So the trade wars have begun.  Mark Levin says that Reagan was for free-trade.  Julia Hahn says that Reagan was actually a protectionist.  Who’s right?  I have to say that the latest article by Julia is very well written, very sophisticated, very well sourced out with quotes and references to back her up.  And when I first read it, I got to admit I was shaken up a bit and thought, “Maybe Levin isn’t quite right about what he’s been saying about trade?”  But I went outside and did some work and chewed on all this and read the article again.  It took me a while, but I see now that this article, though it’s convincing, is still nothing more than manipulative Trump propaganda.  With a little bit of brain power, a common man like me can see this for what it really is.  So I quoted the entire article and I added my notes in an italicized red font to explain what really is going on.  I know trade talk is boring and doesn’t really make ratings on the cable networks; but it is important.  So if you can endure it, please read on.  Here’s the entire article:

Hillary Pledges Open Borders, Levin Responds with Attack on Trump’s Tariffs

by Julia Hahn, 14 May 2016

First of all, the title of this states that Levin is responding to Hillary’s pledge to open borders with an attack on Trump’s Tariffs.  So right off the bat, Julia starts by lying.  Levin is not responding to Hillary pledge, but he’s responding to Trump’s pledge.  Julia is implying that open borders is an issue that Levin doesn’t care about, or perhaps Levin doesn’t see the horror of Hillary’s view on immigration.  Julia seems to think that because Levin is for free-trade, that somehow that makes him an open-border advocate, which most people who listen to Levin know that is absolutely absurd.  All that is simple deflection.  Julie is doing exactly what she’s accusing Levin of doing.  Julia is bringing attention to another subject to distract from the subject at hand due to a personal motive to smear Levin.

Last week, Donald Trump met with the family members of Sarah Root, a beautiful, beaming 21-year-old girl slaughtered by an illegal alien in Nebraska the day after graduating from college with 4.0 GPA. Later that day, Trump warned, “Crooked Hillary Clinton wants completely open borders.”

So Levin doesn’t care about Sarah Root or her family because he’s trying to shed some light on Trump’s trade plan or at least bring it to the forefront of people’s minds.  Of course illegal immigration is how Trump bursted on the scene; it’s his supposed strongest subject.  So, anytime anyone questions Mr. Trump they pound the immigration drum.  Anytime Mr. Trump was slipping in the polls, they pounded the immigration drum.  I remember on Breitbart, before every primary, they’d splash several illegal immigration stories across their website.  So this is par for the course.  Also, please note that Julia is politicizing the Sarah Root tragedy in order to smear Levin.  Deflection and politicization are tools of liberals.

Indeed, a review of Clinton’s campaign website reveals that her immigration plan is even more radical than that of Barack Obama, who completely suspended enforcement of America’s immigration law and printed hundreds of thousands of work permits for illegal aliens.

However, a much more pressing topic seems to have triggered the passions of radio host Mark Levin who, along with Jamie Weinstein, is one of the most vocal members of the #NeverTrump movement. In the course of two days, Levin penned two lengthy denunciations of Trump’s trade platform and Breitbart News’s coverage of it.

In a story featured on this website, Levin emotionally warns conservative Americans that Trump’s effort to boost American manufacturing represents a kind of existential threat to conservatism. It IS an existential threat to conservatism.  Tariffs is a government-handed solution to unfair trade.  Conservatives believe that government is not the solution, but rather government is the problem.  Levin is seemingly unconcerned with the prospect that his energetic Trump-bashing could help place Hillary Clinton in a position to add millions more Third World migrants to America, who almost certainly will not support Levin’s vision of smaller government conservatism nor tune in to his radio show where he espouses the same.  Just because someone disagrees with Trump does not mean that they are responsible for Hillary taking the White House.  Trumpsters are going to repeat this over and over and over.  I whole-heartedly disagree.  Those who vaulted him to the nomination bear the responsibility if he wins or loses.  Trumpsters were warned.  The RNC was warned.  All that should have been considered before the votes were cast.  Elections have consequences.  As Ted Cruz said, “You broke it, you bought it.”

“…Levin’s vision of smaller government conservatism…”  Huh?  This possibly exposes more about Julia than anything else.  I didn’t know there was another type of conservatism that wasn’t smaller government conservatism; as if you can have big government conservatism.  Do you see how they are attempting to redefine conservatism.  Do you remember that Trumpster women, Kayleigh McEnany, that Dana Loesch was bashing?  What did Kayleigh say that got Dana got so mad about?  She said that anybody that doesn’t support Trump is not truly a conservative.  They are actively trying to redefine conservatism.  Ironically, this is the very reason Savage advocated for a nationalist candidate.  Savage said that conservatism doesn’t mean anything anymore.  Well, now we got a nationalist candidate and his crowd is actively redefining conservatism, and demonizing true conservatives. Is that what you wanted, Savage?

One of the enduring mysteries of the #NeverTrump movement now that their preferred vessels— John Kasich and Ted Cruz— have exited the race is why they seem to believe that Trump’s “America First” platform represents a greater threat to conservatism than Clinton’s agenda of massive government, massive taxation, and massive Third World migration.  This is straw-man crud.  Nobody believes that Trump’s platform is a greater threat to conservatism than Clinton’s platform.  There may be a few (very few) people out there that believe that.  In fact, the only people that have even suggested this that I can recall are establishment elite’s like Boehner.  Conservatives don’t believe that and have never suggested that.  A threat to conservatism is a threat to conservatism; no matter what party it comes from.  This is just another ploy to somehow paint conservatives that don’t like Trump into some straw-man that supports Hillary and is really in league with the establishment.  There’s no such thing.

Trump is a “radical protectionist” whose trade policy would result in “economic misery” for nearly “everyone,” Levin warns conservatives:

The billionaire is a radical protectionist who has repeatedly declared his intention to impose massive tariffs aimed at the economies of other countries, such as Japan and Mexico, and a forty-five percent tariff on products from China. Such broad tariffs would most certainly result in retaliation by the targeted countries. This is a sure job-killer that would also drive up costs of everyday products to low- and middle-class Americans. The net result: economic misery, not just for those hard-working, tax-paying Americans who work in industries that rely on international commerce and trade, but mostly everyone.”

Levin lays out his economic theory, which leads him to his conclusion: namely, Trump’s expressed willingness to protect American industries against specific countries would result in higher prices for U.S. consumers and thus ensure economic hardship. Levin writes:

Remember, a tariff is really just a tax, the cost of which is imposed on the American people.  The higher the tariff, the higher the tax.  Imagine what a 45 percent increase in the price of goods made, say, in Japan would do to a middle class family shopping for a Toyota or Honda.   While Trump and his surrogates may have the money to pay the higher prices his policies would cause, many Americans – who are already having difficulty making ends meet – do not.

Levin makes no mention of the fact that if you raised the price of a Toyota by 45 percent, presumably Americans would not pay 45 percent more for a Toyota, but would instead buy a Ford, and that as Ford’s sales went up, the marginal cost of production would go down.

This sentence really is the only argument that Julia offers in defense of Trump’s trade theory, or as an answer to Mark Levin’s trade theory.  That’s it.  This is the only example or argument or attempt to disclaim Levin’s views on trade.  The rest of the article Julia concentrates on Ronald Reagan and attempts to cast Reagan as a protectionist.  But as far as inflation goes, higher prices, and such, this is it.  This simplistic example is really all she has.  I mean is this it?  This is all you got?

So first off, Toyota is already producing vehicles in the United States.  This is not even a good example.  But even if it was, what about all the local Toyota dealerships that would go out of business?  And it’s not just Toyota.  It’s Honda.  It’s Kia.  It’s Izuzu.  It’s Nissan.  All those dealerships and service companies would go belly up.  These are dealerships, family owned and operated by Americans that are the ones that will get hurt.  This will truly be another case of government elites picking winners and losers.

Secondly, what about the fact that a grand amount of the parts in the American made Ford are actually made in Japan or China.  Julia thinks everything under that hood is made in America.  Think again.  She thinks Ford won’t be affected by this?  Chevy?

Thirdly, Julia assumes that a marginal cost of production going down would actually be passed on to the consumer, or the employee.  Yeah right!  You just keep believing that.  I remember reading years ago that what happened more times than not is that…  Well, let me use a simple example.  Trump imposes tariff on Toyota.  Toyota’s price goes up.  Ford, instead of keeping their price the same, they raise their price to match the Toyota price.  Why?  Because they can.  So price goes up on Toyota 45%, but price goes up on Ford 44% and nothing changes but the price.  There’s examples of this in history; the steel industry for one.   

Fourth, she doesn’t address the topic of retaliation that Levin brings up:  Trade Wars.  They are very real, and Mark Levin does use history to back up what he’s saying.  He refers to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of the Depression.  Smoot and Hawley promised to relieve or protect the farming industry by applying these across the board tariffs on imported agriculture.  Most historian seem to believe that these tariffs made the Depression worst.  There’s a few out there that believe that it wasn’t necessarily the Smoot-Hawley tariffs.  One thing can be agreed though:  The Smoot-Hawley tariffs DID NOT DELIVER WHAT WAS PROMISED.  Anyway, many countries imposed tariffs on us because of this maneuver and the whole world paid the price. 

Fifth, Levin has made it real clear that tariffs are hitting this problem from the wrong side.  This is a heavy-handed government solution to unfair trade.  Mexico is not killing American jobs.  Canada is not killing American jobs.  No.  America is killing American jobs.  With all the regulations, taxes, and liabilities associated with doing business, it’s near impossible to compete with other countries.  You don’t fix that by taxing the competition.  You free up the American businesses.  You deregulate them.  You quit taxing them.  You get out of the way and let Americans produce.  We’re over taxed.  And now you’re going to tax the competition and we’re supposed to pay for that too.  Henry Ford begged Hoover not to sign the law, and called the Smoot-Hawley tariffs “an economic stupidity!”.  Yeah, so Julia doesn’t address that.

Sixth, this is it.  This is really the only argument Julia poses for Trump tariffs.  She actually thinks it’s that simple.  The rest of the article, she systematically tries to discredit Mark Levin on the basis that Reagan was not a “free-trade purist”, therefore Levin doesn’t know what he’s talking about even though Levin never asserted such a thing.  Read for yourself.

Moreover, Levin’s example (denouncing a 45% tariff on Japanese vehicles, which he imagines could be implemented by a President Trump) is completely analogous to an action Ronald Reagan took during his Presidency. As President, Reagan implemented a 45% tariff on Japanese motorcycles in order to save the Harley-Davidson Motor Company. To use Levin’s words: “Imagine what a 45 percent increase in the price of goods made, say, in Japan would do to a middle class family shopping for a…” motorcycle. 

A motorcycle is not… nevermind.  I’ll let her finish her argument.

A 1984 report notes that the “average dealer net price of a Harley-Davidson motorcycle” was approximately $4,780—or “$890 more than the average dealer net price ($3,890) of Japanese-brand motorcycles in the 1000cc and over class, and $2,134 more than the average price ($2,546) of all Japanese- brand motorcycles in the 700 to 899cc class.”

Regardless, Levin attempts to defend Reagan’s actions and distinguish Reagan’s trade views from Trump’s, writing:

Reagan did not make wholesale protectionism and tariffs a central plank of his platform, as Trump does; nor did he support imposing high tariffs on every single product produced in a particular country.  Actually, Reagan emphasized the opposite.  Reagan’s tariffs were targeted, including on Japanese motorcycles and semiconductors, and usually in response to specific violations of trade deals.  Besides, Trump is a populist/nationalist/protectionist.  Reagan was a conservative.  There’s a difference.”

This has got to be the most disingenuous stupid arguments I’ve ever seen.   Julia will attempt to take down Levin assertion that Reagan was not a protectionist.  She’s trying to compare Reagan’s tariff on a particular industry to Trump’s across the board China or Japan tariffs.  No they are NOT COMPLETELY ANALOGOUS.  Comparing motorcycles to a whole nation of goods is stupid.  Please. I can’t believe I actually gave some credence to this article when I first read it.  I mean there’s really no point in going further because the rest is based on this fictitious COMPLETE ANALOGY.  But let’s go into it anyway.

However, Levin’s argument is self-contradictory in two ways.

First, Reagan’s actions are completely irreconcilable with the economic principles that Levin has established: specifically, Levin’s belief that an action which raises the price of imports is “a sure job-killer that would also drive up costs of everyday products to low and middle-class Americans. The net result: economic misery.”

Yet trade rules, by definition, are protectionist. NO DUH GENIUS!  Any prohibition on an unfair subsidy is, at bottom, a prohibition on importing a good so cheaply that an American company has no chance of competing against it. However, by Levin’s zero-sum argument that cheaper is necessarily better, none of these trade rules should exist or be enforced at all because to levy a tariff is to raise prices, and— by Levin’s argument— damage the economy.

Moreover, Reagan grounded his decisions in what Levin might define as “protectionist” rhetoric.

“The health and vitality of the U.S. semiconductor industry are essential to America’s future competitiveness,” Reagan said in 1987 as he was implementing a 100% tariff on Japanese semiconductors. “We cannot allow it to be jeopardized by unfair trading practices.”

“I have determined that import relief in this case is consistent with our national economic interest. The domestic industry is threatened by serious injury because of increased imports,” Reagan said in 1983 as he was implementing his tariff on Japanese motorcycles. “I have maintained that I would enforce our trade laws where necessary and where such actions are consistent with our international obligations.”

Reagan explained that protecting American industry is in the economic interests of the United States, even if it precludes the option of buying cheaper foreign goods. Reagan believed it was worth imposing a tariff for the purpose of ensuring that the American industry is able to survive. In other words, instead of letting the global market decide, Reagan applied a mercantilist approach saying the American producers should survive for the simple reason that they’re American— not because it’s cheaper, and not because it’s necessarily better, though it may be, but because America is better off for having it made within our own borders.

The second reason Levin’s logic is self-contradictory is that Levin’s attempted exit-hatch— that Reagan was simply enforcing rules in response to specific violations of trade deals— would more than justify Trump’s proposed actions.

Trump has clearly said that if China devalues its currency, he will impose a tariff on China equivalent to the amount by which they are devaluing their currency— essentially negating the value of the illicit practice so that they stop doing it.

As Trump told the New York Times:

I would do a tax. And let me tell you what the tax should be? The tax should be 45 percent. That would be a tax that would be an equivalent to some of the kind of devaluations that they’ve done. They cannot believe that we haven’t done this yet. [Emphasis added]

Interestingly, Levin criticizes Breitbart for not including this quote in a Breitbart News report last week. However, when Levin provides the quote to his reader, for some reason, he leaves out the one sentence (underlined above) necessary for the reader to understand that Trump’s tariff is in direct response to illicit currency manipulation.

RedState—a blog that is certainly no friend to Trump—points out that members of corporate media are promoting a false characterization of Trump’s statement. RedState writes:

It seems pretty clear… that Trump is not calling for a 45% tariff specifically, he’s saying that this is basically what he figures that it would take to even out the playing field in terms of China’s devaluation of their currency… In other words, while Trump did utter the 45% figure, he seemed to be clearly using it as an example of how he would respond to a given value of Chinese currency devaluation. He did not claim it as an ironclad rule that should be used against China per se.

Okay so…  Same thing.  I don’t care what the tariff is in response to, the point is that he’s proposing ACROSS THE BOARD tariffs as opposed to Reagan’s SPECIFIC tariffs.  So in that respect, Levin is yet to contradict himself.  Julia thinks that China’s devaluation of currency is analogous to a motorcycle.  I’m just not seeing it.  Another point that Levin makes is that ALL countries manipulate their currency, including ours.  Now, I’ll admit: I don’t know too much about currency manipulation.  But I know enough to know that MOST people don’t know much about currency manipulation.  So to me, for Trump to use that as his argument and justification for across the board tariffs on China, is probably an exploitation of the masses’ ignorance, especially because he, and Julia, don’t address the points that Levin is bringing up.  Speaking about currency manipulation, what about the currency manipulation that our government has been doing; all this quantitative easing?  I don’t know much about it, put typically conservatives frown upon it yet Trump is silent on it.  

Look, there are major major major problems with the heavy-handed, iron-fisted, regulatory, bureaucracy that is killing American industry.  To think that tariffs on imports is going to somehow save us, is to completely ignore the real problems in this country:  YUGE GOVERNMENT!  So the conservative looks at it from this end, looking for a way to get the government out this.  While the liberal looks at it from the other end, looking for a way to get the government into this, which is tariffs.  Also, has anybody asked Trump what he’s going to do with all this revenue that essentially comes out of the consumer’s pocket?

Reagan took a similar position in 1985 when his administration pushed the Plaza Accord, which made products from Japan more expensive by raising the value of Japan’s currency.

However, Reagan was dealing with a world in which America had a much different economic threat matrix than it does today. While economic nationalists may find fault with Reagan for not acting strongly enough to protect enough threatened industries, the scope and reach of the threats that he faced were small in comparison to today. Reagan operated before NAFTA and before China’s entrance into the WTO. Plus, for all the tensions that existed between Japan and the U.S. during Reagan’s day, Japan was never a geostrategic threat to the United States’ position in the world in the same way that China is today.

In the specific case of China, Levin complains that Trump suggested imposing a tariff across the board rather than on selected goods: “Forty-five percent [tariff] on what?  Not a single product or some products. But on all products coming from China and other unspecified tariffs aimed at Japan and Mexico,” Levin writes.

Although one hardly gets the impression that Levin would drop his criticism of Trump’s proposal if Trump provided a list of the specific foreign goods he wished to subject to import duties, what Levin apparently fails to appreciate is that China’s currency manipulation would affect the price of all of their exports—not just some exports.

In other words, the only way to halt currency manipulation would be to impose a countervailing duty on all Chinese goods, which necessarily benefit from the devaluation. Trump was specific in saying that the size of his tariff would be proportional to China’s devaluation.

Though the media, as RedState points out, and Trump’s critics—including Weinstein—are perhaps willfully ignorant of this fact, Trump was explicit in saying that the 45% tariff would be a counterbalance to a 45% currency devaluation, in effect removing any incentive for China to cheat in the first place.

Trump’s tariff on currency cheating is, therefore, no more guilty of raising the price of a particular product than is NYPD raising the price of a Fossil watch when they prohibit the sale of an illegal knockoff in Times Square.

Levin’s logic is thus twisted into a pretzel. He offers a muted defense of Reagan by saying that Reagan was simply applying the rules, while at the same time, advancing an economic argument that would prohibit anyone from enforcing any trade rule at any time since such action would deny Americans access to a cheaper subsidized foreign good.

Rather than address the internal inconsistencies of his own logic, Levin’s piece primarily responds by inundating the reader with various Ronald Reagan pro-free trade quotes.

However, the thesis of a 1988 Cato analysis highlighted in Breitbart’s original report—which Levin offhandedly dismisses without explanation—seems to rebut nearly all of Levin’s op-ed. The analysis entitled “The Reagan Record on Trade: Rhetoric Vs. Reality” argues that “words are not deeds,” and an examination of Reagan’s “record leads to the question: With free traders like this, who needs protectionists?”

Yeah so there it is.  Yes, imposing tariffs is protectionist in nature, but that doesn’t make Reagan a protectionist.   Reagan was at the core a free-market capitalist, and yes he did impose SOME tariffs. But it’s disingenuous to call him a protectionist because he imposed a few tariffs, none of which were across the board.  This may be simplistic, but I do some welding from time to time.  Does that make me a welder?  I hate birthday parties and Christmas shopping.  Does that make me a Jehovah’s Witness?  That’s the kind of stupid reasoning that these people are making.  And the only reason they’re doing this is to Trumpify Reagan for their own gain.

“Although he has made some free-trade statements, he has nearly always contradicted them with other statements and then acted like a protectionist,” Some? Reagan spent years running around this country giving speeches defending conservatism, free-trade, free-market enterprise, and capitalism when he worked for GE.  Imposing two or three specific tariffs is nowhere near being an across the board tariff Trumpeteer.  Trump is RUNNING on tariffs.  That’s the comparison that Levin is making.   wrote Cato’s Sheldon Richman, as he proceeded to level the same criticism against President Reagan for raisings the cost of goods for U.S. consumers that Levin now levels against Trump: “The Reagan policy has harmed the United States in several ways… Consumers pay more for products when quotas make imports artificially scarce and when tariffs make them artificially expensive,” Richman said.

The “free traders’” frustrations over the disparity between Reagan’s rhetoric as a trade purist and his actual trade record was echoed by others at Cato during that time.

There’s that word purist again.  That is straw-man poop.  Reagan never called himself a trade purist.  It’s his opponents that called him a purist.  People always do that to disparage someone.  It’s got a double effect.  They derogatorily call you a purist because you have some principles, then call you a hypocrite when you don’t live up to their standards as a purist.  They hit you coming and they hit you going.  That’s exactly what they do today.  “Oh!  Ted Cruz is a purist!  We can’t put him in office!”  And the next day they say, “Ted Cruz is a hypocrite because of blah blah blah!”  Listen to Michael Savage and Hannity, and they use this purist bologna all the time.  They claim that #NeverTrumpers are purists.  No they have principles.  There’s no such thing as purist.  The closest to purist are probably Libertarians.  And Cato Institute, who Julia seems to love so much, is thought to be a libertarian institute. 

Julia says that “Levin’s logic is thus twisted into a pretzel.”  My goodness!  Julia is the one with the twisted pretzel logic.  She on one hand gives undo credence to the Cato libertarians in saying Reagan was a protectionist, but then completely ignores them in their viewpoint of protectionism in supporting the Trump tariffs.  She only believes half of what they’re saying; and of course it’s the half that helps her discredit Levin. 

“Despite President Ronald Reagan’s free-trade speeches, the portion of U.S. trade subject to U.S. nontariff barriers is estimated to have increased more than 50 percent since 1980,” wrote Cato’s Jim Powell in 1990.

Note:  “nontariff barriers”  You see how Julia does this?  Most people read this real fast and get the impression that Reagan upped import tariffs 50%.  But that’s not what it says.  It says nontariff.  Nontariff.

“Reagan’s instinctive or at least rhetorical commitment to economic freedom was once again overridden, apparently for political reasons,” wrote Cato’s Daniel Klein in 1984, referring to the motorcycle tariff. “President Reagan chose to sacrifice free trade and economic prosperity to short-term political goals. Consumers may well view the higher price of motorcycles as just another form of public financing of presidential campaigns.”

Once again, it’s clear we’re talking MOTORCYCLES, not Smoot-Hawley type tariffs.  As to the criticism at the time of Reagan, I think his free-market, limited government record speaks for itself.  Prices may have gone up, but so did wages, so did wealth, so did freedom, so did individualism, so did nationalism.  I think some of our prominent radio host got it backwards.  They think that this rise of nationalism will bring conservatism.  Reagan’s conservatism brought nationalism.  My question is what brings today’s nationalism?  What is fueling today’s rise of nationalism?  it’s not conservatism.  It’s Trumpism.  Trumpism is simply populism.  If Trumpsters are bashing Levin, and Cruz, and Sasse, and good conservatives that have fought the good fight, there’s something wrong. 

Reagan’s “administration has imposed more new restraints on trade than any administration since [President] Hoover,” said William Niskanen, a former Reagan aide who later went on to work at Cato.

Richman echoed this sentiment: “Ronald Reagan by his actions has become the most protectionist president since Herbert Hoover.”

Interestingly, this again is the same criticism Levin says about Trump. While Reagan’s “free trade” contemporaries accused him of subscribing to Hooverism, Levin writes that Trump’s trade position “is not Reaganism but Herbert Hooverism.”

Levin dismisses the 1988 report by writing simply: “Hahn cites a CATO Institute piece condemning the Reagan trade record. Well, here’s a link to a CATO Institute piece praising it. So what?”

I think Levin has got right perspective on Cato Institute.  So what?  Levin is the one saying that Cato’s claims are irrelevant.  Julia is the one that seems to be placing all the weight on what they have to say.  Niskanen seems to be the purist.  It you wiki him and read a little bit about him.  He seems to be a contentious, libertarian, free-trade purist like the kind that Julia imagines exist.  I suppose they do exist after all.  Well of course they’re going to criticize Reagan.  If you read his short bio on Niskanen, you’ll see he criticizes everybody. 

There’s a distinction that is not made in all these Cato comments.  And I’m not a professional on this, but Niskanen supposedly had a real problem with Reagan’s “restraints on trade”.  (That apostrophe is on the inside of the period on purpose)  Well, Reagan also used quotas and other things as a restraint on trade.  Quotas and tariffs are not the same.  So a simple explanation would be that instead of slapping a 45% tax on Toyota imports, there would be a limit as to how many would come in.  I would think that this would be somewhat a safer approach being that it gently affects economics natural equilibrium of supply and demand.   Price may come up somewhat, but it will be dictated by demand, not the heavy hand of government.  It may not come up at all.  Something to learn more about I guess.

But my point is that just because one dude is complaining about Reagan’s “restraints on trade”, that doesn’t make Reagan a tariff happy protectionist.  Tariffs are just one thing that Reagan used to affect trade, and he used it little compared to the other things he used.  Julia even provides a list of eight different things he did, but strangely only one of the list is a tariff.  Like I said, Niskanen was libertarian and so is Cato Institute.  No president will satisfy these type of libertarian ideologues on free-trade. 

Yet the Cato piece Levin highlights—which was written in 2004 after Reagan had passed away—reads like an effort to rehabilitate Reagan’s trade record in the eyes of Libertarians in service of appropriating his name and popularity to promote their agenda—much the same way liberals use Reagan’s amnesty to suggest that Reagan would have supported Barack Obama’s amnesty. Indeed, the article, entitled “Reagan Embraced Free Trade and Immigration,” tries to argue that Reagan would have held an entirely different view on immigration than Levin does. The article even seems to take swipes at professional Reagan conservatives like Levin, writing:

Reagan’s vision of an America open to commerce and peaceful, hardworking immigrants contradicts the anti-trade and anti-immigration views espoused by [those]… who claim to speak for the conservative causes Reagan largely defined… Like President George W. Bush today, Reagan had the good sense and compassion to see illegal immigrants not as criminals but as human beings striving to build better lives through honest work… Compare Reagan’s hopeful, expansive, and inclusive view of America with the dour, crabbed, and exclusive view that characterizes certain conservatives who would claim his mantle. Their view of the world could not be more alien to the spirit of Ronald Reagan.

I don’t know what this lady is saying.  Levin is not anti-trade.  He’s free-trade.  Trump and tariffs are anti-trade.  Levin is not anti-immigration.  He’s, like most Americans, anti-illegal immigration and anti-mass immigration.  So I really don’t know what Julia is getting at.

Groups like Cato, who at once praise Reagan’s free market philosophy whilst cheering mass migration, operate under the assumption that Reagan’s success had nothing to do with the success of the people he governed. In other words, that Reagan’s administration would have been equally successful had he been chosen president of Bangladesh.

The Cato article delineates another inconsistency in Levin’s position on trade. Specifically, Levin’s espoused economic theory dictating his trade policy seems at odds with his stated position on labor policy. Levin has previously claimed to oppose open borders, in part, because a large excess of low-skilled labor that is willing to work at a reduced salary unfairly undercuts the jobs and wages of American workers. Similarly, a large, uninhibited flow of low-priced imports manufactured by countries whose governments unfairly subsidize those goods, will undercut American manufacturing—and, subsequently, the jobs and wages of Americans who fill those jobs.

The only difference is that imports, unlike people, do not bring with them other elements such as healthcare needs, crime, different values and voting habits, welfare, education costs, and so forth. But the same economic principle applies.

Okay, on the onset Julia sounds smart and I’m sure she is.  But take a second and think about this.  Remember, the intention of this article is not to learn more about free-trade.  The intention is to smear Mark Levin.  Notice she is using the same tactics as left wing liberals to this.  She is equating illegal immigration with legal immigration in order to smear their opponents.  She’s also mixing in that purist/hypocrite poop.  This is Julia’s logic:  Since Levin is a ridiculous free-trade PURIST, then in order for him to be consistent, he must support open-borders, illegal immigration, and murderers.  Levin has never been for open-borders.  So somehow in Julia’s head, or what she’s trying to put in your head is that Levin’s position on tariffs signifies that he’s actually FOR Hillary and therefore un-American.  I’m sorry, but that is just plain… I don’t know how to explain that.

This is Rule #5 in Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” This an attempt to ridicule Levin, to make his positions seem ridiculous.

This is Rule #13 “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions.”  Julia spends one sentence defending and explaining tariffs and spends the rest of the article trying to disparage Levin’s credibility and trying to link him to an illegal-alien murderer or worst, Hillary!

Levin’s previously professed desire to curb visa dispensations seems directly at odds with his espoused economic theory that cheaper is better.

I can’t find where Levin’s political positions are “cheaper is better”.  I never heard him say that on radio nor have I read it or seen it on his TV show.

Lastly, in his op-ed, Levin takes a random swipe at famed Reagan advisor Pat Buchanan. The timing of Levin’s jab seems peculiar given that history—and this election in particular—has proven Buchanan prescient on three of the most fundamental issues concerning American voters: migration, trade, and foreign policy.  In the case of the former, this is an issue conservatives could lose forever if Hillary Clinton is put in a position of power from which she can permanently dissolve America’s borders.

All this talk about trade by Julia is truly an effort to Trumpify Reagan.  They are desperately trying to redefine Reagan in order for Trump to carry his mantle.  I think it’s funny that the only way they can Reaganify Trump is to bring Reagan down and criticize him and redefine him.  Reagan, conservative’s champion of free-market capitalism is now a tariff happy protectionist cowboy, just like Trump.  Please.