Debt Rattle April 10 2025

Good morning :-))

‘My long Covid turned out to be terminal cancer

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cde2ln71dwyo

TVASSF

Bonus story ….

Chai-yan, elder daughter of ex-Hong Kong leader CY Leung, dies at 33

“… very suddenly.”

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/society/article/3305750/chai-yan-elder-daughter-ex-hong-kong-leader-cy-leung-dies-33

“Both President Trump and White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt have stated that the Department Of Government Efficiency has made a massive discovery, with Trump calling it “horrible.”

My timing is good this week. You mean MORE than 7 infinity-money printers run by unwatched, unaccountable unnamed warmongers? Worse?

There is a real “worse” though: Bonds going UP. They DID talk about this, in the future, and yes, but now? Already? Uh-oh. I’m not even sure a harder drop will finally get it going because of the timing. It’s just going UP as the markets go DOWN. …It is still only 4% though. That’s not the end, but 3% would be 25% off $36T

Krainer finally figures out what’s going on in Yemen:

TL;DR and this is both tenuous and complicated, So we all know Yemen is doing this. We all know pissing them off is WORSE. We know that what we’re doing will only annoy them: like we CAN get an army and actually hit them but it takes time and money. We haven’t got a chance, and everyone’s shaking their heads, both at the act, and the explanation, WHILE there’s a war crime.

…But did you know that Yemen was NOT attacking Europe? They were ONLY attacking Israel. So there were ships getting through, non-Israeli, to Europe. Fine. AND THEN DUM DUM GOES AND SHOOTS AT THEM SO THEY SHUT IT OFF. And us, btw, they’re out sinking our ships too.

Not only that: it’s so dumb that we had a full war game just a few years ago, saying exactly this! Wow, such.

So okay, when Cheeto shoots at Yemen who did he hit? Uhhhh…Europe. Europe says Yemen is after them, and Trump says he was doing it on Europe’s behalf, but that’s not true is it? There’s only ONE actor hurt by this, though it costs a few bucks: EUROPE. Now all freight is going around Africa, hitting them.

What was in the Vance leak? EUROPE. He said “Why are we helping EUROPE?”
Now if you’re not a moron, suppose you’re the Houthis: You see this going on. Maybe your enemy really is Israel alone. What are you doing? Killing EUROPE. Why? Because they are the reason Israel can exist. Broke, collapsed Europe = broke, collapsed Israel. And you only need to shoot a few missiles.

Speaking of, we’re going to go attack Iran! BombBombBomb! Uhhh…not if we can’t defend our own Navy we’re not. What? Yes, if ALL our anti-air missiles in the theatre are used up shooting at waterballoons, we can’t attack Iran, can we? Boy Israel is going to be super-disappointed when we explain that to them, but too bad/ so sad: it’s TRUE. Those missiles don’t grow on trees, whaddya want from us, steam the Navy to San Diego and have nothing at all? Boy we totally WANTED, we intended, we planned the whole thing out, but shucks, Nutsy, it just didn’t come off this time. Because we were defending YOUR trade routes! YOU told us to! Don’t blame me!

So that’s why we can (barely) hit Yemen. We’re not TRYING to hit Yemen …obviously. And in the world war, SOMEBODY is going to get shot – grow up – and here it’s like less than ten Yemenis killed to take out Europe of 500M people. …Or should be put on red coats and do a bayonet charge on Calais? Yemen may understand this – they certainly don’t seem upset. They seem sporting to the game, like Slap-Contests. It’s fun! Their people dgaf, they’re happy to stick it up ours for pure joy like any Redneck, god bless them.

So does this all start to make sense again?

The outcome IS the plan. If there is an outcome—and nobody’s mad, nothing changed – then that was the outcome they WANTED, obviously. They’re not stupid. I don’t know what the NAVY thinks of this, but if you get orders to just harass them but don’t mess them up much, that’s what you do. That’s POLITICS, not war, and that’s your job.

“Treasury Secretary Bessent just revealed that President Trump laid a trap and China fell into it.”

Maybe. What I’m seeing all over is everyone is just knee-jerk, about everything. With the dumbest assumptions. Like, “Trump selfish whaaaah, bad”, “Trump Zion Axis puppet-powers” or whatever your personal hobby-horse is. IS IT? Stop beginning with your assumptions, you learn nothing that way. Krainer says that almost as his opening remarks: WHAT IF this is NOT chaos – like chaos we’ve been writing about doing for well-understood reasons for forty years – but if there is a REASON? Then you sift what’s actually happening and see if it makes sense.

Sure, Trump MIGHT have goaded China into a bad position, but really, I think this is just State-of-Play. China is very wise and avoided a hundred of these. Remember when Congress eventually ORDERED China to break the peg and re-value (raise) their currency? Yeah, they did that bc they couldn’t trick them into it, and bc that would ruin them. There have been 100 since then. But reality is: China has demographic problems. Although played well, there are still a few years left that they’re locked into being an exporter and not doing that will hurt them bad. At the same time, their ruthless protectionism and non-stop theft was ALWAYS meant to hollow out and murder the U.S. Why not? Who wouldn’t? As Trump said, that’s not their fault, our traitors here sold it to them. That’s why H.W. went over there. …Or we collapse and we all die. So too bad.

So while China is still stuck in this window, the U.S. escaped a little early, before we were completely dead. Mostly. Dead. So we can leverage this. We may not “Win”. We may not even be trying to hurt China. That’s all irrelevant. We’re trying to save US.

Alexander, Duran, etc is an example, went on at great length about the tariffs, punitive actions, etc. He’s missing the point. IT’S NOT PUNITIVE. IT’S NOT MEANT TO MAKE MONEY. That is, What is the real GOAL? You get to have ONE parameter with ONE goal, or they interfere. Our One Goal is WE WILL ALL DIE IF WE DON’T STOP THE BLEEDING. Budget, currency, etc all collapse, US$ may even stop, so worldwide trade seizes, world war inevitably starts, nuclear exchange, the end.

Alexander, even being three steps ahead of “Trump Dum” crowd, still misses this. We’re not trying to WIN anything – couldn’t care less. We have to STOP BLEEDING hundred billion, a trillion in trade deficits. And to Canada, China, IDGAF, to anyone. So if China STOPS trade with retaliatory tariffs, don’t care! Great! Solves the same problem, different way. Do whatever you need to do boys. We do what WE need to do.

So we’re at state-of-game-play, and sure Trump may WANT something, may EXPECT some move, may even be prompting China to take the right pawn, but ultimately doesn’t matter. That’s for amateurs. If you’re Kasperov, you actually don’t care WHICH pawn they take as you’ll respond to any of them just fine.

This is what midwit reporters can’t grasp, having never worked or negotiated a thing in their lives. This is also the weakness of Evil Minions in Europe who have to use “The PLAN” and if the Plan doesn’t actually happen (J6), they just carry on and pretend that move happened, ackshully, the pawn I told you to take you picked achkshully, as reality and “The Plan” diverge mile by mile, year after year, like “More sanctions” “Russia’s going to break up from within.”

Americans aren’t like that. We have a lot of problems, but simply, directly telling you you’re a moron and all your plans suck isn’t one of them. We will do whatever is PRACTICAL. …Once we wrest ourselves out of intellectual midwits, experts, Europeans, and Atlanticists, of which there are so many.

Oh, Elon did the “69” Minutes? Ha!

““I have worked closely with Elon for over 20 years. His heart is pure, and his sole mission is to help humanity.”

That’s my take. …And that’s why he’s terrifying. People who think they know better and “help” are the worst of all life forms. ….Aaaaaaaand am I wrong in that? To “Help” he funds and defended cars that drive around American cities looking for emergency responder equipment to run into, burning all ecologists alive.

“This administration aims to give all banks the chance to succeed and get capital to Americans who need it most.”

This will happen or the plan will fail. Same with subsidies, although I’m against them. I have to tolerate them, put a date on them or something, because we’re not in a pure system now, what’s the difference? We’re MOVING in the right direction.

“Victor Davis Hanson: Elon Musk is a Renaissance man, a Da Vinci of our age—and Democrats hate that.”

You’re overselling this: he’s a programmer who handles money and is a competent manager. But yes, the Left hates success, because HATE. Their most hated objects are successful black, asian, minorities. They’re not obeying “The Narrative” they made up in their minds. …Roughly, they disprove Socialism, their religion. So if anything gets better, they hate it on sight. Because the “Good Thing™” can’t be good unless it was “Good” in a Socialist way.

You would think this is a joke and I’m kidding but I’m not. I can’t think of a religious parallel to it, but remember the 70s or 80s maharishis’ who had a vow of poverty so bought a Rolls just to piss people off, make them THINK about money? And let the whole commune drive it to get groceries? Like that. THAT reaction is what we’re talking about. “Oh my pearls, how DARE they give a Rolls Royce to the whole community as a lark?” Offensive. “It is not done” by “The Good People.” It’s a CAR. Money EXISTS. What you’re fighting is shadows in your mind.

““I’m proud to be the President for the workers, not the outsourcers; the President who stands up for Main Street, not Wall Street; who protects the middle class, not the political class; and who defends America, not trade cheaters all over the globe.”

Note WALL STREET IS BEHIND HIM. They are behind this “Main Street” plan, which is driving the Left – and now apparently everyone? — insane. It’s not insane, it’s OBVIOUS. First, They planned out their “Black Monday” got it all arranged in the media, “The Narrative”. Boom, hit it. Wall Street stopped them cold and laughed. Not today, Satan! Then OBVIOUSLY, if Main Street dies, America dies, so Wall Street dies. They are aligned on this now. So to make loans, they need to make them to MAIN STREET. So they need Main to be strong enough to give them business and profits and everybody wins.

That’s called “Capitalism”, and where the “Profit” they hate so much is just another word for “Prosperity”. Where the workers are EMPLOYED in meaningful labor with meaningful lives. Making meaningful PROFITS of their own, called “wages” where they then do the Evilly-evil of “Consuming”. That is, buying cool stuff they want and need, and “not dying” n’ stuff.

Again, IF TRUMP CAN STAND UP AND SAY THIS, then Wall st and most oligarchs, middle business owners are with him. There are just a few Globalists, Euro-moles still left fighting.

“• Trump “Pauses” Reciprocal Tariffs For 90 Days On Every Nation -Except China (ZH)

Well, yes. Like everything, the Left is making this sound insane. WE ARE NOW NEGOTIATING with those +70 nations. What would be stupid, cruel, and insane, is to not pause the tariffs while negotiating. So that’s what they want instead? They don’t know whether to s—t or go blind as we say here. –What a weird American aphorism.

Again, look, this is NORMAL. If we had just ONE nation out of line, we said, Laos, we’re doing this, Laos said “Okay we’re flying over to talk on Friday” it would be OBVIOUS that the polite and diplomatic thing to do is stop until you talk. But when we add more than one Laos, logic reverses somehow?

“People don’t like change. They’ll only admit change is needed when it’s too late.”

Yeah, we know. That’s why we were deficit for decades – no problem! Hollowed out every industry, ended every job – no problem! Killed every worker, lost every election – no problem! Nation racking up a Trillion a month, reaching hyperinflation – no problem! But you make ONE move to fix it, what we all knew a whole lifetime was wrong and “Everybody loses their minds!”

The problem with being a politician is exactly this, and everybody knows it. “We want you to fix everything.” Okay! “But not by changing anything.” Errrr, I have the feeling I’m in the wrong job, then. That’s why they can only work in CRISIS, and at this point, with childish, immature voters, now MAKE a collapse. Like 1994 health care/ACA, they NEED a collapse, CAUSE a collapse, by thoroughly ruining the system. Only then will the people cryout for worldwide gay race communism, I mean Nationalized Health Care.

Here, for a change — and it’s ALWAYS the Republicans — we’re trying to, in fact need to, fix something BEFORE it collapses, which was only in six months before the collapse timer went off and the nuclear device detonated. Why them? Because if you tell them to eat their vegetables and clean their room, you’re the bad guy. Only Republicans can tolerate that.

But try to convince anyone of that. So he’s the bad guy. DGAF. It’s his last term anyway.

““I do business in China. They don’t play by the rules,” he added. “They’ve been in the WTO for decades, they have never abided by any of the rules they agreed to when they came in.”

This is completely true, of course. But 1) Just like we did when we were a young nation, and 2) WE (but meaning Globalists) did this TO them. We asked them, encouraged them, demanded them to do this, to lower prices, destroy the United States, liquidate it, and hand it to International Billionaires. Some of which WERE American, but some not.

Example: Sam Walton. He was “Made in America”, and his body wasn’t cold before Glass and the board sold out all America for Chinesium. How’s that working for you now, boys? No wages in the U.S., and today, nothing to sell? Maybe Sam was right and that’s why popular and built a company you can barely inherit?

“• China Vows to “Fight to the End” in Economic War with America (CTH)

They do have a problem that they need an off ramp “To save face” in China. They probably have one, but that’s not this part of negotiation. First you meet.

“In short: 4 (more) years of Biden admin. That’s what it would take.
• What Would It Take to Destroy the United States? (Victor Davis Hanson)

Well, yes, but we’d still fight them. Until the Constitution and all Enlightenment values are forgotten. Maybe a collapse would have been better, who knows? It’s what so many expected or were planning for. I think not if it can be helped.

““After all… all global tragedies began with aggressive actions by Europeans: The Napoleonic Wars, World War I, and World War II..”

Example, I think it’s in Krainer, that “Europe still can’t accept that they’ve lost to Russia.” Which is true, I think. But what’s unbelievable in that, un-real, is that EUROPE ALWAYS LOSES TO RUSSIA. Russia, always, always, always, always wins. …And they still can’t believe it, like it’s the first time. What. The Actual. F—? YOU HAVE NEVER WON, boys. You were never CLOSE to winning, and certainly not this time. Are you Drain Bramaged or something? WTF is your Major Malfunction?

You lost because you always lose. Nothing else has ever happened. It’s the whitest swan in all human history.

…And they were going to make US fight it. Uhhhh, no.

• Kiev Targeting Russian Gas Supplies To Southern Europe – Moscow (RT)

Boy that’ll help! Makin’ friends, amirite? Or “Nazis gonna Nazi!” Knock knock. Who’s there? Orange. Orange Who? Orange you glad you armed the Nazis? Gave them half a TRILLION dollars so they could blow up your pipelines? Brilliant!

“American policymakers are too arrogant to acknowledge that they have “lost a war with Russia” over Ukraine, US journalist Tucker Carlson has said.”

Wellllll…. Yes as with Taibbi commenting on the NY Times article admitting all that. But it’s EXPERTS, “Policymakers”, NeoCons, and retards. …But I repeat myself. Americans are happy to not be in a war, and to admit whatever is happening IN the war. Like “They didn’t greet us with flowers.”

Tax credit:

“They are Humans” indeed. It’s extremely hard to turn the dial regardless of what -ism you use. Nevertheless we have found some at least LIMIT bad behavior, even as that behavior cannot be fulled stopped. At this point in history, we know what most of them are: review, limit, balance of powers, free debate, free choice, etc. But again, that only LIMITS the problem – of “Sinful man” as we used to say, it cannot stop it so long as there is any “sin” in our hearts, within. And this is why Conservatives don’t aspire to, don’t want to live in a Perfect world, just a pretty okay one.

“the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart” — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

But the full quote may be better:

“In the intoxication of youthful successes I had felt myself to be infallible, and I was therefore cruel. In the surfeit of power I was a murderer and an oppressor. In my most evil moments I was convinced that I was doing good, and I was well supplied with systematic arguments. And it was only when I lay there rotting on prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good. Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart – and through all human hearts. This line shifts.

Inside us it oscillates with the years. And even within the hearts overwhelmed with evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains…an un-uprooted small corner of evil.” — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

JB new job must suck – and no doubt – he’s cranky lately. Not having space for long reflective thoughts.

“Supply and Demand”

A simple explanation of “Tariffs War”, “Trade War”, “Complexity”, “Lies and Secrets”, Hate and Fear”, “War and Peace”, “Winners and Losers”, “Competitions”.
———

Trump cited calls made by “more than 75 countries” to the Departments of Commerce, Treasury, and the Office of the United States Trade Representative.
According to the president, these nations expressed willingness to discuss trade barriers, tariffs, currency manipulation, and non-monetary tariffs.
Trump also pointed out that, unlike China, “these Countries have not, at my strong suggestion, retaliated in any way, shape, or form against the United States.”
——–

• Trump Tariff Shock Sends Oil To Four-Year Low (RT)

Russia’s central bank warned that the collapse in oil prices and the expanding trade conflict could harm its economy.
“If the escalation of the tariff wars continues, this usually leads to a decline in global trade and the global economy, and possibly, demand for our energy resources,” central bank head Elvira Nabiullina said on Tuesday.
Russia’s Urals crude also dropped sharply, briefly nearing the $50-per-barrel mark for the first time in almost two years, before recovering to around $67.
———
Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas) told reporters that the president is “making good on a campaign promise to shake things up, to reorder the world system whether it’s trade or whether it’s alliances or military organizations.”
Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.) told reporters that the tariffs finally put China on notice.
“If China needs our market more than we need their market, because they already put unfair tariffs and regulations and restrictions on us, they’re going to suffer way more from this than we are in a trade war,” he said. “If the rest of the world’s going to come to the table, why shouldn’t China too?” he added.

———-
Trump’s announcement triggered a historic rally on US stock markets.
The S&P 500 closed up 9.5 percent – its biggest gain since 2008.
The Dow Jones rose 7.9 percent, marking its best day since 2020,
while the Nasdaq soared 12 percent, its largest single-day increase in 24 years.
While Wednesday’s surge added over $5 trillion in market value, US markets have yet to fully recover losses sustained since the president launched the tariff war last week.
Still, Trump insisted his “reciprocal” trade actions marked a turning point.
———–
• China Vows to “Fight to the End” in Economic War with America (CTH)

Full dragon, no panda mask.
Beijing begins using war terminology to discuss the trade conflict with the United States. Through a series of cumulative trade tariffs, President Trump has now placed Chinese imports into the USA in a position of 104% tariffs.
104%! In response Beijing has devalued their currency and dumped treasuries, but no amount of subsidy, devaluation or use of their sovereign wealth fund is going to compensate for 104% taxes on Chinese products.
Very soon all purchase orders from the USA for Chinese manufactured products will stop. The Beijing dragon is looking at the future through a zero-sum position.
Now, they vow to fight to the death.
———
• To Team Trump, Tariffs Are a National Security Issue (Saunders)

“Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on “Face the Nation” Sunday:
“We don’t make medicine in this country anymore.
We don’t make ships,” he said.
“We don’t have enough steel and aluminum to fight a battle, right?”
————–
• US ‘Just Lost A War With Russia’ – Tucker Carlson (RT)

American policymakers are too arrogant to acknowledge that they have “lost a war with Russia” over Ukraine, US journalist Tucker Carlson has said.
Russian officials perceive the Ukraine conflict as a NATO proxy war – a notion that some Western politicians, including US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, have openly agreed with.
In an interview with Alex Jones published on Wednesday, Carlson accused those perpetuating the hostilities of ignoring that Russia has emerged victorious.
”We just lost a war with Russia,” the former Fox News host declared.
“The US was running that war – the US military, the Pentagon, State Department, CIA – running the war against Russia.
It was not… was never about Ukraine.”
———–

Is it a falling knife or a falling sledgehammer?

The job certainly is taking up a lot more than 40 hours a week.

I’m trying to do something in particular. There’s a bloc of people trapped in a mental cul-de-sac and, as many examples show, they will not mentally engage.

And this is a question that has been pondered for years now – how do you help someone who is possessed by an evil ideology/religion? Actually, forget something that big, how do you get them to have a discussion?

If all ports are closed except the visceral, then the only way to send requests to open up ports is to hit those ports. Thus the inclusion of de-pantsing the inherent immorality, ridiculousness, shame, embarrassment, inherent. Does ANY ping get a real response? If it does, then can a request be sent to open up a higher-level port? Does ANYTHING shock or shame or embarrass enough to engage mental gears?

Explaining cause and effect regarding Israel/Yemen/Gaza at least had an effect yesterday. Leftists (Leftists are Socialists…) did the following:

–adopted the most reprehensible modifications to a reprehensible belief system in response to failure
–did as pledged, captured the institutions
–used this to run around ruining everything they touched
–“Educated” the rest of us on their whackadoodle esoteric thoughts (the average Comic Boo Reader, Star Wars fan, and Video Gamer has a pretty good grasp on it now!)
–right on schedule, the moment they captured the institutions, committed genocide again
–scared the absolute shit out of everyone else
–by their actions and their insanity, made an alliance with Israel totally, completely worth it: Win the election, enough power to fix things domestically in exchange for support for Israel.

So, so many other options, choices. But since the 90’s it has been this, one long crescendo, single-note

Sorry, but all the things Socialists did LED to this. You made yourself enemy number 1, threat number 1, all while being worse than useless when you COULD have re-thought things back when the Berlin Wall fell and come up with something COOL.

You don’t like outcomes? Well, LOOK at yourselves, Socialists.

That got QUITE a reaction yesterday. Consequences are oppression. Personal responsibility is oppression. Had to work really, REALLY hard re-writing, re-framing. So at least there’s a nerve there that can be touched.

How could Socialists imagine there could NOT be unintended consequences from their rather massive actions? How could they possibly think their actions could be sacrosanct, free from analysis? And yet this seems to be the case. Cannot or will not see the most obvious billiard-ball connections leading to today.

Getting gaslit for years “nothing is happening and you don’t have the mental capacity to recognize if something was happening” only to see the Globalists rip off masks and fully adopd DEI (globalist=internationalist), which everyone knows is gay-race communism, to find that hundreds of billions, perhaps trillions, were being spent on gay-race communism propaganda… no simple “oh I was 100% wrong about that” no “sorry for gaslighting you” just… on to the next gaslighting.

I am waiting to see a socialist have a fucking heart. And in the meantime, running tests, learning.

The current technique has probably run its course. I’m willing to admit there’s nobody home on that port.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/johnson-says-house-gop-have-votes-pass-budget-resolution

Johnson Says House GOP “Have The Votes” To Pass Budget Resolution Today
Negotiations had continued into Wednesday night, as Johnson and the White House struggled to convince GOP holdouts who wanted deeper spending cuts. The lower chamber was set to vote Wednesday evening on the budget resolution but punted after several House conservatives resisted increasing pressure from Mr. Trump to accept the blueprint that would open the door to implementing his border security, defense, energy priorities and extending expiring tax cuts. ​

“I’m happy to tell you that this morning, I believe we have the votes to finally adopt the budget resolution so we can move forward on President Trump’s very important agenda for the American people,” Johnson told reporters Thursday morning on Capitol Hill. ​

Watching Team USA vs Team China is like watching a couple of hormone soaked hot-rod-driving teenagers in a game of chicken. Don’t expect a good outcome, just call the First Responders (and don’t forget the Coroner’s Office.)

what?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

“Elon Musk is a Renaissance man, a Da Vinci of our age”

da vinci, as far as i know, didn’t murder babies.

oh, my, cancer is the new autism.

I’ve enjoyed reading Dr.D’s posts and I am sorry to see him damaging his credibility on the tariff issue. My advice would be for him to stick to covering events with his welcome sense of humour and steer clear of the tariffs.

Threatening to destroying another’s economy is negotiating? I don’t think so. Trump is no deal maker. He’s a bully who always gets his way then pretends he negotiated a deal.

What I really don’t understand is how Americans confuse a giant Victim Complex for 4D chess…unless all Americans share the same Victim Complex. “Those dirty foreigners are always out to rip us off! They hate us because we’re the greatest country ever!”

Sorry to introduce reality but America makes nothing but consumes more than anyone else. That’s not sustainable. Yes Trump can bully numerous Vichy governments into selling their country out to benefit America, however that doesn’t change the problem which is that the USA has lost to China, even though it was a game with American rules. Kicking over the table because you lost doesn’t make you less of a loser.

Yesterday we saw Trump cave in because he feared panic was setting in. It wasn’t negotiating. Give Trump credit, he is good at pretending defeat is a victory. He understands Americans love winners and hate losers.

He isn’t out of the woods by a long shot. Why? Trump said it himself: he’ll decide what to do in the future based on instinct. That’s not negotiating. That’s not 4D chess. That’s not a coherent plan with a rational objective. That is the whim of a Great Dictator.

Funny way to attract investors back to America. We’ve got no rule of law, now give us your millions!

The weak point in the argument about how Socialists are the root of all evil is that evil was invented a LONG time before socialism. Maybe there’s something about Socialism that evil people find attractive? Or maybe there’s something about evil people that makes Socialism attractive to them. I dunno about either of those two possibilities but there’s one thing I know for damn sure. If you make the word and practice of Socialism unattractive enough the evil people will just give their brand of evil a new name and keep right on doing it.

I suggest that you point out what makes “Socialism” evil and discourage people from doing whatever that is. Going after a label is a waste of time and energy. Like Nazi’s for example. Does anyone around here think that there are fewer folks around who think JUST LIKE the old WW2 vintage stone-cold-killer Nazi’s used to behave? Or has the club just changed brand names?

Looks like Kash Patel stepped on someone’s toes (by showing interest in the wrong skeleton-filled closet). Notice the brazen lack of transparency surrounding his removal from ATF. It would have been so EASY PREASY to make him look like a genius hero who had found top talent to fill his shoes. Instead he was publicly spanked and made to look like a guy who got sacked.

Sends a message, don’t it?

America is being run by a much lower class of thug than it used to be.

Kash Patel was over-extended at FBI and ATF, and was not showing up at ATF.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/kash-patel-reportedly-removed-as-acting-atf-director-after-ghosting-gig/

What I find interesting about Kash Patel’s “Job Placement Disorder” is that he has somehow managed to keep the FBI job after being very publicly Bitch Slapped out of ATF. Watch carefully how well behaved he’s going to be from now on. Not that there ever was any real chance of FBI becoming anything other than the “Federal Blackmail Institute & Evidence Cleanup & Destruction Crew” that it has been from day one under Hoover.

Still waiting on the P Diddy, Epstein and PizzaGate debacles to produce something better than lurid headlines in the grocery checkout isle tabloids at the local Piggly Wiggly.

Trump is trying to prevent / stop / slow the Loss of the US Empire.

He ran (2nd term) as a PEACE Prez. (Well they all do, really, I recall Bush Junior winning because he got the Muslim vote in the US, and then…) Money wasted on stupid International sorties is one easy aim-at point, as is the ‘immigant’ and DEI etc. issue, stuff. But all that is minor as compared to the US debt.

Anyways, to come to the main point, Trump believes that by manipulating or controlling the score-card of money (basically who pays what to whom, why, via what means, under what rules, coerced by what, etc.) and the copey – smokey of narrative can serve to ‘win’, ‘to get a beautiful deal’, and so on, thus re-invigoratin’ US domination – MAGA in real, concrete, terms.

All of which is a flimsy overlay of where the ‘real power’ – in terms of values, resistance, resilience, arms, patience, trickery, production / commodity / land / etc. assets, and more resides. It won’t work.

Here is what Britanica has to say about Monsieur Emile Durkheim:
“Durkheim was born into a Jewish family of very modest means, and it was taken for granted that he would become a rabbi, like his father. The death of his father before Durkheim was 20, however, burdened him with heavy responsibilities. As early as his late teens Durkheim became convinced that effort and even sorrow are more conducive to the spiritual progress of the individual than pleasure or joy. He became a gravely disciplined young man.

As an excellent student at the Lycée Louis le Grand, Durkheim was a strong candidate to enter the renowned and highly competitive École Normale Supérieure in Paris. While taking his board examination at the Institut Jauffret in the Latin Quarter, he met another gifted young man from the provinces, Jean Jaurès, later to lead the French Socialist Party and at that time interested, like Durkheim, in philosophy and in the moral and social reform of his country. Jaurès won entrance to the École Normale in 1878; one year later Durkheim did the same.

Durkheim’s religious faith had vanished by then, and his thought had become altogether secular but with a strong bent toward moral reform. Like a number of French philosophers during the Third Republic, Durkheim looked to science and in particular to social science and to profound educational reform as the means to avoid the perils of social disconnectedness, or “anomie,” as he was to call that condition in which norms for conduct were either absent, weak, or conflicting.

He enjoyed the intellectual atmosphere of the École Normale—the discussion of metaphysical and political issues pursued with eagerness and animated by the utopian dreams of young men destined to be among the leaders of their country. Durkheim was respected by his peers and teachers, but he was impatient with the excessive stress on elegant rhetoric and surface polish then prevalent in French higher education. His teachers of philosophy struck him as too fond of generalities and too worshipful of the past.

Fretting at the conventionality of formal examinations, Durkheim passed the last competitive examination in 1882 but without the brilliance that his friends had predicted for him. He then accepted a series of provincial assignments as a teacher of philosophy at the state secondary schools of Sens, Saint-Quentin, and Troyes between 1882 and 1887. In 1885–86 he took a year’s leave of absence to pursue research in Germany, where he was impressed by Wilhelm Wundt, a pioneering experimental psychologist. In 1887 he was appointed lecturer at the University of Bordeaux, where he subsequently became a professor and taught social philosophy until 1902. He then moved to the University of Paris, where he wrote some of his most important works and influenced a generation of scholars.”

That sez it all, or at least enough for me. In brief, Durheim was one of the guys we have to thank for all the wonderfulness of modern society.

@DB-Smith

You may be too easily influenced by “expert” opinion. Who’s to say how accurate is Britanica’s summary of Durkheim’s life, motivations, and contribution to the world? After reading The Daily Prophet, I immediately signed up with the Death Eaters to fight against Dumbledore, Harry Potter, and all his hair-brained, mudblood friends.

If you want to understand Durkheim, read Durkheim. The same goes for any revolutionary (non-approved) source of ideas. Go right to the source. Otherwise, you become just another victim of state-sponsored media, or jealous critics with an axe to grind. Both are skilled at tossing red herrings to throw you off the trail of knowledge and ideas that are dangerous to the status quo.

I’m not saying Durkheim is the Holy Grail, only that his ideas were revolutionary to the newly formed discipline of sociology, as well as my own ideas about what is “good” or “bad” for society.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/04/zero-based-regulatory-budgeting-to-unleash-american-energy/
ZERO-BASED REGULATORY BUDGETING TO UNLEASH AMERICAN ENERGY
Executive Orders
April 9, 2025
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered:

Section 1. Purpose. In our country, laws are supposed to provide the certainty and order necessary to foster liberty and innovation. Instead, our vast regulatory structure often serves to constrict ordered liberty, not promote it. The United States Code itself is more than 60,000 pages. But unelected agency officials write most of the complex, legally binding rules on top of that, often stretching these statutory provisions beyond what the Congress enacted.

In particular, the previous administration added more pages to the Federal Register than any other in history, with the result that the Code of Federal Regulations now approaches a staggering 200,000 pages. These regulations linger in such volume that serious reexamination seldom occurs.
This regime of governance-by-regulator has imposed particularly severe costs on energy production, where innovation is critical. The net result is an energy landscape perpetually trapped in the 1970s. By rescinding outdated regulations that serve as a drag on progress, we can stimulate innovation and deliver prosperity to everyday Americans.

This order directs certain agencies to incorporate a sunset provision into their regulations governing energy production to the extent permitted by law, thus compelling those agencies to reexamine their regulations periodically to ensure that those rules serve the public good.

Sec. 2. Definitions. For the purposes of this order:
(a) “Conditional Sunset Date” means the date a regulation will cease to be effective and be removed from the Code of Federal Regulations, if the agency does not extend the Sunset Date pursuant to section 4(d) of this order.
(b) “Covered Agency” means one of the agencies listed in section 3(a) of this order.
(c) “Covered Regulation” means a regulation issued in whole or in part pursuant to a statutory authority listed in sections 3(b)-(j) of this order.
(d) “DOGE Team Lead” means the leader of the DOGE Team at each agency as described in Executive Order 14158.
(e) “Regulation” means each part, subpart, or individual provision of the Code of Federal Regulations promulgated under an agency rule as defined in 5 U.S.C. 551(4).

Sec. 3. Covered Agencies and Regulations. (a) This order applies to the following agencies and their subcomponents: the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); the Department of Energy (DoE); the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC); and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). It further applies to the following agency subcomponents: the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), all within the Department of the Interior; and the United States Army Corps of Engineers (ACE), within the United States Army.
(b) For the DoE, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Atomic Energy Act of 1954;
(ii) the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act of 1987;
(iii) the Energy Policy Act of 1992;
(iv) the Energy Policy Act of 2005; and
(v) the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007.
(c) For FERC, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Federal Power Act of 1935;
(ii) the Natural Gas Act of 1938; and
(iii) the Powerplant and Industrial Fuel Use Act of 1978.
(d) For the NRC, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Atomic Energy Act of 1954;
(ii) the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974; and
(iii) the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982.
(e) For the OSMRE, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 and any amendments thereto.
(f) For the BLM, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Mining Act of 1872;
(ii) the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976; and
(iii) the Energy Policy Act of 2005.
(g) For the BOEM, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Outer Continental Shelf Act of 1953; and
(ii) the Energy Policy Act of 2005.
(h) For the BSEE, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the Outer Continental Shelf Act of 1953 and any amendments thereto.
(i) For the FWS, this order applies to all regulations issued pursuant to the following statutes and any amendments thereto:
(i) the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act;
(ii) the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918;
(iii) the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act of 1934;
(iv) the Anadromous Fish Conservation Act of 1965;
(v) the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972;
(vi) the Endangered Species Act of 1973;
(vii) the Magnuson–Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976; and
(viii) the Coastal Barrier Resources Act of 1982.
(j) For the EPA and ACE, within 30 days of the date of this order, the Administrator of the EPA and Secretary of the Army shall provide to the President, through the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB Director), a list of statutes vesting EPA and ACE with regulatory authority that shall be subject to this order.

Sec. 4. Zero-Based Regulating. (a) To the extent consistent with applicable law, each of the Covered Agencies shall issue a sunset rule, effective not later than September 30, 2025, that inserts a Conditional Sunset Date into each of their Covered Regulations.
(b) The sunset rule shall provide that each Covered Regulation in effect on the date of this order shall have a Conditional Sunset Date of 1 year after the effective date of the sunset rule, subject to the process set forth in subsection (d) of this section. Unless the extension condition specified in subsection (d) of this section is satisfied, agencies will treat Covered Regulations as ceasing to be effective on that date for all purposes. An agency shall not take any action to enforce such an ineffective regulation and, to the maximum extent permitted by law, shall remove it from the Code of Federal Regulations.
(c) In any new Covered Regulation, to the maximum extent consistent with law, the relevant Covered Agency shall include a Conditional Sunset Date that is not more than 5 years in the future. Amendments to any Covered Regulation shall provide that they do not reset that regulation’s Conditional Sunset Date and shall be subject to the same Conditional Sunset Date as the amended regulation. The OMB Director may exempt a new regulation or amendment from the requirements of this paragraph if he determines that the new regulation or amendment has a net deregulatory effect.
(d) The sunset provision added to existing and new Covered Regulations shall provide that the agency will offer the public an opportunity to comment on the costs and benefits of each regulation, such as through a request for information, prior to a rule’s expiration, and following such opportunity the Conditional Sunset Date for that Covered Regulation may be extended if the agency finds an extension is warranted. A request for information shall not automatically extend the Conditional Sunset Date. A Covered Agency may extend the Conditional Sunset Date for a particular Covered Regulation as many times as is appropriate, but never to a date more than 5 years in the future.

Sec. 5. Implementation. (a) Neither a determination to extend the Conditional Sunset Date of a particular regulation, nor a regulation that expires as a result this order, shall count towards the ten-for-one regulatory requirement in Executive Order 14192 of January 31, 2025 (Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation).
(b) Agency heads shall coordinate with their DOGE Team Leads and the Office of Management and Budget to implement this order.
(c) This order shall not apply to regulatory permitting regimes authorized by statute.

Sec. 6. Severability. If any provision of this order, or the application of any provision to any agency, person or circumstance, is held to be invalid, the remainder of this order and the application of its provisions to any other agencies, persons or circumstances shall not be affected thereby.

Sec. 7. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or
(ii) the functions of the OMB Director relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

THE WHITE HOUSE,
April 9, 2025.