Trump: “No, no, Bai Yun! When I said I wanted to stop Chinese imports from displacing American goods, I wasn’t talking about you! Please come back! Don’t leave us with only Yogi and Boo-boo for ursine amusement and delight!”

By the end of April, giant pandas Bai Yun and Xiao Liwu will have left their longtime home at the San Diego Zoo and traveled back to their native China, a move that is seen by many as a significant escalation in the US-China trade war initiated by President Donald Trump. Zoo officials were quick to express their displeasure. “Trump says he wants to protect American jobs, and that’s why he’s doing battle with China,” says zookeeper Scoop Dropping. “But how many people come to the Zoo for the express purpose of seeing these majestic yet cuddly creatures? Plenty. And you can bet that their departure is going to take some American jobs with it. No panda poop means no panda poop cleanup technician, for starters. But it’s more than that, of course. The loss to the Zoo in plush toy sales alone is going to be brutal. The fact is, we are dependent on Chinese resources here, and no amount of posturing from a big orange American bear is going to change that. Trump may mean well, but it’s a jungle out there in the new global economy. Or at least a bamboo forest.”