The Fed is acting like, heck with it. Recession is around the corner the Fed thinks, so we have to raise rates into the coming downturn. The Fed may think that the recession will be mild. What if that is not the case?

While this is true, a trade war is screwing farmers in rural areas. Trump is compounding the problem.

For a developing nation, China has far lower tariffs than the US had. I can't believe you would hitch your wagon to Trump madness, Peter.

You may be correct, but Trump ending trade wars is as likely as if he were to end his rallies. Trade wars have become a part of him. He gives massive tax cuts to subsidize the stock market while trade wars and lack of business investment crumble the real economy.

Housing is frozen compared to the old days. There is a lot of weakness in the economy. The Fed would tighten if the economy gets weaker, thinking that it is facing a pending recession anyway and rates are low historically. Lack of business investment is a huge red flag.

Why would the US occupy a central place in the China/Japan fusion, Mark. I noticed you said some think the US matters. That may not include you. The fusion, militarily, of India, Pakistan, China and Russia is already unifying Asia. Add Japan to the mix and we will be on the outside looking in. #Trump #Trumpfail The most populated region in the world appears to be moving on without us.

Yes, but Kelsey, my idea of real fiat money is that which has no collateral backing at all. Being under-collateralized is likely, especially in derivatives markets. Hopefully you will share more of that insight in the future! Thanks, author.

Well, study Hitler. Although he started his trade wars from a recession, he built a powerful economy which was meant for war. Nationalism is aggressive to very aggressive. The very aggressive is war. Nationalism is not just isolationism. It is worse. It is a manifestation of cultural superiority. Donald Trump believes he is genetically superior, and it is on video.

He believes that America is culturally superior, giving us the right, he thinks to bash the entire world. Other presidents have given lip service to American Exceptionalism, and generally went on pragmatically. George W Bush was a precursor to Trump. He left not a popular man. But he planted the seed of us vs them.

Romney was caught saying the 47 percent. So, not all Americans are included in the American Exceptionalism! But American Exceptionalism was taken by W. and the neocons to mean American Empire.

Donald Trump has defined that empire on steroids. He aims to bust any idea that the USA could be exceptional among many exceptional nations. That won't do for him. He is arrogant. He is dangerous. It will lead to a hurtful isolation if it continues. We will be excluded from worldwide supply chains. We will have lost out on the one thing that was to save us from the lost jobs of globalization. Just when we were poised to cash in and have friends, with large populations, Trump pissed it away. Maybe forever.

If you had a million dollars of government treasuries, you would trade them for the cash banks create. That is not strictly speaking, fiat money. Fiat money is not backed by assets. Your treasuries were debt to the government, but assets belonging to you. Without them, or a house, etc, you could not get the bank loan.

Wall Street has been very patient with Donald Trump, going over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt when I saw the handwriting on the wall quite awhile ago. Now they are doubting him in his anger towards the Fed, his trade war with China, his announcement that he is a nationalist. I knew he wanted havoc, to break the New Normal, to break bond prices, to break global prosperity and replace it with regional interaction. This effort to explode an intertwined world economy is Madness. There is no other term for it. It is time for Trump to be objective before he should be trusted, because he sure cannot be trusted as things stand, David.