"The latest proposals for US tariffs are exhaustive and a bit weird. Honey badger don't care"

Both the headline and the story are by Dan McCrum, the former via his Twitter feed and the latter via his fief.
For his sake I hope he didn't have to read the entire 205 page PDF:

Request for Comments Concerning  Proposed  Modification of Action  Pursuant to Section  301 : China’s Acts, Policies, and Practices Related to Technology Transfer,  Intellectual Property, and Innovation

It was sent to me late yesterday, I opened it and realized, "Uh, I have to get home and....and...try on waistcoats, that's it. I have to try on waistcoats, see if I still fit into the vests and waistcoats, they're coming back you know, waistcoats are, and....get me out of here".

Here's FT Alphaville:

Those red state voters have had it with foreign badgers applying their pinko commie elite bristles to the chins of patriotic American workers. At least, that's only the conclusion we can draw from the list of products on the latest US tariff proposals.
Here's what it had to say about putting the roster together:

In developing the list of tariff subheadings included in this proposed supplemental action, trade analysts considered products from across all sectors of the Chinese economy. The tariff subheadings considered by the analysts included subheadings that commenters suggested for inclusion in response to the April 6 notice. The selection process took account of likely impacts on U.S. consumers, and involved the removal of subheadings identified by analysts as likely to cause disruptions to the U.S. economy, as well as tariff lines subject to legal or administrative constraints.

And here's some selected highlights from the list, which if nothing else give a sense of the diversity of human life and trade, and also the sort of mind boggling minutiae and exhaustive detail involved in trade negotiations which the post-Brexit UK will have to embrace:

Badger hair and other brushmaking hair, nesoi, and waste thereof

Tortoise shell, whalebone and whalebone hair, horns, antlers, hooves, nails, claws and beaks, unworked or simply prepared; waste and powder

Shark fins, not in oil, in airtight containters
Shark fins, not in airtight containers

Uranium ores and concentrates

Boat or dock fenders, whether or not inflatable, of noncellular vulcanized rubber other than hard rubber

Tanned whole bovine skin and hide upper/lining leather, w/o hair on, unit surface area n/o 2.6 sq m, in the wet state...

...MUCH MORE

I really, really hope he didn't have to read the whole thing.
Here's yesterday's out the door post:
Markets: "There's something wrong with our bloody ships today, Chatfield"