Jet Blue Airways reported yesterday that it is reducing flights and parking aircraft as “soft travel demand” is impacting the airline’s revenue.

In its coverage of the announcement, USA Today notes that falling demand is not only impacting Jet Blue:

[M]ajor U.S. airlines are scaling back capacity ahead of the typically busy summer travel season as they look to protect fares and adapt to weaker demand.

Recent proponents of tariffs in the United States—including President Donald Trump—can’t seem to decide on the core purpose of their own policy: What exactly are the tariffs supposed to achieve? Their true purpose seemingly depends on who you ask—and which arguments you make against them. Tariffs are effectively being touted as a mystical cure-all for the many ailments supposedly afflicting the American economy.

This will be brief, appropriate to the topic at hand. It consists of a quote from Milton Friedman, found in Joseph Salerno’s outstanding book, Money, Sound and Unsound, p. 356:

The United States is, once again, on the precipice of entering another war in the Middle East. After months of productive negotiations between the Trump administration and the Iranian government to reach a new nuclear deal, the talks were broken off by a series of Israeli airstrikes on June 13, last Friday.

Contrary to the fantasies of certain Republicans in Washington—including President Trump—the current trajectory of the White House’s fiscal policy is toward ever larger deficits and ever more federal debt. In its most recent analysis of the so-called “big beautiful bill” the CBO estimates that the bill will add 2.4 trillion to the deficit over ten years. That’s not $2.4 trillion total. That’s 2.4 trillion extra.

Allow me to remind you of a few uncomfortable truths.

Government spending is out of control in developed nations. Furthermore, no interventionist government wants to cut spending or balance the budget. Government spending empowers politicians, and reducing it means losing the grip on the economy.

Interventionist governments aren’t concerned about debts, deficits, or inflation. Inflation is a deliberate policy, and interventionist governments seek to nationalize the economy while imposing total control over productive sectors by issuing continuously devalued currencies.

Trump is now weighing sending in the US military. This presidency looks like an extension of George W. Bush’s.