The extremes touch

The announced tariff war from the Trump administration falls in Portugal in the middle of the election campaign. The coincidence has forced the parties to position themselves, but as usual, the reactions are in the branch.

On the left the answers are the accusations to Trump and the extreme right wickedness it represents. It is a Bully who has a representative in Portugal named André Ventura.

But what Paulo Raimundo and Mariana Mortágua don’t say, is what deep down they think about the economic options that Trump now defends in an untimely way. And what we conclude by reading the economic programs of these two parties, listening to the speeches and following the practice of their leaders is that, despite the criticism, PCP and Left Block, they advocate, from the economic point of view, the same as Trump defends, but let us see:

– PCP and BE advocate protectionist measures, namely the subsidiation of national products in order to keep companies alive, it costs what it costs.

– PCP and BE argue that the return to productive sectors that the country has already abandoned for not being competitive in competition with products that come to us from other countries has been subsidized.

– PCP and BE want to impose barriers on imports, arguing that only in this way can protect national companies and even boost new ones.

-PCP and BE look out and come in economies that intersect with ours, through an open market, the main enemies of our economy and the main responsible for our delay and low wages.

In short, to the far left, the enemy is beyond borders and our salvation is in closing the doors. Only then can we protect what is ours. Donald Trump would not say better.

Coming from this side of the political spectrum the options are not surprising. But if we look at the other extreme, André Ventura defends exactly the same things but with a more traulite speech, as is his timbre.

Confronted with threats of increasing tariffs from the other side of the Atlantic what does the arrival leader respond? It is very good to protect the economy of your country and we here in Portugal should do the same to protect our companies and our farmers.

It also comes to think that closing doors, not only immigration, but also to external markets, is the solution to ‘doing large Portugal again’.

As he responded on Tuesday to Pedro Nuno Santos, in the debate in which they confronted, if we put barriers or tariffs to the products that arrive from outside, this is good to develop our agriculture, our automotive industry and our services.

In the vision of the arrival, just like that of the PCP and Be, deep down who was right was the late Dr. Oliveira Salazar and the ‘proudly alone’.

This chronicle serves to alert the unwary who think there are differences between extremes. There is no, and when you look at the economic programs of these three parties this is very clear.

When triggering the tariff war in the middle of the election campaign in Portugal, Trump may well have done the country a favor. For farmers, industrialists and entrepreneurs who have already begun to feel the effect of breaking orders from the United States, voting on any of these parties is not an option.