Well... it's Trump... again. #47, here we go.

[lostone]

Interesting story on how Trump's fickle approach to tariffs is hurting the economy in terms of consumer confidence, businesses unable to plan, spending money to bring on product before tariff that then get postponed, etc... He could plunge the country into recession without actually imposing tariffs, but just his on again, off again idiocy.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/06/business/tariff-trade-trump-uncertainty-economy/index.html

I wonder if Trump is somehow turning all of this into a grift. With all the volitility it is causing and with him having sole power to decide if/when tariffs go into effect and then get removed, and which industries get exceptions, there is billions to be made in the financial markets by knowing what he is going to do in advance, as well as profit to be made by selling favorable tariff treatment. We know how easy he is to manipulate and he never turns down an opportunity to make a buck, so it would be surprising if his inner circle is not making massive profits on all this.

An insider trader's wet dream - the more so, given a President who has no respect for rules, and no one with the balls to try to rein him in. and a ton of adoring hard core loyalists willing to defend him from any and all attacks.

 

[ZiprHead]

Does he have dementia or does he just like to act like he has dementia?

Is he a Russian agent or does he just act like a Russian agent.

 

[laughing dog]

President Trump eliminates two key food safety committees

The Trump Administration has eliminated two USDA food safety advisory committees that have been in place for decades. The U.S. Department of Agriculture

www.foodsafetynews.com

Who cares about egg prices anymore if the eggs are bad?

Surely egg producers wouldn’t want to make their customers sick. How is that good for capitalism? Why would we trust some unelected government employee to care more about about us than the ones who want our business?!?!1.

And in the meantime, Kennedy goes stupid

Kennedy and influencers bash seed oils, baffling nutrition scientists

Seed oils have been the focus of fiery critics from internet influencers to high-profile politicians like HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

apnews.com

Goes?

 

[ZiprHead]

"Trump says ‘we’re doing very well with Russia,’ hours after threatening sanctions for bombing Ukraine"

Trump would never sanction his Dear Leader.

 

[ZiprHead]

The stupid, it burns.

Trump now wants the Declaration Of Independence moved to the Oval Office.

Can he get any more childish???

Trump asked for original Declaration of Independence to be moved to the Oval Office

The historic and fragile document is displayed at the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. where it has been housed since 1952

www.the-independent.com

 

[Old Woman in Purple]

A one trick pony and it's a bad trick. But it gets reactions so he feels the power. He's such an infant.

Canada should respond by proposing that the US become their 11th Province

Is there any way we could do an end run around Trump-&-Company, and accept the offer? ( )

 

[GenesisNemesis]

The stupid, it burns.

Trump now wants the Declaration Of Independence moved to the Oval Office.

Can he get any more childish???

Trump asked for original Declaration of Independence to be moved to the Oval Office

The historic and fragile document is displayed at the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. where it has been housed since 1952

www.the-independent.com

Conservatives hate this part:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

most of the jobs never left in the first place. Far more went to automation than ever went overseas.

You keep repeating this. Do you have any numbers to back this absurd statement up?

Just look at the industries that didn't go offshore. Major reductions also.

 

[ZiprHead]

most of the jobs never left in the first place. Far more went to automation than ever went overseas.

You keep repeating this. Do you have any numbers to back this absurd statement up?

Just look at the industries that didn't go offshore. Major reductions also.

Those reductions were slow and easier to anticipate and prepare for. As you yourself said, it did not cause huge layoffs. You just hired less. Unlike automation, offshoring was quick and decimating to many states, especially the rust belt, causing huge amounts of layoffs that doubled as ancillary businesses had to cut back too.

 

[Patooka]

The stupid, it burns.

Trump now wants the Declaration Of Independence moved to the Oval Office.

Can he get any more childish???

Trump asked for original Declaration of Independence to be moved to the Oval Office

The historic and fragile document is displayed at the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. where it has been housed since 1952

www.the-independent.com

I'm not sure it's stupid at all. Imagine if MAGAtards actually read that document and started forming ideas of their own? It's in Trump's interest to keep that thing the fuck out of sight.

 

[lostone]

I have tempered my disapproval of the President, and others may wish to do the same. Say what you will, he is the only thing standing between us and transgendered mice. And the Democrats? Apparently they don't see transgendered mice as a threat!!

Transgendered mice are good on toast, and they are highly recommended by my cat

 

[lostone]

most of the jobs never left in the first place. Far more went to automation than ever went overseas.

You keep repeating this. Do you have any numbers to back this absurd statement up?

“Over the long haul, clearly automation’s been much more important — it’s not even close,” said Lawrence Katz, an economics professor at Harvard who studies labor and technological change.

...

Globalization is clearly responsible for some of the job losses, particularly trade with China during the 2000s, which led to the rapid loss of 2 million to 2.4 million net jobs, according to research by economists including Daron Acemoglu and David Autor of M.I.T.

People who work in parts of the country most affected by imports generally have greater unemployment and reduced income for the rest of their lives, Mr. Autor found in a paper published in January. Still, over time, automation has had a far bigger effect than globalization, and would have eventually eliminated those jobs anyway, he said in an interview. “Some of it is globalization, but a lot of it is we require many fewer workers to do the same amount of work,” he said. “Workers are basically supervisors of machines.”

...

Take the steel industry. It lost 400,000 people, 75 percent of its work force, between 1962 and 2005. But its shipments did not decline, according to a study published in the American Economic Review last year. The reason was a new technology called the minimill. Its effect remained strong even after controlling for management practices; job losses in the Midwest; international trade; and unionization rates, found the authors of the study, Allan Collard-Wexler of Duke and Jan De Loecker of Princeton.

Another analysis, from Ball State University, attributed roughly 13 percent of manufacturing job losses to trade and the rest to enhanced productivity because of automation. Apparel making was hit hardest by trade, it said, and computer and electronics manufacturing was hit hardest by technological advances.

The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China. It’s Automation. (Published 2016)

“Everything we did, you could program a robot to do it.”

www.nytimes.com

What happens when China automates? Will the jobs running the machines then be offshored again to China?

When robots can mine minerals and materials for making more robots, build mining equipment, and can reproduce themselves without any human intervention, and evolve, then we are obsolete.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Trump Admin Reportedly Plotting to Slash NASA Budget by 50 Percent

The Trump administration is expected to slash NASA's science budget by as much as 50 percent, Ars Technica reports.

futurism.com

They want to slash NASA science. One of our greatest government successes.

Even if Congress ultimately disagrees they can do a lot of irreparable damage before Congress can take action.

And this saves such a miniscule fraction of the government’s budget there’s just no sense behind it other than spite.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

most of the jobs never left in the first place. Far more went to automation than ever went overseas.

You keep repeating this. Do you have any numbers to back this absurd statement up?

“Over the long haul, clearly automation’s been much more important — it’s not even close,” said Lawrence Katz, an economics professor at Harvard who studies labor and technological change.

...

Globalization is clearly responsible for some of the job losses, particularly trade with China during the 2000s, which led to the rapid loss of 2 million to 2.4 million net jobs, according to research by economists including Daron Acemoglu and David Autor of M.I.T.

People who work in parts of the country most affected by imports generally have greater unemployment and reduced income for the rest of their lives, Mr. Autor found in a paper published in January. Still, over time, automation has had a far bigger effect than globalization, and would have eventually eliminated those jobs anyway, he said in an interview. “Some of it is globalization, but a lot of it is we require many fewer workers to do the same amount of work,” he said. “Workers are basically supervisors of machines.”

...

Take the steel industry. It lost 400,000 people, 75 percent of its work force, between 1962 and 2005. But its shipments did not decline, according to a study published in the American Economic Review last year. The reason was a new technology called the minimill. Its effect remained strong even after controlling for management practices; job losses in the Midwest; international trade; and unionization rates, found the authors of the study, Allan Collard-Wexler of Duke and Jan De Loecker of Princeton.

Another analysis, from Ball State University, attributed roughly 13 percent of manufacturing job losses to trade and the rest to enhanced productivity because of automation. Apparel making was hit hardest by trade, it said, and computer and electronics manufacturing was hit hardest by technological advances.

The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China. It’s Automation. (Published 2016)

“Everything we did, you could program a robot to do it.”

www.nytimes.com

But it has to be someone to blame! Someone that can be made to fix it. All problems have solutions. Where's your faith?!

 

[Spacetime Inhabitant]

The stupid, it burns.

Trump now wants the Declaration Of Independence moved to the Oval Office.

Can he get any more childish???

Trump asked for original Declaration of Independence to be moved to the Oval Office

The historic and fragile document is displayed at the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. where it has been housed since 1952

www.the-independent.com

High odds that after such a move the document would make its way to Maralago, and end up being splashed by water and deteriorate.

 

[Swammerdami]

The stupid, it burns.

Trump now wants the Declaration Of Independence moved to the Oval Office.

Can he get any more childish???

Trump asked for original Declaration of Independence to be moved to the Oval Office

The historic and fragile document is displayed at the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. where it has been housed since 1952

www.the-independent.com

Conservatives hate this part:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

That's a good reason to move the document to Trump's control. He'll be able to mark up or cross out the "bad parts" with his Sharpie.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

As for the erratic tariffs brouhaha, and other damage to America's economy, institutions and geopolitical standing, realize that this damage delights Putin, Xi, Kim and other Trump "buddies." It's possible that Trump is not deliberately trying to damage the U.S., but in some ways he really is as stupid as he seems, and some of his advisors are Russian agents.

 

[Elixir]

It's possible that Trump is not deliberately trying to damage the U.S.

Ya sure ya betcha. He doesn’t care if “the US” is damaged or not.
He’s only damaging it because it serves to placate his master. He has OBVIOUSLY decided that his legacy must be as the founder of the greatest dynasty o of human leadership the earth has ever seen or ever will see, and that means becoming sole unquestioned dear leader of the most powerful military and richest Country on the planet, with power of life and death over all he sees. Pootey is helping him with the establishing a dictatorship part.

Of course he will think that it is so, even if he lives another 30 years in a padded cell.
Meanwhile he will act that part out for as long as he is permitted to do so. The danger to civilization as we know it has not been so apparent since the Cuban missile crisis. Part of me thinks it’s too ridiculous to expect anyone to go along with it, but that’s where I’ve been so wrong so often.

 

[ideologyhunter]

Conservatives hate this part:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Other clauses in the Declaration that need Sharpie Therapy:
> The complaint that His Majesty "has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good"
> His Majesty has been "obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners"
> He has "made Judges dependent on his will alone"
> "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance"
> He was responsible for "cutting off our Trade with all parts of the World"

Of course, King George proved to be no match for an angry, aroused population of colonial subjects. And his daily behavior became erratic and characterized by irrational and sometimes violent outbursts, and ultimately by full-blown insanity. Not that I'm constructing metaphor.

 

[ImGod]

Trump Admin Reportedly Plotting to Slash NASA Budget by 50 Percent

The Trump administration is expected to slash NASA's science budget by as much as 50 percent, Ars Technica reports.

futurism.com

They want to slash NASA science. One of our greatest government successes.

Even if Congress ultimately disagrees they can do a lot of irreparable damage before Congress can take action.

And this saves such a miniscule fraction of the government’s budget there’s just no sense behind it other than spite.

The thought is Musk can do it better and cheaper. If his rockets stop blowing up.

The first crew he kills, puts him on equal footing. The second or third or fourth, gets people wondering if they are rushing "science" and cutting too many costs.

2 rockets in a row coming apart might get people wondering sooner than later. Hopefully the space station crew gets home safely.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Trump Admin Reportedly Plotting to Slash NASA Budget by 50 Percent

The Trump administration is expected to slash NASA's science budget by as much as 50 percent, Ars Technica reports.

futurism.com

They want to slash NASA science. One of our greatest government successes.

Even if Congress ultimately disagrees they can do a lot of irreparable damage before Congress can take action.

And this saves such a miniscule fraction of the government’s budget there’s just no sense behind it other than spite.

The thought is Musk can do it better and cheaper. If his rockets stop blowing up.

Unfortunately the headline is misleading because the article is about SCIENCE budget being cut in half. ! We are talking about Hubble Space Telescope, and any future astrophysics missions. Earth science will be dead completely, most likely.

It would be near total devastation of NASA science to incur such draconian cuts for no good reason and for so little savings.