Trump / Musk (other than DOGE)

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p5mmr9 said:
Inflation is under 3%. Unemployment is near 4%. GDP growth is about 2.5%.
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I will be interested to see those numbers in January and then compare them to the numbers in July.

My guess is the numbers will be little changed or even a bit worse, and half the country will believe we have returned to having the greatest economy in the history of all mankind.
 
aGDevil2k said:
Predictions

1. The wrong track poll will surge earlier than expected... By mid next year. People will really regret voting for him (not MAGAs but the other 5-10%)
2. Democrats will start to reach out to moderates way more than in the last decade
3. Democrats will seriously blue wave in 2026
4. President 48 will have a metric shit ton to clean up and fix it won't even be a normal presidency
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reaching out to the moderates has been gang busters so far....
rodoheel said:
This is the part that is so crazy to me. Elon and Trump are basically saying they want to do for the US what Javier Milei did for Argentina. But the two situations aren't remotely similar! Milei took over in Argentina in a time of hyperinflation, with annual inflation of hundreds (if not thousands) percentage points. He's basically thrown the emergency break to cool inflation, throwing the economy into depression and most of the country into poverty. Opinions vary on whether his program is a good idea - way too early for him to be claiming victory, for sure - but the only reason something drastic was worth considering is because the economy was in shambles. But the US economy not only isn't in shambles, it's the best in the world! So we should be trying to make minor tweaks to address the problems we do have. Instead, Musk et al are ushing the idea that we're in some sort of crisis that requires drastic action. It's one thing to throw the emergency brake when you're careening off a cliff, and another thing entirely to throw it while you're cruising down the middle of the highway.

I still fear that this is Musk/Thiel trying to intentionally tank the US economy to weaken the dollar and push Bitcoin as the world's new reserve currency. Because it's hard to make it make sense otherwise.
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50% of the country didn't vote. and I'd say 90% of the people who did vote have no clue who Miel is or what he did. People need to fall on their own face to feel pain. It's hard to feel the pain while watching someone else falling, especially when you are not even looking.
 
Ramrouser said:
I don't think the Administration will resort to across the boards tariffs. I agree that would tank the economy. There is a benefit to having an unpredictable President issuing threats against our neighbors. I guarantee you it will get their attention and they'll act accordingly. It's unconventional but I predict it works.

This also demonstrates that the center of world power currently resides in Mar Lago and not DC.
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It’s an easy prediction to make when any outcome will result in “see, it worked.” That is my prediction.
As for “are they working right now?”
No, mortgage rates have risen because of Trumps “threats against our neighbors.”
So it is demonstrably NOT WORKING so far. The future is unknown but can you acknowledge that at this stage of the game Trump’s unpredictability is actually costing Americans money?
 
The idea that a bunch of millionaires and billionaires want to altruistically "fix" the government to work on behalf of the working man is infuriatingly naive. They didn't become ultra-wealthy by working in the best interest of anyone but themselves. There is no "enough."

If the richest man on the planet gave a shit about the working man, he wouldn't be the richest man on the planet - he'd put the VAST majority of his $330+ billion dollars to work for others. But he hasn't. And he won't. I cannot fathom how anyone could retain that amount of wealth.

And now we hand them the keys to the government too. Are people expecting them to change the essence of what made them who they are? Change what made them successful, what made them gobs and gobs of money, what allowed them power and influence?

The rich are using their money and influence to cosplay as statesmen because owning companies just doesn't give them the same high it used to. They need something stronger.
 
nycfan said:
I mean, I don’t think they can do across the board tariffs without violating the USMCA and triggering all kinds of repercussions. For instance, Mexico is the leading supplier of auto parts to U.S. assembly plants now — this harebrained scheme could cripple Detroit (if implemented).
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If Trump does this, it would obliterate the USMCA and we'd have to go back to the drawing board on trade agreements.
 
ZenMode said:
Humiliated? You're the one who said "nothing" and when I provided a link showing a reported 181% increase, you changed your position from nothing to maybe an increase for couple years. That would mean his actions had an impact even if it wasn't directly with the EU.

As the Politico article says, a "memorandum of understanding" can be put out. Could that not be the cause of the reported 181% increase?
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yes, humiliated. I was tossing you a bone with "maybe a slight increase for a couple of years" (that is, maybe 10% of the 181% rise was because of Trump) but never mind. The expert cited in the Politico article was very clear. Any MOU would be complete window dressing. Everyone LNG buyer in Europe is a market participant that buys according to the market. There is regulation of that sector, but the regulation is done on the national level, not the EU level.

Your golden boy Trump was played and that's the long and short of it. Completely played, because he doesn't know shit about the world and won't listen to people who do. Sound familiar?
 
In virtually every permutation of game theory, acting 'unpredictably' is a horrible strategy. Regardless of what the orange clown has said, the West, and large parts of the world, have acted in relatively good faith since 1945, and especially since 1989, and world prosperity is at an all-time high. But fuck it. Let's go back to the law of the jungle because some asshole has made people think false braggadocio will 'Make America - currently, by any almost measure, the greatest country in history - Great....Again?'.
 
Gmonet said:
In virtually every permutation of game theory, acting 'unpredictably' is a horrible strategy. Regardless of what the orange clown has said, the West, and large parts of the world, have acted in relatively good faith since 1945, and especially since 1989, and world prosperity is at an all-time high. But fuck it. Let's go back to the law of the jungle because some asshole has made people think false braggadocio will 'Make America - currently, by any almost measure, the greatest country in history - Great....Again?'
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Correct. The only people who think that chaos and unpredictability are somehow effective negotiating chips when it comes to critical geopolitical alliances, are stupid people.
 
CFordUNC said:
Correct. The only people who think that chaos and unpredictability are somehow effective negotiating chips when it comes to critical geopolitical alliances, are stupid people.
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Let me offer a slight refinement.

It's not true that unpredictability can never be an effective strategy for anyone. For North Korea, for instance, unpredictability gives KJU a stature in international diplomacy that far exceeds what he should have based on the size, power and economic might of his country. It's a way for a nothing country to become a something country in this one respect.

But for a country that isn't just a something country but is actually a BFD, unpredictability is a negative -- as we all agree. My point is that Trump takes his cues from Orban and KJU -- i.e. leaders of nothing countries aspiring to be something countries. That's his mentality. It's also true that "unpredictability" is really just a polished turd of dementia.
 
mpaer said:
The unpredictable part has its "merits" perhaps . Tearing apart our relationships with our neighbors and presumably with out European allies is the really scary part
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They'll forgive us. Trump is simply using the economic might of the US as leverage in a way no other US President has done before. It's a bit unseemly but that's Trump. Canada and Mexico (from their perspective) can't afford to call his bluff.
 
Ramrouser said:
They'll forgive us. Trump is simply using the economic might of the US as leverage in a way no other US President has done before. It's a bit unseemly but that's Trump. Canada and Mexico (from their perspective) can't afford to call his bluff.
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With friends like these...

As a hegemonic, or near-hegemonic, power with the largest economy in the world, remind me why we are looking to upset the apple cart?
 
superrific said:
yes, humiliated. I was tossing you a bone with "maybe a slight increase for a couple of years" (that is, maybe 10% of the 181% rise was because of Trump) but never mind. The expert cited in the Politico article was very clear. Any MOU would be complete window dressing. Everyone LNG buyer in Europe is a market participant that buys according to the market. There is regulation of that sector, but the regulation is done on the national level, not the EU level.

Your golden boy Trump was played and that's the long and short of it. Completely played, because he doesn't know shit about the world and won't listen to people who do. Sound familiar?
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"Tossing me a bone" based on your assumption that the deal resulted in "Nothing. Absolutely Nothing". Then you make more assumptions with your "couple of years" claim. Now, piling on more baseless assumptions attributing 10% of the 181%. You're making things up as you go.

You and I have no idea what, if anything, changed on the EU side that may have resulted in a legitimate increase in LNG purchases from the US even if the EU, as an entity, does no actual purchasing on its own.
 
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Ramrouser said:
to solve the border issue.
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The only way the “border issue” will be truly fixed is to fix the root cause of massive migration. We can build a 50 foot high wall and do all kinds of barbaric stuff to these folks….and they are still going to come.
 
Ramrouser said:
They'll forgive us. Trump is simply using the economic might of the US as leverage in a way no other US President has done before. It's a bit unseemly but that's Trump. Canada and Mexico (from their perspective) can't afford to call his bluff.
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The problem is, they really can’t afford to not call his bluff either. And they know vanity is his weakness. The people of Mexico and Canada are more likely to forgive their leaders standing up to a craven bully than Americans are to forgive Trump for sabotaging the US economy.
 
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