Americans can always be counted on to do what's right - once they've tried everything else.
WaPo, Erica Werner and Kevin Seiff:
When a Mexican company bought Mid Continent Nail Corp. in 2012, workers at the factory here feared it was the beginning of the end. Their jobs, they suspected, would be given to lower-paid workers in Mexico, more casualties of the hollowing out of U.S. manufacturing driven in part by an embrace of global trade.
Instead, Mid Continent’s factory has doubled in size since Deacero’s purchase. The company, facing fewer restrictions on steel exports after the North American Free Trade Agreement, shipped steel into Missouri, willing to pay skilled workers more to take advantage of cheaper energy costs in the United States and a location that allowed swift delivery to U.S. customers.
But President Trump has put 25 percent tariffs on steel imports, bumping production costs and prompting Deacero to reconsider this arrangement. With Mid Continent charging more for nails, orders are down 70 percent from this time a year ago despite a booming construction industry. Company officials say that without relief, the Missouri plant could be out of business by Labor Day — or that remaining production could move to Mexico or another country.
- and -
Philip Bennett, 37, a machine repairman at Mid Continent, appeared close to tears as he talked about his 5-year-old daughter, Aubree, who has a congenital heart condition that has required multiple surgeries. He has health insurance through Mid Continent that covers her.
- the money quote:
“There’s a lot of good things that he is doing. But he’s affecting me now, and I don’t appreciate it,” Bennett, a Trump supporter, said of the president.
It bothers me that Mr Bennet couldn't figure out how to be aware of the shitty things he was willing for other people to endure until those shitty things started to happen to him and his family.
And I may be giving him more credit than he deserves - he didn't say anything about how maybe he's been wrong, so now he's going rethink his political values.
Which brings me to the notion - according to the Let's-All-Sing-Along Lefties - that I'm supposed to coddle Mr Bennet, and soothe him; and pet him; and tell him it's OK that he and millions like him have spent the last 30 years snickering at the pain and suffering being visited on the whole fucking world because of the shitty policies of shitty politicians he's been rabidly supporting, which is why we're in this fucking mess in the first fucking place.
Here's what I have a truly difficult time not saying to guys like Philip Bennet:
"Take a flyin' fuck at a rollin' donut, you skeevy prick. This is exactly what you've been voting for. I hope you end up livin' in a refrigerator box down by the junkyard."
But no - can't do that - that's not good for any of us.
So hey - kumbaya, motherfucker.
