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That's pretty impressive. All you need now is a next level 3-D printer.

It will be interesting to see how this 60 Minutes interview goes down with Trump.

That's the conventional wisdom but if true, it's a very hollow victory for some insecure individual.

It's a very strange state of mind for most of us to try and grasp. I'm sure no one here would qualify as a deal originator either. What is the point of having more money than you can spend in a lifetime? The sad thing is that many, and probably most, of the seriously wealthy amass their fortunes by manipulating rather than contributing. Unfortunately for them they end up dying like the rest of us, so ultimately what's the point?

I think you have to leave yourself out of the count, Spacey. It's the number of `gaps' between you and the others.

Almost achieved six degrees of separation there, Spacey.

I wouldn’t trust Clive with Australia’s bank accounts.

Only for things that are within the outer bounds of his responsibilities as president. Insider trading might be a hard one to argue but apart from the.Democrats getting upset, nothing will happen.

What are the chances the Justice Department or SEC will investigate this? Not good.

That prediction wasn't in any Simpson's episode. It has been debunked.

Trump often complains that America is not respected any more. Respect is normally understood to be a feeling of admiration or regard for somebody or something. Trump has said he wants other countries to respect the US again, but what he means by respect is special attention or consideration. It's the kind of 'respect' a Mafia boss wants that is based on relative power and fear of consequences. There's nothing very noble it.

This is a thoughtful article. It's from the Washington Post so probably behind a paywall, so posting the text here: Eduardo Porter Trump’s economic vision was discredited decades ago in Latin America It’s bizarre to see the United States acting like a “Third World country” of yore. April 9, 2025 at 8:00 a.m. EDTToday at 8:00 a.m. EDT Searching for a rationale to President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs is a fool’s errand. The arguments offered to justify his attack on global trade — to boost factory jobs, raise money, provide leverage and cut deals with other countries — don’t just lack sense, they contradict each other. His tariffs will impoverish the world and push other countries into the arms of America’s strategic rival: China. They will not change the behavior of penguins. But let’s not kid ourselves: Trump’s trade tantrum fits the zeitgeist. It might be insane. It might be inspired by the ideations of a fictional character. But his revulsion against the process of globalization that shaped the world economy over the past half-century is shared across the electorate. Democrats might be less wantonly destructive, but President Joe Biden was just as eager to replace the “neoliberal” economic order with something more protectionist and inward-looking. As I read Trump complain in his executive order about an era that “led to the hollowing out of our manufacturing base; resulted in a lack of incentive to increase advanced domestic manufacturing capacity; undermined critical supply chains; and rendered our defense-industrial base dependent on foreign adversaries,” I could easily imagine Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan nodding along. From my perspective — the one of someone who grew up in what was once called the “Third World,” who came of age in the early years of what came to be known as the “lost decade” — this is super weird. From where I sit, the United States looks like the most affluent and powerful nation on Earth; the big winner of capitalism’s expansion around the globe. Moreover, the United States built this system. It set the rules and erected the institutions that shaped the postwar economic order. It was, after all, the U.S. Treasury that pushed the core ideas that shaped the era of globalization. Indeed, the canonical proposition that development required embracing markets, trimming the role of the state in the economy, opening to international trade and financial flows, and imposing macroeconomic discipline, came to be known as the “Washington Consensus.” So it’s bizarre to see the United States acting like a “Third World country” of yore, rummaging among mid-20th century Marxist structuralist theories, looking for an alternative economic model that might allow it to overcome underdevelopment. Over the past couple of administrations, the United States has embraced the combination of state-led industrial policy and protectionism that flourished in Latin America up until the 1970s. Appealing though Raúl Prebisch’s dependency theory might seem — tempting though it could appear for the government to nurture and protect a domestic industrial base to replace imported goods in order restore a bygone golden age of manufacturing — I’m here to tell you, America, it will end badly. Assuming that the world avoids a massive trade war and that the gargantuan tariffs announced over the past few days don’t tank the global economy, import substitution in a market enclosed behind high tariff walls will not turn the United States into a competitive, vibrant manufacturing hub. It will most likely lead to economic isolation. Latin America had a decent excuse to embrace an “import substitution” strategy in the 1930s and 1940s — when the Great Depression and World War II cut its access to the manufactures it used to buy from the industrial world. Sluggish commodity exports and poor terms of trade underpinned Prebisch’s thesis — that development required evolving beyond providing raw materials for export and building an industrial base. And the strategy seemed to work well at first, producing fast economic growth and a growing manufacturing sector. But the project ultimately failed, bequeathing Latin America with economies that produced low-quality stuff for domestic consumption, unable to compete on world markets — and so it remained dependent on exports of raw materials. The model bred clientelism and corruption, as businesses sought government protection. It squelched competition and stymied innovation. By the late 1970s, Latin America’s industrial footprint was retreating. Burdened by debts incurred to finance imports of capital goods and other manufactures, most countries in the region fell into default and entered a decade of stagnation. To be sure, the United States today has a much richer, more innovative and productive economy than 1970s Mexico or Brazil. And there are a few historical examples of import substitution strategies that worked. Taiwan and South Korea patiently nurtured high-tech industries behind protectionist walls and are now among the wealthiest economies in the world. Still, there is nothing in the historical precedent to justify what America is doing to itself. Trump’s full out attack not only against trade, but against immigration, higher education, scientific research and the like, will decimate the institutions and processes that made the United States into the world’s dominant economy. Not to repeat myself, but the United States was winning under the open markets system that it advocated before falling for protectionism. If there is anything to glean from the political revolution that gave Trump the presidency, it is not that the international order harmed the United States. It is that the United States failed to translate its victory in the race toward global supremacy into broadly shared prosperity at home. A theory that posits the United States at the mercy of other countries with big manufacturing industries is not the theory that America needs. Even if you agree with the proposition that America must build manufacturing capacity in critical industries and if you buy that China must be contained, it is wrong to embed this thought in an argument against the globalized economic order. Where America failed was not in its relations with other countries, it was in not sharing the fruits of its victory broadly among its people. Becoming a Latin American country from the 1970s will not fix that.

GON, this post was about the right to bear arms under the second amendment. Your post is about something else entirely, as usual.

No it doesn't. A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. I don't think Mel Gibson is a member of a well regulated militia and I'm not so sure that the security of whatever State he currently lives in is under threat.

The Chinese have just whacked another 50% tariff on the US, matching Trump’s escalation. Given that Trump is already at 104% which is probably enough to effectively stop imports from China it will be interesting to see what Trump does next.

That should probably be in the `Celebrating Positives' thread.

Reminds me of the `Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow' story, except that this looks more like the `Headless Horse of Sleepy Hollow'.

I’ve always wondered what your shed looks like.

That uninhabited island explanation is rubbish. They are saying the islands are countries which they’re not and even if they were, they are uninhabited so how do you tranship goods. They are just trying to spin an embarrassing blunder.

Putin is giving Trump the run around on a ceasefire deal, has pushed Ukraine out of the Kursk area and continued indiscriminate rocket and drone attacks. Business as usual. He’s got Trump on his side and in his pocket.

Musk’s days are numbered now given his disloyal comments about Trump’s tariffs.

Drop a towel in the bottom of the bath and stand on that.

I once read that most shark attacks occur in waist deep water, because that's where most of the people are.

I don’t think Vance would be able to win an election after four years of Trump. MAGA only has one leader. If something happened to Trump then Vance would get the top job but he doesn’t have Trump’s hold over the GOP and MAGA so he probably wouldn’t be very effective. It wouldn’t matter much anyway because Trump has already set the US on path to self destruction with the rest of the world forging new alliances for better or for worse. The Democrats may get the Senate or House back at the midterms but they won’t be able to do much before the next election and nobody knows what the results of that might be.

When things really go pear shaped Trump will always try to blame others but apart from the ignorant diehards left in his MAGA cohort the rest of America will blame him. Of course, it will be too late and the damage will have been done.