Jobs won’t come back!

Tariffs, a sick Trump ploy. Carnage looms.

Will tariffs bring companies back to the United States? No. The South Carolina clothing mills are gone. The looms are gone. The women are gone. Gone to soldiers every one.

Donald has done this tariff deal before. It did not work. Donald’s ploy is simply to feed his own ego. The tariffs are to force other countries to grovel. Trump wants to play strongman bully all over the world. This is his favorite game.

Making little countries grovel before him, he is the all powerful Oz. Pay no attention to the tiny-handed, fat man behind this curtain. He is a coward.

Trump yelped when China struck back so quickly with the 34% counter tariff. That was not Trump’s plan. He just wanted a phone call to make a good press release. Geez, China, are you stupid?

Let us take a deeper look at this. Will tariffs drive up prices? Yes. And those jobs moved back from there to here would increase prices by themselves.

That pair of undies from Vietnam for $2.00 ($12 for a pack of 6) would cost $5.00 ($30 for a pack of 6) if manufactured in the U.S. The tariff of 50% is doable. You see, $18 for a 6-pack is doable. That says there are no jobs that are coming back here. This is what those jobs would look like here:

That portends for you personally a declining 401K, declining for a long time. I suggest get out now.

• Reinvest in stability.

• Look for stocks that go up in a recession. I point to Hormel (Spam).

• Look at high yields like NLY and UAN.

• Shop for bargains later.

• Conserve and hoard cash.

What goes up during a recession? Spam. People buy Spam. That is Hormel. Cramer told me that.

Step Away From the Precipice. We all need to withdraw from the marketplace regardless, and run for cover. Buy nothing, especially if a tariff is on it. That may mean less imported produce.

• I am buying rice in 10-pound bags, my go to is Zebra brand basmati (not sela) for the past decade. Makes the longest cooked kernel I ever saw. Aromatic, great flavor. Zebra brand offers several kinds of rice, this type says “The True Basmati” on the bag. The rinse water color is milky white whereas others had a brown color. Rinse your rice 3-4 times. Listen up diabetics, I found this out yesterday. This rice has a low glycemic index! You let me do something for 10 years and I will learn something! Beth says not.

• I will load up on some Spam. They have lots of different flavors, like 15 different flavors. Pick a flavor to complement the pot!

• Beans are a great bet. Red beans, white beans, navy beans, great Northern, black beans, black eyed peas, split peas, fava beans, etc. Good for the heart. And what a variety. Listen up diabetics. Legumes are low glycemic index.

Beans are good for the heart and make a filling meal.

I bet white beans (Navy beans, etc.) with chopped Spam would make a great dish. (Add two big cans of turnip greens and a package of Knoor’s Vegetable Soup mix to that for a great soup. It’s an Alabama treat.)

Beans and legumes are rich sources of fiber, essential vitamins + minerals, and plant-based protein. Peanuts are one of the best legumes. (Not so peanut butter.) Chick peas (hummus) the very best. Legumes are great for diabetics. Beans are great sources of fiber and vegetarian protein. You can incorporate beans into soups, tacos, salads, and other recipes. Hummus is highly recommended. Red beans and rice, we do it every Monday. That is tradition in New Orleans.

Beans and legumes have several health benefits. Eating more of them may help reduce cholesterol, decrease blood sugar levels, and increase healthy gut bacteria. Seeing bags of beans on the pantry shelf helps me plan dinner quite often. You can feed d’big’a family for $5.00.

Wealth Preservation.

My plan is to withdraw from the market. I hope you join me. I will do a salad a week for dinner, and should increase that to twice a week. (I have done that for 7 years or so.) I expect we will move to a dish of beans with spam once a week, and still do red beans and rice on Monday. That will end up being 42% or my dinners/suppers. I have lost 57 pounds in 7 years on my new diet.

Other safe havens are needed for wealth preservation:

• Swiss Francs

• Gold

• High yield + stable stocks

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The Tesla Takedown is working. I watch his TSLA stock price while Musk cooks his underlying books. I am witness to a pattern.

• Tesla stock takes big drop.

• Elon announces a new “deal”.

He has been caught numerous times doing questionable things. He gets fined. I think it can be said openly this is his ethos.

Elon Musk’s cooking pots are marked in $10 billion increments. I suspect 89,000 Tesla car sales ($10 billion) were just reported that I suspect to be vaporware.

In Europe, actual registrations are reported by country. He cannot hide or falsify numbers in Europe. Europe’s countries are reporting sales that are down 50%. You can get a honest number there.

Musk can falsify and miscount in the U.S. and China. Musk reports U.S. sales off 13%, China sales he reports are off 11%. Let me rephrase that China number. That was wholesale numbers. Any idea what those are. My guess is units shipped to his dealers. China had been reporting sales off 49%.

I am not buying the U.S. and China sales numbers. I know a crook when they have shown themselves to be a crook. Off 50%, 13%, 11%. Look strange to you? Sentiment in Europe and the U.S. are the same. I call BS.

What I suspect is $10 billion that Musk over reported for his dismal Tesla 1st quarter. Add to that the $33 billion sale, $22 billion-overstated, of X to AI, creating xAI. I guess he cooked up an extra $32 billion in net worth in those two deals in just 1 month if you ask me.

Musk is panicked. The banks are about to come for him to recollateralize his loans. If he has to do massive Tesla-share sales right now to come up with that cash, his stock prices will crater even further. That would frighten me.

Angered at having tariffs placed on them, religiously nonviolent penguins established and trained a coalition, the Seagull Air Command (SAC), to mark peacefully Tesla vehicles.

The Road Ahead. Trump already asked our military to shoot our citizens on the streets, “Can we shoot them in the legs?”), but the military refused. Now he plans to arrest protestors. You know about how far with this that Trump will go, but no one knows what will unfold. Grab a flashlight, because we are at a dark fork on this American road.

Understanding will become a bridge. We all should have affinity with that need. Thank you for finding my voice. You have given that place and meaning by just being here. That is real, heart-felt sentiment. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to help grow HotButtons.