Or at least part of why I think that. I am less opposed to Trump's hard line approach to China than I am to the rest of his trade policies, but I feel about it a little like I did Japan 30 years ago. Protectionism hurts the protectionist more than its target. And Japan had so many structural problems it was only a matter of time before they hindered economic growth. And overnight, we went from a panic about Japan buying up the whole country to "what's the name of that Asian country we fought in WWII again?"

China is different. It engages in espionage and has essentially no rule of law. I think they are on the ropes a little now, and I hope we can parlay that into an end to this trade war - just wish we were presenting a united front against them. Backing out of TPP was a huge blunder IMO. As the market is telling us today, China's pain will be shared throughout the world, and nowhere more intensely than here in all likelihood (TPP might have softened that). So we don't want to take this trade war to the point that it puts us in recession (although Trump may figure one is coming - from a political standpoint for him, the sooner it happens the better if its fairly shallow).