I’m reading about Chinese consumers switching away from Apple because of nationalism and the trade war.  Then, rumors that the trade war is hurting the Chinese economy more than they admit.

So, here’s what’s happening: regular folks are having a tough time.  And when there’s a bully ruining your day or worse, you get mad at them.  This leads to wanting to punch back.  This is the people’s war.  The government uses this, sometimes it’s forced to do something on account of this.

Yet, when a government like Trump’s targets the Chinese economy, their target is the other government.  A poke in the eye.  For the people, it’s a punch in the gut.

There’s a fundamental problem here that libertarians will get.  When gangs of thugs that have their own petty interests rise to a position of monopoly power, they become the state.  This involves entering into a certain kind of relationship with the people.  This relationship changes mafia dons into statesmen.

Idiots like Trump are closer to dons than statesmen.  Statesmen are “supposed” to think of the people.

I believe they generally do.

What happens, though, is that the factions (interest groups) push hard for their piece of the pie.  That introduces thug rules to the game of “state”.  You can see it every time.  The statesmen are the peace party, the reasonable cool heads.  When push comes to special interest shove, the peace party is pushed out of power.  The war party comes in.

Statesmanship is abandoned, and the old thug rules come back.  This ought to cause the government to lose some of the legitimacy it fostered in trying to become a state.  However, everything is blamed on the enemy state, and the people are stupid.

Idiot human tribal instincts want to fight, and fighting requires a team.  People are more willing to kill traitors then they are the enemy.  They’re willing to put more energy into forcing people to pick sides, then they are fighting the other side.  This is why we have war.

Really, I’ve never seen a war ever where the fighting factions didn’t have special interest, thug rules, and irrational fighting instincts take over.

Don’t fight.  Don’t play the “game of thrones”.  It’s the only answer.