Show host Jimmy Fallon joked this week, "It's not great when the summary of Trump's first two months in office is: stocks down, measles up." President Trump doesn't deserve blame for the recent measles outbreak.

Strong economic gains in the long term are worth the short-term stock market volatility Americans experienced this week, allies of President Donald Trump tried to argue Thursday as they fanned out across cable news and a number of media outlets to spread their perspective.

The president has tried to acknowledge the stock market’s fall without backing off from the policies that triggered it. He’s playing with fire.

Second, the U.S. stock market recovered remarkably quickly from the tariffs imposed during the first Trump administration. Specifically, while the S&P 500 declined 19.8% over a three-month period between September and December 2018, the index had already recouped its losses and reached a new high by May 2019.

Over the past two weeks, the market has lost ~10 percent in value. But markets are driven by the profit motive and will discipline an administration that pursues wayward economic policies.