Thoughts on Trump's Amazon Attack

One would think that President Trump would love a company like Amazon. For a man who wants to make America great again by bringing jobs back to America one would be hard pressed to do better than Amazon which created more jobs than 46 states put together last year.

But Trump is far more interested in cutting Amazon down to size than putting Americans back to work as evidenced by a series of tweets accusing it of operating a "Post Office scam" to cut down on its shipping costs.

There are two reasons for Trump's behavior and they center around Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

First, for all of Trump's boasts about his wealth it pales in comparison to that of Bezos. In fact, Bezos is currently listed by Forbes as the richest man in the world. Do you think Trump would rather be President of the United States or the richest man in the world? He would probably like both at the same time, but Bezos stands in his way. The best he can do for now is knock Bezos down a peg. Since Trump started tweeting about Amazon, Bezos has lost $16 billion. Of course, Trump could only dream of such money being scarcely worth $3 billion.

Second, Trump might tolerate Bezos' wealth if he could count him as one of his fans. But Bezos owns The Washington Post which is arguably the media outlet most critical of Trump and his presidency. It's no accident that many of the tweets targeting Amazon also target the WaPo. Being faced with a man who is wealthier than him and is critical of his views is an unpardonable sin.

Trump's threats against Bezos are those of a petty tyrant. Bezos will whether Trump's tweets as he has in the past and Trump will eventually turn his ire against a beauty queen or one of our allies. But in targeting Amazon, Trump drives up costs, makes consumer goods less affordable and puts Americans out of work. In other words, he harms the very people he claims he wants to help.

With all this being said, Bernie Sanders and The New Republic are also singing Trump's tune on Amazon. Trump might not possess Bezos' wealth, but he owns a large portfolio of political instincts. Of course, this portfolio is built on bad information. But the truth seldom counts for anything in politics. If it did Trump wouldn't have been elected President.