Thoughts on Trump tariffs

 What Trump's tariffs made me think about is that we are one after all. You may wonder, 

"Why is that happening?" 

It may seem unrelated, but it is very related.

 President Trump declared,

"Other countries need America, but America doesn't need other countries"

He made such bold statements and imposed a lot of tariffs, but many of them were soon postponed or withdrawn. He was also strong against China until the end, but finally lowered them significantly. Of course. Other countries need America, but America can no longer survive alone. America has traditionally had a tendency towards isolationism, and this has sometimes shown itself in history. When Wilson proposed the League of Nations, Congress opposed it, and America, the initiator, was initially unable to join the League. It's true that America has a large land area, resources, and is strong enough to export agriculture, and it has a large population. It is strong in agriculture, industry, and military power. But even America can no longer survive alone in modern times.

Especially in recent years, supply chains have become globalized. For example, automobiles are not yet in a system where they can be produced in one country. The raw material iron ore comes from country A, steel is produced in country B, tires are made in country C, rubber needed for tires is made in country D, car bodies are made in country E, seats are made in country F, electronic parts are made in country G, semiconductors needed for those are made in country H, rare earths needed for electronic parts are made in country I, glass is made in country J, and so on and so forth, and finally one car is completed in country Z. If any one of them stops, not a single car can be made. When the factories in Tohoku stopped due to the Great East Japan Earthquake, the stoppage of one of the auto parts factories, which is one of the supply chains, affected automobile production around the world, thus the economy has now become one on a global scale. Some leaders today seem to think of the economy in terms of countries like in the 1980s, but that is no longer the case. The supply chain for the iPhone has become globalized, and China is one of the parts, so if China is stopped, the iPhone will not be made. And it is America itself that is in trouble. The same goes for computers and other devices.

Globalization is progressing not only in industrial products, but also in the fields of information and communications, agriculture, finance and insurance and all parts of our lives.

And it seems that the time to overcome the barrier in the field of language, which was thought to be the last barrier, is approaching. I write articles for this blog in English, and before I translated them one by one from Japanese, but now I can do it in one go with Google Translate. But it's still not perfect. There are always a few places where I say,

"It's not what I mean."

In particular, Japanese often omits the subject, so the AI ​​translation often differs from the subject I thought it would be. So, I always check and correct it when I upload it, but I feel like 95% of it is translated well. And the gadgets on this blog also use Google Translate. Now you can instantly translate into many languages ​​around the world. Isn't this amazing?

Anyway, we are becoming more integrated beyond our national boundaries than we thought. And the speed is accelerating. In other words, the identity of each country is still separate at the top, and each feels independent and sovereign, but it is gradually connecting with the world from the feet, and it has gradually risen up to the top, and now it feels like we are attached to each other at the waist. And from the lower half of our bodies that are attached, our blood vessels are connected to each other, and we exchange the nutrients we need to live. Our blood is already connected to the whole world and exchanging nutrients. And if we cut those veins, we won't be able to live anymore. That's the current situation, isn't it?

And, this is important, we have become one more than we think, more than we feel.

When I say, "we are one," you may think it a dream story, such a pretty thing, but it overtakes us, and moves on beyond our imagination. Perhaps many politicians and national leaders are old, and cannot keep up with the speed at which we are becoming one. They still cling to the old identity of "nation" that is crumbling, and believe in that identity, but that identity is about to crumble from under their feet, from their foundations, from their roots. And because they do not want to accept it, they desperately resist, but in the end they will be swept away like a tsunami and destroyed.

And the decisive epicenter that causes that tsunami may be AI, I wonder.

And religions also exist with fragmented identities now, but they will become one.

We can become one while embracing diversity.

I cannot help but hope so.

Let love and compassion guide us.