One very good step that would not have any danger of sparking a trade war would be to put 'buy American' provisions into infrastructure spending bills, which is allowed under the rules, and would go to toward ensuring that infrastructure spending acts as the jobs program that is part of its purpose.

But thanks for the explanation.

Just a quick point: all of the borrowing done by the US is in dollars, so a devaluation of the dollar would not cause us to default on our debt. It would be bad for the United States's creditors, but not necessarily for the United States as such. In general it would be great for exporters and bad for importers.

A trade war would not be good for either party, but it would not raise the cost of, for instance, food, since we are a net exporter of agricultural products to China. It would definitely raise the price of textiles and a lot of other consumer goods though.

I agree that a trade war with China is not an attractive option. Neither is allowing them to indefinitely flout mutually agreed upon rules without consequence. I think there is plenty of middle ground between those options and do not see any reason for hysteria at present.

That quote had nothing to do with currency devaluation in context, so I'm not sure why anyone would mention them in the same breath.

Brexit x3 if what?

You kid, but China has been illegally subsidizing their steel industry and dumping steel on the world market for years, in contravention of the trade deals that helped open up foreign markets to their products.

Nothing good ever comes from that.

Reading the AV Club probably doesn't help with that.

Sexual orientalism?

Jesus Christ man, we already saw Lena Dunham rapping. There's only so much that a human being can stand!

Click is mainly painful for bringing to mind that gawdawful Adam Sandler movie.

I can't wait until It's a Good Day to Fight Hard.

Wait, I thought that was The Boondock Saints…

Unique? Sure. Special? That's a stretch.

If I were him I'd be bragging about coining the term "all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world," since that is a much more clever and evocative turn of phrase.

I actually don't disagree with much of what you said. I have no doubt that it has been a good thing for many people.

It's like the Pepsi Zero of movies: bold taste, zero substance!

We would have also accepted "yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man!"