WoodScientist [she/her]

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Joined 4 months ago
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Cake day: March 18th, 2025

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  • He’s basically claimed unlimited authority to issue whatever tariffs he wants at will, including tariffs against individual companies. If the courts uphold his claim of expansive tariff powers, he can do this with tariffs alone.

    The drug companies are all big multinationals. For those located outside the US, regular import tariffs work. Just threaten to tariff the hell out of any foreign drug manufacturer that doesn’t agree to the administration’s price controls. Add a million percent tariff if need be.

    For domestic companies, it’s a little more difficult. But still, these are domestic companies with international operations. And exit tariffs are a thing. Congress can tax exports if it wants. And Trump could claim the same power. Any US-based drug company that didn’t play ball with prices would face a million percent export tariff.

    And this is just tariffs. Patent law could also be wielded to force companies to abide by price caps. And the generic licensing market could be used similarly. And there are so many national security laws that can be adopted. If certain emergencies are declared, the president can flat-out order companies to produce certain goods.

    Oh, Ozempic is too expensive? Trump just declared obesity a threat to national defense, and he’s ordered a hundred companies to produce Ozempic and similar drugs, at quantities 10x what would be needed to dose the entire population. The country is soon swimming in weight loss drugs and the price crashes through the floor. Your insurance company starts paying YOU to take them.


  • oh i know it’s all BS.

    It may not actually be. Sure, the corporations helped put Trump in power. They made the same gamble countless nations’ corporate sectors did when supporting fascist leaders - “yes he’s extreme, but we can control him.” How well did that work out for the Nazi German corporate sector? How well did that work for Russia’s oligarchs under Putin? Sure, some lucky ones got really rich by maintaining favor with the regime. But the moment your businesses interests go against the interests of the leader? You get trampled under the same boot as everyone else.

    The pharma companies helped put Trump in power, but they’re also incredibly unpopular. If there’s some way Trump can crush them, then that would greatly increase his own popularity. It may well be worth it for MAGA to stomp the pharma companies, even if it means losing their donations. It would hardly be the first time a fascist leader purged many of the people who put him in power.


  • I mean…people do tend to regress as Alzheimer’s sets in, no? Not regress as in regressive/progressive, but regress in terms of their own life experience and beliefs. You lose the newest memories first. And Trump was a Democrat for many years. He’s always been racist and pro-tariff, but it’s not impossible he had more progressive beliefs on many issues earlier in life. Whether he was only a Democrat because he lived in NYC, I can’t say. But him becoming more liberal as his brain turns to mush really wouldn’t be completely impossible. It really just depends on what his beliefs were earlier in life.