I don’t think Trump has any internalized philosophy beyond, “What is best for me in this moment?”
He’ll go whichever way that takes him.
I can’t imagine having anything remotely approaching a philosophical or ethical discussion with him. I truly think he has no concept of such things beyond a dictionary definition (if that).
Yeah. The reference is metaphorical.
It may not be about Bill Clinton. One theory online is about a major GOP donor who’s in big with the Trump Regime:
Let’s not lose sight of post #244 above.
None of the ordinary sexual peccadilloes, dalliances, gropings, etc., we’ve been discussing would ever destroy Trump’s presidency. (I reluctantly quote MTG 
)
Shooting someone on Fifth Ave while getting blow jobs from 10-year old boys would not destroy his presidency. We know that.
Think BIGGER and at the same time LOWER (as in lower morally, ethically, legally, beyond the pale). This has to be something really BAD, and I don’t think we’re close yet. It has to be something that would cause Republican leadership (excuse the expression) to desert him along with the billionaires and oligarchs (foreign and domestic) who like to hang around with him. What would make everyone drop him like a hot potato?
Firm, undeniable connection to Putin & Russia with a clear money trail… maybe.
The Clintons were guests at his wedding to Melania.
Then, like many boomers with failing mental faculties, Fox News melted his brain.
I certainly agree, but what if Trump was with Epstein while president.
And what if he knows Epstein recorded everything
Maybe that would make him nervous?
20 percent or so misery index (inflation plus unemployment).
But Trump’s constantly changing tariff rates are so far letting enough low tariff rate imports into the U.S. to prevent such an economic collapse. The current inflation rate of 3 percent, while certainly higher than Trump promised, is actually very close to what economists recommend. Most say 2 percent is better, but some actually prefer 4 percent, and, in the real world, you cannot hit the target perfectly.
As for Epstein, a cancelled check signed by Trump, with a cursive written note on it, authenticated by multiple handwriting experts, giving the name of an underage woman, would hurt Trump some. I just do not think we’ll see anything that clear.
Epstein did die in a secure facility in a room with no camera, under the management of DJ Trump. At the moment, there’s no evidentiary basis for thinking that it was anything but a suicide but, because of the above, that will always be at least the little bit in question.
Evidence schmevidence. I’m not the type to believe in conspiracy theories but at this point I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump personally rappelled in through the window and strangled him himself with his tiny tiny hands.
The average since the Fed started to use monetary policy to control things has been about 2.6%. The 3% rate really isn’t that far above normal - though I’d expect that it will stay pretty constant and perhaps intensify over the course of the next year and through the next, as people start needing to replace stuff despite the inflation, business owners get tired of “eating the tariffs”, etc.
Trump only, really, had the choices of proving a bastard or also proving a bastard, when it came to tariffs. Wage prices are so far off between countries that, to truly bring back labor to the US, you need to tariff things at 900% if they’re coming from China and Southeast Asia.
Today, if you look at the customer price for most things, the bulk of the cost is in US-based warehousing, US-delivery, US-storefront rent, US-storefront labor. The physical products are a largely negligible percentage of what you’re paying for at the cash register. Tacking on a 20% tariff to the price of the physical product just doesn’t have so much of an impact (until you start tariffing European countries, mid-stage parts and elements of a final product that are crossing the border multiple times, etc.) It does create inflation, it does risk a trade war, it does shift business away from American manufacturers, etc. But it doesn’t make a big enough impact to make Americans buy American.
If you target a tariff rate low enough to not massively inflate prices, then you’re lying to American workers about bringing jobs back.
And if you do raise the tariff rates high enough to do that… Well, you’d be out of office as soon as people started rioting about not being able to afford coffee.
Overall, it was always just a con over blue collar labor.
That’s why, traditionally, Republicans don’t care for unions and socialists. It’s not that we don’t want the work force to succeed and be happy in life, it’s that they have a tendency to choose leaders who are dishonest, take advantage of them, and encourage them into violence and bad behavior - because those people will sell them on these grand visions of impractical things.
Trump is just falling in line with a history of blue collar leaders that take advantage of them.
There is just no way to spin the Epstein story as “it’s nothing.” All the other stuff can be “it’s just politics.” Snap recipients can be turned into lazy or losers. The Republicans talking about Epstein have nothing to say. The moment you start defending pedophiles your career is over. Even saying something like “Trump has changed” would just admit he was a pedophile.
Yey! There is no way out of this. It may drag on till election…and then they will lose.
Bubba is apparently (per Facebook) the name of Ghislaine Maxwell’s horse.
Yowza!
Megyn Kelly is getting roasted over saying if the girl is 15, its not pedophilia.
I don’t think we’ll have any data to actually know what the real inflation rate is. At least for years. The Trump Swamp is very dedicated to hiding the numbers at this point.
Cleveland Fed Nowcasting
Here’s the link:
I don’t know that the reported rates are quite as precise as they used to be and so only mention the whole number percent.
Trump defending Epstein, 2002, younger side, terrific guy.
I do not think Megyn Kelley’s career is over either.
At age 79, he probably has changed. The Trump administration leaks too much for us not to know if it was going on today.
Megyn R. Kelly.
Saw this on Reddit:
If you want to be pedantic Kelly is correct. It is ephebophilia but I really wouldn’t fight for that hill.
But they would hurt.
Naw, life imprisonment would ruin it.
More or less what the MAGAs accused Hillary of doing. Except her hands are bigger.
The crime is the same, even if the perversion has a different name. AFAIK that “island” however has a age of consent of 16, so maybe not to many crimes, but who knows?