Memorial Day and the Dingbat President
Posted: May 26, 2025 Filed under: #FARTUS, #MAGAnomics, American Fascists, Broligarchy, Corrupt and Political SCOTUS, due process, Economy, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, Polycrisis | Tags: 25th amendment, @johnbuss.bsky.social John Buss, Big Beautiful Bill (NOT), ethically challenged SCOTUS, FARTUS, putin, Rambling Diatribes, Trump, Trump v Wilcox, Ukraine 15 Comments
“No one knows immoral more.” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
Today is the day that the Nation pays tribute to many Americans who gave their lives in wars to support our Country. That is, everyone but #FARTUS. He’s ranting about how much our country sucks. This is from Alternet. “‘This is a disgrace’: Trump ripped for ‘outrageous’ and ‘divisive’ Memorial Day diatribe.” This comes on the back of one of the most bizarre and uninspiring graduation speeches ever given to the graduating cadets at West Point. I cannot believe this deranged monster was elected President. It’s beyond embarrassing.
Early Memorial Day 2025, President Donald Trump used his Truth Social platform to post a rambling diatribe.
Trump, writing in all caps, posted, “HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY TO ALL, INCLUDING THE SCUM THAT SPENT THE LAST FOUR YEARS TRYING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY THROUGH WARPED RADICAL LEFT MINDS, WHO ALLOWED 21,000,000 MILLION PEOPLE TO ILLEGALLY ENTER OUR COUNTRY, MANY OF THE BEING CRIMINALS AND THE MENTAO INSANE,THROUGH AN OPEN BORDER THAT ONLY AN INCOMPETENT PRESIDENT WOULD APPROVE, AND THROUGH JUDGES WHO ARE ON A MISSION TO KEEP MURDERERS, DRUG DEALERS, RAPISTS, GANG MEMBERS, AND RELEASED PRISONERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, IN OUR COUNTRY SO THEY CAN ROB, MURDERERS, AND RAPE AGAIN, PROTECTED BY THESE USA HATING JUDGES WHO SUFFER FROM AN IDEOLOGY THAT IS SICK, AND VERY DANGEROUS FOR OUR COUNTRY. HOPEFULLY THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT, AND OTHER GOOD AND COMPASSIONATE JUDGES THROUGHOUT THE LAND, WILL SAVE US FROM THE DECISIONS OF THE MONSTERS WHO WANT OUR COUNTRY TO GO TO HELL.”
But Trump, according to Mediaite, later deleted that post and replaced it with a much shorter post that read simply, “HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY!
Who voted for this kind of shit? He also went off on Putin over the weekend. There’s some blowback on that as well as questions about the ongoing mental health crisis Trump is experiencing.. This is from Reuters. “Kremlin on Trump’s remark about Putin being ‘crazy’: there is some emotional overload.” Trump must be still pissed Obama got that Nobel Peace Prize when all he can get is a wink, wink, nod, nod of respect from Putin.
The Kremlin on Monday said that U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim that Vladimir Putin had “gone absolutely CRAZY” might be due to emotional overload, but thanked the U.S. leader for his assistance in launching Ukraine peace negotiations.
Trump said Putin had “gone absolutely CRAZY” by unleashing the largest aerial attack of the war on Ukraine and said he was weighing new sanctions on Moscow, though he also scolded Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
“We are really grateful to the Americans and to President Trump personally for their assistance in organising and launching this negotiation process,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said when asked about the Trump remarks about Putin.
“Of course, at the same time, this is a very crucial moment, which is associated, of course, with the emotional overload of everyone absolutely and with emotional reactions.”
Every man just loves to be told he is overly emotional. Believe me, I’ve had some bad experiences on that account in my past life in Omaha when I moved a lamp from my computer desk to my secretary’s. I told him that I never imagined he would get so emotional over a lamp. He got worse about it, needless to say. Men can be such toddlers.The Federal Reserve just bought $43.6 billion in US treasuries in the span of a week, sparking concerns that a quiet quantitative easing operation is underway.
New documents show the Fed purchased $8.8 billion in 30-year bonds on May 8th via its System Open Market Account (SOMA) – a move that followed a $34.8 billion purchase earlier that same week.
The move has triggered allegations that “stealth QE” has arrived, with a MarketWatch op-ed by Charlie Garcia calling the move “monetary policy on tiptoes.”
The Fed has long stated such purchases are routine reinvestments of maturing securities to adjust the money supply and influence interest rates to meet its targets.
The Fed’s buying spree follows a major Treasury sell-off from China.
New numbers from the Treasury Department show China sold $18.9 billion in US bonds in March, while most other countries increased their holdings.
China now holds $765.4 billion in US Treasuries and is in third place behind the UK and Japan, which hold $779 billion and $1.13 trillion, respectively.
Since you buy US Treasuries with U.S. Dollars, one has to wonder what the Chinese are going to do with the cash. Yam Tits once again, changed his plan on tariffs which might sound good, but remember, no on likes uncertainty and we’ll see what all this means tonight when the futures markets open up. This is from CNN. “Trump delays 50% EU tariffs until July 9.” I guess he thinks blowing up the markets over the Independence Holiday may cause a silversmith to jump a horse and ride into the countryside. Looks better to do it after.
President Donald Trump said Sunday that he has agreed to delay a 50% tariff on European Union imports until July 9, the latest instance of Trump declaring an impending tariff and throwing markets into confusion only to later walk back the threatened levies.
Trump said he and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen had a “very nice call” that led to the delay.
“(Von der Leyen) said she wants to get down to serious negotiation,” Trump told reporters at Morristown Municipal Airport in New Jersey. “July 9 would be the day, that was the date she requested. Could we move it from June 1 to July 9? I agreed to do that.”
“She said we will rapidly get together and see if we can work something out,” he added.
As recently as Friday, Trump said he was “not looking for a deal” with the EU, and that their tariff rate was set at 50% and would go into effect on June 1. That rate would have come after he had imposed a 20% reciprocal tariff on the EU in April — which itself was also delayed, as were other so-called reciprocal tariffs.
Minutes after speaking with reporters, Trump posted on Truth Social that “talks will begin rapidly.”
Earlier in the day, von der Leyen had posted on X that there was a “good call” with Trump.
Leah Litman has a new book out for all of you interested in watching the Supreme Court blow up the Constitution. She is a professor of law at the University of Michigan Law School. Her book is “Lawless: How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes”. She describes it as “an assessment of the Court’s supermajority and how it serves Republican interests instead of the public good.” She writes on the issues at Public Notice.
Last Thursday evening, the Supreme Court all but demolished the legal basis for the independent agencies that are part of the modern administrative state.
In a brisk four paragraphs, only two of which contained any attempt at legal reasoning, the Court’s six Republican justices allowed the president to fire members of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) in violation of federal law. The decision highlights the lawlessness of the Court and is likely to further embolden a president who is very keen to place himself above the law.
The Court’s order in Trump v. Wilcox allows the president to violate the federal laws that prohibited him from removing NLRB and MSPB members without cause for doing so. Laws that insulate the heads of multimember commissions such as the NLRB are a common feature of the administrative state. The Supreme Court upheld one such law almost a century ago in Humphrey’s Executor v. Federal Trade Commission, the case that now undergirds modern independent agencies.
It was therefore a little surprising to read the Supreme Court’s order in Wilcox, which permits the president’s statutorily prohibited removal of officers on multi-member commissions, and see no mention of Humphrey’s Executor, the decision upholding statutes that prohibited such removals. Humphrey’s didn’t appear until the dissent.
But this dismissal of important precedents structuring modern society and government has become a hallmark of the Roberts Court. In a decision few years ago, the Court confidently declared that an earlier precedent on the Establishment Clause had been “abandoned.” Did that mean overruled? Unclear, but it at least meant the Court didn’t have to follow it!
Last term, the Court formally overruled the Chevron doctrine that had allows agencies to interpret ambiguous statutes they administer, as the Republican Justices turned tail on a a precedent they had previously embraced. The year before that, the Court announced that the time had come to end affirmative action programs in higher education, as if it was just closing up shop on the precedents upholding such programs.
It’s beginning to feel like the Supreme Court is bringing back slavery. It’s not like any of the current heads of agencies are going to actually do the work of the agencies anyway. But Alito just loves to dismantle democracy.
The “Big Beautiful Bill” is still hobbling its way through the Senate. Politico has this story on the man with the smallest gavel in the world. “Mike Johnson urges Senate not to make major changes to megabill. “We’ve got to deal within the realm of what’s possible,” the House speaker said Sunday.” After all, once you’ve blown up democracy, the Constitution, and the economy, what’s left but to hand the remainders over to the Kleptocracy?
House Speaker Mike Johnson is urging GOP senators to exercise caution in making changes to the sweeping megabill passed through the House last week.
“I encourage them to do their work, of course, as we all anticipate,” Johnson told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday on “State of the Union.” “But to make as few modifications to this package as possible, because remembering that we’ve got to pass it one more time to ratify their changes in the House. And I have a very delicate balance here, very delicate equilibrium that we’ve reached over a long period of time. And it’s best not to meddle with it too much.”
Jamming the megabill through the House the first time was a Herculean task for Johnson and his allies in leadership. It required a visit from President Donald Trump to the Capitol and careful negotiating by the speaker to bring the chamber’s many coalitions aboard. Doing it a second time — with major changes from the Senate side — could prove impossible.
But key senators are already looking to make modifications, with different factions holding that the bill goes too far in its approach to Medicaid and clean-energy tax credit cuts. Others, such as Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), say it doesn’t move the ball far enough. Johnson wants to cut spending by roughly $6 trillion.
“This is our only chance to reset that to a reasonable pre-pandemic level of spending,” Ron Johnson told Tapper, also on Sunday. “And again, I think you can do it in the spending that we would eliminate, people wouldn’t even notice. But you have to do the work, which takes time.”
“The problem is the math doesn’t add up,” Paul told host Shannon Bream on “Fox News Sunday.” “They’re going to explode the debt by the House says $4 trillion, the Senate’s actually been talking about exploding the debt $5 trillion.”
The speaker pointed to Republicans’ tiny majority in the House, with margins that may make sweeping changes unrealistic.
Yes, he also has a “tiny minority.” Should I mention he’s getting overly emotional, too?
So, I will close with that horrid West Point graduation speech. It’s really time for someone to question Trump’s mental health and send him to Walter Reed for a real test or 10. This is from US Today. James Powel has the analysis. “Trump tells West Point grads to avoid ‘trophy wives’ in commencement speech.” I’m not sure you’ve ever seen the average salary of a soldier, but I’m certain trophy wives and yachts are not likely to be in their future.
President Donald Trump told graduates to avoid “trophy wives” during his commencement address at the United States Military Academy at West Point on May 24.
“He ended up getting a divorce, found a new wife. Could you say a trophy wife? I guess we can say a trophy wife,” Trump said, referring to real estate developer Bill Levitt. “But that doesn’t work out too well, I must tell you, a lot of trophy wives, it doesn’t it work.”
Trump has been married three times: Ivana Zelníčková – married in 1977, divorced in 1990; Marla Maples – married in 1993, divorced in 1999; and Melania Knauss, now First Lady Melania Trump – married in 2005. Each worked as professional models before their engagement to Trump.
The anecdote came during the commencement address, in which Trump touted his administration’s isolationist stances and the ending of diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
“The job of the U.S. armed forces is not to host drag shows, to transform foreign cultures (and) spread democracy to everybody around the world at the point of a gun,” he said. “The military’s job is to dominate any foe and annihilate any threat to America, anywhere, anytime and any place.”
The military academy shut down a slew of on-campus organizations, including the Corbin Forum, a leadership club for female cadets, and Spectrum, a gay-straight alliance, in February following an executive order ending diversity, equity and inclusion policies in the federal government, according to Military.com.
“We’ve liberated our troops from divisive and demeaning political trainings,” Trump said. “There will be no more critical race theory or transgender for everybody forced onto our brave men and women in uniform — or on anybody else for that matter, in this country.”
Trump, wearing his campaign’s red MAGA hat, also pulled a common campaign reference in the speech, saying, “I went through a very tough time with some very radicalized sick, people. I say I was investigated more than the great, late Alphonse Capone.”
Trump was convicted in 2024 on 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide a hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
If there are any active gods flying around this solar system, could you please send a few burning bushes or thunderbolts at our truly evil president? I’d also settle for a few comic book characters with the same abilities, too! Oh, wait, one woman did call out the White House dingbat! “Unfit to Serve? Jasmine Crockett: ‘It’s Time for Republicans to Question Trump’s Mental Acuity’. The congresswoman wants the GOP to ask whether the president is “equipped to serve mentally.” This is reported by Peter Wade at Rolling Stone.
Following Donald Trump‘s bizarre speech to West Point graduates, where the president opined on topics ranging from yachts and trophy wives to drag shows and golf, Rep. Jasmine Crockett is calling on Republicans to “start calling him out and start questioning his mental acuity, and whether or not he is equipped to serve mentally.”
“I don’t think that those who have gone through West Point expected to have their commander in chief address them and start talking about trophy wives or start talking how he has so many investigations,” she said. “What a great reminder that you are not qualified to be the person that potentially will command troops to go into war. That is not instilling confidence whatsoever.”
“It is time for Republicans to start calling him out and start questioning his mental acuity, and whether or not he is equipped to serve mentally,” Crockett added. “We know when it comes down to his criminality, he is not qualified to serve, but this is just absolutely deplorable.”
Okay, so I know you have better things to do today than worry about the sanity of the President and the state of our democracy and economy. Please remember the people who died fighting for our democracy instead of the ones fighting to destroy it in your activities today.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Finally Friday Reads: Free Speech Attacks, Incompetency, Cruelty, and Grifting Galore Characterize the Trump Regime
Posted: May 23, 2025 Filed under: American Fascists, Broligarchy, emoluments clause of the US Constitution, Foreign Affairs, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, Polycrisis, Psychopaths in charge, South Africa, Vietnam | Tags: @johnbuss.bsky.social John Buss, academic freedom, CryptoCurrency Ponzi Scheme from Trump and Musk, FARTUS, Harvard v Trump, Neo Robber Barons, No Kings protest over #FARTUS parade, The Hindu Love Gods, Trump sours Apple, We live in Dark Times 5 Comments
“A modern-day interpretation of a 1871 Thomas Nast work seems fitting to commemorate Trump’s secret crypto dinner.” John Buss, repeat@1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
As the old Buddhist and Hobbit saying goes: “We live in Dark Times.” “Kali Yuga” is the Hindu expression. Darkness has always been an expression of decline in European History, hence the label “Dark Ages” for the period from the 5th to about the 8th century. Usually, these periods experience a decline in economic, intellectual, and cultural life. One of the most prevalent things about these times is that there is a paucity of written records. So, it’s difficult to capture the decline until a renaissance occurs. The breakdown of institutions occurred in these past times as well as the present. At the moment, we still have the ability to document the decline in the US. Many relate to it as a rebirth of fascist movements of the 20th century. It is a global feature at the moment, but no matter if it’s the Decline of the Roman Empire or the American Empire, there are signs.
The invention of the printing press is seen as one of the most powerful examples of an invention that can change the course of history. Access to information directly, for personal consideration, tends to create a citizenry with low tolerance of being shut off from thinking for themselves. Perhaps it’s why today’s dark leaders tend to go for education and the press, and why they attract “low information” and angry denizens. They also attract a cadre of greedy followers willing to help attack and grab the wealth of those who are powerless.
These are indeed Dark Times.
The fight for the light in the newly filed Harvard case against the Trump administration’s ban on foreign students is a prime cause of denying the citizenry access to anything that might cause them to question the goings-on here. But it also breaks into the tradition of the United States being the shining light of discovery, science, and reason. It’s why those of us who have had academic careers cherish and enjoy academic freedom. The free exchange of ideas and opinions is essential.
We have traditionally had a small number of women in my field of economics. It was between 4 to 10 percent in the late 70s and early 80s. It once rose to above 30%, but recently has settled on 27%. The STEM fields still reflect the struggle for inclusion. It’s even lower for Black Americans. However, my career has led me to have colleagues from a variety of countries, which is wonderful. In my early career, most of my women colleagues came from the Middle East or China. I was lucky enough to have a professor from Finland. She was brilliant. Believe me. During my academic studies and life, the joy of having colleagues from all over the world who could share things was a blessing in my life. A colleague from the Punjab who now teaches in Canada helped me improve my math chops to get me through some of the most complex models that you could imagine. He stayed with me after Katrina until the campus got its FEMA trailers. I also had a student from Taiwan staying with me. My last biggest joy, however, was writing 2 letters of recommendation for two Black New Orleans students to Rice. The US cannot afford to fall behind in a vast world of research. And, yet, here we are with a professional moron taking down the biggest academic center of research in the World. America’s first University, Harvard. If we do not train the world’s best minds, we will fall deeply behind in everything.
Today, we got the news of the Case Harvard filed against Trump. “Judge Temporarily Blocks Trump Admin From Revoking Harvard’s Ability To Enroll International Students.” This is from The Harvard Crimson. Harvard turned out one of my favorite journalists, Joy Reid, and you can read this article knowing there are more good journalists headed to jobs.
A federal judge granted Harvard a temporary restraining order in its suit to block the Trump administration’s efforts to revoke its authorization to enroll international students.
The order was issued less than two hours after the University requested a halt to the Department of Homeland Security’s attempt to end its Student Exchange and Visitor Program certification. Harvard had described the move as “unprecedented and retaliatory.”
United States District Judge Allison D. Burroughs agreed that if the DHS’ move goes forward, Harvard “will sustain immediate and irreparable injury before there is an opportunity to hear from all parties.”
The TRO will go into effect immediately and will likely last until a hearing in the case. Burroughs has scheduled a May 27 status hearing and a May 29 hearing on whether to issue a preliminary injunction. Harvard would need to file for a preliminary injunction to prevent the DHS’ directive from going into effect after the TRO expires.
Under the terms of the order, the DHS is barred from enforcing the Thursday move to strip Harvard of its SEVP status — and Harvard is no longer legally obligated to turn over the requested documents by Sunday.
Burroughs, a Barack Obama appointee, has adjudicated several cases relating to Harvard in the past. She oversaw a case brought by Harvard and MIT in 2021 against the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s effort to force all international students who were enrolled online in the U.S. to leave the country. ICE ultimately rolled back the policy without a ruling from Burroughs.
Burroughs is also overseeing Harvard’s first lawsuit, filed in April, against the Trump administration over its nearly $3 billion funding cut.
You can see all of the destruction of the Age of Reason and the Scientific Age, and the Information Age, clearly in these actions and even more clearly in Trump’s appointments and the destruction of the Agencies most responsible for progress using science and reason. BB shared this Substack today, and I thought I’d post it here. It’s from Steven Beschloss, a journalist with a historian brother. “How Much More Stupidity Will Americans Endure? Reflecting on the escalating hostility to American values, principles, and decency in a 24-hour period.” I personally cannot take much more of this.
I admit: The daily drumbeat of stupidity is exhausting. I wish it were enough for me to simply document the dangerous ignorance of Trump and his sycophants, confident that we’ll soon be free of this regime and its power to spread their poison and cancerous hostility across the land and around the world. But the midterm elections will not arrive for another 17 months. It’s hard to overstate how much damage Trump, his cabinet and his kowtowing Republican Congress can cause between now and then.
That’s why most days I ask myself: Could today be the day Americans decide they’ve had enough and demand change? I have thought that there might be a single event that triggers millions of Americans taking to the streets or committing to a national strike in a public, unavoidable show of solidarity. But I have come to see that the daily drumbeat is numbing too many people, causing them to adapt to the cruelty, the racism, the hostility to democracy, the arrogant rejection of the Constitution and the rule of law. The metaphor of the frog in a slowly boiling pot of water is apt; by the time the frog’s figured out he needs to get out, it’s too late.
We’re not there yet. You can see that dedicated lawyers are filing suit against the corruption and criminality, judges are pushing back, outraged Americans are engaging in protests, some elected Democrats and other awake leaders are ringing alarm bells, a growing number of colleges and universities have refused to buckle under, some independent media are addressing the reality of authoritarianism in no uncertain terms. Americans have not surrendered their sanity or capacity to know what’s right and wrong, what’s true and false. The pot may be beginning to boil, but we can still see and feel what’s happening. We are still able to take action.
But I want to spotlight a series of events in a single 24-hour period that individually outrage me and, taken together, express a level of stupidity and sickness that should motivate more than a shrug of the head or an angry social media post. You may have already focused on—been outraged by—one or even all of these. But it’s important to not look at them as discrete events, but part and parcel of a single plot to convince us that we should accept a fascist regime bent on elevating white nationalism, oppressing people of color, silencing dissent and making the rich richer and the poor and middle class poorer and sicker. This effort is led by a malignant racist and sociopath who’s convinced the people around him to do what he says, no matter how ugly, cruel, blatantly false—or just plain stupid.
Two of the four events were in the Oval Office Wednesday—our Oval Office, the place where real presidents have made some of the most momentous decisions that improved the lives of Americans, created a safety net to overcome the ravages of the Great Depression and soften cap italism’s turbulence, helped defeat the Nazis and fascism, built global alliances that made the world safer, more stable and prosperous, and demonstrated a commitment to bend the arc of history toward justice.
Into this historical place of honor came South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, a calm and skilled diplomat who decades earlier had served alongside Nelson Mandela as his chief negotiator to end apartheid in South Africa. But just like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in February, he arrived for an ambush by a spiteful, narrow-minded man who spreads lies like Ukraine not Russia started the still-raging war. On this day he insisted with false information from fringe groups that South Africa, whose leaders are mostly Black, are committing genocide against white farmers, a false narrative that his top donor and South African-born Elon Musk has propagated.
At Trump’s urging, Ramaphosa answered a reporter’s question about what it would take to convince Trump there is no such white genocide. “It will take President Trump listening to the voices of South Africans, some of whom are his good friends, like those who are here,” he calmly said, referencing South African golfer Ernie Els who was in the room. “When we have talks between us around a quiet table, it will take President Trump to listen to them.”
But South Africa’s president was being set up. Trump interrupted him to play a video pushing the lies, then he showed photos meant to “prove” how much death there was, even leading Trump to mutter, “Death, death, death, horrible death, death.”
Except the video clip showing a long line of white wooden crosses were not actual burial sites for white farmers, as Trump insisted, but were from a 2020 protest against farm murders over the years. Except the photo Trump showed of people lifting body bags, insisting they “are all white farmers that are being buried,” was actually of humanitarian workers burying bodies in Congo. Except for all the claims of genocide among white farmers, meant to justify bringing white Afrikaners as preferred refugees to America now, there were a total of 44 murders in farming communities last year, Reuters reports, with over 26,000 in the country overall.
President Ramaphosa came to discuss trade and economic partnership. Yet Trump brought him into the Oval Office to ambush and abuse him, push his white nationalist agenda, spread more widely his egregious lies and showcase that—while illegally deporting people of color—only whites deserve America’s protection from presumed persecution. “We were taught by Nelson Mandela that whenever there are problems, people need to sit down around a table and talk about them,” Ramaphosa noted, but Trump was not listening.
There is a daily drumbeat of stupidity, airing of white grievances, and cruelty. While discriminating harshly against everyone who is not white and Christian, this administration harbors supporters who carry torches and shout “Jews will not replace us,” and has bubble-headed Congress Critters who scream about “Jewish Space Lasers”. Anti-semitism has become transactional. It has become a useful tool in the attack on Academia and the Democratic Party. It assumes that you can’t understand the history of the Jewish people without turning a blind eye to the punishing attacks on Palestinian women, children, and innocents in the Gaza Strip. I do not think there is a bigger way of showing disrespect for a group of people than using their historical struggles as a tool to encourage the murder of innocents. But then, our #FARTUS is planning a Trump Tower, hotel, and golf course in GAZA. The Trump Boyz–in between murdering endangered animals for sport–have been travelling the globe using the Tariff stick as a way to expand their Crime Syndicate. All, at the expense of the United States and its economy. This is from QUARTZ: “8 countries where Trump has been making new business deals, from Pakistan to Vietnam, Residential towers, golf courses, crypto — the deals didn’t stop on Inauguration Day.” This is the art of the steal in full display. All we need to see is Eric and Don Jr. flying in the palace in the sky and sitting at Trump’s Crypto Fundraiser now.
Businesses spearheaded by President Donald Trump have struck numerous deals since Trump returned to the White House in January.
Leading the way is the Trump Organization, a conglomerate privately owned by the president. With more than 250 subsidiaries, it serves as a holding company for Trump’s various hotels, residential real estate, towers, resorts, and golf courses across the world.
World Liberty Financial, a decentralized protocol that merges financial services and cryptocurrency, has also brokered deals. A Trump business entity owns 60% of World Liberty and is entitled to 75% of all revenue from coin sales. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. manage the company.
Here are the countries where the Trump empire has been dealmaking. The slide show that follows lists Vietnam. It’s in Hanoi, which reminds me of the Hanoi Hilton and the late Senator John McCain.
The project consists of a golf course, hotels, and luxury residences, and is slated for completion by 2029. In addition, Eric Trump is scheduled to meet with officials in Ho Chi Minh City on Thursday to discuss a possible Trump Tower in the city, Reuters reports.
In April, the president imposed a “reciprocal” tariff rate of 46% on Vietnamese goods. While that policy is currently on a 90-day pause, it would deal a major blow to the Southeast Asian country if resumed. Goods exported to the U.S. account for 30% of Vietnam’s economy, according to IMF estimates, the largest of all U.S. trading partners. As the specter of these crippling levies looms, Hanoi has pledged to buy more American goods, including Boeing (BA) aircraft and agricultural products.
Other countries include Serbia, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Pakistan, and Singapore. Most of these discussions haven’t been covered by the Media other than Qatar, which came with the gift that “Palace in the sky” that will cause millions of dollars to refit before it’s handed over to Trump and his “library.” If there’s a bigger oxymoron than Trump Library, I’m waiting to hear it. Let’s just call it the warehouse facility for all the bribes and emoluments. We have to discuss that big ol’ party Trump threw for his richest customers. This is from the New York Times. “Hundreds Join Trump at ‘Exclusive’ Dinner, With Dreams of Crypto Fortunes in Mind. The guests were the biggest investors in President Trump’s memecoin, and they were greeted with chants of “shame” as they arrived at Trump National Golf Course.”
President Trump gathered Thursday evening at his Virginia golf club with the highest-paying customers of his personal cryptocurrency, promising that he would promote the crypto industry from the White House as protesters outside condemned the event as a historic corruption of the presidency.
The gala dinner held at the Trump National Golf Club in suburban Washington, where Mr. Trump flew from the White House on a military helicopter, turned into an extraordinary spectacle as hundreds of guests arrived, many having flown to the United States from overseas.
At the club’s entrance, the guests were greeted by dozens of protesters chanting “shame, shame, shame.”
It was a spectacle that could only have happened in the era of Donald J. Trump. Several of the dinner guests, in interviews with The New York Times, said that they attended the event with the explicit intent of influencing Mr. Trump and U.S. financial regulations.
“The past administration made your lives miserable,” Mr. Trump told the dinner guests, referring to the Biden administration’s enforcement actions against crypto companies.
The gala attendees made whooping noises while Mr. Trump spoke, and applauded as the president declared: “They were going after everybody. It was a disgrace frankly,” according to a video provided to The Times by a dinner guest.
Mr. Trump promised to change that approach. “There is a lot of sense in crypto. A lot of common sense in crypto,” he said. “And we’re honored to be working on helping everybody here.”
That sure is different than the 2021 #FARTUS who told Fox News. He just couldn’t wait to get into that scam, I guess. This is from the BBC. “Donald Trump calls Bitcoin ‘a scam against the dollar’. This is reported by BBC News Business Reporter Mary-Ann Russon.
Former US President Donald Trump has told Fox Business that he sees Bitcoin as a “scam” affecting the value of the US dollar.
“Bitcoin, it just seems like a scam,” Mr Trump said. “I don’t like it because it’s another currency competing against the dollar.”
He added that he wanted the dollar to be “the currency of the world”.
As per usual, the biggest losers from any more normalization of cryptocurrency will be his own voters. This is from the BBC. “The Bitcoin hum that is unsettling Trump’s MAGA heartlands.” This was written by Mike Wendling.
Installations like the one at the power plant near Dresden are appearing across the country, drawn by record-high cryptocurrency prices and cheap and abundant energy to power the computers that do the mining. There are at least 137 Bitcoin mines in the US across 21 states, and reports indicate there are many more planned. According to estimates by the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), Bitcoin mining uses up to 2.3% of the nation’s grid.
The high energy use and its wider environmental impact is certainly causing some concern in Dresden.
But it’s the unmistakable hum that is the soundtrack for discontent in many places with Bitcoin mines – produced by the fans used to cool the computers, it can range from a mechanical whirr to a deafening din.
“We can hear a constant buzzing,” says another Dresden resident, Lori Fishline. “It’s a constant, loud humming noise that you just can’t ignore. It was never present before and has definitely affected the peaceful atmosphere of our bay.”
Such is Ms Campbell’s annoyance with Trump’s Bitcoin backing, her political allegiance to the Republicans is being tested. “Right now I’m not real happy about that party,” she says.
So, build the nastiest factory in the backyard of the people least able to deal with it. That’s the sound of these Robber Barons that should be familiar to anyone who knows US history from its early 20th-century business escapades. The most interesting thing that’s popped up today is that Apple has got Trump in a lather, and the Equity Markets hate it. This is from Yahoo Finance: “Stock market today: Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq trim losses as Trump threatens Apple, EU with new tariffs.”
US stocks fell on Friday, on pace for weekly losses as investors assessed President Trump’s latest tariff threats and what his giant tax bill means for the deficit and the economy.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) sank 0.4%. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) also fell roughly 0.4%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) backed off about 0.6%.
All three indexes trimmed steeper losses after Trump said on Friday that Apple (AAPL) must pay a 25% tariff on iPhones sold but not made in the US. The tech giant has begun shifting some manufacturing to India, with China, home to its key suppliers, locked in a trade war with the US. Apple shares fell 3% after Trump’s post on Truth Social.
At the same time, Trump threatened to hike the tariff on EU imports to “a straight 50%” beginning June 1 as trade talks between the two have stalled.
The president’s warnings shattered a more muted mood on Wall Street as investors wound down to the Memorial Day trading break on Monday.
It adds another supply chain complication for companies already worried about the potential hit to the economy from Trump’s tariff blitz. Earnings season has seen several companies hold off from providing full annual guidance thanks to uncertainty around tariffs.
All three major gauges are on track for a losing week. Stocks have suffered as deficit worries pushed up Treasury yields, intensified as Trump’s giant tax bill forged ahead. Wall Street is still weighing the economic impact of Trump’s revised bill, which cleared a key hurdle in the House vote for approval.
Well, I have always called him Orange Caligula. It seems we have a mad emperor on our hands. It didn’t help crypto either. “Bitcoin tumbles under $108K after Trump calls for 50% EU tariff. Trump’s tariff announcement sparks Bitcoin volatility, highlighting digital assets’ sensitivity to geopolitical events.” This is from Crypto Briefing and Vivian Nguyen.
The price of Bitcoin (BTC) fell below $108,000 early Friday after President Donald Trump called for steep tariffs on EU imports and threatened Apple with similar measures. The digital asset briefly touched $107,300 on Binance, pulling back from session highs above $111,000 as traders responded to fresh geopolitical tensions.
The US president on Friday proposed a 50% tariff on all EU imports starting June 1, 2025, in a post on Truth Social. He cited trade imbalances and regulatory frictions as rationale for the move, declaring current EU-US trade dynamics “totally unacceptable.”
Apple is being threatened with 25% tariffs. Wow, how free market is this? Sounds a lot more like the old Soviet Command and Control model. Is he channeling Putin and Orban or just pissed about something Apple did at his party? This is from CNBC. “Trump says Apple must pay a 25% tariff on iPhones not made in the U.S.” Does he not realize how long it would take to even set up a factory, let alone train everyone? Doesn’t he know what this huge project would take to even break even?
President Donald Trump said in a social media post Friday that Apple will have to pay a tariff of 25% or more for iPhones made outside the United States.
“I have long ago informed Tim Cook of Apple that I expect their iPhone’s that will be sold in the United States of America will be manufactured and built in the United States, not India, or anyplace else. If that is not the case, a Tariff of at least 25% must be paid by Apple to the U.S.,” Trump said on Truth Social.
Shares of Apple fell about 2% on Friday after the post.
Apple’s flagship phone is produced primarily in China, but the company has been shifting manufacturing to India in part because that country has a friendlier trade relationship with the U.S.
Some Wall Street analysts have estimated that moving iPhone production to the U.S. would raise the price of the Apple smartphone by at least 25%. Wedbush’s Dan Ives put the estimated cost of a U.S. iPhone at $3,500. The iPhone 16 Pro currently retails for about $1,000.
This is the latest jab at Apple from Trump, who over the past couple of weeks has ramped up pressure on the company and Cook to increase domestic manufacturing. Trump and Cook met at the White House on Tuesday, according to Politico.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in an interview with Fox News on Friday that he was not part of the meeting at the White House but that the Apple situation could be part of the Trump administration’s push to bring “precision manufacturing” back to the U.S.
“A large part of Apple’s components are in semiconductors. So we would like to have Apple help us make the semiconductor supply chain more secure,” Bessent said.
Cook gave $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund and attended the inauguration in January. Apple has announced a $500 billion spend on U.S. development, including AI server production in Houston.
Apple declined to comment for this story.
So, I’m over 4200 words and probably have put you to sleep. You know how I am about Rabbit Holes. How much longer before the economy collapses? I’m actually beginning to wonder that. I know every time I see or hear him act so insane, I just collapse on the couch.
You have a very nice Memorial Day weekend. Please spend your time appreciating the many folks who gave their life for this country and its democracy. Don’t let the ones trying to destroy it get to you. There’s always the June 14th Flag Day “No Kings” protests and actions to look forward to and participate in. Just don’t watch that damn parade. The least we old folks can do is tank the ratings.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
How about a little Warren Zevon and Prince?
Mostly Monday Reads: A Big, Ugly Mess
Posted: May 19, 2025 Filed under: A thread for Ranting, Agency Purges, Banksters, Broligarchy, democracy is threatened, Joe Biden, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, New Orleans, Polycrisis | Tags: @johnbuss.bsky.social John Buss, Big Beautiful Bill, China Dumps T-Bonds, Eat the Rich, FARTUS, Major Disruption in the Polar Vortex, Medicaid Cuts, New Orleans Bubble Day, No Kings Day, No Kings protest over #FARTUS parade, Trump budget destroys medicaid, Trump tax cuts for the rich 9 Comments
“Relax, it’s just a cartoon. I know he can’t do yoga.” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
As you know, I’m a nerd on all levels. I was catching up on my usual rabbit holes. The last thing I was reading was in the category of weather and climate change, and a major disruption in the polar vortex that will drastically change the weather from here on out. It’s slid off the North Pole and is moving over Northern Europe. That was after I was reading about this equally major disruption in the global economy. “China Dumps $18,900,000,000 in Treasuries as US Government Faces Major Dilemma: Macro Analyst Luke Gromen.” I’m now working on “In late-night vote, Republicans move closer to pushing Trump agenda bill through House. GOP officials are scrambling to advance massive tax breaks and dramatic Medicaid cuts, and it’s worth appreciating why they’re in such a rush,” written by Steve Benen.
Here in New Orleans, we had a Big Bubble Protest because of some rich guy that moved to the Quarter last year and has filed no less than 15 Criminal complaints over a bubble machine on the balcony of a restaurant that’s been there for over ten years. He thinks that the bubbles will ruin his Porsche and poison his drink when he imbibes on his balcony. This is the typical New Orleans gentrifier. He comes from someplace and expects New Orleans to accommodate his burbie weirdness. Just another old rich white guy trying to rule the world.
Meanwhile, Trump was posting madly early in the morning about every big music star that ever rejected him. That’s right before he’s supposed to be meeting with Putin and Zelensky over Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Joe Biden has cancer, and Junior’s been hitting Truth Social and drugs at the same time.
All I can do is quote Chief Meteorologist Emeritus for Channel 2 Action News’ Severe Weather Team 2. AMS certified Glenn Burns. He was talking about the Polar Vortex, but it applies to everything these days. “Nothing is like it used to be anymore.”
You can go read about the selfies of Trump with the Waffle House Toilet guys for yourself. Yes, it’s up there on the Daily Mail.
No wonder the Polar Vortex doesn’t want to be near the United States anymore. Who would?
There are a lot of improvements we need in this country, but none of this stands as necessary or wanted. I love this float pic but think Senator Duckworth’s label Cadet Bone Spurs is more appropriate since Yam Tits would have never made it to a rank of sargent. But, yes, we’re getting a big, beautiful parade. It’s going to cost millions. This rather makes it official. We’re a damn Banana Republic. But the best thing is that pissed-off Americans are once more taking to the streets with placards and protests. This is from lawyermonthly. ““No Kings Day” Protests Set to Disrupt Trump’s $45M Birthday Military Parade.”
On June 14, a date that commemorates both the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army and the 79th birthday of former President Donald J. Trump, the streets of the nation’s capital are expected to swell, not only with tanks, soldiers, and fighter jets, but with thousands of protestors prepared to send a very different message.
In a show of political theater unprecedented in recent years, Trump and his allies are staging what they’ve dubbed a “patriotic celebration,” complete with more than 6,000 uniformed troops, 150 military vehicles, and a dramatic aerial flyover.
The event, organizers say, is intended to honor America’s armed forces. Critics, however, see something more troubling: a public spectacle designed to cement the image of Trump as commander-in-chief, long after leaving office.
But while the parade commands the headlines, another force is quietly gaining momentum and it’s aiming to steal the spotlight.
Born from frustration and sharpened by years of political tension, a broad coalition of advocacy groups is organizing a massive counter-movement under the banner “No Kings Day.”
It’s not just a protest, they say. It’s a rejection of the authoritarian imagery they believe the parade represents.
Organizers from groups including the 50501 Movement and Refuse Fascism say they’re mobilizing demonstrations in over 100 cities nationwide, with Washington, D.C. serving as the focal point.
Estimates suggest between 10,000 to 20,000 demonstrators will gather in Meridian Hill Park before marching toward the National Mall.
“It’s not about hating Trump, it’s about preserving democracy,” said Angela V., a volunteer coordinator in Maryland who’s helping coordinate buses into the city. “We can’t normalize tanks in the streets every time a former president wants a birthday party.”
Though the name “No Kings Day” may sound theatrical, the intentions behind it are serious.
Protestors plan to highlight what they see as Trump’s attempts to centralize power and glamorize military dominance, particularly during a time when the former president faces multiple indictments related to election interference, classified documents, and alleged abuse of power.
How about we use that $45 million plus whatever it costs to undo the damage Washington D.C. roads to fund the Veterans’ services cut by that ugly budget winding its way to the Senate today? Economist Paul Krugman–writing at his substack–colorfully describes the budget process as “Attack of the Sadistic Zombies. The GOP budget is incredibly cruel — and that’s the point.” Sounds a lot like the guy who doesn’t want bubbles in his drink or on his Porsche.
Republicans in Congress, taking their marching orders from Donald Trump, are on track to enact a hugely regressive budget — big tax giveaways to the wealthy combined with cruel cuts in programs that serve lower-income Americans. True, the legislation suffered a setback last week, initially failing to make it out of committee. But that was largely because some right-wing Republicans didn’t think the benefit cuts were vicious enough.
OK, news at 11. Isn’t this what Republicans always do? But this reconciliation bill — that is, legislation structured in such a way that it can’t be filibustered and may well pass with no Democratic votes — is different in both degree and kind from what we’ve seen before: Its cruelty is exceptional even by recent right-wing standards. Furthermore, the way that cruelty will be implemented is notable for its reliance on claims we know aren’t true and policies we know won’t work — what some of us call zombie ideas.
And it’s hard to avoid the sense that the counterproductive viciousness is actually the point. Think of what we’re seeing as the attack of the sadistic zombies.
To get a sense of how extreme this legislation is, do a side-by-side comparison of the impact on different groups of Americans between this bill and Trump’s one major legislative achievement during his first term, the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. It looks like this:
Source: Tax Policy Center and Penn-Wharton Budget Model
The TCJA, like the current legislation, gave big tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans. But it also threw a few crumbs to people further down the scale. By contrast, the House Reconciliation Bill, by slashing benefits — especially Medicaid — will cause immense, almost inconceivable hardship to the bottom 40 percent of Americans, especially the poorest fifth.
Medicaid, in case anyone needs reminding, is the national health insurance program for low-income Americans who probably don’t have any other way to pay for medical care. In 2023 Medicaid covered 69 million Americans, far more than Medicare (which covers seniors), including 39 percent of children.
Providing health care to children, by the way, isn’t just about social justice and basic decency. It’s also good economics: Children who receive adequate care grow up to be more productive adults. Among other things they end up paying more taxes, so Medicaid for children almost surely pays for itself.
And although Republican legislation apparently won’t explicitly target childrens’ care, it will impose paperwork requirements that will cause both children and their parents to lose coverage.
Here’s some analysis of the late-night passage of the bill on the substack of Heather Cox Richardson, historian. ‘
Tonight, late on a Sunday night, the House Budget Committee passed what Republicans are calling their “Big, Beautiful Bill” to enact Trump’s agenda although it had failed on Friday when far-right Republicans voted against it, complaining it did not make deep enough cuts to social programs.
The vote tonight was a strict party line vote, with 16 Democrats voting against the measure, 17 Republicans voting for it, and 4 far right Republicans voting “present.” House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said there would be “minor modifications” to the measure; Representative Chip Roy (R-TX) wrote on X that those changes include new work requirements for Medicaid and cuts to green energy subsidies.
And so the bill moves forward.
In The Bulwark today, Jonathan Cohn noted that Republicans are in a tearing hurry to push that Big, Beautiful Bill through Congress before most of us can get a handle on what’s in it. Just a week ago, Cohn notes, there was still no specific language in the measure. Republican leaders didn’t release the piece of the massive bill that would cut Medicaid until last Sunday night and then announced the Committee on Energy and Commerce would take it up not even a full two days later, on Tuesday, before the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office could produce a detailed analysis of the cost of the proposals. The committee markup happened in a 26-hour marathon in which the parts about Medicaid happened in the middle of the night. And now, the bill moves forward in an unusual meeting late on a Sunday night.
Cohn recalls that in 2009, when the Democrats were pushing the Affordable Care Act, more popularly known as Obamacare, that measure had months of public debate before it went to the Committee on Energy and Commerce. That committee held eight separate hearings about healthcare reform, and it was just one of three committees working on the issue. The ACA markup took a full two weeks.
Cohn explains that Medicaid cuts are extremely unpopular, and the Republicans hope to jam those cuts through by claiming they are cutting “waste, fraud, and abuse” without leaving enough time for scrutiny. Cohn points out that if they are truly interested in savings, they could turn instead to the privatized part of Medicare, Medicare Advantage The Congressional Budget Office estimates that cutting overpayments to Medicare Advantage when private insurers “upcode” care to place patients in a higher risk bracket, could save more than $1 trillion over the next decade.
Instead of saving money, the Big, Beautiful Bill actually blows the budget deficit wide open by extending the 2017 tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that those extensions would cost at least $4.6 trillion over the next ten years. And while the tax cuts would go into effect immediately, the cuts to Medicaid are currently scheduled not to hit until 2029, enabling the Republicans to avoid voter fury over them in the midterms and the 2028 election.
The prospect of that debt explosion led Moody’s on Friday to downgrade U.S. credit for the first time since 1917, following Fitch, which downgraded the U.S. rating in 2023, and Standard & Poor’s, which did so back in 2011. “If the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is extended, which is our base case,” Moody’s explained, “it will add around $4 trillion to the federal fiscal primary (excluding interest payments) deficit over the next decade. As a result, we expect federal deficits to widen, reaching nearly 9% of GDP by 2035, up from 6.4% in 2024, driven mainly by increased interest payments on debt, rising entitlement spending and relatively low revenue generation.”
Steven Beschloss calls for more activism today at his substack, America, America. “Heeding the Warnings! We must avoid normalcy bias, expand our imagination, and both recognize and confront the fascistic danger of the Trump regime.”
Last week On Tyranny author Timothy Snyder warned that the second 100 days of the Trump regime could entail a dangerous escalation that includes some kind of terrorist attack. Imagining this can be hard; it’s understandable to ignore such a warning since it’s not yet true, it’s unpleasant to consider—and yes, it may not happen.
But it’s worth listening to what this historian of authoritarian regimes envisions—a warning layered with advice on how to prepare and how to respond. “I think it’s very important to expect there will now be exogenous surprises,” he said in a short video, including the “bottom falling out” of the economy because of the tariffs, “a major disruption” within the U.S. or even some kind of terrorist attack.
“Don’t fall for language about extremism or terrorism,” Snyder urged if it happens. He also emphasized the importance of staying calm, being active and sticking together. “Be aware that this is the pretext that will be used to push things further…use it as an opportunity to hold the people responsible who should be taking responsibility.”
This mirrors what he said in one of the final chapters of his short book that offers lessons to prepare, one entitled “Be calm when the unthinkable arrives.” His thinking draws on the Reichstag Fire staged by Hitler and the Nazis in 1933.
Modern tyranny is terror management. When the terrorist attack comes, remember that authoritarians exploit such events in order to consolidate power. The sudden disaster that requires the end of checks and balances, the dissolution of opposition parties, the suspension of freedom of expression, the right to a fair trial, and so on, is the oldest trick in the Hitlerian book. Do not fall for it.
As he notes in a Substack piece published last month about the possibility of such an attack, “The people in the White House have no governing skills, but they do have entertainment skills. They will seek to transform themselves from the villains of the story to the heroes, and in the process bring down the republic.”
None of us know if such an attack will happen. But I agree with Snyder that it’s important to expand our imaginations and be prepared if it does. That means not falling victim to normalcy bias.
Yes, millions of Americans failed to grasp the potential for disaster and crisis if Donald Trump were to occupy the White House again. But rather than look backward and rue that misfortune, let’s look forward and do what we can.
Warn the people we know. Warn the people we meet. Reach out on social media and email to our friends and communities. Contact our elected officials. Participate in public demonstrations and bring friends with us.
Let them all know this is an emergency—no time for business as usual and old ways of doing things. There’s an arsonist in the White House aggressively seeking to end our constitutional republic, free speech and the rule of law. And let’s not lose sight of our collective power to ensure that the Trump regime’s desired trajectory is not inevitable.
The Financial Markets are reeling. This is from NYT. “Markets Rattled on Concerns About U.S. Debt. Stocks fell, the dollar slipped, and bond yields jumped after a rating downgrade highlighted worries about the cost of President Trump’s policies and the health of the economy.”
Turbulent trading hit financial markets on Monday, with investors selling U.S. stocks and bonds and the dollar, an ugly combination that suggests sentiment is souring on the outlook for the world’s largest economy.
The S&P 500 index fell about 1 percent in early trading in New York. Bond markets shuddered, with U.S. Treasury prices falling and their yields, which underpin interest rates across the economy, rising. The 10-year yield jumped a tenth of a percentage point, a large move in that market, to 4.54 percent. The dollar also fell, with a gauge of its value against other major currencies slipping 0.8 percent.
One factor jarring markets is a bill in Congress that would make President Trump’s signature 2017 tax cuts permanent and could add trillions of dollars to federal debt. A House committee voted to approve the bill Sunday night, although it was expected to remain a focus of contentious congressional debate.
The United States’ loss of its last triple-A credit rating late on Friday and mounting concerns about government debt have threatened to disrupt the relative calm in markets that has prevailed since Mr. Trump paused many of his tariffs in recent weeks.
In downgrading the U.S. credit rating, Moody’s cited the tax cut legislation along with broader concerns about the fiscal deficit and growing debt costs. The move by Moody’s means that all three major rating agencies no longer consider the United States qualified for their top credit ratings.
The U.S. credit rating downgrade and worries about debt and deficits could further upset financial markets if they begin to shake the safe-haven status of Treasury bonds. That would likely spur global investors to demand higher premiums in return for buying U.S. debt.
On Monday, the 30-year Treasury yield rose to its highest level in a year and a half, above 5 percent.
The market has yet to fully absorb the Treasury Bond Dump by China. This is from the Daily HODL (News and Insight for the Digital Economy). Yes, I’m getting seriously nerdy for you know. This is the kind of stuff that drives my research and derivatives class lectures. This is the stuff that should frighten everyone if they ever knew about it. “China Dumps $18,900,000,000 in Treasuries as US Government Faces Major Dilemma: Macro Analyst Luke Gromen.”
Macro investor Luke Gromen warns that the countries buying more USTs won’t be able to simultaneously buy more American-manufactured goods, further hurting America’s trade deficit that President Trump has promised to address.
Says Gromen,
“Foreign UST holdings rose $133 billion Mar vs. Feb.
UK, Caymans, and Canada were $86 billion of that $133 billion; China sold $19 billion.
UK surpassed China as the 2nd biggest US foreign creditor for 1st time ever in March.
Cayman Islands (pop. ~73,000) is now the fourth biggest US foreign creditor at $455 billion…
How are they going to buy both USTs and more goods from America going forward?”
Analysts reportedly told Reuters that Chinese holdings of USTs have been in a downward trajectory since 2018, even though foreign holdings of Treasuries surged to an all-time high of $9.05 trillion in March.
That means our exports will go down in many of the countries. It’s damned recessionary. Also, if the price of bonds goes down because a country dumps their portfolio of treasuries, the interest rates go up. It will be truly interesting to see what the Fed does with this. Then there’s this. I bet Senator Warren is apoplectic. This report comes from The Guardian. You remember how fun that crash was. “US reportedly plans to slash bank rules imposed to prevent 2008-style crash. Watchdogs could cut capital rules as Trump’s deregulation drive opens door to rollback of post-crisis protections.”
US watchdogs are reportedly planning to slash capital rules for banks designed to prevent another 2008-style crash, as Donald Trump’s deregulation drive opens the door to the biggest rollback of post-crisis protections in more than a decade.
The move follows heavy lobbying by the banking industry, with lenders such as JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs having long complained that competition and lending have been hindered by burdensome rules governing the assets they must hold versus their liabilities.
Regulators are expected to put forward the proposals this summer, aimed at cutting the supplementary leverage ratio that requires big banks to hold high-quality capital against risky assets including loans and derivatives, according to the Financial Times, which cited unnamed sources.
The rules came into force after the 2008 financial crisis, as part of efforts to shockproof the banking system and avoid damaging ripple effects that could cause another global economic meltdown. The crisis forced governments to spend billions of dollars bailing out big lenders that took too much risk.
Changes to bank capital rules have been widely expected, with Trump having promised a bonfire of regulation during his second term in office, with plans to slash 10 regulations for every new one added.
While some critics warn it is the wrong time to slash protections, given growing uncertainty over policy overhauls and market volatility, banks seem to have won the ear of policymakers. Lobbyists have long argued that the rules punish them for holding relatively low-risk assets including US debt, known as treasuries, and hinders their ability to provide more loans.
I just want to wish Former President the best as he struggles with cancer. I know how that feels. I’m 35 years out from a stage 4 cancer episode. It transforms how you see time. “President Biden has metastatic prostate cancer. Here’s what you should know,” via CNN. He will receive top-quality cancer treatment and has a wonderful supportive family. All of this will help him. He’s also one tough cookie.
President Joe Biden’s diagnosis of metastatic prostate cancer has understandably raised concerns and questions: How long has he had cancer, how will he be treated, and what is his prognosis?
As a urologist, I regularly diagnose prostate cancer in my patients, and each time I share the diagnosis with them and their family, it’s never easy. Over time, I’ve learned the importance of keeping conversations simple and straightforward — avoiding sugar-coating and instead using data, statistics and personal experience to help patients begin their cancer journey.
As his public announcement draws attention to this type of cancer, it’s a reminder to regularly check on your own health. Here’s what you need to know about metastatic prostate cancer: how it’s detected, what treatments look like, and why early screening remains essential for men’s health.
The former president’s diagnosis began after he experienced “increasing urinary symptoms,” his office said, and a prostate nodule was discovered.
…
“Metastatic” means the cancer cells have spread beyond the original location (the prostate gland) into other areas — most commonly bones and lymph nodes. Biden’s cancer has specifically spread to his bones, placing him among the 5% to 7% of prostate cancer cases in the United States that are metastatic at initial diagnosis. While this percentage seems small, it represents a significant number given that over 300,000 men in the US and approximately 1.5 million worldwide are diagnosed with prostate cancer every year.
Early-stage prostate cancer carries an excellent prognosis, with nearly a 100% five-year survival rate. However, when prostate cancer is metastatic at diagnosis, the five-year survival rate drops sharply to around 37%. Importantly, these survival rates are statistical averages, and individual outcomes vary considerably based on overall health, age, cancer aggressiveness, and how well a patient responds to treatment.
All of the #FARTUS policies add up to a big mess for the economy. It’s driving me back to research again. But right now, I guess I’ll go blow some bubbles for a while.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Finally Friday Reads: Feet Don’t Fail Me Now
Posted: May 2, 2025 Filed under: #FARTUS, #MAGAnomics, academia, American Fascists, Broligarchy, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, Polycrisis, U.S. Economy, U.S. Politics | Tags: "Is Trump waging a war on dolls? ", Are Flights in the USA Safe?, Domestic Terrorists and Judges, Donnie Two Dolls, FARTUS, PBS Funding, Trump's War on Christmas, Yam Tits, Yam Tits 100 days of oops 4 Comments
“Wow, eye-opening interview!” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
I’m a little late on this because I’ve finally reached the end of all these tests to figure out why I keep having to sing Feet Don’t Fail Me Now. I’m finally getting a bit of information on my poor polyneuropathic feet. It seems they likely came from the intense rounds of chemotherapy I had for the cancer I developed after my youngest was born. Anyway, I’m back from the EMG which involves a lot of needle poking and shocking your nerves. It wasn’t a pleasant experience, much like Yam Tits’ reign of terror, but now I know. I guess the best thing I can do is take a couple more supplements, so I will keep on Truckin’ here in New Orleans. Anyway, the Polycrisis continues on all fronts.
So, now is the time for all good citizens to come to the defense of Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster, and all the Sesame Street gang. The AP reports that “Trump signs executive order directing federal funding cuts to PBS and NPR.”
President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order aiming to slash public subsidies to PBS and NPR as he alleged “bias” in the broadcasters’ reporting.
The order instructs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and other federal agencies “to cease Federal funding for NPR and PBS” and further requires that that they work to root out indirect sources of public financing for the news organizations. The White House, in a social media posting announcing the signing, said the outlets “receive millions from taxpayers to spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’”
It’s the latest move by Trump and his administration to utilize federal powers to control or hamstring institutions whose actions or viewpoints he disagrees with. Since taking office, Trump has ousted leaders, placed staff on administrative leave and cut off hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to artists, libraries, museums, theaters and others, through takeovers of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Trump has also pushed to withhold federal research and education funds from universities and punish law firms unless they agreed to eliminate diversity programs and other measures Trump has found objectionable.
The broadcasters get roughly half a billion dollars in public money through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and have been preparing for the possibility of stiff cuts since Trump’s election, as Republicans have long complained about them.
March 20, 2017
I have to say that PBS is a mainstay of the small amount of TV viewing I actually do. Master Piece Theater has been a staple of my viewing since University, and my daughters grew up with Mr Rodgers, Sesame Street, and my youngest was addicted to Barney and Friends. My mother always watched all the Detective Shows they ever showed, including Mystery Theater. It’s where I learned to love Dr. Who and Monty Python. I can’t even imagine #FARTUS has even seen any of those shows. The actual Federal Spending on the public networks is very small. They get most of their money from corporate sponsorship and their viewers. The amount going to Elon Musk’s enterprises is huge. You can view the funding numbers for PBS at this link: “Frequently Asked Questions about Support.”
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) receives a congressional appropriation each year of about $500M. CPB allocates the appropriation mostly to public television and radio stations, with some assigned to NPR and PBS to support national programming.
CPB funding to stations covers a portion of each’s annual operating budget (the percentage varies from station to station but as a general rule the percentage is smaller for larger market stations). Stations rely on generous donations from viewers like you, corporate sponsorships, and foundation grants to cover the rest of their operating budget.
Part of each station’s operating budget is programming dues which it pays to PBS (and NPR) for National programming like PBS News Hour.
The News Hour receives about 35% of its annual funding/budget from CPB and PBS via national programming funds – a combination of CPB appropriation funds and annual programming dues paid to PBS by stations re-allocated to programs like ours. The remaining 65% is generated from individual donations, foundation grants and corporate sponsorships.
Here’s a recent article from WAPO on the amount of Federal Funding received by Musks’ businesses. “Elon Musk’s business empire is built on $38 billion in government funding. Government infusions at key moments helped Tesla and SpaceX flourish, boosting Musk’s wealth.” Remember,nothing has ever actually blown up on Sesame Street.
Elon Musk and his cost-cutting U.S. DOGE Service team have been on a mission to trim government largesse. Yet Musk is one of the greatest beneficiaries of the taxpayers’ coffers.
Over the years, Musk and his businesses have received at least $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies and tax credits, often at critical moments, a Washington Post analysis has found, helping seed the growth that has made him the world’s richest person.
The payments stretch back more than 20 years. Shortly after becoming CEO of a cash-strapped Tesla in 2008, Musk fought hard to secure a low-interest loan from the Energy Department, according to two people directly involved with the process,holding daily briefings with company executives about the paperwork and spending hours with a government loan officer.
When Tesla soon after realized it was missing a crucial Environmental Protection Agency certification it needed to qualify for the loan days before Christmas, Musk went straight to the top, urging then-EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to intervene, according to one of thepeople. Both people spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
Nearly two-thirds of the $38 billion in funds have been promised to Musk’s businesses in the past five years.
In 2024 alone, federal and local governments committed at least $6.3 billion to Musk’s companies, the highest total to date.
The total amount is probably larger: This analysis includes only publicly available contracts, omitting classified defense and intelligence work for the federal government.SpaceX has been developing spy satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office, the Pentagon’s spy satellite division, according to the Reuters news agency. The Wall Street Journal reported that contract was worth $1.8 billion, citing company documents.
The Post found nearly a dozen other local grants, reimbursements and tax credits where the specific amount of money is not public.
An additional 52 ongoing contracts with seven government agencies — including NASA, the Defense Department and the General Services Administration — are on track to potentially pay Musk’s companies an additional $11.8 billion over the next few years, according to The Post’s analysis.
Well, isn’t that special? Here’s a read from Politico about the pushback from NPR to Trump. “Public media executives push back against Trump targeting NPR and PBS: ‘Blatantly unlawful’. The president issued an executive order late Thursday trying to cut federal funding.”
Public media executives are pushing back against President Donald Trump’s late Thursday executive order seeking to strike federal funding for NPR and PBS, arguing it is unlawful.
Trump’s Thursday order directed the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private nonprofit that Congress awards more than $500 million annually to fund public media, to “cancel existing direct funding to the maximum extent allowed by law” to NPR and PBS.
“Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government,” she wrote.
CPB is already embroiled in a battle with the Trump administration. Earlier this week, the organization sued after Trump asserted he was removing three of the organization’s five board members.
Trump and his allies in Congress have repeatedly targeted NPR and PBS, arguing that the two outlets have a liberal bias and seeking to strip their funds.
The leaders of both organizations were hauled in front of Congress for a hearing in front of the House Oversight Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency — a companion to Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency — and the FCC has launched an investigation of both’s underwriting messages.
The White House is expected to ask Congress to cancel already approved funding for public broadcasting, in what is known as a rescission request, POLITICO previously reported.
PBS Chief Executive Paula Kerger released a statement Friday in response to the president’s order, calling it “blatantly unlawful” and said the broadcaster is “exploring all options” to ensure it can continue programming across the country.
In a press release from NPR, the organization said it would “vigorously defend our right to provide essential news, information and life-saving services to the American public” and challenge the executive order “using all means available.”
The order explicitly called on the CPB Board of Directors to end direct, indirect and future funding to the two public broadcasters. Federal funds make up about 15 percent of PBS’ annual revenue and about 1 percent of NPR’s budget every year.
Well, kids, the President says you have to scale back holiday gifts, and he doesn’t want you to access Blue’s Clues. Work it out, Wombat, Milo, and Carl the Collector. Lawrence O’Donnell is now calling him Donny Two Dolls. Martine Powers–writing for the Washington Post–has this to say. “Is Trump waging a war on dolls? The president’s call for American children to own fewer dolls sounded to some like an implicit rebuke of U.S. consumerism. It’s not his usual message.”
Call it the Great Barbie Belt-Tightening — as if that were even possible with her waistline.
President Donald Trump and his deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, might have a new target in their trade war crosshairs: dolls.
Or, more specifically, excessive numbers of dolls. Or, dolls that are not of the superior manufacturing quality befitting America’s children.
On Wednesday, Trump predicted during a Cabinet meeting that higher prices caused by tariffs will mean “children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls.” The next morning, Miller doubled down in a White House briefing, suggesting that American parents agree that fewer dolls would be better.
People of all ideological stripes, from liberals to conservatives to the late Pope Francis, have cautioned against American overconsumption — and suggested that the world’s richest nation should make do with less. But Trump has never come close to espousing such a philosophy, not even in his messaging around his tariff policies, which threaten to raise prices on myriad consumer products, including dolls. In his second term, the president has decorated the Oval Office with gilded accents — and has promised repeatedly, as he did Tuesday at a political rally in Warren, Michigan, to “make America wealthy again.”
History shows that there is great political peril in asking Americans to do more with less. Just ask Jimmy Carter, the late president whom Republicans have pilloried for nearly 50 years for scolding the country to make sacrifices during the energy crisis of the late 1970s.
Plus, there are few more uniquely American icons than toy dolls. Barbie was the runaway bestseller for decades before it became a blockbuster movie in 2023. One of the most popular brands of dolls is literally called American Girl. And among the best-selling dolls are action figures marketed to boys, such as the U.S.-military-inspired G.I. Joe.
Some Democrats have suggested that Trump’s comments are an act of political self-sabotage — a bridge too far for American consumers, who don’t want to be told by a rich politician that their children should expect a smaller-than-usual stack of toys on Christmas morning.
So, you intrepid reporter wants to know if Yam Tit’s has just started an official war on Christmas? This surely looks like it. Good thing Sky Dancing Blog doesn’t rely on any federal or state funding.
If all that wasn’t depressing enough, AXIOS’ Mark Caputo has a mood-killer headline up today. “Scoop: Stephen Miller emerges as top contender for Trump’s next national security adviser.” Will one single Republican in Congress say hell, no?
Why it matters: Miller — the deputy chief of staff and the brain behind Trump’s controversial immigration crackdown — is one of the president’s longest-serving and most-trusted aides.
- Miller’s name surfaced shortly after Trump removed Mike Waltz as national security adviser on Thursday and nominated Waltz to become the next United Nations ambassador.
- Secretary of State Marco Rubio is temporarily taking over Waltz’s responsibilities, but sources familiar with his thinking say he’s busy enough running the State Department.
Zoom in: Miller already is the administration’s Homeland Security adviser, and is an aggressive defender of the administration’s legal push for immediate deportations of unauthorized immigrants without court hearings.
- One White House source told Axios via text that Miller has made the Homeland Security Council run “like clockwork,” and that it’s “infinitely more effective than the NSC [National Security Council] with a tiny fraction” of the staff.
Zoom out: Trump has a penchant for putting his faith in a small number of advisers and piling responsibilities on their plate, so insiders say it wouldn’t be unusual for Miller hold multiple titles, just as Rubio does.
- “Marco and Stephen have worked really closely on immigration and it might be a perfect match,” said another White House source.
- “Given how well he’s worked with Marco, many see him as the perfect person to restore the role of the NSA to a staff-level policy role that reports to the chief of staff, instead of some inflated Cabinet position,” said another insider.
- A fourth source said Miller signaled interest in the job Thursday, but Miller couldn’t be reached for comment to confirm.
- A fifth source said Miller might not want the job “if it takes him away from his true love: immigration policy.”
What’s next: Those who understand the president’s thinking say it’s unclear how long he wants to keep Rubio as national security adviser.
-
- But one of the administration sources said that “if Stephen wants the job, it’s hard to see why Trump wouldn’t say yes.”
Judges that have made decisions against Trump continue to be under threat of violence and death as are their families. This headline is from Reuters. “These judges ruled against Trump. Then their families came under attack. As federal judges rule against the Trump administration in dozens of politically charged cases, the families of at least 11 of the jurists have been targeted with threats and harassment. The intimidation campaign has strained judges and their relatives – and legal scholars fear it could have a chilling effect on the judiciary. Multiple reporters have contributed to this very jarring story.
When U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ruled in April that Trump administration officials could face criminal contempt charges for deporting migrants in defiance of a court order, the blowback was When Elon Musk shared an online post that mischaracterized the work of Judge Boasberg’s daughter, some of his followers responded on X with calls “to lock her up.”
The president’s supporters unleashed a wave of threats and menacing posts. And they didn’t just target the judge. Some attacked Boasberg’s brother. Others blasted his daughter. Some demanded the family’s arrest – or execution.v
U.S. District Judge John McConnell’s family endured similar threats after he ruled that President Donald Trump overstepped his authority in freezing grants for education and other services. Far-right provocateur Laura Loomer tweeted a photo of the judge’s daughter, who had worked at the U.S. Education Department as a policy advisor, and accused McConnell of protecting her paycheck. Billionaire Elon Musk amplified the post to his 219 million X followers. Neither mentioned the daughter had left her job before Trump’s inauguration.
When Elon Musk shared an online post that mischaracterized the work of Judge Boasberg’s daughter, some of his followers responded on X with calls “to lock her up.”
Loomer continued her attacks with nine more posts in the ensuing days – and more than 600 calls and emails flooded McConnell’s Rhode Island courthouse, including death threats and menacing messages taunting his family, according to a court clerk and another person familiar with the communications.
Trying to fly anywhere? Are you willing to take this hits to your time and the risk to your safety?
Jennifer Bowers Bahney–writing for Raw Story— has the scary details. “
MSNBC correspondent Tom Costello claimed Friday that an air traffic controller who “handles airspace” at the Newark, NJ, airport gave him some “rather concerning and startling information” about public safety.
“He said, It is not safe. ‘It is not a safe situation right now for the flying public,” Costello said. “Really an incredible statement, unsolicited. He just said that to me, and separately, ‘Don’t fly into Newark. Avoid Newark at all costs.”
Costello said that there were about two-hour delays for planes coming into Newark on Friday following a week of major delays due to staffing issues.
“We’ve got a lot of problems going on,” Costello said, including “equipment failures.”
“They have lost both radios and radars this week,” Costellos said. “And because of the stress, some controllers have walked off the job.”
Newark Liberty Airport posted a statement to X advising, “Flights at @EWRairport continue to be disrupted due to @FAA staffing shortages, with delays and cancellations expected to continue throughout the day.”
Costello said that Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was touring the Newark facility, along with the president of the air traffic controllers union, “trying to reassure the public and reassure controllers that they’re working on this.”
“But,” Costello added, “this is not going to be an easy fix by any means.”
CNN reports that “Trump says the government will revoke Harvard’s tax-exempt status.”
President Donald Trump says Harvard University will be stripped of its tax-exempt status, redoubling an extraordinary threat amid a broader chess match over free speech, political ideology and federal funding at the Ivy League school and across American academia.
“We are going to be taking away Harvard’s Tax Exempt Status. It’s what they deserve!” Trump posted Friday morning on Truth Social.
Trump floated a trial balloon April 15 for the notion of removing Harvard’s tax-exempt status, and the Internal Revenue Service had been making plans to carry out the idea.
“There is no legal basis to rescind Harvard’s tax-exempt status,” a university spokesperson told CNN. “Such an unprecedented action would endanger our ability to carry out our educational mission.”
Money for federal taxes would have to be taken away from other priorities and “would result in diminished financial aid for students, abandonment of critical medical research programs, and lost opportunities for innovation,” the spokesperson said Friday.
US law specifically prohibits presidents from directing the IRS to investigate anyone. If it found Harvard’s tax-exempt status should be revoked, the agency would have to formally notify and give the school a chance to challenge the decision. The IRS did not immediately respond to CNN’s questions about how Trump’s announcement might be implemented.
Democratic Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts said Friday that Trump’s actions are an attempt to force Harvard to comply with his ideology and described the move as unconstitutional. He added the disruption caused by Trump’s threats has had a negative impact on life-saving research and people’s livelihoods.
The trouble is, if you give in just a little bit on a Mafia shake-down, they always return for more. “It’s not personal, Sonny. It’s strictly business.”
I’m not sure it was the pokes or the shocks this morning, but I seem to be floating back somewhere to the 70s where Nixon was making trouble for every one. That seems picayune now. I was planning to do some work around the garden and the backyard but for some reason, I just want to hug the furbabies, make so lunch, and find something distracting. I certainly hope you’re upcoming weekend will be joyful and peaceful. I’m wondering how much tea I’m going to have to stock up on.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Mostly Monday Reads: It’s the Policies Stupid!
Posted: April 28, 2025 Filed under: #FARTUS, #MAGAnomics, American Fascists, Broligarchy, Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, Constitutional Crises, kakistocracy, kleptocracy, MAGA Assholes, MAGA goes after the Rule of Law, MAGA Political Carnage | Tags: #Fartus #DeportUs, @johnbuss.bsky.social John Buss, All Apologies, Bombastic Rhetoric, FARTUS, Kash Patel, Pam Bondi weirdo, Pete Hegseth weirdo sexual assaulter, Verbal Bully Bombs, Yam Tits 100 days of oops 6 Comments
“Arresting development,” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
I don’t know about you, but these first 100 days of #FARTUS have taken a toll on me. So many bad policies in such a short time have me spinning and anxious. I can’t even plan my one-person, small-house, semi-retired life. I can’t even figure out what state and local governments, big and small businesses, and the courts have on their hands right now.
The assessment of these first 100 days, coming from polls and pundits, is stunningly bad. Bad to the point that any polling firm is considered to be a criminal organization by yam tits. I will start with this analysis in The Guardian by Steven Greenhouse. “Trump’s second term will be the worst presidential term ever. Tragically, the president’s second term is already more lawless and more authoritarian than any in US history.”
In his first 100 days back in office, Donald Trump has made a strong case that his second term will be by far the worst presidential term in US history. So many of his flood-the-zone actions have been head-spinning and stomach-turning. His administration seems to be powered by ignorance and incoherence, spleen and sycophancy. Both he and his right-hand man, Elon Musk, with their resentment-fueled desire to disrupt everything, seem intent on pulverizing the foundations of our government, our democracy, our alliances as well as any notions of truth. Tragically, Trump’s second term is already more lawless and more authoritarian than any in US history.
The worst and most dangerous part of Trump’s agenda is his war against our democracy and constitution – defying judges’ orders, deporting people without due process, suggesting he will run for a third term, calling to impeach judges who rule against him, pardoning hundreds of January 6 criminals, gutting federal agencies and firing thousands of federal employees in flagrant violation of the law, and banning books from military libraries. (One wonders: will book burning be next?) Underlining just how dangerous and lawless Trump is, he is talking publicly about disappearing US citizens to foreign countries where they could be locked in prison forever. For those who care about democracy and basic freedoms, this is Defcon 1 stuff.
From Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan to Joe Biden, every president since the second world war has worked hard to build alliances to promote peace and prosperity and deter aggression. But right out of the box, Trump 2.0 has rushed to blow up our alliances and cavalierly alienate our allies. Trump quickly rejected the US’s traditional foreign policy and ideals by warmly embracing Vladimir Putin, a brutal dictator, and turning against Ukraine and its noble fight against Putin’s aggression. Trump sounded like a rapacious 19th-century imperialist when he threatened to take over the Panama canal and, ditto, when he talked of using force to seize control of Greenland, which belongs to our longtime Nato ally, Denmark. Then there’s Trump’s astoundingly idiotic talk – and taunt – that Canada should be our 51st state. What a way to anger and alienate a nation that has long been the US’s best friend.
Then there is the disaster – or should we say clown show – of Trump’s on-again, off-again, on-again, who-knows-what’s-going-to-happen-tomorrow tariffs. His “liberation day” tariffs were put together by a clown-car crew, just three hours before he announced it, and Trump and company seemed to have zero idea that his hodgepodge of tariffs would send the world’s stock markets into a nervous breakdown. Trump’s team was stupid enough to think that China was too feeble to respond effectively to Trump’s trade war – treasury secretary Scott Bessent said China had “a losing hand” with just “a pair of twos”. Trump and his clown car failed to realize that China had the ability to retaliate in devastating ways – by clamping down on rare earth exports that American manufacturers and tech companies desperately need, and perhaps by selling off hundreds of billions of dollars in US bonds. Former treasury secretary Janet Yellen was appalled, saying: “This is the worst self-inflicted policy wound I’ve ever seen in my career inflicted on our economy.”
What really gets to me is his “bombastic rhetoric.” It’s like you’re either with the bully or being bullied. But what appalls me is his stewardship of the US and global Economy. He is completely detached from all we have learned about policy impacts from the 1930s. It was clear that as industrialization increased, the old mercantilism of the colonial days was fading fast. Industrialization created a different trade paradigm.
The switch from the Gold Standard created a different-looking financial economic system. The Information Age and the rise of advanced technology like robotics have changed us even more. We have complex, intertwined, mixed market economies. While the basics of market structure remain similar, the frictions within them have become much more complicated. You may check the academic research of Nobel Prize-winning Joseph E. Stiglitz for his legendary study on how the various quirks in producing specific goods and services can lead to fairly serious economic issues.
I don’t think anyone in the West Wing or the Agencies knows how economic policy works. For that matter, Trump doesn’t even know how many countries there are in the world since he keeps mentioning 200 trade deals when there are only 195. Maybe the Penguin islands are more autonomous than we know?
In fact, the communication style of the entire MAGA movement makes it an impossible environment for governing. This is how Amanda Marcotte–writing for Salon— puts it. “MAGA loves a tantrum: How public meltdowns became the preferred method of GOP communication. Why Nancy Mace, Pete Hegseth, and Stephen Miller keep throwing fits on camera.”
If there were an Oscar for the category “hard to watch,” I’d have to nominate the video of Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., barking expletives at a constituent after he asked her if she would have a town hall soon. It’s produced in a beauty supply store instead of a movie studio, but in a brief minute and 42 seconds, the video finds its place in the canon of horror films shot from the villain’s perspective. The camera focuses entirely on the story’s hero, a man in a polo and shorts holding a bottle of what appears to be face cleanser, as he holds his own against his congressional representative getting increasingly shrill as she yells invective at him. Even though he said nothing about gay marriage, she demands his gratitude for voting “for gay marriage twice.” When he gets annoyed at her reductive assumption, she calls him “crazy” and “absolutely f—king crazy,” and repeatedly says “f—k you” to him.
In the eyes of normal people, Mace, as her interlocutor said when he fled from this encounter, is a “disgrace.” Most adults who act like Mace in public immediately wish to disappear off the face of the earth in shame. But not our Nancy! No, she’s the one who posted this video online, proud of her emotional incontinence. She even offered a homophobic “gay panic” defense, by describing the man as “wearing daisy dukes, at a makeup store.” (Sorry, Miss Nancy, they aren’t daisy dukes until we see cheeks.) To people outside the MAGA bubble, it’s a baffling choice. She’s not even a fun villain. There’s none of the sleek appeal of Loki from the “Avengers” franchise or camp glee of Ursula from “The Little Mermaid.” Mace is serving pure toddler here. She likely wished to throw herself to the floor and start pounding it, but doing so would have meant dropping her iPhone.
Mace isn’t wrong, however, to think that what most adults find embarrassing, the MAGA base will eat right up. The public meltdown, in which you declare yourself the world’s greatest victim, is the preferred GOP method of political communication these days. Despite this effort, Mace didn’t even come close to nabbing last week’s gold star for the most histronic MAGA performance. She was outdone by Stephen Miller, whose usual register on TV is “verge of a nervous breakdown,” but got so shrill on Fox News Tuesday that Lauren Tousignant at Jezebel worried she’d soon have to “look at Stephen Miller’s face as he pops a dozen blood vessels as his brain explodes.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth turned in two performances that would cause Al Pacino to tell him to settle down. While carping about “the fake news media” during the White House Easter egg roll, Hegseth’s whining got so pitched his voice started to crack, while his children stood behind him, embarrassed at the spectacle.
Despite his own family’s discomfort with his antics, Hegseth kept up the scenery-chewing, bellowing about the all-powerful, forever-mysterious “they” have “come after me from day one.” (“They,” in this case, means close friends and advisors who got pushed out after beginning to question Hegseth’s fitness for the job.)
All this yelling and bellyaching serves a pragmatic purpose: to distract from how what they’re saying makes no sense. Miller’s claim that the six Republican judges on the Supreme Court — three appointed by Trump — are “communist” wouldn’t withstand even a moment’s thought at a normal volume. Because he’s delivering his commentary at “front row at Led Zepplin” levels, the brain can’t even process how preposterous the lie is. Mace’s routine showed this working in a literal way. Her target runs away, because trying to talk to someone behaving like her is like trying to converse with a wildfire.
It’s part of the overall too-muchness that is the signature of the MAGA aesthetic, which goes right back to Trump’s gold-plated tastelessness. We see it in the infamous “Mar-a-Lago” face, which uses plastic surgery and spackled-on make-up to turn women into terrifyingly exaggerated caricatures of femininity. Or the love of roided-out male bodies, which try to recreate the impossibly huge muscles of comic books on human bodies. It’s a maximalist aesthetic, minus all the playfulness of Las Vegas casinos or “RuPaul’s Drag Race.” There’s a grim vibe to the undertaking, as if they’re trying to pound your head into the ground with the excess.
“Fake Melania mystery solved. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.” John Buss, @repeat1968
Ashley Parker and Michael Scherer–writing for The Atlantic—dialed up Trump on his private phone one day in late March. He spoke to them even though he had described them both heinously.
The week our interview was supposed to occur, Trump posted a vituperative message on Truth Social, attacking us by name. “Ashley Parker is not capable of doing a fair and unbiased interview. She is a Radical Left Lunatic, and has been as terrible as is possible for as long as I have known her,” he wrote. “To this date, she doesn’t even know that I won the Presidency THREE times.” (That last sentence is true—Ashley Parker does not know that Trump won the presidency three times.) “Likewise, Michael Scherer has never written a fair story about me, only negative, and virtually always LIES.”
Yes, it was full-on #FARTUS Bully Verbal Bombing them publicly. They actually just called him later. He picked up. This article is the result
Despite his attacks on us a few days earlier, the president, evidently feeling buoyed by a week of successes, was eager to talk about his accomplishments. As we spoke, the sounds of another conversation, perhaps from a television, hummed in the background.
The president seemed exhilarated by everything he had managed to do in the first two months of his second term: He had begun a purge of diversity efforts from the federal government; granted clemency to nearly 1,600 supporters who had participated in the invasion of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, including those caught beating police officers on camera; and signed 98 executive orders and counting (26 of them on his first day in office). He had fired independent regulators; gutted entire agencies; laid off great swaths of the federal workforce; and invoked 18th-century wartime powers to use against a criminal gang from Venezuela. He had adjusted tariffs like a DJ spinning knobs in the booth, upsetting the rhythms of global trade and inducing vertigo in the financial markets. He had raged at the leader of Ukraine, a democratic ally repelling an imperialist invasion, for not being “thankful”—and praised the leader of the invading country, Russia, as “very smart,” reversing in an instant 80 years of U.S. foreign-policy doctrine, and prompting the countries of NATO to prepare for their own defense, without the protective umbrella of American power, for the first time since 1945.
…
We asked Trump why he thought the billionaire class was prostrating itself before him.
“It’s just a higher level of respect. I don’t know,” Trump said. “Maybe they didn’t know me at the beginning, and they know me now.”
“I mean, you saw yesterday with the law firm,” he said. He was referring to Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, one of the nation’s most prestigious firms, whose leader had come to the Oval Office days earlier to beg for relief from an executive order that could have crippled its business. Trump had issued the order at least partially because a former partner at the firm had in 2021 gone to work for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, where he was part of an investigation of the Trump Organization’s business practices. Also that week, an Ivy League institution, threatened with the cancellation of $400 million in federal funding, had agreed to overhaul its Middle Eastern–studies programs at the Trump administration’s request, while also acceding to other significant demands. “You saw yesterday with Columbia University. What do you think of the law firm? Were you shocked at that?” Trump asked us.
Yes—all of it was shocking, much of it without precedent. Legal scholars were drawing comparisons to Franklin D. Roosevelt and the early stages of the New Deal, when Congress had allowed FDR to demolish norms and greatly expand the powers of the presidency.
As ever, Trump was on the hunt for a deal. If he liked the story we wrote, he said, he might even speak with us again.
“Tell the people at The Atlantic, if they’d write good stories and truthful stories, the magazine would be hot,” he said. Perhaps the magazine can risk forgoing hotness, he suggested, because it is owned by Laurene Powell Jobs, which buffers it, he implied, from commercial imperatives. But that doesn’t guarantee anything, he warned. “You know at some point, they give up,” he said, referring to media owners generally and—we suspected—Bezos specifically. “At some point they say, No más, no más.” He laughed quietly.
Media owners weren’t the only ones on his mind. He also seemed to be referring to law firms, universities, broadcast networks, tech titans, artists, research scientists, military commanders, civil servants, moderate Republicans—all the people and institutions he expected to eventually, inevitably, submit to his will.
We asked the president if his second term felt different from his first. He said it did. “The first time, I had two things to do—run the country and survive; I had all these crooked guys,” he said. “And the second time, I run the country and the world.”
More like the country and the world run from him. I have to admit. I admire the Chinese method of trolling him. It’s funny and effective. Philip Bump at the Washington Post analyzes this self-defeating policy of the second term. “The bubble that created Trump is the reason he’s stumbling. The White House is now a bubble where loyalty, not ability, defines success.”
Consider Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
No one should be surprised that Hegseth is flailing in his new role, one of the most arduous and complicated in the U.S. government, if not the world. When Donald Trump proposed that Hegseth run the agency, the response was broadly unified: Hegseth lacked the experience needed to do the job effectively. You could debate the other controversies surrounding his bid for the role ad nauseam, but there was no way to reasonably argue that the Fox News talk-show host was prepared to run the Pentagon.
Hegseth was confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate anyway because Trump and a universe of voices who support him insisted Hegseth was the best choice for the job — because he was Trump’s choice for the job. Republican senators who undoubtedly knew better went along, betting that things wouldn’t get so bad under Hegseth that it was worth stirring up the fury of that pro-Trump bubble.
It’s the same bet that prominent Republicans have been making on Trump himself since 2015. Now, as Trump too is flailing — polling and the data make clear that he is — it’s trivial to identify that insular chorus of cheerleaders and cynics as a root cause.
The president owes his political career to that same bubble. Over the past few decades, the fringe right and then Republicans more broadly embraced discussions of the world that were mostly devoid of nuance: left bad, right good. The internet allowed for the emergence of bespoke “news” organizations (and, later, social media accounts) catering to conspiratorial partisan rhetoric — an alternative to traditional reporting unhampered by criticism or unpopular truths.
Trump secured the 2016 Republican nomination not because he was the best spokesperson for the Republican Party but because he echoed the refrains of that surreal universe of information. When you hear his supporters praise his straightforwardness, this is what they are referring to: He says the false things with which they agree.
We’re about to say goodbye to Musk. Hopefully, Hegseth will be a quick second out. But what comes next? Certainly, nothing better. Even Rubio seems to have caught the munificently Kiss Ass Fever. The speed of light is the rate at which he contradicts the old Little Marco makes me wonder if he a Musk AI robot and the ex-Senator is up in space some where. Here’s the latest example from The Independent. “Marco Rubio claims Canada should be 51st state as PM told Trump they ‘couldn’t survive’ without U.S. Rubio says State Department has not taken action on the president’s push to annex Canada and Greenland.”
America’s top diplomat was questioned on Sunday about Donald Trump’s reasoning for repeatedly calling for Canada to join the United States as the 51st state.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio appeared on NBC’s Meet the Presson Sunday where moderator Kristen Welker asked him if the administration was actually taking any steps to make Trump’s vision a reality.
The president has made his opinion clear: he wants Canada to join the United States and suggested his administration would also acquire the Danish-held territory Greenland by any means.
The secretary of state gave his own translation of the president’s remarks on the matter:
“What the president has said, and he has said this repeatedly, is he was told by the previous prime minister that Canada could not survive without unfair trade with the United States, at which point he asked, ‘Well, if you can’t survive as a nation without treating us unfairly in trade, then you should become a state.’ That’s what he said.”
Rubio told Welker that the administration had taken no action to realize this particular strain of Trump’s bluster, which has alarmed U.S. allies.
There’s a U.S. military base on Greenland, and the president has cited the self-governing nation’s geographical importance as a reasoning for his expansionist goal. Trump has made the comments on numerous occasions, including in conversations with his Canadian counterparts.
Trump himself made his goals of northward expansion apparent during his address to Congress in February.
“We need Greenland for national security and even international security. And we’re working with everybody involved to try and get it,” Trump said at the time. “And I think we’re going to get it one way or the other. We’re going to get it.”
But he was making similar remarks publicly as early as December 2024.
“No one can answer why we subsidize Canada to the tune of over $100,000,000 a year? Makes no sense!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Many Canadians want Canada to become the 51st State.”
“They would save massively on taxes and military protection. I think it is a great idea,” added Trump.
So tell me if you ever thought you’d see the day that an American Secretary of State believes annexing your best allies, the ones you’ve fought beside in Wars, and stood by you when you were attacked, would say that sort of thing? Meanwhile, the entire Deportation debacle continues on its cruel and ugly path. This is from Politico. “Homan presses undocumented immigrants to self-deport, threatening prosecution. The push comes as the monthly deportation numbers have lagged behind the Biden administration’s.” Homan is now the antonym for Human. Deportation in this country does not just fall on the undocumented. It impacts everyone.
White House border czar Tom Homan on Monday warned undocumented immigrants that they “cannot hide” and will be prosecuted in they remain in the U.S. illegally — the latest effort from the Trump administration to push self-deportation.
“Get your affairs in order. If you’re in the country illegally, work with ICE, go to CBP One Home app, and leave on your own,” Homan said from the White House press briefing room.
Homan said every immigrant in the U.S. illegally must register with the federal government and carry documentation. And those who fail to register with the Department of Homeland Security or neglect to update any new address will have those actions treated as criminal offenses “starting today.” He also warned other undocumented immigrants that if they have a final order to leave the country but remain anyway, the Trump administration will “aggressively prosecute” and issue daily monetary fines of up to $998.
The border czar’s briefing room appearance comes as the Trump administration marks its 100th day in office this week, with Homan touting the administration’s progress on border security. He pointed to a significant drop in illegal border crossings, which have plunged since Trump took office to the lowest level in decades.
Homan said Monday that the administration has deported 139,000 migrants since Jan. 20 as Trump officials have struggled to ramp up removal numbers. This figure includes people deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Protection and the Coast Guard, who would have been encountered at or before they reached the border, according to a DHS official. The Trump administration’s monthly deportation numbers have lagged behind the Biden administration’s, according to data obtained by NBC News.
The bluster is abusive, but the actions are unconstitutional, illegal, and inhumane. The New York Times reports on the weekend’s 60 Minutes sign-off. Every voice raised against the dismantling of US democracy is a voice that counts! “‘60 Minutes’ Chastises Its Corporate Parent in Unusual On-Air Rebuke. The show’s top producer abruptly said last week he was quitting. “Paramount began to supervise our content in new ways,” the correspondent Scott Pelley told viewers.”
In an extraordinary on-air rebuke, one of the top journalists at “60 Minutes” directly criticized the program’s parent company in the final moments of its Sunday night CBS telecast, its first episode since the program’s executive producer, Bill Owens, announced his intention to resign.
“Paramount began to supervise our content in new ways,” the correspondent, Scott Pelley, told viewers. “None of our stories has been blocked, but Bill felt he lost the independence that honest journalism requires.”
A spokesman for Paramount had no immediate comment, and has previously declined to comment on Mr. Owens’s departure.
Mr. Owens stunned the show’s staff on Tuesday when he said he would leave the highest-rated program in television news over disagreements with Paramount, CBS’s corporate parent, saying, “It’s clear the company is done with me.”
Mr. Owens’s comments were widely reported in the press last week. The show’s decision to repeat those grievances on-air may have exposed viewers to the serious tensions between “60 Minutes” and its corporate overseers for the first time.
Shari Redstone, the controlling shareholder of Paramount, has been intent on securing approval from the Trump administration for a multibillion-dollar sale of her media company to a studio run by the son of Larry Ellison, the tech billionaire.
President Trump sued CBS last year, claiming $10 billion in damages, in a case stemming from a “60 Minutes” interview with the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, that Mr. Trump said was deceptively edited. Ms. Redstone has expressed her desire to settle Mr. Trump’s lawsuit, although legal experts have called the case far-fetched.
So that’s it for me today. I’m just trying to keep my head above water and my thoughts on calm, clear awareness. I hope you’re finding a way to cope with this mess. I try to tune out as much as possible, but my job is to teach folks about financial and economic policies, so I can only shut out so much. A friend of mine posted a picture of American NAZIs partying in the French Quarter and getting drinks from the Dungeon. The tattoos and the t-shirts said it all. What’s most disturbing about all of this is these folks are out of their hidey holes, and they don’t care who sees them and what they say. I’ll be out on Wednesday at a protest in front of the ICE offices here in the Central Business District. I need to do something, even just being with like-minded people.
Also, we’re finding some older Dem Pols stepping down to make way for new blood. “Rep. Gerry Connolly, the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, will step down from his leadership post on the panel and not run for reelection.” Let’s try to hope.
What’s on your Reading and Blogging list today?
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
mablue2
Mama Lopez
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
Recent Comments