Re: The 47th POTUS - Donald J. Trump

[doug rr]

[Bi_3]

So, you’re saying we hold all the cards?

Asked if Ireland was also taking advantage of the US, he said: "Of course they are. I have great respect for Ireland, for what they did and they should have done just what they did. But the United States shouldn't have let that happen. We had stupid leaders, we had leaders who didn't have a clue.

"All of a sudden Ireland has our pharmaceutical companies, this beautiful island of five million people has got the entire US pharmaceutical industry in its grasps."

He went on to say he would slap a 200% tariff on all the pharmaceuticals but rambled off on that point. Think he might understand who would end up having to pay for that and it wouldn’t be Ireland or big pharmaceutical companies here.


"Mr Trump also said Apple had been "treated very badly", referring to an EU court ordering the company to pay back taxes in Ireland.

Mr Martin interjected to say "we fought with them" on the EU case.

"It's the European Union, isn't it? The European Union is going after our companies," Mr Trump said when asked if Apple should relocate from Dublin back to the US."

Apple have been in Ireland since 1980. Through thick and thin. It’s unlikely they’re going anywhere now. But the EU laying the smack down and making them pay the full tax owed ya never know.

Tax arbitrage via Ireland has been very beneficial for US companies. It would be unwise to mess with that and I'm sure Trump's advisors will make it clear now is not the right time to demand changes.

[spike]

Our PM is in the Oval doing a presser with Trump at the moment.

He’s fairly unscathed thus far.

He'll be lucky to get out of there alive. If there is any country in the EU that is impacting USGOV revenue, it's Ireland.

Trump’s antics are mostly about power, not economics, so I doubt he’ll give Ireland a hard time.

[spike]

Burt is right guys, even if McP is right too. "Bothering Elon" is not a win, nor should it be a goal, nor should it inform anyone's thinking about what's happening. Being a little butthurt means nothing when you are the richest man in the world, enjoy preferred access to the levers that govern our public markets, and exclusive access to the levers that operate the inner-workings of the government engine.

Elon is not losing, at all. He is actually crushing it, and by "it" I mean breaking things to line his own pockets. A $100B loss last week will likely be a $200B gain in a year when he scoops up all the preferred stocks, and destroys all the regulations, to drive his companies to lucrative government contracts and private market access.

I take Elon's apparent discomfort in that interview to be more around him asking himself "Is this actually fun? Making everyone hate me because I broke everything?" Like, he probably went into this thinking it would be fun, but is now realizing that actually building things, and sending rockets to space, is actually way more fun. Now he has to spend all day with a bunch of political wonks and weird evangelicals, while the quality of pu**y he will get is arguably way worse. But I'm sure he'll sleep just fine, because when you have $330B dollars, it's still probably pretty easy to fall asleep.

Hahaha, this is my new favorite theoretical ending to this circus. Elon just gets bored one day and washes his hands of it all.

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[spike]

Burt is right guys, even if McP is right too. "Bothering Elon" is not a win, nor should it be a goal, nor should it inform anyone's thinking about what's happening. Being a little butthurt means nothing when you are the richest man in the world, enjoy preferred access to the levers that govern our public markets, and exclusive access to the levers that operate the inner-workings of the government engine.

Elon is not losing, at all. He is actually crushing it, and by "it" I mean breaking things to line his own pockets. A $100B loss last week will likely be a $200B gain in a year when he scoops up all the preferred stocks, and destroys all the regulations, to drive his companies to lucrative government contracts and private market access.

I take Elon's apparent discomfort in that interview to be more around him asking himself "Is this actually fun? Making everyone hate me because I broke everything?" Like, he probably went into this thinking it would be fun, but is now realizing that actually building things, and sending rockets to space, is actually way more fun. Now he has to spend all day with a bunch of political wonks and weird evangelicals, while the quality of pu**y he will get is arguably way worse. But I'm sure he'll sleep just fine, because when you have $330B dollars, it's still probably pretty easy to fall asleep.

Hahaha, this is my new favorite theoretical ending to this circus. Elon just gets bored one day and washes his hands of it all.

I genuinely suspect that he'll keep breaking things like a toddler playing with Legos, until finally his accountants say "Sir, we've figured it out. Press here, here, and HERE, and you'll earn $400B" and he'll just say "Ok, great, I'm done."

Maybe this is just the way he plans to fund his Mars program. If the government won’t fund it, I’ll get their cash another way.

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[McParadigm]

i love how Democrats are fighting to keep the government open, ostensibly so they can see previously appropriated funds get deployed through various programs.

LOL.

Bunch of pussies.

Pathetic organization, as always.

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[Higgs]

Australia got hit with 25% tariffs on steel yesterday as well. No big surprise, our politicians haven't exactly enamored themselves to Trump as of late.

But what gets me is that Australia actually is one of the few countries in the world with a trade deficit with the US, so we are already importing more from you guys than we sell to you. But more interestingly our PM has straight up said there will be no retaliatory tariffs from us. A win on all sides for Trump.

Apparently some think we should have gone nuclear though. Turns out we get most of our planes from Boeing in the states. Ongoing future orders lined up for years. If we'd come out and said "OK, thanks Donnie. We'll cop your tariffs but are now cancelling all our orders with Boeing and are going to get our planes from Airbus in France from now on instead". That would have been upwards of $25 Billion in cancelled orders.

But alas no, we had to be the adults in the room for once. Missed opportunity I say.

[dimejinky99]

Australia got hit with 25% tariffs on steel yesterday as well. No big surprise, our politicians haven't exactly enamored themselves to Trump as of late.

But what gets me is that Australia actually is one of the few countries in the world with a trade deficit with the US, so we are already importing more from you guys than we sell to you. But more interestingly our PM has straight up said there will be no retaliatory tariffs from us. A win on all sides for Trump.

Apparently some think we should have gone nuclear though. Turns out we get most of our planes from Boeing in the states. Ongoing future orders lined up for years. If we'd come out and said "OK, thanks Donnie. We'll cop your tariffs but are now cancelling all our orders with Boeing and are going to get our planes from Airbus in France from now on instead". That would have been upwards of $25 Billion in cancelled orders.

But alas no, we had to be the adults in the room for once. Missed opportunity I say.

We have a €50 billion trade surplus with the US. Donald isn’t happy about that.
Despite our PM gargling his balls and licking Donald’s boots yesterday.
Only way to deal with him is to plamas him and blow smoke up his ass. Fighting with him or even correcting him doesn’t end well for whoever does it.
The end result is probably the same.
Aus Gov really should’ve went in hard here and studs up. I wish we would too. We’ve him and US pharma here over a barrell so don’t have to in a way. Easier to placate him.

Let’s reconvene in a year and see how it’s all gone and where we are.

[spike]

But alas no, we had to be the adults in the room for once. Missed opportunity I say.

You are now a card carrying member of the DNC!

[tommy]

But alas no, we had to be the adults in the room for once. Missed opportunity I say.

You are now a card carrying member of the DNC!

Did you just call Higgs a spineless loser?

[Bi_3]

But alas no, we had to be the adults in the room for once. Missed opportunity I say.

You are now a card carrying member of the DNC!

Did you just call Higgs a spineless loser?

Counterpoint:

[dimejinky99]

Oh Donald. If it isn’t from the Champagne region in actual France, it’s just sparkling MAGA koolaid

[dimejinky99]

[tragabigzanda]

FUCK ICE

[BurtReynolds]

Homan tried to use the "you can't yell fire in a crowded theatre" bullshit the other day. I wish I could say I'm shocked by how many morons in government don't understand free speech, but nothing shocks me any more.

[Peeps]

Homan tried to use the "you can't yell fire in a crowded theatre" bullshit the other day. I wish I could say I'm shocked by how many morons in government don't understand free speech, but nothing shocks me any more.

when you say bullshit do you mean he likens student protests as yelling fire in a crowded theater?

[BurtReynolds]

Homan tried to use the "you can't yell fire in a crowded theatre" bullshit the other day. I wish I could say I'm shocked by how many morons in government don't understand free speech, but nothing shocks me any more.

when you say bullshit do you mean he likens student protests as yelling fire in a crowded theater?

Yes, but also the argument itself is bullshit (you can in all but the most specific and narrow cases), was originally used to jail people resisting the draft, and the person who originally made it later recanted himself.