President Donald Trump has never cared about actually delivering results. He only cares about being seen as effective, the biggest and the best, even when the numbers he brags about are pure fantasy.
He has spent years touting trade deals packed with imaginary investments and impossible purchase commitments. One of the most absurd came when he claimed the European Union had agreed to buy $250 billion in American energy imports—a figure not only three times their then-current level, but one that U.S. producers couldn’t physically supply. Naturally, the real agreement bound neither party to anything remotely approaching that number.
But Trump doesn’t care. He just wants a giant number to wave around like proof of competence.
And once again, he’s done exactly that.
“Field of bad dreams” by Tim Campbell
Last month, he announced a “deal” with China in which Beijing supposedly agreed to buy 12 million metric tons of American soybeans—music to the ears of farmers hammered by the very tariffs Trump imposed. Reality, of course, looks nothing like the press-conference fantasy.
“The USDA report released after the government reopened showed only two Chinese purchases of American soybeans since the summit in South Korea that totaled 332,000 metric tons,” reported the AP. “That’s well short of the 12 million metric tons that Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said China agreed to purchase by January and nowhere near the 25 million metric tons she said they would buy in each of the next three years.”
One analyst pointed out that even if China really did agree to purchase soybeans, it was likely contingent on a “good price.” And China is getting far better prices from Brazil and now Argentina—both happily undercutting U.S. producers. All while Trump funnels tens of billions to prop up his favorite South American autocrat.
The result is predictable: American farmers will keep begging for government bailouts instead of pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, the very standard they demand of everyone else. And despite getting shafted over and over again, their loyalty to Trump and to a Republican Party that has done nothing but exploit them remains absolute.
They voted for this. They can live with it.
