This is CBS Eye on the World.

Here's John Batchelor.

I welcome my colleague Joseph Sternberg, a member of the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal.

He writes political economics column.

He's based in London.

And he's done us all the favor of finding something that's less wise, sometimes called

dumber than the tariff imbrolio we're now witnessing around the world.

But I need Joe's help to explain it.

It has something to do with the fact that the world forces us to spend money, but I'm not sure how I connect all the dots.

Joe, a very good evening to you.

As I understand it, there is intellectual Trumpism, I believe that is capital I, capital I, capital T.

And that involves a version of the world in which we need to be paid for issuing treasuries.

How does it work, Joe? Good evening to you.

Hey, John. So this is basically a continuation of the conversation that you and I were having

last week, which is about, you know, Trump's own personal views on trade policy or really anything else are kind of

mysterious and there's a sense that he's always making it up as he goes along.

But there are people in his circle of economic advisors who seem to have a more comprehensive

theory of trade in the global economy and how tariffs fit into that, which is not a good theory,

but it is a more coherent theory.

So I figured we should take it seriously.

And last week we kind of talked a bit about some of the flow of goods in this theory

and how other countries suppressing their domestic consumption leads them to produce too much.

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