Just Politics

[MrMike241]

Oops, yes, South Korea. Thank you!
That error doesn't change the argument in any way, though. Unfortunately.

[BullNBear52]

AOC fundraising soars as the New York rep and Bernie Sanders barnstorm U.S. against Trump
Published Tue, Apr 15 20253:23 PM EDTUpdated An Hour Ago
thumbnail
Erin Doherty

Key Points
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez raised $9.6 million in the first quarter of 2025, the best quarter ever for the New York progressive Democrat.
The big haul comes as Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders hold rallies across the United States to criticize President Donald Trump, DOGE chief Elon Musk, and others.
AOC is being touted as a possible primary opponent to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, whose support of a Republican funding resolution angered many Democrats.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/15/aoc-trump-fundraising-bernie-sanders-musk.html

[BullNBear52]

China orders its airlines to stop accepting deliveries of Boeing jets, report says
moneywatch
By Aimee Picchi
Edited By Alain Sherter
Updated on: April 15, 2025 / 1:22 PM EDT / CBS News
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-boeing-orders-halt-to-jet-deliveries-bloomberg-trump-tariffs/

Trump has brought a knife to a gunfight with China.

[BullNBear52]

More trouble for Boeing. I noticed there is a model of Air Force 1 in the Oval Office and it has a new cooler scheme. The sky blue underbelly is out and the dark blue is back in.

The new planes on order now for years may never get delivered.

[BullNBear52]

The bar is open.

[BullNBear52]

The White House has also targeted Columbia, Cornell and Northwestern universities with threats to their federal funding.

US government has revoked more than 600 student visas, data shows
Some cases were related to activism and participation in protests against Gaza war, others were for 'minor crimes’

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/10/how-many-student-visas-revoked

The law firms that Trump blackmailed to get pro Bono work need to get out ahead of Trump and take on these colleges and students pro Bono then sit back and watch Trump fume.

That will make up for them caving in the first place.

[BullNBear52]

Harvard has $2.2 billion in grants frozen by Trump administration after rejecting demands
Published Mon, Apr 14 20252:20 PM EDTUpdated 5 Hours Ago

The Trump administration on Monday night said it was freezing $2.2 billion in grants to Harvard University over concerns about antisemitism on campus.
The freeze was announced hours after Harvard flatly rejected demands by the Trump administration to eliminate its DEI programs and screen international students for ideological concerns, putting nearly $9 billion in federal funding for the university at risk.
The Trump administration proposed conditions Harvard must follow to receive funding, including eliminating so-called DEI initiatives and screening for international students “supportive of terrorism and anti-Semitism.”
The White House has also targeted Columbia, Cornell and Northwestern universities with threats to their federal funding.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/14/trump-harvard-deal-funding-billion-dei.html

Blondie Bondi is about to find out just how many lawyers Harvard has graduated over the years.

[BullNBear52]

You can make it one of many issues for the midterm elections but it should not be the primary issue.

Dems focused on social issues in 2024 and not enough on kitchen table and immigration issues. Trump highlighted to great effect Americans who were killed by illegal immigrants.

I heard his crap about sending Americans to El Salvador if they commit crimes but he and Bondi don't understand due process rights are imbedded in the Constitution. But I do suggest you have the phone number of a lawyer in your wallet.

[nowwhat2]

Make America Gag Again






.

[Diogenes of Sinope]

https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=176070830

https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=176071255

[catani]

What? Did you mean South Korea?

[MrMike241]

I get what you're saying, but Kilmar Abrego Garcia does matter to everyone, because Trump is saying that "homegrowns" are next. When American born citizens can be disappeared out of the country, that starts sounding even more like concentration camps. The courts need to nip this in the bud. Criminal contempt of court will be next. Trump will try military law, and if he does, I hope it is as popular as it was in Germany a few months ago.

[BullNBear52]

Maybe rallying for the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia won't light that fuse. Maybe it won't accomplish anything beyond getting him back to this family. But, goddamn, that's a pretty big victory. And it points to how we can fight back against these vicious motherfuckers intent on ripping up everything this country ever pretended to stand for.

The problem is if that is the only rallying point, Trump will use it against the Dems to say they are soft on immigration.

I like what AOC and Bernie are doing on their tour. Trump is hurting Americans in their wallets, their retirement and their health plans. Medicare and Medicaid.

As despicable as what Trump is doing in his deporting innocence people the judges will figure it out.

[blackhawks]

The Release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia Is the Issue We All Need to Rally Behind

4/13/2025

https://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2025/04/the-release-of-kilmar-abrego-garcia-is.html

After he was granted permission in 2019 to stay in the United States by an immigration judge due to the fact that he faced a genuine threat of being killed in his native El Salvador, Kilmar Abrego Garcia got work as a sheet metal apprentice in Maryland and joined the Local 100 of SMART, the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers, a union with nearly a quarter-million members.

Abrego Garcia was making a life for himself in this country, supporting his wife and three kids, including a 5 year-old with autism who is unable to speak. But on March 12, despite never having been charged with a crime, Abrego Garcia was picked up by ICE and shipped off to the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, the notoriously deadly prison
in El Salvador, which is likely filled with members of Barrio 18, the gang that harassed and threatened him and his family. The federal government claims that Abrego Garcia is a member of MS-13, although that's based on one shitty informant and no evidence, and they also admit that he shouldn't have been kidnapped off the streets of Baltimore and trafficked to CECOT. It was "an administrative error," said lawyers for our skeevy government.

You might know most of this. You might also know that the US Supreme Court, in a 9-0 decision, said that the Trump administration had to, at the very least, facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia with a timeline to be decided by a district court.

Judge Paula Xinis quickly demanded that the White House provide daily updates on its efforts bring back Abrego Garcia, and, in its inimitably dickish way, the State Department said, "Yeah, sorry, he's in El Salvador now. We can't do shit." Again, you might know all of this because it's frankly one of the most frightening, extreme, and enraging things ever done by any president ever. I'll get to the implications of what the Trump administration said in a sec, but, at the most basic level, this was a blatantly illegal act, denying due process, which is what would have prevented the mistake.

But even more instructive has been the reaction from Abrego Garcia's union, SMART: they are fucking pissed off about Abrego Garcia. The union held a rally on April 4 in support of Abrego Garcia and his family. SMART General President Michael Coleman, in a statement, tied Abrego Garcia directly to the rights of workers and to what is supposed to be the promise of this country: "In his pursuit of the life promised by the American dream, Brother Kilmar was literally helping to build this great country. What did he get in return? Arrest and deportation to a nation whose prisons face outcry from human rights organizations.

SMART condemns his treatment in the strongest possible terms, and we demand his rightful return." Coleman has called on government to give Abrego Garcia his due process rights, and the union has a GoFundMe for Abrego Garcia and his family. The statement on the fundraiser says, "The United States Government has no legal authority to snatch a person who is lawfully present in the United States off the street and remove him from the country without due process. The Government’s contention otherwise, and its argument that the federal courts are powerless to intervene, are unconscionable."

At a gathering of the leadership and delegates of the North America Building Trades Unions, which SMART is a part of, the president of that organization of 3 million members, Sean McGarvey, loudly and angrily said that the union "means all of us. All of us. Including our brother, SMART Apprentice Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who we demand be returned to us and his family now!" He slapped his hand on the lectern for emphasis, yelling, "Bring him home!" as the gathered audience of mostly older and middle-aged white men stood up and applauded and cheered.

You got that? One of the biggest union groups in the country has made opposition to Abrego Garcia's kidnapping (and that's what it needs to be called because that's sure as shit what it was) a rallying point, and it's invited its millions of members to join in. Because that's what you do fucking well do: you stand up to the assholes who are abusing your fellow human beings.

There's a lot to say about the clusterfuck of evil, incompetence, insanity, and brutality involved in the crimes the American government has committed against Abrego Garcia, up to and including the ignoring of the clear orders of the Supreme Court and the district court by the Trump administration. There's a lot to say about how grimly ludicrous it is that no one will just say, "Oh, shit. Our bad" and bring him back, which would lend some minor bit of credibility to the entire cruel exercise of totalitarian power.

There's a lot to say about the entire savage exercise of essentially sentencing migrants to prison with no due process and sending them to a place where they will have no rights and then saying, "Ah, well. They now are only El Salvador's problem" (and that goes for all the ones who are allegedly Venezuelan gang members -prove it, motherfuckers). There's so much more to say in general; I'll just add that there's also one hell of a story to be written about how some of our prisons in the United States are as bad as CECOT.

But if you were in an opposition party or a group of resisters to the fascist fuckery eating this nation alive, I'd be centering Abrego Garcia's imprisonment as a single thing worth uniting to rally over. It's one of those stories that is easy to comprehend, easy to be on the right side of, and easy to come up with what you want to happen: ICE kidnapped a father of American kids and husband of an American wife who was here in the country legally, lied about who he was, and sent him to prison without charge or trial to the country where violent assholes want him dead.

Then they admitted they made a mistake and refuse to correct it. And all we want is for him to come home. There. It's fucking easy. You can get a few hundred thousand union workers pissed off about it, too. To their credit, Democratic lawmakers are speaking out, but we need more, much, much more.

Every cause looks for the incident that lights the fuse on the metaphorical explosives that will make the movement erupt into an unstoppable force. This is the kind of shit that is so egregious, so blatantly awful, so clearly unlawful, and so obviously arrogant that it'll piss off people even beyond the usual cadre of marchers and clever sign creators. Again, the president of a major coalition of unions is ready to go to the wall about it. SMART keeps posting about Abrego Garcia. The fuse is there. Light that fucker.

Hell, use the refusal by Donald Trump to pick up the fucking phone and telling the government of El Salvador, who we're paying to keep our hostages, to send him home as a sign of Trump's weakness. Mr. Art of the Deal can't get a deal on this? Or is Trump just the bitch boy of dictators? Or maybe Garcia was treated so awfully not just in CECOT but while in the custody of the United States that they can't allow him to be able to tell just how much we're abusing innocent people in our fast slide into authoritarianism.

Maybe rallying for the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia won't light that fuse. Maybe it won't accomplish anything beyond getting him back to this family. But, goddamn, that's a pretty big victory. And it points to how we can fight back against these vicious motherfuckers intent on ripping up everything this country ever pretended to stand for.

[janice shell]

You could be right. If he's gonna get rid of Donnie, I wish he'd get on with it, because Donnie is outta control. That presser--or spray, really--with Bukele was scary.

We will be up shit creek for real if he defies the Supreme Court. Which he seems prepared to do.

[janice shell]

You know how Trump feels about magnets.

“And they have all magnetic elevators to lift up 25 planes at a time, 20 planes at a time. And instead of using hydraulic, like on tractors that can handle anything from hurricanes to lightning to anything, they use magnets,” Trump said.

“It’s a new theory. Magnets are going to lift the planes up, and it doesn’t work. And they had billions and billions of dollars of cost overruns,” he said.

While the production of the ship was delayed and experienced cost overruns, it’s not entirely clear why Trump has decided that the magnets on these ships don’t work. But, he has talked incoherently about this technology before. In January 2024, Trump baselessly claimed that magnets stop working when placed in water, and therefore were a stupid thing to put on a boat. When weaving his way through his grievances, the president’s mind has a tendency to repeat the hits, even the more inane ones.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-complains-magnets-unintelligible-rant-153703851.html

[MasterBlastr]

I love Xi. He just does his job. In reality he will be responsible for flushing The Donald and restoring World Order. Maybe.

[blackhawks]

What happens when one doesn't think things through.

BREAKING NEWS**** China Halts Critical Exports as Trade War Intensifies



China has suspended exports of a wide range of critical minerals and magnets, threatening to choke off supplies of components central to automakers, aerospace manufacturers, semiconductor companies and military contractors around the world.

Shipments of the magnets, essential for assembling everything from cars and drones to robots and missiles, have been halted at many Chinese ports while the Chinese government drafts a new regulatory system. Once in place, the new system could permanently prevent supplies from reaching certain companies, including American military contractors.

The official crackdown is part of China’s retaliation for President Trump’s sharp increase in tariffs that started on April 2.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/13/business/china-rare-earths-exports.html

[BullNBear52]

He is no different than the other 2. All 3 are out of touch with reality. You want to make excuses for him that is your prerogative. I'll pass.

[MrMike241]

MrBeast replaces USAID! It's interesting to watch.

Watch it. Like it. Share it. Does it help?

[janice shell]

Hey, I didn't say he had any idea how ordinary people live. He seems to be completely out of touch. But in an adult way, compared to Lutnick and Navarro.

[BullNBear52]

Bessent is hardly a grownup. He is the spoiled little rich kid along with Lutnick.

The Treasury Secretary Is Wrong About How Most Retirees See the Stock Market
We asked readers who were on the cusp of retirement whether they were watching the markets. About 400 replied.

Last weekend, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent went on television and said people who wanted to retire right now were not paying attention to the stock market.

On the NBC program “Meet the Press,” referring to those who have “put away for years in their savings account,” he said the following: “I think they don’t look at the day-to-day fluctuations of what’s happening.”

Is that true? I asked readers of our Your Money newsletter who were on the cusp of retirement whether they were watching the markets and, if so, why?

About 400 people replied. More than 90 percent of them said they were looking. They gave me an earful.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/13/your-money/retirement-bessent-stock-market.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

[janice shell]

Well... Navarro is an idiot, but he's very close to Trump, apparently. Lutnick is said to be abrasive and obnoxious, and fights with Bessent, but he's still part of the team. And Bessent tries to be the grownup, but this administration doesn't seem to like grownups.

MSNBC reported today that they actually got their silly formula from an economist from the University of Chicago. He was interviewed, and said they got it all wrong.

Which is unsurprising.

[BullNBear52]

It was a complete capitulation to Navarro's fuzzy math.

[janice shell]

So Trump caves. Again.

Nononono. You're not looking at it the right way. Which is to congratulate Trumpty for (partly) solving the problem he created.

But he needs to lift that 10 percent off the backs of the PENGUINS!!

[Diogenes of Sinope]

Caving under pressure—That’s what 💩trump’s Father Time certified theme song is and will always be

Sadly—That’s just the way it is—Some things never change;

Stay focused and resolute and change can happen;

[BullNBear52]

New Rule Exempts Smartphones and Computers From Most Tariffs
The move by the Trump administration is a major reprieve for big tech companies, and has wide-ranging implications for the U.S. economy.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/12/us/trump-administration-news?unlocked_article_code=1._E4.p6mz.CtHmvBFFL7L9&smid=url-share

So Trump caves. Again.

[BullNBear52]

A Lot About Trump Doesn’t Add Up
April 12, 2025, 7:00 a.m. ET
Maureen Dowd
By Maureen Dowd
Opinion Columnist

You have to give it to Donald Trump. The man is a marvel at multitasking.

In one sensational swoop, President Trump was able to set the global economy reeling, shatter our alliances, shred our standing in the world, tank consumer confidence, scupper the Kennedy Center and tart up the Oval Office, turning it into Caesars Palace on the Potomac.

And yet he still managed to find time to brag about winning his Jupiter golf club’s championship and sign an executive order relaxing restrictions on water pressure from shower heads — “I like to take a nice shower to take care of my beautiful hair,” the president cooed. He also ordered an investigation of an election security official he had fired four years ago for having the temerity to acknowledge that the 2020 election was not stolen.

“We’re living in a bizarro world where heroes are being targeted and scoundrels are in a position to target them,” David Axelrod told me.

Trump is also consumed with terms of surrender for top law firms and Ivy League universities in his quest to get even with those he feels went after him unfairly or embraced wokeness too avidly.

My Netflix algorithm searches for “revenge,” “lives ruined” and “mayhem.” But I don’t want that in my government.

Trump is engaging the full power of the presidency to settle scores. The White House was not meant for petty tyrants on revenge tours. In the biggest job in the world, Trump seems like a very small man.

“Revenge is the oxygen that keeps him afloat,” said Tim O’Brien, the Trump biographer.

And he has surrounded himself with small people who elaborately flatter him and puff him up in risible cabinet meetings. Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, even has a Maoist golden Trump head on his lapel.

Barack Obama’s White House portrait was nudged aside for one of Trump pumping his fist after the assassination attempt.

The Emperor of Chaos told us to “BE COOL!” as markets cratered and people got “yippy,” as Trump put it. But how is that possible when everything is so unstable?

Trump may even turn into the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Jami Warner, the executive director of the American Christmas Tree Association, warned on CNN Friday that the holiday may be difficult for a lot of families accustomed to getting their cheap artificial trees, lights and ornaments from China, not to mention presents.

I had to go to summer school for algebra, but I don’t want a government that’s bad at math. O’Brien wrote in Bloomberg News that Trump’s “tragicomic ‘formula’” for tariffs “somehow positioned Cambodia and Thailand at the top of the heap of countries posing major economic threats to the U.S. and also caused tariffs to be imposed on uninhabited islands near Antarctica.”

The Republicans’ math on the budget bill is also fuzzy. You can’t give trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy and pretend it won’t cost anything.

Even before Trump opened a Pandora’s box of economic woe, we knew numbers weren’t his strong suit. He had six bankruptcies, and his father had to buy $3.4 million in chips to save one of his casinos.

The most conclusive evidence of his innumeracy was his appearance in 2006 on Howard Stern’s show with Ivanka and Don Jr. The Trump siblings’ insistence that they got into Wharton on their merits inspired Stern to give them a grade school-level pop quiz.

“What’s 17 times 6?” he asked.

After some nervous laughter, Don Jr. replied “96? 94?” His father interjected, “It’s 11 12. It’s 112.”

“Wrong!” Stern said, adding, “It’s 102!”

Donald Trump repeated “112.”

Trump should be alarmed that investors are skittish about buying U.S. government bonds, usually considered safe assets.

“And guess who owns a lot of U.S. debt?” O’Brien said. “China, Japan, Europe. Are they feeling good about us right now?”

As everyone else gets yippy — JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon warned of a recession — the president seems to be enjoying center stage, toying with the strings like a cat.

“All of this unnecessary, orchestrated dissent and doubt and damage for his own amusement,” O’Brien told me. “He’s the kid in the garage with matches standing next to the gasoline tank.”

Now that Trump’s tariff scheme has gone horribly awry — and the administration’s attempt to spin it as an “Art of the Deal” victory has fallen flat — it remains to be seen if this will be a “Wizard of Oz” moment when the curtain gets pulled back on the con man.

Will the global chaos puncture the sense of mastery that Trump has projected?

“This is not a reality show,” Axelrod said. “This is reality.”

He continued: “People like the idea of cutting waste and fraud and abuse until it means that the Social Security office in your hometown or veterans’ health programs close down, or there are measles outbreaks, because they don’t know what they’re doing. Do these add up so, at some point, people say: ‘You know what? This isn’t really working for me’”?

The former casino owner in the White House brags that he has never gambled. But he is gambling with Americans’ lives and futures. How strange, as even the dollar loses its allure, that a man long considered a branding savant has so badly mucked up the U.S. brand.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/12/opinion/trump-presidency-multitasking.html

[blackhawks]

Yeah I wondered about that one. Several commenters caught it too. Doesn't change the overall point of the meme though.


28. Patti wrote a novel about lesbian lovers, but denied it was autobiographical,
and said she’s not gay. So I’m still puzzled.

[janice shell]

That's kind of odd. Nancy's daughter, Patti Davis, isn't a lesbian.

[janice shell]

And to think they all complain about the Chinese Communist Party. What a great little bunch of apparatchiks, paying homage to Dear Leader.

[blackhawks]

I'm A Republican



https://www.democraticunderground.com/100220229257

[janice shell]

That is good. Right on target.

[Diogenes of Sinope]

[BullNBear52]

Two UNCG students have visas revoked
School declined to ID home countries of the students
JOHN DEEM
Staff Writer 10 hrs ago


UNC Greensboro has joined the growing list of universities where international students have had their visas canceled as President Donald Trump's administration applies a new level of scrutiny on college campuses.

As of Thursday afternoon, the visas of two UNCG students had been revoked, school spokesman Brian Clarey confirmed.

UNCG's Global Engagement Office has offered its assistance to the students.

"We're in the process of sorting all of it out on our end," Clary added.

The university declined to identify the home countries of the students.

Wake Forest University, which has more than 1,000 international students – the fifth largest number among higher-education institutions in the state – has had no visas revoked, a spokeswoman said Thursday.

The Trump administration has targeted students who supported Palestinians and opposed Israel's war in Gaza. However, it's unclear why the UNCG students were singled out, as has been the case for most who have been targeted nationwide.

Federal funding also has been frozen to schools over their handling of pro-Palestinian protests, as well as diversity, equity and inclusion policies, which the administration claims are illegal.

The most severe cases so far came this week when the administration cut $1 billion to Cornell University and $790 million to Northwestern University.

Meanwhile, UNC Chapel Hill is one of 60 colleges and universities being investigated for antisemitism by the U.S. Department of Education.

In campus demonstrations in April and September of last year, protesters expressed support for the Palestinians and called on the university to divest from companies with ties to Israel. About three-dozen people were arrested in connection with the protests.

UNC Chapel Hill confirmed this week that at least six international students had their visas revoked, the same number as UNC Charlotte. Two student visas at N.C. State also were terminated.

All three universities said they were unaware of any issues with the students that would have led to the government's decisions.

[e-mail]

https://greensboro.com/eedition/page_00c6adb3-c599-59a6-809d-baf613216cd2.html#fe=1&eh=3b6708353eb4d86d1549f97d1e8d7b46

[BullNBear52]

I recently got involved in local politics here after discovering that there was no leader in our precinct and we had to file in order to vote at the upcoming state convention.

I'm determined to not go down without a fight in the 2026 elections.

I've had enough of the bullshit.

[MrMike241]

This is good.

[BullNBear52]

The trading of DJT on 04/09 and early 4/10 sticks out like a sore thumb.
https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/DJT?qsearchterm=DJT

[janice shell]

Yes. And Martha was caught.

[MrMike241]

Isn't everyone on the planet concerned about the market? 😉

Everyone, except those "allegedly" insider trading 🤔

MTG was one with a profitable week. Remember Martha Stewart? That was during a time of law.

[janice shell]

I hope they bring him back quickly. But I would not be surprised by delays.

Stephanie Ruhle's show just started. She thinks the markets are still a mess. And is very concerned.

[MrMike241]

The Supreme Court is waking up. Bring Mr Garcia back!

[nowwhat2]

Actually there exists evidence that he still does.

[janice shell]

I don't know. But some say he used to do cocaine.

[janice shell]

WTF ?.....What kinda person frickin' TALKS like that ?

Not presidents, usually. At least not in public. But Trump is extremely vulgar.

[BullNBear52]

Look now, the market ain't buying his BS.

[BullNBear52]

No.

[BullNBear52]

I hope they thought long and hard about releasing the video. And don't think for a minute Trump won't try and seek revenge because he will.

[blackhawks]

I've noticed his increasing buyer's remorse. If I were on a panel with him and he stated the below I would respond that 'no man your age should be bending over that way no matter the doubt. Better to stand up straight with a rod of certitude in your back.'


even when I’ve bent over backward to give him the benefit of the doubt,

[BullNBear52]

He has never smoked pot?