Look around, White House environs dug up, disciplined military in disarray, well planned trade & manufacturing auto sector in disarray, well integrated global economy in disarray. Post GFC safeguards dismantled. It seems that America elected a demolished in chief to systematically kill the country & make it a 3rd world backwater. Every action of Trump has taken America towards self destruction. Years of strategic positioning, accumulated goodwill & global leadership pawned for personal ego satisfaction & vanity. Truly sad. Even sadder is that this clown gets a baseline of 34% support even now!’
"a shooting war against Iran in which the vaunted U.S. military performed very poorly;"
A rare correction from this military family member: I would say U.S. military LEADERS performed poorly.
The troops did their jobs professionally and under duress (especially the rescue of the downed aviator, once they got the orange monkey out of the situation room). The leaders have been less than honest, and less than courageous in telling the CIC to go pound sand.
Thus we have our illustrious fascist felon being flattered and insulated from facts.
He does fire everyone who tells him the truth, though, so I also sympathize with those who want to reduce the harms done by sticking around instead of resigning.
It's a situation that hurts all of us, and the lion's share of the blame should fall upon the Secretary of Defense.
I agree with what you said with one exception. When you say "Thus we have our illustrious fascist felon being flattered and insulated from facts." it presumes that, if only trump had the facts, he would do the right thing. This seems to say that his people are worse than he is and destroying us without his permission. I don't believe that. I believe that he has all of the facts, and is pretending that he doesn't to protect himself from accountability. It's his MO.
I'll paraphrase: Trump wants the world to be simple, gets frustrated when the world is not simple, and lashes out with little thought for the consequences because he is so, so angry. Unfortunately, he accurately represents a lot of people, not a majority, but enough to be a challenge.
Sadly, it's this very anger that keeps the 33% or so of followers with him. They think he's feeling their anger even as he fleeces them again and again.
Fool them once, shame on him. Fool them 100X, shame on them. But his core MAGA base, the ones who'll never stop supporting him no matter the consequences, are too stupid or deluded to recognize that the've been fooled, even now.
I'd say that in many cases, they are too uneducated rather than stupid or deluded. They were never taught how to think critically. Remember, Trump loves the uneducated.
"Facts" are irrelevant to Trump. He wants what he wants and doesn't even consider letting "facts" get in his way-b/c in his world, they are whatever he wants them to be. We've won the Iran war (many times!), his polling numbers are the highest any president has ever had, at any time, every American wants a ballroom, and nasty Democrats messed up the reflecting pool. Ad nauseum. And I would add that this isn't dementia - it's his multiple and omnipresent personality disorders which don't let him believe anything other than whatever he wants to believe in that particular moment.
"And I would add that this isn't dementia..."; Felon47 has a new DSM-6 diagnosis consisting of Nero-Syndrome + Malignant Narcissistic Personality Disorder + Scorched-Earth Psychopathy + Oppositional Defiant Disorder + Borderline Personality Disorder + most elements of the Hubris Syndrome.
I assume you make these diagnoses cynically, since oppositional defiant disorder is only diagnosed in children (though he acts like a very young one often), and he is unlikely to have borderline personality disorder. The others don't exist in the DSM. But I get your main point that he manifests these traits. They are all related to an inadequate ego and superego, which displays as a big ego in public.
I agree with Light Warder's description, including Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Some aspects of Trump's behavior cannot be understood except by recognizing that he's never matured past about age 10 -- which is the only reasonable explanation for his babyish, playground-bully name-calling and petty, childish acts such as renaming Lake Ontario.
"Inadequate superego" means he lacks a conscience or inhibitions. He's never had a conscience or any sense of morality or ethics, and the few inhibitions he once had have fallen away as his mind has deteriorated. A neighbor of my mother's put her husband in a nursing home when he began "watering" the trees on the street. Will Trump's loss of inhibition lead to something far worse, such as ordering a nuclear strike on Iran -- or Canada or Greenland or another former ally that defies his will? No one will remove him from office, let alone put him in a nursing home, no matter how demented his behavior.
Trump is likely no longer in charge. His minders drug him up and wheel him out to the white house desk to say whatever... The actual decisions are made by a gang who are even more sinister!
Oh, while he's clearly very suggestible, I'd say he's also "in charge" since any and all of his handlers are likely to be out on their rears the second he feels that they've dissed him.
I don’t think he is currently capable of recognizing new information and modifying his emotions to achieve revised goals. Those require “executive function” - which, in his aging, increasingly demented brain no longer exists. He is an empty puppet, filled only with anger and fear, and easily manipulated. That doesn’t mean he should not be accountable but it does mean that his so-called thought processes and ability to control his emotions will continue to deteriorate. There is no way back.
Anger and fear -- and greed. The last still seems to be his primary motivation. But his anger and fear are more dangerous. We -- our nation and the world -- are in a very perilous situation, and no one capable of doing anything about it has the integrity or the cojones to act.
I agree. They did exactly what they were ordered. Hegseth & Trump are not rooted in reality & do not value expertise. Even the greatest military can fail due to leadership failure.
And military leaders who are constantly trying to figure out how to mitigate the damage tRump and Hegseth are causing daily are hamstrung and slowed. And the frontline people have performed as best they could under awful conditions which their C&C and SecDef chose to inflict on them.
A distinction needs to be made. Even a great military, which I believe our is from my experience of working along side of them, cannot perform miracles when our battles are not chosen wisely or the objectives are unrealistic.
Vietnam was a war we should never have engaged in. Kuwait was a resounding success on the battlefield. If we had been satisfied with eliminating bin Laden in Afghanistan and gone home that would have been a success, instead Bush2 took us to Iraq which was a poorly chosen battle. And now we are engaged in another poorly chosen battle with Iran; we don't even have defined objectives let alone realistic ones.
Trump had an objective: Haul in more money. And it's worked beautifully for him.
I refuse to believe that he got us into this "excursion" for any reason other than that Bibi told him he could take Iran's oil and get rich. He hasn't gotten the oil (which is why he can't stop the war), but he's making money hand over fist, so it's fine.
I concur. And also remember the words of Lindsey Graham regarding getting into the war: "and we're gonna make a ton of money..." What specifically was he referring to?
This may be the opportune moment to suggest halving the defense/offense budget and closing half of the 800 foreign American military bases. The pentagon has a $1 trillion annual budget much of which is waste, fraud and abuse, and they are incapable of dealing with a country the size of Iran. Ukraine with a much smaller defense department is fending off Russia. Their annual defense budget is about $100 billion. Surely, we could get by on $500 billion which would be still larger than any other country's defense budget. China's is about $277 billion.
The capability of striking Iran in ways that produce the desired outcome (if we only know what that is) seems to be in short supply. That should have been recognized before the first bomb was dropped. And that's the real problem.
On the other hand if the goal was to decimate Iran without regard to casualties both immediate and consequentially, I think the US is militarily capable of that. Leveling a half-dozen major cities and destroying the petro infrastructure would truly take Iran back to the early 1900's.
In the modern warfare era, that has come to be seen as not a good way to "win." It's beyond my pay grade to debate the wisdom of that. History shows us that there will be wars. We are already projecting armed conflicts into space. How a nation wishes to confront that reality and the resulting strategies employed is a huge driver of what will be history.
The bloated budget is to some extent due to wanting a military that can function as an empire serving colonial tool and can also deliver complete and utter defeats.
GWB was not in office when bin Laden was assassinated. That didn't happen until Obama was president. GWB was set on regime change in Iraq to finish the job his daddy started and to gain control of that nation's oil.
I didn't say Bush2 was in office when bin Laden was killed. Bush's expansion of the war effort in Iraq no doubt played a role in how long it took to get bin Laden. If resources were being used in Iraq, they weren't being deployed in Afghanistan. Who knows? Had those resources been concentrated in Afghanistan, it might look very different than it does today.
Liverpool - as so often with Trump, the weaknesses of our system of government are being exposed. We have civilian control of our military - elected, political leadership that makes the crucial decisions for where, when, & how force will be applied. That system wouldn't work well if top brass was prone to say, "nah, ain't doing that." But the system assumes a Commander in chief in possession of character, judgment, & good will. In many a mob story, the plot involves some poor pigeon being asked by the criminal to do a little thing, just a tiny favor, nothing really... so they go along. Then comes another request, an escalation. Then more. They've been corrupted, committed, in too deep to stop now. This is the world our C-in-C creates around himself. Because most of us don't live our lives this way, we may not realize when we're taking that 1st small step, thinking we're doing our best just to get along, giving a little benefit of the doubt, buying ouselves some time hoping a situation will improve, not realizing that we've stepped into quicksand that will pull us down
I think the analogy that Trump is a mob boss is off the mark. Mob bosses become bosses not only because they are ruthless, but they are also smart, likely the smartest of the crew. A dumb mob boss does not last very long. But Trump as a "brilliant, ruthless and successful" businessman was an image that Mark Burnett created for Trump - it was fiction that unfortunately too many people believed and still believe. Trump is just an actor who played a role and somehow parlayed it into 2 terms as President of the US.
Bry - not sure how far to take my analogy since I’m no criminologist… when it comes to “smart,” don’t most mob bosses wind up in prison or dying by violence? Which doesn’t seem like the pinnacle of a smart career LOL 😆 You’re spot on that his image is mainly from role he was given on TV. Could we agree in his relatively small, tightly run family bizness, he utilized manipulation techniques he may have observed from his dealings with NYC mob enterprises in construction, waste hauling, etc? He didn’t build Gambino sized empire, maybe more like thug boss in some little burg where the real mob didn’t play? Also, the specialized cunning exhibited in building up even a small empire of thuggery and muggery seems to me a narrow type of intelligence - most definitely not what’s sometimes called general intelligence. Maybe some “street smarts” vs “being smart”
Above all, our system depends on a C-in-C of sound mind, who honors the Constitution and understands and believes in the rule of law. Donald Trump fails in all three measures!
Trump is a blathering carnival barker who has somehow fooled enough Americans to get reelected. It is mind boggling. The silence of the Republican toadies in Congress is treasonous. Vote them all out!
Can't help but feeling like you have to be absolutely oblivious to not see who this moster is. I'm not sure that it means you're dumb but surely some mental deficiency is involved.
Michael - I think I get your viewpoint. To me it often seems more an issue for moral, spiritual, or characterological examination. Stipulated that any of those may relate to mental, as in brain-located, processes even when we use expressions like heart, soul, spirit - but I think “mental” often carries a connotation of intelligence or formal educational experiences that, to me, doesn’t adequately explain our societal predicament
Thank you. Given your background, do you feel that a significant % of the rank-and-file military, who have historically voted overwhelmingly for the Republicans, might vote for the Democrats in the mid-terms?
All I can tell you is that of the 5 millennial active-duty service members to whom I am related, 4 of them do not vote Republican. But then, they are officers.
I cannot speak for enlisted members, many of whom are not highly-educated.
The google says that 57-65% of military members voted for Trump in 2024. That, to me, is not "overwhelming," and it would only take a small proportion of those members changing their vote to bring him to heel this fall.
Thank you. I’ve never been on a US military base, but I understand they play Fox News exclusively in the mess and other common quarters - and this was also the case when Biden was president. Is my understanding correct?
I’m not worrying about them going down with the ship if they somchoose. It is the damage they could do on the way down that bothers me. The coarsening of the military from a defense force to a more aggressive stance, the Carribean operations and the possible actions in South America appears to be aimed at a military force that could be used in all sorts of ways, particularly the young troops and the officers who have gotten used to carrying out orders that one might consider less than legal.. I was drafted out of post graduate studies during the Vietnam disaster and I’ve noted the differences between the older draftees and the 18-year olds who were looking forward to their great adventure -and there was no Fox “news” then to jolly them along. There were good reason why the Founders were opposed to standing Armies and yet here we find ourselves with an all-volunteer military and a portion of the nation fascinated with special operations and black ops This isn’t a good combination .
I don't doubt those percentages. It would surprise me if there were more Democrats in the ranks and leadership, but one hopes that they will remember the oath that they took and, if it comes to that they put country and constitution above their partisan predilections. Maybe it all depends on what type of Republicans they are!
There's ample evidence job growth and global economy are slowing and the Bond Market is freaking out over crushing debt. I've expressed my sense of foreboding and this morning there's an escalation of tensions between Russia and Europe over a bomb plot in Germany. Coincidentally, this is in the NY Times spelling out why I'm concerned.
The next big hit to expect is the complete emptying of our SPR--Strategic Petroleum Reserve--that Trump started emptying to ease gas/diesel prices. Expect news within the next few weeks of this newest catastrophe.
THIS is why he made his ludicrous Venezuela 65 billion barrel oil reserve claim yesterday. Which, btw, will need tens of BILLIONS of dollars in investment before that country can begin to produce meaningful levels of (heavy) crude, that can enter the market, and be refined into gas/diesel sufficient to lower fuel costs. Or refined into premium crude for injection into the SPR.
Trump's Iran War--which *did* succeed in distracting the public from the GOP's Epstein files coverup--has produced a global oil/fertilizer/helium shortfall that is slowly suppressing national GDP's globally, pushing the world economy towards recession.
Every August since Tar Sands oil production started, the Alberta, Canada, oil industry has a maintenance shut down. US refineries normally draw on reserves to maintain production.
Energi media reports that this year refining output dipped because the US doesn't have enough reserve capacity to backfill for regular maintenance.
The effect at the gas pump was swamped by other causes but the oil industry has taken note:
Canada doesn't have to retaliate Trump's tariffs to have an impact. If Canada does not do take action to mitigate the effect of Trump's policies on the US, Americans will suffer.
Your point is well taken. Canada is producing flat out and cannot easily expand. September is maintenance month in the Canadian fields and will remove 300K bpd.
In the last month, we crossed into the yellow zone and cut our draw from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve from a million barrels a day to about 670,000 barrels. As of August 21, we are at 289.7 million barrels. There are debates over exactly what the Minimum Operating Level is; if we fall below, caverns start collapsing, pipelines clog, and there are other calamities we don’t want to test. A common belief is that the MOL is 1/3 capacity or 240 million. There is talk of a statutory or “military desirable” MOL of 252 million. Sources from the Energy Department say the effective MOL is 188 million barrels. So that ranges from 57 days (October 17) to 152 days (January 23).
Prices are not rising fast enough to destroy demand. Estimated oil demand in July was at 20.3 million barrels/day, a drop of only 2.3% from the same period last year. The price of diesel has not come down from $5.80/gallon (I saw $8.50 by the NYC Midtown Tunnel). This has created a whole separate problem that will likely get worse. There were some wild predictions at the beginning of the crisis of $300/barrel oil. I said major demand destruction would not start until the 200-day moving average at the NYMEX hits $120. It currently sits at $79. The 200-day MA for gasoline is about $2.71; the all-time nominal high is $3.15 in 2022 which did not cause significant demand destruction. At the current rate of rise, it will take 13 weeks to reach $3.15. That’s early December, so prices may cut demand if the optimistic MOL view is accurate. The real high reached in 2008 is a much larger number.
So what can save us from the MOL? Not light oil from the Permian. It is the wrong kind of oil for our refineries which is why we are exporting a record amount of crude. This is also why a ban on oil exports won’t help.
Moving from refining heavy oil to light oil is not the flick of a switch or even swapping out a few parts. You have to build a whole new annex. In 2015, the Energy Department assessed building light-tight-oil refineries as an alternative to exporting oil. Their findings are here:
No new refineries have opened in the USA since 1976. In March, it was announced there would be a light-tight-oil refinery built in Brownsville, TX. However, there are no pipelines to this area, India is financing the build and the expectation is that all refined product will be exported. Its volume will be 168,000 bpd and its cost is far more than the 2015 Energy Dept study anticipated.
The Gulf of Mexico set a record in April for production. Whether this can be sustained is an open question and the Gulf can also be severely affected by hurricanes.
Venezuela raised its June production to 1.07 million bpd. In 2015, it was producing 2.4 million but experts say it will take a long time before it regains that level as our host pointed out yesterday.
If we don’t start planning for gas rationing, it will be rationed in the most inefficient and expensive manner. It takes 7 weeks for oil from Hormuz to reach the US East Coast. We may have only 8 weeks left.
And he is well pleased with his efforts. At heart he is an agent of chaos and destroying what others have laboriously built gives him some perverse and to me incomprehensible pleasure. I know he has learned to profit off his chaos, but there is a deeper need to destroy.
Indeed, "a deeper need to destroy" drives this guy. He wants the world that will not love him to die. Will we let him destroy us? It would be so easy for him.
Correct. At some level (very very deep down), he's so insecure he's not even sure that he exists - hence his need to put his name on everything, everywhere. (Note that this isn't a new thing, see., e.g., "trump towers" all around the world ..)
He us indeed very insecure. It all goes va k to his home with parents who didn't care, he also thought because daddy was a rich guy that he would be welcomed by the old money in town, the Rockefellers, Carnegie, Vanderbilt, but they wanted nothing to do with him, so he had to prove he was better than they were, but if course he couldn't. He is still a crude, coarse uneducated child-man.
He has made obscene amounts of money by monetizing the presidency which is why he got involved in politics to begin with. To Donnie Demento his second term has been a resounding success already. He doesn't care that he will leave an empty shell of a formerly great country when he leaves.
Almost like he’s working for someone else’s benefit? Someone who is wanted by international courts for invading another country and will be visiting the trump golf course on taxpayer dollars?
I also find it disturbing that Trump's approval rating remains stubbornly in the mid thirties, despite all the chaos. Unlike others, I do not see his approval rating going down. The people who think it's still 1865 are all in. Therefore, courtesy of the Electoral College, Trump just needs another 12% or so of the gullible electorate to become POTUS again.
Think that can't be delivered by gerrymandering, by meddling with the postal service, by Musk and the Russians, by the infusion of hundreds of billions of dollars in dark funding, and, if that's not enough, having ICE show up at the polling stations? Think again. Can't be a President more than twice? Watch what Trump does to the 22nd Amendment.
There are only 3 ways out of this: 1) Trump expires. He's a sick demented old man, and it's only a matter of time before gravity takes care of him; 2) The Senate finally grows a pair and invokes the 25th Amendment; 3) The DNC grows a pair and chooses a charismatic, populist candidate with a progressive agenda, someone who specifically has never said "defund the police" or "I hate American holidays."
Gerrymandering has created a guaranteed win. Now the main hurdle is the primaries. So people suck up to T to win the primary. This has made the elected representative unresponsive to the people and the government disconnected from ground reality. Now even gerrymandering can’t deliver so they are looking to create chaos and prevent voting!!
We have an imbecilic, immovable grievance sector of the electorate (primarily aggrieved white ethno-nationalists) who want to tear everything down because they think the orange chaos monkey-in-chief will place them at their rightful divinely-ordained place at the top of the smoldering heap.
Trump is getting rid of brown-skinned immigrants and transgender people, and that's good enough for millions of Americans. They're even willing to sacrifice their own livelihoods for this.
It’s very strange to see the natural entropy in humans (I.e. the opposite of the survival instinct ) taking the upper hand once again in two heads of state (Putin and Trump) who prefer the destruction of their countries to their wellbeing.
Aristotle was right (contrary to Plato) : democracy survives only when the democratic institutions are stronger than a dysfunctional head of state.
The head of state should be a figurehead with no power. Time and again history shows us that concentrated power will eventually lead to tyranny. The founding fathers greatest mistake was the presidency.
It doesn’t matter : France has a President who has a lot of executive power but can’t override Parliament nor Senate. Germany has a President with no executive power, only a so-called moral authority, Belgium, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries plus the UK have kings as figureheads but the executive is solidly in the hands of prime ministers and Parliament. All of them have independent judiciary. So it’s really a question of the strength of the Institutions that matter.
As I said earlier, the Founding Fathers were naive in their belief that no scoundrel would be President….
Putin needs something to smile about, considering how badly his war of choice has been going. So Donald is giving his boss (Putin, lest anyone misunderstand) exactly what he wants: The systematic demolition of our government, military, and economy, with fractured alliances thrown in for good measure.
Yes- this is about us. We cannot have a democracy that works and keeps going with people who are ill-informed, not informed, filled with partisan hate and or presuming that this will just end and we will go back to the semblance of normalcy. There must be pain it seems for awakening enough people. Soon please. Every day we are deconstructed even more by this vindictive bullying administration. Vote like your life depends on it because it does.
Raj, Even sadder is that this clown gets a baseline of 34% support even now!’ With all that was and is known about Trump's history, and what he has wrought it is mind boggling that 34% are still on board with him. They can only be cultists, imaging that many - hard to believe.
I can’t stop picturing our Dear Leader on his regular, long phone calls with Putin. Don’t you think Putin is playing him like a fiddle? Layering compliments and implications of the kompromat file along with direct “suggestions” that feed Dear Leader’s paranoia that all the competent people left in government are planning a coup. “Suggestions” that a strong leader would kick all those competent people to the curb?
Recall how at the Helsinki meeting trump came out with a hang-dog demeanor while putin smirked. Likely trump was told that putin has the golden shower video and that is his Sword of Damocles over trump. putin will release that video when it serves him best.
At some point the buy now pay later groceries are going to come due. Credit cards will be maxed out with gasoline charges. Then the foreclosures. I wonder if it is going to be a cold winter.
We may see food shortages this coming year. Inflation will continue and gas prices won’t go down. Trump’s tariffs are screwing everything up, and corporations will see their tariffs refunded, while consumers who actually paid the tariffs will get nothing. The maladministration is also getting very close to the point where it will be unable to withdraw fuel from the strategic petroleum reserve. Trump has shown just how utterly incompetent he is, but I was expecting he would. I knew Trump was a failure at business and he squandered Daddy’s money, but too many voters believed his grift. Now we are all paying for it.
Kathy - 100% - Trump's war brought big increase to prices of diesel & fertilizer needed in farming. Climate change isn't raising crop yields. Tariffs & trade wars impact importing food (though I've read we have some uninspected beef available if that sounds appealing). Reduced inspection of foods all through the supply chain. Agricultural labor supply reduced via the round-up & purge of immigrants. This chaotic mix of negatives surely adds up to grocery prices & supplies being an ongoing pressure on American households. Trump played a bizness man on TV, but wasn't the food bizness
Bad for the US, worse for Europe (from UK to Russia), and that doesn't even touch the countries that are particularly hit by the triple whammy of climate change, super El Niño, and loss of their usual food imports.
Bear in mind how much agricultural land is *wasted* on high-input livestock feed and (in the US) the abomination that is ethanol corn.
I'm in MO and see spot shortages of food and goods every week. They restock after a few weeks, but that never used to happen. The beef counter at our Price Cutter is very thin and high priced. Not that we can afford to buy beef anymore. 🙄 Produce quality is down over the last several months. I've been going to our local organic market to get decent produce even though it costs more. Farmer's markets here are a bit skimpy from the drought/ heat domes we've been having all summer. It's going to get worse in a month or so when the SPR runs out. Gas and diesel are going to jump multiple dollars all at once according to Mr. Global, who is an expert on such things. I don't think this winter will be much fun for anyone.
You are being insulated from most of the effects of tariffs. Importers of parts and supplies and wholesale finished goods, such as the auto manufacturers and retailers like Walmart, are eating most of the extra costs, and writing off the losses. They can sustain that in the short term. The CEO's of these companies don't want to upset customers and see them voting Democrat, because Republicans have given them and their companies huge tax breaks.
Maybe after the midterms you will start seeing the real effect of tariffs. By then it may be too late.
I live abroad and my pension is in the US. The dollar is ever weaker, so I am hit by triple whammys by this government.
1) My pension is decreasing with these hits and as long as there is a war, which I don't see ending under Trump it is not recovering too well and I can knock the taxes off right off the top, so I have less money and when I take money out of my pension it is taxable income, but I am getting less for it. So the taxes are taken out. Wish I had paid them when I was working.
2) When the money changes into Euros I get a much lower rate than I was even 2 months ago.
3) Europe also has inflation. I am glad that my regular costs are mainly food, and those are much lower here than in the US. Same with transportation with the Germany ticket.
So, I am just having less purchasing power for my hard earned money because it is disappearing fast, and it is worth less and less where I actually spend it.
I imagine a lot of other people who have retired abroad are in the same boat.
This is an aspect that neither the media or most people see. People who built the country or defended their country in their working years are discarded like used packaging.
I live in Japan where the yen has fallen to low levels not seen for 40+ years. That means I get much more value for my social security than I would if it was ¥100 = $1.00. That’s the only reason I’m glad the yen is so cheap now. The question is, how long will we keep receiving it, or will trump & company stop that out of spite?
Don't know. I hope you can last with that. I guess I would like the Euro to fall too, but I don't see that happening right now. The opposite is happening. Trump keeps pretending that he is going to sign a peace agreement to keep the market rising and falling and making money off of that. On the other hand, he cannot truly end the war because he is not trustworthy and Iran knows that. That does not mean a deal will not be made, just that Trump will not stick to it.
If they can get their money out, they might be. We cannot do that. Not all at once. We have to pay taxes up front on any money we take out of our retirement accounts. The exchange rate sucks right now and may for the time that Trump is in power. Zev Shalev keeps explaining that because Trump is invested in Crypto he is intentionally tanking the dollar. The awfulness never stops.
I was reading how Netherlands has moved some of their gold from the US and Canada to Europe and it sounds like they will move more.
Another thing is that we cannot use the college savings account which is a 529 because she is going in Europe. If she were on exchange we could, but because she is not, we cannot. That sucks. It also sucks that I paid into Medicare and I cannot use it abroad. It would save Medicare money to have citizens abroad in the system, because the countries we live in generally have cheaper health care.
I still feel better off, because I chose a lifestyle that is more suited to my values. Today we were discussing the heat pump with our neighbors. They are getting the same one we have although the newer version is smaller than ours, which is nice.
I see what you're saying; that sure does sound like a bad situation with the exchange rate being what it is. Trump's actions are affecting everyone, in all kinds of awful ways. I'm glad you're in a good country anyway....
"It would save Medicare money to have citizens abroad in the system, because the countries we live in generally have cheaper health care." Uh, no? In the current situation, you cost the US system nothing.
I know that US citizens have to file with the IRS every year even when living and earning abroad, and can have to pay Fed. taxes. I had not realized that you must pay Soc. Sec. contributions too?
The people are not doing well. The working class of the US are struggling. We’re in debt and maxed out. We work and try to save but it’s death by a thousand cuts. Everything is going up.
Zev Shalev was also writing today how Trump is intentionally tanking the dollar to prop up crypto which he is heavily invested in. As he tanks the dollar everyone can buy less with it.
One of my economic indicators is looking at the classified section of my local newspaper and seeing how the number of foreclosure notices, tax-sale notices, self-storage auctions, and similar are doing. The number of all of these things has been going up over the last year. When people can't keep up with their mortgage, can't keep up with their property taxes, can't keep up with the monthly charge for their storage unit, you know the underlying economy is starting to brush the rocks!
PK made the point that the US-Canada auto industry is so integrated that trying to separate them will severely damage the industry, and possible destroy it. In other words, the consequences of Trump's policies already carry a penalty worse than anything Canada is willing to apply.
China has the advantage of relentless planning. Their idea of "national security" was being as independent in resources as they could, and not being vulnerable to Western sanctions or blockades or disrupted supply chains.
Energy independence required switching away from dependence on foreign gas and oil via mass electrification, they started building domestic gallium (and other mineral) supplies before it was fashionable, and while US financial media wasn't looking.
Paradoxically, China is in many ways much more hard-core capitalist than the US, in that they don't bail out major banks or industries: They let banks fail from the property bubble bursting, and many companies have gone bankrupt as they were out-competed by other private companies.
This surely isn't a problem created by Trump and co.? Surely, this must be Biden's or the Democrat's problem or the fake news industry up to no good? But if it has anything to do with Trump, his maga base has a new excuse/taking point, which is "at least he cares about America". In other words, don't worry about all the current financial trouble we're in. Just give it time and it will work out. He means well, you know! Racist scapegoating always works on bigots.
It almost doesn’t matter. There will be so many foods for sale of mysterious provenance that people will either go hungry or die from food-borne illnesses. Thanks to that dynamic duo of Trump and Kennedy. Beans, maybe, if you buy them before any announcements of danger. Rice? Avoid Lundberg’s. I get my stuff at local markets, not chains except for not at all cheap Whole Foods. At least their ground beef is safe and remotely affordable. Their chicken is also safe, as is Miller’s brand Amish chicken, so far anyway. Here in Chicago I get that at Fresh Farms, a local grocery that started in the Indian-Pakistani area in Devon Street, and now has a huge confusing grocery in Niles with all kinds of imported condiments. I also plan to try Chinatown to look for Chinese condiments. I have two good Chinese cookbooks, but for that food, condiments make the difference. I’ve been trying to find chili paste with garlic for weeks. It lasts forever and adds zip to anything you put it in. And you only need a little bit. But I cook. Not everyone does. I would strongly advise people to learn how, since prepared foods always come with cautionary notes.
Also, watch “Pasta Grannies” on YouTube or TikTok. Shows are ten or so minutes long and filled with authentic Italian recipes from old ladies like me who make their own pasta. They also have accompanying cookbooks. Simple homemade food, not rich people food. Peasant food. With ingredients you can find in ethnic groceries, not supermarket chains. I think cooking your own food is kind of good insurance against food-borne illness, and it’s better for your purse. Anyone who has other good ideas should share them. Let’s decide to survive this war against everyday people!
So you said "avoid Lundberg's", I asked why, you googled for a reason. And found there is a recall for certain lots of their rice. Useful information so here it goes. Affected is the Lundberg Organic Jasmine White Rice with UPC 073416040281, lot numbers 260201MA and 260202MA, and best-before dates of February 1 and February 2, 2027 (32-ounce packages). The recall is for these Lundberg Rice products only. It does not mean that all white rice or all Lundberg rice products are affected (with unspecified materials).
Hopefully people take this into account when they vote. They can vote for someone who enables this to continue, or they can vote for someone to put brakes on it. Sitting on the sidelines is accepting the status quo.
Sorry, I just gave the name of the rice, which is white jasmine rice. How many people will read the UPC numbers? I won’t. And I don’t buy Lundberg rice. I use either the bulk rice I can get at Whole Foods or I buy it at Fresh Farms on Devon Avenue here in Chicago, which is the Indian-Pakistani section of Chicago. I can get it in 10-pound bags if I want. Or maybe 5-pound bags. But I’m one person so I don’t eat that much that fast.
We used to joke when I was a Tai Chi student that the Chinese term for white person was “lo fan,” which we were told meant “stale rice.” And I’ve eaten enough rice that I can actually tell what that is. This entire story may be apocryphal.
Anyone who needs heating oil and hasn't already bought it is going to have a stroke when the see the price. I hope those who need it bought it a few months ago. Diesel will likely go to the highest price ever in a month or so.
None of it can last. Evangelicals had a hankering for the end times but some apparently large portion of the super-rich is now fine with it, banking on being able to weather a catastrophic downturn. They're building bunkers, buying crypto and basking in blood money. Remember the days when blowing everything up wasn't normal and the lives of average citizens mattered?
The plutocracts won't make it to their bunkers. Their security details will turn on them when the anarchy really starts. They'll then be "persuaded " to turn over the PINs for the ATM card.
The Evangelicals will be just fine with the "End Times*" they are trying to create, right up until they're suffering in the middle of it. I hear MAGA complaining already and this is just the first tiny ripples.
*I'm not a believer and Christ told them not to set it off on their own.
YEP!! Starting WWIII to bring about the End Times seems, to me, to be taking things out of God's hands... rather like committing murder instead of allowing of allowing God to decide when and how things will happen.
Trump thinks as long as the stock market does well, nothing else matters. He doesn’t know or care how his catering to American oligarchs is contributing to inflation and higher gas prices. Ordinary people understand very well how inflation and higher gas prices are attacking their wallets, and Trump’s trying to illegally game the midterms so his candidates win. The SCOTUS six have destroyed the Voting Rights Act and we need a national voting rights act to outlaw all of the undemocratic practices the Republicans are engaging in.
The stock market is NOT the United States economy.But an indicator of where and to what money is moving! The fact that so mich of it's growth is based on the valuation of AI is lethal for business in the long run.
The stock market is a game in which market movers look for excuses to buy or sell. Then a new excuse comes along to reverse the previous glee or gloom, whether it be a single stock or the market as a whole. Very long term, stocks have outperformed bonds. But once your personal 50 year time horizon has passed, that's not a consideration any more. I lived through the S&L crisis aka the Milken Milking, the dot-com bubble burst, the horrendous insanity of the Great Recession, and now the Trump sh*t storm. I'm seeing short term treasuries as very attractive right now. I'd rather wait out the next big correction without a correction. Unless the Deranged Orange Chaos Monkey defaults on US debt.
He actually mentioned the idea of US bond default some years ago so that he and his rich friends won't have to be taxed to balance the budget, much less pay down the debt. He's too stupid to realize that the debt is what allows the rich NOT to pay taxes. Or maybe someone educated him since then and he now knows how to rob the treasury directly - the debt will cover it.
Hi Paul. I’ve been with you from the first NY Times article. You were a Friday habit. The truth is I need you. Take a break. I don’t need you burning out.
Keep in mind, the economy’s resilience is all because of A.I. being propped up by a few corporate "Emperor's and their new clothes". When this bubble pops, and it will, it will make the Housing/Derivative bubble of 2007-2008 look like a paper cut. Brace for a Global recession, and that is being generous at best.
I really don't see the AI implosion causing a global recession. It will decimate the US, certainly. But most of the world isn't as invested in AI as we are. Further, countries have been forming trade blocks that do not include the US for some time. That has accelerated under Little Donnie Dipstick. BRICS+, CPTPP (the trans-paccific partnership that Donnie pulled us out of), EU-Mercosur, Canada now building multilateral trade pacts across the world; everyone is looking for stability and the US is no longer where they look. The Chinese are delighted, of course. China's trade with the US dropped by 20% but its trade with others has exploded and last year achieved a trade surplus of $1.19 trillion (thanks Donnie, next time you're in Beijing we'll buy you a cup of tea. Maybe Taiwanese tea). The days of America sneezing and the world geting a cold are winding down.
Generative AI is more international than you might think. The bubble burst will hit the chipmakers in Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea hard. I don't know about Taiwan, but Japanese and South Korean stock markets are supported by large companies like SoftBank, Samsung and SK Hynix, and are highly likely to crash when the bubble bursts. Officials in South Korea are already worried about how much debt is being taken on by ordinary leople to invest in volatile single-stock leveraged ETFs of these chipmakers.
Plus, if/when the U.S. economy crashes, it will likely take down the Canadian economy (where I live), which is still highly dependent on the U.S., despite some MOUs being signed with other countries.
I'm aware of the ripple effects but semiconductors is a huge industry. It will have an impact but I don't see it as dire for fabs. I wouldn't want to be holding Nvidia stock though.
Your point about Canada is well taken. The world may not get a cold but Canada will certainly get the sniffles.
Their valuations will come back down to earth. You are correct that the companies should survive, but not before a lot of retail investors lose their shirts.
Yeah, it's always the retail investors who take it on the chin. I've been slowly moving out of equities other than a couple of well-performing ETFs over the last couple of years. Valuations are just too high. Bubble risk is too high. Inflationary pressures are too high. The party's just been rocking too hard for too long. FOMO? FAFO. Not me.
It's not a good time to be in the market, everything is too tech-heavy and those stocks are held up by wishful thinking. Which is why the SpaceX IPO getting shoved onto index funds should have been illegal.
Pigs Breath can have a competent military or one that is loyal to the President over the Constitution. He can't have both - at least not initially. We need to reverse the effects ASAP or we will end up with competent evil at the top of the ranks.
The good news is that we are running out of senate confirmed military leaders. Two branches are out already, so anyone's belief that the military is anything but a Republican SS is literally not backed up by facts, so thats a trillion dollars we can immediately cut from the budget.
Russia, China, North Korea and Iran would all love that option. They all also like us running out of stuff. Let's just hope the Republicans don't opt to kill the filibuster for all Senate confirmed appointmentd and not just SCOTUS justices.
I mean we've already lost a war against a country that spends a half of a tenth of one percent on thier military as what we do. I dont think anyone in Russia or China is deluding themselves about American military capability, only Americans.
We have a habit of planning to refight the last war. Now we are firing or driving away the generals who are trying to prepare us for the lessons from Ukraine.
Curmudgeon - note though that military leadership & cabinet confirmations are simple majority in Senate. I am painfully aware of this because my Indiana Senator Todd Young (who likes playing role of normie country club Republican & playing up that he was in Marines some decades ago) was the senator perhaps most responsible for Hegseth. Young was believed to be opposed to the nomination because of his silence about it, and because of his trad/military background - surely Todd wouldn't agree to a 2nd tier Fox weekend 'personality' for one of the most serious jobs in the Cabinet? But then Young announced his support! Other senators who may have had reservations took that as a positive sign, an imprimatur to confirm - so most Republicans did (3 voted nay, astonishing really, and proof of how bad a nominee Hegseth was). So the vote was 50-50; JD Vance walked in and broke to tie to put Hegseth in charge. Thus did Todd Young demonstrate his lack of concern for his Constitutional oath, his loyalty to his military roots, and to the faith voters had accorded to his judgment
Gaaahhh! We should move it back to supermajority, but that would allow Republicans to block ALL Democratic choices... I don't see any really good options. Confirmation should be on the quality of the candidate, not political alignment. Ideas please???
Our sub-optimal reality is that our republic relies on people of some intelligence, good will, and commitment to the common good. When enough of the electorate is missing those elements, they elect men (usually, right?) of similar low character. Now it’s always possible that people of low character get themselves elected even by a sensible public, but they don’t get reelected, and the tiny number that slips into office are disciplined and checked by their colleagues
That’s the theory. Worked imperfectly but fairly well till recently. We’re in new waters now, trying to learn how to swim forward
Markets hate uncertainty more than anything, and it’s been unleashed in abundance. Does anyone else find the return of the acronym “cds” unsettling? Credit Default Swaps troubles in 2006-07 were harbingers of what was to come in 2008 through March 09.
AND crucial to remember that then there was no Trump administration making multiple lethal financial decisions or orders. It was greed but not the plan of greediness like now on all financial fronts
I will get worse, way worse, and then a democratic president will inherit this colossal mess in 2028, maybe democrats will also control congress then, but guess who the (pathologically forgetful) voters will blame for the mess ? It’s a cycle that always repeats itself. You’ll see republicans shamelessly blaming the democrats in 2028 for the Iran war, tariffs, inflation, a new boogeyman … and it will probably work!
Pete Hegseth is beyond a disaster, but don't blame the U.S. military for the Iran fiasco. The military performed its task of bombing designated targets and imposing a blockade. The failure is entirely on Trump and his inane idea to go to war with Iran without a plan for winning.
He did have a plan, egged on by israel, Iran would capitulate in days, he would proclaim victory, take their oil, see a dramatic rise in the polls, thus win the midterms, the Nobel Prize, and a third term. Well, that's what his gut and bones told him but the professionals told him what he now learned about Iran.
I am not sure about that. Maybe the metrics to characterize and measure the performance of the economy is ‘misleading’ ..
About 60% of people who work living from paycheck to paycheck
Inequality has exploded dramatically
Healthcare costs have increased
Grocery costs have increased
Environmental destruction is in full swing
and …
Unemployment rate (officially at about 4.1%) is probably - functionally - at about 20% plus.
We really need a discussion about how the labor department is measuring / reporting the unemployment rate. I think the official reporting is misleading as there is more behind the numbers - particularly related to who is looking for a job vs. the number of people who cannot find a job and are not looking for jobs vs. people have temporarily jobs because they don’t find jobs in line with their qualifications…
Giving the above remarks, I would characterize our economy at best ‘stalled’.
The bureau of labor statistics (BLS) has been smashed and slashed. Companies don't have to report like they used to. Even when they used to, I worked for a company who did massive layoffs over time so the numbers wouldn't have to be reported (to the public, maybe - it was decades ago). I don't trust what I'm seeing coming out of there as much as I don't trust NOAA - they've been slashed so how does one expect an iota of accuracy other than it'll be hot today with thunderstorms likely. The list goes on.
New neighbor is moving in with her son next door. He's in criminal something and can't find a job (what use is there for jobs like that when you live in a mafia state). It's getting worse and we'll be voting.
To paraphrase Sansa Stark as she released Ramsey Bolton's own hounds to eat him alive: Trump's words will disappear. His house will disappear. All memory of him will disappear.
All that will be left of Trump is the flimsy remains of a dirty, broken balloon lying at the bottom of history's dustbin.
I hope you're wrong. History has not been kind to Hitler, or Mussolini, or Stalin, or Pol Pot etc... or (for that matter), Nero or Caligula. I'm sure they all had their followers, but over time the reality of what happened tends to crystalize and the followers and their kin die off.... at least, one hopes.
"History has not been kind to Hitler" Yeah but for these really destructive characters unfortunately attention and fame is everything. Badass fame is better than mediocracy to them.
Tr.mp is not seeking approval at the moment, he is going for desaster. He wants to have impact, even if it means Untergang.
These extremely malignant characters want to be feared. As long as they have attention, as long as they are everywhere in history books..
This is the vibe I get from him, and it is max dangerous.
Trump is in a furious race with time to try to prove your fears true and my hypothesis wrong. That is the fuel energizing his obsession with the East Wing, arch, Kennedy Center etc.
His mortality cannot outrun angels, at least I hope not! :)
I would agree that Trump is trying furiously to prove to mankind that he is a frightening strong man. I would assume that he is interested in being remembered as a frightening figure in world history even after his death.
I do not think that he is aspiring to be remembered as a positive influence on world history. I would assume that he does not mind to be remembered in one breath with Hitler and Stalin. After all, he admires Putin and Kim Jong Un. That’s his reference.
I do not know how much more the economy, or my mental health, can take. I find it odd that as a young woman in the 1970s my dad used to say I would make an excellent paramedic or ER nurse because I could handle anything, and was tough as nails. Now I am what some call anxiety prone and a bundle of nerves. Old age and Trump, I guess.
It is already hard enough getting old, since I am one of those who are turning into the highly anxious and distrustful and moody elderly, not fun, but add in climate change and a serious of unfortunate events that caused my nervous system to be locked in the permanent "on" position for "fight or flight" for a number of years prior, as well (PTSD) and I feel a need to engage in the tunnel vision of gardening most of the day and blissful ignorance whenever I can distract myself enough, for long enough, to protect my physical health.
I will vote however long it takes, and whatever it takes, though, and I will do whatever I can for us all and for future generations.
I assume sowing chaos is the plan so he can dispute the election results, since the people who will be hurt the most by a potential disruption of mail-in voting tend to be elderly and snowbirds, in swing states, who are more often republican or more conservative voters, so it will backfire on Trump if only suppression of voting is the aim.
I came to terms with the idea that very bad things will happen and have convinced myself that somehow we will be OK. What else can I do at this point? Bad things are already happening.
Many of us are only here because we had an ancestor who endured something very bad and kept trying to make things better, so hang in there everyone.
Endure and push for change and keep at the fight to make things better.
I did see something very weird when I went to look at the Atlanta Fed's GDPNow the other day.
I have never seen their estimate so far off from blue chip although it is rarely the same. Is that simply normal during the estimating phase at points? Something seems weird, but then I am looking at everything through chaos colored and anxiety prone glasses at this point. Maybe this is typical and I am unaware.
You know the answer — you manage your anxiety by controlling what you can. My father’s Depression-era mantra was “hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.” I’ve been stocking up on foods, installing solar, making my house more fire-resilient, and doing other things in the event of a collapse. Although, in terms of hoping for the best, I also bought some new champagne glasses and a bottle for *the* occasion.
One of the ‘unknown unknowns’ (Rumsfeld) here is what the Trump administration will do next. Trump likes to claim the spotlight, and he has constructed an administration based a lot around a feudal form of fidelity to him alone, but they are a team of individuals (variables) operating under conflicting impulses and, ultimately, prone to making decisions which are sometimes contradictory. So, your metaphor of ‘the shocks keep coming’ is correct.
A big ‘unknown’ is if an unforeseen shock arises (as Covid was). The US is adapting under the stresses, the rest of the world is adapting to an unreliable and aggressively assertive US Administration, but we can only keep a certain number of plates spinning without failure. That shock might originate somewhere other than the US, or it might come from within the US. I can’t see the Trump team handling such a shock with competence, even allowing for their performative buffoonery.
Look around, White House environs dug up, disciplined military in disarray, well planned trade & manufacturing auto sector in disarray, well integrated global economy in disarray. Post GFC safeguards dismantled. It seems that America elected a demolished in chief to systematically kill the country & make it a 3rd world backwater. Every action of Trump has taken America towards self destruction. Years of strategic positioning, accumulated goodwill & global leadership pawned for personal ego satisfaction & vanity. Truly sad. Even sadder is that this clown gets a baseline of 34% support even now!’
"a shooting war against Iran in which the vaunted U.S. military performed very poorly;"
A rare correction from this military family member: I would say U.S. military LEADERS performed poorly.
The troops did their jobs professionally and under duress (especially the rescue of the downed aviator, once they got the orange monkey out of the situation room). The leaders have been less than honest, and less than courageous in telling the CIC to go pound sand.
Thus we have our illustrious fascist felon being flattered and insulated from facts.
He does fire everyone who tells him the truth, though, so I also sympathize with those who want to reduce the harms done by sticking around instead of resigning.
It's a situation that hurts all of us, and the lion's share of the blame should fall upon the Secretary of Defense.
I agree with what you said with one exception. When you say "Thus we have our illustrious fascist felon being flattered and insulated from facts." it presumes that, if only trump had the facts, he would do the right thing. This seems to say that his people are worse than he is and destroying us without his permission. I don't believe that. I believe that he has all of the facts, and is pretending that he doesn't to protect himself from accountability. It's his MO.
I'll paraphrase: Trump wants the world to be simple, gets frustrated when the world is not simple, and lashes out with little thought for the consequences because he is so, so angry. Unfortunately, he accurately represents a lot of people, not a majority, but enough to be a challenge.
Remember, too, that Felon 47 is profoundly lazy and stupid. He believes he has all the answers without a moment's study. He's a clueless fool.
Trump is the upper left peak of the Dunning-Kruger curve. 👇
https://bsky.app/profile/justinsg.bsky.social/post/3lgyra2gsl22b
Bingo
Sadly, it's this very anger that keeps the 33% or so of followers with him. They think he's feeling their anger even as he fleeces them again and again.
Fool them once, shame on him. Fool them 100X, shame on them. But his core MAGA base, the ones who'll never stop supporting him no matter the consequences, are too stupid or deluded to recognize that the've been fooled, even now.
I'd say that in many cases, they are too uneducated rather than stupid or deluded. They were never taught how to think critically. Remember, Trump loves the uneducated.
Yes! A perfect summary of The Donald - and a 2 or 3 year old toddler... What went wrong with his childhood?
"Facts" are irrelevant to Trump. He wants what he wants and doesn't even consider letting "facts" get in his way-b/c in his world, they are whatever he wants them to be. We've won the Iran war (many times!), his polling numbers are the highest any president has ever had, at any time, every American wants a ballroom, and nasty Democrats messed up the reflecting pool. Ad nauseum. And I would add that this isn't dementia - it's his multiple and omnipresent personality disorders which don't let him believe anything other than whatever he wants to believe in that particular moment.
"And I would add that this isn't dementia..."; Felon47 has a new DSM-6 diagnosis consisting of Nero-Syndrome + Malignant Narcissistic Personality Disorder + Scorched-Earth Psychopathy + Oppositional Defiant Disorder + Borderline Personality Disorder + most elements of the Hubris Syndrome.
I assume you make these diagnoses cynically, since oppositional defiant disorder is only diagnosed in children (though he acts like a very young one often), and he is unlikely to have borderline personality disorder. The others don't exist in the DSM. But I get your main point that he manifests these traits. They are all related to an inadequate ego and superego, which displays as a big ego in public.
I agree with Light Warder's description, including Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Some aspects of Trump's behavior cannot be understood except by recognizing that he's never matured past about age 10 -- which is the only reasonable explanation for his babyish, playground-bully name-calling and petty, childish acts such as renaming Lake Ontario.
"Inadequate superego" means he lacks a conscience or inhibitions. He's never had a conscience or any sense of morality or ethics, and the few inhibitions he once had have fallen away as his mind has deteriorated. A neighbor of my mother's put her husband in a nursing home when he began "watering" the trees on the street. Will Trump's loss of inhibition lead to something far worse, such as ordering a nuclear strike on Iran -- or Canada or Greenland or another former ally that defies his will? No one will remove him from office, let alone put him in a nursing home, no matter how demented his behavior.
Ninja'd!
Trump is likely no longer in charge. His minders drug him up and wheel him out to the white house desk to say whatever... The actual decisions are made by a gang who are even more sinister!
Oh, while he's clearly very suggestible, I'd say he's also "in charge" since any and all of his handlers are likely to be out on their rears the second he feels that they've dissed him.
I'm not convinced Trump was ever in charge.
That would be McConnell.
I don’t think he is currently capable of recognizing new information and modifying his emotions to achieve revised goals. Those require “executive function” - which, in his aging, increasingly demented brain no longer exists. He is an empty puppet, filled only with anger and fear, and easily manipulated. That doesn’t mean he should not be accountable but it does mean that his so-called thought processes and ability to control his emotions will continue to deteriorate. There is no way back.
Anger and fear -- and greed. The last still seems to be his primary motivation. But his anger and fear are more dangerous. We -- our nation and the world -- are in a very perilous situation, and no one capable of doing anything about it has the integrity or the cojones to act.
I agree. They did exactly what they were ordered. Hegseth & Trump are not rooted in reality & do not value expertise. Even the greatest military can fail due to leadership failure.
And military leaders who are constantly trying to figure out how to mitigate the damage tRump and Hegseth are causing daily are hamstrung and slowed. And the frontline people have performed as best they could under awful conditions which their C&C and SecDef chose to inflict on them.
Was it ever the greatest military? We haven’t won a war since WW2. I believe this is a myth. But, yes, most EXPENSIVE military in the world.
A distinction needs to be made. Even a great military, which I believe our is from my experience of working along side of them, cannot perform miracles when our battles are not chosen wisely or the objectives are unrealistic.
Vietnam was a war we should never have engaged in. Kuwait was a resounding success on the battlefield. If we had been satisfied with eliminating bin Laden in Afghanistan and gone home that would have been a success, instead Bush2 took us to Iraq which was a poorly chosen battle. And now we are engaged in another poorly chosen battle with Iran; we don't even have defined objectives let alone realistic ones.
Trump had an objective: Haul in more money. And it's worked beautifully for him.
I refuse to believe that he got us into this "excursion" for any reason other than that Bibi told him he could take Iran's oil and get rich. He hasn't gotten the oil (which is why he can't stop the war), but he's making money hand over fist, so it's fine.
I concur. And also remember the words of Lindsey Graham regarding getting into the war: "and we're gonna make a ton of money..." What specifically was he referring to?
This may be the opportune moment to suggest halving the defense/offense budget and closing half of the 800 foreign American military bases. The pentagon has a $1 trillion annual budget much of which is waste, fraud and abuse, and they are incapable of dealing with a country the size of Iran. Ukraine with a much smaller defense department is fending off Russia. Their annual defense budget is about $100 billion. Surely, we could get by on $500 billion which would be still larger than any other country's defense budget. China's is about $277 billion.
The capability of striking Iran in ways that produce the desired outcome (if we only know what that is) seems to be in short supply. That should have been recognized before the first bomb was dropped. And that's the real problem.
On the other hand if the goal was to decimate Iran without regard to casualties both immediate and consequentially, I think the US is militarily capable of that. Leveling a half-dozen major cities and destroying the petro infrastructure would truly take Iran back to the early 1900's.
In the modern warfare era, that has come to be seen as not a good way to "win." It's beyond my pay grade to debate the wisdom of that. History shows us that there will be wars. We are already projecting armed conflicts into space. How a nation wishes to confront that reality and the resulting strategies employed is a huge driver of what will be history.
The bloated budget is to some extent due to wanting a military that can function as an empire serving colonial tool and can also deliver complete and utter defeats.
GWB was not in office when bin Laden was assassinated. That didn't happen until Obama was president. GWB was set on regime change in Iraq to finish the job his daddy started and to gain control of that nation's oil.
I didn't say Bush2 was in office when bin Laden was killed. Bush's expansion of the war effort in Iraq no doubt played a role in how long it took to get bin Laden. If resources were being used in Iraq, they weren't being deployed in Afghanistan. Who knows? Had those resources been concentrated in Afghanistan, it might look very different than it does today.
They do not know anything about leadership…and sadly, I believe they know it….
Liverpool - as so often with Trump, the weaknesses of our system of government are being exposed. We have civilian control of our military - elected, political leadership that makes the crucial decisions for where, when, & how force will be applied. That system wouldn't work well if top brass was prone to say, "nah, ain't doing that." But the system assumes a Commander in chief in possession of character, judgment, & good will. In many a mob story, the plot involves some poor pigeon being asked by the criminal to do a little thing, just a tiny favor, nothing really... so they go along. Then comes another request, an escalation. Then more. They've been corrupted, committed, in too deep to stop now. This is the world our C-in-C creates around himself. Because most of us don't live our lives this way, we may not realize when we're taking that 1st small step, thinking we're doing our best just to get along, giving a little benefit of the doubt, buying ouselves some time hoping a situation will improve, not realizing that we've stepped into quicksand that will pull us down
I think the analogy that Trump is a mob boss is off the mark. Mob bosses become bosses not only because they are ruthless, but they are also smart, likely the smartest of the crew. A dumb mob boss does not last very long. But Trump as a "brilliant, ruthless and successful" businessman was an image that Mark Burnett created for Trump - it was fiction that unfortunately too many people believed and still believe. Trump is just an actor who played a role and somehow parlayed it into 2 terms as President of the US.
Bry - not sure how far to take my analogy since I’m no criminologist… when it comes to “smart,” don’t most mob bosses wind up in prison or dying by violence? Which doesn’t seem like the pinnacle of a smart career LOL 😆 You’re spot on that his image is mainly from role he was given on TV. Could we agree in his relatively small, tightly run family bizness, he utilized manipulation techniques he may have observed from his dealings with NYC mob enterprises in construction, waste hauling, etc? He didn’t build Gambino sized empire, maybe more like thug boss in some little burg where the real mob didn’t play? Also, the specialized cunning exhibited in building up even a small empire of thuggery and muggery seems to me a narrow type of intelligence - most definitely not what’s sometimes called general intelligence. Maybe some “street smarts” vs “being smart”
Above all, our system depends on a C-in-C of sound mind, who honors the Constitution and understands and believes in the rule of law. Donald Trump fails in all three measures!
Trump is a blathering carnival barker who has somehow fooled enough Americans to get reelected. It is mind boggling. The silence of the Republican toadies in Congress is treasonous. Vote them all out!
Can't help but feeling like you have to be absolutely oblivious to not see who this moster is. I'm not sure that it means you're dumb but surely some mental deficiency is involved.
Michael - I think I get your viewpoint. To me it often seems more an issue for moral, spiritual, or characterological examination. Stipulated that any of those may relate to mental, as in brain-located, processes even when we use expressions like heart, soul, spirit - but I think “mental” often carries a connotation of intelligence or formal educational experiences that, to me, doesn’t adequately explain our societal predicament
Thank you. Given your background, do you feel that a significant % of the rank-and-file military, who have historically voted overwhelmingly for the Republicans, might vote for the Democrats in the mid-terms?
All I can tell you is that of the 5 millennial active-duty service members to whom I am related, 4 of them do not vote Republican. But then, they are officers.
I cannot speak for enlisted members, many of whom are not highly-educated.
The google says that 57-65% of military members voted for Trump in 2024. That, to me, is not "overwhelming," and it would only take a small proportion of those members changing their vote to bring him to heel this fall.
Thank you. I’ve never been on a US military base, but I understand they play Fox News exclusively in the mess and other common quarters - and this was also the case when Biden was president. Is my understanding correct?
Rank and file military are cultural Republicans and will be the last to turn on the Rs. They will go down with the ship.
I’m not worrying about them going down with the ship if they somchoose. It is the damage they could do on the way down that bothers me. The coarsening of the military from a defense force to a more aggressive stance, the Carribean operations and the possible actions in South America appears to be aimed at a military force that could be used in all sorts of ways, particularly the young troops and the officers who have gotten used to carrying out orders that one might consider less than legal.. I was drafted out of post graduate studies during the Vietnam disaster and I’ve noted the differences between the older draftees and the 18-year olds who were looking forward to their great adventure -and there was no Fox “news” then to jolly them along. There were good reason why the Founders were opposed to standing Armies and yet here we find ourselves with an all-volunteer military and a portion of the nation fascinated with special operations and black ops This isn’t a good combination .
Trump approval is 60% among military personnel and 63% of veterans voted for Trump. That's a tough nut to crack.
I don't doubt those percentages. It would surprise me if there were more Democrats in the ranks and leadership, but one hopes that they will remember the oath that they took and, if it comes to that they put country and constitution above their partisan predilections. Maybe it all depends on what type of Republicans they are!
fools
Jim - some cross tabs on that data would be interesting, differentiating among racial/ethnic groups & sex
There's ample evidence job growth and global economy are slowing and the Bond Market is freaking out over crushing debt. I've expressed my sense of foreboding and this morning there's an escalation of tensions between Russia and Europe over a bomb plot in Germany. Coincidentally, this is in the NY Times spelling out why I'm concerned.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/01/opinion/world-order-international-relations.html?unlocked_article_code=1.-FA.vhbe.TL8DhUvRwSda&smid=url-share
I agree. The best force in the world will badly underperform if incompetently led.
Great post. So well thought out.
And a definite Yes for Liverpool.
The lion's share of the blame falls upon the voters who voted these clowns into office — twice!
pawned for putin, more like? A spy could not do better..... .....
Manchurian candidate?
If he were Agent Krasnov, would he be acting any differently?
That movie has often come to mind lately.
The next big hit to expect is the complete emptying of our SPR--Strategic Petroleum Reserve--that Trump started emptying to ease gas/diesel prices. Expect news within the next few weeks of this newest catastrophe.
THIS is why he made his ludicrous Venezuela 65 billion barrel oil reserve claim yesterday. Which, btw, will need tens of BILLIONS of dollars in investment before that country can begin to produce meaningful levels of (heavy) crude, that can enter the market, and be refined into gas/diesel sufficient to lower fuel costs. Or refined into premium crude for injection into the SPR.
Trump's Iran War--which *did* succeed in distracting the public from the GOP's Epstein files coverup--has produced a global oil/fertilizer/helium shortfall that is slowly suppressing national GDP's globally, pushing the world economy towards recession.
We've seen an impact already:
Every August since Tar Sands oil production started, the Alberta, Canada, oil industry has a maintenance shut down. US refineries normally draw on reserves to maintain production.
Energi media reports that this year refining output dipped because the US doesn't have enough reserve capacity to backfill for regular maintenance.
The effect at the gas pump was swamped by other causes but the oil industry has taken note:
Canada doesn't have to retaliate Trump's tariffs to have an impact. If Canada does not do take action to mitigate the effect of Trump's policies on the US, Americans will suffer.
Your point is well taken. Canada is producing flat out and cannot easily expand. September is maintenance month in the Canadian fields and will remove 300K bpd.
In the last month, we crossed into the yellow zone and cut our draw from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve from a million barrels a day to about 670,000 barrels. As of August 21, we are at 289.7 million barrels. There are debates over exactly what the Minimum Operating Level is; if we fall below, caverns start collapsing, pipelines clog, and there are other calamities we don’t want to test. A common belief is that the MOL is 1/3 capacity or 240 million. There is talk of a statutory or “military desirable” MOL of 252 million. Sources from the Energy Department say the effective MOL is 188 million barrels. So that ranges from 57 days (October 17) to 152 days (January 23).
Prices are not rising fast enough to destroy demand. Estimated oil demand in July was at 20.3 million barrels/day, a drop of only 2.3% from the same period last year. The price of diesel has not come down from $5.80/gallon (I saw $8.50 by the NYC Midtown Tunnel). This has created a whole separate problem that will likely get worse. There were some wild predictions at the beginning of the crisis of $300/barrel oil. I said major demand destruction would not start until the 200-day moving average at the NYMEX hits $120. It currently sits at $79. The 200-day MA for gasoline is about $2.71; the all-time nominal high is $3.15 in 2022 which did not cause significant demand destruction. At the current rate of rise, it will take 13 weeks to reach $3.15. That’s early December, so prices may cut demand if the optimistic MOL view is accurate. The real high reached in 2008 is a much larger number.
So what can save us from the MOL? Not light oil from the Permian. It is the wrong kind of oil for our refineries which is why we are exporting a record amount of crude. This is also why a ban on oil exports won’t help.
Moving from refining heavy oil to light oil is not the flick of a switch or even swapping out a few parts. You have to build a whole new annex. In 2015, the Energy Department assessed building light-tight-oil refineries as an alternative to exporting oil. Their findings are here:
https://www.eia.gov/analysis/studies/petroleum/lto/
No new refineries have opened in the USA since 1976. In March, it was announced there would be a light-tight-oil refinery built in Brownsville, TX. However, there are no pipelines to this area, India is financing the build and the expectation is that all refined product will be exported. Its volume will be 168,000 bpd and its cost is far more than the 2015 Energy Dept study anticipated.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/trump-announces-opening-oil-refinery-texas-2026-03-10/
The Gulf of Mexico set a record in April for production. Whether this can be sustained is an open question and the Gulf can also be severely affected by hurricanes.
Venezuela raised its June production to 1.07 million bpd. In 2015, it was producing 2.4 million but experts say it will take a long time before it regains that level as our host pointed out yesterday.
If we don’t start planning for gas rationing, it will be rationed in the most inefficient and expensive manner. It takes 7 weeks for oil from Hormuz to reach the US East Coast. We may have only 8 weeks left.
The strategic oil reserve is, at this point, on the way to becoming an oxymoron. Equally as important is to ask whether Ft Knox has been emptied.
And he is well pleased with his efforts. At heart he is an agent of chaos and destroying what others have laboriously built gives him some perverse and to me incomprehensible pleasure. I know he has learned to profit off his chaos, but there is a deeper need to destroy.
Indeed, "a deeper need to destroy" drives this guy. He wants the world that will not love him to die. Will we let him destroy us? It would be so easy for him.
He also likes to pee on every pole to leave his scent. Kennedy centre &. Vanity projects are prime examples!!
Correct. At some level (very very deep down), he's so insecure he's not even sure that he exists - hence his need to put his name on everything, everywhere. (Note that this isn't a new thing, see., e.g., "trump towers" all around the world ..)
He us indeed very insecure. It all goes va k to his home with parents who didn't care, he also thought because daddy was a rich guy that he would be welcomed by the old money in town, the Rockefellers, Carnegie, Vanderbilt, but they wanted nothing to do with him, so he had to prove he was better than they were, but if course he couldn't. He is still a crude, coarse uneducated child-man.
His niece Mary says that if he thinks he's going down, he'll try to take the rest of us with him. I believe her.
He has made obscene amounts of money by monetizing the presidency which is why he got involved in politics to begin with. To Donnie Demento his second term has been a resounding success already. He doesn't care that he will leave an empty shell of a formerly great country when he leaves.
Not hard to see how he bankrupted 6 businesses is it. Even an ATM like a casino!! The USA will be the 7th notch on trumps bankruptcy belt.
Almost like he’s working for someone else’s benefit? Someone who is wanted by international courts for invading another country and will be visiting the trump golf course on taxpayer dollars?
Putin's puppet? I must agree. Hilary had it right all along.
Trump may be a clown, but the destruction is too comprehensive, methodical and effective not to be intended—by somebody.
I think you're underestimating the damage a chaos monkey can do.
Exactly!!
I also find it disturbing that Trump's approval rating remains stubbornly in the mid thirties, despite all the chaos. Unlike others, I do not see his approval rating going down. The people who think it's still 1865 are all in. Therefore, courtesy of the Electoral College, Trump just needs another 12% or so of the gullible electorate to become POTUS again.
Think that can't be delivered by gerrymandering, by meddling with the postal service, by Musk and the Russians, by the infusion of hundreds of billions of dollars in dark funding, and, if that's not enough, having ICE show up at the polling stations? Think again. Can't be a President more than twice? Watch what Trump does to the 22nd Amendment.
There are only 3 ways out of this: 1) Trump expires. He's a sick demented old man, and it's only a matter of time before gravity takes care of him; 2) The Senate finally grows a pair and invokes the 25th Amendment; 3) The DNC grows a pair and chooses a charismatic, populist candidate with a progressive agenda, someone who specifically has never said "defund the police" or "I hate American holidays."
Gerrymandering has created a guaranteed win. Now the main hurdle is the primaries. So people suck up to T to win the primary. This has made the elected representative unresponsive to the people and the government disconnected from ground reality. Now even gerrymandering can’t deliver so they are looking to create chaos and prevent voting!!
We have an imbecilic, immovable grievance sector of the electorate (primarily aggrieved white ethno-nationalists) who want to tear everything down because they think the orange chaos monkey-in-chief will place them at their rightful divinely-ordained place at the top of the smoldering heap.
I've said this before:
Trump's a Russian asset whose assignment was to weaken/destroy America and the West, and he's doing a superb job
Russia, China, and now North Korea are thrilled and watching with their big boxes of popcorn
Trump is getting rid of brown-skinned immigrants and transgender people, and that's good enough for millions of Americans. They're even willing to sacrifice their own livelihoods for this.
It’s very strange to see the natural entropy in humans (I.e. the opposite of the survival instinct ) taking the upper hand once again in two heads of state (Putin and Trump) who prefer the destruction of their countries to their wellbeing.
Aristotle was right (contrary to Plato) : democracy survives only when the democratic institutions are stronger than a dysfunctional head of state.
The head of state should be a figurehead with no power. Time and again history shows us that concentrated power will eventually lead to tyranny. The founding fathers greatest mistake was the presidency.
It doesn’t matter : France has a President who has a lot of executive power but can’t override Parliament nor Senate. Germany has a President with no executive power, only a so-called moral authority, Belgium, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries plus the UK have kings as figureheads but the executive is solidly in the hands of prime ministers and Parliament. All of them have independent judiciary. So it’s really a question of the strength of the Institutions that matter.
As I said earlier, the Founding Fathers were naive in their belief that no scoundrel would be President….
The two-party system is a weakness too.
Putin needs something to smile about, considering how badly his war of choice has been going. So Donald is giving his boss (Putin, lest anyone misunderstand) exactly what he wants: The systematic demolition of our government, military, and economy, with fractured alliances thrown in for good measure.
Once again I ask: I s there ANYTHING Trump does that doesn’t please Putin?
Yes- this is about us. We cannot have a democracy that works and keeps going with people who are ill-informed, not informed, filled with partisan hate and or presuming that this will just end and we will go back to the semblance of normalcy. There must be pain it seems for awakening enough people. Soon please. Every day we are deconstructed even more by this vindictive bullying administration. Vote like your life depends on it because it does.
Raj, Even sadder is that this clown gets a baseline of 34% support even now!’ With all that was and is known about Trump's history, and what he has wrought it is mind boggling that 34% are still on board with him. They can only be cultists, imaging that many - hard to believe.
I can’t stop picturing our Dear Leader on his regular, long phone calls with Putin. Don’t you think Putin is playing him like a fiddle? Layering compliments and implications of the kompromat file along with direct “suggestions” that feed Dear Leader’s paranoia that all the competent people left in government are planning a coup. “Suggestions” that a strong leader would kick all those competent people to the curb?
Recall how at the Helsinki meeting trump came out with a hang-dog demeanor while putin smirked. Likely trump was told that putin has the golden shower video and that is his Sword of Damocles over trump. putin will release that video when it serves him best.
Likely that video is not nearly the worst of what Putin has on Trump.
T%hat huge baseline support is what is really troublesome.
At some point the buy now pay later groceries are going to come due. Credit cards will be maxed out with gasoline charges. Then the foreclosures. I wonder if it is going to be a cold winter.
We may see food shortages this coming year. Inflation will continue and gas prices won’t go down. Trump’s tariffs are screwing everything up, and corporations will see their tariffs refunded, while consumers who actually paid the tariffs will get nothing. The maladministration is also getting very close to the point where it will be unable to withdraw fuel from the strategic petroleum reserve. Trump has shown just how utterly incompetent he is, but I was expecting he would. I knew Trump was a failure at business and he squandered Daddy’s money, but too many voters believed his grift. Now we are all paying for it.
Kathy - 100% - Trump's war brought big increase to prices of diesel & fertilizer needed in farming. Climate change isn't raising crop yields. Tariffs & trade wars impact importing food (though I've read we have some uninspected beef available if that sounds appealing). Reduced inspection of foods all through the supply chain. Agricultural labor supply reduced via the round-up & purge of immigrants. This chaotic mix of negatives surely adds up to grocery prices & supplies being an ongoing pressure on American households. Trump played a bizness man on TV, but wasn't the food bizness
"We may see food shortages this coming year."
----
Bad for the US, worse for Europe (from UK to Russia), and that doesn't even touch the countries that are particularly hit by the triple whammy of climate change, super El Niño, and loss of their usual food imports.
Bear in mind how much agricultural land is *wasted* on high-input livestock feed and (in the US) the abomination that is ethanol corn.
I'm in MO and see spot shortages of food and goods every week. They restock after a few weeks, but that never used to happen. The beef counter at our Price Cutter is very thin and high priced. Not that we can afford to buy beef anymore. 🙄 Produce quality is down over the last several months. I've been going to our local organic market to get decent produce even though it costs more. Farmer's markets here are a bit skimpy from the drought/ heat domes we've been having all summer. It's going to get worse in a month or so when the SPR runs out. Gas and diesel are going to jump multiple dollars all at once according to Mr. Global, who is an expert on such things. I don't think this winter will be much fun for anyone.
You are being insulated from most of the effects of tariffs. Importers of parts and supplies and wholesale finished goods, such as the auto manufacturers and retailers like Walmart, are eating most of the extra costs, and writing off the losses. They can sustain that in the short term. The CEO's of these companies don't want to upset customers and see them voting Democrat, because Republicans have given them and their companies huge tax breaks.
Maybe after the midterms you will start seeing the real effect of tariffs. By then it may be too late.
I live abroad and my pension is in the US. The dollar is ever weaker, so I am hit by triple whammys by this government.
1) My pension is decreasing with these hits and as long as there is a war, which I don't see ending under Trump it is not recovering too well and I can knock the taxes off right off the top, so I have less money and when I take money out of my pension it is taxable income, but I am getting less for it. So the taxes are taken out. Wish I had paid them when I was working.
2) When the money changes into Euros I get a much lower rate than I was even 2 months ago.
3) Europe also has inflation. I am glad that my regular costs are mainly food, and those are much lower here than in the US. Same with transportation with the Germany ticket.
So, I am just having less purchasing power for my hard earned money because it is disappearing fast, and it is worth less and less where I actually spend it.
I imagine a lot of other people who have retired abroad are in the same boat.
This is an aspect that neither the media or most people see. People who built the country or defended their country in their working years are discarded like used packaging.
I live in Japan where the yen has fallen to low levels not seen for 40+ years. That means I get much more value for my social security than I would if it was ¥100 = $1.00. That’s the only reason I’m glad the yen is so cheap now. The question is, how long will we keep receiving it, or will trump & company stop that out of spite?
Don't know. I hope you can last with that. I guess I would like the Euro to fall too, but I don't see that happening right now. The opposite is happening. Trump keeps pretending that he is going to sign a peace agreement to keep the market rising and falling and making money off of that. On the other hand, he cannot truly end the war because he is not trustworthy and Iran knows that. That does not mean a deal will not be made, just that Trump will not stick to it.
Gosh Linda, that sounds terrible! And here I was thinking that people who moved out of the US might be in better shape than the rest of us.
If they can get their money out, they might be. We cannot do that. Not all at once. We have to pay taxes up front on any money we take out of our retirement accounts. The exchange rate sucks right now and may for the time that Trump is in power. Zev Shalev keeps explaining that because Trump is invested in Crypto he is intentionally tanking the dollar. The awfulness never stops.
I was reading how Netherlands has moved some of their gold from the US and Canada to Europe and it sounds like they will move more.
Another thing is that we cannot use the college savings account which is a 529 because she is going in Europe. If she were on exchange we could, but because she is not, we cannot. That sucks. It also sucks that I paid into Medicare and I cannot use it abroad. It would save Medicare money to have citizens abroad in the system, because the countries we live in generally have cheaper health care.
I still feel better off, because I chose a lifestyle that is more suited to my values. Today we were discussing the heat pump with our neighbors. They are getting the same one we have although the newer version is smaller than ours, which is nice.
I see what you're saying; that sure does sound like a bad situation with the exchange rate being what it is. Trump's actions are affecting everyone, in all kinds of awful ways. I'm glad you're in a good country anyway....
Thanks, CLS!
"It would save Medicare money to have citizens abroad in the system, because the countries we live in generally have cheaper health care." Uh, no? In the current situation, you cost the US system nothing.
True, but we are also lobbying to not pay into the system then. If this wins, we will be costing the system.
I know that US citizens have to file with the IRS every year even when living and earning abroad, and can have to pay Fed. taxes. I had not realized that you must pay Soc. Sec. contributions too?
The people are not doing well. The working class of the US are struggling. We’re in debt and maxed out. We work and try to save but it’s death by a thousand cuts. Everything is going up.
Zev Shalev was also writing today how Trump is intentionally tanking the dollar to prop up crypto which he is heavily invested in. As he tanks the dollar everyone can buy less with it.
Isn't Crypto harmful to the environment? I don't wanna use it.
My understanding is that crypto is unregulated and untraceable and has been used mostly for criminal (or quasi-same) activities!
That's just as bad
I agree... I was just adding to the important argument you had already made. I apologize for forgetting to like your post.
One of my economic indicators is looking at the classified section of my local newspaper and seeing how the number of foreclosure notices, tax-sale notices, self-storage auctions, and similar are doing. The number of all of these things has been going up over the last year. When people can't keep up with their mortgage, can't keep up with their property taxes, can't keep up with the monthly charge for their storage unit, you know the underlying economy is starting to brush the rocks!
Brilliant!
Only time will tell Kimberly…not “who” but how MANY 🥲.
Especially if Canada stops selling energy to the US
Not likely to happen... but try an export tax of 25% on potash.
PK made the point that the US-Canada auto industry is so integrated that trying to separate them will severely damage the industry, and possible destroy it. In other words, the consequences of Trump's policies already carry a penalty worse than anything Canada is willing to apply.
China has the advantage of relentless planning. Their idea of "national security" was being as independent in resources as they could, and not being vulnerable to Western sanctions or blockades or disrupted supply chains.
Energy independence required switching away from dependence on foreign gas and oil via mass electrification, they started building domestic gallium (and other mineral) supplies before it was fashionable, and while US financial media wasn't looking.
Paradoxically, China is in many ways much more hard-core capitalist than the US, in that they don't bail out major banks or industries: They let banks fail from the property bubble bursting, and many companies have gone bankrupt as they were out-competed by other private companies.
That will force a lot more farmers into bankruptcy next spring.
This surely isn't a problem created by Trump and co.? Surely, this must be Biden's or the Democrat's problem or the fake news industry up to no good? But if it has anything to do with Trump, his maga base has a new excuse/taking point, which is "at least he cares about America". In other words, don't worry about all the current financial trouble we're in. Just give it time and it will work out. He means well, you know! Racist scapegoating always works on bigots.
It almost doesn’t matter. There will be so many foods for sale of mysterious provenance that people will either go hungry or die from food-borne illnesses. Thanks to that dynamic duo of Trump and Kennedy. Beans, maybe, if you buy them before any announcements of danger. Rice? Avoid Lundberg’s. I get my stuff at local markets, not chains except for not at all cheap Whole Foods. At least their ground beef is safe and remotely affordable. Their chicken is also safe, as is Miller’s brand Amish chicken, so far anyway. Here in Chicago I get that at Fresh Farms, a local grocery that started in the Indian-Pakistani area in Devon Street, and now has a huge confusing grocery in Niles with all kinds of imported condiments. I also plan to try Chinatown to look for Chinese condiments. I have two good Chinese cookbooks, but for that food, condiments make the difference. I’ve been trying to find chili paste with garlic for weeks. It lasts forever and adds zip to anything you put it in. And you only need a little bit. But I cook. Not everyone does. I would strongly advise people to learn how, since prepared foods always come with cautionary notes.
Also, watch “Pasta Grannies” on YouTube or TikTok. Shows are ten or so minutes long and filled with authentic Italian recipes from old ladies like me who make their own pasta. They also have accompanying cookbooks. Simple homemade food, not rich people food. Peasant food. With ingredients you can find in ethnic groceries, not supermarket chains. I think cooking your own food is kind of good insurance against food-borne illness, and it’s better for your purse. Anyone who has other good ideas should share them. Let’s decide to survive this war against everyday people!
What is the deal with Lundberg's rice?
It is Lundberg’s organic jasmine white rice. Because of unspecified foreign materials in the rice. Found that on Google just now.
So you said "avoid Lundberg's", I asked why, you googled for a reason. And found there is a recall for certain lots of their rice. Useful information so here it goes. Affected is the Lundberg Organic Jasmine White Rice with UPC 073416040281, lot numbers 260201MA and 260202MA, and best-before dates of February 1 and February 2, 2027 (32-ounce packages). The recall is for these Lundberg Rice products only. It does not mean that all white rice or all Lundberg rice products are affected (with unspecified materials).
Hopefully people take this into account when they vote. They can vote for someone who enables this to continue, or they can vote for someone to put brakes on it. Sitting on the sidelines is accepting the status quo.
Sorry, I just gave the name of the rice, which is white jasmine rice. How many people will read the UPC numbers? I won’t. And I don’t buy Lundberg rice. I use either the bulk rice I can get at Whole Foods or I buy it at Fresh Farms on Devon Avenue here in Chicago, which is the Indian-Pakistani section of Chicago. I can get it in 10-pound bags if I want. Or maybe 5-pound bags. But I’m one person so I don’t eat that much that fast.
We used to joke when I was a Tai Chi student that the Chinese term for white person was “lo fan,” which we were told meant “stale rice.” And I’ve eaten enough rice that I can actually tell what that is. This entire story may be apocryphal.
Anyone who needs heating oil and hasn't already bought it is going to have a stroke when the see the price. I hope those who need it bought it a few months ago. Diesel will likely go to the highest price ever in a month or so.
None of it can last. Evangelicals had a hankering for the end times but some apparently large portion of the super-rich is now fine with it, banking on being able to weather a catastrophic downturn. They're building bunkers, buying crypto and basking in blood money. Remember the days when blowing everything up wasn't normal and the lives of average citizens mattered?
I personally look forward to pouring napalm down the ventilation systems of Zucks bunker.
The plutocracts won't make it to their bunkers. Their security details will turn on them when the anarchy really starts. They'll then be "persuaded " to turn over the PINs for the ATM card.
Building bunkers is silly. The rich are going to sit in them with their families and do what, smell armpits?
They don't think ahead. They think they're the masters of all they survey. Reality begs to differ.
I hope so. … while normies will be enjoying sunshine outside.
The Evangelicals will be just fine with the "End Times*" they are trying to create, right up until they're suffering in the middle of it. I hear MAGA complaining already and this is just the first tiny ripples.
*I'm not a believer and Christ told them not to set it off on their own.
YEP!! Starting WWIII to bring about the End Times seems, to me, to be taking things out of God's hands... rather like committing murder instead of allowing of allowing God to decide when and how things will happen.
The stock market went up when Trump was elected. It is remarkably bad at prediction.
The stock market is not the economy.
Trump thinks as long as the stock market does well, nothing else matters. He doesn’t know or care how his catering to American oligarchs is contributing to inflation and higher gas prices. Ordinary people understand very well how inflation and higher gas prices are attacking their wallets, and Trump’s trying to illegally game the midterms so his candidates win. The SCOTUS six have destroyed the Voting Rights Act and we need a national voting rights act to outlaw all of the undemocratic practices the Republicans are engaging in.
The stock market is NOT the United States economy.But an indicator of where and to what money is moving! The fact that so mich of it's growth is based on the valuation of AI is lethal for business in the long run.
The stock market is a game in which market movers look for excuses to buy or sell. Then a new excuse comes along to reverse the previous glee or gloom, whether it be a single stock or the market as a whole. Very long term, stocks have outperformed bonds. But once your personal 50 year time horizon has passed, that's not a consideration any more. I lived through the S&L crisis aka the Milken Milking, the dot-com bubble burst, the horrendous insanity of the Great Recession, and now the Trump sh*t storm. I'm seeing short term treasuries as very attractive right now. I'd rather wait out the next big correction without a correction. Unless the Deranged Orange Chaos Monkey defaults on US debt.
Hold that thought. Trump's only actual business skill is stiffing creditors.
He actually mentioned the idea of US bond default some years ago so that he and his rich friends won't have to be taxed to balance the budget, much less pay down the debt. He's too stupid to realize that the debt is what allows the rich NOT to pay taxes. Or maybe someone educated him since then and he now knows how to rob the treasury directly - the debt will cover it.
Whatever your politics, the investing lesson here is important:
Useful investing lesson: economies can absorb one shock far better than a sequence of overlapping shocks.
Tariffs, energy prices, higher yields, geopolitics, and weaker business confidence can each look manageable on their own.
The real risk is when they start reinforcing each other.
Resilience matters.
But so does knowing when “resilient so far” is being mistaken for “immune.”
The reinforcing nature of overlapping shocks works two ways. One is resilience. The other is collapse.
Hi Paul. I’ve been with you from the first NY Times article. You were a Friday habit. The truth is I need you. Take a break. I don’t need you burning out.
And, thanks for it all.
Yes, Paul, please take care of yourself. You are my first read every morning. I and WE need you.
Keep in mind, the economy’s resilience is all because of A.I. being propped up by a few corporate "Emperor's and their new clothes". When this bubble pops, and it will, it will make the Housing/Derivative bubble of 2007-2008 look like a paper cut. Brace for a Global recession, and that is being generous at best.
I really don't see the AI implosion causing a global recession. It will decimate the US, certainly. But most of the world isn't as invested in AI as we are. Further, countries have been forming trade blocks that do not include the US for some time. That has accelerated under Little Donnie Dipstick. BRICS+, CPTPP (the trans-paccific partnership that Donnie pulled us out of), EU-Mercosur, Canada now building multilateral trade pacts across the world; everyone is looking for stability and the US is no longer where they look. The Chinese are delighted, of course. China's trade with the US dropped by 20% but its trade with others has exploded and last year achieved a trade surplus of $1.19 trillion (thanks Donnie, next time you're in Beijing we'll buy you a cup of tea. Maybe Taiwanese tea). The days of America sneezing and the world geting a cold are winding down.
Generative AI is more international than you might think. The bubble burst will hit the chipmakers in Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea hard. I don't know about Taiwan, but Japanese and South Korean stock markets are supported by large companies like SoftBank, Samsung and SK Hynix, and are highly likely to crash when the bubble bursts. Officials in South Korea are already worried about how much debt is being taken on by ordinary leople to invest in volatile single-stock leveraged ETFs of these chipmakers.
Plus, if/when the U.S. economy crashes, it will likely take down the Canadian economy (where I live), which is still highly dependent on the U.S., despite some MOUs being signed with other countries.
I'm aware of the ripple effects but semiconductors is a huge industry. It will have an impact but I don't see it as dire for fabs. I wouldn't want to be holding Nvidia stock though.
Your point about Canada is well taken. The world may not get a cold but Canada will certainly get the sniffles.
Their valuations will come back down to earth. You are correct that the companies should survive, but not before a lot of retail investors lose their shirts.
Yeah, it's always the retail investors who take it on the chin. I've been slowly moving out of equities other than a couple of well-performing ETFs over the last couple of years. Valuations are just too high. Bubble risk is too high. Inflationary pressures are too high. The party's just been rocking too hard for too long. FOMO? FAFO. Not me.
It's not a good time to be in the market, everything is too tech-heavy and those stocks are held up by wishful thinking. Which is why the SpaceX IPO getting shoved onto index funds should have been illegal.
Pigs Breath can have a competent military or one that is loyal to the President over the Constitution. He can't have both - at least not initially. We need to reverse the effects ASAP or we will end up with competent evil at the top of the ranks.
As long as you have Hegseth "competent evil" is unlikely. I would not trust him to run a lemonade stall.
Got that right
The good news is that we are running out of senate confirmed military leaders. Two branches are out already, so anyone's belief that the military is anything but a Republican SS is literally not backed up by facts, so thats a trillion dollars we can immediately cut from the budget.
Russia, China, North Korea and Iran would all love that option. They all also like us running out of stuff. Let's just hope the Republicans don't opt to kill the filibuster for all Senate confirmed appointmentd and not just SCOTUS justices.
I mean we've already lost a war against a country that spends a half of a tenth of one percent on thier military as what we do. I dont think anyone in Russia or China is deluding themselves about American military capability, only Americans.
We have a habit of planning to refight the last war. Now we are firing or driving away the generals who are trying to prepare us for the lessons from Ukraine.
Curmudgeon - note though that military leadership & cabinet confirmations are simple majority in Senate. I am painfully aware of this because my Indiana Senator Todd Young (who likes playing role of normie country club Republican & playing up that he was in Marines some decades ago) was the senator perhaps most responsible for Hegseth. Young was believed to be opposed to the nomination because of his silence about it, and because of his trad/military background - surely Todd wouldn't agree to a 2nd tier Fox weekend 'personality' for one of the most serious jobs in the Cabinet? But then Young announced his support! Other senators who may have had reservations took that as a positive sign, an imprimatur to confirm - so most Republicans did (3 voted nay, astonishing really, and proof of how bad a nominee Hegseth was). So the vote was 50-50; JD Vance walked in and broke to tie to put Hegseth in charge. Thus did Todd Young demonstrate his lack of concern for his Constitutional oath, his loyalty to his military roots, and to the faith voters had accorded to his judgment
Gaaahhh! We should move it back to supermajority, but that would allow Republicans to block ALL Democratic choices... I don't see any really good options. Confirmation should be on the quality of the candidate, not political alignment. Ideas please???
Our sub-optimal reality is that our republic relies on people of some intelligence, good will, and commitment to the common good. When enough of the electorate is missing those elements, they elect men (usually, right?) of similar low character. Now it’s always possible that people of low character get themselves elected even by a sensible public, but they don’t get reelected, and the tiny number that slips into office are disciplined and checked by their colleagues
That’s the theory. Worked imperfectly but fairly well till recently. We’re in new waters now, trying to learn how to swim forward
Markets hate uncertainty more than anything, and it’s been unleashed in abundance. Does anyone else find the return of the acronym “cds” unsettling? Credit Default Swaps troubles in 2006-07 were harbingers of what was to come in 2008 through March 09.
AND crucial to remember that then there was no Trump administration making multiple lethal financial decisions or orders. It was greed but not the plan of greediness like now on all financial fronts
I will get worse, way worse, and then a democratic president will inherit this colossal mess in 2028, maybe democrats will also control congress then, but guess who the (pathologically forgetful) voters will blame for the mess ? It’s a cycle that always repeats itself. You’ll see republicans shamelessly blaming the democrats in 2028 for the Iran war, tariffs, inflation, a new boogeyman … and it will probably work!
Pete Hegseth is beyond a disaster, but don't blame the U.S. military for the Iran fiasco. The military performed its task of bombing designated targets and imposing a blockade. The failure is entirely on Trump and his inane idea to go to war with Iran without a plan for winning.
He did have a plan, egged on by israel, Iran would capitulate in days, he would proclaim victory, take their oil, see a dramatic rise in the polls, thus win the midterms, the Nobel Prize, and a third term. Well, that's what his gut and bones told him but the professionals told him what he now learned about Iran.
He would never consider fighting, always wants others to do it for him …
Perfect round up of what is baffling about the stock market.
…’the economy is podding along …’
I am not sure about that. Maybe the metrics to characterize and measure the performance of the economy is ‘misleading’ ..
About 60% of people who work living from paycheck to paycheck
Inequality has exploded dramatically
Healthcare costs have increased
Grocery costs have increased
Environmental destruction is in full swing
and …
Unemployment rate (officially at about 4.1%) is probably - functionally - at about 20% plus.
We really need a discussion about how the labor department is measuring / reporting the unemployment rate. I think the official reporting is misleading as there is more behind the numbers - particularly related to who is looking for a job vs. the number of people who cannot find a job and are not looking for jobs vs. people have temporarily jobs because they don’t find jobs in line with their qualifications…
Giving the above remarks, I would characterize our economy at best ‘stalled’.
The bureau of labor statistics (BLS) has been smashed and slashed. Companies don't have to report like they used to. Even when they used to, I worked for a company who did massive layoffs over time so the numbers wouldn't have to be reported (to the public, maybe - it was decades ago). I don't trust what I'm seeing coming out of there as much as I don't trust NOAA - they've been slashed so how does one expect an iota of accuracy other than it'll be hot today with thunderstorms likely. The list goes on.
New neighbor is moving in with her son next door. He's in criminal something and can't find a job (what use is there for jobs like that when you live in a mafia state). It's getting worse and we'll be voting.
One day--and that day may come soon--it will all collapse. And Donald J. Trump will be at the bottom of the pile of his own calamity.
He will suffer less than we for sure!
We at least have souls, wit and meaningful lives.
To paraphrase Sansa Stark as she released Ramsey Bolton's own hounds to eat him alive: Trump's words will disappear. His house will disappear. All memory of him will disappear.
All that will be left of Trump is the flimsy remains of a dirty, broken balloon lying at the bottom of history's dustbin.
Unfortunately, I do not believe this. T.rump will be worshipped and remebered with awe as long as there are human historians. And he knows it.
I hope you're wrong. History has not been kind to Hitler, or Mussolini, or Stalin, or Pol Pot etc... or (for that matter), Nero or Caligula. I'm sure they all had their followers, but over time the reality of what happened tends to crystalize and the followers and their kin die off.... at least, one hopes.
"History has not been kind to Hitler" Yeah but for these really destructive characters unfortunately attention and fame is everything. Badass fame is better than mediocracy to them.
Tr.mp is not seeking approval at the moment, he is going for desaster. He wants to have impact, even if it means Untergang.
These extremely malignant characters want to be feared. As long as they have attention, as long as they are everywhere in history books..
This is the vibe I get from him, and it is max dangerous.
You may well be right.... I try to be hopeful, but it's true that Trump will definitely be in the history books!
Trump is in a furious race with time to try to prove your fears true and my hypothesis wrong. That is the fuel energizing his obsession with the East Wing, arch, Kennedy Center etc.
His mortality cannot outrun angels, at least I hope not! :)
I would agree that Trump is trying furiously to prove to mankind that he is a frightening strong man. I would assume that he is interested in being remembered as a frightening figure in world history even after his death.
I do not think that he is aspiring to be remembered as a positive influence on world history. I would assume that he does not mind to be remembered in one breath with Hitler and Stalin. After all, he admires Putin and Kim Jong Un. That’s his reference.
I totally agree.
I do not know how much more the economy, or my mental health, can take. I find it odd that as a young woman in the 1970s my dad used to say I would make an excellent paramedic or ER nurse because I could handle anything, and was tough as nails. Now I am what some call anxiety prone and a bundle of nerves. Old age and Trump, I guess.
It is already hard enough getting old, since I am one of those who are turning into the highly anxious and distrustful and moody elderly, not fun, but add in climate change and a serious of unfortunate events that caused my nervous system to be locked in the permanent "on" position for "fight or flight" for a number of years prior, as well (PTSD) and I feel a need to engage in the tunnel vision of gardening most of the day and blissful ignorance whenever I can distract myself enough, for long enough, to protect my physical health.
I will vote however long it takes, and whatever it takes, though, and I will do whatever I can for us all and for future generations.
I assume sowing chaos is the plan so he can dispute the election results, since the people who will be hurt the most by a potential disruption of mail-in voting tend to be elderly and snowbirds, in swing states, who are more often republican or more conservative voters, so it will backfire on Trump if only suppression of voting is the aim.
I came to terms with the idea that very bad things will happen and have convinced myself that somehow we will be OK. What else can I do at this point? Bad things are already happening.
Many of us are only here because we had an ancestor who endured something very bad and kept trying to make things better, so hang in there everyone.
Endure and push for change and keep at the fight to make things better.
I did see something very weird when I went to look at the Atlanta Fed's GDPNow the other day.
I have never seen their estimate so far off from blue chip although it is rarely the same. Is that simply normal during the estimating phase at points? Something seems weird, but then I am looking at everything through chaos colored and anxiety prone glasses at this point. Maybe this is typical and I am unaware.
You know the answer — you manage your anxiety by controlling what you can. My father’s Depression-era mantra was “hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.” I’ve been stocking up on foods, installing solar, making my house more fire-resilient, and doing other things in the event of a collapse. Although, in terms of hoping for the best, I also bought some new champagne glasses and a bottle for *the* occasion.
Good advice Ann. I hope we get to pop a cork or two soon.
I need to learn to count my blessings, I tend to over think and end up in an stupor of anxiety that is quite painful really.
Yes, strategies.
Thanks Paul.
One of the ‘unknown unknowns’ (Rumsfeld) here is what the Trump administration will do next. Trump likes to claim the spotlight, and he has constructed an administration based a lot around a feudal form of fidelity to him alone, but they are a team of individuals (variables) operating under conflicting impulses and, ultimately, prone to making decisions which are sometimes contradictory. So, your metaphor of ‘the shocks keep coming’ is correct.
A big ‘unknown’ is if an unforeseen shock arises (as Covid was). The US is adapting under the stresses, the rest of the world is adapting to an unreliable and aggressively assertive US Administration, but we can only keep a certain number of plates spinning without failure. That shock might originate somewhere other than the US, or it might come from within the US. I can’t see the Trump team handling such a shock with competence, even allowing for their performative buffoonery.
Regards,
Anthony