reader in every Mac?  The consumer pays.

I agree with your point generally but not entirely.

On the face of it, the idea that tariffs are anything other than a tax on US purchasers is absurd. If Trump had any shame he wouldn't keep spouting this nonsense. Does he also assert that local sales taxes are taxes on businesses? It's literally exactly the same thing. You buy something for price X from someone overseas, but have to pay X to the seller and X times tariff rate to the US government.

On the other hand, economics teaches us that who ultimately bares the burden of a particular tax depends on the market (of the price elasticities of supply and demand). Although in the immediate term the buyer pays the tax (obviously), in the long run some of the cost of the tax will be borne by other economic actors (including the sellers). It's very complex, but I'll give a simple example to demonstrate.

Imagine the worldwide price of widgets is $100. You can buy US made widgets for $100; UK widgets for $100; etc. Now the US imposes a 25% tariff on UK widgets (but not Brazilian, Canadian or US widgets, etc.). If you already had ordered 10 UK widgets, you would get hit with an import duty of $250. But when you placed your next order for widgets, you would get them from anywhere but the UK. We all do that and firms adjust their prices in response. We could end up with an equilibrium of something like a worldwide widget price of $102.50 but the UK sells (many fewer than before) their widgets to US consumers for $82. The end result is that US consumers pay a bit more (but not 25% more); UK sellers are hit hard; and domestic and non-UK widget sellers get a small boost. Oh and the US Treasury gets 25% of the value of the (now much smaller) UK-to-US widget market.

In this example, almost all of the cost is borne by the UK widget sellers and hardly any by US consumers, but that's only because I imagined a market where the UK doesn't have a dominant position to start with. If instead, the UK has a monopoly in widget production (literally impossible to make them elsewhere for some reason), and US consumers have no substitute for widgets (completely inelastic demand) we would have seen a radically different long-term result. Prices (before paying the tariff) would come down slightly, the UK would sell somewhat fewer widgets to the US, and US consumers would be barely almost all the cost of the tariff.

Realistically, the alternative scenario is more relevant to what we'll experience given China's dominant role in production for so many things. So, yeah, US consumers will bear the brunt of these tariffs even in the longer term (and US producers will get a windfall).

CrossPlatformFrogger said:

I hope Apple continues to ignore Epic, not because I have anything against Fortnite being on the App Store, but this brings more attention to Apple and its abuse of its platform. So Apple, please carry on! 

Thanks for the chuckle.

I'm surprised you say "its platform." It almost seems like you're conceding that the App Store is something Apple created and controls rather than a natural human right that Apple is obligated to manage for the public good.