snowave
Active member
Trump is a megalomanic. I don't think he'd hesitate for a second to get into an armed conflict.
American Election 2024
- Thread starter Sbooker
- Start date
Trump is a megalomanic. I don't think he'd hesitate for a second to get into an armed conflict.
Disagree. He cut the unfavorable deal with the Taliban to get out of Afghanistan. He wants to do the same in Ukraine. His megalomania is about how great he is at making deals, even when the deals don't turn out well. These foreign policy deals are particularly attractive because it may take some time before they go bad; then he can blame the failure on his successor. He brags that there were no major wars during his first term, then Gaza + Ukraine during Biden's.
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I’ve read a lot of analysis on the dynamic between Trump and Zelenskyy and Putin but no one has mentioned this. Quite unbelievable that Trump can court an obvious foe. Is he completely blind to reality?
tseeb
Well-known member
State of the Union speech fact checking from MSNBC
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow...-check-joint-address-congress-lies-rcna194848 includes
“The problem is made worse by the apparent fact that he felt like he had to lie — likely aware of the unavoidable fact that the truth about his record and his vision simply isn't good enough to stand on its own.”
And ends with “But this doesn’t change the fact that a presidential vision built on a foundation of falsehoods will inevitably falter. It’s one of the reasons Trump’s first term was such a spectacular failure, and it’s one of the reasons his second term is on a similar trajectory.”
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow...-check-joint-address-congress-lies-rcna194848 includes
“The problem is made worse by the apparent fact that he felt like he had to lie — likely aware of the unavoidable fact that the truth about his record and his vision simply isn't good enough to stand on its own.”
And ends with “But this doesn’t change the fact that a presidential vision built on a foundation of falsehoods will inevitably falter. It’s one of the reasons Trump’s first term was such a spectacular failure, and it’s one of the reasons his second term is on a similar trajectory.”
There's a lot of luck from external events during presidencies. Trump was very lucky 2017-19, and in retrospect it seems likely he would have been reelected in 2020 if not for COVID.
Sorry, Maddow is in a bubble. Remember the "guardrails" restrained Trump from a lot of stupid $#!& during his first term. That's part of why people like jimk voted for Trump in 2024 (no response yet to my inquiry on that). It hard to see how there will not be way more chaos this time.
All along this is the aspect of Trump that offends me most personally. But I accept the reality that most of the American public doesn't give a flying f*** about foreign policy. It's all about their pocketbooks, and secondarily hot button social issues. That applies to many people on the left as well as the right. It's easy to sell the idea that American $$$ spent overseas are full of "waste, fraud and abuse."
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snowave
Active member
In regards to our previous exchange.... This is why I feel like the idea of no war/conflict is much closer than it might have been previously. This is a much different Trump than his first term.
Live updates: Trump will delay some tariffs on Mexico and Canada for a month amid economic fears
President Donald Trump said Thursday that he has postponed 25% tariffs on most goods from Mexico and some imports from Canada for a month.
apnews.com
Next month it could be Elon who.
EMSC
Well-known member
Similar to needing Greenland, someone told Trump 15+ years ago about the awesomeness of tarrifs. He has bought into that concept hook, line and sinker. This is one of the better articles I've seen. Trump very literally thinks he's going to raise huge sums of money with few affects on Americans or inflation. And manufacturing magically will also reappear in the US. So who do you tarrif? Anyone with big flows of goods to the US... it's the only way tariffs will theoretically raise those magic bucks.
www.yahoo.com
The real reason Trump is waging a global trade war
In the middle of Donald Trump’s tornado of tariff announcements, policy analysts have been clinging to a single hope.
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Excellent reference above by EMSC. I have read elsewhere that Trump has this weird fixation on the late 19th century as America’s golden age. Tariffs were the federal government’s primary revenue source there.
It is frustrating that Trump can do this tariff whiplash unilaterally. The primary appeal for trade violations is the WTO, which has little enforcement power. I thought that the 2019 USMCA treaty, negotiated in Trump’s first term and ratified by Congress, would be subject to US judicial enforcement with regard to Canada and Mexico. But there is a 1977 law allowing the president to declare a national emergency, which Trump has done with respect to the border.
The financial markets do not like the tariff whiplash. That is the only constraint I see.
It is frustrating that Trump can do this tariff whiplash unilaterally. The primary appeal for trade violations is the WTO, which has little enforcement power. I thought that the 2019 USMCA treaty, negotiated in Trump’s first term and ratified by Congress, would be subject to US judicial enforcement with regard to Canada and Mexico. But there is a 1977 law allowing the president to declare a national emergency, which Trump has done with respect to the border.
The financial markets do not like the tariff whiplash. That is the only constraint I see.
tseeb
Well-known member
You can discount opinion Maddow (who my Mom calls "that horrible woman") has of Trump's first and second term, but what do you think of her claim in the link I posted "The Washington Post published a memorable report on the number of false or misleading claims he’d made during his first term. The total was incredible: “By the end of his term,” the report explained, “Trump had accumulated 30,573 untruths during his presidency — averaging about 21 erroneous claims a day” and all the new lies he told during his State of the Union speech?
And just after the LA County fires Trump dumped "2.2 billion gallons from California reservoirs".
If this mattered to most Americans, Trump would never have been renominated in 2024, much less re-elected. Perhaps JimK can lend some insight here because I can’t.
It has been amply demonstrated that opposing Trump on the basis of his lies or about Jan. 6 doesn’t work. It would be helpful if James could unlock Nicholas Kristof’s NY Times editorial from March 8 which addresses this point.
“Chickens” refers to the price of eggs, or more broadly inflation in general and the possibility that Trump’s second term policies will screw the economy in some way.
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LINK
It would be interesting to hear Tony's opinion about anger against Musk/Tesla -- and whether giving up his current EV in favor of a different carmaker is under consideration. Maybe he's sidestepping the question by putting one of those "I bought this car before Elon lost his mind" magnets on his car.
I certainly wouldn’t buy a Tesla now. In fact I wouldn’t drive one if I was paid to do so.LINK
It would be interesting to hear Tony's opinion about anger against Musk/Tesla -- and whether giving up his current EV in favor of a different carmaker is under consideration. Maybe he's sidestepping the question by putting one of those "I bought this car before Elon lost his mind" magnets on his car.
I mentioned in the Aspen thread that I was unlikely to be in Colorado anytime soon because of the unfavourable exchange rate. No offence to you nice people on here but I will admit that the current leadership does influence my thinking when it comes to visiting as a tourist. (Which is a pity because the US and it’s people have been wonderful the 9 times I have visited since 2010).
Perhaps a coronary or an insurrection will take place at some point in the next few years……..
jasoncapecod
Well-known member
I certainly wouldn’t buy a Tesla now. In fact I wouldn’t drive one if I was paid to do so. yep, i would sooner go back to horseback.LINK
It would be interesting to hear Tony's opinion about anger against Musk/Tesla -- and whether giving up his current EV in favor of a different carmaker is under consideration. Maybe he's sidestepping the question by putting one of those "I bought this car before Elon lost his mind" magnets on his car.
berkshireskier
Active member
Yea, my wife bought herself an electric vehicle about 14 months ago and she REFUSED to even look at a Tesla, never mind buy one (and this was before Elon hooked up with Donald Trump); she was ahead of the curve here and knew he (Elon) was a very bad person, so she didn't want to contribute (in a small way) to his wealth. She ended up leasing the Hyundai Ioniq 5, which she loves (other than the fact that she had problems this Winter with the heater, as in no heat was coming out, that Hyundai was unable to fix).
berkshireskier
Active member
I live in one of the most liberal enclaves in the entire country and there are a LOT of people who drive Teslas and I have seen that bumper sticker on MANY cars in the grocery store parking lot and around town.LINK
It would be interesting to hear Tony's opinion about anger against Musk/Tesla -- and whether giving up his current EV in favor of a different carmaker is under consideration. Maybe he's sidestepping the question by putting one of those "I bought this car before Elon lost his mind" magnets on his car.
I certainly understand this standpoint. Add that to your exchange-rate woes and our country is a definite no-fly zone for you. I'm surprised that you went through with your recent visit, although you mentioned that it was triggered by a family obligation of sorts.
No. To recap history here we bought the first one in April 2016, loved the car but range and charging speed on newer Teslas improved sufficiently that we traded it in and got a new one in 2019. Buying a new car that expensive and keeping it only 3 years is not a very responsible decision financially. As with many new tech products, it's not a surprise that the 2019 was also 10% cheaper than the 2016.
Many of the 2018-19 Model S/X including ours have the rare combination of free supercharging from sales promotions and fast charging speeds for road trips. We have the Tesla on the current trip and will be taking in onwards to Colorado for another 10 days or so. All of the 2016 and prior Model S/X have free supercharging but much lower supercharging speeds that have been cut back in the interest of early model battery longevity. I did not have the patience to take the 2016 car any farther than NorCal, while as most of you know the 2019 car had an 8,000 mile round trip to Florida.
So the free supercharging is a powerful incentive to hang on to this car until it drops. I estimate it has already saved us $5,700. Tesla knows this and occasionally offers us to keep the free charging if we trade in and buy a new one. Under no other circumstances can anyone else get free supercharging on a new Tesla anymore.
Those cars have fast charging speeds although their rated range of 250 miles or so (that usually means 200 real world) is on the low side for its price range. I know berkshireskier is not much of a road tripper, so I'm sure that EV is charged at home 90+% of the time. So he's probably not having the issues I describe below.
BUT I would not buy anyone else's EV until they change the charging ports to the NACS standard to fit Tesla superchargers. Most of the the manufacturers signed deals with Tesla in the second half of 2023 to start doing this sometime in 2025. I have been too busy to monitor progress on this, but I don't think any such EVs are available for sale yet. Yes you can get adapters, but I saw a Rivian owner in September not able to get his to work.
The other fast charging networks (Electrify America, EVGo, etc.) are reliability disasters and have less comprehensive coverage areas than Tesla superchargers. Those other networks are supposed to get a lot of IRA money to build more and maintain them, but I certainly wouldn't count on that happening now.
Because of the road tripping we have high standards of what's acceptable in an EV. We would insist on the NACS charging port plus evidence that it works seamlessly at Tesla superchargers, which means that both Tesla's and the other manufacturer's software are cooperating when you plug in. Most non-Tesla public chargers require you to download an app and fiddle with it when you plug in. After 9 years of seamless, plug in and walk away experience at Tesla superchargers, I won't accept that.
One of my MD friends here at Iron Blosam has read that Elon is an avid user of ketamine, which can have significant personality warping side effects.
I was the first but there are a lot of Tesla owners among our IB group. Most people separate economic decisions from political decisions. Al Solish owns two Teslas and reinforced this point. He is Jewish but mentioned that in his younger days he had owned Fords despite Henry Ford being a notorious Nazi sympathizer in the 1930’s.
I have not heard yet of anyone planning to get rid of their Teslas. I suspect that for a few of them, a decision to buy a new one might be different than it might have been a couple of years ago. I'm glad we are not making a new car decision now. Several years down the road the EV landscape will hopefully be clarified, but right now it's not a great situation.
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berkshireskier
Active member
You're right here, Tony. Yes, although we have had the Ioniq5 for over 14 months, we have not taken one single long trip in the car, that would have necessitated finding a charging station. My wife uses it almost exclusively to commute to work (one of her office is only a 9 mile roundtrip from our house and her other office that she visits about once a week is about 45 miles roundtrip or its used for general local driving - going out to eat or the grocery store, etc. We also own an "ICE" Subaru Outback wagon that we use for longer trips. Yea, so the electric car is charged at our house about 99% of the time (we installed a level 2 charger soon after she leased the car). Supposedly, Hyundai reached an agreement with Tesla so that Hyundai owners could use Tesla chargers but we have yet to see the adapter that you need to use those proprietary chargers. I have to call the dealer to see where it is? I'm not sure of the exact range with a fully-charged battery; Hyundai claims in the 240 to 280 mile range but I think it depends on weather and driving styles. I think it is a little crazy for us to own an electric car, given what we use it for - a plug in hybrid probably would have been a better choice but my wife wanted to be environmentally responsible, so she chose the all-electric car.