Trump / Musk (other than DOGE) Omnibus Thread

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Trump’s ‘interesting problem’ with Treasuries

“President Donald Trump suggested that Elon Musk’s government efficiency team has found irregularities while examining data at the US Treasury Department, and intimated that may lead the US to disregard some payments.

“There could be a problem, we’ve been reading about that, with Treasuries,” Trump told reporters Sunday on Air Force One en route to the Super Bowl.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether he was talking about US government debt, or payments processed through the Treasury Department.

“That could be an interesting problem because it could be that a lot of those things don’t count,” he said.

“Therefore maybe we have less debt than we thought of.”

Trump didn’t elaborate on what problems Musk found. Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency has sought access to Treasury Department payments data, but Musk’s statements on social media have largely concerned payments to contractors and grant recipients, not bondholders.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request to elaborate. The Treasury Department also didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment….”
Just create your own reality. No one's really paying attention. Debt? What debt?!
 

China’s Strategy in Trade War: Threaten U.S. Tech Companies​

Preparing for Trump talks, Beijing starts probe of Google and keeps Apple and Broadcom in its sights​


“…
Beijing has already said it is investigating Nvidia and Google over alleged antitrust issues. Other American companies in its sights include Apple, Silicon Valley tech company Broadcom and semiconductor-design software vendor Synopsys, said people familiar with the matter. Synopsys has a $35 billion acquisition awaiting approval by Beijing.

China needs all the leverage it can get to hit back at the U.S., and antitrust is one of the most useful, said Tom Nunlist, a Shanghai-based tech policy specialist at consulting firm Trivium China.

“China is on a chip-gathering exercise,” said Nunlist, likening the countries to poker players. “They want to come to the table to negotiate and need something to play with.”…”
 
If I was Markey, I would’ve just pushed past this clown. I mean come on.
How would a security person know who Markey is?

Markey could come through my front door and I’d have no clue who he is.

Protest. Don’t try to enter buildings.
 
I worked part of my career in textiles. Trust me, a 150% tariff on apparel from Bangladesh still wouldn’t make American made apparel competitive. The textile companies in this country that are still in business have carved out markets in industrial textiles and high end markets where quality concerns outweigh price (to a degree). American textiles companies do not compete against apparel products from countries in Asia and Central America because our labor costs are in some instances 10X greater than theirs. Apparel is considered primarily a commodity market. Such markets are areas American companies cannot compete in.
Textiles/apparel has been a commodity market for decades/centuries. I know you know this. I’m just stating it.

Textile mills flourished in the South for decades/125+ years post-Civil War in the South BECAUSE the South was a Third World country at best…..especially the rural South.

When my Dad joined UNC’s faculty in the late ‘60’s, UNC and Duke were considered “good Southern colleges.” Emphasis on Southern and college, not university and certainly not national.
 


“…
Seven years after the first Trump administration implemented a zero-tolerance criminal-prosecution policy that separated thousands of migrant children from their parents, some 3,200, such as Barrera, were reunited during the Biden administration. An estimated 1,000 remain separated.

Hours after President Trump returned to power on Jan. 20, one of his first moves was to rescind the task force working to reunite families and provide benefits to those who had been torn apart during his first term. The move threw into further question the degree to which the next administration will continue the reunification efforts, which are required by law under a 2023 court settlement.

Trump’s team is still debating how to abide by that settlement—and whether it will at all, according to people familiar with the discussions. …”
 
Textiles/apparel has been a commodity market for decades/centuries. I know you know this. I’m just stating it.

Textile mills flourished in the South for decades/125+ years post-Civil War in the South BECAUSE the South was a Third World country at best…..especially the rural South.

When my Dad joined UNC’s faculty in the late ‘60’s, UNC and Duke were considered “good Southern colleges.” Emphasis on Southern and college, not university and certainly not national.
You are right. The South’s cheap labor was a selling point for textile supporters. It also held back economic growth here. Starting in the 80’s the apparel business started moving offshore. There were scores on small knitting operations in
NYC that knitted goods for Vivanti and other apparel companies. Now, probably none of them are still operating.
 

Trump 2.0 Heralds an Aggressive Flexing of Power​

President Trump’s early moves to slash the federal government and expand American territory represent significant ideological swings from his first term.


“… Likewise, the first President Trump denounced overseas nation-building and sought to extricate the United States from the Middle East to focus the country’s resources inside its own borders. The second President Trump seems determined to expand those borders by swallowing up foreign territory, including a Middle East enclave in desperate need of nation-building, as America First isolationism gives way to a form of America First imperialism.

… Indeed, Mr. Trump has never been particularly rooted to one ideology for all that long. He switched political parties five times before first running for president as a Republican in 2016, and at one point or another was for abortion rights, gun control, higher taxes on the rich and the invasion of Iraq before he was against all of them.

His most consistent through line going back to his days as a real estate developer in the 1980s has been a conviction that the United States was being cheated by friends and enemies alike, which has informed his views of trade, security and alliances. Otherwise, he has been willing to shift direction if it suits his interests.

“Trump clearly has not changed,” said Jeremy Shapiro, a former State Department official in the Obama administration who is now at the European Council on Foreign Relations.

“What has changed is his administration — that is, the people around him. The guardrails are gone and the adults have left the room. We are now seeing a much purer version of Trump, less filtered by traditional advisers and the institutions of U.S. governance.” …”
 
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