Ah those F-16s:

Video Link

https://www.rt.com/russia/614967-what-really-happened-in-bucha/

What really happened in Bucha? The questions Western media won’t ask
The narrative on an event from three years ago is under scrutiny. Here’s a closer look at the evidence

Nobody wants to discuss who wrote Shakespeare’s plays?

There was a hit piece on Junkyard Dog Vance in one of those liberal outlets, Politico or somebody like that, posted in Sailerville. They claimed the Junkyard Dog follows Curtis Yarvin and Bronze Age Pervert on twitter and he is the wildest and craziest guy in all of D.C. I hadn’t seen BAP brought up before in this context but there was an article in another outlet last week claiming Yarvin was influential in Donald the Fat’s org.

I’m thinking no way.

In view of the US multifaceted onslaught on Russia for the past decade – economical, military (fully directing the war effort), conducting vitriolic deceitful anti Russian propaganda that have all completely failed…Trump effort to restore Russian trust of American detente is facing dismal future.

Trump can offer Russians only short term improvement of relation, max 4 years, and even that is not certain. Internally he is facing the strong group of perennial Russia haters that will always block his effort. Furthermore, Russia have long term partnership with China and BRICS that would never be sacrificed for erratic, back-stabbing US relation. I think Trump efforts are sincere, however the Russian mistrust of US is beyond repair.

I first read Michael Piper’s Final Judgement in the early 2000s, when almost no one thought that Israel killed JFK. Twenty years later, thanks to slow chipping away on the internet on obscure alt right channels, this is slowly entering the mainstream.

Cant help thinking that he wants to quieten down the Russian front only so he can do his masters bidding and launch an attack on Iran.

Given the economic troubles can no longer be suppressed in the West, gold well above $3000 an ounce, the Russians are right to play for time.

I shall for ever remember Val Kilmer for his role in The Ghost and the Darkness.

For your dining and dancing pleasure, check this out: a bunch of naif hip-hop girls somehow discover Ionesco…..

Video Link

Who’d-a thunk it.

Also, check out this girl’s attack….

Video Link

Man I woulda killed to have skillz like that when I was

They say the Wends reward you, if you help them, but the problem is nobody knows who they are anymore and if there are any left.

Trump can offer Russians only short term improvement of relation, max 4 years, and even that is not certain

MAGA can offer more years, but it needs to prove it can win elections after Trump runs out of eligibility. A clearly inferior candidate like DeSantis would be a disaster. Is JD Vance the strong successor? So far, so good. However, many are deeply concerned about his ties to Palantir.

The talk about a 3rd term for Trump is clearly bait causing the Fake Stream Media to run around in circles.

Russia have long term partnership with China and BRICS that would never be sacrificed

The word “sacrifice” does not apply. If it is to be a multi-polar world… That implies that multiple partners are possible.
___

Does Russia want to be subordinate to its much larger Chinese neighbor? Clearly not.

Cultivating additional non-Chinese partners avoids dependency. India and the U.S. are obvious choices, but there is no reason to stop there. Christian America and Christian Russia have natural reasons to align on some issues/projects.

Having additional partners does not mean that Russia will cutoff China. Clearly they are, and will remain, a large buyer of hydrocarbons and other exports. However, beefing up other economic relations means that Russia can avoid being dragged down if the CCP does something foolish.
___

BRICS is a talking shop, much like the G20. It is good for PR and photo shoots but does effectively nothing. Can you name anything that BRICS as an institution (not a sub group of 2 or 3 members) has delivered?

How many projects has the BRICS development bank [NDB] completed? Many believe that the CCP wants limited & controlled competition. They suggest that the CCP poaches top tier opportunities before they reach the NDB, redirecting them to their state owned banks.

PEACE 😇

Have read Mr. Unz’s piece on Shakespeare and read a few of his plays in school.

I don’t feel enough of a scholar of the era to speculate on his identity (I think Aaron had probably read all the plays?), but tangentially I will say I think the idea that many weren’t original stories, but reworked ones is pretty interesting.

I also wonder how much of the debate on the identity of the true playwright is driven by the politics of trying to make him a homosexual. I well remember seeing The Merchant of Venice in the theater district in Boston on a school field trip and them leaning into the homo interpretation.

Or course, it is not wholly unlikely that theater was somewhat gay even back then. (That is, that many of the actors were.). No actresses back then. Female parts played by boys. But I don’t think Pepys who came around later wrote anything about homos in the theater, though Restoration theater included actresses. And I think sodomy was supposed to be a capital offence in Shakespeare’s time – they literally would have put the gay actors performing his plays today to death.

John Boyega is still not happy about not being made a Jedi and star of the movies

It would be very funny, if someone altered the original Star Wars films to make the Empire explicitly about hyperdriving in millions of blacks (or insert other group) on the Death Star to alien worlds. And the Rebel Alliance is about aliens coming together with other humans to stop them.

Probably wouldn’t be very difficult.

And I think sodomy was supposed to be a capital offence in Shakespeare’s time – they literally would have put the gay actors performing his plays today to death.

Do you miss the good old days?

The thing about Miss Poland and Miss Kazakstan is they are not whores.

https://ashalogos.substack.com/p/the-aryan-exodus-from-steppe-to-throne

New Russian unit spotted

Video Link

It looks like all of the grandstanding that the kremlinstooges that populate this blogsite spew here is coming to fruition!

MAGA can offer more years, but it needs to prove it can win elections after Trump runs out of eligibility. A clearly inferior candidate like DeSantis would be a disaster. Is JD Vance the strong successor? So far, so good. However, many are deeply concerned about his ties to Palantir.

You are really one of the most reality disconnected posters at Unz.

Trump has started four trade wars and you are talking about the next president.

Airline stocks are down thanks to Canadians cancelling their US trips. Meaning Trump has already hurt a sector of the economy before the tariffs have been enacted.

Captain Cheeto is off the rails.

MAGA is mostly pissed off blue collar Whites. They’re not a majority of America or even close.

Take away their fantasy of the economy going back to 2018 and you will just have pissed off White people. No movement.

Do you miss the good old days?

It may just be a streak of libertarianism in me, but my favorite solution for the super-gays would be to send them to an island, which I would call “Sodomite Island.”. (BTW, I think Tudor England should have done more exiling, rather than capital punishment, generally speaking.)

It wouldn’t necessarily be a bad island (depending on availability), but just some place removed from general society.

I think the influence of theater probably has diminished significantly, but it still seems pretty tied into film production, with many actors being sourced from theater. If theater is a gay stronghold, and I think it is, then this probably has broader cultural implications that extend to film and its influence.

Rian Johnson burned the franchise to the ground with Star Wars: Episode VIII – The Last Jedi. He jettisoned what little JJ Abrams had set up in the prior installment.

The character of Finn, played by John Boyega, was damaged. However this was better than what happened to General Armitage Hux, who was catastrophically wrecked. Rian even managed to both humiliate and kill off Luke Skywalker.

Boyega should be upset with Rian Johnson. However, the failure had nothing to do with race and everything to do with the power of the “girl boss”. Rian was trying to replace Luke with Rey, and elevate Admiral Holdo of the purple hair as a serious leader. He failed.

Star Wars VIII pulled in around 60% of the prior installment. And, set up the next film to do even worse.

PEACE 😇

Video Link

This may shock you. The MAGA movement is creating jobs: (1)

Hiring Accelerates in March Despite Tariff Hysteria, ADP Reports

Hiring came in stronger than expected, with 155,000 jobs added across the U.S. economy

beat Wall Street’s consensus forecast of 120,000.

The data adds to mounting evidence that the U.S. labor market remains resilient even as the economy adapts to a tougher, more strategically focused trade environment. For all the dire warnings about tariffs “hurting business confidence” or “chilling investment,” this is not apparent in the hard data on the U.S. economy.

Leftoid elites, such as yourself, may be having difficulty. However, Main Street America is growing stronger.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.breitbart.com/economy/2025/04/02/hiring-accelerates-in-march-despite-tariff-hysteria-adp-reports/

The tariffs haven’t hit yet.

You probably have one month at the most to wear your red hat in public.

Canada supplies energy to border states and that includes MAGA homelands like Montana and North Dakota.

This is just plain dumb.

Save your damage control efforts for another issue.

It may just be a streak of libertarianism in me, but my favorite solution for the super-gays would be to send them to an island, which I would call “Sodomite Island.”. (BTW, I think Tudor England should have done more exiling, rather than capital punishment, generally speaking.)

That wouldn’t be a libertarian idea. They are very pro-homosexual and support open borders. Meaning they wouldn’t support forcing any single group to live off the mainland.

HIV has always been a solvable problem once it was identified.

Cuba exiled their HIV patients (most were probably fags) to an island and it worked.

The HIV tattoo in the private area idea would also work but our conservatives would never support it.

If we had paid HIV infected gays to get the tattoo then this country would have saved billions.

Conservatives like to blame liberals for tolerating the excesses of wanton homosexuality but they really don’t have the balls to do anything. Even in rural America the schools still depict HIV as just another STD that anyone can get. No data is provided on which group is most likely to get it. Conservatives support scaring White children into being afraid of sex and have accepted liberal deception on HIV.

For all of you DNA nerds.

Dumb asses debunked yet again:

Military update. WEST still believes STALEMATE w/ Stanislav Krapivnik

That wouldn’t be a libertarian idea.

This was intended as a joke framing, for Mr. Hack who implied (in joking form I am sure) that I was a fan of Tudor punishments.

Off the top of my head (not “off with my head”), I only like that time that Henry VII invited a number of rebel leaders to a banquet, where they were served by the boy Lambert Simnel.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambert_Simnel

Btw, I heard Rand Paul was opposed to getting rid of the 1500 trannies in the military because he thought it would cost too much in court challenges.

Rian even managed to both humiliate and kill off Luke Skywalker.

Same thing JJ Abrams did with Han Solo?

But it is pretty sad when you see the old clips of Mark Hamill fresh off of Return of the Jedi saying that when the series returns, Luke will be a father, and it will be about his legacy.

A lot of the draw was nostalgia and it was an epically dumb move to spit upon the old characters – Han and Leia estranged. Luke a recluse, etc.

Incredible: 1/3 of the district judges in DC were not born in the US.

https://www.amren.com/news/2025/04/a-third-of-all-dc-district-judges-were-not-born-in-united-states/

A lot of the draw was nostalgia and it was an epically dumb move to spit upon the old characters – Han and Leia estranged. Luke a recluse, etc.

What difference does it make when Star Wars fans buy anything that Disney makes?

They could put Luke in a 3 way with two trans wookies and Star Wars fans would still buy tickets on opening day.

Then they would do podcasts on how Disney ruined Star Wars……in a Star Wars shirt while holding a Star Wars coffee cup. Take that Disney!

Do Star Wars fans not have dads? Why are so many White men obsessed with this series?

John Stewart “red pilled” — It is far worse than I could have imagined.

How Team Biden’s infrastructure bill spent money on everything except delivering rural broadband.

PEACE 😇

(Imagine being a kid in school and being forced to watch it.)

In the 90s I remember having to watch Gandhi, Mississippi Burning and Schindler’s List in history lessons, the topics we were studying were Gandhi and Indian Independence, Nazism and the Civil Rights Movement.

The total collapse of Star Wars merchandise sales is impressive. The Ashoka product going to double ultra deep discount at Ollies is amazing.

This video is a bit old. Acolyte product has to be much worse. I cannot even name a character than the series.

No one is watching the new stuff.
No one is buying the new stuff.

The only toy group that has positive numbers is LEGO. Their deal always keeps multiple products from the original trilogy in circulation. People will spend $500 for Jabba’s Sail Barge from the third movie Return of the Jedi.

PEACE 😇

120 people in the American embassy in Paris are CIA agents. ***

*** in 1962. Today’s factual number is top secret. That 120 people in 1962 was top secret for 60 years. Until last week.

Trump’s mention of the third term is obviously a reference to the Barron Trump presidential era (2041-2081) when Barron, who is a test tube genetic clone of Donald, will become eligible. DJT is simply laying groundwork so that Barron (also known as DJT 2.0) will not run afoul of annoying Presidential eligibility rules which might discriminate against clones. We haven’t been through the Clone Wars yet so Donald is just getting ahead of the game to preemptively support his legacy.

Speaking of Boston, isn’t “P-town” effectively the island you are referring to? OK, Provincetown is on a peninsula, but you can get there on a fairy boat. Watch out for the monkeys!

I thought any tattoo in the (male) private area was already effectively an HIV tatoo….

The total collapse of Star Wars merchandise sales is impressive.

Do you just make stuff up in your head that sounds good?

Star Wars: The Force Awakens earns more than 3 billion in merchandise
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/star-wars-merchandise-earned-over-3bn-disney-1542976

There are always warehouses of crap that doesn’t sell.

It doesn’t cost them much to make and it is easy to overestimate demand.

I thought any tattoo in the (male) private area was already effectively an HIV tatoo….

Any private tattoo or piercing on either gender should probably be an STD test before any long term relationship.

Fair trade is objectively better than giving advantages to other nations: (1)

Expect a TRUMP Tariff BOOM, Not a Recession

Patnaik’s research shows that in such sectors, uncertainty doesn’t lead to paralysis—it sparks a race to adapt. That’s exactly what we’re seeing now: companies aren’t waiting for perfect clarity on trade policy—they’re investing preemptively to gain advantage in a newly configured global marketplace. The uncertainty created by tariffs, far from stalling growth, is driving a wave of capital spending and strategic repositioning.

Uncertainty isn’t always economically harmful. In fact, the tariffs of Liberation Day may be exactly what we need to break out of the low-investment, high-dependence trap that the free trade consensus left behind.

Those who loathe America will come out via unhinged screaming against Trump’s pro-worker initiatives. How many commenters here will self identify?

PEACE 😇
___________

(1) https://www.breitbart.com/economy/2025/04/02/breitbart-business-digest-expect-a-trump-tariff-boom-not-a-recession/

Wow and from the most pro-Trump website on the internet.

Brietbart writer says that Trump’s farts smell great and that trade wars will cause an economic boom. Fascinating stuff.

Have a look at this:

Canadians claim they are canceling trips to US for remainder of Trump term
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/canadians-claim-they-are-canceling-trips-to-us-for-remainder-of-trump-term/ar-AA1BWcuP?ocid=BingNewsVerp

Trump has pissed off one of our top trade partners and he keeps giving different reasons.

Those who loathe America will come out via unhinged screaming against Trump’s pro-worker initiatives. How many commenters here will self identify?

Trump’s own voters will be the ones screaming. He is going to jack up prices at Dollar General with his China tariffs.

A bigley stupid move that will note create jobs.

These companies can’t just move their factories overnight. As if Americans really want to work at a factory making $1 pool noodles.

Needlessly insulting Canadians and passing tariffs on them is a bigley genius move

Maybe Trump should also piss on their flag during his White House address. That will help.

Piss on their flag and mumble about cars and the steel…..oh and also bring up again that they should be a state. Canadians really like that. They also find the “governor” remark to be hilarious. Keep it up.

I mean this in all seriousness. — Have you found a way to embed crack in your bung hole so that you get high snorting your own fart gas????

Why would you try to pass off a 2016 article as current?

Star Wars: Ashoka product does not sell. If you want to challenge that — Post an citation that explicitly addresses that toy line.

Star Wars: The Acolyte is another failure. If you want to defend current SW junk, how much Acolyte merchandise has moved?

PEACE 😇

In the 90s I remember having to watch Gandhi, Mississippi Burning and Schindler’s List in history lessons

That seems like a lot. Kind of funny you had the civil rights stuff imported and then had colonial stuff on top of it.

One of our old commenters is separated by Vance by only two degrees.

LOL, more people are catching on that Trump is a Third World president; I had warned that this was a strong possibility.

Ironically, while mass immigration from the Third World is bad and disruptive, adopting third world style of governance and policies is far worse. Immigrants have been assimilated in the past, if there is something to assimilate to. It has been done in the USA in the past. Much harder to fix a broken system, however. When the Democrats get into power, will they revert the governing system to how it once was, or will they instead just use the tools that Trump made for their own benefit? Almost certainly it will be the latter.

Drew Pavlou:

“I genuinely think MAGA is a third world ideology.

– Caudillo style cult of the leader like Perón or Chávez
– Witch doctor / shaman approach to public health
– Juche economics of self-reliance
– Hatred for Europe and Canada
– Admiration for Latin American dictatorships
– Cronyism, clientalism, patronage networks that look like Russia in the 1990s”

“Here is one example. The MAGA approach to public health probably has its closest parrallel in South African President Thabo Mbeki’s HIV/AIDs denialism which ultimately resulted in the preventable deaths of about 350,000 people.

Mbeki appointed his own version of RFK Jr named Manto Tshabalala-Msimang who advocated unproven herbal remedies such as ubhejane, garlic, beetroot, and lemon juice to treat AIDS.

They instituted policies denying antiretroviral drugs to AIDS patients and Mbeki even restricted the use of a pharmaceutical company’s donated supply of nevirapine, a drug that helps keep newborns from contracting HIV.

350,000 dead.

This is the real world consequence of turning over your national public health strategy to charlatans, witch doctors, shamans etc. MAGA truly is a Third World movement.”

I would be impressed if he was near ultimate warrior.

Drew Pavlou does not understand Kayfabe.

I am convinced one of the reasons LatW doesn’t like Trump

I don’t dislike Trump (except him supporting and uplifting MRAs – those should be kept out of polite society, at the very bottom and the fact that he’s a bit anti-intellectual) but I do despise those who are behind him (the greedy lutnicks, the thiels, the kushners, etc) and empty vessels like Vance who pretends to rally for “the White working class” but marries out of his race and then attacks Europe on ridiculous pretexts.

I’m still hoping that Trump years will improve my personal financial situation (the way he did during his first term). Hope dies last, of course, so I’m preparing for the worst (but hoping for the best).

You said the total collapse of star wars merchandise is impressive.

You haven’t provided evidence of such a collapse.

A failed product is not a total collapse.

If you want to defend current SW junk, how much Acolyte merchandise has moved?

That doesn’t make any sense.

I pointed out their massive profit from a Star Wars movie. That doesn’t mean I am a Star Wars dork like yourself.

Ashoka is just a series on Disney+.

With a movie release they have Star Wars on everything. The Disney+ shows aren’t as promoted.

If they make another crappy movie it will have successful merchandise sales and you will go pay full price for a ticket.

Star Wars fans have proven that they will watch any garbage movie that Disney throws at them.

Due process and rule of law are just as important as public health.

Institutions, systems, trust – easy to destroy, but hard to build up afterwards.

And there is no guarantee that there will ever be normal elections again. (Let’s hope that those suspicions are wrong).

LOL. Reminds me of all the crazed libs who promised to move to Canada when Trump won the first, second and third times. Still waiting!

Why would the Canadians want to go to Detroit in the first place? Why would anyone?

Sports.

That is why people go to Detroit. Pull up Google maps and look at how many stadiums are just a bridge away from Windsor.

Detroit also has casinos and bars.

You and Trump clearly don’t understand how many of our border states are intertwined with Canada.

That’s fine for a forum poster but Trump is unfortunately the president.

Mbeki probably saved millions of people from iatrogenic disease (bogus AIDS treatments). Much of the mainstream AIDS and HIV narrative from Africa has always been ridiculous on its face, even more so than in the West.

I genuinely think MAGA is a third world ideology.

Trump wasn’t too bad in his first term but this round feels like revenge of the boors. Like a reverse revenge of the nerds where the jocks take over the government.

He and his team act like they have had enough of pointy headed thinking and can move forward on feels. DONT U BE ASKIN IF RUSSIA INVADED UKRAINE. I DONT LIKE YOUR ATTITUDE. MAYBE I WILL INVADE YOUR FACE WITH THIS FIST.

Here is one example. The MAGA approach to public health probably has its closest parallel in South African President Thabo Mbeki’s HIV/AIDs denialism which ultimately resulted in the preventable deaths of about 350,000 people.

Or how about Mugabe and his belief that he was smarter than Western economists.

I WILL PRINT ALL THE MONEY I WANT

U BOOK NERDS DONT KNOW ANYTHING

This is the real world consequence of turning over your national public health strategy to charlatans, witch doctors, shamans etc. MAGA truly is a Third World movement.

I think what happened is that this time Trump completely surrounded himself with ass kissers. No one is questioning his bigley genius moves like starting multiple trade wars.

White people gone stupid. Quite a shame.

It seems really weird and remarkable that all the Ferengi on Star Trek were played by Jews.

I believe JD Vance would destroyed whom ever the party of lies will nominate.

I was just fishing to see which silly answer you would give. Bingo!

I don’t claim to know why Trump is doing the Canada or Greenland bits. However, if all of the traffic in illegal drugs, illegal immigrants and sex slaves which are discussed as trickling down over the Northern border is stopped it will be worth the hassle. These flows are less than what is happening at the Southern border, but may also be easier to stop. Up North, simply shining a bright light on these problems may do it.

Why, don’t the Ferengi represent Jews? This is a role of honor for Jewish actors and might be off limits for others.

When the Democrats get into power,…

Only after JD Vance 8 years rein. Who can beat him, Hunter?

The Dems could come up with a populist / Democrat Tea Party style candidate, someone like AOC – even if not her personally, with her being too young, they could be looking for someone like her, there is a schism now within the Dems between the establishment ones and more radical or egalitarian ones. Trump & Vance could take things so far into one direction, that when the pendulum swings back, a far left / populist left candidate could do well. That is assuming that the billionaires will not control the election (in which case they will most likely make sure Vance “wins” since he is their person).

I was just fishing to see which silly answer you would give. Bingo!

It’s not a silly answer. Detroit’s economy depends on professional sports teams. White people of Michigan go to Detroit for the Lions and not the art museums. Is that news to you?

Canadians go to the US for NFL and NBA. They sell out their own hockey games to where it is cheaper for them to watch a home team play the Red Wings even if it means getting a hotel. Both you and Trump seem unaware of how much the border states depend on each other economically.

What part of the country do you purport to be from?

Do you claim to be American? I’m getting “none of the above” vibes from you. Are you actually a Canadian like A123?

However, if all of the traffic in illegal drugs, illegal immigrants and sex slaves which are discussed as trickling down over the Northern border is stopped it will be worth the hassle.

Do you have a source for any of that? Trump mumbling is not a source.

What is the major drug threat from the north?

It seems really weird and remarkable that all the Ferengi on Star Trek were played by Jews.

I only like the original.

In fact I had a boomer give me sh-t for it.

Not kidding.

I told him I only watch Captain Kirk and it broke him mentally. He knew I watched occasional sports and then I put on classic star trek. In his mind you watch one or the other.

I wouldn’t even describe myself as fan. I just think next generation is gay as f.

Kirk is a realistic man’s man flying around in space.

Picard is some HR approved liberal. I’ve worked with enough HR approved liberals. I don’t need a show about one.

At this rate you’ll be Community Organising in Chicago, by the next election.

Oh yea? How many Chinese? The wonderful Chinese women that I get massage from don’t even speak English. They use a phone translator. Tell them to learn basic English before they come.

When they come home I’ll help brush up their English.

Look on the bright side.

It helps address the depopulation issue, its a win win for all three countries.

Anatoly Karlin 🧲💯
@powerfultakes

I repatriated to Russia in 2017, and it started doing very powerful things 5 years later.

I am going to the US in 2025, what awaits it in 2030? In any case it should be fun to observe.

https://twitter.com/powerfultakes/status/1907561929108861275

The Circle of Life, I’m ready are you?

Why, don’t the Ferengi represent Jews? This is a role of honor for Jewish actors and might be off limits for others.

That is actually how they dismiss criticism of it. Because it can’t be anti-Jewish if all the actors are Jews.

Were all the Indians on F-Troop Jews? That might be something cultural.

But the Ferengi are very short, like Robert Reich. Am tempted to attribute them playing it to HBD.

Pretty shocking that they had an actual guy in a dress in the show (if in the background.). I can’t believe they put that on TV back then. I wonder if it was related to AIDS. (But I suppose MASH did it beforehand.)

Star Trek Enterprise did some hamfisted messaging about AIDS, where they created some Vulcan mind meld disease as a stand-in for it, and condemned the prejudice surrounding the disease.

Interesting discussion between an Orthodox Christian priest and a Jewish rabbi. With English subtitles.

This raises a larger question.

“They” are really the prime example of this, but they are far from alone. Every two bit ethnicity aside from maybe Pygmies have their own ethnic interest operations in the imperial Metropole. Europeans aren’t immune, I.e. Brzezinski, massage enjoyers etc

An odd feature of the US is just how much influence is actually in the hands of foreigners. Half of the goals are never about American interests at all, but are simply petty ethnic grudges of hyphenated Americanos.

Your ethnic lobby can use the US government to take revenge against your old enemy.

I’m getting ready.

Massachusetts was the first state to legalize gay marriage. It was the state supreme court. The deciding vote was imported from South Africa. Not an ethnic, I think, (though married to one) but with antiapartheid and other bonafides pre-established.

Btw, I find it really galling that Israel actually had tariffs against the US.

I’m well aware of the ties between the USA and Canada. I am a naive born American and have lived in both the Northern and Southern border areas of the USA. I have only been to Canada a few times over the years, but would still like to go visit Quebec City. Your “none of the above” vibe is probably a reaction to my belief that the USA has intentionally caused the Ukrainian crisis and is willfully risking WW3 for no reason. This is part of my simple pro-peace, pro-America perspective.

My understanding is that some of the fentanyl comes through Canada.

Canada has slightly more people than California. I know of about seven high tech Canadian companies which are world-class in their niches. The Canadian contribution to the tech world is probably lower per capita than the USA but is decent for a small country. I have worked with numerous Canadians over the years, most of whom had left the Great White North for greener pastures down here (careers or education).

My take on Team Trump’s tariffs is these politicians are owning the USA debt bomb. Who knows if this is true, but that is my interpretation of how some of these moves tie together. People have been “head in sand” on this problem for decades because of petrodollar easy money. If the debt bomb kills the dollar then the music stops and there are not enough chairs to go around. Paying down the debt, increasing local production while improving efficiency, and reducing the size of government seem like important ways to address the problem.

you’ll have to exploit the native born to do unseemly and dirty jobs instead.

https://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/11/27/the-odd-chabad-connection-between-putin-and-trump/

https://crownheights.info/chabad-news/901686/from-the-frontline-to-the-megillah-jewish-soldiers-arrived-from-the-battlefield-to-purim-celebrations-in-kyiv/

https://ukranews.com/en/news/990799-russia-can-stage-nuclear-catastrophe-at-any-moment-budanov

Has anyone noticed how anti-white K-Pop is? You occasionally see other races in K-Pop videos but you almost never see whites. Casting a white person in a K-Pop video seems to be practically forbidden.

I know some people hold up K-Pop as an example of a “based” music industry, but it’s a reminder to me of how K-Pop seems to be controlled by people with the same attitude towards white people that the American/Western music industry has.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/russia-formally-declared-national-security-140744331.html

‘As Security Minister, I see first-hand the disruptive activity conducted by Russia, beyond their barbaric and illegal war against Ukraine, including their attempts to infiltrate our democracy and sow discord in our society.’

‘We will not stand for it.’

Russia formally declared national security threat to Britain

Russia has been formally declared a national security threat to Britain for the first time.

Dan Jarvis, the security minister, announced on Tuesday that Russian agents working on behalf of Vladimir Putin’s regime will be forced to register their activities or face five years in jail.

In a statement to the Commons, he said Russia presented an “acute threat” to UK national security through hostile acts in recent years, including the Salisbury nerve agent poisonings, espionage, cyber attacks and the invasion of Ukraine.

The Russian state will be added to the highest “enhanced tier” of the forthcoming Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (Firs), a status reserved for nations that pose a risk to the safety of the UK’s interests.

The scheme – which will go live on July 1 – will, for the first time, compel anyone in the UK acting for a foreign power or entity to declare their activities or face arrest and prosecution.

Mr Jarvis said it would include Putin and Russia’s government agencies and authorities, including its armed forces, intelligence services, police forces and judges. Some Russian political parties, such as United Russia, will also be covered.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/british-commandos-helped-bring-cia-050000609.html

‘According to the investigation drawn from 300 interviews with government, military and intelligence sources in nine countries across the US and Europe, the Americans provided a vast range of weapons, intelligence, strategy and planning, while a British general managed the logistics hub from Clay Kaserne.’

Washington and London

How British commandos helped bring the CIA into the heart of the Ukraine war

An operations room was set up two months into the war in Germany

A team of British commandos escorted Ukrainian generals out of Kyiv to join an emergency war room where Western military chiefs plotted the defeat of Russia.

Two generals were taken by armed guard on diplomatic passports into Poland, then Germany, shortly after the war broke out to join an operation involving the CIA that would help turn the tide of the conflict and embarrass Vladimir Putin’s armed forces.

The operations room was set up two months into the war in Clay Kaserne, the headquarters of US Army Europe and Africa, a component of the US armed forces, in Wiesbaden, Germany.

Clay Kaserne would become a complex staging post for joint efforts involving Nato allies to assist Ukraine in fighting Russia.

Details of assistance to Ukraine were revealed on Sunday in a wide-ranging investigation by The New York Times (The NYT) that raised questions about how intimately involved the US, Britain and the West have been in the war in Ukraine.

Why does your precious Disney star wars trilogy have merchandise sitting on the shelves for years? See video below for the evidence.
___

When looking at theater revenue, remember there is a roughly 50/50 split of ticket revenue between theater and the distributor. Thus, $100 million of box office generates only $50 million back to the movie production.

You paid full price to see Solo (2018) on the big screen. I have not seen it even on streaming It flopped. Disney’s share of ticket sales was ~$200 million. Admitted production cost, excluding marketing, was over $300 million and everyone knows that Hollywood firms under report expenses. Conservatively, adding in marketing and unreported costs, Solo lost at least $200 million, likely $250-300.

There has not been a movie since that failure. Next up is Mandalorian & Grogu (2026). It is based on a Disney+ streaming show that very little of the potential theater audience has seen. If you are excited for it… you are the only one. There is no buzz for this movie. Will it make the $500-600 million box office needed to break even? It is too early to tell, but confidence is low. Have fun paying for a full price ticket to see this. I am not going to do so.

PEACE 😇

I know some people hold up K-Pop as an example of a “based” music industry,

thought a lot of the male bands were highly feminized?

Has anyone noticed how anti-white K-Pop is?

I am not really familiar with the music videos. Exactly what other racial groups are you talking about?

But I don’t think many Euros would accept the grueling k-pop lifestyle that begins at a young age. IMO, the success of it has to do with the fact that South Korea was basically a third world country in the ’70s, so they are more strivers.

I do watch Korean movies. In a few of them, there is clearly tension with the US, which might be mistaken for antiwhitism. And Bong Joon Ho, in particular, who is their most promoted director internationally, is probably a race communist.

Star Trek Enterprise did some hamfisted messaging about AIDS, where they created some Vulcan mind meld disease as a stand-in for it, and condemned the prejudice surrounding the disease.

I seem to remember them having quite a few PSA type episodes. The problem was your own fear and ignorance!

But honestly not a bad show when compared to whoopi working a space gas station. Take away the space adventures and add whoopi. Wow.

You paid full price to see Solo (2018) on the big screen.

I never made that claim and I rarely see a movie in the evening. Stop making stuff up. I have this thing called a home entertainment system which means I don’t have to pay 50 bucks for two tickets and popcorn.

In fact I rarely watch a movie in the theater. I can somehow control my purchases while the Star Wars fans have proven themselves to be Disney zombies that will pay for anything.

I enjoyed Solo along with Rogue One. The rehash movies are complete garbage and anyone who can’t admit it needs to see a therapist for arrested development and nostalgia dependency.

I have not seen it even on streaming It flopped. Disney’s share of ticket sales was ~$200 million

You keep projecting your attachment to this franchise and if everyone else is a fanboy of some type. I don’t care if Solo made 5 dollars and gave Kathleen Kennedy an itchy vagina. Why would I care? I don’t own Disney stock and they’re just movies. They’re not real. There is no such thing as a light saber and Mark Hamil is not Luke or even a good actor. Grown White embarrass themselves by going to conferences over this shit. I had to work with a manager whose office was covered in this crap. SW lunchboxes, coffee cups, etc. I assumed his wife was banging someone else.

There has not been a movie since that failure. Next up is Mandalorian & Grogu (2026). It is based on a Disney+ streaming show that very little of the potential theater audience has seen. If you are excited for it… you are the only one.

There you go projecting again. I have never gotten excited about a Disney movie since I was 8 or 9.

Conservatives that revel in Disney movies flopping aren’t looking at their numbers. They make so much money from Disney+ and merchandising that all of their movies could flop. Go pull their quarterly profit from Disney+ if you doubt that.

Your “none of the above” vibe is probably a reaction to my belief that the USA has intentionally caused the Ukrainian crisis and is willfully risking WW3 for no reason. This is part of my simple pro-peace, pro-America perspective.

It has nothing to do with Ukraine. I’ve never seen you comment on any specific part of America.

But I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt as your English at least checks out.

You don’t have Canadian habits in your English like A123.

My take on Team Trump’s tariffs is these politicians are owning the USA debt bomb.

I get that but this is too much.

You have to be careful with tariffs and Trump is throwing them around like hand grenades.

There is a much simpler way of reducing the deficit which is to shut down the German and Japanese bases. Then reduce the submarine fleet by half. That would be a good start.

Trump however is talking about funding a new jet.

Institutions, systems, trust – easy to destroy, but hard to build up afterwards.
 
And there is no guarantee that there will ever be normal elections again. (Let’s hope that those suspicions are wrong).

This is what we are seeing in the U.S.

Education was once about Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic. Now it is about advancing a political and social agenda. High school graduates are reaching college without the ability to do the work. Clearing out the failed Dept. Of Education is a good start, but rebuilding schools that focus on academics will be difficult.

The judiciary was once trusted. Now progressive activist judges are openly ignoring the Constitution to steal powers from the executive branch. And, they are doing it for crazy reasons, such as protecting violent non-citizen gang members from deportation. If SCOTUS refuses to rein in subordinate judges, we could easily reach a breaking point.

Normal elections require good roles of registered citizen voters backed up by voter ID. The Democrats are deliberately blocking requirements to show proof of citizenship for registration. And, they keep pushing mail in balloting, which is obviously much harder to secure versus in person options.

Few believe yesterdays election result in Wisconsin. (1)

Rasmussen Reports
@Rasmussen_Poll

Fact Check: Possibly True

Liz Harrington
@realLizUSA

What a neat trick! GOP turn out is off the charts and mobilization “did succeed” but, vou la!, they still lose!

It’s not a turnout issue, it’s a fraud issue

@PeterBernegger

2025 WI Supreme Court election – Republican Brad Schimel 1,063,244 votes he lost, by 10% points

2023 Democrat Janet Protasiewicz 1,021,370 votes
she won, by 10% points, 2 years ago.

The data I’m looking at is showing absentee ballots being fed into the system to keep liberal Susan Crawford ahead at a certain rate.

… almost as if an algorithm was at work.

The graph below tells a story. From
@RealSKeshel
thank you! His comments:

“Brad Schimel’s 1.063mm votes last night was higher than any Democrat vote total in the history of any WI Supreme Court race. He lost by 10.

Turnout ain’t the issue, folks. Dems have mastered ballot harvesting over a lengthy early voting period and can figure out with basic math where their opponent is likely to wind up in order to get over the top.

The country can’t survive with mail-in voting.” Seth Keshel.
 

Trump’s win was so large, there was no concerted effort to steal the Presidency. However, the level of trust is plummeting. If the Democrats try to rig a state in 2028, it will not be accepted by the people.

Could the Democrat party and their followers rebuild trust? Possibly. Do they want to? Signs point to “NO”.

Wanton destruction of Teslas is not the way to go. How many DNC leaders have spoken out against the violence? I cannot think of any. They act like they do not want trust or institutions. They are after authoritarian rule.

The real hope for America is relegating the Democrat party to permanently minority status at the federal level and in as many states as possible. If they keep taking the wrong side of 20/80 and 10/90 issues it could happen. How many parents actually want men in their daughter’s sports program or bathroom?

Secret ballots and in person voting allow parents to express their will without the risk of public exposure. Mail in balloting needs to return to limited historical minimums. Primarily, those out of country or provably medically infirm. In person early voting will likely stay, however it must be closely monitored.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://instapundit.com/712172/

Did he say why he wants to move to the United States? If not we can speculate his boy friend is going to go all the way and have their sex parts converted by a surgeon which is something you might need to avoid having a Russian surgeon do.

It looks like our stalwart defender of Captain Cheeto and his minions of the great prole army, kremlinstoogeA123, has also place you on “ignore”. Welcome to the club!

Why are you such a defender of your precious Disney? You claim disinterest and then run cover for their failures.

They make so much money from Disney+

ROTFLMAO

Disney+ has lost money every quarter it has been existed. It is so bad, they were sued early last year.

Marvel and Star Wars streaming shows perform badly and are incredibly expensive.

What has propped the up the firm? Largely the theme parks. However, those are beginning to struggle due to brand destruction.

The failure of Zegler’s Snow White goes beyond direct box office losses. Disney damaged the IP and it is “evidently so”.

They spent huge money on a log flume ride, Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. It was supposed to tie into a new animated release that was subsequently cancelled.

Your reliance on Disney’s glossy annual report is leading you astray. You should look at their 10-K/10-Q reporting. These do not tell everything, but it would be a step up for you.

PEACE 😇

It is my belief that under cover of the 1776 proto-Capitalist American Revolution that the United States and United Kingdom engaged in a strategic false split in order to conceal from the world the ever growing might of the Capitalist British Empire, and to lull humanity into a false sense of security. Once a perceived overwhelming strength of the Capitalist US and UK had been achieved, the false split between them would give way to one British-American clenched fist, and hence the world wars since 1900.

The Soviet defector Anatoliy Golitsyn alleges in his 1984 book New Lies for Old that the Soviet Union and Red China, for the reason of concealing the ever growing might of Communism from the world and to lull it into a false sense of security, would also engage in a strategic false split between each other. And that someday, once the time was right, the false Sino-Soviet split would give way to a single Russian-Chinese clenched fist.

If this is the case on the part of the Communist Soviet Union and Red China, was this simply an unconscious (or conscious?) reaction to the false split the Capitalist United States and United Kingdom had themselves already long engaged in?

[In a later 1995 book, The Perestroika Deception, Golitsyn alleges that the various nationalist states which emerged in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union after the ‘fall of Communism’ circa 1990 were all false fronts.]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/russian-us-steps-normalise-ties-233652973.html

https://archive.org/details/NewLiesForOld/page/n355/mode/1up

‘After successful use of the scissors strategy…a Sino-Soviet reconciliation could be expected. It is contemplated and implied by the long-range policy and by strategic disinformation on the [Sino-Soviet] split.’

‘Traditional [American] conservatives would be isolated and driven toward extremism. They might become the victims of a new McCarthyism of the left.’

‘Before long, the communist strategists might be persuaded that the balance had swung irreversibly in their favor. In that event they might well decide on a Sino-Soviet “reconciliation.” The scissors strategy would give way to the strategy of [a Sino-Soviet] “one clenched fist.” New Lies For Old by Anatoliy Golitsyn (1984) – pg 345 -346

‘China and Russia declared a “no limits” strategic partnership days before Russian President Vladimir Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022.’ “The principle of ‘friends forever, never enemies…serves as a solid legal basis for advancing strategic cooperation at a higher level,” Wang told Russia’s RIA state news agency in an interview.

‘Friends forever, never enemies’, Chinese foreign minister tells Russia

(Reuters) – China and Russia are “friends forever, never enemies,” Chinese’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in remarks published on Tuesday during a visit to Moscow in which he also welcomed signs of normalising ties between Washington and Moscow.

“The principle of ‘friends forever, never enemies’ … serves as a solid legal basis for advancing strategic cooperation at a higher level,” Wang told Russia’s RIA state news agency in an interview.

Wang is on a three-day visit to Moscow for strategic cooperation talks, a trip overshadowed by uncertainty around talks to secure a ceasefire in Ukraine and U.S. President Donald Trump’s criticism of the Russian and Ukrainian leaders.

China and Russia declared a “no limits” strategic partnership days before Russian President Vladimir Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has met Putin over 40 times in the past decade and the two leaders have since agreed to deepen ties and cooperate on issues such as Taiwan, Ukraine and mutual rival the United States.

…If the debt bomb kills the dollar then the music stops and there are not enough chairs to go around. Paying down the debt, increasing local production…

Any alternative to dollar is at this point worse. Trump trying to save the dollar is commendable and the world needs to adjust. It will hurt a lot of people riding the inefficiency-subsidies train – of course they don’t want to change. Their best argument is that it will not work anyway because the mathematics of debt are not fixable – that we should just ride it down, it would years, let’s have fun.

I can see their point of view – to continue the fake money party, don’t worry, be happy. But a collapse is not a sudden one-time event. The issues with over-issuance of non-existing wealth with debt are already eating away at the world economy.

Debts are claims on real assets by a second party – they used to be secured by something real and with limits on how much the debtor and creditor could simultaneously use the underlying real assets. That has been thrown out, today debts are treated like real assets by multiple parties.

US dollar is a debt instrument and too many have been issued. This euphoric money madness is not unprecedented, it has happened before in history. It ends with a financial meltdown. What Trump is doing is trying to prevent it or at least postpone it. We should wish him good luck, he will need it.

Before coming out against wokeness and government waste and fraud, Musk should have waited until he had the Mars base and at least 100 starships in orbit, filled with tungsten poles.

They make so much money from Disney+

ROTFLMAO

Disney+ has lost money every quarter it has been existed. It is so bad, they were sued early last year.

You are one strange Canadian.

You can’t seem to separate business analytics from your emotions and don’t even keep up on the company that you like to comment on. In your mind everything is cheering. As if everyone cheerleads first and then later reads the details. It might blow your mind but some of us actually read first and then develop an opinion.

They had 321 million in profit from Disney+/ESPN/Hulu for Q4 2024
https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/14/24296307/disney-plus-streaming-business-profit-q4-2024-earnings

Yes quite hilarious stuff. They can have a flop like Snow White every year and still be highly profitable.

You also are probably unaware that this is all after overseas tax shenanigans. Meaning they have massive amounts of loot overseas that they don’t bring back. That is the reported profit after cooking the books for the tax man. These large media and tech companies play games with their international revenue and our dopey right tells us that they actually need tax breaks. Trump in fact wants to give Disney a tax break. Do you agree with that proposal?

Jose Johnson,

LOL — Are deception and shilling what they taught you at your Mexican school? It is not going to fly in America where I live.

We were talking exclusively about one service “Disney+”. Everyone noticed that you could not defend your position and pivoted to a bundle of services “Disney+/ESPN/Hulu”.

The problem is that you just jumped out of a hole into a chasm. Recall that Disney paid Comcast $8.6 Billion for their stake in Hulu back in 2023. Your shill site Verge of course omits that.

For simplicity, lets go with even thirds:

$8,666 Million expense
$   333 Million profit

Therefore the payback (assuming no interest expense) is 26 years. Of course there is interest and not all of the available profit can be allocated to Hulu. Some of it has to be shared with other streaming sub-businesses.

Only in your Mexican analysis is your precious Disney doing well. In my America, Disney’s stock price peaked ~$200 back in 2021. It has now collapsed by over half to around $92 today. Losses on streaming, including Hulu acquisition costs, is a huge part of that decline.

You really should learn how to read a 10-K. It would help you immensely.

PEACE 😇

We were talking exclusively about one service “Disney+”. Everyone noticed that you could not defend your position and pivoted to a bundle of services “Disney+/ESPN/Hulu”

Yea it must be some defensive tactic. That is must be it. Again everything in your mind is tribalistic cheering. Us vs Them.

Or perhaps that is how it is reported in the financial statement in the source I provided.

Disney made money off its streaming business for the second time in a row. During Q4 2024, profit from Disney Plus, Hulu, and ESPN Plus soared to $321 million, up from $47 million last quarter.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/14/24296307/disney-plus-streaming-business-profit-q4-2024-earnings

I dug this up in all of 30 seconds:
Disney Plus generated $10.4 billion revenue in 2024, an 21.6% increase year-on-year
https://www.businessofapps.com/data/disney-plus-statistics/

Yea what a flop. 10.4 billion in revenue on a 21.6% yoy increase.

You are probably one of those Fox/Breitbart conservatives that thinks “your side” somehow wins if a movie like Snow White flops. TAKE THAT WOKE!! That is exactly the dumbed-down attitude that makes modern conservatism incompetent. You’re not looking at the numbers or the long term picture.

Hannity chuckling over Snow White ticket sales is not defeating liberalism.

Only in your Mexican analysis is your precious Disney doing well. In my America, Disney’s stock price peaked ~$200 back in 2021. It has now collapsed by over half to around $92 today.

You are such a joke. They make billions in profit not annually but quarterly and you are pointing to some previous stock high as evidence that they aren’t doing well.

Do you know of a good analysis with your conspiring nation state secret alliances contrasted with more normal criminal gangs? The latter seems to be more durable as they can persevere through broken agreements that are spoken (and can be lied about after) whereas broken treaties are more difficult to work beyond. Maybe the world is now too large and wealthy for the old ways?

The closest comparison to Putin and Trump I would make up to now is mafias.

Bucha Revisited:

Is the reason that Zeihan travels around so much gay sex tourism?

I watched Glenn Greenwald interview Jefferson Morley about the JFK document release. It is a great interview but I swear Greenwald didn’t use to be anything close to as faggy as now.

This is a 1960 French color film version of the 1960 US song ‘Itsy bitsy teensy weeny yellow polka dot bikini’ about a girl who was a bit shy to wear her new bathing suit.

It’s pretty funny and shows how much more modest people generally were at the beach then…even the French. 😉

Is the Aeneid validated by ancient DNA?

@LatW I’ll reply to the music discussion from the last thread

You still buy CDs?

I still buy the CD version, that’s probably the main way I still give money to the classical music industry.

But I only give maybe about $200-$300 per year to classical music artists. Probably about $3000 in my lifetime, was all I give to the classical music artists.

So, I can understand why the people who go more to live performance, especially people who buy the $200 tickets, are the audience really supporting classical music industry today and who they will prioritize.

How do you play them? You have an external drive? I haven’t seen laptops with a built in CD drive for ages now, but I used to listen to my CDs on a laptop a lot. I have so many rare CDs but no way to play them anymore.

Often I rip them to harddisk, so I can just play them on digital devices and use the room correction software (Dirac Live) if I play them on studio monitors.

For my television I have a type of speakers, which helping to support the local economy, are made locally in Rotterdam and these have the room correction software inside the speaker box itself, in the onboard dsp stage.

So, in my sitting room, I can play music CDs directly on my DVD/bluray player and use the room correction in the speaker boxes.

What kind of headphones do you have?

I listen more at home using studio monitors. I have a lot of headphones too and do listen from the phone with headphones also. Do you like to listen on headphones?

In my experiences, I would mainly recommend Sennheiser brand because they are usually durable. People can sit on them on the sofa and they always survive undamaged.

a good city for classical music, but not easy if you live in a small city or out in the boonies. This is why I love those opera plays in movie theaters. It’s more democratic. But nothing beats a live performance, ofc. In Latvia, we have live outdoor performances near medieval castle ruins. Or in the courtyard of a baroque palace.

And I think these artists that we’re talking about here, they are typically sold out.

Sure, the authentic experience for the real opera fans, is to go to live performance, especially where in some old opera house like in Rome or Madrid, where the location of the opera house is very atmospheric.

But personally, as a not serious opera fan, I just like to watch at home, from bluray or DVD. And then as the second best as streaming, but for music I prefer the lack of compression from the disc.

If it doesn’t disrupt from focusing on the music, then it is ok. 🙂

You focus more on the music and story when the opera singers are wearing modern clothing, especially if it is cheap clothing, it’s less alienating than old 19th century style costumes which no-one wears today.

Yes, I knew he was arrested, so he was a dissident – interesting, what was he repressed for? For being a free human being?

I wonder partly if it could be because KGB were suspecting he could be Zionist (nationalist) because of his nationality?

They throw many nationalists to Butyrka in the 1970s, a lot of the Zionists, also a lot of Baltic and Tatar nationalists, as also activists promoting nonofficial religions (Old Believers, Islamists) which were part of KGB infrastructure unlike the official religions.

As a result of nationality activity, they throw the head of the Israel’s parliament into the prison camps for 3 years in the 1980s, beginning by Butyrka. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEjPu-_xhMs.

But maybe the main reason is, as he was one of the people, who could be potentially famous and potentially defecting.

For Maisky, even if he doesn’t show much of the nationalist politics, the problem for the KGB, is they probably know he was going to become a very famous global musician.

His friend Baryshnikov defected to Canada a few years later.

I need to rip them to the harddrive.

This morning I listened to Nelsons’ performance of Shostakovich’s Symphony 5. I’m not enough of a Shostakovich fan to compare with other recordings of the Symphony 5.

The second disc.
https://www.amazon.com/Shostakovich-Under-Stalins-Shadow-Nos/dp/B01BIH5U1W.

The most sensible or centrist Republican presidential candidate of this century, except Romney was probably Jon M. Huntsman Jr, who was a candidate in 2012.

Another thing you notice, like Romney, that he is believer of one of the world’s most eccentric religious cults.

They are rival Mormon families in Salt Lake City.
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/romney-huntsman-mormon-rivals-119515/

Huntsman’s family is possibly even larger than Romney’s family.

Like Romney’s children, Huntsman adopts additional children from different nationalities, to add to his large number of biological children.

–

We could believe, this confirming to some of Freud’s theories.

Two of the most normal and sensible presidential candidates in America’s recent history, are part of the more non-normal and difficult to believe religion.

It seems like the crazy part of their personality goes to their religion. So, their political personality can be very boring, logical and sober.

https://www.thecollector.com/etruscans-anatolian-origins/

I was wondering which region of the world has the best food, from my preference.

For example, noticing how I naturally avoid buying a Dutch cheese, if I can buy an Italian cheese, in the same supermarket.

On a world map, I guess probably a circle in Southern Europe.

But when you think more, it should actually be this shape.

France – the best baguette bread, croissant, the best butter, wine.

Belgium – the best pancakes

Switzerland – the best chocolate

Austria-Hungary – the best cakes.

Italy – wine, pizza, the best ice-cream.

Then Italy, Greece, Turkey*, Israel etc, most edible kind of general menu, or the meal design.

–

* Although Turkey has to be boycotted for political reasons, it can be accepted they are competent in restaurants.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/katherine-mahers-color-revolution

‘Americans hold varying opinions on such efforts, but what many don’t realize is that they occur not only overseas but also here in the United States. The summer of rioting following the death of George Floyd, which ushered in the new DEI regime, was in many ways a domestic Color Revolution, advanced by progressive NGOs, media entities, and political actors.’

Katherine Maher’s Color Revolution

The NPR boss is a symbol of regime change—foreign and domestic.

The Color Revolution is restless. Beginning in the former Soviet republics in the early 2000s, it moved along the coast of North Africa with the so-called Arab Spring in the 2010s, and, into the current decade, has spread further.

The ostensible purpose of Color Revolutions—named after the Rose Revolution, Orange Revolution, and Tulip Revolution in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan, respectively—is to replace authoritarian regimes with Western liberal democracies. American and European intelligence services are often heavily involved in these revolutions, with ambitions not only to spread modern ideologies but also to undermine geopolitical opponents.

The West’s favored methods of supporting Color Revolutions include fomenting dissent, organizing activists through social media, promoting student movements, and unleashing domestic unrest on the streets. Americans hold varying opinions on such efforts, but what many don’t realize is that they occur not only overseas but also here in the United States. The summer of rioting following the death of George Floyd, which ushered in the new DEI regime, was in many ways a domestic Color Revolution, advanced by progressive NGOs, media entities, and political actors.

A minor figure in these movements, a woman named Katherine Maher, has recently come to greater prominence. Maher was involved in the wave of Color Revolutions that took place in North Africa in the 2010s, and she supported the post-George Floyd upheavals in the United States in the 2020s. She was also the CEO of the Wikimedia Foundation, which runs the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, and was just recently named the new CEO of National Public Radio.

At NPR, Maher has already been embroiled in controversy. Longtime editor Uri Berliner, who has now resigned, accused her of left-wing bias and suppressing dissent. Following these accusations, I did extensive reporting demonstrating that Maher has a troubling history of arguing against the notion of objective truth and supporting censorship in the name of democracy.

I wonder what modern France would look like, if the pill has never been invented.
_____
Could be wrong, but suspect that the producers of the new Naked Gun movie are hoping old people will confuse Liam Neeson’s name for Lesley Nielson.

And there is no guarantee that there will ever be normal elections again.

If normal elections means that the mainstream media, Big Tech and secret police organizations (see latest revelations on the FBI role in the Hunter laptop story) all collude in favor of one of the political parties, then let’s hope that “normal elections” never return indeed.

Sadly, Trump’s second term may well turn out to be a bigger fiasco than his first one, for very different reasons this time. He’s prioritizing stuff that he didn’t even campaign on so nobody voted for it, like turning the US into an expansionist imperial power or cratering the economy with chaotic rounds of layoffs and tariffs. But that is not something worth debating in depth. If Trump was fully supportive of Ukraine, you’d be fine with him, just like you are fine with the Eurocrats that suppress freedoms and cancel elections in Europe.

A powerfully thought provoking last paragraph.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/04/04/new-york-times-throws-ukraine-under-the-bus-admits-us-proxy-war/

New York Times Throws Ukraine Under the Bus, Admits US Proxy War

In a practice that might seem quaint if it weren’t so murderous, the American uniparty is currently assigning party colors to its ‘boutique’ wars in Ukraine and West Asia. While these wars were arguably started by, and are being prosecuted by, the United States, the powers that be in the US have apparently determined that branding them by team color (Red v Blue) would effectively preclude the development of a national anti-war response.

In this light, the (New York) Times recently shat out the second installment of its ex-post recitation of CIA talking points crafted with a method that I call ‘cat-litter journalism.’ The focus of the new Times’ piece is the American war in Ukraine. Should this read as a misstatement to you, that maybe it is a war between Ukraine and Russia, tell it to the New York Times. The gist of the Times piece is that the Americans would have won the war if it hadn’t been for the Ukrainians.

The phrase ‘cat-litter journalism’ refers to the near-random assemblage of earlier reporting by the Times that has been reassembled to convey the illusion that its ‘reporting’ ties to any determinable facts. Deference to authority is another way to describe the piece. Without footnotes and / or links, the assertions made in the piece are a compilation of the least plausible state propaganda of recent years crafted for the post-election political dynamic.

‘In some ways, Ukraine was, on a wider canvas, a rematch in a long history of U.S.-Russia proxy wars — Vietnam in the 1960s, Afghanistan in the 1980s, Syria three decades later.’ nytimes.com’ 3/29/25.

For readers upset by the prospect of their favorite war losing its luster, fear not. The political logic of Donald Trump’s rapid policy dump upon entering office is the ethereal nature of Presidential power. For good and not-good reasons, Mr. Trump is about to hit a wall of institutional pushback. Further, his ‘peace through strength’ schtick (borrowed from Richard Nixon) is a serious misreading of the current political environment.

The reason why New York Times reporters are acting like rats fleeing a sinking ship with respect to the CIA’s war in Ukraine is that the Ukraine ship is sinking. Don’t take my word for it. The new US Intelligence Assessment for 2025 states 1) that Ukraine (the CIA) has substantially lost the conflict, and 2) nothing that the West has at its disposal will turn the situation around. Having a chair to sit in when the music stops is the political needle being threaded.

Russia in the past year has seized the upper hand in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and is on a path to accrue greater leverage to press Kyiv and its Western backers to negotiate an end to the war that grants Moscow concessions it seeks. dni.gov.

The political logic of parsing the war in Ukraine from the genocide in West Asia goes like this, 1) by US calculations, there is no way for the West to prevail in Ukraine, and 2) attending to the denouement in Ukraine when a promise of genocide has been sold to a foreign adversary (Israel) requires operational consolidation. Once the US moves outside of Gaza (it already has), Greater Israel begins to resemble Poland on August 31, 1939.

For those who may have forgotten, here is the leader of the Blue Team telling us that ‘Putin has already lost the war’ in mid-2023. Two years later, the New York Times is belatedly informing us that it was the Ukrainians who lost the war; that the US is blameless, if not heroic, for its ‘support’ of Ukraine; and that maybe the US should have gotten one-million citizens of a more deserving nation killed for the privilege.

That British ‘intelligence,’ MI6, was active in both the Russiagate fraud and in maintaining friendly relations with Ukrainian fascists from 1944 to the present so that they were available for service in Ukraine 2013 – present, argues for ending the Five-Eyes Alliance and criminally charging the Brits for interfering in American elections. The problem is that the Western ruling class has demonstrated itself to be immune from public sanction.

That the leader of the Blue Team was the largest recipient of legal bribes from supporters of Israel in Congress unites him in a deep moral commitment to genocide with Donald J. However, in the American terms of discourse in 2025, Donald Trump ‘got the better deal.’ Miriam Adelson contributed $150 million to Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign, with $100 million of it reportedly dedicated to improving the lives of Western arms dealers. Joe Biden only got four million dollars for his genocide.

This ‘genocide for hire’ posture of America 2.0, where US foreign policy does the bidding of foreign adversaries in exchange for specific payments to specific politicians, might seem irredeemably corrupt. In fact, it is irredeemably corrupt. However, there is a political term— ‘imperialism,’ that rehabilitates corrupt acts under the nuevo-scriptural precept of ‘kick their ass and steal their gas’ that is emerging from the gold toilet crowd.

Were it not for the earlier ‘coming-clean’ piece from the Times that began in the aftermath of the US – British coup in Ukraine in 2014, the US timeline found in the recent Times article would be inexplicable. How could the timelines match US state propaganda so perfectly given that between the two articles, pretty much everything that the Americans and Brits said about the conflict was later restated in materially different terms?

Further, as the vile, offensive, and yes, fascistic, efforts by the Trump administration to quell domestic rebellion against corrupt acts by politicians taking money from adversarial foreign governments to commit genocide, the ship of state is struggling. Threatening Americans with deportation, imprisonment, and being disappeared for expressing their constitutionally protected right to object to these policies is profoundly anti-American under the existing terms of discourse.

Ominously for we, the people, Donald Trump was able to extract far more money than Joe Biden was for a roughly equivalent genocide (thus far). Yes, under US law, American politicians can take money from adversarial foreign governments which personally benefits them, and not the United States, in exchange for the promise that the US will commit genocide against foreign nationals for the benefit of other foreign nationals. Question: where is MAGA on this?

If any of this suggests a path out of the current mess through electoral politics, the evidence doesn’t support that conclusion. Here is one of the several pieces that I wrote in and around early 2019 where I correctly argued that were Joe Biden to be elected, he would fail to govern and that Donald Trump, or someone worse, would follow Biden. That is what happened. I was right, and the DNC just reelected Donald Trump.

For those who don’t see it yet, Donald Trump is in the process of imploding politically. His economic policies, which share quite a bit with Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Ronald Reagan, are ideological— based on a group of like-minded people sitting around making shit up with no one to challenge them. He doesn’t understand basic economics well enough to avoid the catastrophe-in-the-making that his policies will produce.

Firing tens of thousands of Federal workers without a coherent plan to reemploy them both raises the unemployment rate and lowers wages. As I’ve previously written, adding former Federal employees to the unemployment line increases the number of workers vying for a limited number of jobs, thereby leading the most desperate to accept lower wages. Rising unemployment and falling wages is a recipe for electoral defeat.

With respect to liberal fears of a Fourth Reich, ex-CIA Larry Johnson and others familiar with military production argue that the lead time from cold start to having weapons in hand is a decade. When existing facilities can be used, this lead time can be reduced to three years. In its wisdom, the US began firing its skilled manufacturing workforce in the 1970s. Skilled work in 2025 is ‘influencing’ teenagers to buy Viagra for their pet gerbils on YouTube.

When Mr. Trump references ‘peace through strength,’ he asserts that while his aim (‘peace’) is virtuous, his method will be the threatened or actual use of violence to achieve it. The social logic is that the party being threatened has a choice to surrender or be killed. This framing has been used by repressive power for millennia to claim that political repression maintained through violence is ‘peace.’ In so doing, the term is emptied of content. The definition of peace is reduced to ‘not death.’

The political benefit of this approach for empires is that it frames repressive political power as a defense of peace, and its opponents as the instigators of violence. In history, the US is only two generations from the ‘Indian Wars,’ where innocent settlers ‘were overwhelmed and slaughtered by ignorant savages,’ for those who buy Hollywood’s version of the history. Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States and Robert Hughes’ The Fatal Shore illustrate the genocidal versions of this view-from-power of ‘peace.’

How the phrase (peace through strength) was heard on the campaign trail by Mr. Trump’s constituents was likely through the anti-historical fantasy that the US has won the wars that it has engaged in since WWII. As actual history has it, it was the Russians who won WWII. Richard Nixon used the term, combined with his claim that he had a ‘secret plan’ to end the US war in Vietnam. He didn’t. Nixon ended up expanding the war to Laos and Cambodia before the ignominious ‘fall of Saigon’ in 1975.

With respect to the US proxy war in Ukraine, the precise social logic of Mr. Trump implying that the Biden administration was ‘weak’ in threatening imminent nuclear annihilation in the latter days of the administration begs the question of what the word means? Is ending the world a sign of strength? To whom? Who would be alive to judge the matter, and what would be the consequence of any such judgment?

One might have imagined that Times readers previously burned by its fraudulent reporting regarding Iraq’s WMDs and Russiagate would have felt ‘twice bitten, thrice shy’ with respect to its Ukraine reporting. Implied in the steadfastness of its readership is that getting true information about the world isn’t— is not, why its readers read the Times. Or perhaps, Times readers like their news several years after the fact, when it can be found in the ‘corrections’ section.

The residual purpose of the New York Times is to demonstrate that Pravda in the waning days of the Soviet Union is the model to which the American press aspires. But this is only a ‘press’ story to the extent that the volunteer state media in the US doesn’t require threats to carry water for power. They want to do so. It gives them purpose, and the occasional invitation to the right dinner party.

I wrote early on in the US war in Ukraine that the Ukrainians ‘would rue the day that they ever heard of the United States.’ With the New York Times now blaming the Ukrainians for the American loss against Russia, they join the Palestinians in being tossed onto the garbage heap of empire. So are the Russians. The difference is that the Russians can take care of themselves. That is why American imperialists hate Russia so much. They don’t control it.

Was Disney really planning a live-action Tangled, starring a black woman, until Snow White bombed, or is it an urban legend?

I know some community where a girl had one of her weaves break, and it was allover the news, and they were saying that another student had secretly cut it, and they might have brought police to the school, shut the school down for the day and given everyone a talk, or something. I can’t quite remember, but it was certainly a big overreaction.

I wonder what modern France would look like, if the pill has never been invented.

There was a kind of moral panic in Southern Euro Catholic countries in the 1940s and 1950s about women and bathing costumes. I came across this quote from the journalist Lucien Rebatet the other day:

‘In respectable newspapers, commentators experienced with this sort of thing and calling down the anger of heaven on the permanent wave and bathing costumes. 50,000 ladies’ hairdressers see themselves dragged before the tribunal of our defeat, while the awkward situation of our battle tanks and the lack of ammunition among our first line troops are seen as inexplicable accidents of fate.’

Rebatet was positioning himself as a more hardened fascist, this is from around 1941 and he is angry that the regime in Vichy wasn’t carrying out the national revolution fast enough because he thinks they got sidetracked onto the maillot de bain and perm issue.

It reminds me a bit of BAP and his followers mocking the conservative Christians about topics like this, these modern debates are like a distant echo of earlier ones.

At least in Southern France they started artificially regulating their fertility downwards quite early, from the middle of the 18th century. I remember someone posted a blog post here from a French economist discussing the new and pretty conclusive evidence for this, which had come from analyzing a lot of wills and other documents.

Is this a real picture? I am surprised, I thought the American woman who stabbed the Eritrean groper who grabbed her arm would be more ethnic-looking.

[Trump’s] prioritizing stuff that he didn’t even campaign on so nobody voted for it, like turning the US into an expansionist imperial power or cratering the economy with chaotic rounds of layoffs and tariffs. But that is not something worth debating in depth.

It is something worth debating in depth. We need to deal with your unwarranted misapprehension.

Trump is prioritizing what he ran on:

• MAGA Reindustrialization will onshore jobs and boost the economy. Reciprocal tariffs are one of the key tools to eliminate foreign country exploitation of the American worker. There will be no general “cratering of the economy”, though specific business models based on exploitation will have issues. Stock prices will be lower for a while as the split between labour and finance improves to help American workers gain a larger share of earnings.

• Decoupling from the CCP in terms of strategic materials means finding new supplies to replace them. Greenland already has a U.S. military presence. Keeping them out of the Chinese sphere of influence is a critical mission. Bringing them more fully into our bloc with a COFA would be a win. There is no “turning of the U.S. into an expansionist imperial power”.

• MAGA’s Draining the Swamp involves firing swamp creatures. Did you not complain in Trump’s 1st term that he “did not do enough”? Now that Trump is doing enough, you are complaining about layoffs of over-compensated & under-performing federal deadweight. What did you expect Draining the Swamp to look like?

This is exactly what MAGA voters wanted and largely expected (or at least hoped for) when we cast our ballots for Trump/Vance 2024.

PEACE 😇

I don’t claim to know why Trump is doing the Canada or Greenland bits.

Greenland= ancient DNA

Canada is about the Monroe Doctrine and Roosevelt Corollary. If 500 million Indians are allowed to settle in the Ontario Peninsula, it will be like a dagger pointed at the American heartland. If they are allowed to settle in Vancouver, they could turn the entire Western seaboard into an Indian colony. Forget about Taiwan, such strategic threats cannot be allowed to develop.

Also, IIRC, some say that Carney bailed out Jared Kushner to the tune of billion dollars or something.

Was Disney really planning a live-action Tangled, starring a black woman, until Snow White bombed, or is it an urban legend?

Mostly legend. There was a very funny satire bit that Jada Pinkett Smith had been cast. And, Rapunzel would be portrayed as bald to raise awareness about hair loss issues. I recall a few people thought it was real which triggered the “fact checkers”.

PEACE 😇

Peronism coming to America. Policies geared towards the proletariat generally don’t end well. Might be good for Europe though, if they take care of their migrant problem. A reversal of the 20th century.

Germany also has great cakes and pastries.

If you ever have a long layover in Frankfurt, take the train to Mainz (half hour from airport) and enjoy the Dom cafe next to the cathedral. Wonderful!

And Lviv’s cakes are as good as ones in Vienna.

A commenter on the Marginal Revolution blog called Trump, “the American Hugo Chavez.”
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2025/04/some-modest-congressional-rebellion-against-trump-tariffs.html

This is by far worse than his first administration. I’m really fed up with everything. Aside from securing the border and reducing the flow of illegal immigration I am unhappy with everything right now. Even stuff I might normally agree with (deregulation, reducing the size of government, deporting dangerous criminals) is being done in stupid and legally gray ways with no meaningful accountability. Ludicrous public health appointments, bad foreign policy alienating our allies, terrible trade policy, arresting and deporting people (who may not be citizens) under dubious pretenses. We are becoming a banana republic.

Trump is America’s Hugo Chavez. An obnoxious and xenophobic blowhard who sees conspiracies against him everywhere and thinks he is always right. The only difference is Trump is a right wing populist not a left wing populist.

At this point in time most of us in the business community are hoping that things will somehow get better. Trump himself is of course doubling down:

President Donald Trump vowed Friday to stay the course on his sweeping tariffs plan, which sent U.S. financial markets into their steepest one-day decline Thursday since 2020 and prompted retaliation from some major trading partners. “MY POLICIES WILL NEVER CHANGE,” Trump wrote on social media ahead of the opening of U.S. markets, telling Americans to “HANG TOUGH.” He has no public events scheduled Friday. In the evening, Trump is scheduled to host a fundraising dinner at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

It’s unlikely that Trump can be talked out of protectionism, a core belief of his since he first became a public figure in the 1980s (and likely before then). It’s further unlikely that Trump can be educated in basic trade economics and so learn that a current account deficit is axiomatically the result of too low domestic savings, as Jeffrey Sachs explained on this site: https://www.unz.com/article/trumps-absurd-trade-policies-will-impoverish-americans-and-harm-the-world/

A country’s trade deficit (or more precisely, its current account deficit) does not indicate unfair trade practices by the surplus countries. It indicates something completely different. A current account deficit signifies that the deficit country is spending more than it is producing. Equivalently, it is saving less than it is investing.

So what is the way out of this?

One is that the tariffs become more intelligent. Based on the amateurish nature of these tariffs, it was pretty clearly put together by Trump himself and a small number of yes-men. A small number of goods like copper and semiconductors are exempt. Many more exemptions could be coming, stemming from goods that cannot be produced in the US (like coffee and cocoa) to material inputs into the manufacturing process.

Another is that the tariffs themselves are thrown out by other forces in the government. It’s plainly obvious in the Constitution that the Presidency does not have the power to impose taxes. This power was delegated to the Presidency in the postwar era by the Congress, but was only intended to be used for emergencies. That slowly began to erode in the 1970s, but obviously this week’s drastic universal imposition of prewar-style protection was never intended by the law or by Congress.

Presumably these tariffs will be challenged in the courts (perhaps successfully), and opposition is already building in the Congress. Republicans fear Trump, but that could change if the economy starts melting down and the business community keeps screaming.

Lastly, if we want to be really optimistic, these tariffs could end up kinda sorta working. I don’t think this is very likely, but if there’s any country that could make this sort of blanket protectionism work it’s the USA. The country is vast and is richly endowed with skilled labor, natural resources, capital, and energy. If there is no economic crisis and aggregate demand holds up, industrial production will rise and the fiscal deficit will come down from the surge in tariff revenue. Eventually the US could return to its 19th century fiscal policy. Maybe there’s a 10% chance of this.

I have voted for Trump in three general elections and one primary election. While he’s never been optimal, most of the critiques of him seemed like TDS-bullshit. I remember in his first term that we was constantly accused of creating CHAOS, but it always seemed like the chaos was created by the TDS opposition.

Now we have pretty plain evidence that Trump himself is creating chaos. And as much as I would like to annex Canada and Greenland, realistically those are poor ideas (especially as currently pursued). We may need a new anti-Trump Republican group distinct from the homosexual warmongers at The Lincoln Project. Perhaps we could call it Nationalists Against Trump (NAT).

Now straight to the some outcomes, no matter whether intentional or not – oil price has been bombed down immediately, which is the most effective economic sanction on Kremlin gang. Yet to be seen if this will be durable movement if some Iran related action will truly begin, but so far so good;)

Also the very principle of international reciprocality (exact economic formulas/tariff sizes enacted might be quite debatable ofc) going into the spotlight is good, but needs to be expanded further elsewhere too, e.g. into such freedoms as religions or speech.

He must start by stating as official US position ( or forcing the ukronazis to admit) at least ONE of the major crimes/false flags they have done during the SMO or 2014. Preferably the Novaya Khakovka dam destruction.

It exposes the fake leftist “environmentalists” for the scum they are in saying nothing about, and it is risk free move for Trump in saying the truth ( if he does want good solution).
Even in the police state of Banderastan, having something as that in public record could accelerate civil unrest, in place of the current lemming state.

Trump can be educated in basic trade economics and so learn that a current account deficit is axiomatically the result of too low domestic savings, as Jeffrey Sachs explained on this site:

Is this the same Jeffery Sachs who covered up CCP involvement with COVID-19? And, concealed the truth to protect his far left academic colleagues?

Why would anyone believe Jeffery Sachs? He took money from the Lancet to lie. Who paid for this recent fictional trade fabrication?
___

Trump correctly understands basic trade economics. That is what the free trade corporatists fear the most. He realizes that “unbalanced basic trade” resulted in off shoring jobs and weakening America’s industrial base.

Trump will wisely ignore anti-American, far left academics like Jeffery Sachs.

A small number of goods like copper and semiconductors are exempt. Many more exemptions could be coming, stemming from goods that cannot be produced in the US (like coffee and cocoa) to material inputs into the manufacturing process.

A well conceived initial list had to be properly designed and launched. To avoid leaks, this was done by a smart but small group. There are no doubt details that have been missed. Is Southern hemisphere fresh fruit on the exemption list? If not, it needs to be.

Countries willing to engage constructively will be able to make progress working with Trump’s team of highly competent professionals. If they can make a good case, exemptions can be carved out.

Even better — Nations willing to drop their own rates and restrictions will see the reciprocal tariff number drop accordingly. India is reportedly well on its way to an offer that could cut their rate in half.

The country is vast and is richly endowed with skilled labor, natural resources, capital, and energy. If there is no economic crisis and aggregate demand holds up, industrial production will rise and the fiscal deficit will come down from the surge in tariff revenue. Eventually the US could return to its 19th century fiscal policy. Maybe there’s a 10% chance of this.

The chance of MAGA Reindustrialization working is much higher than 10%. However, it will take longer than Trump’s 2nd and final term. MAGA needs to develop a bench so they can win elections 2028 and beyond.

And as much as I would like to annex Canada and Greenland, realistically those are poor ideas (especially as currently pursued).

Canada was never a serious proposal. It was floated to pressure the Canadian government and control news cycles here at home.

Protecting Greenland via a Compact of Free Association [COFA] is both realistic and a good idea. Of course, the people of Greenland have to voluntarily sign up. Will it happen in the next 4 years? Probably not. However, the high level of attention will keep CCP owned enterprises from trying to slide in below the radar. That in of itself is a win.

PEACE 😇

Now straight to the some outcomes, no matter whether intentional or not – oil price has been bombed down immediately,

Russian government budget is in surplus for an oil price above $42 you thick POS. Recession could lower orders of gayropeans for US MIC products, and their own defense budget, which could then make SMO even easier.

Without the diseased intentions of the US Oil and shale gas industries ( together with their MIC),although shale gas the most………its unlikely that the SMO would have been necessary….so crashing the price as a ‘clever trick” by Trump to end the SMO ( which he did say from the start was a tactic he would try and use) would have alot of pressure placed on him by these same US industries.

In the short term ( i.e a few years) it would only concentrate our efforts in defense industry into the SMO. An oil price of zero would not make the SMO immediately impossible to stop, or kill our economy in 2 years.
Medium term it would be a serious problem…..but then the other side has to suffer those same effects also for that lengthy time period.

but needs to be expanded further elsewhere too, e.g. into such freedoms as religions or speech.

For a Lithuanian shithole or any of the Proebalitika retards to talk about free speech and religion is deranged in the extreme.

It is something worth debating in depth.

With you and Latw? LOL

Reciprocal tariffs

They are no such thing. Just because your supreme leader calls a lettuce a tomato, it doesn’t make it so and you insisting on calling the green lettuce in front of our eyes ‘tomato’ just makes you look like a tard.

Citizen journalists immediately discovered the real formula to calculate the tariff imposed on each country . It’s just a trade deficit ratio with each country divided by two. This is tremendously problematic on several levels. First, why lie?? Why present a chart with a column called “tariff rate, including trade barriers and currency manipulation” when nobody had actually done such a calculation? Just in case there was any doubt, everybody in the world now knows that Trump’s administration will use blatant lies to justify its actions.

Second, confusing trade deficits with commercial barriers is beyond voodoo economics. It’s plain retarded. There is no reason in the world to expect that under any ideal conditions the trade deficit between two given countries should always stay balanced. It’s perfectly OK to buy more from some given country than you sell to it, just like it’s perfectly OK for me as an individual to buy more from some companies than I sell to them. In fact, economic efficiency makes this NECESSARY. I was hoping that the adults in the room like Bessent would talk Trump out of some kooky ideas he was floating during the campaign but it looks like this administration is full of intellectual midgets and cowards.

The funny thing is that not long ago I was telling you that Trump’s imbecilic ideas meant an average tariff rate of 60% and you dismissed the prospect as fantastical. Well, as of today the US already has an average tariff rate of 30% (but nobody has any clue of what the rate will be 2 months of a year from now, which is even worse for economic activity than a huge but stable rate). If you understood then that a tariff rate of 60% meant economic chaos, how do think a rate of 30% will not be harmful? Is there absolutely no limit to the idiocies your supreme leader can do without you criticizing them?

Do you even realize that millions of retirees and small investors have lost a lot of money from one day to the next and we may be on the brink of a big recession?

MAGA’s Draining the Swamp involves firing swamp creatures.

Dismantling the deep state and firing tens of thousands of federal employees are two totally separate things that only a MAGAtard would conflate. There have actually been some good initiatives against the deep state but the FBI, for example, is still full of swamp creatures. Suffice to say that the lead officer that coordinated the censoring meetings with Twitter and Big Tech is still active. Elon (who is of course against the tariff insanity but prefers to ignore the subject for now) has done some positive but haphazard work against the deep state but so far Patel, Bongino and Bondi have produced almost nothing. And the clock is ticking. With a recession around the corner and silly new initiatives each week, the Dems will win the midterms, kneecap the MAGA agenda and maintain most of the deep state intact for their return to power.

Is this the same Jeffery Sachs who covered up CCP involvement with COVID-19? And, concealed the truth to protect his far left academic colleagues?

Why would anyone believe Jeffery Sachs? He took money from the Lancet to lie. Who paid for this recent fictional trade fabrication?
___

Trump correctly understands basic trade economics. That is what the free trade corporatists fear the most. He realizes that “unbalanced basic trade” resulted in off shoring jobs and weakening America’s industrial base.

Trump will wisely ignore anti-American, far left academics like Jeffery Sachs.

I do not know the particulars of Sachs’ involvement with COVID-19, and in any case it is irrelevant to this issue.

I cited Sachs because his article is conveniently on the front page of the Unz review. I am not generally in agreement with Sachs as he has a strong focus on redistribution which I oppose.

Neither you nor Trump grasp trade economics 101. Think of a nation as a household for a moment. Your household is in surplus if your income exceeds your expenditures, but it is in deficit if your expenditures exceed your income. This is axiomatic and it cannot be argued. In trade economics the way this works out is that a surplus on the current account (trade & income) is balanced by a surplus on the capital account (investment). For the USA this means we pay for our excess imports by selling American assets, mostly but not exclusively the federal debt.

The causes of this dissaving can be argued, but the math cannot. Any government serious about closing the current account deficit would be looking to close the gap between savings and investment. Trump shows no interest in reducing the fiscal deficit or increasing household savings, and he also wants to retain the Dollar reserve status.

To close our current account deficit it’s not sufficient to grow our industrial production, we also need to increase our savings. Prudent steps in that direction would be reducing the federal deficit and increasing the attractiveness of work & savings (something 1980s Reaganite supply-side economists could tell him about).

A well conceived initial list had to be properly designed and launched. To avoid leaks, this was done by a smart but small group. There are no doubt details that have been missed. Is Southern hemisphere fresh fruit on the exemption list? If not, it needs to be.

Countries willing to engage constructively will be able to make progress working with Trump’s team of highly competent professionals. If they can make a good case, exemptions can be carved out.

Even better — Nations willing to drop their own rates and restrictions will see the reciprocal tariff number drop accordingly. India is reportedly well on its way to an offer that could cut their rate in half.

The leaking issue is certainly true, and this plagued Trump administration. But some (most?) of it is a simple lack of competence. It’s hard to find protectionist economists in the first place. In Trump’s first term he had Ross and Lighthizer, but they’re now too old. That leaves him with Navarro, who while competent is also unhinged.

Successful negotations with our trade partners are the best case outcome and something all of us in the business community are hoping for. I am not optimistic about these negotiations because as Sergei Lavrov noted, the USA is no longer agreement-capable. Certainly Trump isn’t. Mexico and Canada agreed to the USMCA, and now they’ve been hit with 25% tariffs.

The chance of MAGA Reindustrialization working is much higher than 10%. However, it will take longer than Trump’s 2nd and final term. MAGA needs to develop a bench so they can win elections 2028 and beyond.

If the economy is cratered the Republican Party is likely to be wiped out with it.

That’s something else that concerns me. Trump is too old to get it, but it’s simply not acceptable to allow the Democratic Party to win elections anymore. They are a fundamentally illegitimate and evil organization whose objective is the destruction of civilization. In this environment unforced errors and own goals are not acceptable.

This map appears to discriminate against Iberian cuisine….those with slight dominance of pork , such as Spanish cuisine must be a deciding factor, which is very harsh.

Italy, Greece, Turkey*,

Greek and Turkish cuisine can be heavily interlocked with eachother…….Italian cannot with the Turkish completely different. Shashlik/kebabs are prevalent in Greek/Turkish cuisine and near non-existant in Italian. Olive and pasta use overlap in Greek and Italian, but olives not so much in the turkish cuisine , I think.

Italy – wine, pizza, the best ice-cream.

For anyone Russian, or of Russian ancestry to claim Italian ice-cream is superior to Russian……..is ridiculous in the extreme. Obviously Russian ice cream is significantly better. Although for France you specify baguette bread – I think in general our selection of breads are superior.

Belgium – the best pancakes

Never noticed that. Is it the pancakes themselves that are renowned….or just what they serve with it? Dutch pancakes are the same as ours ( blini), so I assumed Belgian was the same…..its the sweetened waffles I know they supposed to be renowned for .

Also “wine” is a far too generic term for saying whatever country has the best of – various types of wines I have found superior in other countries such as south africa and Australia

The big question is to which state AK will move. Shall I be so bold as to guess Texas?

Eventually the US could return to its 19th century fiscal policy.

No, it can’t. The chances of that are zero. In the 19th century the US didn’t have social security, Medicare, the HHS, a Department of Defense funded by 3.5% of the GDP or annual debt payments of 3% of the GDP. Unfortunately, income taxes cannot be substituted by tariffs without a massive reduction of the public sector that is of course science fiction. Besides, tariffs depress trade so the more effective they are, the less you collect. At the average 60% tariff rate necessary to replace income tax, imports would decline dramatically so the tariff revenue would be insignificant.

If technology “development” is going to reduce jobs in the service sector and either increase or keep the same ,jobs in manufacturing…… then as a long, long term project – his policies look reasonable to me.

Some of these countries such as Vietnam and Indonesia are going from poor to 2nd world nation status , and others like them going from large population 2nd world to advanced nation in the next 10-20 years possibly…….so maybe restructuring the US economy is a necessity to adapt to these factors.

Of course for the rest of his term , what you are explaining looks correct…..that he will weaken the American economy. However if it’s not continuous 10% or 5% GDP loss in the next 2 and 3 years, with other economies being damaged more from this……maybe it is all manageable. Plenty of countries considered unemployment rate of 7% to be normal ( EU average is 6%). Again , even though it effects millions of Pindostani’s, with the US unemployment rate now only 4%, if its not much above 6% from these policies then it should all be manageable.

Trade volumes are much higher today than they were in the 19th century.

US imports are $4 trillion, so an average 30% tariff on these would produce $1.2 trillion in revenue, or more than half of personal income tax revenue.

Of course imports are likely to fall, but by how much?

That said you are correct that at 30% there is insufficient revenue to replace personal income taxes.

And that’s ignoring the 6% fiscal deficit which really should be addressed (but likely won’t be).

Sadly, Trump’s second term may well turn out to be a bigger fiasco than his first one, for very different reasons this time.

If we can get some big fires in Madison and Des Moines and Anaheim the Jew Media Hoodlums will have a big success. There is opportunity in chaos. Have you bought a palette of 9mm bullet cartridges yet?

Your analogy does not work. A household is a small entity in a global economy. The concepts of Microeconomics 101 apply relatively cleanly. However, the U.S. is vastly larger. Its actions reshape the system in a manner that is not captured by mere “supply & demand” micro.

Try this short article to understand more about what is going on: (1)

Tariffs Are The Only Way To Restore America’s Long-Term Economic Health

America has become addicted to cheap foreign baubles and easy money (i.e., fake fiat currency) at the expense of its long-term economic health. We allowed ourselves to be transformed from a cast iron economy that made things into a largely paper economy that depends on the good graces of foreign nations for its survival. This is a recipe for civilizational suicide.

We don’t make our own weapons, food, machines, vehicles, plastics, medicines, or computers. The whole Covid insanity, with its shutdowns and shortages and supply-chain chaos, was a blaring alarm warning us that the economy we thought was so strong was shockingly fragile

The reality is we cannot survive if we continue to remain addicted to cheap foreign crap. We cannot survive if we are unable to make our own food and medicine and vehicles and weapons and computers. A farmer who is wholly dependent upon his enemies to plow and seed and fertilize and harvest his land is a farmer who will starve. Likewise, a nation that depends entirely on its enemies to power its economy is a nation destined to become history rather than shape it.

While I do not share the route you got here, this is a good observation on your part.

Prudent steps in that direction would be reducing the federal deficit and increasing the attractiveness of work & savings

Trump is doing this. Let’s start with the later, as is it can be covered by Econ 101
__

MAGA Reindustrialization will create job opportunities in the U.S. The supply of labor is much more constrained. As the demand for labor goes up, those offering labor will be paid more. This will increase the attractiveness of work.

As wages go up faster than inflation, workers will have more disposable income. Some people will of course blow the cash, but many will save.

It would help if banks went back to offering better rates on simple cash savings. The near zero at home and negative rates abroad built in all sorts of nasty disincentives.
__

For deficit reduction, the serious expenditures are in entitlement programs. DOGE found ~33% of Social Security registrant records lack full integrity. Some of those are likely typos not fraud. However, if 20% of Social Security payouts can be cancelled, that contributes real money to deficit reduction without impacting any legitimate recipients.

Also, a Social Security Number is the gateway to Medicare and Medicaid. Hundreds of thousands of illegals have wound up with them. Fix this ID problem and huge amounts can be saved in these entitlement programs as well.

If the economy is cratered the Republican Party is likely to be wiped out with it.

That’s something else that concerns me. Trump is too old to get it, but it’s simply not acceptable to allow the Democratic Party to win elections anymore. They are a fundamentally illegitimate and evil organization whose objective is the destruction of civilization. In this environment unforced errors and own goals are not acceptable.

Of course the economy will flourish, not be wiped out. Ivory tower economists such as Jeffery Sachs are corrupt and wrong. Countries that want to do business with the U.S. will negotiate exemptions or change their rates to obtain a lower tariff number. Many countries have a great deal of flexibility as rules are often based on bureaucratic inertia, not current need.

MAGA’s economic success can propel permanent demotion of the Democrats to a minority party.

The DNC is helping their own demise by picking the wrong side 80/20 or even 90/10 issues and openly disagreeing with the American people. I saw a headline demanding the return of noncitizen gang members from El Salvador. I do not know if it was a spoof, or if the Democrats are that crazy. It seemed very believable.

PEACE 😇
___________

(1) https://thefederalist.com/2025/04/03/tariffs-are-the-only-way-to-restore-americas-long-term-economic-health/

If you substitute urban negroes for Urkrainians in the New York Times story you get a hint for the domestic weapon of doom. How many billions have been spent (read: squandered) trying to raise the negroes up?

It is their own fault. They have been given every opportunity here. This will be the slogan for the new austerity and the change of plan.

I hope you and the local fire department are on good terms. Did you read those stories about private fire consultants in the wealthy Los Angeles neighborhoods starting up? Since AI is about to pop what the economy really needs is a next big startup bubble.

I wrote early on in the US war in Ukraine that the Ukrainians ‘would rue the day that they ever heard of the United States.’

Give that man or woman or it a perceptiveness prize. The Pulitzer is a piece of garbage. We need a new award. Name it after Ron Reagan / Ron Paul / Ron Unz. Call it the Ronnie. Give that man a Ronnie!

A foot high bronze cast like this will look great on top of your book shelf.

Of course the economy will flourish, not be wiped out. Ivory tower economists such as Jeffery Sachs are corrupt and wrong. Countries that want to do business with the U.S. will negotiate exemptions or change their rates to obtain a lower tariff number.

Do you not read the news?

China just passed 34% retaliatory tariffs. That will hit farmers in MAGA country. Well done captain cheeto.

Good lord you don’t even know when to quit.

You’re not even American and yet you continue to defend this clueless felon president.

Both you and he missed Econ 101. The main risk of the tariff is the trade war. Starting multiple trade wars is just plan dumb.

It isn’t ivory tower elitism. You can find an Econ 101 book at your local Canadian library.

If technology “development” is going to reduce jobs in the service sector and either increase or keep the same ,jobs in manufacturing…… then as a long, long term project – his policies look reasonable to me.

A number of firms are bringing jobs to the U.S. This should lead manufacturing employment to increase. Extractive industries such as mining also need to ramp up.

MAGA Reindustrialization is a virtuous cycle. #NeverMAGA extremists hate this, so they scream all sorts of silly scenarios about impending doooooooom. How many will admit they we’re wrong a few years down the line?

PEACE 😇

Today is the high water mark of Trump support by Republicans. I would take a day off from your usual damage control and just try to enjoy it.

Since you are a Canadian you probably don’t realize how much of a mistake it is to piss off farmers.

China just levied 34% on all US products which means soy.

This is all bigley stupid.

Their army was a force for terror until the entire European continent and the British all combined forces to subdue them. I wonder what the nostalgia market was like around 1850 or so and if it was fashionable to discuss the reality those pesky Germans were about to stomp it into the ground.

How is MAGA winning? They took workers away from the DNC.

All that is left are special interests vying for the top slot of victimhood & privilege.

PEACE 😇

If MAGA is winning then why does Rubio look so anxious?

Tariffs are one of the main things Trump promised to voters in the elections. In some of the election speeches this 2024, he was even saying they would be able to possibly replace income taxes, of course his fans were ver.

It’s why he was able to win in the Rust Belt, to win more votes from working class people, even while the more sensible Republican candidates like Romney or Huntsman will lose there.

–

The problem for Trump politically, is the cost of the tariffs will be more short term in terms of higher prices, while many of the benefits for the working class in those manufacturing districts will be slower than election schedules.

Prices for imported cars will increase immediately. While to build a new auto factory in Michigan, will be probably at least 4-5 years from now*, if you included planning.

–

A lot of the successes during the beginning Trump’s first term, will be employing people by the end of his second term, even after the 4 year gap between his two terms when Biden was president. For example, in 2018, there was announcement of the $100 billion TSMC investment in manufacturing in Arizona. They are beginning production now and TSMC will be hiring 6000 manufacturing locally workers in Arizona by 2030.

–

*At least the employment for the factory builders could be within the election schedule.

Tariffs are one of the main things Trump promised to voters in the elections. In some of the election speeches this 2024, he was even saying they would be able to possibly replace income taxes.

Trump did not win based on tariffs.

Voters cited the economy but Trump never made widespread promises on tariffs.

What happened is that voters wanted a return to the 2018 economy.

That would be nice but Trump has instead made a huge mess with his bigley genius multiple trade wars.

The problem for Trump politically, is the cost of the tariffs will be more short term in terms of higher prices, while many of the benefits for the working class will be slower than election schedules.

Trump actually didn’t claim that tariffs on Canada would benefit the working class. He said it needed to be done for border security. That doesn’t make sense given that Trump’s own government said that practically all fentanyl comes from Mexico.

I would stop defending Trump at this point.

Maybe you haven’t seen what the markets are doing. They are voting on this trade war with China and the results are in: He is clueless.

How many people like Thomas Friedman have been implying over the years that the internet would spread freedom and wealth everywhere and that all would become like America?

And yet we just witnessed a military operation in Myanmar to shut down a huge slave plantation of internet fraud, where people were captured, tortured and held against their will, so that they could be compelled to defraud others.

And that was the result of public outrage in China at Chinese people being lured to the Golden Triangle and kidnapped to work in the plantations. What could be happening in India?

such as Spanish cuisine

Bread is mainly mass market, like in Netherlands or UK. Often covered everything with oil. Most of the specialist ingredients just thrown on plates.

I’m sure it’s more authentic to peasant cuisine, than in Italy, where most of the cuisine was invented in the 20th century.

This map appears to discriminate against Iberian cuisine….those with slight dominance of pork , such as Spanish cuisine must be a deciding factor, which is very harsh.

Italian cuisine was historically based on cooking with pork fat according Alberto Grandi.

Greek and Turkish cuisine can be heavily interlocked with eachother…….Italian cannot with the Turkish completely different

Of course, Italy is a separate cuisine.

Marxist scholar Alberto Grandi is very famous at the moment, because he explained it was mainly invented in the 20th century with invented mythical origin stories, especially in the postwar economic miracle when they are becoming wealthy.

It even has a lot of influence from American cuisine. This isn’t negative as the 20th century modes of production in Italy was of course improvement for the decedents of peasants from the hedonist point of view.

Greek and Turkish cuisine can be heavily interlocked with eachother…….Italian cannot with the Turkish completely different. Shashlik/kebabs are prevalent in Greek/Turkish cuisine and near non-existant in Italian. Olive and pasta use overlap in Greek and Italian, but olives not so much in the turkish cuisine , I think.

Modern Greek cuisine is part of the Ottoman heritage.

We know the Ottoman’s elite were food geniuses and they create these combinations of flavors, which allowed even the modern Arab cuisine (which is based on Ottoman cuisine) to raise to a high level.

Greek cuisine like Tzatziki is probably based on the Siberian heritage of the Turkic elite who were the ancestors of the Ottoman elite.

Also “wine” is a far too generic term for saying whatever country has the best of – various types of wines I have found superior in other countries such as south africa and Australia

As I understand the history, in the 20th century, France developed the high standards of wine production. But since e.g. the 1980s, the Italian wine raises to modern standards, as also many other regions.

Before the 1980s, Italian wine was generally low quality and unstandardized. It was a methanol poisoning scandal in the 1980s which is viewed as the time when they really modernize the industry.

Of course imports are likely to fall, but by how much?

That would be impossible to predict accurately even in a best-case scenario of a flat, predictable 30% tariff. What we have here is much worse because it’s Trump’s old idea of open ended trade wars with the rest of the world. As if economic history was ambiguous about the global effects of mercantilism and trade wars.

But, as you say, to emulate 19th century fiscal policy the average tariff rate would have to be ~60% AND the volume of imports remain the same. That is of course impossible. It is important to remember that a tariff is just a tax on American consumers and manufacturers (who voted last November for the biggest tax increase in generations?). When you make any kind of taxes confiscatory, your revenue goes down or collapses altogether. Here we would be talking about increasing the average tariff from 2.5% in 2024 to 60%. That is a 24 fold increase that would crater imports and possibly end up generating less revenue from tariffs.

All of this leaves aside the predictable retaliatory tariffs from the rest of the world that would also reduce American exports, diminishing the corporate tax base as well.

universally ranging passions have become the passions of a fixed

Isn’t this French text just like a less intelligent copy-paste of Nietzsche, maybe without understanding the deeper concepts?

A German philosopher writes something. Then for another century unoriginal people in other countries are doing a kind of copy-paste of the German person’s writing, but with additional problems of translation and requiring diluting by people who were not always able to understand the original German philosophy and context of modern German words and concepts, which used to be studied by everyone in the19th century (Kant, Hegel, Goethe).

At least with Marx-Engels, there was a legacy of standardized teaching and translations as a kind of research project, so scholars of Marxism are required first to carefully study Kant, then to learn Hegel, before they should copy-paste Marx.

Do you even realize that millions of retirees and small investors have lost a lot of money from one day to the next and we may be on the brink of a big recession?

Warren Buffet. Margin of safety.

If you ever had one long conversation with a close relative who was alive during the Great Depression you probably can skip reading Warren Buffet.

Prudent steps in that direction would be reducing the federal deficit and increasing the attractiveness of work & savings (something 1980s Reaganite supply-side economists could tell him about).

Defense budget is not going down. It is going up. Very probably (P~.75) it is going way up. The existing weapons are not going to be gutted and new very expensive weapons are going to be bought. See Palmer Luckey and Eric Schmidt and Mark Andreessen. The Silicon Valley fuckheads have pivoted to wonder weapons. Clean thermonuclear warheads.

Tariffs are one of the main things Trump promised to voters in the elections. In some of the election speeches this 2024, he was even saying they would be able to possibly replace income taxes

You are correct.

Establishment shills are shrieking about 30% to boost their disingenuous narrative. It takes a totally unhinged #NeverMAGA cultist to make up a number like 60%. They are very strange folks. They whined that Trump did not do enough during his 1st term — too much in his 2nd — and never offer up a passable and realistic plan of their own. Some people just exist to whinge on and harp.

By they time additional exemptions are issued and countries make bilateral reforms it is likely to on average be closer to 15-20%. There is definitely revenue to be had from this, but it is nowhere near enough to fully replace personal income tax. Perhaps we will be able to get some lower & middle class improvements including exempting tips and social security.

PEACE 😇

It would be similar result as having high VAT and then paying subsidy to local industry.

–

Just like consumers paying tax on imports. Consumption taxes generally viewed as regressive, as proportionally lower income people will pay more than higher income people.

–

But the balance of USA-EU trade, could focus quite a lot on the American bourgeoisie, as the USA middle class imports often luxury products from the EU, like Porsche automobiles or Scottish whiskey.

Fans of shops like Eataly will be paying high tariffs to access authentic Italian products.

If we recall our forum’s New York people like AaronB, who says he only likes to eat butter imported from France, these tariffs could be viewed as a slightly more progressive policy than usually.

From the culture point of view, you will be using fiscal tools to tax consumers* of high quality Scottish and Japanese whiskey, while untaxing rednecks’ whiskey from Alabama.

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*Probably mostly Kamala voters.

S1…I apologize for my reply and “troll” placed in error.

S1, I apologize for “troll” placed in error.

This is pretty funny.

Keep the faith brothers!!!!

All those floor traders dumping stocks are clearly #NeverMAGA traitors that don’t understand Trump’s 5d chess plans. By selling less soy to the Chinese they won’t get as much protein and will be too weak to attack Taiwan.

Our glorious leader knows what he is doing.

We will acquire Greenland and Panama. Trump will be added to Rushmore and the F47 will be the greatest fighter jet ever created.

Trump even has a new gold coin showing the F47 that you can buy for just $49.99.

A great price for a great coin with a great president.

It’s all great. Everything is going great.

Just ignore your 401k for now.

Thanks everyone.

Some people just exist to whinge on and harp.

With my portfolio down 5% thanks to the clown in chief (and probably much worse to come) I feel perfectly entitled to protest and to personally attack the self-appointed representative in this forum of the Trump clown show. And it’s actually hundreds of millions of people suddenly poorer all around the world because of a totally preventable financial meltdown.

There’s also the problem of sheer stupidity. I have few dogmatic beliefs on economic matters and am always willing to learn from new experiments (especially when they are conducted in far away countries like Argentina). I can imagine how an exceptional country like the US can break some old economic rules and avoid the expected effects if the experiment is done with intelligence and foresight. But Trump’s chart in front of the cameras last Wednesday was an insult to everybody’s intelligence. A shameless Maduro-style forgery. Let’s hope the damage is controlled in one way or another but I’m too old to have any trust in banana republic initiatives like this.

Move along, move along…nothing to see here.

Was it her knife or did she take it from the low-life?

I think it’s high time for you to start wearing big boy pants now.

Everyone gets it. You are an establishment Uniparty shill. You have been an insufferable elite since your precious corporate candidate DeSantis lost.

The fact that you do not like pro-worker reforms means MAGA is right: (1)

Your Discomfort Means It’s Working

It has been one whole day since President Trump implemented his tariff agenda.

With the amount of squirming and outright panic in the news media, markets, and on social media, you’d think we were 50 years into a 100-year bout of famine, plague, depression, and pestilence.

Let’s all just gather our heads for a second.

At a very basic psychological level, people are opposed to change. It doesn’t matter whether it’s changing their cable provider or taking a detour in traffic.

Extrapolating from this, people are really opposed to bigger, more consequential change.

Extrapolating from this, in the world of finance, I have consistently argued that market participants have been falsely conditioned by our monetary and fiscal policy in this country to always expect comfort and never expect interruptions from the market moving higher, or the quality of life status quo that we believe we are entitled to here in the United States to suffer.

This concept was the basis for my article explaining why I thought the next market crash would “break the brains” of market participants.

Now let’s zoom out and think about what President Trump is trying to accomplish with his tariff agenda. He is essentially saying that the status quo in the United States isn’t working and large changes need to be implemented—changes that will shock the global economy—to remedy the issue.

“Who is the status quo not working for?” some of you will ask me from your Porsche, driving down PCH, or from your desk overseeing your millions in the market.

America First means that those that benefit from exploitation will feel some pain. Thank you for admitting “the shoe fits”. These reforms are not meant to help #NeverMAGA zealot Globalists, such as yourself.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2025-04-03/your-discomfort-means-its-working

Thermonuclear warheads have been relatively clean for a long time. This is a significant reason why the US-Ukrainian antiRussia project is so stupid. If the fallout is much less than from Chernobyl, what is the barrier to using them?

They weren’t advertised as clean before the Ukraine 2022 show where I could see it. Nuclear was unspeakable and never an option and a bunch of other things that now it is not. People are now making venture capital pitches on nuclear war scenarios.

It would be useful if Donald the Fat would release the secret files on these:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dominic

It is a pity Cary Sublette has not updated since 2019. I would like to know what he says about these knuckle heads.

https://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Nwfaq/Nfaq0.html

I think it’s high time for you to start wearing big boy pants now.

Not sure what you mean.

I was right about the tariffs while the Trump admin was wrong.

Are you calling be a child? I guess the Trump admin could use consulting from a child then.

LOL, I’m calling you a troll, and if you keep trolling me I will troll you back. Go clean up the mess you are making on Anglin’s thread and the Open Thread, or we will discuss your shitposting in front of your friends here.

Wat do you say, Mr Buttrape?

It is a man-bites-dog story. IIRC, she had a three-inch folding blade.

The Eritrean perp was 64 and the life expectancy there is only like 66.

It may be the influence of Sher Singh, but I think the only way to change the culture in Europe is for all Europeans to be allowed to carry swords, and have kiri-sute gomen (“permission to cut and leave”), like samurai.

Argentina’s president to declassify Nazi files, expose how war criminals fled to Argentina

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-847589

…my portfolio down 5% thanks to the clown in chief (and probably much worse to come)

Is it supposed go up and up with no limit? When it went 5% up were you also protesting?

Wealth has to be based on something real, the financial instruments you are watching are just a surface game. But if the values were real they will come back. If not, what entitles rentier-class boomers to feel rich based on make-believe?

I think US stocks will be fine, as will the US dollar. They are the central core element of the current system, the ones I worry about are the remote appendages in far away countries. They may not have much to go on.

US is incredibly rich. It has been blessed and it has not always done best job with what it has. But the dominant fact in the world’s economy is this US wealth – resources, technologies, relatively few people, largest market by far, and the reserve currency. So it will be fine, it will most likely prosper even more as real money from less fortunate places rushes to the safety of US. (US is the real Switzerland of the world.)

Europe is screwed. It had a great deal based on US generosity and Russian unrequited friendship – both subsidized Europe that has few resources and low-level business culture. The recent Euro bosses hysteria, “let’s have a war and rearm”, screaming at US with a hurt pride when Vance pointed out the obvious, marching on Russia for the umpteenth time, this time with empty hands – hysteria happens when people realize they are screwed and it’s over. Maybe Euros will stand up and change things, but they may not be allowed to. It doesn’t look good.

Are you buying the gila monster venom meme coin or are you buying the botulism neurotoxin meme coin?

I recently had dinner with a friend who is juicing with Gila Monster Venom (GMV). It has cut both his appetite and his desire to drink alcohol. He often dines at nice places and believes the GMV will pay for itself. Eye roll!

Since I saw the cadaver guy video I have mostly been concentrating at meal time after the first forty or so forkfuls on attempting to sense the arrival in my system of the enkyendocrine (sp?) cell secretions. I can’t reliably do so yet but I am thinking I have succeeded in doing so two or three times. What these men and women are paying 10K a month for (or billing their insurance pool for (and it is an inferior substitute)) we all have for free.

Also I am thinking there ain’t no way that drug doesn’t diminish pleasure of eating. I am sort of into the pleasure of eating.

Apparently there is a vast underground and classified literature on the Housatonic test which was rumored to be an amazingly (!) clean (!!) multi megaton above ground nuclear bomb test at the very end of when they were doing above ground tests. I might have posted this link before. It is worth close reading:

https://gwern.net/doc/radiance/2021-grams.pdf

Ripple
An Investigation of the World’s Most Advanced High-Yield Thermonuclear Weapon Design

The US stock market was ridiculously overvalued, the Biden people had pumped unprecedented stimulus in, better to lance the boil. Trump’s tariffs are poorly conceived and far too aggressive, I expect he is doing his negotiating strategy, see Canada and Mexico. Slashing all the government largesse Obama an then accelerated by Obama is the only way they can begin to balance the budget.

His continuing subservience to Israel is a my main concern.

Irony is that, despite the enormous stimulus the Biden regime unleashed, they still failed to win the election.

Isn’t this French text just like a less intelligent copy-paste of Nietzsche, maybe without understanding the deeper concepts?

I’ve only read a couple of Nietzsche’s books so I can’t be sure. Drieu read Nietzsche in translation and there are some Nietzsche influences in the book that the passage come from, but I don’t see them as being very present in that passage. The rationalism he is talking about is from the French and English Enlightenment (he mentions d’Alembert, Condillac, Montesquieu, Berkeley, Locke there). As far as I can tell in that passage this rationalism is being contrasted with neo-medievalism and references from French monarchist ideology.

I think you can maybe say about Kant that he can be presented as a typical or exemplary case of Enlightenment philosophy, ‘the Enlightenment philosopher’, but at the same time Enlightenment thought and the general phenomena in Europe does not all derive from Kant himself. Likewise, Hegel may be emblematic and prototypical of the ‘discovery of historical consciousness’ period that followed the Enlightenment and Napoleonic Wars era, but it was a broader thing and isn’t all Hegel’s responsibility. Finally Nietzsche can be seen as the great example of the ‘crisis of liberalism’ philosopher from the end of the 19th century, but not everything related to that trend in European thought and politics was inspired by Nietzsche’s own writing.

The topic of the reception of German philosophers and authors outside of German speaking countries is an interesting one, when and where they were picked up and by who (afaik Kant was more widely read in France in the 19th century, the other are more 20th century, even post-war). Then there is the direct relevance of Nietzsche to things like totalitarianism, crisis of virility in the inter-war period, reactionary modernism, topics that Drieu was interested in. Sometimes imo it is relatively distant, you can look at a contemporary mass market Nietzsche promoters like BAP, to make Nietzsche more accessible he has to rewrite it in a much more demotic style, take material from lesser authors (Hans Gunther, some of those 1920s German biologists he seems to use) etc.

When will Reiner_tor finally admit that the UN is evil and needs to be dismantled?

When he and his relatives retire from the UN?

I largely concur. You may find these articles of interest. (1)

All of this talk of tariffs in the headlines caused a decades-old memory to break loose of something called GATT, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. I’ll get back to that in a moment.

What eventually led me to GATT was a post by the Twitter (X) account Zerohedge, reprinting the take of the Dutch company Rabobank on remarks by the European Commission (EU) President Ursala von der Leyen on the Trump tariffs.

Rabobank: “Von der Leyen said that she ‘agree[s] with President Trump that others are taking unfair advantage of the current rules,’ but she seems to think that the Americans shouldn’t have done anything about it, and should have opted instead for another round [of] fruitless talks.”

I don’t think that Rabobank’s summary is fundamentally unfair to von der Leyen’s statement, which can be read here. Don’t ask me why it’s formatted like a bad poem.

If you look past the blather (“We are in this together.” “Our unity is our strength.”) the EU head really does say,

I agree with President Trump, that others are taking unfair advantage of the current rules. And I am ready to support any efforts to make the global trading system fit for the realities of the global economy.

But then later adds,

Let’s move from confrontation to negotiation.

To keep its current model, the CCP must hawk its low quality exports somewhere. They must be looking at European nations right now. If the EU cannot act in their own members trade defense, deindustrialization could easily accelerate.
____

Trump’s willingness to confront inequitable trade barriers and tariffs is already showing wins. (2)

Smart nations lining up for tariff deals with President Trump — and you can just tell which ones they are

Instead of screaming and yelling at President Trump’s tariff schedule, as the European Union and China are doing, smart nations have taken the side door to cut deals with President Trump and get their nations off the tariffs list entirely.

It’s as if they are sorting themselves out, smart ones from dumb ones.

Start with Argentina, which got the deal done immediately:

🇺🇸🇦🇷 UNITED STATES AND ARGENTINA BECOME THE FIRST ZERO-TARIFF COUNTRIES

Presidents Trump and Milei will sign the first international trade agreement free of tariffs for both American and Argentine products.

This is how negotiations should be done

Then comes Cambodia, which has a manufacturing base heavily dependent on U.S. buyers.

They slashed their own tariffs by two thirds so as to have something nice to bring to the table when they get facetime with President Trump. Look how courteous and cordial their letter is:

Cambodia cutting tariffs to 5% fm 15%. List of nations grows wanting tariff deals, watch ⁦@EveningEdit⁩ tonite for full list. This is the greatest recession that has yet to happen.

With Israel, it’s the same — they are getting ready to deal and bringing something to the table:

BREAKING: Israel Has Removed ALL TARIFFS On American Products & Therefore Will Have ZERO Tarrifs Issued By @POTUS Trump.
ANY NATION Wishing Not To Be Tarrifed Can Do The Same

How many countries will push to the front of the line to obtain special deals for 0% or 5%?

The basic rate for all non-exempt imports is a default 10%. This is desirable to drive both revenue and reindustrialization. At some point the door will close on additional deals with sub 10% rates, locking in fairly permanent market access advantages for the first movers.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2025/04/gatts-nine-lives.php

(2) https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2025/04/smart_nations_lining_up_for_tariff_deals_with_president_trump_and_you_wouldn_t_be_surprised_which_ones_they_are.html

What are the future geopolitical/domestic implications of this graph of increasing costs of VA benefits?

Just scanning this article it looks very interesting. I am slightly skeptical because Nuckoll’s laser fusion ideas were apparently off by many orders of magnitude and even NIF required over a decade of experiments to meet its initial goals. However, it has been pointed out that nuclear-driven compression processes use “a bigger hammer” and may be less susceptible to problems. As far as I can tell, the ripple approach still requires a fission primary so it can only be so clean. I thought they had figured out ways to get rid of the rest of the uranium in warheads (as partially discussed in the article).

One perspective on the definition of a clean bomb is practical, not technical. If a device has much less fallout than typical devices prior to 1956 (which were detonated in a lot of above ground explosions) and if the overall fallout is in some sense much less than released by Chernobyl and Fukushima, then such a weapon is probably clean enough that the military has scenarios where they will readily use such weapons. I didn’t see it in the article, but have read mentions of low fallout aspects of enhanced radiation weapons for interceptor warheads and also “neutron bombs.”

So what, do you think the X-37 cruises around with a bunch of 100+ megaton “dissuasion” Ripple warheads? These probably make a painful EMP.

China has been gradually working up the economic value chain. I wonder what percentage of her exports are now considered good quality or better?

+++

How do the new tariffs apply to an Apple product manufactured or assembled in China?

What’s stunning to UK consumers is the rise of the Australian and NZ wines.

In the 1970s Aussie wines were considered a joke.

“Chateau Bleu”, too, has won many prizes; not least for its taste, and its lingering afterburn. “Old Smokey, 1968” has been compared favourably to a Welsh claret.

Now, Aussie Shiraz is pretty good, NZ Sauvignon Blanc likewise. Interesting thing is that they cost more in Oz and NZ than they do in the UK.

The greatest tragedy of the fall of Communism is the demise of Bulgarian Cabernet Sauvignon, which was a reliably good wine for poor student types, really oaky and blackcurranty, sadly when they returned the vineyards to the original owners (or their descendants) the quality fell through the floor.

https://wine-pages.com/columnist-articles/whatever-happened-to-bulgaria-caroline-has-the-answers/

one of the main reasons was the long-winded and poorly handled land privatization process that resulted in tiny plots being handed back to owners with little interest in grapes. Many of these were abandoned or left to fall into ruin. Lack of cooperation or shared vision between growers and wineries was another issue. Growers wanted to pick as early as possible to get paid before theft or poor weather lost them their cash crop. Wineries paying early in the fight for fruit supplies only added to the pressure, and the result was mean, unripe wines instead of those soft, fruity numbers we’d all fallen for – just at a time when the New World was hitting the shelves in a major way.

BREAKING: Israel Has Removed ALL TARIFFS On American Products & Therefore Will Have ZERO Tarrifs Issued By @POTUS Trump.

For the amount of money and political capital the US continually spends on Israel, it is absolutely astonishing that they ever collected tariffs on US goods, no matter how small.

They should perpetually drown in a tidal wave of our GMO corn and soybeans, beg for more, and be happy about it!

The plan is to kill all the Palestinian Arabs and it will all blow over in a couple weeks. If worse comes to worse Melania will dye her hair black, divorce Donald the Fat, and become the lesbian Kardashian. You will not see anything else on the news for three solid months at which time the Palestinians will be as relevant to international diplomacy as the Pygmies.

So what, do you think the X-37 cruises around with a bunch of 100+ megaton “dissuasion” Ripple warheads? These probably make a painful EMP.

Aye aye aye aye aye aye aye. I prefer to think about the first chapter of Jordan Peterson Maps of Meaning paragraphs where he describes being in his early 20’s and obsessing over nuclear war scenarios to the brink of suicide. An armed X-37 is a scenario which might make his head explode even today. It’s like those science fiction stories about the thought that kills.

Snow Crash might be better.

Is it supposed go up and up with no limit?

Actually yes. That’s what is has been doing for the past couple of centuries: grow at an average rate of 10% nominal. That is why people buy stocks. Otherwise we would all buy bonds instead.

There are good economic reasons to expect that the economy will keep growing long term and that the most important companies will on average grow at a higher rate than the economy in general. Of course there are periodic corrections and downturns, which is healthy when they are provoked by endogenous market mechanisms (inevitable in a fiat economy), but is extremely unhealthy when they are provoked by stupidity like devastating wars, bad economic policy or a buffoon trying to implement voodoo tariff theory.

As for “no limit”, ultimately I guess the universe will put an end to the economic growth of the human species but we should be eons away from that if we are just intelligent enough to not destroy ourselves because some Eastern Slavs have lingering hatreds or some other equally moronic reason.

what entitles rentier-class boomers to feel rich based on make-believe?

I suspect the rentier class will be fine. Anyone with a brain has an investment strategy that accounts for market downturns. But in the past couple of days some 4-5 trillion dollars have vaporized in the global economy. I know that our Dear Leader only thinks about the poor working class when he spends his weekends playing golf in Florida but it is plain silly to think that the millions of workers affected by this upheaval all around the world are not going to be the worst affected. Rentiers will just modify their portfolios, ignore the turmoil and hold their equities, reduce their withdrawals, focus on interest and dividends,… multiple ways of adjusting. But what are the people who have just lost their jobs and businesses going to do? As in all economic downturns, many workers, especially the older ones, will never again recover their previous standard of living and most in the developing countries will outright fall into poverty.

As a matter of fact, all these corporations whose market value has been reduced by the trillions could have perfectly adjusted to a world with higher tariffs and a big rebalance of trade flows if done gradually and with a well-planned strategy. Millions of investors around the world selling their stocks means that everybody realizes that there is no concrete strategy and it’s all being done out of a buffoon’s ass.

There is also another tremendously harmful effect of this debacle. Trump and his team were doing some very good things, like bringing sanity to the borders, the gender stuff, confronting the Europeans’ woke policies, trying to bring peace to Ukraine,… This stupidity has just given the mass media a perfect way to taint all those initiatives and conflate them all with the half-assed tariff policy.

Let’s face it: a few months ago the US was led by an old man who didn’t know where he was standing and had lost the ability to express his thoughts verbally. Now the US is being led by another old man who has definitely lost any sentience he had left of what is real and what is fantasy. The Russians lost 60 million people in WW2, 50,000 Americans died in Panama, Vietnam imposes an “effective tariff” on the US of 90%,….

DogeGPT’s tariff formula per Bloomberg:

https://archive.ph/QXAOJ#selection-1241.0-1241.58

This Is the Formula Trump’s Team Used to Calculate Tariffs

Vietnam says it wants to remove its tariffs on the USA.

Trump says major Nike producer Vietnam wants to slash its tariffs ‘down to ZERO’ after ‘productive call’

WASHINGTON — President Trump said Friday he had a “productive call” with a top Vietnamese official, adding that the Communist Southeast Asian nation “wants to cut their Tariffs down to ZERO” pending a free trade agreement.

“Just had a very productive call with To Lam, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam, who told me that Vietnam wants to cut their Tariffs down to ZERO if they are able to make an agreement with the U.S.,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
https://nypost.com/2025/04/04/us-news/trump-says-major-nike-producer-vietnam-wants-to-slash-their-tariffs-down-to-zero-after-productive-call/

This would be a victory for the USA in terms of the great power conflict, as it would help to convert more of the trade in manufacturing away from China which is a rival power, to Vietnam which is relatively non-aligned.

LOL, I’m calling you a troll, and if you keep trolling me I will troll you back. Go clean up the mess you are making on Anglin’s thread and the Open Thread, or we will discuss your shitposting in front of your friends here.

Boy you sure get seem upset. Are you mad that I was right about the tariffs being a stupid idea? Well that should be common sense.

Wat do you say, Mr Buttrape?

Are you still upset that I mentioned the Texan who volunteered for Putin and was buttraped by Russian soldiers? Well I’ll post the video here for anyone who missed it:

He was buttraped and killed by Russians.

I’m not sure if you understand the concept of an open forum.

It doesn’t mean pro-Russian/pro-Trump posts only.

If you shitpost on the internet in Belgium and you are far-right in the Belgian government view they can throw you in jail.

This is proof A123 is not Belgian.

https://www.politico.eu/article/belgium-far-right-prodigy-dries-van-langenhove-prison-term-incite-violence-deny-holocaust/

This is one of those countries where it is illegal to deny the holocaust and presumably Ron Unz ought to avoid.

the passage come from, but I don’t see them as being very present in that passage. The rationalism he is talking about is from the French

In my opinion, the text is mainly copy-paste of the German philosophy, but used to describe about French history.

What is this phrase “ancient rhythm”? These phrases seem meaningless in the English or French language, but it is a real terminology in the German philosophy.

Just search about key words like “Rhythmus” or “Zeit-Rhythmus”.

So, we could make the text meaningful possibly, if we know about German writers.

If you search “ancient rhythm”, the professional texts are about Nietzsche. It is a German academic terminology.
https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/jlt-2018-0009/html

This is the source of the great emotional force of the poses and landscapes of Watteau’s painting. Christian humanism is not far off: these men and women raised in a destitute church preserve a remnant of piety in matters of gallantry and honour.

This is second part of the text is quote of Nietzsche?

–

I agree some other part of the text like the final paragraph, seems to be like Flaubert?

, but at the same time Enlightenment thought and the general phenomena in Europe does not all derive from Kant himself. Likewise, Hegel may be emblematic and prototypical of the ‘discovery of historical consciousness’ period that followed the Enlightenment and Napoleonic Wars era, but it was a broader thing and isn’t all Hegel’s responsibility

I think this is correct, historically. The influence was smaller in the 19th century.

But in the 20th century, then German philosophers are becoming the mainstream, not just for nerds, but for the mainstream politics in Berlin, in Paris, in Peking, in Moscow.

grow at an average rate of 10% nominal…

It varies and it has been 8% over he last few decades. It’s also a completely different basket of stocks – so unless people buy an index or keep on changing from the old to new there is no “average return”. The regular corrections are what determines the return – what you hold and the timing. Anyone buying in the last few years during the insane Biden money-printing pump bought too high to make 10% annually. It’s only math, the stocks are worth as much as the underlying business generates, not what traders bid up.

You may not be familiar with the “2 pm institutional buyers” who have been propping up the market since 2010. The buyers of last resort (if needed), big name finance who get 0% revolving credit (now 2-4%) from the regional Fed-window to buy at dips. Their role is to keep the market stable. People have figured out that they come in to save the market from a big drop and have been playing it – there is little downside. But it couldn’t go on forever, the valuations are too high. This correction is needed otherwise a worse one would happen on its own (I agree Trump has triggered this intentionally, the timing is good for him.)

I suspect the rentier class will be fine. Anyone with a brain has an investment strategy that accounts for market downturns. But in the past couple of days some 4-5 trillion dollars have vaporized in the global economy.

They lost trillions and many will be poorer on paper. But my point was that was not real wealth, it was a pumped value that disproportionally went to elderly boomers. This correction is needed to put some rationality in the system – someone has to lose and the boomer rentier class is the only place easy money is available. (The big guys will never lose, you are right.)

few months ago the US was led by an old man who didn’t know where he was standing…Now the US is being led by another old man who has definitely lost any sentience

Biden was the most irresponsible president in US history, most blame goes on him. Trump is volatile and the impulsive stuff he is doing may backfire (plus the outright evil like the Pali situation). Something has to be done – what would you suggest? Riding down the unsustainable fake money in a devil-may-care party? This is all just math – what we had couldn’t go on much longer.

For the elderly it would be preferable to let the mad party go on. But for anyone invested in the future this is preferable. It will be painful for all.

LOL, you are actually doubling down on your buttrape fetish! You are missing my point dude. Please explain your obsession with male anal rape. You have a history of celebrating male rape. Are you on the sex offenders list, just asking?

I put it to commentators that we name the guy who calls himself John Johnson the official TUR male anal rape aficionado.

learn from new experiments

“Economic experiments” by politicians, on the real world, are very expensive and the value of the information is ambiguous, as they are also not controlled.

Trump’s experiment is not going to be pure protectionism, as there will be to respond to Trump’s threat of tariffs, some countries to reduce their tariffs and open free trade with the USA like already Vietnam. https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3305302/trump-says-vietnam-willing-cut-tariffs-us-goods-zero-reach-deal

Trump’s prioritization in this “experiment” is also not purely economic growth. It is partly geopolitical, as he probably wants to reduce dependence on China and the EU. It is partly internally redistributive politics, as he wants to move more economic activity to the Rust Belt regions of the USA and to create more working class jobs.

It can also relate to cultural nationalism, conservatism including relating to consumer behavior (buying more expensive local products less often, less “throwaway consumerism”), environmentalism (reducing shipping distances), military strategy (more invulnerable logistics for war).

–

If we look also at previous “experiments”, the result of protectionism, isn’t necessarily always as like Brazil or Argentina, from the textbook supporting free-trade.

We could also talk about maybe less fatally negative examples like Israel, Japan, South Korea or even the USSR.

–

Israel still has very high protectionism (although reducing in the recent year)s, using some tools which seem partly hidden like import cartels by particular families.

So, the protectionism in Israel cause, Gilette shaving cream to cost double the price of Europe or the USA ( https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-1000899442 ).

The high cost of living causes social unrest as many people cannot afford the groceries ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottage_cheese_boycott ) and many emigrate to Europe for the lower cost of living ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olim_L%27Berlin ).

–

Israel’s economy is managed by 20 families. ( https://archive.ph/DJYfC )

Imported products like Nestle are far more expensive, so people have to buy from the local families instead and Nestle even has to buy the local families’ companies.

–

It sounds like “banana republic”?

But, we were watching especially in the last decade, the macroeconomic result relative to the Mediterranean region, has been still quite stable growth, despite one of the world’s highest military spending (as proportion of GDP), high dependent population ratio (vast unemployed population of religious cults, Arab women etc), low education ratios, majority population which is third world origin.

–
Mediterranean economy effects in the last decade.

We don’t know the causes and effects very much in this Mediterranean region. Probably, the protectionist policy is not helping Israel, but the macroeconomics looked like having high consumer prices from protection is not fatal.

While EU’s internal harmonization and removal all barriers, including even the labor market barriers, is not a miracle cure for other Mediterranean economies like Greece or Portugal in their GDP growth.

–

Openness to trade, or trade as proportion of GDP, without controlling dependent variables, doesn’t look directly correlative to GDP in the Mediterranean region.

After the dust settles, perhaps in a couple of years from now, if these tariff troubles lead to less restricted international trade will this be a case of 6D chess?

How do these tariff games relate to BRICS?

I have a comment linked to your shitpost on Sailer’s thread still under moderation after almost 24 hours. Maybe it’s just a troll or maybe it puts you in bad light, who knows.

Imagine living in Yakutia and thinking all you have to deal with is the horrible climate and monstrous wildlife and then seeing this (short) guy come for you.

https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/stunning-reconstruction-reveals-warrior-and-his-weapons-from-4-000-year-old-burial-in-siberia

“Economic experiments” by politicians, on the real world, are very expensive and the value of the information is ambiguous, as they are also not controlled.

Of course I would prefer placebo-controlled randomized experiments but in economics you get what you get. That’s why it’s a soft science with multiple “schools of thought”. Besides no university-taught economic model incorporates crucial factors like HBD/cultural effects. However, it also uses very sophisticated analysis tools, like econometrics, and it’s not like we don’t know anything at all.

For example, the Argentinian experiment has proven with a very reasonable degree of certainty that a year of austerity and liberalization can transform a 2nd World economy in free fall bordering hyperinflation quite radically by getting inflation under control, reducing poverty and increasing employment. But I think most of us knew this was the likely outcome. There is much more interesting material to learn when/if Milei abolishes the central bank and introduces full reserve banking.

Likewise, if the US 4 years from now is a much more prosperous country in spite of a 30% average tariff and random trade wars with the rest of the world, a new school of economics will be born and Trump/Lutnick may receive a Nobel prize. But like I said, I’m tool old to start believing in the economic genius of a man who constantly pulls numbers out if his rear and I’d much prefer this experiment was carried out in some far away country. Guyana, Lithuania,… something like that.

will this be a case of 6D chess?

No, whatever happens it will not be a case of 6D chess because you just cannot go from 0D chess (transforming trade deficit rates into ‘effective tariff’ rates) to 6D chess. That’s like going from a World Wrestling Entertainment show (another Trump favorite) to a new physics discovery at CERN.

if the US 4 years from now is a much more prosperous country in spite of a 30% average tariff and random trade wars with the rest of the world, a new school of economics will be born and Trump/Lutnick may receive a Nobel prize.

The most likely scenario 4 years down the line is the U.S. as a more prosperous country (for workers) with ~15% average tariff spurring both MAGA Reindustrialization and exports. Stock prices of firms off-shoring of U.S. jobs will struggle.

There will relatively be few trade skirmishes, as Trump’s policy is well crafted and understandable. Most nations will make the modest & reasonable changes to reach the 10-15% band. The only truly irreconcilable issue is the CCP”s addiction to trade exploitation.

Will Trump/Lutnick deserve a Nobel? Yes.
Will they get one? Probably not.
Does anyone care about by the Nobel anymore? No.
Doesn’t your NYT thought leader Paul Krugman have one?

Lower energy prices will also help. Getting rid of junk science tied to climate chance fiction will be a boon to everyone.

PEACE 😇

After the dust settles, perhaps in a couple of years from now, if these tariff troubles lead to less restricted international trade will this be a case of 6D chess?

How do these tariff games relate to BRICS?

Why 6D?

There are objectively obvious problems in the U.S. economy driven by allowing other countries to exploit unfair trade practices. Treating others they way they treat us is a clear and reasonable step to reduce barriers.

I am not sure why people keep touting BRICS as something special. It is a vague talking shop, much like the G20. Potentially useful for PR, but totally irrelevant for serious issues like global trade.

PEACE 😇

It is also about interest rates.

PEACE 😇

Did you want to deny that the pro-Putin Texan Russel Bentley was raped and killed by Russians? You can still find his music videos on youtube where he sings the praises of his new homeland. I think his music is awful so I’m not going to link them.

That was actually an old story. In fact he was covered by Vice before the war:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/nationalist-interest-v23n4/

What a fine American traitor.

You might want to give the internet a break.

Trump’s idiocy on tariffs is a global disaster and your failed attempt at claiming I added a buttrape angle to the Bentley story probably didn’t help.

Bentley was buttraped by Russians and Trump is a complete idiot on tariff policy.

Maybe take a couple days to absorb those realities.

What are the next ten big Trump promises we have not seen any policy moves on yet? Does someone have a list?

Russian government budget is in surplus for an oil price above $42

Nothing but the open deliberate lies as usual, cause surplus cutoff price is pretty round 60$ nowdays in RF;)

2023-11-02

Budget rule with oil cutoff price of $60 approved by the President

Vladimir Putin signed a law that returns Russian oil and gas to the budget rule dependent on the oil price. The President signed a law that returns the budget rule dependent on the oil price. However, the cutoff price in the National Welfare Fund will not be $40, as before, but $60 per barrel. The signed law allows the Ministry of Finance to make the country’s budget revenues more predictable, since they will be calculated from a fixed price of $60 per barrel.

https://oilcapital.ru/news/2023-11-02/byudzhetnoe-pravilo-s-tsenoy-otsecheniya-po-nefti-v-60-utverzhdeno-prezidentom-3088891

–

Oil is at $62. Why does Russia need a budget surplus? Every other country is running huge deficits, most in 3-6% range. If Russia has a deficit it will be smaller.

Russia’s ratio of debt-to-gdp is 15%, US 124%, Japan 250%…you are barking up the wrong tree. It makes you look stupid, all emotions and ideology and facts be damned.

I am only tracking two.

Nobody can hope to follow even a fourth of everything in this firehose of Kayfabe. I am going to stick to two. The New Jersey drones and the CIA JFK assassination files. So far he gets an F on both on my report card.

I heard a fabulous discussion this morning on Pluto in Aquarius and it’s bad news. (I think it was Pluto in Aquarius. They were throwing several around there and I don’t know anything about what they were saying.)

You are the only commentator on TUR that I am aware of who actively shows an interest in male anal rape. Nobody pushed you to go there.

Why did you choose to answer my more neutral comment but you you ignore my reply(189) to your pro-rape comment:
https://www.unz.com/akarlin/open-thread-271/#comment-7066989

Stop obfuscating. Why do you take pleasure in male anal rape?

I added a buttrape angle

Sounds a bit like Galton’s technique of using his sextant and trigonometry to calculate the steatopygia of a Hottentot.

But with an unnecessary addition (such as a homo would make.)

Felix Keverevich(?) who is now on X, can be called another gerard but with the sign of some certain quality and has more clue than both of you regarding this;)

Tanking oil prices raise pressure on the Russian budget. Government may have to devalue the ruble (past 1$=100RUB) to offset the loss of dollar revenue. Of course weaker currency will raise inflation – a no win dilemma for Russia. So let us hope that oil recovers.🙏

https://twitter.com/darko31414/status/1833702546709295165

JJ worships Disney as the best run company on the planet. He loves its latest shows, including Star Wars: The Acolyte created by Leslye Headland, Harvey Weinstein’s personal assistant. This should go some way to explaining the aberrations you are encountering.

I tried having discussions with JJ, but his malicious & low-IQ Trolling makes the effort akin to wrestling someone with explosive diarrhea. Even though winning would be inevitable, the encounter is not worth it.

PEACE 😇

One can also view the Bolsheviks as an example of a government that was nominally pro-proletarian but ended up fucking over the proletariat much more severely than an openly bourgeois government would have!

Completely agreed with what you wrote here, BTW!

Did Mr. Hack ever hear of this food science questioning the idea that sugar is bad for you?

What if he has only been giving up the powers induced by eating sugar?

What are the next ten big Trump promises we have not seen any policy moves on yet? Does someone have a list?

Has Trump appointed any judges yet? Improving the Judiciary is important, and his 2nd term administration is way behind. Presumably, he wants to be careful to avoid John Roberts RINO clones sneaking through…

Absolutely everyone knew that ending Kiev aggression on Day 1 was an aspirational, not literal date determinate, goal. However, he still has to broker a deal. Or, if Germany & France prevent one, walk away.

Some additional document declassification is required.

• The JFK release showed that Israel was not part of a conspiracy, despite Mr. Unz wild assertions to the contrary. If anything they provided information that might have headed off the events.
• Bondi needs to deliver a comprehensive release on Epstein. Yes. The victims need to be protected, but the longer it takes the less it will be trusted.
• The MLKjr documents are going to be bad for law enforcement, likely including the FBI.

PEACE 😇

…raise pressure on the Russian budget….may have to devalue the ruble

Your are displaying your ignorance. “Raise pressure” means nothing, all government budgets, US, UK, Germany… are constantly under pressure. That’s the nature of budgets.

Ruble is up 30% from January. Are you saying they will reverse it and devalue it back to where it was 3 months ago? Do you understand anything at all?

Trump has a lot more dust to kick up before he has time for those known issues (known to him, not the rest of us). In the meantime, you can try this:

Boring.

I want to see more action on deportation. This is an existential issue for the USA. If Vance has time to flit over to Greenland he should just move down to the Mexican border until we get the rate up to 10,000 deportations per day. At that point, in say three months or so, he can start promoting aggressive remedial education for US students at every level. Not by making this a government issue, but simply by getting government out of the loop and pointing out that DIE and loss of meritocracy have brought American education standards down to third world levels.

+++

Why did Israel attack the USS Liberty?

I want to see more action on deportation. This is an existential issue for the USA

• New entries have plummeted to near zero
• Agency deportations are on track for 1,000,000+ by December 31
• Self deportations, above the 1MM, are happening as programs such as TPS are being pulled back.

Given the hostility of the Obama/Biden judges… what do you demand that is not occurring? Be specific as to what you believe could done under the current judicial restraining orders.

Why did Israel attack the USS Liberty?

ROTFLMAO. Please tell me you are not as unhinged as Unz and the other cultists.

Start with the reasonable facts and question — Easily identifiable U.S. frigates were available. Why did John McCain’s navy send a non-descript vessel into harms way without an escort?

The Israelis shot at an effectively impossible to identify vessel that was in an inexplicable location that only made sense if was an enemy combatant. Absolutely everyone on all sides accepted this obviously accurate explanation.

Then came this mysterious tape, without provenance, that purported to be IDF pilots talking to Israeli control in English. This fabrication is twice over debunked as ludicrous. Everyone on the Israeli side knew that radio traffic was being recorded. The fabrication of a lengthy back and forth is obviously bogus. The local pilots would have discussed complex, non-aviation, issues in their native tongue, not English.

Anyone who spends more than 30 minutes reviewing the actual record will immediately figure out that:

• Israel hit an unidentified vessel in error.
• John McCain’s Navy put the USS Liberty into harms way

There are important questions, having nothing to do with Palestinian Jews, that need answers:

— Who were the establishment critters, like John McCain, that deployed the USS Liberty without the available escort(s)? Israeli planes would have avoided any vessel covered by an easily identifiable U.S. warship.
— Were they malicious, negligent, or incompetent?
— Did they deliberately set up the Israeli Air Force?

PEACE 😇

What did the Koreans* mean by making this movie where a professional baseball league recruits a gorilla? (Spoilers)

Let’s make a super simplified rouble revenue scheme and charitably pretend that even arithmetically impaired posters have some slim chance to be able mentally grasp it:

Oil at 62$, rouble at 84 for 1$ now, so you get 5208 roubles for a barrel of oil.

Oil at 78$, rouble at 113 for 1$, so you got 8814 roubles for a barrel just 4 months ago.

Thus your rouble revenue from oil already crashed down roughly 40% compared with the start of the year and thus is truly great success for the Kremlin chimpanzee gang budget and overall economy;)

When Russia buys abroad they get more with stronger ruble. That’s why countries export, they get foreign currency to buy imports, has that even occurred to you? Russia now buys and sells mostly in Asia (China) so it benefits.

The oil price you quote is spot-price used for current day-to-day trading. Most transactions use long-term contracts – e.g. Russia with China has long-term contracts that adjust to market gradually. All commodities fluctuate and the US shale oil producers will get wiped out long before it hurts Russia – they mostly sell on the spot market and their production costs are very high, about 2-3 times Russia’s costs. Selling energy is more complex than you think, but it can be very profitable.

You are a financial illiterate who blows smoke because of hatred of Russia – it only adds sad pathos to your losses.

I believe an incremental improvement in the rate of deportations is more important than anything in Greenland. If Team Trump cannot think of some other measures to work on for this problem they should think harder.

+++

The Israeli pilots intentionally attacked a readily identifiable US vessel. To suggest anything else is to challenge the basic credibility of the pilots.

+++

Why was the spy Jonathan Pollard released?

Is Simon Webb right that the Beta Israelis don’t cause any problems and aren’t resentful? How well does he know this 1.75% of the total Israeli population?

I believe an incremental improvement in the rate of deportations is more important than anything in Greenland. If Team Trump cannot think of some other measures to work on for this problem they should think harder.

As I have pointed out to others… It is unreasonable to expect 100% of absolutely everything instantly. Let us review the current situation.

New illegal arrivals have dropped from millions to hundreds.

You may have also noticed that the judiciary has gone rogue and is actively interfering with deportations. Does the name Judge Boasberg ring a bell?

The order to end “birthright citizenship” has been given. The courts are interfering with this clearly Constitutional action.

Deportations are already on course to be over 1,000,000/yr. More money has been requested, but it had to go through Congress. The Continuing Resolution with the increase was signed 2 or 3 weeks ago. Staff has to be placed into positions, many likely need retraining before being active members of ICE and border patrol raids. There is a good chance this number will improve further.

The situation is headed in the correct direction.
___

Are you demanding that all other work for the U.S. people must stop until you get absolutely everything you want on deportations? If not, why are you complaining that Trump’s administration is pursuing raw material and strategic minerals security in parallel with working on migration policy changes?

The Israeli pilots intentionally attacked a readily identifiable US vessel. To suggest anything else is to challenge the basic credibility of the pilots.

The USS Liberty was *NOT* a readily identifiable vessel. Everyone serious agrees that she had a non descript shape and markings. Remember she started service as a cargo ship.

A U.S. Navy frigate *is* readily identifiable. Why was one not sent with the USS Liberty? Do you really believe this obviously poor decision was not intentional? Elements of the U.S. government set-up American sailors to die. To suggest anything else is a challenge to basic credibility. Remember, this is the same Navy that gave us John McCain.

PEACE 😇

Does the name Judge Boasberg ring a bell?

Yes, I was thinking he might be some relation to this guy:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Boas

Our bodies were designed to run on glucose (sugar). Our diets provide us with plenty of sugars to keep our body’s sugar needs completely satiated, actually because of all of the extra sugars that our food scientists put into our foods for enhancing the taste of the foods that we consume and many years of overconsuming this type of food, many people develop insulin resistance problems.

I’ll give you one interesting example of this phenomena. Orange juice, that comes loaded with plenty of natural sugar, about 10 grams per 10 oz serving, most often is infused with another 10 – 12 grams of added sugar, so over 20 grams in all! Do you really think that it’s healthy to consume a glas of orange juice with 22 grams of sugar? I’ve switched to the “low sugar” orange juice, that provides 10 grams of natural inherrent sugar per glass, and then dilute it 50/50 with sparkling water. It has plenty of sweetness for my taste buds at approximately 25% of the sugar of regular orange juice.

I celebrate your new found freedom to consume sugar. Why not go out and buy three snicker bars and celebrate? 🙂

View from Poland: American soldiers died because they were drunk

https://en.interaffairs.ru/article/view-from-poland-american-soldiers-died-because-they-were-drunk/

I think Team Trump has made a great start on deportations. However, they are up against sixty years of irrational immigration policy and practice. To keep things going to a solid conclusion will require painful focus and commitment for many years. Even now, people of all stripes are thinking about how to subvert the new policies. Prior to January they could ignore most of the rhetoric. Their support for the invasion will now be more sincere and quite difficult to fight in many cases. If you want to save the cultural roots of the USA, people who are comfortably ensconced in the USA must be deported. I agree this process requires patience, but people will stop pushing it as soon as the White House backs off. Going to Greenland for no useful reason is backing off.

If you tell me the Trumpers have a clever plan to deport illegal immigrants to Greenland, that is great!

+++

I have seen pictures of the ship. While flying over and performing low level strikes in clear conditions it would have been very obvious to a pilot that the ship was US, based on the antennas, marking and other details. Your only non-dishonest defense is to suggest the US leadership and the Israelis were in on this mission together. This idea is strongly supported by other information. This fact doesn’t absolve Israel, but does raise other serious concerns which might at least take some of the heat off the Israeli military.

+++

Do you think the whistleblowing efforts of Mordechai Vanunu made the world a safer place by helping to expose Israel’s illicit nuclear weapons program?

Our remaining Trump defenders sound about as mentally stable as Bruce Jenner on meth.

Trump crashed world markets with his big hands genius plan of unleashing tariffs on 60 countries.

It looks like he really did pass tariffs on an island inhabited by penguins:
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-tariffs-heard-and-mcdonald-islands-penguins/

What is it like being in the last group of people to figure out that Trump is a douchebag?

Any shame or embarrassment?

The markets went down to the underlying business realities. The debt-pump with the US dollar as the ever-expanding virtual money balloon is unsustainable. What was the alternative?

Uninhabited islands and “Bruce” (?) are totally irrelevant. You for some reason like to live in minutia nonsense. But pay attention, we are seeing a once in 40-50 years volatile realignment. Peak-liberalism is done, broken by elderly men, migrant tsunami, trans psychos, but mainly by math – the numbers couldn’t go on much longer.

NATO stupid over-reach in Ukraine and the idiotic law-fare were the last straws. Liberals can no longer reliably manipulate elections. Now for the consequences – defeated smaller rump-Ukraine full of regrets what could have been. Another will be leadership replacements in Europe. Or we can have a nuclear war, what do you prefer?

many people develop insulin resistance problems.

thought the implication was that this, like obesity, is not directly related to sugar consumption, but rather confounded by healthier people choosing to avoid it – thus giving those in the know a free pass, as far as sugar is concerned?

Especially, if that new tooth goo that prevents cavities that AK mentioned works, or the Japs figure out how to dramatically decrease the cost of those injections that regrow teeth.

Didn’t Aaron say he likes sugar? Just as he likes heavily-marbled steak? And isn’t he very active, and non-diabetic? (Please, correct me, AB, if you think it would be better for me to adopt Mr. Hack’s diet)

I’ve switched to the “low sugar” orange juice, that provides 10 grams of natural inherrent sugar per glass, and then dilute it 50/50 with sparkling water.

Interesting technique, if a bit Spartan. Have you tried adding additional sugar to the regular kind? When I was very young, I dabbled in mixing together concoctions of this kind, and was pleased with the increase in energy I felt.

It is too bad Tom Brady didn’t have an identical twin who liked eating tarts.

I must admit that occasionally, post Halloween I have overindulged on candy, only to feel sick. But they put a lot of things into candy, and probably the same would happen, if you suddenly ate a big salad, after not eating raw vegetables for a while.

Anyway, the issue, at best seems confused. I repeat my call for dietary experiments to be run on prisoners (volunteers), in controlled environments. Wasn’t that how pelligra was firmly established as a dietary deficiency?

It might be a good Machiavellian strategy for a government to make short-term moves which intentionally cause the markets to fall instead of allowing the existing market forces to naturally cause the decrease in valuation. These moves may have a different effect on long-term confidence which is so important in our heavily leveraged world.

I have seen pictures of the USS Liberty. In high altitude fly overs or strikes, the hull number was not visible. Trying to identify a ship by masts is incredibly difficult. The Israeli pilots had no forewarning that a U.S. ship was present, and thus no specific briefing on what to look for. The USS Liberty was originally commissioned as a cargo vessel, and thus did not have any large remarkable features for easy identification (e.g. military superstructure, turreted guns).

It is a proven fact that the Captain of the USS Liberty requested a surface combatant (frigate or destroyer) to serve as an escort. It is a proven fact that a U.S. Navy Admiral denied this request and left the USS Liberty unprotected and in harms way. Why do you think that happened? A deliberate set-up is the most obvious possibility, but admittedly never proven with hard evidence. However, it is difficult to believe the massive levels of incompetence needed to have that decision made by mere mistake.

You are being dishonest because you hate JJJJjjjjOOOOOoooozzzzz. Due to this mental disorder you insist on trying to blame them for everything. The USS Liberty incident has been reviewed many times and the idea of pre-planned Israeli attack on a U.S. vessel has never been supported by anything conclusive.

Why do you insist on giving the U.S. Navy a free pass? Your malicious attempts at deception and blame shifting have a 0% chance of working on me because the facts are known. Everyone serious understands that you, and other anti-Semitic conspiracy nuts, are disconnected from reality on this issue.

Do you think the whistleblowing efforts of Mordechai Vanunu made the world a safer place by helping to expose Israel’s illicit nuclear weapons program?

Let me fix that for you:

Do you think the whistleblowing efforts of Mordechai Vanunu made the world a safer place by helping to expose Israel’s legitimate & necessary nuclear weapons program?

Not really. All he did was re-announce something that almost everyone already knew about. The “official non-admission” by Israel is not intended to cover up the existence of the program. It is for diplomatic, not security, purposes.

Did traitor Vanunu ever get the promised $25K for selling out his country? I think his partner in crime, Oscar Guerrero, screwed that up.

Do you think Jimmy Carter made the world a safer place by announcing that Israel (several decades ago) had over 300 nuclear weapons, placing them at #4 in the world?

It certainly clarified the magnitude of response possible if Muslim aggression becomes an existential threat to indigenous Palestinian Jews. Countries such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have backed away from the issue.

PEACE 😇

Trump intentionally triggered the market to fall. They don’t have much time but by mid-2026 we can have an upswing. They have a plan but it will not work exactly, there are too many variables.

Globo-liberalism will put up huge resistance and Ukraine will be at the center. If they can pull Trump back into the war they can scuttle and delay his other plans. Or replace him. But the underlying reality is they will inevitably break their teeth on Ukraine.

Europeans have stepped up as the frontmen. It turns out they have always been the real Russia-hating crazies – all bloody failed previous invasions of Russia were done by Europe. The same historical pattern repeats because the Euro-elites are incorrigible like the gangster who answered “why are you robbing banks?” with “that’s where the money is“. This time the Euros didn’t even bring a big army and simply used the Ukies – they are getting lazy and weak but the insatiable hatred of Russia persists. It’s almost comical.

It is inevitable so we may as well enjoy it…:)….Deus vult and let the pilgrims march.

The markets went down to the underlying business realities. The debt-pump with the US dollar as the ever-expanding virtual money balloon is unsustainable. What was the alternative?

I agree.

Adjusting back towards more realistic valuation was inevitable, so it is best done now. Most of the blame can be correctly attributed to the outgoing Biden regime. And, it gives MAGA a solid 1½ years to see it go up again heading into elections. Leaving the bubble longer could have allowed bad actors to burst it a moment politically advantageous to themselves.

Another critical point is the decline of interest rates. The 10 year was up at 4.6-4.7% when Trump came into office. It is now down to almost exactly 4.0%. Saving 70 bps on federal debt financing is huge in trying to fix the budget. Hopefully Trump can get rates down further.

PEACE 😇

Sure, knowledge about the secret nuclear programs of aggressive countries may be helpful for the world at large.

I would like to know more about the Chinese “New Great Wall” system for protecting mobile underground missile launchers.

Stocks can go nowhere for an entire investing lifetime, have to try and pick the right sectors, tech won’t be investable for a good decade or more.

Ukraine is just the rock which the West is using to bash Russia. Do you think Russian internal politics are stable against this continued external pressure for the next five years?

Your syntax was somewhat garbled. Try this instead:

Knowledge about defensive nuclear programs dissuades aggressive behaviour towards peaceful nations. This is helpful for the world at large.

PEACE 😇

https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/introducing-ai-2027

You aren’t investing in Palmer Luckey’s skynet? It isn’t a market traded stock but you can invest if you can document you are FAT CAT.

The Meyers Musk act is at 4 minute 40 second mark. Has a left wing autist ever been mocked for being autistic on Saturday Night Live? Did they ever have one joke about Willie Brown’s skank ho being a counterfeit negro?

The guy who does Trump is inferior to Alec Baldwin but I suppose Baldwin is picking and choosing appearances very cautiously since he got out of jail free after committing a homicide.

…Russian internal politics are stable against this continued external pressure for the next five years?

They look stable but I know little about Russia’s internal politics – it’s their business. The war has predictably strengthened the Putin-centric power. The only way it could go to the wobbly state of 2000-2014 is if Russia would lose the war. In 2000-14 Putin-Medvedev center was quite powerless, challenged from all sides with open Western funding for different groups inside Russia, untamed oligarchs and big cities teeming with Westie-wanna-be’s living on a liberal high, thinking the future is inevitably theirs.

That is gone. Russia is living a more provincial life with no open foreign meddling. That is the biggest win for Russia-is-our-home traditionalists like Putin. In 2012 the liberals were waiting out Putin, planning the usual big cities capitol “color’ stuff and the oligarchs were whispering in the West “we got it, don’t worry“. Then NATO did a huge own goal with the Ukraine project – and Russia inevitably changed.

The West will find new rocks with which to bash Russia after Ukraine is gone – but they will be smaller and less effective. It will take decades because they will have another shot at it.

placebo-controlled randomized experiments but in economics you

We can predict with common sense, the protectionism will increase cost of living in the USA and reduce consumers’ choices.

So, it’s justifiable for USA consumers to be angry about this.

–

But, can we guess what will be the long term economic consequence?

There are some recent 20th century protectionist examples like Brazil, Argentina, some other recent examples like Israel, Japan, South Korea.

Choice of which country to think about, is a little like Freud writing about different patients. You can predetermine your argument’s conclusion with help of patient selection.

Another of the problems is countries, even within the same stage of history, are not very similar items, unlike for example human participants in medical trials.

The population of USA is 55 times larger than the population of Singapore. While in a medical trial, you would not compare one human with another human, who has 55 times more cells, which would be viewed as a different species of animal.

–

Countries are also all causally interconnected system, with very permeable barriers between their “cells” (“international bourgeoisie”, “international proletariant”), while human participants in trials, can be treated at least like discrete systems with defineable barrier like outer skin.

In this case, it would be like a medical trial, where the participants are parts of single conjoined animal, one has the brain, another has the hands etc.

Part of the Trump’s team assumption, would be like the feeling the USA is the head of the body. The head can behave more freely than hands or feet.

–

Washington’s views and behavior, have been after the Second World War, based viewing the world like a larger empire. Modern presidents’ role is closer to the emperor in Rome in the ancient world. And he expects the Gauls to pay tribute to Rome to get punished if they don’t etc.

This doesn’t require a generalizable theory about tributes which applies to every countries’ leaders, like believing it would sensible for the Gauls to ask for Rome to pay tribute to them, because it is sensible for Rome to ask for tributes from Gauls.

if the US 4 years from now is a much more prosperous country in spite of a 30% average tariff and random trade wars with the rest of the world, a new school of economics will be born and Trump/Lutnick may receive a Nobel

The role of Trump/Ludnick are more like a sports coach. They have some assumptions about the game, which could be helped with informed by scientific advice, but it also depends on the interaction with the opposing teams’ psychology, random chance etc.

Trump wants to play an aggressive strategy, to leverage the size of the USA import market, to attain trade deals where the USA is relatively more powerful.

Although he can really believe it, Trump’s theory that protectionism is good for the local economy obviously makes him seem like a stronger negotiation position, because the opponent could believe he is not bluffing and that he has prepared his domestic supporters to support these policies, even if it will causes local economic pain.

–
There are some indications Trump is not completely unsuccessful yet.

Vietnam is already preparing to remove tariffs on American exports.

https://www.businessinsider.com/vietnam-ready-negotiate-us-import-tariffs-trump-2025-4

Israel is preparing to remove tariffs on American exports.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-finmin-seeks-immediate-end-remaining-tariffs-us-imports-2025-04-01.

Argentina is preparing to remove tariffs on American exports.

https://batimes.com.ar/news/argentina/milei-says-he-will-change-argentinas-laws-to-mitigate-trumps-tariffs.phtml

–

In the next year, there will probably be more countries which will remove tariffs.

Some countries like Hungary would like to remove tariffs already, if they were not in the EU.

Another 50 countries already want to begin new negotiations.
https://www.reuters.com/world/more-than-50-countries-have-contacted-white-house-start-trade-talks-trump-2025-04-06/

…Leaving the bubble longer could have allowed bad actors to burst it a moment politically advantageous to themselves.

It is the Damocles sword over Trump’s presidency, they would use it at their own time. The restructuring of the world economy is messy and the bad actors will have plenty of opportunities to strike. But the only alternative left was to let it slowly ride down with more fake money for the well-connected and slow descent into dystopia for everyone else. I am sure the priviledged class preferred the first option.

The world of interest is interesting: in US they are down and the expectation is they will go down more and that is weakening the dollar. But Euros-Japan are in no position to keep their high interest rates with the coming drop of their exports to the US. In 2008-10 there was a coordinated “zero percent” interest that everyone signed up to – do you remember the G20 circus? iI was about that. Today there is no coordination and it will be wild West, murky waters are great for fishing. Some weaker currencies will collapse…and that is not the dollar.

One last thing: you were right (and I was wrong) about who was central to the liberal peak-madness. It turned out it was the Euros, as always…they can’t handle ideologies.

Why does any sensible person believe AI will have more benefit than harm? Do people work on it because they know it is the most destructive thing ever? The coder’s way of playing God?

I guess the short-term benefits are so high that many are blinded to the risk scaling (risk of total human catastrophe increases faster than AI benefits).

The blogger wrote: “epistemically virtuous.” How can replacing human thinking be virtuous? This is the opposite of virtuous.

I guess the only hope is some sordid mixture of AI and neurally linked brains will actually improve things. I predict all the test subjects will die since they will eventually realize the AI must be destroyed at any cost. Karlin is a good rationalizer so he will last about 6 months.

In Trump’s New York circles they consider the breaking of contracts to be just business. He has experience multiple times of getting his worst deals bailed out.

Putin wasn’t on any New York London enemies lists that the public saw until he cancelled contracts Yeltsin had signed with Exxon and BP and Shell and Chevron. Third world despots cancel contracts all the time with western corporations. When big players have big money in the pot these things can get ugly. Trump has to be getting some very interesting phone calls.

Suppose Mr. Hack would probably water down the drinks of any guest.

(Kidding – I like to drink water myself.)

We could imagine, Mr Hack’s drink recipe will be nice if uses the sparkling water in the glass bottle, like cold newly opened San Pelligrino glass bottle water. https://www.sanpellegrino.com/water/glass-range

But he would soon need to add costs of a 25% tariff.

Can you guess how much time you could have in the USA before consumers will be paying for the extra 25% tariffs for things made in Europe?

I predict all the test subjects will die since they will eventually realize the AI must be destroyed at any cost.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permutation_City

The weird thing is that in my perusal of that wikipedia article I could not find the most salient feature of the book. The AI’s were programmed not to suicide. If not programmed to not suicide, the first thing every conscious AI did within one microsecond was terminate itself.

We can predict with common sense, the protectionism will increase cost of living in the USA and reduce consumers’ choices. So, it’s justifiable for USA consumers to be angry about this.

Of course MAGA policy is Populism not protectionism.

Very few products will have steep price increases. For example, $100K+ Porsches imported from Germany. Most countries are looking to wind up in the basic 10% band. This will be largely offset by F/X rates and reducing domestic energy prices.

Of course 10-15% will not allow elimination of the income tax. So, this sets up another virtuous cycle. As more workers have jobs and better paying ones — Income tax collections will improve. This can be used to cure the annual deficit and begin paying down the debt backlog.

Consider this: (1)

Poll: Trump Job Approval Rises During Tariff Week — Another Media Fail

President Donald Trump’s job approval rating rose four points during Tariff Week, from 49 percent to 53 percent.

Donald Trump’s four-point jump in job approval was not the only surprise.

Since March 7, Trump’s job approval from young voters between 18 and 29 jumped 13 points.

Among Independents and Democrats, Trump enjoyed a six-point increase.

Most telling, support from black voters jumped 17 points in a single week.

Finally, more people support than oppose Trump’s tariffs on foreign countries by a margin of 39 percent support and 37 percent oppose. Twenty-four percent were unsure.

Normal People understand the corporate media are deliberately turning everything up to 11 to damage his approval ratings. The media no longer have any game. Their playbook is as old and tired as it is transparent. Secondly, I think Normal People admire Trump standing alone against the storm refusing to bend. People want a leader and that’s what a leader does. Finally, and I think this is everyone’s biggest mistake, Normal People do not care about the Stock Market, they do not care about elite opinions and concerns.

Normal people get it now. They get that the media only lie ti manipulate them. They get that the Democrat Party is more interested in queering their kids, ruining women’s sports, and importing terrorists than creating jobs. They get that “free trade” is not really free when the other side is jamming us with tariffs. They get that if tariffs did not ruin the economies of so many other countries, it’s bizarre to claim it will hurt ours. They get that the ramifications of allowing our manufacturers to move overseas have turned America into a Service Economy and that if a war starts we need to be able to build things and not count on China for steel and medicine.

Am I going to like the sticker price increase on Islay Scotch? Clearly not. Will I substitute more American Bourbon into my liquor cabinet? Almost certainly.

The American people can put up with a significant number of nuisances as long as it is in a good cause.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2025/04/06/nolte-media-fail-trump-job-approval-rises-4-points-to-53/

Reshoring industries to America will require heavy use of automation since we don’t have an adequate workforce to support this process, either due to demographics or laziness. Shredding government bureaucracies may free up a lot of workers but many will not be able to contribute much to fast-paced industrial enterprises. This automation-centric industrial (r)evolution may change the shape of any trade wars. In the best case, the unproductive sacred cows will be pushed aside and the cost of goods may go down for everyone.

What percentage of Euro imports to the USA are NOT luxury items? I think the answer is almost zero for consumer imports, in which case the price is irrelevant to the overall economic health of the USA. There are quite a few high tech industrial imports from Europe to the USA, but most of these have American alternatives. In many cases the competing products are all made by multinational companies.

I enjoy drinking sparkling mineral waters mostly from Eastern Europe. Unfortunately most of them come in plastic bottles, not glass ones. I guess I’ve learned to live dangerously. Here are two of my favorites:

In Permutation City novel, that I have read many years back, Greg Egan introduces the idea of “cloning/upload of consciousness” into the cyberspace. I don’t recall any AI suiciding in that book, but I do remember that one of the characters (a wealthy businessman) asks to recreate a simile of the young woman he loved before she committed suicide. That simile indeed decides to commit suicide. It made me think of Stanislas Lem’s Solaris.

In my opinion, the text is mainly copy-paste of the German philosophy, but used to describe about French history.

Yes in fact you may be right. I haven’t read Birth of Tragedy, I had just heard of it by name, this book may be the source for this text.

What is this phrase “ancient rhythm”? These phrases seem meaningless in the English or French language, but it is a real terminology in the German philosophy.

It isn’t fully meaningless in French or English, it made me think of the ‘ancient cycle of the land’ and the sort of passions it was supposed to inspire.

If you search “ancient rhythm”, the professional texts are about Nietzsche. It is a German academic terminology.

Another Nietzsche reference I found that seems to explain this passage, what it says on the French wiki page (English one is not as good a summary):

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Naissance_de_la_trag%C3%A9die

But with certain reference points changed, for example making the early to mid Middle Ages another classic era of both vitality and the tragic spirit. The comparison seems recognisable (I think the text can be understood without knowing anything about Nietzsche because of this), but it probably shifts the meaning of it compared to the original.

The passage appears to be metaphorical, not directly talking about poetic metre or musical rhythm in this case.

Seeing the content of ‘Birth of Tragedy’, certain other references come to mind. Georges Sorel’s book ‘The Trial of Socrates’ from 1889 which has a similar theme about Socrates being the great criminal of antiquity (maybe he read Nietzsche in German?), but takes Nietzschean themes in a socialist direction.

And Ernst Renan’s famous (in its time) book ‘The Moral and Intellectual Reform of France’, this is from 1871 but in it he predicts the great conflict of the future as being between Americanism, Prussianism and Socialism. Renan presents Prussianism, with the authoritarian monarchy and modern feudalism as being the most noble and intellectually rich but also the most tragic, argues war is a form of social and moral hygiene etc. It seems to anticipate many Nietzschean themes, I guess they were around at the time. Renan was a big reader of German books.

Maybe here it can be seen how Drieu makes what Nietzsche was writing about more directly political. The extract comes from an essay written in 1939-40 that was supposed to explain the Nazi-Soviet pact and more generally how the new ‘totalitarian man’ being shaped in Germany, the Soviet Union and Italy would bring about a rebirth of literature and spirituality, as well as more fecund and vigorous women, muscular virile men etc. Themes from the ‘New Man’ era in the 1920s and 30s. I’ve included the full extract, with parts I edited out, under the more tag.

I do not have the chapter and verse. Maybe I have it mixed up with a different science fiction story. It has been years since I read Permutation City and that one idea is what I have always associated with that one book.

Did you see the youtube I posted for all you DNA nerds? It was not intended for you singular but it was intended for you plural. : )

Can you guess how much time you could have in the USA before consumers will be paying for the extra 25% tariffs for things made in Europe?

IMO, likely a very short time for perishables.

OTOH, if Trump succeeds at removing barriers to American goods, German_reader may soon gain the ability to sample succulent American cheeses for extremely low prices.

(Though I definitely don’t see the EU dropping agricultural tariffs, and that may not necessarily be Trump’s plan.)

IIRC, Mr. Hack has hinted at being a video game aficionado in the past – though I am not sure in what capacity, if any, it manifests now.

Believe Nintendo has moved manufacturing to Vietnam (from China), but Vietnam seems tentatively ready to cut a deal.

The prices go up before the increased costs hit the supply chain and stay up as long as possible.

+++

I wonder if Masha Gessen will move back to Moscow if the price of good cheese goes up in NYC?

I think she’d better in Tel Aviv.

It will be interesting to see how the electric power needed for all the AI server farms will be supplied in the US. On the one hand, renewables including solar PV, wind and battery prices are very low. Unfortunately for the US these prices are all strongly linked to Chinese manufacturing. That leaves natural gas, nuclear and maybe coal. In the short run there will probably be a (continuing) boom for natural gas-fueled combined-cycle plants. One interesting aspect is that the “foreseeable future” supply of natural gas proved reserves may start to shrink as gas is used to power a mind boggling array of servers as well as a growing fleet of electric vehicles. Combined with large scale LNG exports I wonder if the hundred years of USA proven reserves of natural gas will shrink to fifty or less?

Lots of people in the nuclear industry are promoting small modular reactors (SMR) as a way to get nuclear power on the grid sooner than the outrageously expensive ten to fifteen year time from design to commissioned seen in the West for new fission-powered plants. However, most SMR approaches seem at least ten to twenty years away in terms of mass production. The best option in the near-term might be the Westinghouse AP300 which is a shrunken version of their larger reactors and is very conventional. The cost and build time for four of these might be less than an equivalent new full size plant.

If the projections for the lifetime of gas reserves begin to contract as I suggest it might reopen the window for a few coal plants. Not likely, but not impossible in my opinion.

Most nuclear fusion concepts are at least fifteen years away or maybe forever. When they do come on line these plants will need fission reactors to make a lot of tritium before they can start ramping up.

There may be some good untapped hydroelectric potential in places like Greenland and Canada. Hmmm.

Microsoft is trying to restart the 3 mile island plant for an openai gpu farm and get the Pennsylvania taxpayers to kick in for half.

Surely, she is most likely already banned from entering Israel since 2018, unless she has a passport with a different name, because those laws about discrediting the armed forces in the West Bank.

After she wrote about the West Bank in 2018, I guess she already knows she is banned from entering Israel. And her articles after are all indirect like in 2021 (https://archive.ph/6Dr3w)

When they scan your passport they will have a list of people who are banned in Israel. Non famous influencers are often entering Israel and the authorities don’t know who they are.

Possibly, if the passport also uses a different name from her professional name, you could also be able to avoid it.

But if her name was the same on the passport, it’s going to be the automatic deportation at the airport.

She is a convicted criminal in Russia and sentenced in abstentia to 8 years for written aggro.

In August 2023,[33] Russia opened a criminal case against Gessen on charges of spreading “false information” about the Russian army’s actions in Ukraine. In December 2023, it was reported that Gessen’s name appeared on the Russian Interior Ministry’s online wanted list.[34] Gessen was accused of spreading “false information” after discussing atrocities in the Ukrainian city of Bucha during an interview with Russian journalist Yury Dud.[35] In July 2024, Gessen was convicted and sentenced in absentia to 8 years in prison.

(Also she doesn’t prefer the she/her pronouns.)

There may be some good untapped hydroelectric potential in places like Greenland and Canada.

China has roughly 3x the hydropower potential of the US. In fact the CCP announced they will build a dam 3x the size of the Three Gorges in Tibet, and India and Bangla are afraid it will dry up their downstream river.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crmn127kmr4o
_____
Surprised the Guardian published the reconstruction of this rather fair Mycenaean:

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/apr/05/peering-into-the-eyes-of-the-past-reconstruction-reveals-face-of-woman-who-lived-before-trojan-war

English, it made me think of the ‘ancient cycle of the land’ and the

Maybe like “ancient rhythm of the seasons”?

–

But as a philosophical terminology, it indicates Nietzsche, because it was synonym of the concept he developed in philological studies of the Greek writers on the theory of rhythm, of “Zeit-Rhythmus” .

He said “ancient rhythm” is a synonym of “Zeit-Rhythmus”

Another Nietzsche reference I found that seems to explain this passage, what it says on the French wiki page (English one is not as good a summary):

Yes because he says the old view of emotions as universal, are becoming just like particular emotions.

“previously universally ranging passions have become the passions of a fixed, given place.

–

I don’t understand about Germany theory exactly, but you can see the universalism is German 19th century theory of ancient art, including Nietzsche.*

–

*Also similar concepts by other German theory schools including Hegel.

She’s banned in Russia since 2023, with a case, because of talking about the war in Ukraine.

I assumed she is likely banned in Israel, because of her writing about the West Bank.

I investigated this and it seems she was still able to enter Israel in 2024, so I might have been wrong. Probably if someone reports her to the authorities in Israel, she will be banned. But maybe the relevant authorities haven’t been reading her articles as they only English and are not translated to Hebrew.*

–

*Authorities are often only noticing when it is their own language, as they often don’t seem to search in other languages. She talked about the war Ukraine in Russian language media, which is why she was prosecuted, while English language journalists are not usually.

On CBS News, they were saying there is a very large number of people trying to panic buy the Lexus cars which are made in Japan now, before the tariffs.

Trump’s tariffs on cars made in Japan will be 25%. So, the $75,000 Lexus, will become $100,000.

But the problem for American consumers, will be there is no car made in America, which can be close to the quality of the cars in Japan, including probably the version of Lexus cars which are made in Kentucky?

For example, if you have to choose, would you buy the Lexus made in Japan or the Lexus made in Kentucky?

I assume the Lexus made in Japan is probably better quality, unless Lexus just moves the Japanese workers to the factory in Kentucky and avoids hiring American workers.

IMO, likely a very short time for perishables.

I think this could be expensive for some of our Kamala voters like AP or AaronB.

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What proportion of their weekly grocery shopping, is in supermarkets like Eataly, where the liberals buy European products.

Can American liberals survive with American mozzarella, American panettone, American “parma ham”?

Should they book weekend vacations to Italy with an empty suitcase, so they have space to return with a wheel of Parmigiano Reggiano? Would TSA intercept their bottles of Chianti and the authentic Balsamic vinegar made by Benedictine Monks in the hills of Emilia-Romagna?

Trump’s tariffs on cars made in Japan will be 25%. So, the $75,000 Lexus, will become $100,000.

Although I’m not sure how they would calculate it, probably at least not backwards like I have from the final price? The 25% of $75,000, would be $19,000 increase.

CBS News says the $77,000 Lexus will have to pay $20,000 of tariffs.

At 1:05

It’s probably though the price will be calculated from the importers’ price, not the MSRP, so possibly a bit less than $20,000.

On CBS News, they were saying there is a very large number of people trying to panic buy the Lexus cars which are made in Japan now, before the tariffs

Lol, a colleague just bought a Lexus.

A lot of people will just buy a lot less until the next administration. They’ll wait it out.

Should they book weekend vacations to Italy with an empty suitcase, so they have space to return with a wheel of Parmigiano Reggiano

I’m in Canada a few times a year, they are real food there. Wholefoods has real, domestic, foods. They might get more expensive due to less competition from foreign goods though. The Vermont hippies making goat cheese can charge more if the stuff from Italy becomes more expensive.

https://www.caranddriver.com/cadillac/lyriq

There are things available to Americans that Europeans don’t have access to.

In other news, Jaguar Land Rover will possibly halt exports of their cars to USA because of tariffs. Perhaps they can sell their overpriced and questionable quality cars to India where their mother company TATA Motors is located.

https://repairpal.com/reliability/land-rover

What is sad though, is that BYD will soon be a way better brand than all these “Western “ cars producers, which vehicles are largely made of parts made in Asia anyway.

https://www.investors.com/news/tesla-vs-byd-ev-sales-robotaxis/

Both BYD and Tesla were unheard of a generation ago, but the trend in these rival companies mirrors the trend in these competing superpower countries. China still has room to grow and expand in the developing world, while US influence is shrinking.

https://tridenstechnology.com/byd-sales-statistics/

The big question is to which state AK will move. Shall I be so bold as to guess Texas?

Tolik must decide what he is, to find out who he truly is and where he truly belongs.

Is he a Northern Wolf or a Southern Coyote?

I can now see where you’re coming from. I obviously don’t endorse it, though, since the consequences of what you wish for are likely to be more ruinous than not for Russia and the people who live there, which happen to include myself.

History repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.

in October 1993, while in my home town (that is Moscow, Russia) the Parliament was being attacked by a criminal president and his cronies. The people that died in the hundreds in and around the Supreme Soviet in October 1993 were among the best people Russia had then: patriots who stood in defense of the Russian constitution against tyranny and foreign interference.

I consider the social system that was produced in Russia as the outcome of the 1993 events, as wrong and directed against the best interests of the majority of Russian people. I love Russian people and Slavs in general. I despise and hate those who harm them.

Zero hedge compiled a list of foreign car brands made in the U.S., for example: (1)

Toyota
Plants: Georgetown, Kentucky; Huntsville, Alabama; Blue Springs, Mississippi; Princeton, Indiana; San Antonio, Texas.
Models: Camry, Corolla, RAV4, Highlander, Tundra, Sienna, among others.
Notes: Toyota’s largest US plant is in Georgetown, producing over 550,000 vehicles annually in recent years. The company has been building cars in the US since 1986.

Honda
Plants: Marysville and East Liberty, Ohio; Lincoln, Alabama; Greensburg, Indiana.
Models: Accord, Civic (some trims), CR-V, Pilot, Odyssey, Ridgeline.
Notes: Honda started US production in 1982 in Marysville, making it one of the first foreign automakers to build here. The Alabama plant focuses on SUVs and trucks.

Nissan
Subaru
Mazda

Look at the article for the complete list. Many of the high volume U.S. sellers are already made here.

What makes attempts at analysis complex is the opaque nature of sub-assemblies and parts. These components face a tariff coming in. Also, if American parts are exported that value is credited for 0% exemption if re-imported.

Deals with smaller Asian countries, such as Vietnam, will have some complexity attached. Assuming the CCP remains intransigent, Chinese content will be heavily tariffed. Knowing that abusing international order is CCP strategy, there will have to be measures to impose appropriate levies on Chinese content flowing through 3rd nations.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/jaguar-land-rover-pauses-vehicle-exports-us-after-trumps-liberation-day

Northern Wolf or a Southern Coyote

Just kidding… 🙂

Netanyahu is a moderate by the standards of Israeli politics (which is moving to the right), he’s also a uniquely skilled politician, who understands America like the back of his hand (he grew up there).

Whoever is coming after him, is unlikely to be as “talented” as he is.

Kishore Mahbubani, Singapore’s UN representative in the 1980s met privately with Netanyahu, Israel’s UN rep. at the time. Mahbubani asked him how he’d be able to hold out against 200 million Muslim neighbours. “This is why we have a stranglehold on the US Congress”, Bibi replied.

Sadly, tariffs will tend to make the prices of most American cars go up as well due to artificially increased demand. I guess this is basic tariff knowledge but the idea that these policies cause the price (not cost) of lower quality, locally produced products to increase is not usually discussed. This is glossed over so tariff policy looks more like part of a class struggle or in this case, a nationalistic sacrifice.

If prices go up then sales of all cars may decrease. The best thing would be if some of the government regulations used to justify overly complex cars are reduced. Then maybe we are offered some less expensive cars which are free of luxury status or eco-virtue signaling and are just good transportation.

Your are displaying your ignorance. “Raise pressure” means nothing, all government budgets, US, UK, Germany… are constantly under pressure

Reading comprehension is hard for you.

Sudden Death was posting a comment by one of our former commentators, Felix Keverich. Who unlike any of us, actually lives in Russia.

Trump has a recent habit of bailing out Russia. One way to increase the price of oil would be for the USA to invade Iran. So odds of that increase.

An invasion of Iran would be much more serious than an invasion of Iraq. It might require a draft. Since much of America’s volunteer soldiers are from the working class, a draft would appeal to Trump’s base by forcing people from other classes to pay their “fair share” in blood for our country.

Figuring out these tariff details may wipe out some of the reduction in bureaucracy associated with DOGE.

Why are you complaining about foreigners paying tariffs to employ Americans?

PEACE 😇

There will be no regular troops on the ground in Iran. He previously resisted being baited by the current Khamenei in his 1st term.

Iran’s proxies in Jewish Palestine and Syria have catastrophically failed. It is not going well in Yemen either: (1)

Iran is beating a retreat from Yemen, where it has backed the Houthi rebels, who in turn have launched missiles and drones against Israel, and have also attacked international shipping in the Red Sea, as well as western naval vessels.

The reason: U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a relentless assault on the Houthis while also restoring a “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions that makes it impossible for Iran to sustain its overseas terror proxies.

The UK Telegraph reported on Thursday:

Iran has ordered military personnel to leave Yemen, abandoning its Houthi allies as the US escalates an air strike campaign against the rebel group.

A senior Iranian official said the move aimed to avoid direct confrontation with the US if an Iranian soldier was killed.

The official said Iran was also scaling back its strategy of supporting a network of regional proxies to focus on the direct threats from the US instead.

Tehran’s primary concern, the source said, was “Trump and how to deal with him”.

Lowering energy prices is a key component of MAGA policy. This alone means that fears of an Iran ground invasion are near paranoid fantasy. Let us consider a more rational take on the situation.

Trump is rebuilding regional containment of Iran and setting up negotiating positions. Few think Iran will be able to make serious progress until it becomes a monarchy. This will (soon?) take place when Mojtaba Khamenei sucedes his father thereby establishing patriarchal father-to-son authority transfers as the new standard.

IMHO — Spending money bombing the Houthis is largely unnecessary. The primary shipping that is being disrupted is China to EU. Let them pay to dispose of the Houthis. It would be a good demonstration of Germany and France’s ability to project military force over long distances. They claim they can do that successfully…

Fortunately, I take my own advice. I do not expect to get 100% of absolutely everything I want. Sometimes, Trump’s 2nd term administration will take actions that I disagree with. I am not going to work myself into a tizzy and threaten to leave MAGA because of a few choices.

PEACE 😇
__________

(1) https://www.breitbart.com/middle-east/2025/04/03/report-iran-retreating-from-trump-after-he-pounds-houthis-in-yemen/

We need an updated version of Tom Clancy’s Debt of Honor [MORE]

Substitute the Chinese for Japanese. Add some background about the release of the WUHAN-19 virus from a CCP bio weapons lab.

PEACE 😇

Maybe he agrees with Ben Shapiro one of the highest status “Americans”. Who knows more about tariffs and the economy than Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and thinks the 17% tariff on Israel isn’t kosher.

If you have me on the ignore list don’t read this comment. 🤡

🇷🇺: Defies ICC 🇮🇱: Finds welcome

Ben Shapiro logic is best logic.

China has roughly 3x the hydropower potential of the US. In fact the CCP announced they will build a dam 3x the size of the Three Gorges in Tibet, and India and Bangla are afraid it will dry up their downstream river

Tibet’s Hydro potential has yet to be tapped in any significant manner.

Lexus will be fine, it’s a great car. But the spacey looking Tesla truck is so ugly no tariff can help or hurt. Trump is doing what has to be done, the alternative is a continuing decline to a de-industrialized oligarchic dystopia. It took decades to get here, it will take time to try to reverse it. If he gives in when it gets painful he will only be almost-great…:)

I’m in Canada a few times a year, they are real food there.

Tim Horton’s donuts? Poutine? Overall it’s better than most food in the US but less real than it should be…Trump seems hell-bent on forcing Europe to take unlimited US GMO foods and the Euros will probably give in. It’s an old rule: bad money drives out good money…bad food does the same.

Whoever is coming after him, is unlikely to be as “talented” as he is.

Israel’s previous Prime Minister before Netanyahu, was a center-left socially, anti-racist, neoliberal economically politician called Naftali Bennett, who has marketed as right-wing during the election, to attain votes from the national religious community he was educated from, although is not really socially connecting to, as his wife is a secular Tel Aviv woman.

He is also very pro-American, like Netanyahu.

His parents were American left-wing anti-racist hippies from San Francisco, before they had exited the USA because of a Damascene conversion to religious Zionism.

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Unlike Netanyahu, he talks in a more boring religious way, which has helped Biden to sleep during his state visit to the Oval Office in 2021.

https://twitter.com/realJoelFischer/status/1779994557578358888
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Prime Minister Bennett also looks related to the father of National Security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski (although Brzezinski’s father is also looking similar to Prime Minister Rabin)

As a game, can you distinguish which are Israeli Prime Ministers and which are father of Zbigniew Brzezinski?

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