Political Posts

[sleepydragon]

3 minutes ago, Pelagic said:

A massive gift indeed, disagree on the Taiwan invasion aspect though. The US has basically forfeited the soft-power game in SE Asia. Countries that it has spent decades creating trade relationships with in order to splinter them away from China got hit just as hard or harder than China. Sure maybe some work out a deal like Vietnam is trying to do, but they were all just shown how ephemeral their alignment with the US really is. China could announce tomorrow it's own version of the TPP and probably have quite a few takers. From China's perspective there's little sense engaging in a costly war for Taiwan where there's a chance you might lose or worse get tied up in a counterinsurgency operation for years.

 

Instead China can take the gift they've been given when the US showed it doesn't care to make a distinction in trade between potential allies and adversaries and capitalize on it. A Chinese invasion of Taiwan is the end result of expanded American influence in the region, a last resort on their part to check that influence if you will. If that sphere suddenly collapses, from China's perspective - why bother? Sure there's still going to be nationalist voices advocating for reuniting Taiwan with China but Xi is probably smart enough to see the big picture.

 

I agree with you it’s china’s best interest to do what you suggested. But it’s not Xi’s interest. He really just want china go back to Mao’s era

[SharperDingaan]

Interesting that Elon is now floating the idea of a tariff free Canada/US zone ... otherwise known as CUSMA.

 

All good, but until the US actually experiences the tariff driven unemployment and damage that Orange Boy and Elon have caused, there is no need to rush. Orange Boy's threats are enabling things in Canada that wouldn't otherwise be possible (inter-provincial trade barriers, pipelines, infrastructure, NATO defense, etc.), there is a need to rebuild trust again, and frankly ... it would be better for all if the US entered into the coming midterms with significant stagflation and an own-goal recession. The US founding fathers put in controls ... let them work.

 

Orange Boy is a melting ice-cube, his administration is incompetent, and the US economy is about to experience a world of hurt for an extended period. He turns 79 in June, the presidency ages people like dogs, and 'old man' denial is already prevalent. Sleepy Joe had his senior moment at 81 ... have to think that should the mid terms not go Trumps way, maybe Orange Boy turns into Orange Puddle.

 

The entire world is paying the costs of Orange Boy's tariffs, and I think we would all like a return on our 'investment'. The world has moved on, and the US will have a much smaller place in it; not a bad thing.

 

SD

      

[Gregmal]

1 hour ago, 73 Reds said:

Of course not.  But is Emily acting on an immediate scenario or one she just thinks might happen?   Planning ahead is always prudent but expecting the worst rarely plays out as expected and in hindsight acting too soon on such concerns is often a costly mistake.

Yup. I’m sure you’re hearing it in FL with the condos; a similarly thought provoking situation. Many HOAs are freaking out over reserve requirements post Surfside. Even in NJ we have new laws that if put into effect immediately, would be devastating. But the reality is, most have rollout periods or like in NJ, 8-10 year windows for HOAs to become compliant.

 

So what’s one to do? Become compliant immediately and kill homeowners with gargantuan assessments? Well, IMO that would be the dumbest thing to do. Better to just gradually work towards adapting to the new situation, while also keeping in mind that things can change and realistically, if enough are adversely effected, it will change and the only idiots are the ones that overreacted and got compliant on day one.

[sleepydragon]

18 hours ago, dwy000 said:

Bessent looks really, really uncomfortable out there. Hes obviously been kept out of the loop on the tariffs and even more obviously doesn't like it but has to hold the party line. I'd be surprised if he lasts another 3 months. 

it might be good for him since this thing is turning into a shit show for trump and he’s seen as the more moderate guy. 

[cubsfan]

22 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Mike [ @cubsfan ],

 

You just lost a regular reader during many years, as of yesterday, effective from here, because of what happened here on CofB&F yesterday. I don't even bother to press the report button.

 

I never used the "report button" once on this site. The difference between you and me.

[Blake Hampton]

23 minutes ago, Gregmal said:

Yup. I’m sure you’re hearing it in FL with the condos; a similarly thought provoking situation. Many HOAs are freaking out over reserve requirements post Surfside. Even in NJ we have new laws that if put into effect immediately, would be devastating. But the reality is, most have rollout periods or like in NJ, 8-10 year windows for HOAs to become compliant.

 

So what’s one to do? Become compliant immediately and kill homeowners with gargantuan assessments? Well, IMO that would be the dumbest thing to do. Better to just gradually work towards adapting to the new situation, while also keeping in mind that things can change and realistically, if enough are adversely effected, it will change and the only idiots are the ones that overreacted and got compliant on day one.

I’ve read quite a bit on the whole condo situation and my god is it screwed up. I really don’t like the economics of condos.

 

Edited April 6, 2025 by Blake Hampton

[Pelagic]

American labor gravitating toward its highest and best use. You get a real sense of who Lutnick sees as their base in this.

 

 

 

[LC]

That is one of the dumbest things I have ever seen.

America picked its administration like I pick disposable kitchen utensils on sale via Temu.

[73 Reds]

33 minutes ago, Gregmal said:

Yup. I’m sure you’re hearing it in FL with the condos; a similarly thought provoking situation. Many HOAs are freaking out over reserve requirements post Surfside. Even in NJ we have new laws that if put into effect immediately, would be devastating. But the reality is, most have rollout periods or like in NJ, 8-10 year windows for HOAs to become compliant.

 

So what’s one to do? Become compliant immediately and kill homeowners with gargantuan assessments? Well, IMO that would be the dumbest thing to do. Better to just gradually work towards adapting to the new situation, while also keeping in mind that things can change and realistically, if enough are adversely effected, it will change and the only idiots are the ones that overreacted and got compliant on day one.

Right.  It's clearly a concern for condo owners and BODs, particularly older buildings on the water.  But the goal isn't to bankrupt anyone, create empty buildings to rot, or wreak havoc on entire communities.  A balanced approach which will protect the integrity of such buildings will ultimately prevail.  Not that it still won't hurt many folks; the solution is always far from perfect while striving to balance cost with safety.           

[SharperDingaan]

1 hour ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Internallly, in my head, I visualize, this Emily calling me by phone, as a client of me, about her options and what to do.

 

Emily, who I have had as client for some years now, set up her business in 2008, and it has prospered, and she now has 8 employées to help her run it. She is very worried, that she'll have to lay-off several of her employées, perhaps even wind up the business, and call it a day, after 17 years.

 

As she sees the situation of her business, the COGS [cost of goods sold] go up by 34 per cent in one giant step, because of tariffs, and her gross margin is lower than that. Her freight provider on the goods from China is Maersk, and she expects increases because of tariffs on freight, too.

 

I tell her, this is actually really not a question for her bean-counter, but for her lawyer. I offer to go with her to a meeting about it with her lawyer without charge, because I'm interested in hearing what her lawyer has to say about the matter at hand.

 

She appreciates my offer and we agree she will take care of coordination of such a meeting.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

Nothing leftist about that, - at all.

 

Just to add to this ...

 

In the craft brewing business, one of our biggest unit costs is the aluminum can and fastener; for the most part, the aluminum comes from Canada and the can comes from the US. Almost everyone bought 6-9 months worth of cans, for delivery just before the tariffs came down, and has multiple containers of these things stacked up in various locations. Forecast interest on the credit line being less than the tariff on the cans.

 

At the industry level there is discussion around bringing can manufacturing to Canada, and aggregating demand from all brewers in Canada; each brewer free to sell their resultant production allocation to someone else, if they can source the cans for less. There is similar discussion around a standardized glass stumpy; but more complex, as more is involved. A stumpy can typically be used 40x and costs less/use....  but it needs collection, sanitation, is heavier to transport, and pallets cannot be stacked as high. 

 

Consumers will of course pay more for their beer, drink less, and have better choice ... but provinces are also expected to lower their taxes, and allow inter-provincial sales. Beer moving over distance via rail, then truck to the distribution center.

 

The US .... eliminated entirely from the process.  No involvement unless the landed cost of a can, inclusive of tariff and transport, is less than the cost of a locally sourced can. No exposure to US/CAD changes, no exposure to tariffs, no more drama.

 

Not good, if you are a US worker making cans.

 

SD 

 

 

[backtothebeach]

37 minutes ago, Pelagic said:

American labor gravitating toward its highest and best use. You get a real sense of who Lutnick sees as their base in this.

 

 

 

Quoting out of context is just lazy. He said: "The army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones -- that kind of thing is going to come to America. It's going to be automated."

[Dalal.Holdings]

Running endless trade deficits and hollowing out your own manufacturing base and expanding you rival's "because you are the reserve currency" is all fun and games until one day when you actually have to fight a war and realize you can't build ships anymore ...

 

I don't think Adam Smith would have pushed free trade to such an extent where it makes a nation incredibly vulnerable (survival risk)

 

 

 

 

Edited April 6, 2025 by Dalal.Holdings

[Spekulatius]

This Scottish fellow has a really bad sensor of humor then. What do you think would happen to him if he did that in the US?

 

As far as Greece’s howled are concerned , any (like me) he lived in the US for many years, sometimes decades. They paid tens if not hundreds of thousand in taxes, a house, 401k etc. It’s not exactly like a temporary Visa. The status is called US person for good reasons. I am not aware of any administration that has done this before.

 

Always remember the saying, first they come for x, then they come for y and then they come for you.

 

Also look at this - news flash, the CCP does not do that for tourist or even long term work Visa. I am not sure what other county does this but you may have to go down to Iran or North Korea. Doesn’t look like free speech to me, more like a surveillance autocracy.

 

[Gregmal]

1 hour ago, Blake Hampton said:

I’ve read quite a bit on the whole condo situation and my god is it screwed up. I really don’t like the economics of condos.

 

Yea in theory they should be efficient, but they’re often not great economically because of the HOA structure. Unpaid trustees whom often do what they do for selfish reasons, property managers whom decide contracts with great discretion, both create what almost always turns into a wasteful structure. Long story for another time but I did actually go apeshit activist on an HOA once; it was glorious. 

[Buckeye]

Can any of the resident Trump experts on this thread, please explain to us losers, who don’t get it, their opinion of how things will play out under 4 years of President Trump? 
 

It seems to me that anyone who posts a message questioning Trump’s logic or actions is quickly lambasted as “not getting it.” And anytime someone posts a prediction about the future under Trump, their thoughts are quickly discounted as complete rubbish by the experts. 

 

Everything seems so clear to his supporters, especially with their hindsight bias. 

But what I rarely see is anyone of his supporters who are willing to actually predict what they think will happen over the next 4 years. 

 

Please help me (us) understand how you think the next 4 years will go down. Thanks!  

[Pelagic]

4 minutes ago, backtothebeach said:

Quoting out of context is just lazy. He said: "The army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones -- that kind of thing is going to come to America. It's going to be automated."

Yeah that's fair I should have found a better clip sans quote. My point in sharing it was that he views their base as high school educated labor that is underemployed currently and that is ostensibly going to find employment maintaining the automated factories. Which sure, those jobs exist and often pay fairly well, data center maintenance positions are growing rapidly for instance. But nuking America's relations with other countries and driving up costs domestically to subsidize a jobs program for your base is shortsighted. If employing that segment is the goal there's lots of ways to go about it that don't cause as much harm to the rest of the economy. FDR created the TVA for instance, hell a lot of defense spending could be seen as a pseudo jobs program for the various districts that it exists in. Other options exist to solve the problem that don't distort life for everyone else.

[Blake Hampton]

1 minute ago, Gregmal said:

Yea in theory they should be efficient, but they’re often not great economically because of the HOA structure. Unpaid trustees whom often do what they do for selfish reasons, property managers whom decide contracts with great discretion, both create what almost always turns into a wasteful structure. Long story for another time but I did actually go apeshit activist on an HOA once; it was glorious. 

I read a WSJ article detailing how a lot of owners couldn't sell their condos because Fannie and Freddie wouldn't approve loans to buy them. I don't think I'll ever be buying one.

[73 Reds]

3 minutes ago, Buckeye said:

Can any of the resident Trump experts on this thread, please explain to us losers, who don’t get it, their opinion of how things will play out under 4 years of President Trump? 
 

It seems to me that anyone who posts a message questioning Trump’s logic or actions is quickly lambasted as “not getting it.” And anytime someone posts a prediction about the future under Trump, their thoughts are quickly discounted as complete rubbish by the experts. 

 

Everything seems so clear to his supporters, especially with their hindsight bias. 

But what I rarely see is anyone of his supporters who are willing to actually predict what they think will happen over the next 4 years. 

 

Please help me (us) understand how you think the next 4 years will go down. Thanks!  

@Buckeye I'm no more of an expert than you but I did vote for most (not all) of his polices and hope that expectations for these policies play out.

[Blake Hampton]

I like this post so I'm reposting it here:

The biggest problem facing our country is the federal budget.

We have these enormous deficits that are growing as old debt rolls over at higher interest rates, and all of it just keeps getting piled onto the national debt. When the U.S. government deficit spends $2 trillion—approximately $15,000 for every single U.S. household—that puts additional strain on Treasury markets. Last year, the U.S. federal government ran a net deficit of $1.8 trillion, 41% of which was financed through Treasury bills. This $1.8 trillion of securities was created out of thin air. You think your T-bills are cash right? Well so does everyone else. And our country prides itself on having the "deepest and most liquid markets in the world," so a lot of longer-duration Treasury debt is viewed similarly. Imagine a large number of people suddenly sold their Treasury securities without a proportionate level of buying to offset it—who do you ultimately think fills this liquidity gap? This is nearly the exact situation the Federal Reserve faced during the pandemic, when it had to monetize trillions of dollars worth of debt to prevent a broken Treasury market from destroying our economy. That was actual cash added into the system—even if it only became bank reserves. Today, we're in an exponentially worse fiscal situation, with a manic trying his absolute best to make the whole world completely lose faith in us. And on top of all this madness, CONGRESS IS TRYING TO CUT MORE TAXES. Trade is something that should've been left unaddressed because our country can't afford the inflation that will come from trying to deal with it.

 

Buffett has said the same thing over and over and over again: you can't do just one thing in economics. This is a zero-sum game where when money goes one place, it must come from another. These deficits are just a funny, convoluted way of printing money. And printing money is inflationary.

[Buckeye]

3 minutes ago, 73 Reds said:

@Buckeye I'm no more of an expert than you but I did vote for most (not all) of his polices and hope that expectations for these policies play out.

So how do you see the next 4 years playing out? 

[73 Reds]

Just now, Buckeye said:

So how do you see the next 4 years playing out? 

I don't predict, just hope.  My hope is we become a safer, stronger, more merit based society.  We stay out of endless conflicts that we won't and can't resolve.  We spend tax dollars much more wisely.  We retain the moral values that got us here.   In.a nutshell, these are the issues I voted on.  The economy was nowhere near the top of my priority list but vilifying those who achieve success with the threat of higher taxes without regard to how the funds are allocated is bad policy. 

[Buckeye]

3 minutes ago, 73 Reds said:

I don't predict, just hope.  My hope is we become a safer, stronger, more merit based society.  We stay out of endless conflicts that we won't and can't resolve.  We spend tax dollars much more wisely.  We retain the moral values that got us here.   In.a nutshell, these are the issues I voted on.  The economy was nowhere near the top of my priority list but vilifying those who achieve success with the threat of higher taxes without regard to how the funds are allocated is bad policy. 

Sounds great Red, thanks! For sure those are some good issues to support and like you I am very hopeful that Trump can follow through on some of those things! If he succeeds we all succeed.

 

 

[cubsfan]

1 hour ago, Buckeye said:

Can any of the resident Trump experts on this thread, please explain to us losers, who don’t get it, their opinion of how things will play out under 4 years of President Trump? 
 

It seems to me that anyone who posts a message questioning Trump’s logic or actions is quickly lambasted as “not getting it.” And anytime someone posts a prediction about the future under Trump, their thoughts are quickly discounted as complete rubbish by the experts. 

 

Everything seems so clear to his supporters, especially with their hindsight bias. 

But what I rarely see is anyone of his supporters who are willing to actually predict what they think will happen over the next 4 years. 

 

Please help me (us) understand how you think the next 4 years will go down. Thanks!  

 

I think we're going to go through a rough period.

 

It would have been far worse under Kamala Harris and a continuation of a socialist leaning administration. Civil liberties - in the shitter. Prosecute your political opponents - until you jail them. Censor Free Speech - guaranteed. Parents rights - continue to erode. Endless wars with absolutely no plan - feed the meatgrinder in Ukraine - millions dead. Lunatic universities pesecuting Jews and Conservatives - more of the same. 

 

The alternative was the direction of the country.  Now we have a legitimate chance to reverse ALL of this.

 

On the economy - whoever inherited this mess was sure to get torched. Kamala campaigned on wealth taxes, large tax increases, and bigger, bigger, bigger government. Endless government to adjudicate just about everything.  

 

 

[Buckeye]

Thank you for sharing your opinion Cubs.

[Paarslaars]

I am curious if we have seen the worst of it. How will Trump handle the inevitable retalliation? Sure smaller countries like Vietnam want to negotiate but China and Europe won't...

 

China did everyone else a favor by firing first, this could get messy.

Edited April 6, 2025 by Paarslaars