Andy1

I’m still waiting for a rational explanation for the need for the Trump tariff taxes. No respected economist endorses the Trump tax as a cure for the American economy. Hell, I don’t even know what the problem is aside from some inflation in America which has also happened in every other developed nation. If there was any sound economic reasoning for the tariffs, any rational sane president would explain to the country why tariffs are necessary and why America will benefit from them. They would be implemented in a planned manner to minimize financial losses to American businesses. There would also be a “Buy Made in America” PR campaign to raise support for the policy. Instead, Trump lies to Americans that other nations will be paying the tax money to America, like his “Mexico will pay for the wall” fantasy. There is no logic to how they are implemented. They are On, Off, On again, Off, maybe On again in the future…He gives no or very little advance notice to the American businesses affected. Clearly he is not doing this in a way to help businesses adapt or minimize the negative financial impact to our economy. So why the hell is he doing it? No one in the government can give a rational answer yet the Republican Party seems all for it since no one objects. Ostensibly, the administration claims the tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada are necessary until those evil countries stop the illegal fentanyl and migrants crossing the north and south borders. Illegal immigration is down 94% from a year ago so that doesn’t make sense. Over 90% of the fentanyl enters the country through legal border crossings with the vast majority being carried by American citizens. Why should all Americans pay thousands $ more each year to live because some stupid people choose to do drugs? Even if the most gullible person believes the immigrant/drugs BS, it doesn’t explain why tariffs are needed on products coming from other countries. Here is the bogus White House fact sheet explaining why tariffs are needed: https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/02/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-imposes-tariffs-on-imports-from-canada-mexico-and-china/ There is no reason on this document to rebuild American manufacturing industry. There are no government incentives for businesses to build manufacturing plants in America. So it’s not about that. So why the hell is he doing it? Here are the options I’ve got so far: 1. This point is from Frankish Reich: Tank the economy, make a great recession and take the opportunity to use the bogus Emergency powers. I guess this theory would be to cause maximum stress and pain for Americans, divide the nation more than ever, get people marching in the streets, then he can claim the powers he so desires. Plausible. 2. Trump is a demented psychopath who enjoys using his power to inflict pain on others. He wants and gets off on other billionaires coming to him to beg for tariff relief for their business. He likes having the leaders of other nations calling him, asking for a policy change. His ego is happy when he sees others in pain. 3. He is trying to break and poison our relationships with our traditional trading partners and allies. His expansionist plan to take Canada and Greenland are consistent with this plan. Like WTF, who can be angry with Canada? He is preparing to leave NATO. America vs the world! America alone, or with our great ally Russia is best. These are all the desires of daddy Putin whom he is always trying to please. 4. Tariffs are a source of entertainment for him and his feeble brain. He loves the publicity and attention he gets from it all. He just wants to see what happens if he goes all in on tariffs, just because he can. Basically like a mad experiment on the economy. 5. Tariffs are a means he can use to extort millions of $$ from businesses owners for his personal enrichment. Corruption to the max. 6. He wants Americans to pay more to live so he can pay for his future tax cut for his billionaire friends. This is often speculated but I don’t think Trump cares about paying for anything. He never has cared about paying his bills. 7. The MAGA dream: Tariffs are bargaining chips the master deal maker will use to create a better world than any of us can imagine. 8. #s 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5 above. That’s all I got. If you have a rational reason, voice it.

While that may be the game, it was an amateur F up. Re the second part, I can understand that but Trump ain’t the answer. I too hope the Dems move to a more centrist position on many social issues. A third party would be great but doesn’t seem viable the way our government is run.

Typical MAGA response. For anyone in the intelligence community, this is a huge deal. Russia, Iran and China now know that our military and intelligence officials communicate on Signal. They were probably using personal phones. They have their personal contacts lists. They can use those contacts to hack administration officials phones. They know the lack of competence of these people. The cyber division of their militaries is working overtime now with this treasure trove of information. Our government has secure communication platforms to use. Trump officials are likely not using them because those communication channels are subject to records preservation laws. Instead, they obviously prefer Signal since the messages disappear, thus erasing a communication trail for accountability. They will continue to use Signal because of this. Our enemies now know this.

No one is buying the lies as they go down the coverup route. No one believes the texts weren’t classified info. The administration saying that DEI hires are unqualified fills the government with unqualified, unserious people who have very serious positions of responsibility. Does anyone trust these clowns vs the cyber capabilities of China, Russia, Iran and North Korea?

So Trump wants tariffs, increasing the cost that all dealers will have to pay, and then he wants them to eat that cost? Of course that cost will be passed on to the buying public! So what do all the republicans who say Biden was a communist have to say about this? In addition, the cost of used cars will rise since more people will be shopping used and there is a massive shortage of good used cars due to supply chain problems after Covid. But that’s not all. The cost to repair our cars will increase as the parts are more expensive due to the Trump tax and the cost to insure our cars will be higher since it will cost more to repair them. We will all get to pay more to Donald while he will give his billionaire buddies tax cuts.

So this is the guy Donald carefully chose to be his National Security Advisor. According to his own words, he can’t even manage the contacts list on his phone. He thinks the reporters number just mysteriously got sucked into the group. Either he is lying to avoid accountability or he is a complete idiot. He is supposed to be the guy Trump trusts most on national security. And how many actually qualified federal employees, including many veterans, did they fire claiming it was due to poor job performance? And now Americans will be paying the Trump tariff tax for everything. What an amateur clown show from top to bottom.

And now Trump is supporting Putin’s crackdown on Russian’s exercising free speech. Donald does anything to please his daddy.

He is using his freedom of speech and more power to him for that. It’s better than Russian athletes who may be told they can’t speak. More athletes should speak their positions on controversial topics like this. Let athletes speak and let the rest of us debate what they say.

There is no logic inside of Trumps brain. He likes tariffs because it’s a power move he can do to make himself feel powerful because he constantly needs to feed his feeble ego. America is not about old school manufacturing relying only upon ourselves for everything we use. America is about creating new technology, industries, stuff in every field that has never been done before. That’s why the best and brightest in the world have always wanted to do their thing here, until now. Funding for research at all levels has been cut. He wants to kill the CHIPS act for microchip manufacturing. Immigrants are not welcomed. Those innovators are now moving to other countries. Trump wants to take America back. The result will be our competitors moving ahead.

The clown crew needs some lessons. Note that no one is working on a cell phone texting emojis. Get your ass back to the office.

Let’s hope these troops are found safe and alive. It doesn’t look good right now. If they were killed by a foreign adversary, first line of inquiry will be if it was because of Hegseth’s lack of concern for security. What a mess.

When the message from the top down is that government is the enemy and everything that came before is bad, no one in national security cares about following proper protocol and procedures. Complete clown show. Meanwhile Trump is clueless and doesn’t even know what is going on.

It seems pretty likely that Iran, Russia, China, etc are well informed given the relaxed approach to information security the clown team has.

Unqualified.

I’m seeing a lot of Trump officials saying that “no classified information was discussed.” That’s a technical talk around because there is a specific process for the classification of government information. The information being discussed had not been classified … yet. Surely it is sensitive enough to be classified, otherwise, they could just release the text discussions. Information about targets, attack plans, CIA agents, etc. is always classified.