By The Plain Truth News Staff
February 2025 Broadcast – “The Plain Truth Today”
In a February 2025 episode of The Plain Truth Today, host Bob Barney sounded an early alarm about what he called “Donald Trump’s most dangerous blind spot” – his faith that tariffs alone could fund his economic agenda and strengthen America’s position abroad.
Speaking weeks after President Trump’s return to office, Bob Barney cautioned listeners that the administration’s trade rhetoric risked triggering an avoidable economic crisis and alienating key allies – especially Canada, one of America’s largest energy and resource partners.
“He says we’re going to be able to pay for all of his budget cuts and all the cuts out of tariffs alone,” Bob said. “I do not think he understands what a trade war means.”
What is Cognitive Dissonance as it applies to elections:
Bob Barney opened his broadcast by revisiting a familiar theme from his college thesis – cognitive dissonance – arguing that both individuals and nations swing wildly between extremes instead of seeking balance. He said the 2024 election perfectly illustrated that concept.
“The American people were disgusted with the radicalization of the government under Joe Biden,” he said. “So they swung the pendulum back to the other extreme.”
But Bob warned that if Trump overcorrected to the right – particularly through economic overreach – the nation could face another reactionary swing in 2028, one that could bring Democrats back to power “worse than anything Donald Trump could do.”
A Stark Warning on Trade with Canada
In a detailed critique rarely heard in conservative media at the time, Barney highlighted a specific, underreported vulnerability in the U.S. economy: its dependence on Canadian crude oil and uranium.
“Seventy to seventy-five percent of all of our uranium comes from Canada,” he explained.
“And maybe what you didn’t know – and I didn’t until this weekend – is that 75 percent of American refineries can only refine Canadian oil into gasoline. If Canada retaliates in a trade war, we could see gas lines like 1974 or 1979.”
Mr. Barney argued that a tariff confrontation with Ottawa could leave American consumers paying the price and devastate the very working-class voters who helped return Trump to the White House.
“America Needs a Sane and Arrogant Trump”
While reaffirming his long-standing support for the president’s core goals – border security, national strength, and protection of U.S. workers – Barney pleaded for restraint and wisdom.
“America needs a sane and arrogant Donald Trump,” he said, “but what we are seeing here … is an unhinged Donald Trump.”
He warned that Trump’s increasingly erratic tone and misinformed trade statements could erode goodwill among allies and supporters alike:
“The average Canadian that was so pro-Donald Trump before the election – they feel betrayed,” he said. “They thought China was the enemy. They thought Mexico was the enemy. They did not expect they’d become the 51st state.”
A Message to Trump’s Inner Circle
Barney closed the show with a plea for honesty around the president:
“The man needs to get someone around him that’s going to tell him what is the plain truth – and not what he wants to hear. Because God hates arrogance, and arrogance leads to downfall.”
Barney emphasized that his critique came not from opposition, but from concern for the movement’s survival: “I’m trying to save the Trump presidency,” he said. “I’m not trying to destroy it”.