Trump - a man for some seasons

I have very mixed feelings and thoughts about the man:

1.  I like his economic policies.  I don't believe any of the Democrat ravings about his policies being intended to benefit the 1% ers or that they have done that.  I have looked carefully at the present federal income tax laws and that just ain't so.  Look at the effect his policies have had on unemployment, especially of women and minorities.  Look at how many jobs are available for new hires in America.  Look at the reduction of taxes on working class people  At the same time, we should remember that upper income people in the US were already paying the bulk of income tax in actual dollars BEFORE this new tax law.

2.  If he wants to slug it out in trade negotiations with China and the EU, I am all for it.  Let him not take counsel of his fears!.   The trade deal with Canada and Mexico is so patently to the benefit of us all that a Democratic obstruction to the deal under "Fast Track"  will surely be seen as purely political.  Perhaps Trudeau can talk sense to Pelosi in his talk with her next week.

3. Immigration - US law admits 1.2 million permanent immigrants a year.  That is enough.  False appeals for asylum should be firmly rejected.  If he wishes to round up illegals whose final status has been legally decided and deport them I am all for it.

4.  He should stop insinuating that he would like a 3rd term.  We do not need presidents for life in the US.  If he wants a third term, let him sponsor one of his people.

5.  He is allowing the consolidation of executive foreign policy power in the hands of neocons and Zionists.  Pompeo, Esper (Pompeo's USMA classmate), Bolton, Bolton's stsff, these people seek imperial domination.  Gina Haspel should fear for her job..  There are undoubtedly Pompeo stay-behinds at CIA.

6.  He is seeking to make the Palestinians permanent serfs of the Israelis, a captive work force.  He allows Israel to control US policy in the ME.  Whether or not this is from political fear or conviction is irrelevant.  They run our show and the belligerence toward Iran is a reflection of both neocon free floating hostility and Israeli desire to dominate the region using us as tools.

7.  I like his space program.  I like the creation of a US Space Force that will eventually be out of the grasp of USAF.

All in all a mixed bag.  pl

Comments

[Jack]

Sir

What I best like about Trump is that he drives the media and political establishment batshit crazy.

Considering that we have spent several trillion dollars on our foreign interventions mostly on behalf of neocon and zionist pipe dreams of hegemony and domination with nothing positive to show for, and with a consequence of a massive buildup of a national security surveillance state that acts with impunity shredding what limited rule of law we have, IMO, that is the single most important political issue we have if we want to retain even a small semblance of a constitutional republic. Trump has not been a change agent here. The best he's done is openly support Bibi's maximalist vision stripping away the false mask previous president's have worn in this matter. IMO, the American people need to continue to vote for change agents on this issue until they can finally get someone with sufficient character to dismantle the Borg influence.

I also believe that the real national security threat is China's totalitarian CCP. This not just a trade dispute we have with them. They've been fully engaged in a strategic non-military war with us for decades. I give kudos to Trump for highlighting it but IMO he's not gone far enough and the jury's out whether he'll cave to Wall St and corporate interests who were instrumental in us voluntarily supporting the CCP's strategic war aims.

IMO, the data does not support increase in capital investment due to the tax cuts and favorable terms if repatriation of offshore corporate funds. What we've got instead is massive stock buybacks that benefit management and Wall St. Main St is also not doing as well as the headlines purport when one delves deeper into the economic and financial data. I read a lot of perjorative comments when anyone proposes "socialism" for the bottom 80%. However the reality of the past 60 years is that we've only had socialism for the top 0.01%.There's more economic concentration than at anytime over the last century. Across every major sector. We've financialized our economy and de-emphasized the real economy to the benefit of the oligarchy. The symbiotic relationship between big business and big government has never been stronger in my 80+ year lifetime.

The political duopoly has not served us well as all we get is Tweedle Dee or Tweedle Dum.

[Linda]

Just one note - my taxes have increased since the “tax cut” legislation

[turcopolier]

Linda

Congratulations! you made the cut! So did I. My taxes paid went up because of the loss of the SALT deduction and such things as fiduciary fees on a trust.

[Eric Newhill]

With the Democrats you'll get the same foreign policy at the end of day and a foreign invasion of the US + socialism + general post modern anti-American insanity culture.

The Pomp publicly says that Trump doesn't want war with Iran and I believe that; if for no other reason than Trump knows that's the one thing that would damage his sure thing win in 2020 - though actually, I'm pretty sure Trump sees it for what it is and what it is offends his business sense (bad ROI, etc).

Voting Trump is the only option.

[Thomas]

Why did they go up? Informing us on that point allows us to debate the policy. Just saying taxes went up is an emotional response. My wife and I’s overall tax rate went from 18% to 14%. Nothing special for us. One income from service to country and one pension income. We have one child, so a little day care credit (not full amount of credit). Definitely not an expert on financials of the tax laws. So there is my point of view. With some factual information.

[turcopolier]

Thomas

My tax rate is higher and I lost various deduction including the SALT deduction

[Eugene Owens]

Why do you lump Esper with the neocons? His bio says in the past he worked for Senators Hagel and Frist, neither of whom was a neocon in my understanding.

He did serve as a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Negotiations Policy under Bush. But he left in 2004, I wonder what the backstory on that was.

He served time in the Heritage Foundation during the mid 90s, but unlike the AEI they had drifted away from neocon thinking by then.

So maybe he is, or maybe he ain't. I for one would like a closer look at his opinions during his time as a DepAsstSecDef and while he was at Heritage.

[Jose]

Congratulations! you made the cut! So did I. My taxes paid went up because of the loss of the SALT deduction and such things as fiduciary fees on a trust - pl

Florida has one and half million more people than New York, yest we have have the budget of New York.

Why should efficient, Republican states subsidize inefficient, Democratic states.

Florida does not need to buy votes and patronage like New York (Miami is a different mess).

Elect Governors that can Govern, not "grease" the system.

Really feel sorry for Virginia, all those refugees from inefficient Maryland will eventually destroy your state.

[Fred]

Jose,

Florida has a lot of transplanted Puerto Ricans too.
The state doesn't buy votes or patronage, politicians and interest groups do both.

[Turcopolier]

I received a wondrous (to be treasuered) comment today from Yolande of Jerusalem (hallabina)This creature (French usage) told me that whilst she approves of my anti-interventionism, my support of DJT is unacceptable. The world is full of people like her (a lot of them undergraduates studying on government money in France and Spain). For them they are the intellectual descendants of people like Edith Piaf (I adore her) who was a street singer and daughter of a street singer. Yolanda, this hidalga castellana?, is typical of her kind,. For her there are no people who should be judged as anything but black and white, good or bad. Sad. I was like that for about a week in high school. BTW, I support the constitutional order and SOME of DJT's policy. I will not vote for any of the neo-marxists running against him. Joe? Don't be ridiculous.

[Barbara Ann]

Now if I were a subscriber to Patrick Armstrong's Trump cutting the Gordian knot of foreign entanglements theory, I might just be persuaded that he has deliberately allowed the neocons enough rope to hang themselves, or at least to cut the blood supply off where it really matters.

The House has put the noose around its neck, will the Senate open the trapdoor? Is Patrick right, is Iran a long con and if so who is in on it? Is the Very Stable Genius the most underestimated man in history?

Questions.

[Lars]

Our taxes went up and Trump endorsed the bureaucratic NASA vision of the future, which is wasteful, already delayed, over budget and undesirable. There is a competing vision, which would be cheaper, is ready to go now and involves private enterprise. Other than that, Trump will be regarded as the worst POTUS ever and hopefully will remain as such for a very long time.

[doug]

Most (80% or so) people's taxes decreased as a result of the Trump/Republican tax cut. The Left did an excellent job of convincing voters that it didn't happen. Truly fake news.

That said, it didn't happen to everyone. My taxes went up about $5,000 due to the SALT 10K deduction limit even though my brackets dropped. I live in California where state and property taxes are high much like those in New York and other coastal states. I lost the ability to deduct a large fraction of them and I'm retired. My income, while decent, isn't enough to overcome the hit.

Still, while I take a hit it bugs me that Democrats have convinced so many folks that they didn't get a cut.

[JamesT]

Eric Newhill,

You will not get the same foreign policy with Bernie or Tulsi. The Democrats are not all the same.

[turcopolier]

doug

Exactly the same thing happened to me.

[turcopolier]

Lars

You have no idea how bad and inept a lot of these men have been. Go back to Sweden. It will be so much better there.

[Jose]

Fred, we have absorb almost one million since the bankruptcy and hurricane.

Please fact check me by googling this information, but I believe certain school districts have had to deal with nearly a new middle school of students for many months.

I am proud of how we have been able to take care of these Americans with jobs and opportunity, not traditional blue state mistakes.

Now the ones that went to New York, are coming down..lol

[J]

Colonel

If we could just get rid of the Cigar-store president (Bolton) and the court jester (Pompeo), we'll be a whole lot better off.

The Space Force no longer under the tutelage of the USAF? Perish the thought. O Richard Dean Anderson, where are you when the Stargate calls?

J

[J]

Colonel

Seems that Trump is Santa's helper when it comes to adding even more domestic surveillance on our fellow Americans.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/06/19/critics-lament-126-house-democrats-join-forces-gop-hand-trump-terrifying-mass

J

[Seamus Padraig]

You know, BA, I always hate those '400D chess' theories concerning Trump, since they are completely unfalsifiable. And yet, and yet, and yet ... I have to admit that, up till now at least, pretty much everything that's happened in the Persian Gulf has been completely consistent with Patrick Armstrong's thesis, so who knows. One thing's for certain: I can't hope that Armstrong is wrong.

[Patrick Armstrong]

I remain confused https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/03/17/trump-mysteries-inconsistent-inconsistencies/

[Eric Newhill]

JamesT,
You are assuming the President gets to have full control over FP. That apparently isn't true.

[Ghost Ship]

You have it the wrong way round, it's the Democratic states that subsidize Republican states.

[English Outsider]

(5) and (6) are far worse than feared in 2016. I don't know whether it would have been worse with Clinton as regards foreign policy overall. We can't estimate Trump's body count, let alone guess what Clinton's would have been. Disastrous, anyway.

I like the "he's giving the neocons enough rope to hang themselves with" theory. Also the theory that if he can't get foreign policy changed from the White House then he's arranging things so that force of circumstance will change it. But there's no proof but hope of the various 4D chess theories and if Trump were trying such things he'd scarcely advertise it. More likely the swamp's just too strong for him.

The doom pornsters are out in force on the economic side of things but then they always are. They're realists, in truth, the doom pornsters, but their reality is not the reality of magic money and financial plate spinning we live in right now. I had hoped that Trump would keep the plates spinning while bringing back industry and jobs. Is he moving in that direction? Seems to me that the West as a whole is still in the grip of the suicidal economic orthodoxy currently prevailing and that that great hope of the Trump Presidency has not been realised. But there's a theory for that as well, the Rome wasn't built in a day theory, as consolation if one insists on optimism.

Where one need not seek consolation, and sufficient reason this side of the Atlantic for being a permanent ever Trumper, is that our status quo political classes can't stand him. Either side of the Channel they still go for him on any excuse or none. Non stop and no sign of it stopping. Heartening to see the cat among the Progressive pigeons, when it's so repellent and dangerous a breed of pigeons he's disturbing.

[Lars]

I did go to Sweden last December, but I still prefer Florida's Space Coast for a variety of reasons. However, it would be helpful if you clarify who "these men" are.