Trump goes snarly over Harley again

WASHINGTON: Perhaps for the fifth or sixth time, US President Donald Trump invoked India’s taxes on Harley-Davison motorcycles, a thoroughly inconsequential item and sum, to highlight his gripe about what he considers an unfair global trade arrangement that purportedly exploits the United States.

There was more than a metaphorical rolling of eyes among regional experts and analysts as Trump once again latched on to an issue that means chump change in terms of commerce with India, which in any case is not a particularly big trading partner of the US.

"I got a call from Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi of India. They're one of the highest taxing nations in the world. They taxed us 100 per cent," Trump said in a rambling address at the National Republican Congressional Committee Annual Spring Dinner where he picked in the Harley issue again.

He them complained: "They charge us 100 per cent tariffs on goods. So they send a motorcycle and they make a lot of them Indian cycles. They send them to our country, we charge them nothing. We send a Harley Davidson to India and they charge us 100 per cent. Not fair, okay. Not reciprocal. It's not fair."

The accusation came even though India has reduced tariffs on Harley motorbikes to 50 per cent, and Trump himself has has acknowledged it, although he appears to have forgotten about it since.

The charitable explanation for the US President’s bizarre fixation with the Harley Davidson issue vis-à-vis India- which the motorbike company itself is not particularly exercised about- is that it is a simple illustration that his mostly white and blue-collar base can understand. But many experts remain mystified about why a President should spend so much time and energy beating a financially inconsequential issue when he can easily focus on bigger items.

“To be clear: we have a lot of trade and economic issues with India. ALL US administrations struggle with how to approach these longstanding problems. But tariffs on Harley Davidsons just don't make a top 50 list in terms of importance,” tweeted Alyssa Ayres, a former State Department official.

“Ask any business association for their top issues with India and you'll hear about: IPR, medical device price caps, specific sector FDI caps, tax problems, dairy and other ag export issues, ease of doing business problems. Harley tariffs? Too specific,” she added.




Some commentators see the President’s remarks as part of a pattern where he says whatever comes to his mind without too much concern about facts, accuracy, veracity, or relevance.

In fact, the week has seen Presidential behavior that is bizarre even by Trump’s own standards. On Tuesday, in an appearance with the NATO Secretary General, Trump repeated that his father was born in Germany (even though it is well-known and recorded that he was born in New York; his grandfather was born in Germany). Then he went on to claim that noise from windmills cause cancer. He also sneered at Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s New Green Deal, referring to her working class background as a bartender.

None of this seem to matter to his base, where he retains strong support; in fact, some of his most ardent supporters want him to turn around the inquiry and begin a probe into how and why there was an investigation in to the Russia collusion issue.

“According to polling, few people seem to care about the Russian Collusion Hoax, but some Democrats are fighting hard to keep the Witch Hunt alive. They should focus on legislation or, even better, an investigation of how the ridiculous Collusion Delusion got started - so illegal!” Trump tweeted on Thursday.