Dump Shithole

[dmbrocker]

"Trade wars are good, and easy to win":

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/trum ... nance.html

Every time he opens his big mouth...

[exitflagger]

Florida votes for Trump Trump is big buddies with Vladimir Putin Putin shows a video of Russia maybe planning on nuking Florida

Some things make perfect sense.

[eddie lee roth]

Florida votes for Trump Trump is big buddies with Vladimir Putin Putin shows a video of Russia maybe planning on nuking Florida

Some things make perfect sense.

Ever since Gazpacho moved there it’s nothing more than a shithole country.

[milk-milk-lemonade]

The great unraveling: Trump's allies are really worried about him

CNN)Not since Richard Nixon started talking to the portraits on the walls of the West Wing has a president seemed so alone against the world.

One source -- who is a presidential ally -- is worried, really worried. The source says this past week is "different," that advisers are scared the President is spiraling, lashing out, just out of control. For example: Demanding to hold a public session where he made promises on trade tariffs before his staff was ready, not to mention willing. "This has real economic impact," says the source, as the Dow dropped 420 points after the President's news Thursday. "Something is very wrong." Even by Trumpian standards, the chaos and the unraveling at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are a stunning -- and recurring -- problem.

But there's an up-against-the-wall quality to the past couple of weeks that is striking, and the crescendo is loud, clear, unhealthy, even dangerous.

A brief summary: The Rob Porter wife abuse scandal, and the resulting security clearance scandal, in which the President's son-in-law gets his clearance downgraded.
Then the President (yet again) attacks his attorney general. The AG fights back; the President fumes. Meantime, he's also fuming at the free-spending cabinet officials' scandals, the unseemly expenditures brought to you by Trump's version of the best and the brightest. (See: Ben Carson's dining room set.)

Then consider these odd developments: Trump agrees with Democrats on gun control in a public session. Then he takes on Republicans and some of his own economic team by proposing steel and aluminum tariffs. His career ambassador to Mexico quits after President Peña Nieto cancels a trip to the United States following a bad phone call (build the wall?) with the President.

His communications director, Hope Hicks -- a loyal, longtime aide who provided his "emotional support," according to one source -- resigns. And one friend predicted to me this would likely send the President into a "tailspin." (Consider that box checked.)
Oh, and the Russia probe continues -- with former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates flipping to cooperate with the special counsel, who is asking questions about Trump's Russia connections, among other uncomfortable things.
And -- in the midst of all of this tumult -- the President announces the hiring of the man to run his 2020 re-election bid. Because, why not? The President is stewing, according to one source with knowledge, blaming everyone but himself for the tumult: his chief of staff Gen. John Kelly for mishandling the clearance issue, Jeff Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia investigation, Republicans for being afraid of the NRA, Democrats for obstructing everything.

So the President has gone rogue, which is not a healthy development. "Morale is as bad as it's ever been," says another source familiar with the situation inside the White House, echoing the comments of Anthony Scaramucci in a CNN interview Thursday. What's more, the source lamented, "The good people are being driven crazy."

That almost goes without saying.

Multiple sources report an increasingly isolated Trump: cordoned off from old friends by Kelly, getting the cold shoulder from wife Melania (after Stormy Daniels and friends), increasing friction with his daughter and son-in-law over clearance, and home alone without longtime bodyguard/friend Keith Schiller and Hicks. His economic team is split over tariffs; his national security adviser, according to reports, will be replaced soon. No doubt the exodus will continue.

And the President -- who has bullied Jeff Sessions regularly since the summer -- is now furious that the attorney general has dared defend his department against a President who called it "disgraceful." A man who prides himself on his instinct to counterpunch finds it shocking when someone punches back. Oh the irony of Trump!
"Some of these things don't bother him like they do other people," offers another old friend, trying to explain the chaos, or at least how Donald Trump regards it.
That may be true. Maybe this great unraveling doesn't bother him.

But it should bother us.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/02/opinions ... index.html

[TawnyVonJagger]

Florida votes for Trump Trump is big buddies with Vladimir Putin Putin shows a video of Russia maybe planning on nuking Florida

Some things make perfect sense.

Ever since Gazpacho moved there it’s nothing more than a shithole country.

Thanks, Gazpacho.

[Rageman]

Saw this analogy and thought that I'd share

Chess analogy;

A. * Mueller takes pawn *
Trump-supporter; "It is just a pawn (coffee-boy?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

B. * Mueller takes minor piece *
Trump-supporter; "It is just a bishop (insignificant part of early presidential campaign?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

C. * Mueller takes major piece *
Trump supporter; "It is just a rook (non-essential part of Trump administration?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

Some pieces seemingly leave the board of their own accord ("Hey, where is that knight going?")
Some times President Trump removes (fires) his own pieces. ("I don't need such a disloyal bishop. He was a biased bishop. Sad!")
Other pieces are just humiliated and disparaged. ("Why can't the queen just take the other King? Just appoint some more bishops, and investigate the other King for foul play and abuse of power! Witch hunt!")

* Mueller repeats A, B and C. *
Trump-supporter; "It doesn't matter. There is nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

Robert Mueller; "Checkmate!"
Trump-supporter; "But......."

[Turner Coates]

Robert Mueller; "Checkmate!"
Trump-supporter; "But......."

Trump: "The game was RIGGED!"

[eddie lee roth]

"Trade wars are good, and easy to win":

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/trum ... nance.html

Every time he opens his big mouth...

Star Wars was based on a trade war and they still haven’t figured that shit out.

[TenBenny]

Man, the last week or so has brought a crazy flurry of new developments. Developments that really have seemed to kick the push back against the administration into a higher gear. Despite being cautious about feeling this way, this is the most optimistic I've felt in a long time.

Anyone else have a similar thought?

[Chip Z'Hoy]

I don't want to hijack the Hungwell Appreciation Sticky so I'm going to respond to this here.

He goes on to say that he didn't vote for Trump but always assumed that since video game violence was always a Democratic angle, he would be cool under Trump.

Then someone shows him a tweet from 2012 where Trump says "Video game violence must be stopped!" and the guy says "Yup. I've been scared shitless since he tweeted that."

Dudes and their fucking video games.

[DEATH ROW JOE]

LMFAO, in case you want to know why Kushner's world is collapsing. His family purchased 666 Fifth Avenue right before the financial meltdown and they are desperate to refinance it. The property is now underwater (1.2 billion in debt exceeds the value of the building). Debt coming due next year and they can't get $$$. They tried to borrow from Qater and failed.

Qatar Refused to Invest in Kushner’s Firm. Weeks Later, Jared Backed a Blockade of Qatar.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/20 ... -firm.html

In 2007, Jared Kushner decided that the real-estate market had nowhere to go but up. And so the 26-year-old mogul decided to plow $500 million of his family’s money — and $1.3 billion in borrowed capital — into purchasing 666 Fifth Avenue for twice the price it had previously sold for. Even if we’d somehow avoided a global financial crisis, this would have been a bad bet: Before the crash, when the building was almost fully occupied, it generated only about two-thirds of the revenue the Kushners needed to keep up with their debt payments.

After the crisis, however, things got really hairy. The Kushners were forced to sell off the building’s retail space to pay their non-mortgage debt on the building — and then to hand over nearly half of the office space to Vornado as part of a refinancing agreement with the real-estate giant.

The office space that the Kushners retained is worth less than its $1.2 billion mortgage — which is due early in 2019. If their company can’t find some new scheme for refinancing and redeveloping the property by then, Kushner will have cost his family a fortune.

Kushner attempt to secure a $400 million loan from the Chinese insurance firm Anbang, and a $500 million one from former Qatari prime minister and billionaire investor Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani, also known as “HBJ.” Anbang pulled out once the deal attracted critical media scrutiny, and HBJ jumped ship when the Kushners failed to find a second major source of capital.

In those same weeks, Kushner met with Sergey Gorkov, head of the Kremlin-affiliated Vnesheconombank. The senior White House adviser has insisted that this meeting was strictly political; Gorkov maintains it was strictly business.

[vlad]

LMFAO, in case you want to know why Kushner's world is collapsing. His family purchased 666 Fifth Avenue right before the financial meltdown and they are desperate to refinance it. The property is now underwater (1.2 billion in debt exceeds the value of the building). Debt coming due next year and they can't get $$$. They tried to borrow from Qater and failed.

Qatar Refused to Invest in Kushner’s Firm. Weeks Later, Jared Backed a Blockade of Qatar.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/20 ... -firm.html

In 2007, Jared Kushner decided that the real-estate market had nowhere to go but up. And so the 26-year-old mogul decided to plow $500 million of his family’s money — and $1.3 billion in borrowed capital — into purchasing 666 Fifth Avenue for twice the price it had previously sold for. Even if we’d somehow avoided a global financial crisis, this would have been a bad bet: Before the crash, when the building was almost fully occupied, it generated only about two-thirds of the revenue the Kushners needed to keep up with their debt payments.

After the crisis, however, things got really hairy. The Kushners were forced to sell off the building’s retail space to pay their non-mortgage debt on the building — and then to hand over nearly half of the office space to Vornado as part of a refinancing agreement with the real-estate giant.

The office space that the Kushners retained is worth less than its $1.2 billion mortgage — which is due early in 2019. If their company can’t find some new scheme for refinancing and redeveloping the property by then, Kushner will have cost his family a fortune.

Kushner attempt to secure a $400 million loan from the Chinese insurance firm Anbang, and a $500 million one from former Qatari prime minister and billionaire investor Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani, also known as “HBJ.” Anbang pulled out once the deal attracted critical media scrutiny, and HBJ jumped ship when the Kushners failed to find a second major source of capital.

In those same weeks, Kushner met with Sergey Gorkov, head of the Kremlin-affiliated Vnesheconombank. The senior White House adviser has insisted that this meeting was strictly political; Gorkov maintains it was strictly business.

The truly insane, as in bugfuck nuts, thing is that the United States' biggest base (c.10K) in the Middle East in Qatar!

[TenBenny]

These fuckers are nuts. Lindsay Graham is now saying a war with North Korea would be "worth it." Is there anyone in the GOP that understands the terrible cost of war?

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3765 ... e-long-run

[Chip Z'Hoy]

These fuckers are nuts. Lindsay Graham is now saying a war with North Korea would be "worth it." Is there anyone in the GOP that understands the terrible cost of war?

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3765 ... e-long-run

Do you find that interesting?

[Luminiferous]

“I really believe I’d run in there even if I didn’t have a weapon.”

[risingfarce]

Saw this analogy and thought that I'd share

Chess analogy;

A. * Mueller takes pawn *
Trump-supporter; "It is just a pawn (coffee-boy?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

B. * Mueller takes minor piece *
Trump-supporter; "It is just a bishop (insignificant part of early presidential campaign?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

C. * Mueller takes major piece *
Trump supporter; "It is just a rook (non-essential part of Trump administration?). It doesn't matter. Nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

Some pieces seemingly leave the board of their own accord ("Hey, where is that knight going?")
Some times President Trump removes (fires) his own pieces. ("I don't need such a disloyal bishop. He was a biased bishop. Sad!")
Other pieces are just humiliated and disparaged. ("Why can't the queen just take the other King? Just appoint some more bishops, and investigate the other King for foul play and abuse of power! Witch hunt!")

* Mueller repeats A, B and C. *
Trump-supporter; "It doesn't matter. There is nothing on President Trump. We are winning!"

Robert Mueller; "Checkmate!"
Trump-supporter; "But......."

We need "Checkmate!" right now.

#ImpeachNowPrisonNow

[Luminiferous]

Report: Donald Trump misled the public about freeing UCLA basketball players

President Donald Trump wasn’t entirely truthful about saving three UCLA basketball players stranded in China for shoplifting, according to a new ESPN report.

Twelve hours after being arrested for stealing sunglasses and beaded bracelets at Louis Vuitton and two other stores in Hangzhou, China, UCLA freshmen LiAngelo Ball, Jalen Hill and Cody Riley were released on bail with their passports withheld after returning the items, according to ESPN’s Arash Markazi. They were free to do as they please in the city as the situation was being resolved by UCLA And Pac-12 officials, with help from Alibaba chairman Tsai and the Federation University Sports China.

Two days later, on Friday, Nov. 10, the shoplifting charges against Ball, Hill and Riley were dropped, the bail was returned, and their passports were released on one condition, the report said. The players, now embroiled in reports of an international incident, were not permitted to leave for Los Angeles until Tuesday, a week after their arrest and three days after their UCLA teammates returned home.

“It was important for [Chinese authorities] that the players were left back for a couple of days after the rest of the team flew home,” a UCLA source told ESPN. “We agreed not to say anything and not comment until they returned home. They wanted there to be some kind of punishment and avoid the perception that they got off easy. Their flights were switched from Saturday night to Tuesday night, so they were going back home 72 hours after the rest of the team. So, it wasn’t like we found out Tuesday morning they were coming home that day. We knew. That was already the plan Friday morning.”

On Wednesday, Nov. 15, as the three players prepared to make their first public statements since the incident became global news, Trump, as he is wont to do, took to Twitter to make it about Trump:
Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

Do you think the three UCLA Basketball Players will say thank you President Trump? They were headed for 10 years in jail!
9:11 AM - Nov 15, 2017

According to Trump, who was on an Asian tour at the time, he didn’t contact Chinese president Xi Jinping about the players until Sunday, Nov. 12, after the situation had reportedly been resolved. So, when White House Chief of Staff John Kelly called UCLA officials that day to tell them Trump was “very optimistic that this would be taken care of in short order,” the players already knew their fate.

“The situation was already resolved by the time we heard about Trump’s involvement,” a source told ESPN. “That’s not to take away from the fact that he got involved, but the players already had their passports back and their flights booked to go home Tuesday night when Gen. Kelly called the players.”

The players were encouraged to and did thank Trump, if only to “not create another story by not thanking him,” ESPN reported, but LiAngelo’s father LaVar Ball is not one to avoid stories. Days later, when he got in front of a microphone, LaVar said when asked of Trump’s involvement, “Who? What was he over there for? Don’t tell me nothing. Everybody wants to make it seem like he helped me out.”

To which Trump responded:
Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

Now that the three basketball players are out of China and saved from years in jail, LaVar Ball, the father of LiAngelo, is unaccepting of what I did for his son and that shoplifting is no big deal. I should have left them in jail!
11:42 AM - Nov 19, 2017
Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

Shoplifting is a very big deal in China, as it should be (5-10 years in jail), but not to father LaVar. Should have gotten his son out during my next trip to China instead. China told them why they were released. Very ungrateful!
5:36 PM - Nov 19, 2017

LaVar Ball, seizing the opportunity, doubled down, telling CNN, “If he helped, I would say thank you.”

And Trump upped the ante, too:
Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

It wasn’t the White House, it wasn’t the State Department, it wasn’t father LaVar’s so-called people on the ground in China that got his son out of a long term prison sentence - IT WAS ME. Too bad! LaVar is just a poor man’s version of Don King, but without the hair. Just think..
4:25 AM - Nov 22, 2017
Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump

...LaVar, you could have spent the next 5 to 10 years during Thanksgiving with your son in China, but no NBA contract to support you. But remember LaVar, shoplifting is NOT a little thing. It’s a really big deal, especially in China. Ungrateful fool!
4:33 AM - Nov 22, 2017

So, there is our president, demanding credit for accomplishing nothing.
https://sports.yahoo.com/report-donald- ... 21151.html

[milk-milk-lemonade]

Trump risks more than a trade war by targeting China

Yeah, doesn't the US owe China a fuck ton of money?

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/03/politics ... index.html

[Turner Coates]

[Turner Coates]

Trump on China's Xi consolidating power: 'Maybe we'll give that a shot some day'
https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/03/politics ... index.html

President Donald Trump bemoaned a decision not to investigate Hillary Clinton after the 2016 presidential election, decrying a "rigged system" that still doesn't have the "right people" in place to fix it, during a freewheeling speech to Republican donors in Florida on Saturday.
In the closed-door remarks, a recording of which was obtained by CNN, Trump also praised China's President Xi Jinping for recently consolidating power and extending his potential tenure, musing he wouldn't mind making such a maneuver himself.
"He's now president for life. President for life. No, he's great," Trump said. "And look, he was able to do that. I think it's great. Maybe we'll have to give that a shot some day."

[Luminiferous]

President Donald Trump bemoaned a decision not to investigate Hillary Clinton after the 2016 presidential election, decrying a "rigged system" that still doesn't have the "right people" in place to fix it, during a freewheeling speech to Republican donors in Florida on Saturday.

I still don't know why Drumpf doesn't just put ScaryAnne Conway, Hannity, Alex Jones and Rush Limbaugh in charge of all this Hillary investigatin' and election riggin shenanigans that's afoot here in 'Murica...

Those would be the only ones he could trust..

[DEATH ROW JOE]

[UtahRatt]

I don't watch much politics maybe it's been said but holy shit.....Does Sarah Huckabee remind you of that Iraqi Information Minister?

Every time I hear her speak I wanna stuff a sock in her mouth.

[TenBenny]

I don't watch much politics maybe it's been said but holy shit.....Does Sarah Huckabee remind you of that Iraqi Information Minister?

Every time I hear her speak I wanna stuff a sock in her mouth.

She's basically Trump's answer to Joseph Goebbels.

[vlad]

Trump and his tariffs. Because he's a stupid baby, vindictively idiotic and fucking up the economy because he needs to lash out.

Came across this today, about steel tariffs by the Bush Admin in 2002. It's a PDF.

http://www.tradepartnership.com/pdf_fil ... bstudy.pdf

• 200,000 Americans lost their jobs to higher steel prices during 2002.
These lost jobs represent approximately $4 billion in lost wages from
February to November 2002.

• One out of four (50,000) of these job losses occurred in the metal
manufacturing, machinery and equipment and transportation equipment and
parts sectors.

• Job losses escalated steadily over 2002, peaking in November (at 202,000
jobs), and slightly declining to 197,000 jobs in December.

• More American workers lost their jobs in 2002 to higher steel prices than
the total number employed by the U.S. steel industry itself (187,500
Americans were employed by U.S. steel producers in December 2002).

• Every U.S. state experienced employment losses from higher steel costs,
with the highest losses occurring in California (19,392 jobs lost), Texas
(15,826 jobs lost), Ohio (10,553 jobs lost), Michigan (9,829 jobs lost),
Illinois (9,621 jobs lost), Pennsylvania (8,400 jobs lost), New York (8,901
jobs lost) and Florida (8,370 jobs lost). Sixteen states lost at least 4,500
steel consuming jobs each over the course of 2002 from higher steel
prices.

• While insufficient data exist at this time to measure the precise role steel
tariffs played in causing such significant price increases, relative to the
other factors, it is clear that the Section 201 tariffs played a leading role in
pushing prices up. Steel tariffs caused shortages of imported product and
put U.S. manufacturers of steel-containing products at a disadvantage
relative to their foreign competitors. In the absence of the tariffs, the
damage to steel consuming employment would have been significantly
less than it was in 20 ...

[Luminiferous]

I don't watch much politics maybe it's been said but holy shit.....Does Sarah Huckabee remind you of that Iraqi Information Minister?

Every time I hear her speak I wanna stuff a sock in her mouth.

Every news conference she holds she reminds me of Chevy Chase in Spies Like Us...



Well, of course, their requests for subsidies was not Paraguayan in and of it is as it were the United States government would never have if the president, our president, had not and as far as I know that's the way it will always be. Is that clear?

[TenBenny]

Trump was at an annual political banquet tonight making jokes like "I was late getting here because Kushner couldn't get through security" and "Who will be the next to leave the White House, Stephen Miller or Melania?" What kind of weird wormhole have we all gone down where these situations are comedy?

Also, milestones! Trump hit his 100th day in office at a Trump golf club today (back in Florida). So almost one out of every four days has been spent at a Trump club.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/201 ... clubs.html

[Luminiferous]

"Who will be the next to leave the White House, Stephen Miller or Melania?"

Did Melania laugh or have the "Oh shit, he heard me talking to my attorney" look on her face?

[TenBenny]

"Who will be the next to leave the White House, Stephen Miller or Melania?"

Did Melania laugh or have the "Oh shit, he heard me talking to my attorney" look on her face?

He's really pushing it with these kinds of comments. Sure, Donnie, just keep alluding to the horrible state of your marriage and uninterested trophy wife.

[TenBenny]

I'm really intrigued by how Mueller is now investigating well beyond the scope of just Russia stuff now. This sort of thing is probably going to lead back to Kushner and make the truth behind his "work" in Middle East peace so much more illuminating.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ry-socials