What did Donald Trump do today?

He stalled for time on his tariff policy.

As he virtually always does, Trump is spending the weekend at the Florida resort and social club where he lives. Each trip costs roughly $4 million, not counting the cost to local governments to assist with his security, which is about $250,000 per day. (It's not all red ink, though: Trump himself makes money on the trips by charging his Secret Service detail top dollar for their lodgings.)

A reporter aboard Air Force One early this morning asked Trump to comment on his decision, announced late Friday night, to exempt phones, computers, and various other expensive consumer electronics items from the staggering 145% tariffs he's levied on Chinese goods. 

Not doing this would have been a political nightmare for Trump and the Republican party. Tens of millions of Americans in the market for a new smartphone—already an expensive necessity—would have seen prices skyrocket well over the $1,000 mark on average. A rapid rise in inflation is already inevitable unless Trump yet again retreats, but seeing hundreds of dollars added to the sticker price for a single item—and one with no domestic-made equivalent—would drive the point home to American consumers that much faster.

And yet, carving out a substantial exception for noticeable inflation virtually gives the game away. Trump is essentially admitting that adding astronomically high taxes to the price of consumer goods will hurt American consumers. (While polls show that this is obvious to the overwhelming majority of Americans, Trump has pretended otherwise, at least in public.)

Trump had spent the last few days unsuccessfully lobbying China's president, Xi Jinping, to "request" an audience with him. Throughout the whole second-term trade war, Trump has been eager to portray himself as a "dealmaker" with the nations of the world begging favors from him. It now seems likely that Trump was hoping he could spin a call with Xi as evidence that he'd forced China to the bargaining table, and that the exemption for phones and computers was his "reward" to them.

In reality, Xi pointedly ignored the invitation, and the Chinese government has continued to raise tariffs on American products in retaliation.

Trump, who apparently has not landed on a more appealing narrative, simply ducked the question and told the reporter on Air Force One that he'd explain it all on Monday.

Why does this matter?

• This is one of many reasons that trade wars are not "good and easy to win," which is something Trump probably should have figured out by now.

• Policies that make sense and accomplish good things don't need to be spun.

• Americans deserve to know what our trade policy is now, not when Trump decides he's ready to go back to work.