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Wow amazing summary of Tru mp's business dealings etc and I could be wrong 5 or 6 Bankruptcies and ties with.....I could go on....I read the whole thing , minus the Links
A few notes on the criminal and Russian influence upon our politics. To see the sources one needs to go to the noted webpage and there will be the "source" linked to the associated reference.
MOBBED UP AF - A RETROSPECTIVE
https://www.sutori.com/en/story/timeline-you-might-be-interested-in--pTTyLH39r7FsRtF51JZi4BVt
1970s & 1980s: wave of Russian criminals arrive in New York and begin interfacing with established American organized crime networks (La Cosa Nostra/The Five Families aka Bonanno, Genovese, Colombo, Lucchese, Gambino) (source)
1977: KGB reportedly opens file on Donald Trump (source).
1979: Construction begins on Trump Tower. Trump purchases overpriced concrete from mafia bosses Anthony “Fat Tony” Salerno and Paul Castellano of the Genovese and Gambino crime families (respectively). (source)
1980: Trump's mentor, Roy Cohn, introduces Donald to Roger Stone. (source)
1982: New York City Housing Commissioner Anthony Gliedman received what he described as an “abusive and profane” call from someone angry that Gliedman had opposed Trump’s request for a $20 million tax abatement. Gliedman reported the call to the FBI, saying the caller was “threatening his life.” (source)
June 3, 1983: Rudy Giuliani becomes US attorney for SDNY
January, 1984: Vladimir Alexandrovich Kryuchkov, First Chief Directorate of the KGB arm responsible for gathering foreign intelligence, urges his officers to be more creative with agent recruitment - and to use money and flattery vs. alignment with Soviet ideology. Additionally, he gives the directive to find "U.S. targets to cultivate or, at the very least, official contacts...The main effort must be concentrated on acquiring valuable agents." (source)
1984: Russian émigré David Bogatin pays cash for five apartments in Trump Tower. (source). Bogatin's brother ran a $150 million stock scam with Russian mafia boss Semion Mogilevich (source)
1985: Trump reportedly “apoplectic” when he loses bid to re-develop the Coliseum at Columbus Circle to Salomon Brothers-backed Mort Zuckerman. (source) More on Trump’s proposal here.
October 1985: Trump's helicopter pilot indicted on drug trafficking charges. Trump doesn't fire him. Instead, he leases his personally-owned unit in Trump Plaza Apartments to him with an agreement of half the rent is to be paid in cash, the other half in unspecified helicopter services. Trump also writes a letter on behalf of his pilot (Weichselbaum), calling him "a credit to the community.” Who does the case end up with? Federal judge Maryanne Trump, Donald's sister. (source)
Autumn, 1986: Trump meets Soviet ambassador Yuri Dubinin. And per Trump's own account in Art of the Deal, “One thing led to another, and now I’m talking about building a large luxury hotel, across the street from the Kremlin, in partnership with the Soviet government.” (source)
1986: Trump makes the rounds in the news offering to negotiate with the Russians (source), and also angles for a Soviet posting in the Reagan administration (source)
March 16, 1987: Bogatin (who had purchased multiple apartments in Trump Tower for cash) pleads guilty to taking part in a massive gasoline-bootlegging scheme with Russian mobsters. The government seized his five condos at Trump Tower, because he'd used them to “launder money, to shelter and hide assets.” A Senate investigation into organized crime later revealed that Bogatin was a leading figure in the Russian mob in New York. (from New Republic)
April 3, 1987: Trump excluded from bidding on Australian casino deal because of mafia connections (per Australian police) (source)
July 4, 1987: Trump flies to the USSR for the first time after being personally invited - the trip is arranged by the Soviet government (source).
1987: Trump talks extensively in an interview about nuclear bombs, and states that his pilot used to work for Qaddafi. In the same interview, Trump describes the type of bomb he thinks will be possible in the future: "Carry it in your briefcase, right. I’m not even talking about airplanes and missiles. You’ll walk in with your damn tape recorder,” he says, pointing to my innocent Sony, “and you’ll say it’s a tape recorder and nobody will be able to tell the difference. I mean, that’s where it’s going to be in 20 years.” (source)
1988: Trump starts talking about running for president on Oprah (source).
1988: Trump purchases a yacht from Adnan Khashoggi, the uncle of Jamal Khashoggi (source) (source)
1988: American Media Inc. (AMI) comes into being after Enquirer owner Generoso Pope dies. (source) Among the interested parties are Robert Maxwell (source), the father of Ghislaine Maxwell - Jeffrey Epstein's partner. (source). Among the trustees of the Pope estate are Peter G. Peterson, a partner in the Blackstone Group (source) - a private equity firm founded by Steven Schwarzman (source). (More on Schwarzman and his relation to Trump here). According to Pope's son, Paul, The Enquirer was started with a $75,000 loan from the mafia (source).
October 11, 1989: helicopter crashes with 3 Trump casino execs aboard (source). Trump claimed he was supposed to be on it, but then changed his mind at the last minute. (source) After their deaths, he blamed them for the failure of his Atlantic City casino (source) The helicopter's pilot was identified by the state police as Robert Kent of Ronkonkoma, L.I., and its co-pilot as Lawrence Diener of Westbury, L.I. b/b
1990: Wall Street bond house Salomon Brothers advises institutional clients to sell bonds issue from Trump's Castle Casino in Atlantic City, due to debt and performance concerns. (source)
1991: Trump declares bankruptcy (source)
1991: Trump sells his yacht to Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal (source) (source)
December 17, 1991: Fred Trump gives Donald an interest-free loan by purchasing $3.5 million worth of casino chips at Trump Castle casino, circumventing bankruptcy rules and enabling Donald to make the interest payment due on his bonds. (source)
1992: Trump declares bankruptcy an additional 3 times stemming from various properties he's over-leveraged. (source)
1994: Trump allegedly rapes and beats a 13-year-old girl at a party with Jeffrey Epstein, multiple times. In the filed complaint, the 13-year-old was threatened to be "disappeared" like another young girl had been if she told anyone. (source)
October 20, 1994: Christine Seymour, Roy Cohn's secretary (Cohn was Trump's mentor), who was set to publish a tell-all book, dies in head-on collision with tractor trailer (source)
1995: Trump reportedly in Moscow to discuss matters related to Okhotny Ryad underground mall on Manezh Square. (source)
The trip is also reference in this article: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1997/05/19/trump-solo
1995: Trump sells Plaza Hotel to Alwaleed bin Talal (source) Barbara Corcoran brokers the deal (source)
June 8, 1995: Vyacheslav Ivankov arrested (source). Ivankov was known to be a notoriously brutal gangster in the upper echelon of the Russian mafia. (source) After having difficulty finding him, the FBI picked up his trail at Trump Taj Mahal, and then discovered that Ivankov had a luxury condo in Trump Tower. (source) According to Robert Friedman in his book, Red Mafiya, Friedman viewed Ivankov's personal phone book containing "a working number for the Trump Organization’s Trump Tower Residence, and a Trump Organization office fax machine." (this is listed as a citation at the end of the book). Ivankov is also mentioned in this 2003 DOJ paper on organized crime, with a forward by Bruce Ohr (pp 49).
1996: Trump goes to Russia with Howard Lorber (source). Lorber later donated to the Trump inaugural fund (source).
1998: Trump Taj Mahal fined for currency transaction reporting violations (source)
February 1999: Evercore Capital Partners L.L.C., headed by former Deputy Treasury Secretary Roger C. Altman, acquires American Media, Inc. and places David Pecker at the helm. (source)
1999: Trump's first run for president (source)
2000/2001: Mark Burnett in negotiations with Putin for a show called "Destination Mir." (source)
October 2001: AMI offices in Boca Raton are attacked with anthrax (source). Later, in 2004, a cleaning company owned by Rudy Giuliani is contracted to clean up the anthrax, with his company, Bio-One, slated to rent/occupy the building after cleanup. (source) The contract later ended in a feud. (source)
2002: Mark Burnett begins talks with Trump regarding The Apprentice. (source)
2002 - 2011: The Bayrock Group partners with the Trump Organization on developments including the Trump SoHo hotel (source). Principals in the group include Felix Sater - believed to be connected with Semion Mogilevich (source) - and Tevfik Arif (source).
2004: Trump declares bankruptcy again. (source)
Spring 2004: The Apprentice debuts (source)
May 2004: Diamond dealer and former Trump Tower tenant (1 year prior he'd lived right below Kellyanne Conway) Eduard Nektalov is shot on 6th Avenue (source). He was reportedly cooperating with federal authorities on a money laundering investigation (source) More on money laundering and Trump properties here.
2005: at the same time Trump is unable to get a 25 million pound loan from Bank of Scotland due to being a credit risk (source), Deutsche Bank (who later is hit with massive fines for money laundering) loans Trump nearly one billion dollars. Trump's banker at Deutsche Bank is Justice Kennedy's son. (source).
2006: Felix Sater escorts the Trump children during their trip to Russia (according to Sater) (source). Later, in emails to Michael Cohen, Sater says that he'd arranged for Ivanka to sit in Putin's chair. (source).
2006: Paul Manafort buys unit in Trump Tower (source).
2006 - 2009: Trump makes multiple attempts (and fails) to get a loan from the Bank of Scotland to purchase Hamilton Hall. The bank executive "expressed concern that Trump would hold the bank to 'future ransom'” (source)
2007 - 2016: Buyers tied to Russia make 86 cash purchases at Trump properties. (source)
2008: Soviet-born (Moldovia) Orly Taitz helps bring suit regarding Obama's citizenship/birth certificate. (source)
2008: Junior brags that they're getting a lot of money from Russia. (source)
2008: Russian oligarch buys a Palm Beach mansion from Trump, paying twice the value (source).
August 27, 2008: a small-time scam artist transfers a Beverly Hills, California, mansion to Donald Trump for $0. (source)
November 2008: Unable to meet his obligations for the nearly 1 billion dollar loan they gave him, Trump sues Deutsche Bank saying he shouldn't have to make good on his promise because of the economic crash. (source)
2009: Trump declares bankruptcy again. (source)
2009: a lawyer representing Trump Atlantic City casino creditors says he got threatening phone calls. The FBI traced one of them to a payphone outside the “Late Show With David Letterman,” where Trump was appearing.
“My name is Carmine,” the caller told the lawyer, Kristopher Hansen. “I don’t know why you’re fucking with Mr. Trump but if you keep fucking with Mr. Trump, we know where you live and we’re going to your house for your wife and kids.” (source)
July 23, 2009: Stormy Daniels' political advisor's car explodes (source). This was approximately 3 years after her affair with Trump (source).
August 2009: After multiple tries dating back to 2006, Trump denied a final time for loan for 25 million pounds from Bank of Scotland because the bank considered it "too risky." (source)
2010: Tevfik Arif, a principal of the Bayrock Group - which at this time is partnering with the Trump organization on a variety of projects - is arrested in a Turkish prostitution sting. (source). Charges were later dropped by Turkish authorities.
July 25, 2011: President Obama issues executive order declaring organized crime a national security emergency. (source)
2011 - 2015: Deutsche Bank, who 5 years previous had given Donald Trump nearly 1 billion dollars when Bank of Scotland wouldn't loan him 25 million pounds, is laundering billions of dollars with the help of Russians. (source)
2011: Eric Trump brags that they have access to millions of dollars from Russians. (source)
2011 - 2015: Donald Trump begins paying for his properties with hundreds of millions of dollars in cash. (source)
January 1, 2012: former Trump bodyguard dies from apparent overdose (source).
2013: Trump walks out of a BBC Panorama interview when asked about his connections with Felix Sater. (source)
April 16, 2013: Preet Bharara, then US attorney for SDNY, announces charges against massive Russian organized crime ring operating out of Trump Tower. (source)
June 16, 2013: Trump announces Miss Universe pageant will be in Moscow. (source)
November 9, 2013: Miss Universe pageant (source). One of the fugitives indicted in the Trump Tower organized crime ring in April, ALIMZHAN TOKHTAKHOUNOV, is a guest of honor there. (source)
2014: Steve Bannon, while at Cambridge Analytica, orders testing on Putin messaging with Americans. (source)
February 10, 2014: Trump praises Putin on Fox & Friends. (source)
March 6, 2015: Trump Taj Mahal fined for money laundering. (source)
2015: Michael Cohen threatens a reporter covering Trump's divorce with Ivana. “I’m warning you, tread very fucking lightly, because what I’m going to do to you is going to be fucking disgusting,” the Daily Beast’s Tim Mak, recalled Cohen telling him. “You write a story that has Mr. Trump’s name in it, with the word ‘rape,’ and I’m going to mess your life up … for as long as you’re on this frickin’ planet.” (source) (source)
April 18, 2015: Trump's former pilot dies in head-on collision (source).
November 3, 2015: Felix Sater, who is believed to work for Semion Mogilevich (source) writes Michael Cohen stating that he'll get buy-in from Putin and that they'll engineer Trump's presidency. (source)
November 5, 2015: former head of RT Mikhail Lesin found dead in DC hotel room with blunt force trauma to head, neck and torso. He had a meeting with DOJ scheduled for following day. (source)
January 23, 2016: Trump tells the crowd at a rally that he could shoot someone in the middle of 5th Avenue and not lose voters. (source)
February 23, 2016: Trump tells the crowd at a rally that he'd like to punch a protestor in the face, and "I love the old days. You know what they used to do to guys like that when they were in a place like this? They’d be carried out on a stretcher, folks.” (source)
March 29, 2016: Paul Manafort joins Trump campaign. (source)
April - May 2016: George Papadopoulos in communication with “high ranking Russian official” in an attempt to set up meetings between Trump team and Russian reps, w/the promise “that the Kremlin had 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton in the form of “thousands of emails…” (source)
May 2016: Stephen Schwarzman flies to Riyadh to meet with Mohammed bin Salman - then the deputy crown prince of Saudi Arabia - about infrastructure, and presumably the $20 billion fund that's announced a year later. (source) More on Schwarzman's relationship with Trump, and Saudi Arabia here. More on Schwarzman's links to Russia and Rosneft here.
Summer 2016: Stefan Halper, an FBI informant, approaches Trump campaign officials. (source)
June 9, 2016: Trump Tower meeting with Russians, Manafort, Kushner, Don Jr.. (source). Present at the meeting was Nataliya Veselnitskaya, who at the time was representing Prevezon (source), a company implicated in a money-laundering case at SDNY (source)
June 14, 2016: News breaks that the DNC has been hacked by Russians. (source)
June 14, 2016: Michael Cohen cancels his planned trip to Moscow to discuss Trump Tower Moscow (source)
Sometime after July 19, 2016: Trump warned by FBI that Russians will try to infiltrate campaign. (source)
July 2016: FBI opens counter intelligence investigation into Trump campaign. (source) (source)
September, 2016: Trump and Cohen discuss hush money and contingency for if guy gets hit by a truck. (source)
October 31, 2016: Mother Jones reports "A Veteran Spy Has Given the FBI Information Alleging a Russian Operation to Cultivate Donald Trump"
November 7, 2016 (one day before election day): Connie Watton, maid of Stephen Schwarzman - a Trump AND Kremlin friend - is pushed in front of a subway. (source) The woman who pushed her is assigned defense attorney Mathew Mari, known for his legal work for the Bonanno crime family. More on Schwarzman's relationship with Trump, and Saudi Arabia here. More on Schwarzman's links to Russia and Rosneft here. Schwarzman had also financed Kushner projects and gave Jared Kushner a loan (source).
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November 8, 2016 (election day): Russian diplomat Sergei Krivov found unconscious at the Russian Consulate in New York and died on the scene. (source)
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December 2016: FSB officers arrested in Russia. (source)
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December 2016: Jared Kushner instructs Michael Flynn to sabotage US foreign policy. (source)
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December 1 or 2, 2016: Kushner tries to set up secret back channel with Russians using Russians' secure facilities. (source)
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December 1, 2016: Jared Kushner and Michael Flynn meet with Sergei Kislyak at Trump Tower (source)
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December 13-14, 2016 (date not confirmed): Jared Kushner meets with Sergey Gorkov, "a graduate of the academy of the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the domestic intelligence arm of the former Soviet KGB, who was appointed by Putin to the post less than a year before his encounter with Kushner." (source)
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December 19, 2016: Russia's ambassador to Turkey, Andrei Karlov, is killed. (source)
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December 19, 2016: Russian diplomat to Latin America, Peter Polshikov, is killed. (source)
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December 20, 2016: Methbot white paper published. (source)
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December 26, 2016: Ex-KGB chief Oleg Erovinkin, who was suspected of helping draft the Trump dossier, found dead in the back of his car. (source)
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December 29, 2016: Obama expels 35 Russian diplomats. (source)
December 29, 2016: KT McFarland sends email stating that "If there is a tit-for-tat escalation Trump will have difficulty improving relations with Russia, which has just thrown U.S.A. election to him," (source)
December 29, 2016: Flynn calls Kislyak to discuss the expelling of the diplomates and asks that the Russians not retaliate. (source)
January 6, 2017: Trump, McFarland, Pence, Flynn, Priebus, Pompeo and Bossert briefed with classified intelligence report by Brennan, Clapper, Comey. (source) That same day, DNI releases this report.
January 9, 2017: Russian Consul in Athens, Greece, Andrei Malanin, found dead in his apartment (source)
January 10, 2017: Buzzfeed publishes Steele Dossier. (source)
January 24, 2017: Peter Strzok interviews Michael Flynn. (source)
January 27, 2017: Russia's Ambassador to India, Alexander Kadakin, dies. (source)
January 30, 2017: New York State Department of Financial Services fines Deutsche Bank $425 million for massive Russian mirror trading scheme. (source)
February 2017: Trump's bodyguard, a Trump Organization lawyer and a third man raid Harold Bornstein's office, taking Trump's medical records. (source)
February 20, 2017: Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the UN, dies suddenly in New York (source)
March 2, 2017: Ukrainian businessman with links to Trump found dead from undetermined causes. Oronov was Michael Cohen's brother's father-in-law, and Cohen did business with him. (source)
March 11, 2017: Trump fires Preet Bharara, who as US Attorney of SDNY had led the breakup of a massive Russian organized crime ring operating out of Trump Tower. (source)
March 16, 2017: laptop stolen from Secret Service agent's car while parked in her driveway. The laptop contained highly sensitive information including floor plans and evacuation protocol for Trump Tower. (source)
March 20, 2017: It's learned that the FBI had launched a counter intelligence investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian links in July of 2016. (source) (source)
March 21, 2017: A lawyer for a Putin-foe, Nikolai Gorokhov, reportedly thrown from a window in Moscow. Gorokhov was set to testify as a U.S. government witness in a money laundering case initiated by SDNY (led by Preet Bahrara). (source) "The alleged vehicle by which these dirty assets were washed clean was a Cyprus-registered company called Prevezon Holdings Ltd." (source) Prevezon is represented by Nataliya Veselnitskaya at the time that she attends the Trump Tower meeting in June of 2016. (source)
March 23, 2017: former Russian MP, Denis Voronenkov, shot dead in Kiev. (source)
March 30, 2017: FBI raids Trump-linked casino in Saipan. (source)
March 30, 2017: Mike Flynn asks for immunity. (source)
May 1, 2017: Scott Christianson, investigative reporter for McClatchy, publishes this:
https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/article147454324.html
May 9, 2017: Trump fires FBI director James Comey. (source)
May 2017 (date unclear): FBI opens counter intelligence investigation into Trump. (source)
May 10: 2017: Subpoenas issued to Michael Flynn by Senate Intelligence Committee. (source)
May 10, 2017: closed-door meeting in Oval Office with Russians. (source)
May 10, 2017: Roger Ailes falls in his home at Palm Beach Country. (source)
May 11, 2017: FBI raids GOP consulting firm in Maryland. (source)
May 14, 2017: Scott Christianson dies after falling down the stairs at his home (source)
May 14 2017: Republic operative Peter Smith found dead in Minnesota 10 days after speaking with WSJ (source)
Smith had said he'd been working with Michael Flynn (source).
May 17, 2017: Robert Mueller appointed special counsel (source).
May 18, 2017: Roger Ailes dies from head injury he'd sustained 8 days earlier (source).
May 20-21, 2017: Trump takes his first overseas trip as president to Saudi Arabia. During this trip, it's announced that Blackstone, led by Stephen Schwarzman, will manage Saudi Arabia's $20 billion investment fund. (source) Most of the investment will be in US infrastructure (source) During that trip, Trump also meets with Kirill Dmitriev of VEB bank (source)
July 4, 2017: body washes up on shore of Trump golf course in California. (source) (source)
July 26, 2017: Paul Manafort's home raided (source)
July 27, 2017: George Papadopoulos arrested. (source)
August 3, 2017: Secret Service kicked out of Trump Tower (source).
August 23, 2017: Russian ambassador to Sudan, Mirgayas Shirinsky, found dead. (source)
September 1, 2017: fire at Russian consulate in San Francisco (source).
September 14, 2017: Junior ditches Secret Service to go to Canada (source).
September 25, 2017: Richard Beckler, Trump's appointee as General Counsel of GSA dies (source). Beckler is the GSA staff member who'd assured Trump that requests for materials/emails from special counsel would not be honored (source).
September 27, 2017: Paul Horner, fake news writer who took credit for Trump’s win, dies of apparent overdose (source)
October 2017: Trump muses that he'll likely get to place 4 justices on the Supreme Court because of future health issues they may have (source).
October 16, 2017: Panama Papers journalist killed with a car bomb. (source)
October 25, 2017: Jared Kushner leaves on unannounced visit to Saudi Arabia.
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/29/jared-kushner-saudi-arabia-244291
October 26, 2017: Investigator (Catherine Hunt, a former FBI agent) working on behalf of 9/11 families suing Saudi Arabia interviews Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi texted Saudi officials that same day.
(as claimed by the lawyer working on behalf of the families)
https://twitter.com/KlasfeldReports/status/1235232331218268162?s=20
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6793970-PEC-Khashoggi-letter-3-2-2020.html
October 28, 2018: Jared Kushner returns from unannounced visit to Saudi Arabia.
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/29/jared-kushner-saudi-arabia-244291
October 30, 2017: Papadopoulos guilty plea revealed (source)
November 3, 2017: Alex van der Zwaan is interviewed by the FBI. (source)
November 4, 2017: Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman consolidates power and arrests several princes, including Prince Alwaleed bin-Talal. (source) Trump had previously sold his yacht (1991) and the Plaza Hotel to Alwaleed bin-Talal (source).
November 2017: Trump picks fights with North Korea. (source)
November 17, 2017: Brett Kavanaugh added to short list of SCOTUS nominees. (source)
December 1, 2017: Michael Flynn pleads guilty to lying to the FBI. (source)
December 5, 2017: It's reported that Deutsche Bank received subpoena from Robert Mueller (source) In-depth Rachel Maddow segment on Deutsche Bank and the subpoena here.
December 16, 2017: Trump learns that Mueller has in his possession all of their transition emails on the .gov domain, obtained via the GSA. (source)
December 22, 2017: House Intelligence Committee interviews Rhona Graff
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/rhona-graff-longtime-trump-assistant-be-interviewed-house-intelligence-committee-n832056
December 30, 2017: Fire at home linked to Ivanka's diamond business (source).
January 8, 2018: Fire at Trump Tower (source)
January 20, 2018: Former spokesman for Rick Gates, Glenn Selig, dies in Afghanistan hotel attack. Selig was a well-known Tampa Bay Area TV anchor. (source)
January 25, 2018: It's learned that Dutch intelligence had infiltrated Russian hacker group Cozy Bear and witnessed in real time as they attacked the State Department as well as the DNC. (source)
January 27, 2018: Steve Wynn resigns as RNC finance chair amid sexual assault allegations (source).
January 31, 2018: chartered train carrying GOP lawmakers to retreat crashes into truck (source).
February 16, 2018: Indictment of 12 Russians, outlining their methods of election interference (indictment sealed). (source)
February 20, 2018: Alex van der Zwaan pleads guilty to making false statements to FBI. (source)
February 22, 2018: Paul Manafort and Richard Gates indicted. (source)
February 23 - 27, 2018: Trump Tower Panama standoff with physical altercations and armed guards (source).
Week of March 4 - 10, 2018 (date unclear): FBI raids Trump-linked casino in Saipan a second time. (source)
March 4, 2018: Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, found poisoned on a park bench in Salisbury. (source)
March 16, 2018: FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe fired. (source)
April 7, 2018: ANOTHER Trump Tower Fire - art dealer Todd Brassner dies (source); Michael Cohen texts Dennis Shields with a warning to "get out ASAP" (source).
April 9, 2018: FBI raids Michael Cohen's home, hotel room, and office (source).
April 13, 2018: RNC Finance Chair Elliot Broidy resigns in midst hush money payoff scandal (source).
April 15 or 16, 2018: Matthew Mellon (finance chair, NY RNC, and who made his fortune in cryptocurrency) dies of apparent overdose (source). Note - original link/story is now gone; here are alternate sources for that story: https://twitter.com/business/status/986135482013769728?s=20
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-17/billionaire-banking-heir-matthew-mellon-dies-at-54?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_content=business&cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43800610
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanvardi/2018/04/19/the-last-days-of-banking-heir-matthew-mellon/#e2ad3665d528
April 24, 2018: Devin Nunes sends classified letter to Jeff Sessions regarding FBI informant (source) who is later revealed to be Stefan Halper. (source)
April 28, 2018: Fire at Trump Tower Azerbaijan (source).
Week of April 29, 2018: Devin Nunes issues subpoena to DOJ seeking information about FBI informant (later revealed to be Stefan Halper). (source)
June 20, 2018: New York State Department of Financial Services fines Deutsche Bank $205 million for "unlawful, unsafe and unsound conduct in its foreign exchange trading business." (source)
June 22, 2018: Trump-backed Katie Arrington seriously injured in head-in collision (source).
June 27, 2018: Justice Kennedy, whose son was Donald Trump's banker, unexpectedly announces retirement. (source) Trump and Kennedy reportedly had a special relationship (source).
July 4, 2018: delegation of Republicans go to Moscow. (source)
July 9, 2018: Brett Kavanaugh nominated to SCOTUS. (source)
July 14, 2018: Indictment of 12 Russians/internet research agency unsealed (source).
July 16, 2018: Maria Butina criminal complaint unsealed. (source)
July 16, 2018: Trump meets with Putin in Helsinki. (source)
July 17, 2018: Secret Service agent dies in Scotland. After falling ill at Trump's golf course in Turnberry, he died the day after the Helsinki meeting (source) (source). (obituary)
July 25, 2018: dead body found in waters off Trump NYC golf course (source).
August 6, 2018: Rand Paul goes to Russia. (source)
August 10, 2018: Dennis Shields - the same guy Cohen texted back in April - found dead in Trump Tower (source)
August 15, 2018: Trump revokes John Brennan's security clearance. (source)
August 16, 2018: mystery case before grand jury initiated. (source)
October 2, 2018: Jamal Khashoggi murdered on orders from Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. (source) Trump later disputes the findings of the CIA and stands with MBS, stating that too much money is at stake. (source)
October 3, 2018: Nikki Hailey resigns, but resignation is not yet publicly announced. (source)
October 3, 2018: The Russian deputy attorney general (Saak Karapetyan) who reportedly directed Natalya Veselnitskaya (the lawyer who met with the Trump campaign in Trump Tower) dies in a helicopter crash (source). It was later reported that the pilot of the helicopter had been shot. (source)
October 9, 2018: Internet Research Agency (aka the troll farm) named in DOJ indictment (unsealed July 14, 2018) set on fire. (source)
October 9, 2018: Nikki Haley announces resignation.
https://www.npr.org/2018/10/09/655794985/nikki-haley-resigns-as-u-n-ambassador
October 9, 2018: New York Times reports that Saudi Arabia had ordered Khashoggi's murder.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/09/world/europe/jamal-khashoggi-turkey-saudi-arabia.html
October 17, 2018: Don McGahn resigns. (source)
October 19, 2018: "Project Lahkta" (Russian election interference) criminal complaint unsealed (source)
October 21, 2018: John Bolton goes to Russia to meet with Putin. (source)
October 22 - 27, 2018: week of terror begins with bombs at the home of George Soros. (source). It was followed by bombs sent to Bill and Hillary Clinton (Oct. 23); Barack Obama, CNN, John Brennan, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Eric Holder and Maxine Waters (October 24); Robert de Niro and Joe Biden (October 25); and Cory Booker, James Clapper, Kamala Harris, and Tom Steyer (October 26). It ends with mass shooting at Tree of Life synagogue on October 27 (source).
October 30, 2018: Whitey Bulger killed. (source)
November 21, 2018: head of GRU agency accused of DNC hacks and Skripal poisoning dies, reportedly after a long illness. (source)
November 27, 2018: Methbot indictment unsealed at EDNY. (source)
November 28, 2018: Miami Herald publishes Perversion of Justice investigative report.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/article220097825.html
November 29, 2018: Michael Cohen pleads guilty. (source)
November 29, 2018: Massive raid at Deutsche Bank. (source)
November 29, 2018: FBI raids offices of Trump's former tax attorney, Chicago Alderman Ed Burke. (source)
December 4, 2018: Epstein trial set to begin. It is settled at the last minute, avoiding testimony from witnesses. (source)
December 13, 2018: FBI allegedly raids Chicago Alderman and former Trump tax attorney Ed Burke's office a second time (FBI neither confirms nor denies whether raid took place) (source).
December 22, 2018: Government shuts down. (source)
January 8, 2019: it's learned that Manafort passed polling data to Kilimnik in the summer of 2016. (source)
January 11, 2019: it's learned/reported that the FBI had opened a counter intelligence investigation into Trump in May of 2017. (source)
January 23, 2019: Michael Cohen postpones testimony before Congress, saying it's because Trump has been threatening him. (source)
January 25, 2019: Roger Stone arrested and indicted. (source) (source)
February 21, 2019: Judge rules that federal prosecutors (including Trump labor secretary Alex Acosta) broke the law in Epstein case. (source)
February 27, 2019: Michael Cohen testifies before Congress that Trump had directed him to threaten people as many as 500 times when he worked for him. (source) He also testifies that Felix Sater's office had been located on the 26th floor of Trump Tower - the same floor as Trump's office - and, in the location that would eventually become Cohen's office. (source)
And let's not forget the acid in Steve Bannon's bathroom:
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/bannons-vacated-florida-home-had-a-bathroom-destroyed-by-acid-washington-post-report-985356
Or how Michael Cohen threatened this reporter:
https://twitter.com/cherijacobus/status/974831949285031936?lang=en
Or the threats Stormy Daniels received:
https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/25/politics/stormy-daniels-threat-60-minutes/index.html
A short history of Donald Trump's threats:
https://www.propublica.org/article/a-short-history-of-threats-received-by-donald-trumps-opponents
_______________________________________________________________________________________
List is not all inclusive, out of the growing list, this one particularly wasn't there. One of the most profitable of dirty dealings working with criminal cartels and the Russian Mafia. As usual many of Traitor trump's "partners" in organized crime were indicted and sent to prison.
NARCO-A-LAGO: MONEY LAUNDERING AT THE TRUMP OCEAN CLUB PANAMA
https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/corruption-and-money-laundering/narco-a-lago-panama/#chapter-0/section-0
In the early 2000s, a series of bankruptcies meant Donald J. Trump was shunned by most lenders. Struggling for credit, he started selling his name to high-end real estate projects. This report examines in detail the criminal connections that propelled one such project – the Trump Ocean Club International Hotel and Tower in Panama – and how this case bears some of the same disturbing hallmarks as other Trump developments....................................................
..............................................................Colombian cartels’ narcotics trafficking were laundered through the Trump Ocean Club and that Donald Trump was one of the beneficiaries.
One key player in the laundering of drug money at the Trump Ocean Club was notorious fraudster David Eduardo Helmut Murcia Guzmán, whom a U.S. court subsequently sentenced to nine years for laundering millions of dollars' worth of illicit funds, including narcotics proceeds, through companies and real estate.
Another was Murcia Guzmán’s business associate, Alexandre Henrique Ventura Nogueira, who brokered nearly a third of the 666 pre-construction unit sales at the Trump Ocean Club and claims to have sold 350-400 units overall. Ventura Nogueira’s sales brokerage was critical to ensuring the project’s lift-off and Trump’s ability to earn tens of millions of dollars.....................................................................
.....................................................A large number of those involved with the Trump Ocean Club in its early phase were Russian and Eastern European citizens or diaspora members. In an interview with NBC and Reuters, Ventura Nogueira said that 50 percent of his buyers were Russian, and that some had “questionable backgrounds.” He added that he found out later that some were part of the Russian Mafia.
Since the Russian government’s alleged interference in the 2016 election, a lot has been made of Trump’s heavy reliance on funds from Russia for his licensing deals. Trump relying on funds from Russia is not in itself a problem – some of these funds are no doubt from legitimate sources. What is deeply problematic, however, is the fact that some of this money appears to have come from criminal networks.
Donald Trump has incessantly promoted himself as a successful and viable businessman, and this was critical to his success in the 2016 presidential election. But this report presents evidence that this façade was built, at least in part, on ventures used to launder cash generated by criminal activities. Trump’s unscrupulous business dealings and blindness to potential illegality raise serious questions about his suitability to govern the most powerful country in the world....................................................
Trump got elected by repeatedly pledging to “drain the swamp”, but in the nine months since his inauguration he has actually taken steps that could worsen corruption in the U.S. and internationally. Indeed, one of his administration’s few legislative successes to date has been to overturn the implementing regulation of a ground-breaking anti-corruption law................................................
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Depending on who gets control for the decision to have an assessment done and if done, I would agree that this would be the result.
https://twitter.com/OurShallowState/status/1788687083680268420
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Stormy Daniels Trolls Trump With ‘Real Men’ Jibe After His Lawyers’ Complaints
SHOTS FIRED
The porn star was apparently unimpressed with the former president’s team’s efforts to amend his gag order.
Dan Ladden-Hall News Correspondent
Published May 10, 2024 6:28AM EDT
Stormy Daniels took a swipe at Donald Trump after his lawyers attempted to amend a gag order imposed during his hush-money trial in order to allow him to publicly respond to her testimony.
Mike Blake/Reuters
Stormy Daniels couldn’t resist taking another swipe at Donald Trump after her bombshell testimony in his hush-money trial after his defense team sought a change in his gag order to allow him to speak publicly about the porn star.
After Judge Juan Merchan on Thursday rejected the request to amend the order—which was imposed to prevent Trump from intimidating witnesses, jurors, and others connected to the trial—Daniels offered up some free, unsolicited advice about how Trump could respond to what she’d said in court. “Real men respond to testimony by being sworn in and taking the stand in court,” she wrote in a post on X. “Oh... wait. Nevermind.”
Donald Trump’s hush-money trial resumes Friday with more testimony from Madeleine Westerhout.
Trump has denied 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to hide payments to his former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen, which prosecutors claim were reimbursements for a $130,000 payment Cohen made to Daniels to buy her silence about an alleged affair.
After Daniels testified—sometimes in graphic detail—in the trial this week, Trump’s legal team unsuccessfully asked for a mistrial, arguing that parts of what she’d told jurors was not relevant to the charges in the case. Todd Blanche, a lawyer for Trump, also asked for the gag order to be reined in so that Trump could talk publicly about Daniels now that her testimony is over.
“As we’ve said repeatedly, he needs an opportunity to respond to the American people,” Blanche said. Merchan denied the request, saying he was concerned with “protecting the integrity of the proceedings” and said the gag order was imposed to stop “very real, very threatening attacks on potential witnesses.” “The reason why the gag order is in place to begin with is precisely because of the nature of these attacks, the vitriol,” he said.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/stormy-daniels-trolls-trump-with-real-men-jibe-after-his-lawyers-complaints?ref=home?ref=home
AG Nessel Charges Attorney Stefanie Lambert and Former Adams Township Clerk Scott for 2020 Election Voter Data Breach
https://www.michigan.gov/ag/news/press-releases/2024/05/08/ag-nessel-charges-attorney-stefanie-lambert-and-former-adams-township-clerk-scott
May 08, 2024
LANSING – Today, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced charges against former Adams Township Clerk Stephanie Scott, 52, and her private attorney Stefanie Lynn Junttila, 42, also known as Stefanie Lambert, for allegedly permitting an unauthorized computer examiner access to voter data, including non-public voter information, concerning the 2020 General Election.
The Department contends that Scott intentionally disregarded numerous instructions from the Director of Elections, acting on behalf of the Secretary of State, to present the Adams Township voting tabulator to an authorized vendor for maintenance and testing and withheld the tabulator until it was seized by Michigan State Police pursuant to a search warrant. The Department also alleges Lambert illicitly transmitted data from the Adams Township Electronic Poll Book concerning the 2020 General Election under the direction of Scott.
“Ensuring election security and integrity stands as the cornerstone of our democracy,” Nessel said. “When elected officials and their proxies use their positions to promote baseless conspiracies, show blatant disregard for voter privacy, and break the law in the process, it undermines the very essence of the democratic process. Those who engage in such reckless conduct must be held accountable for their actions.”
Scott is charged with:
One count of Using a Computer to Commit a Crime, a seven-year felony;
One count of Computers - Unauthorized Access, a five-year felony;
One count of Conspiracy to Commit the Offense of Computers -Unauthorized Access, a five-year felony;
One count of Misconduct in Office, a five-year felony;
One count of Concealing or Withholding a Voting Machine, a five-year felony; and
One count of Disobeying a Lawful Instruction or Order of the Secretary of State as Chief Election Officer, a 90-day misdemeanor.
Lambert is charged with:
One count of Using a Computer to Commit a Crime, a seven-year felony;
One count of Computers - Unauthorized Access, a five-year felony; and
One count of Conspiracy to Commit the Offense of Computers -Unauthorized Access, a five-year felony.
The Michigan State Police referred this matter to the Department of Attorney General, following its investigation into possible election law violations by the former Adams Township Clerk.
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‘The stakes could not be higher’: world is on edge of climate abyss, UN warns
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/09/world-is-on-verge-of-climate-abyss-un-warns
Trump promised to scrap climate laws if US oil bosses donated $1bn – report
Trump promised to 20 executives at Mar-a-Lago dinner to increase oil drilling and reverse pollution rules among other pitches
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/09/trump-oil-ceo-donation
"The fact we can't simulate these step-change increases and understand why it's happening is terrifying." -- Prof. Hayley Fowler
— Prof. Eliot Jacobson (@EliotJacobson) May 9, 2024
"The impact of warming the ocean could lead to new classes of heatwaves we've never seen before." -- Prof. Valerio Lucarinihttps://t.co/rgPzGm2A1S pic.twitter.com/I3xjPXouoO
"I went to dinner and didn't get dinner." Stephanie Clifford (AKA Stormy D)
What is it about life
That makes it
Different
One old guy only talks a lot of empty talk, the other old guy just quietly walks the walk.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AMTMNO
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-04-05/world-economy-latest-the-data-behind-biden-trump-factory-job-pitches
“[Trump] came here with your senator, Ron Johnson, literally holding a golden shovel. ... They dug a hole with those golden shovels, and then they fell into it.”
— The Recount (@therecount) May 8, 2024
— President Biden, touting a new Microsoft AI facility in Racine, Wisconsin, hits Trump for Foxconn investment pic.twitter.com/Ib1yz30BBb
CNBC: Biden is visiting Wisconsin today to announce plans to invest $3.3 billion in a high-tech datacenter. The facility in Racine County will be built on the same land where Trump had once planned with Foxconn to construct a $10 billion factory, that he once called the ‘8th… pic.twitter.com/eRTPTET7Ax
— Kamala HQ (@KamalaHQ) May 8, 2024
Stephanie Clifford is testifying now...getting interesting for derTrumpfh
How The Right Wing Media Killed Its Own Audience To Own The Libs
The right wing or Republican media has long been engulfed in scandals. Fox “News” fired chairman Roger Ailes and top rated entertainer Bill O’Reilly after they paid out $40 million in settlements for sexual harassment. Fox paid a whopping $787 settlement to settle a lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems after Fox falsely claimed that Dominion stole the 2020 election. Rush Limbaugh nearly lost his show in 2012 after he said he wanted to watch imaginary sex tapes of a graduate student who spoke out against GOP opposition to birth control.
The biggest right wing media scandal of all time was when they waged a campaign against the Covid-19 vaccine in 2021–22. For over a year, Fox’s highest rated entertainers waged a nightly sabotage campaign against the vaccination effort. In addition, Clay Travis and Buck Sexton waged a sabotage campaign on AM right wing talk radio. These are the entertainers who succeeded Rush Limbaugh.
The reason for the sabotage campaign was that the GOP wanted to prolong the pandemic in the hopes that it would hurt Joe Biden and the Democrats. The GOP opposed both mask and vaccine mandates. Trump refused to wear a mask because it would mess up his bizarre make up. And an integral part of the disinformation campaign was waged by the right wing media’s most popular entertainers. This campaign killed their own audience and possibly cost the GOP the 2022 elections.
What made Fox’s sabotage campaign especially outrageous was that 90% of Fox’s staff was vaccinated. The right wing network had a vaccine mandate for its employees. The entertainers who disparaged the vaccine rollout never mentioned it on their shows. In addition, Tucker Carlson refused to answer questions as to whether was vaccinated for Covid-19.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/5/6/2239188/-How-The-Right-Wing-Media-Killed-Its-Own-Audience-To-Own-The-Libs
Fox also sabotaged Biden’s vaccine rollout for ratings and profit. A Fox insider speaking anonymously said that the anti-vax commentary is “great for ratings,” and that’s what matters to the network’s owners and shareholders. All that mattered to them was that their elderly and vulnerable audience tuned in. Apparently, it didn’t matter to Fox if their audience died.
CNN — July 20, 2021:
“There’s no dispute that Fox News has been delivering to its audience, of which almost 60% is in the high-risk over-65 age group, dangerously misleading information about the Covid vaccine and its rollout by the Biden administration. A report released Friday by the liberal media watchdog group Media Matters documents that the majority of vaccine-related segments that Fox News aired over the past two weeks “repeatedly fearmongered about and downplayed the need for continued vaccination campaigns.
Carlson emerged as perhaps the nation’s foremost coronavirus vaccine skeptic, using his massive platform to argue that the vaccines are less effective and more dangerous than advertised and that his viewers should be deeply concerned about the campaign to get the public to take them.
Ingraham’s primetime show delves into many of the same themes and she is particularly focused on suggesting that the vaccines are useless by mocking prominent people who were infected despite being vaccinated.
Specifically, Media Matters found the between June 28 through July 11, “Fox News aired 129 segments about coronavirus vaccines. Of those, 57% included claims that either undermined or downplayed immunization efforts.
Even worse, Media Matters notes, “Thirty-seven percent of segments included claims suggesting that vaccines are unnecessary or dangerous.” Just one example cited was Fox News host Laura Ingraham, who on her show last week touted “natural immunity” over the Covid vaccine.”
Media Matters — March 7, 2023 :
“Clay Travis is a prolific purveyor of coronavirus misinformation. He has downplayed the severity of COVID-19, insisted effective precautions such as masks do nothing, and fearmongered about and denied the efficacy of vaccines.
Notably, Travis supported the baseless anti-vaccine conspiracy theory that there is an increase in cardiovascular complications in athletes tied to the COVID-19 vaccine.”
The right wing media’s campaign to sabotage the Covid-19 vaccine rollout was deadly effective. According to the Kaiser Foundation, 92% of Democrats were vaccinated, 68% of Independents, and 56% of Republicans.
As a consequence of the GOP’s sabotage campaign, a disproportionate number of Republican voters were killed by Covid-19.
The states with the highest COVID death rates in 2021:
1. Oklahoma
2. Alabama
3. W. Virginia
4. Arizona
5. Kentucky
6. Mississippi
7. Wyoming
8. Florida
9. Georgia
10. S. Carolina
Source: Johns Hopkins; U.S. Census; CDC
Trump carried 8 out of 10 of these states. None of them are blue states.
National Public Radio conducted a study and issued its findings on May 19, 2022:
“NPR examined COVID deaths per 100,000 people in roughly 3,000 counties across the U.S. from May 2021, the point at which most Americans could find a vaccine if they wanted one. Those living in counties that voted 60% or higher for Trump in November 2020 had 2.26 times the death rate of those that went by the same margin for Biden.
The scale of the preventable loss of life is staggering. According to a recent analysis by Brown University, nearly 320,000 lives nationwide could have been saved if more people had chosen to get vaccinated. The Brown analysis also shows a partisan split in how those preventable deaths are distributed. States that went most heavily for Trump — including Wyoming and West Virginia — have among the highest rates of preventable deaths, while states that voted heavily for Biden — such as Massachusetts and Vermont — had among the lowest. “
According to a 2023 Yale University study:
“Researchers from Yale University who studied the pandemic’s effects on those two states say that from the pandemic’s start in March 2020 through December 2021, excess mortality was significantly higher for Republican voters than Democratic voters after COVID-19 vaccines were available to all adults, but not before.”
Politico on December 8, 2022:
“Republicans accounted for about 80 percent more of the excess deaths than Democrats. Part of this is because of vaccine hesitancy; part of it is because of the age profile of voters.
Now there is evidence that the demographic change spurred by Republicans’ and Democrats’ divergent responses to the pandemic likely cost Republicans a number of key seats in the 2022 midterms. And the fallout, fueled by cross-country migration and even the Covid death toll, could linger into 2024 and beyond.”
Somebody made Donald Trump aware of the fact that his followers weren’t getting vaccinated and that it may cost him future elections. At an Alabama rally on August 22, 2021, Trump urged his followers to get vaccinated. He was loudly booed and quickly backtracked on that advice at the rally. Trump never talked about it again.
Another aspect of this scandal that is never mentioned is that elected Republican officials quietly stood by and took no actions to prevent the right wing media from killing their supporters. That is yet another indicator that Fox and the right wing entertainers on AM radio run the GOP. That is why the GOP is so extreme. As former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum said: “Republicans originally thought Fox worked for us. Then we discovered that we work for Fox.”
Do you want the GOP in charge again? It is no coincidence that the last two Republican presidents led the United States into disaster. This is the direct result of the GOP’s bankrupt governing philosophy that rejects science, expertise and government itself. The Republicans like to tell us that government doesn’t work and then they wreck government in order to prove it.
Trump and the GOP are overrated by the pundits and the polls. Republicans are celebrating polls. Democrats are celebrating victories.
‘Greedflation’ Statistics & Trends 2024
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/credit-cards/greedflation-statistics-2024/
John Egan
Personal Finance Expert
Doug Whiteman
Fact Checked
....
Corporate Profit Trends
Corporations initially launched small price increases to deal with rising demand during the pandemic, supply squeezes, and higher food and energy costs linked to the Russia-Ukraine war. But many companies later cranked up the increases, making numerous consumer products and services more expensive.
Corporate profits began to rise rapidly in the middle of the second quarter of 2020 before reaching a peak in the second quarter of 2022, and then continuing to trend upward through the end of 2023.
Brands That Have Raised Prices
As corporate earnings reports have rolled out in recent years, many brands have been accused of contributing to greedflation and engaging in corporate profiteering.
Accountable.US, which describes itself as a nonpartisan watchdog group, analyzed earnings data for the 10 largest retailers by market capitalization in April 2022 and found that not only did they raise consumer prices, but they collectively reported $24.6 billion in higher profits during their most recent fiscal years[11]. The following brands were cited for excessive net profit increases:
Amazon
Saw its net income increase by more than $12 billion in 2021, to over $33 billion
CEO pay ratio—comparing the chief executive’s pay to that of the company’s typical worker—increased from 58-to-1 to 6,474-to-1
Walmart
Saw net income increase by $163 million in the company’s 2022 fiscal year to over $13.6 billion
Shareholder payouts grew by $7.2 billion, to nearly $16 billion in 2022
Planned to spend at least $10 billion on stock buybacks in fiscal 2023
Home Depot
Reported a 27% increase in annual net earnings
Boosted stock buybacks by $14 billion and spent nearly $7 billion on shareholder dividends
Planned to increase quarterly dividends by 15%
Costco
Posted record-breaking $5 billion in net income
Boosted shareholder payouts by more than $4.5 billion to over $6.2 billion
Continues to see spikes in profits after earning $1.2 billion in net income in the second quarter of fiscal 2022, up $348 million from the previous year
Lowe’s
Saw 2021 net income jump 44% to $8.4 billion while spending $15.1 billion on shareholder payouts, including stock buybacks that were $1.1 billion higher than expected due to better-than-anticipated financial performance
CVS Health
Posted more than $7.8 billion in 2021 net income
Authorized a $10 billion buyback program and spent $2.6 billion on shareholder dividends
Target
Saw net earnings rise 59% in 2021
Used profits to boost buybacks by 887% while spending $1.5 billion on shareholder dividends
Other evidence of potential greedflation:
During one three-month period in 2022, Nestle hiked prices 9.5% and Procter & Gamble raised them 9%[12]. The companies represent two of the world’s largest consumer brands.
Coca-Cola bumped up prices by 11% in 2022, and Kraft Heinz notched a more than 15% price hike[13].
As Tyson Foods reported surging profits in May 2022, its CEO told reporters the company was “asking customers to pay for inflation.”.........................................
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
ICYMI: “Greedflation” Added to Dictionary.com
https://groundworkcollaborative.org/news/icymi-greedflation-added-to-dictionary-com/
Groundwork exposed “greedflation” as a key driver of higher prices beginning in 2021; Corporate greedflation continues to keep costs artificially high according to new Groundwork report
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Judge finds Trump in contempt for violating gag order again
Judge: Trump's violations are a 'direct attack on the rule of law'
The judge in the hush money trial says he will have to consider jail time in the future
https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/trump-hush-money-trial-05-06-24/index.html
More on inflation;
Half of recent US inflation due to high corporate profits, report finds
Thinktank report says ‘resounding evidence’ shows companies continue to keep prices high even as their inflationary costs drop
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/jan/19/us-inflation-caused-by-corporate-profits
A new report claims “resounding evidence” shows that high corporate profits are a main driver of ongoing inflation, and companies continue to keep prices high even as their inflationary costs drop.
The report, compiled by the progressive Groundwork Collaborative thinktank, found corporate profits accounted for about 53% of inflation during last year’s second and third quarters. Profits drove just 11% of price growth in the 40 years prior to the pandemic, according to the report.
Prices for consumers rose by 3.4% over the past year, but input costs for producers increased by just 1%, according to the authors’ calculations, which were based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis and National Income and Products Accounts.
“Costs have come down substantially, and while corporations were quick to pass on their increased costs to consumers, they are surprisingly less quick to pass on their savings to consumers,” Liz Pancotti, a Groundwork strategic adviser and paper co-author, said.
Since pandemic inflation spiked in 2021, a high-stakes debate has played out about its sources. Many progressive economists pointed to corporate profits – or “greedflation” – and supply chain issues as a driver of high prices, while their more conservative counterparts singled out government stimulus cash and high wages.
The report’s authors scoured corporate earnings calls and found executives bragging to shareholders about keeping prices high and widening profit margins as input costs come down.
The findings come as the Federal Reserve has hiked interest rates to their highest point in 20 years. The report casts serious doubt on the need for further interest rate hikes, and instead calls for stronger policies to rein in “corporate profiteering”.
Prices rose in 2021 as labor costs jumped and supply chain shocks from the pandemic and the Ukraine war snarled shipping traffic and left energy supplies in question. But those issues have in many cases been fully sorted out or are easing, and the labor market has stabilized. Many commodities and services producers’ prices have actually decreased, the report notes.
Nearly 60% of the drop in key goods and services’ inputs was driven by large declines in energy costs, such as jet fuel and diesel fuel, while transportation and warehousing costs have fallen by nearly 4% since June 2022 peaks.
Still, prices remain high. Consumers are still paying about 25% more for groceries, the report notes as an example.
Corporations maintain high prices by exploiting cost shocks caused by events such as the Ukraine war and coordinating price hikes, said Isabella Weber, a University of Massachusetts Amherst economist who was not part of the paper.
The shocks create an environment in which it is safe for firms to increase prices as they expect their competitors to do the same, said Weber.
“This is a form of implicit collusion,” she said. “Firms do not even need to talk to one another to know that a cost shock is a great time to raise prices. But when costs fall, price-setting firms do not have any incentive to decrease prices.”
If no firms launch a price war, Weber added, then companies “hold the line” on prices and widen margins. She pointed to food processors as an example.
The paper zooms in on the diaper industry, of which Procter & Gamble and Kimberly-Clark control 70% of the domestic market. Diaper prices have increased by more than 30% since 2019 from, on average, $16.50 to nearly $22.
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It's not just the US: Corporate profits are keeping inflation high in Europe too
https://www.businessinsider.com/corporate-profits-keep-inflation-high-in-europe-and-america-imf-2023-7
Juliana Kaplan Jul 6, 2023, 6:00 AM MDT
The economic downturn the world has been bracing for still hasn't arrived, labor markets are still booming, and yet the economy feels bad. You can blame inflation for that one — and how much money companies are making off of you.
It's what some economists have termed "greedflation," as companies have found that customers are willing to tolerate ever-increasing prices amid pandemic-era economic conditions like supply chain issues and scarcity. In that model, companies pass along their increased costs to consumers, and then still make additional profits on top of it.
And it's not just an American issue: Higher prices in Europe are largely powered by corporate profits, according to a new working paper from the International Monetary Fund, and profits need to normalize before prices can truly drop.
IMF researchers Niels-Jakob Hansen, Frederik Toscani, and Jing Zhou find that domestic profits in Europe account for a little under 45% of inflation in the Euro Area, while higher wages — which have been pointed to as a primary driver of inflation — account for just a quarter of inflation.
"The growing literature on the role for profits is generally aligned with our finding that firms have fared relatively better than workers even in the absence of a large increase in markups," the IMF authors write.
Inflation is not solely caused by soaring profits, but the working paper finds that profits rising well above pre-pandemic trends have made their mark on European inflation. According to the IMF research, both labor costs and profits rose "significantly" above their recent averages — but profits made up a greater part of that. In particular, industries like trade, food, and travel saw their profits skyrocket, and contribute more to rising costs......................................................
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Trump's tax cuts and a vote for the same;
After Decades of Costly, Regressive, and Ineffective Tax Cuts, a New Course Is Needed
Testimony of Samantha Jacoby, Senior Tax Legal Analyst, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Before the Senate Committee on the Budget
https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-tax/after-decades-of-costly-regressive-and-ineffective-tax-cuts-a-new-course-is
MAY 17, 2023
In my testimony, I will make three main points:
-First, tax cuts enacted in the last 25 years — namely, the tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 under President Bush, most of which were made permanent in 2012, and those enacted in 2017 under President Trump — gave windfall tax cuts to households in the top 1 percent and large corporations, exacerbating income and wealth inequality. These tax cuts cost significant federal revenue, adding to the federal debt and limiting our ability to invest in policies that broaden opportunity and contribute to shared prosperity.
Extending the Trump tax cuts that expire at the end of 2025 would continue to mostly benefit the well-off and, if not paid for, would add considerably to the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges.
-Second, extending the Trump tax cuts that expire at the end of 2025 would continue to mostly benefit the well-off and, if not paid for, would add considerably to the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges. Permanently extending the cuts would benefit households in the top 1 percent more than twice as much as those in the bottom 60 percent as a share of their incomes — providing a roughly $41,000 annual tax cut for the top 1 percent compared to $500 for households in the bottom 60 percent, on average — at a cost of around $300 billion per year. This would be on top of the large benefits high-income households will continue to receive from the 2017 tax law’s permanent provisions.
-Third, instead of doubling down on the failed trickle-down path of the Bush and Trump tax cuts, policymakers should set a new course by partially reversing the 2017 law’s flawed corporate tax cut, strengthening its international tax provisions, and reconsidering the tax code’s large tax breaks for high-income and high-wealth households. Doing so would make the tax code more progressive and raise substantial revenues that could be used to address the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges and pay for important policy priorities.
This approach stands in stark contrast to the House Republican debt limit bill, which would force deep cuts in a host of national priorities; leave more people hungry, homeless, and without health coverage; and make it easier for wealthy people to cheat on their taxes.[1]
The Wealthy and Corporations Have Received Massive Tax Cuts in Recent Decades
U.S. policymakers have substantially reduced taxes for wealthy households in recent decades. The 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts[2] reduced individual income tax rates, taxes on capital gains and dividends, and the tax on estates, all of which provided the largest benefits to the highest-income taxpayers. Though policymakers let many of the Bush tax cuts for high-income households expire in 2013, the 2017 Trump tax cuts again lowered individual income tax rates (including the top rate) and weakened the estate tax, so that it applied only to the wealthiest estates: those worth more than $11 million per person or $22 million per couple, indexed for inflation. The 2017 law also created a large new tax deduction on “pass-through” business income (business income from partnerships, S corporations, and sole proprietorships) and enacted large and permanent tax cuts for corporations.
Taken together, these tax cuts disproportionately flowed to households at the top and cost significant federal revenues, adding trillions to the national debt since their enactment.[3] By shrinking revenues, these tax cuts limit policymakers’ ability and willingness to make public investments that pay off in tangible and important ways for individuals, families, communities, and the country as a whole..........................
....................
Trump Tax Cuts Created New Costly Tax Advantages for the Wealthy
Like the Bush tax cuts, the tax cuts enacted in 2017 under President Trump benefited high-income households far more than households with low and moderate incomes. The 2017 tax law will boost the after-tax incomes of households in the top 1 percent by 2.9 percent in 2025, roughly three times the 0.9 percent gain for households in the bottom 60 percent, TPC estimates.[13] The tax cuts that year will average $54,220 for the top 1 percent — and $220,310 for the top one-tenth of 1 percent. (See Figure 1.) The 2017 tax law also widens racial disparities in after-tax income.[14]
The law’s tilt to the top reflects several costly provisions that primarily benefit the most well-off:
--Large, permanent corporate tax cuts. The centerpiece of the 2017 tax law was a deep, permanent cut in the corporate tax rate — from 35 percent to 21 percent — and a shift toward a territorial tax system, which exempts certain foreign income of multinational corporations from U.S. tax. At a cost of $1.3 trillion over ten years,[15] the deep cut in the corporate tax rate was the most expensive provision of the 2017 tax law, largely benefiting the most well-off. TPC estimates that over a third of the benefits from corporate rate cuts flows to the top 1 percent of households.[16] Proponents of these regressive corporate rate cuts argued that the benefits would trickle down in the form of broadly shared economic growth.[17] But a careful new study from researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, the Federal Reserve Board, and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) finds that none of the earnings gains from the 2017 corporate rate cuts accrued to the bottom 90 percent of the income distribution, and this group received just a small fraction of the overall economic gains.[18]
--20 percent deduction for pass-through income. The law adopted a new 20 percent deduction for certain income that owners of pass-through businesses (partnerships, S corporations, and sole proprietorships) report on their individual tax returns, which previously was generally taxed at the same rates as wage and salary income. The deduction costs around $50 billion a year through 2025[19] and its benefits are highly tilted toward the wealthy; over half of its benefits will go to households with more than $1 million in income in 2024, according to JCT.[20] (See Figure 2.)
Wealthy households benefit the most from the deduction because they receive most pass-through income,[21] they get a much larger share of their income from pass-throughs than the middle class does,[22] and they receive the largest tax break per dollar of income deducted (because they are in the top income tax brackets). The deduction also creates new opportunities for high-income taxpayers to game the provision to maximize deductions.[23] Complex and valuable tax benefits like the pass-through deduction encourage taxpayers to push the boundary between lawful tax avoidance — itself engaged in by people with access to well-paid tax advisors — and unlawful evasion, and plummeting pass-through audit rates give them more leeway to do so.[24]
FIGURE 2
In addition to these and other flaws,[25] recent research from economists at the Treasury and the Federal Reserve found no evidence that the deduction provided any boost in economic activity in the two years following the deduction’s enactment — no additional investment, jobs, or higher wages for employees of pass-through businesses.[26]
Cutting individual income tax rates for those at the top. The law cut the top individual income tax rate from 39.6 percent to 37 percent for married couples with over $600,000 in taxable income. By itself, this provided a couple with $2 million in taxable income a $36,400 tax cut. The law also weakened the alternative minimum tax (AMT), which is designed to ensure that higher-income people who take large amounts of deductions and other tax breaks pay at least a minimum level of tax. The law raised both the AMT’s exemption threshold and its phaseout, delivering another tax cut to affluent households.
Doubling the estate tax exemption. The law doubled the amount that the wealthiest households can pass on tax free to their heirs, from $11 million per couple to $22 million, (indexed for inflation). The few estates large enough to remain taxable — fewer than 1 in 1,000 estates nationwide — will receive a tax cut of $4.4 million per couple.[27]
Extending the Trump Tax Cuts Would Double Down on the Law’s Flaws
Most of the 2017 law’s corporate tax provisions are permanent, but nearly all of its other changes — including changes to the individual income tax and the estate tax — are set to expire after 2025. Extending all of these provisions would be an expensive policy mistake, costing around $300 billion per year.[28]
These expiring provisions include some provisions affecting families with low and moderate incomes, but often in offsetting ways. For example, the law lowered statutory tax rates at all income levels, nearly doubled of the size of the standard deduction from $13,000 to $24,000 for a married couple in 2018, and doubled the size of the Child Tax Credit for many families.[29] Yet other provisions raised taxes on families, such as the elimination of personal exemptions and the new, permanent inflation adjustment for key tax parameters.[30] The end result of these offsetting changes is only modest tax cuts overall for most families, which pale in comparison to the law’s large net tax cuts for the wealthy.
The expiring provisions primarily benefiting affluent households — the cut in the top tax rate, the pass-through deduction, the weakened AMT, and estate tax cuts — account for a majority of the total cost of extending the law’s expiring provisions.[31] Extending the individual income tax and estate tax provisions would boost after-tax incomes for the top 1 percent more than twice as much as for the bottom 60 percent as a percentage of their incomes.[32] (See Figure 3.) In dollar terms, this is a $41,000 annual tax cut for households in the top 1 percent but only about $500 for those in the bottom 60 percent of households, on average.[33] These benefits would be on top of the very large benefits wealthy households receive from the law’s permanent corporate tax cuts.
CBO estimated in 2018 that the 2017 law would cost $1.9 trillion over ten years (not including the cost of interest payments on the debt from resulting larger deficits).[34] Making the individual tax cuts permanent would add another roughly $2.6 trillion in cost from 2024 to 2033, or $300 billion a year beginning in 2027.[35] Making other parts of the law permanent, such as the “expensing” tax break for business investments, which some policymakers have called for, would add hundreds of billions more to this cost.[36]
Steps to Creating a Better Tax System
Instead of doubling down on the flawed trickle-down path of the Bush and Trump tax cuts, there are opportunities to work toward a tax code that raises more needed revenues, is more progressive and equitable, and supports investments that make the economy work for everyone. A crucial first step is allowing the 2017 tax law’s provisions primarily benefiting high-income households to expire. Additional steps include scaling back the 2017 law’s large corporate tax cuts, ensuring that more income of very wealthy households faces annual taxation, and limiting other tax breaks primarily benefiting high-income households.
Reforming the 2017 Law’s Costly and Regressive Corporate Provisions
The 2017 law’s permanent corporate provisions are heavily tilted in favor of large corporations and their shareholders, who are disproportionately wealthy. Cutting corporate taxes costs significant revenue, and evidence is sorely lacking that the benefits have trickled down. Executives, disproportionately wealthy corporate shareholders, and highly paid employees have reaped virtually all the economic gains from the corporate rate cuts, research suggests.[37]
Reforming the corporate tax — such as by partially reversing the law’s deep rate cut to 28 percent, or halfway between the pre-2017 law 35 percent and the current 21 percent rate — would make the tax code more progressive while generating substantial revenue to fund national priorities.
The 2017 law’s international tax rules also require reforms to more effectively deter costly profit shifting and to better align with the global minimum tax agreement.[38] The 2017 law exempted certain foreign income of U.S. multinationals from U.S. tax and added several provisions, including the global intangible low tax income (GILTI) minimum tax, to try to limit incentives for foreign profit shifting. These provisions have serious design flaws, however, and leave significant room for multinationals to avoid taxes by shifting their profits to low-tax countries.[39]
In 2019, two years after the 2017 tax law was enacted, economists Ludvig Wier and Gabriel Zucman found “no discernible decline in global profit shifting or in profit shifting by U.S. multinationals.”[40] (See Figure 4.) This profit shifting costs significant revenue: globally, multinational corporations shift to tax havens about 36 cents of every dollar they make in profits, research suggests.[41]
Figure 4
Strengthening international tax rules by aligning them with the recent multilateral minimum tax agreement would increase the taxes multinationals pay to the United States. It would do so by ensuring that U.S. multinationals’ foreign profits are taxed at a rate closer to that which applies to domestic profits, and that more foreign profits are subject to the tax, which would greatly reduce the tax savings from reporting income offshore. It would also penalize foreign multinationals that operate in the U.S. if they earn profits in a country that does not impose adequate taxes. On the other hand, failing to update our rules would mean that another country could levy extra taxes on a U.S. multinational that operates within its borders — tax revenue that should be flowing to the U.S.[42]
There is little evidence that previous corporate tax cuts delivered the economic growth that proponents promised, particularly for lower- and middle-income workers. And there is no reason to believe that partially unwinding those cuts — by reducing the large cut in the corporate tax rate and restructuring international tax provisions to adhere to the global minimum tax agreement — would significantly harm the economy. Moreover, using the revenue from corporate tax increases to finance high-return public investments can boost growth. For example, compelling research finds that infants in families with lower incomes who receive more support from child-related tax benefits go on to have higher test scores, high school graduation rates, and earnings into young adulthood, all of which support a strong economy.[43]
Ensuring That More Income of Very Wealthy People Faces Annual Taxation, Reducing Special Breaks
.....................................................Critics of increasing taxes on high-income and high-wealth households often argue that doing so would stifle economic growth by reducing the return to capital investment and discouraging economic activity. Yet this belief, which has been subject to extensive research and analysis, does not fare well under scrutiny.[50]
These proposed reforms to the corporate and high-income provisions of the tax code — in addition to letting the 2017 law provisions benefiting affluent households expire as scheduled — belong at the center of future tax debates. They would generate substantial progressive revenue that the U.S. could use to fund new investments or address long-term fiscal challenges, benefiting workers, families, and businesses.
.
How Trump’s Tariffs Really Affected the U.S. Job Market
https://carnegieendowment.org/chinafinancialmarkets/83746
MICHAEL PETTIS
A recent study on U.S.-China trade concludes that Trump’s trade policies cost the U.S. economy nearly a quarter million jobs. But its obsolete understanding of trade flows ends up pointing trade policymakers in the wrong direction.
January 28, 2021
AJanuary 2021 study commissioned by the U.S.-China Business Council (USCBC) claims that former president Donald Trump’s trade policies cost the United States 245,000 jobs. As a Reuters news report put it, the USCBC claimed that “a gradual scaling back of tariffs” could help stop the bleeding, while also arguing that a failure to do so would lead to even greater job losses and more sluggish growth.
But while I have long argued that Trump’s approach to trade harmed the U.S. economy more than it helped, this is mainly because these trade policies were based on obsolete ideas about how trade works and because they ignored the fundamental sources of the U.S. trade imbalances. As Matthew Klein and I argued in Trade Wars are Class Wars, bilateral tariffs on Chinese goods do nothing to change the income distortions in China that spurred the country to run huge surpluses and export its deficient levels of domestic demand. Nor do such tariffs address the mechanisms that send these demand deficiencies to American shores. As a result, even if Trump’s tariffs were to succeed in reducing the U.S. bilateral deficit with China, they would simply cause the U.S. deficit with the rest of the world, along with China’s surplus with the rest of the world, to rise by at least as much.
Clearly, the Trump administration’s trade policies were not successful. American deficits with China and the rest of the world were higher last year than they had been in over a decade. And while it is a little unfair to consider 2020 data without recognizing the peculiar economic distortions created by the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. trade and current account deficits were much higher during Trump’s presidency than they had been under former president Barack Obama....................................................................
Lumber Affordability Hitting Homebuilders After Trump Tariff
Homebuilders' confidence waned in July as lumber prices rise in the aftermath of a Trump-implemented tariff.
https://www.usnews.com/news/economy/articles/2017-07-18/lumber-affordability-hitting-homebuilders-after-trump-tariff
By Andrew Soergel
July 18, 2017, at 4:06 p.m.
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NY TIMES OPINION gifted article: The Exit Interviews - Twelve departing lawmakers tell us what Congress is really like.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/04/30/opinion/congress-resignations.html?unlocked_article_code=1.pk0.7pXw.Wh8TTwcyPhyZ&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
Forgot to add this to my last post;
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=174360850
Oil & gas industry campaign contributions in the U.S. 2019/20, by beneficiary
Published by Statista Research Department, Aug 25, 2023
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1179621/us-oil-and-gas-industry-campaign-donations/
An Oil Price-Fixing Conspiracy Caused 27% of All Inflation Increases in 2021
The FTC just found evidence that American oil companies colluded with the Saudi government to hike gas prices, costing the average family $3,000 last year. The question is, what can we do about it?
https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/an-oil-price-fixing-conspiracy-caused
MATT STOLLER
MAY 03, 2024
I’m at the Google antitrust closing arguments, and I’ll have some thoughts on that soon. But today’s piece is about some bombshell evidence that just came out on a giant post-Covid conspiracy in the oil industry. And I do mean giant, because there’s now evidence that price-fixingp in the oil industry alone may single-handedly be responsible for a little over a quarter of the total inflationary increase in 2021.
Let’s dive in.
Last Sunday, I wrote a piece alleging that U.S. shale oil producers colluded with the Saudi government from 2021-2023 to drive up gas prices. That essay was based on some reporting I had done, as well as a complaint from a savvy Kansas City class action law firm, Sharp Law, with special expertise in oil. The theory was that American producers, after a bitter price war from 2014-2016, got tired of competing on price with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or the OPEC oil cartel, and at some point from 2017-2021, decided to join the cartel and cut supply to the market. This action had the affect of raising oil prices, costing oil consumers something on the order of $200 billion a year.
Yesterday, the Federal Trade Commission released evidence confirming that collusion played a serious role in hiking oil prices at that time. Pioneer Natural Resources CEO Scott Sheffield, a leader in the fracking field, “exchanged hundreds of text messages with OPEC representatives and officials discussing crude oil market dynamics, pricing and output.” Sheffield was explicit about his goal, saying that “if Texas leads the way, maybe we can get OPEC to cut production. Maybe Saudi and Russia will follow. That was our plan,” he said, adding: “I was using the tactics of OPEC+ to get a bigger OPEC+ done.” He talked to shareholders, publicly threatened rivals, and ultimately achieved output cuts across the industry regardless of price. “Even if oil gets to $200/barrel,” he said, “the independent producers are going to be disciplined.
By 2021, as the economy roared back from Covid, the independents had joined OPEC. “I don’t think the world can rely much on US shale,” Sheffield said. “It’s really under OPEC control.”.....................
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Trump moves ahead with selling public land to fossil-fuel industry amid coronavirus and oil price freefall
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/trump-fossil-fuel-coronavirus-oil-price-fall-us-public-lands-a9493101.html
Louise Boyle
New York
Thursday 30 April 2020 18:56 BS
................................................................Melyssa Watson, executive director of the Wilderness Society, told The Guardian: “From rolling back EPA’s pollution standards, to pushing for more oil and gas drilling and stifling the public review process, the federal government is fast-tracking rollbacks that deserve public scrutiny."
Last month, Environmental Protection Agency chief Andrew Wheeler, a former coal lobbyist, announced a rollback on the Obama administration’s emissions standards for vehicles, despite the decision meaning that millions more tonnes of CO2 will be added to the global warming crisis.
The EPA also said last month that it would suspend the enforcement of environmental regulations that punish polluters during the coronavirus outbreak and allow industries to self-monitor.
At the time, the Natural Resources Defense Council tweeted: “This is an open licence to pollute. The administration should be giving its all toward making our country healthier right now. Instead it is taking advantage of an unprecedented public health crisis to do favours for polluters that threaten public health.”
Associated Press contributed to this report
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Trump Administration’s Bad Deal for Public Lands
https://www.politico.com/news/agenda/2020/10/07/trump-public-lands-deal-426773
Opinion by JAYNI HEIN and MAX SARINSKY
10/07/2020 04:30 AM EDT
Jayni Hein is the natural resources director at the Institute for Policy Integrity at NYU School of Law.
Max Sarinsky is an attorney at the Institute for Policy Integrity at NYU School of Law
As wildfires exacerbated by climate change ravage the western United States, the Trump administration is fueling future climate disasters by continuing to hand over pristine public lands to private fossil fuel developers at breakneck pace.
That would be bad enough, but this fire sale of public lands is happening at arguably the worst possible moment for the American taxpayer: Global energy prices are at record lows, which means oil and gas developers are unwilling or unable to pay a fair price for access to these lands.
A normal approach to a decline in prices is to delay selling an asset until demand, and prices, recover. So a rational administration would look at the decline in demand for oil and gas leases and see it as an opportunity to hit pause and come up with a fiscally and environmentally smarter way to manage these lands.
Instead, the Trump administration is rushing ahead with these lease sales, locking in more harmful greenhouse gas emissions while failing to earn a decent return for American taxpayers...................................
.....................................These giveaways have become the norm for the Trump administration. In one extraordinary example, it allowed a single company to obtain over 113,000 acres of federal land — the size of over 80,000 football fields — for under $190,000, less than the median price of an American home. The Trump administration offered more acres for lease in its first two years than were offered under President Barack Obama’s entire second term. Last year, the Trump administration offered 1.6 million acres, seven times the amount offered in 2016.
By leasing so much public land and granting developers a 5- to 10-year option to drill, the administration not only deprives the public of the land’s other beneficial uses — such as conservation, recreation and renewable energy development — but also ties the hands of future administrations to enact responsible climate policies.
This recklessness is reminiscent of an era at the turn of the 20th century deemed the “Great Barbecue” for the buffet of federal mineral, grazing and forest lands offered to settlers and prospectors for paltry fees, ultimately leading to rapid and wasteful resource exploitation. Congress and regulators eventually adopted a more rational conservation policy, resulting in the establishment of agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and Interior’s Bureau of Land Management that are directed to manage public lands for public benefit.
Today’s flurry of bargain fossil-fuel lease sales could be called a second “Great Barbecue” for creating the conditions for producing the heat-trapping greenhouse gases that fuel climate change. Already, U.S. public lands would rank fifth in the world for greenhouse gas emissions if they were their own country. Continuing to produce large amounts of federal coal, oil and gas contradicts what climate science says we must do to prevent catastrophic climate damages: transition rapidly away from producing and burning fossil fuels..............................................................
____________________________________________________________________________________________
Saudis take 100% control of America's largest oil refinery
https://money.cnn.com/2017/05/01/investing/saudi-arabia-buys-largest-oil-refinery-port-arthur/index.html
by Matt Egan @MattEganCNN
May 1, 2017: 1:53 PM ET
Code: 6 | Message: The usage license for this video player has e
Saudi Arabia Now Controls the Largest Oil Refinery in North America
The move is a huge boon to Aramco before a big IPO, experts say.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/03/saudi-arabia-now-controls-the-largest-oil-refinery-in-north-america-energy-middle-east-aramco/
By Robbie Gramer, a diplomacy and national security reporter at Foreign Policy.
MAY 3, 2017, 10:01 AM
The Port Arthur refinery in Texas is North America’s largest oil refinery, and as of this week Saudi Arabia controls all of it. With the stroke of a proverbial pen, Saudi’s state-owned oil giant Aramco took on 100 percent ownership of the port, cementing its access to the lucrative U.S. energy market at a critical time.
Industry experts say this week’s deal is Aramco’s latest power play before its highly anticipated IPO next year. But it also unveils a wider Aramco strategy no other state-owned oil giant has pursued yet: buying up downstream refineries worldwide to ensure steady consumer access regardless of prices.................................
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"Pure evil': Robert De Niro unleashes on Donald Trump
no I really don't have, the lions, the wings and michigan after that nope.
You should have a second fave team to hope for ??
I do like Hockey but my wings are out of it.
seeya gdog enjoy some hockey or baseball or something
ok thxs have good night and again I'll leave you all to your thread.
I did provide you the link to the WAPO article. The rest is up to you.
So I ask you to provde the proof from your article and you assume I don't know how to look it up myself ahh ok
I would expect YOU to know how to access this stuff by yourself. Again, that WaPo link should work for you.
Funny thing is I was told I make alot of assumptions, jump to a lot of conclusions, I believe thats what most of you here do.
The Fact is I don't like Trump or Biden, I just think Trump was a better President .
you post the article I would expect you to provide the proof I mean I could change Bidens to 35k if no proof is required.
btw it says lies and misinformation.
Trump's NY pizza scam exposed in under a minute pic.twitter.com/VUiHg1ktrc
— MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch) May 3, 2024
You expected them to run all 30,000+ in an article.
Gee, if only you could read the Post article. I'm inclined to doubt you can't. The post allows everyone some free articles every month. And they provide a link to a database containing all the lies.
they say over 30 k and then show 3 lol but as I said before that makes them both liers.
It should have worked. I'm not a subscriber, and it worked for me. This will work:
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/535081-wapost-counts-30573-false-or-misleading-claims-in-four-years-by-trump/
we can't open and read so I guess we just have to believe it?
well my artical shows that BIden told the lies, it ddn't say how manytime he repeated them. I'd like to read your artical
As I said, there's no comparison.
Well I guess thier both liers then huh ?
So let's see. That article says the Federalist found that in the first two years of his presidency, Biden told 249 lies. By contrast, the Washington Post found that in all four years of Trump's presidency, he told more than 30,000 lies.
No comparison.
Republican/trump labor and wages
Florida workers brace for summer with no protections: ‘My body would tremble’
Effects of heat are expected to worsen after bill prohibiting municipalities from enacting shade and water protection is passed
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/04/florida-worker-heat-water-protection
There are 17 gop states suing the federal government over the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The act protects access to very basic things, among which are:
— Miranda (@DoomScroling) May 2, 2024
- bathroom breaks
- access to water
- being able to sit or stand as needed
- allowing for lactation
So let's be clear, in… pic.twitter.com/IYVmtbvDNT
https://rollcall.com/2024/05/01/biden-takes-aim-at-trump-era-tax-cuts-and-his-own-campaign-promise/
Biden takes aim at Trump-era tax cuts — and his own campaign promise
President misleads blue-collar workers about 2017 law
President Joe Biden leaves the Capitol on March 15. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)
President Joe Biden leaves the Capitol on March 15. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)
By David Winston
Posted May 1, 2024 at 6:02am
Two weeks ago, President Joe Biden took aim at the Republicans’ 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and its provisions that are due to expire in 2025. He told electrical union workers, “It’s going to expire, and if I’m reelected it’s going to stay expired.”
Biden didn’t just violate his pledge to not raise taxes on anyone making under $400,000; he shattered it with his boast to the union crowd.
And, according to House Ways and Means Committee Republicans, if Congress fails to extend the Trump-era tax cuts, it means an average American family of four making $75,000 will get hit with a $1,500 tax increase. “Main Street businesses will face a 43.4 percent tax rate” and “working parents will suffer from a Child Tax Credit slashed in half” along with the standard deduction every taxpayer is due.
Contrary to what Biden and his supporters would have us believe, most Americans got a tax cut thanks to the 2017 law, which Biden loves to demonize. Biden has been peddling disinformation on the 2017 tax cuts for years. When running for president in 2019, Biden said, “There’s a $2 trillion tax cut last year. Did you feel it? Did you get anything from it? Of course not. Of course not. All of it went to folks at the top and corporations.”
In a May 1, 2019, Washington Post “Fact Checker” column, Glenn Kessler called foul on then-candidate Biden’s claim. “But Biden, with his loose language, ends up in the Four-Pinocchio territory. He asserts that no Americans but those at the top received any tax cut in 2018, which is clearly false,” Kessler wrote.
An April 14, 2019, New York Times article started with this: “If you’re an American taxpayer, you probably got a tax cut last year. And there’s a good chance you don’t believe it.” It went on: “To a large degree, the gap between perception and reality on the tax cuts appears to flow from a sustained — and misleading — effort by liberal opponents of the law to brand it as a broad middle-class tax increase. … Experts are divided on whether the tax law was a good idea. But there is little disagreement on this core point: Most people got a tax cut.”
Currently, the middle class is getting hit hard by inflation. Since Biden became president, overall weekly wages have gone up 14.2 percent, while overall prices have gone up 19.4 percent. Sixty percent of the country believes inflation is getting worse, according to the “Winning the Issues” survey of 1,000 registered voters conducted April 27-29.
Despite the president’s almost historically poor marks for his handling of inflation, the Biden team and his supporters on Capitol Hill seem to be sticking to more of the same: economic and tax policies that will take even more money out of people’s pockets, with one big exception.
If the TCJA isn’t extended, the big winners won’t be the families and small businesses struggling to stay afloat in the Biden economy. No, the big winners will be the top earners in high-tax states who will benefit the most as the cap on state and local tax deduction expires. This deduction applies only to those who itemize their returns, which leaves about 90 percent of taxpayers out in the cold.
This would be a huge tax break for those upper-income earners and millionaires in states like California, New Jersey and New York with high tax burdens. Those states could then increase taxes even further knowing that 39.6 percent of those tax increases would be paid by the federal government as wealthy taxpayers take the SALT deduction when filing their federal taxes.
It boils down to this: If you are a taxpayer who doesn’t itemize and instead uses the standard deduction, you get to pick up the bill for millionaires in New York and California who get a big tax break for living in a profligate state.
Without an extension, there will also be a significant impact on businesses, especially small businesses, as more of their revenue would become taxable, making them less competitive and financially sound. Make no mistake, those additional costs would be passed on to consumers, hurting small businesses and increasing prices for customers already suffering from inflation.
Biden’s current economic policies have been unable to effectively deal with inflation, as it has remained at or above 3 percent for 10 consecutive months. In the latest consumer price index report, inflation increased from 3.2 percent in February to 3.5 percent in March, which was similar to an increase in the personal consumption expenditures index, always a focus of the Federal Reserve.
With inflation back on the rise, the Federal Reserve has hesitated on reducing interest rates, keeping the economy in a volatile state, reflected by a Bureau of Economic Analysis first-quarter gross domestic product increase of only 1.6 percent in its advance estimate. This was well below the 2.4 percent expected by economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal.
Listening to Biden on the campaign trail, he remains committed to economic policies that have produced the worst inflation in four decades. If given another four years, Biden would increase taxes just when people need more income to deal with rising prices. Biden’s problem isn’t the Trump-era tax law. It’s how to fund his massive spending plans that are driving trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see.
And about those electrical union workers who heard Biden pledge to end the TCJA? Here’s what he didn’t tell them.
The average earnings of a union electrician, according to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, is $81,404, along with an average pretax 401(k) contribution of $9,860. If that worker is married to a stay-at-home-parent with two kids and Biden keeps his promise to let the 2017 law expire, based on the Tax Foundation’s “2026 Tax Calculator,” the worker and their spouse would pay an additional $1,423 in federal taxes, a 1.9 percent reduction in take-home pay.
So much for promises.
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Try and post something intelligent. If you can't then it sucks to be you.
There are posters who still don't seem to understand the above. Posting nonsensical posts are simply thread disruptions when it comes to
the main topic of the board. However other topics of the day such as sports, weather and trivia are certainly allowed considering that we all need
a little break now and again.
At a formal cocktail party 2 things that should never be discussed are religion and politics. Consider the dress code here semi-formal. You can discuss religion (in context with the news of the day) but preaching to the choir/heathens will get you sent off. No one here is looking to be converted.
And by all means please read this post. No explanation is needed.
How Trolls Are Ruining the Internet
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=124646062
Please do not post links to boards where posters here can not respond to the referenced link. It is frustrating not to be able to refute the original post.
A 4-Step Guide to Ranting Productively
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=141041965
The 25 Words You Need to Stop Saying to Improve Your Communication Skills
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=140233496
Congratulations!
You have finally reached the end of the internet!
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=144506693
Journalists are not the enemy
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=142942649
You Have a Right to Weariness
The struggle for goodness and decency is an eternal struggle, not a seasonal one.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=144842805
All people are welcome to post here and I'll put a moratorium on banning and the inmates have been set free. I don't think banning in hindsight was the right way to go.
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