President Trump has announced his intention to place tariffs on steel and aluminum imports to protect American jobs and producers.

I won’t comment (at least not today) on whether or not that is a good idea. But I couldn’t help but notice that the opinion of American businessmen on this issue is divided strictly along financial lines. American producers of these materials stand to profit from these tariffs and they support them wholeheartedly. On the other hand, American industries which manufacture products made from these materials will be forced to pay higher prices for raw materials, and are totally opposed to the tariffs.

So much for economics, politics, ideology, “business” or jobs. These capitalists don’t care about anything except whether or not THEY will profit from this policy. The rest of the country, and the world, can go straight to hell as far as they are concerned. All that matters to them is their own pocketbook.

Those of you who are convinced the country should be run by businessmen, or politicians concerned with implementing policies friendly to business, should reflect on this. This is why we need government to make objective decisions on these economic policy issues, not lobbyists and ideologues from the private sector. Those bastards cannot be trusted with choices that affect the rest of us.