Trump Thread

**spmetla** · 03-27-2025, 02:14

Vance doesn't understand the inner circle operation of Trumpism and never will. NEVER suggest that the big man may not understand something or may have got something mixed up.
Vance and the others still don't understand the basics of world trade.

They seem to absolutely loath our Allies for needing US help. The British used to have an Empire, used to control Yemen, but gave up even those up in the 60s Withdrawal East of the Suez after the US betrayal during the Suez Crisis in the late 50s. The Brits had Aden and the French, Djibouti, for exactly these reasons of securing a key choke point for trade.
Like did they not see the fallout of the Suez being blocked by a single container ship for a few weeks. It took months for the flow of containers to unclog and get the backlog in the European and American ports sorted.

All this also points to how disconnected Trump really is. He's not of this 'digital' generation, he doesn't even like to use email, I'm sure ppt briefings and working on computers bore him so he likely just gets executive summaries without any personal deep dives from people he likes. The VP is usually not in the Chain of Command of the military and is just a spare leader, that Trump isn't involved in any of this and just his handlers are involved is truly embarrassing.

As for Signal, there are reasonable circumstances in which to use it, securely, such as when dealing with quick, simple procedural updates. And who knows, by the way, how many people other than these in the Trump admins and beyond have been setting their communications to autodelete.

Yup, for routine admin, coordinating regular training, state side etc... Not for classified conversations at all.

Even during the first Trump era it was so poetic that Trump was essentially delivered to office by the manufactured moral panic (with Russian assist) over Hillary Clinton's secure and otherwise-regulated handling of a private email server for non-classified materials. Remember something as petty as how they tried to censor Trump's White House schedule and visitor lists years ago (he was occupied with TV, Twitter, golf, and general leisure), after Obama took the unusual steps of making as much info public as possible?

Part of it is a generational convenience problem. The Cold War military had people joining up and finding satcomm, radios and so on as extremely advanced and impressive. The current generation of leaders have grown up in a digital world and find the means for secure information as too slow and restrictive as it usually means secure locations, hard lines or well encrypted direct communications.

There really needs to be some sort of digital OPSEC starter course that people need to take when they go into government. For Gabbard and Hegseth, there's no excuse. They as service members (even if on IRR or MDay status) have to still do their annual cyber security awareness quizes and so on. They absolutely should know that what they posted on Signal is at least Secret if not TS.

I really wish that the Dems in their hearings would subpoena for the transcripts for this signal chat from each member involved in the chat. They need to push the issue that these meetings have no records and that is an egregious crime that is happening and will continue to happen.
Hillary should have gotten in more trouble but as the R's found out, the W. Bush admin have private email servers as well. This habit just needs to stop completely. They are issued government phones and computers and need to be held to only using those items.
The conveniences we are so used to in civilian life is destroying our national security when people cannot give it up when working in government. It's a systematic issue that makes us such easy targets for our enemies and appointed/elected officials that keep doing this need to finally be held to accountability.
Not gonna happen from this administration though

**Montmorency** · 03-31-2025, 04:23

Heh, there aren't many ways Clinton could have been through more trouble!

As I saw it, while there are good reasons for the protocols in place, all the evidence that came out proved Clinton personally handled her office's communications about as diligently as one could. And if the Russians were able to hack Republicans and Democrats left and right, then not her. Of course, many found it a little perverse to scapegoat her for a basically universal form of corner-cutting (not even corruption).

But even if one personally determined that this was all disqualifying for her as a political candidate, it was always plain to see that Trump was much worse - on discretion, on information security, on law/rule-abidingness, and on other relevant axes. It's why the media always worked so hard, successfully, to invent bizarre conspiracies about the Clintons to try to catastrophize their flaws and negate their positive qualities, whether for "balance" or as part of the "scream machine" itself.

I recall commenting late in the election season that the Hillary Clinton pneumonia story was the most noteworthy development about her all campaign. I hope the irony was plain.

In a way, this even happened with Biden in the form of his relentless age 'controversy'. The man was demonstrably not as energetic and engaged as he was in his 70s, but he was also demonstrably managing to engage with his job daily in ways that Trump literally never could in his prime (never mind that in his own old age Trump reserved all his energy for bellowing at rallies and being angry on social media, i.e. the pro wrestling projection of virility). But the mainstream media narratives only hammered the point for the one and not the other, making the point in a vacuum that one would prefer POTUS not to have those limitations, or even that gerontocracy was problematic in principle. Coverage of the age issue, somehow, totally disappeared at approximately the end of last July, though someone was still the oldest presidential nominee in history... That's working out predictably now.

Hell, look at Mitch McConnell. The guy has been barely holding it together in public for a few years now, but I doubt Trump has even 20% of the mental capacity McConnell has left.

**Montmorency** · 04-09-2025, 00:58

Senior tax officials are bracing for a sharp drop in revenue collected this spring, as an increasing number of individuals and businesses spurn filing their taxes or attempt to skip paying balances owed to the Internal Revenue Service, according to three people with knowledge of tax projections.

Treasury Department and IRS officials are predicting a decrease of more than 10 percent in tax receipts by the April 15 deadline compared with 2024, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share nonpublic data. That would amount to more than $500 billion in lost federal revenue; the IRS collected $5.1 trillion last year.

Musk is reportedly also seeking the end of tax enforcement at the Justice Department, on top of his other corrupt activities and self-dealing. The United States is in progress of the greatest class-level theft in its history as a country, basically on the scale of the Nazis looting France or Poland, but without a fight. 'And everything that's nailed down...' We may have opportunity to test the full extent of the sovereign privileges of the US dollar before long. I wonder which goes first, your military benefits or your Social Security.

Maybe after you present for the Maximum Leader's promenade this year, you and the other lucky candidates from the ReserveArmy can be transitioned to realizing the 5-Year Concepts-of-a-Plan for reshoring American sweatshops.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

Never forget that the Republicans bore all this through as a generational project, and could still stop it at any time.

Tangentially, this comment echoes my impressions for the past month on the tariff 'strategy.'

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

I literally even predicted 100% tariffs on China, though I believe Trump has personally made that threat in some speeches, so it's not a tremendous bet (still displaying far more skill and comprehension than most professional macroeconomic analysts here...).

Trump, above any other epithet, is a madman in the traditional sense, which is to say that he harbors the irrational conviction that he can and must defy the most basic facts of nature. Now that he has unlimited power within grasp, we are seeing the ramifications of that ever-present and often-communicated madness. There is really no psychological difference between this and Chairman Mao demanding that the Chinese peasantry industrialize China by their own backyard efforts, or that "man must conquer nature" and therefore every citizen must participate in the designated extermination of certain species of wildlife, albeit Trump is profoundly less rational across the board than even Mao... But I don't expect that quite as many people will die from this one tyrant's madness, not directly.

**spmetla** · 04-18-2025, 01:05

I wonder which goes first, your military benefits or your Social Security.

I'm sure social security will go first. For the military benefits, that'll be useful for them to threaten non-loyalists. If you voice disagreement then in future they could dishonorably or other than honorably discharge service members and they'd be denied any benefits no matter how many years of service they had. Similar to what he did to FBI Director McCabe.

At least it looks like Musk may go soon for annoying too many inner circle Trumpers but the damage he's done to this country will take decades to fix if we're even given that opportunity.

Never forget that the Republicans bore all this through as a generational project and could still stop it at any time.

Tangentially, this comment echoes my impressions for the past month on the tariff 'strategy.'

Ass seen with Murkowski's comments today, the traditional republicans are scared of losing their seats or scared of actual violence against them and will stay inline.

I literally even predicted 100% tariffs on China, though I believe Trump has personally made that threat in some speeches, so it's not a tremendous bet (still displaying far more skill and comprehension than most professional macroeconomic analysts here...).

Trump, above any other epithet, is a madman in the traditional sense, which is to say that he harbors the irrational conviction that he can and must defy the most basic facts of nature. Now that he has unlimited power within grasp, we are seeing the ramifications of that ever-present and often-communicated madness. There is really no psychological difference between this and Chairman Mao demanding that the Chinese peasantry industrialize China by their own backyard efforts, or that "man must conquer nature" and therefore every citizen must participate in the designated extermination of certain species of wildlife, albeit Trump is profoundly less rational across the board than even Mao... But I don't expect that quite as many people will die from this one tyrant's madness, not directly.

He is absolutely as bad as so many of us has predicated. It's certainly frustrating when hearing 'surprised' Trump voters that liked the first administration and don't like this second run of hist. As so many of us have said, the 'deep state' and 'RINOS' around Trump the first time are what kept the slightest semblance of normality going. That what they liked weren't Trump's policies but traditional Republican policies.

Trump's hold on the base of Republican voters despite working against their interest are keeping him safe from the old guard Republicans that hate Trump.

It's shocking though to see that 2/3s of Republicans are totally okay with denying non-citizens due process. They honestly can't see how being denied their time in court before deporting is so absolutely vital to protect regular citizens too.

Wonder if this is what Romans must have felt like as Augustus dismembered what remained of the Republic following his Civil War with Marc Antony. No return to 'norms' it seems

**Montmorency** · 04-18-2025, 06:02

Wonder if this is what Romans must have felt like as Augustus dismembered what remained of the Republic following his Civil War with Marc Antony. No return to 'norms' it seems

Augustus?? Well, this is only a fitting capstone for this website:
https://www.attalus.org/cicero/verres25_3.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Verres

The man of whom I speak, Gavius of Consa, was one of those Roman citizens whom Verres threw into prison. Somehow or other he escaped from the Stone Quarries, and made his way to Messana... To this Verres replied that he had discovered that Gavius had been sent to Sicily as a spy by the leaders of the fugitive army, a charge which was brought by no informer, for which there was no evidence, and which nobody saw any reason to believe. He then ordered the man to be flogged severely all over his body. There in the open marketplace of Messana a Roman citizen, gentlemen, was beaten with rods ; and all the while, amid the crack of the falling blows, no groan was heard from the unhappy man, no words came from his lips in his agony except “I am a Roman citizen.” By thus proclaiming his citizenship he had been hoping to avert all those blows and shield his body from torture ; yet not only did he fail to secure escape from those cruel rods, but when he persisted in his entreaties and his appeals to his citizen rights, a cross was made ready – yes, a cross, for that hapless and broken sufferer, who had never seen such an accursed thing till then.

Does freedom, that precious thing, mean nothing? nor the proud privileges of a citizen of Rome? nor the Porcian law, the Sempronian laws? nor the tribunes’ power, whose loss our people felt so deeply till now at last it has been restored to them ? Have all these things come in the end to mean so little that in a Roman province, in a town whose people have special privileges, a Roman citizen could be bound and flogged in the market-place by a man who owed his rods and axes to the favour of the Roman people ?

I mean, Trump's career-long combination of eliminating the rights of non-citizens while arrogating the authority to negate the citizenship of citizens is not exactly subtle.

The fact that the manner of thing quoted in Cicero has always been going on in the depths of American jails and prisons for all time should help explain, and facilitate our predicament...

**spmetla** · 04-18-2025, 08:04

I only referenced Augustus as he ended any hopes of the restoration of the Republic. Trump is more a Nero for sure.

I hadn't read about Gaius Verres. It is extremely similar. However, in our present the criminal Trump as succeeded in the delays and waiting for friendly courts.

I'll have to read Cicero's piece there at a later time, bookmarked for reading, thank you for sharing!

**Montmorency** · 04-20-2025, 23:59

Elon Musk's team have openly spent 3 months illegally seizing access to computer and data systems throughout the government, granting themselves unlimited administrative access to the deepest layers of network and software while attempting to conceal their specific activities. This alone constitutes the worst hostile data breach of the US government ever.

The situation is even worse than was previously known, as is the typical cycle.