President Trump delivered a major address in the White House Rose Garden Wednesday, outlining his America First economic agenda.
 
There were many union workers in the audience. One union auto worker the president invited up to the podium said, “Mr. President, we can’t thank you enough.” It’s a sentiment shared by many in the heartland. (Here and here.)
 
Not everyone is happy. The tariffs Trump announced were in many cases tougher than what had been expected. The financial markets cratered yesterday.
 
The entire chattering class is screaming, “The sky is falling!” Democrats are in high dudgeon, and some GOP knees are buckling.
 
I know there is serious economic pain here for some people, depending on what industry they are in. I know great families in the business of selling cars. They are tremendous patriots who love America. I would hate to see their businesses get hurt. But if they’re selling cars made in Germany or Japan, the tariffs are going to hurt.
 
Even American car companies, like General Motors, have built a lot of plants outside of America. Those cars coming back to America will have tariffs, and those auto dealers will have challenges.
 
 
 
Conventional Wisdom
 
Here’s something to think about: If tariffs are so bad for the economy, why does virtually every nation around the world have high tariffs on our products?
 
Contrary to the “conventional wisdom” that says prices will universally go up, Ford just announced it is offering big discounts.
 
In spite of all the gloom and doom from the professional pundits, hiring in March was strong. In fact, manufacturing jobs have grown the past two months, after losing jobs under Joe Biden. And that’s exactly the point.
 
If all of this does what it is supposed to do, General Motors and foreign car companies will start building more plants in America, creating more jobs here so more Americans are able to buy cars. How quickly that happens, and what the pluses and minuses are, remains to be seen.
 
But it is already happening. In response to President Trump’s tariffs, Hyundai recently announced a $20 billion investment in new manufacturing in the United States, including a $6 billion steel mill to supply its U.S.-based auto plants.
 
I tend to agree with economic analyst Charles Payne. He said on Fox News yesterday that the “bomb” Trump just dropped on our foreign competitors may quickly result in multiple deals between the United States and individual countries that will be beneficial to everybody.
 
That is already happening, too. Israel is dropping all tariffs on U.S. products. India says it’s open to dropping tariffs on U.S. goods. So is Vietnam, which Trump just hit with some of the highest tariffs. And our Canadian friends sound like they want to make a deal, but we’ll have to wait and see how serious they are.
 
By the way, are Canadians really eating manatees?!
 
 
 
Putting Americans First
 
For years now, everybody has been talking about “income inequality” and the growing structural flaws in our economy. The top 10% of U.S. consumers are responsible for 50% of all spending because their assets and incomes are that much higher than the rest of the population.
 
Meanwhile, nearly 60% of lower and middle-class Americans say an unexpected expense of $1,000 would be a financial crisis for them. Year after year, a growing number of Americans say they are struggling to make ends meet, living paycheck to paycheck. And 30 million American children qualify for subsidized school lunches.
 
These are not good trends.
 
We used to make most things in our own country. After World War II, America was the manufacturing center of the world. Our industrial base was unlike anything that had ever been seen. American-made appliances lasted for decades.
 
I grew up in the industrial Midwest. In my hometown of Newport, Kentucky, we had a steel mill, multiple other factories, a brewery, and more. World War II veterans were able to come home, work in those factories, and earn good wages so they could buy a house, take care of their family, and put their kids through college.
 
But decades later, establishment leaders in both parties decided it was more efficient if we let other countries around the world make most things because they could do it more cheaply. They said we would be better off as a service economy, selling services to each other.
 
That policy decision decimated American manufacturing.
 
In the years following the passage of Bill Clinton’s North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 90,000 U.S. factories closed down. Main Streets throughout the heartland were boarded up. Communities died.
 
As American workers were forced to compete against slave wages paid in foreign countries, it became difficult for people without college degrees to earn a living wage. It contributed to the breakdown of the family and to the “deaths of despair” from the opioid epidemic.
 
Free trade, it turned out, wasn’t so free. It had many costs, and America’s working class bore the brunt of them, while our elites got richer and richer.
 
My blood boils every time I hear commentators on CNBC saying, “Are people really going to tolerate paying a couple dollars more for T-shirts?”
 
Well, if we paid a few more dollars for T-shirts, it would be the result of a fellow American getting a job in a textile plant, enabling him to afford to buy cars! We need to start looking out for Americans first.
 
Donald Trump understands this. He has warned his entire adult life that we must stop allowing foreign nations to dump their cheap goods into America while they impose high tariffs on us. And many of these countries expect us to defend them if they are in danger! (See next item.)
 
 
 
Putting America First
 
The hollowing out of our industrial base also made America very vulnerable. During COVID we learned that even our medications are not made here. The personal protection equipment that doctors and nurses needed wasn’t made here.
 
As free trade made communist China wealthy, enabling its massive military buildup, we are now suddenly realizing that we don’t make ships anymore. We don’t have the factories to mass-produce tanks and ammunition. The war in Ukraine made that painfully clear.
 
If we don’t rebuild our manufacturing base, we could wake up one morning shocked to learn we have lost a major war.
 
This is not only an unsustainable model, it’s a dangerous model.
 
Thankfully, we finally have a president who is putting America and American workers first!
 
 
 
Women Are Fighting Back
 
Whenever an athlete takes a knee in protest, the left usually celebrates the kneeler. But not this time.
 
When Stephanie Turner learned she would be competing against a man in a women’s fencing tournament, she decided to take a stand. Actually, she took a knee at the beginning of her match.
 
A curious official walked over to find out what was going on. Turner said, “I am a woman, and this is a man, and this is a women’s tournament. And I will not fence this individual.” Turner was immediately expelled from the competition.
 
The entire left-wing establishment is on the side of the man she wouldn’t fence.
 
The entire left-wing establishment is on the side of Lia Thomas, aka William Thomas, who just announced he’s going to lead the battle for the right of men to cheat in women’s sports.
 
The entire left-wing establishment is on the side of men who are ruining women’s sports.
 
The left constantly lectures us about “women’s rights,” but they hate any woman who defends her right to safe spaces and fair competition.
 
The good news is that women, like Riley Gaines and Stephanie Turner, are fighting back. Many women, abandoned by the feminist movement and the entire left-wing establishment, are seeing this abuse and thinking twice about their loyalties.
 
They are also inspired by Donald Trump’s bold willingness to make this a major issue, instead of the usual GOP response in a culture/values battle of assuming a crouching position and slowly surrendering.
 
Turner told Fox News that she used to be a “lifelong Democrat.” But now she is a “new Republican conservative” who “voted Red down the ticket” in the last election. And she fully supports President Trump’s efforts to save women’s sports.
 
 
 
Left-wing Lunacy
 
We’re already seeing how crazy this gets. Now we have drag queen story hours for children.
 
The teachers’ unions are demanding the right to tell your seven year-old about dozens of genders that don’t exist. They’re going so far as to say, “Johnny, you can use the girls’ restroom if you want, because you may be a girl trapped in boy’s body. We won’t tell your parents.”
 
Think this insanity can’t get any worse? Think again.
 
A four year-old was recently suspended from a British preschool “for being transphobic.” The school refuses to say exactly what the child’s offense was, but there are only a couple of possibilities.
 
One is that the child used a slur he heard at home. The proper response in that case is to talk to parents and warn the child against inappropriate language.
 
But I think it’s more likely that the child said something really outrageous like, “Men can’t get pregnant” or “It’s wrong for that boy to wear a dress.”
 
There was a time when being openly gay could cost you your job. No one is suggesting we go back to that. But the world is upside down when speaking the truth can cost you your job or get your toddler kicked out of school.
 
But that’s exactly where the left’s lunacy has led us.
 
They appealed to our tolerance. But once the left won the “tolerance” battle, they switched to smashing to anyone who dared to disagree with them.
 
 
 
Tune In To Family Talk
 
Please tune in to Dr. James Dobson’s Family Talk radio show. On today’s broadcast, I talk with actor Kirk Cameron about his new series that teaches children timeless truths.
 
You can find station listings here. Or you can listen online here.