Political Posts

[Sweet]

8 minutes ago, Paarslaars said:

 

Bit pessimistic Dalio... though the interviewer is kinda annoying, keeps asking for the worst case.

 

I ignore this guy.  He’s been honking his bearish horn for years (decade maybe?), same arguments then, same argument now.  All of what he says is relevant, but he’s saying it all the time, and he’s wheeled out every time there is market turmoil.

[Sinbius]

8 hours ago, Blake Hampton said:

Trump is a loser. A stupid, arrogant loser.

 

Someone agree with you....

 

 

[Sweet]

 

[Spekulatius]

Yep, making more enemies before going to war seems to be the Art of the deal. It doesn’t sound like the Art of War.

 

The Boeing delivery cut is another escalation in the trade war. Trump admin answered by cutting China off from NVDA H20 chip.

 

Some industries are rapidly decoupling between China and the USA. I think the semiconductor industry and equipment producers are particularly exposed here. AMAT  and Intel for example have a huge business in China. 5 years from now, it will be much smaller.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/nvidia-expects-up-55-billion-charge-first-quarter-2025-04-15/

Edited April 16, 2025 by Spekulatius

[Sweet]

"Trump's chips strategy: The US will struggle to take on Asia"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd9ljwgg9y0o

 

Forget the headline.  The article is interesting and actually from my reading of it, demonstrate why something needs to be done about manufacturing in the US, and Europe too (hope they are watching).  You can't have such important products being manufactured in only one region of the world.  I think Trump admin's execution leaves much to be desired.  This is a 5-10 process, slapping huge tariffs may not speed up the process, might actually hurt the build out of factories - who knows.

[Spekulatius]

More free speech:

Wasn’t MAGA compliant enough in this case. But people here complain that a comedian In Britain did got fined 800 GBP for publishing a “funny” clip on YouTube involving “gas the Jews” and that’s supposedly the end on free speech there…

 

 

 

 

[Sweet]

1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:

Yep, making more enemies before going to war seems to be the Art of the deal. It doesn’t sound like the Art of War.

 

The Boeing delivery cut is another escalation in the trade war. Trump admin answered by cutting China off from NVDA H20 chip.

 

Some industries are rapidly decoupling between China and the USA. I think the semiconductor industry and equipment producers are particularly exposed here. AMAT  and Intel for example have a huge business in China. 5 years from now, it will be much smaller.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/nvidia-expects-up-55-billion-charge-first-quarter-2025-04-15/

Lol ‘more art of the deal than art war’ - it is getting memed quite badly now.

Intel had 25ish % of revenue in China in 2023, however it was going to lose that in spite of Trumps tariffs because China had already enacted legislation that amounts to a ban on US chips:

 

https://www.pcmag.com/news/china-reportedly-phasing-out-intel-amd-chips-from-government-computers (March 2024)

 
https://www.pcmag.com/news/china-ditch-intel-amd-chips-telecom-networks (April 2024)

 

I just don’t know what Trumps plan was when he goes around pissing off America’s allies.  Either there was no plan.  Or he thought America had such a strong hand that it could effectively bully everyone collectively - which is an idiotic plan.

 

Directionally I think this US-China trade war is kinda of necessary but the execution has been terrible.

 

Edited April 16, 2025 by Sweet

[John Hjorth]

12 hours ago, Blake Hampton said:

Trump is a loser. A stupid, arrogant loser.

 

Culture, modus operandi, what to comply with, and what not to do, in an organisation is always influenced and defined from the very top of the organisation.

 

Here is an example of a 27 years old piece of eye candy, receptive, easy to learn, teachable, representing the White House of the United States of America, in public coming down hard in the most condescending way thinkable on the predecessor of her own boss, - a man who likely is ill, and for sure at high age, and has been serving his country long before she even was born. [Please listen to video clip in the lower part below].

 

Respect for the elder seems to be the name of a village in Sibiria, all while her own boss in reality already and also is a geriatric, but appearantly by now a heathy one.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

How low can we go?

 

 

Edited April 16, 2025 by John Hjorth

[Sweet]

7 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Culture, modus operandi, what to comply with, and what not to do, in an organisation is always influenced and defined from the very top of the organisation.

 

Here is an example of a 27 years old piece of eye candy, receptive, easy to learn, teachable, representing the White House of the United States of America, in public coming down hard in the most condescending way thinkable on the predecessor of her own boss, - a man who who likely is ill, and for sure at high age, and has been serving his country long before she even was born. [Please listen to video clip in the lower part below].

 

Respect for the elder seems to bethe name a village in Sibiria, all while her own boss in reality already is a geriatric.

 

 

 

The way rudeness has slipped into casual discourse has pissed me off.

 

However, I don't think it started with anyone side, just that Trump and his team have taken it to the next level.

 

I remember well the John McCain and Mitt Romney were racist stuff.  Obama and others accusing Trump of siding with Neo Nazis - it's just more highbrow name calling.

 

 

[John Hjorth]

@Sweet,

 

Am I right assuming you're English, based on my poor recollection of your origin and home country?

[Sweet]

2 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

@Sweet,

 

Am I right assuming you're English, based on my poor recollection of your origin and home country?

 

British yes (not English though).  We try to be polite, the English are especially polite.

 

Edited April 16, 2025 by Sweet

[james22]

7 hours ago, dwy000 said:

How much of that was stocking up in advance of tariffs?

 

That's fair.

 

We'll see soon enough.

[John Hjorth]

2 minutes ago, Sweet said:

British yes (not English though).  We try to be polite, the English are especially polite.

 

@Sweet,

 

I'm really sorry, if I above offended you. In that was the case, I sincerely apologize.

 

However the nosy part of me has to ask :

 

What is [English minus British]? I'm not sure if the answer to this question is 'Irish' or 'Scottish' 

[John Hjorth]

45 minutes ago, Sweet said:

The way rudeness has slipped into casual discourse has pissed me off. ...

 

I've got a private message from Sweet answering my last question.

 

Ref. the above quoted, posted by @Sweet earlier, it's certainly a concerning trend in Politics in general, but to varying degrees, whereever one looks. I think, for my part, locally, it's fair to say, that for Danish politicians, that don't comply to a certain codex of an absolute minimum of decency and codiality, there is no room, nor future. It's just considered 'Un-Danish'. '- We simply aren't so.'

[james22]

4 hours ago, Parsad said:

Volunteering...not unlike yourself. 

 

Again, I've made the earned distinction. One should have a little experience (like yourself) to volunteer without otherwise just adding noise.

 

4 hours ago, Parsad said:

I don't understand why people are so sure they are correct...on either side.  I think if you are thinking critically, then take on each issue and how it is being dealt with. 

 

That's the nature of Sowell's "visions," they are internally consistent and self-reinforcing.

 

 

 

 

4 hours ago, Parsad said:

And I think critics of Trump, me included, feel that the faithful are willing to ignore the methods because of the problems...while the critical are ignoring the problems and focusing on the methods.

 

That's exactly right, though the relationship is ordered - methods (solutions) are downstream problem recognition.

 

it's hard to take advice about methods by those who don't/didn't recognize the problem. Wrong once, they've lost credibility.

 

And I've admitted before that Trump's methods makes me wince. But that's the package.

[Spekulatius]

You should be worried if the treasury secretary tells you to stop worrying.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/treasury-secretary-scott-bessent-to-americas-biggest-ceos-stop-worrying-121627070.html

[dealraker]

 

Choosing who to read as to COBF has been the best decision I've made.  The posters who dominated the climate, their hyper-sensitive grievance rage, on COBF well over a decade ago still dominate today...or at least did a couple of months ago when I read the last of those posts.  My view is the attempts of these posters towards macho alpha presentation is actually a fragile frailness and wide open obvious panic when anyone disagrees with them.  What I still read today, but will gradually work on avoiding, is the endless responses to those posts.  

 

The video of Charlie Munger discussing Donald Trump is simply my view, nothing more and nothing less.  DJT's incredible talent at gaining attention is a net negative to business and investing leading to a sad and awful decade plus of wasted world energy and focus.  It matters little what someone's goal is when that person has no skills towards attaining that goal and surrounds himself with even more inferior helpers.

 

Most days of the week I leave my home to engage in volunteer work.  What do I encounter?  I exist in a world of people with mostly similar views, that others are the problem...that government is the problem...that Trump and only Trump can fix it.  Yes I live in what is described as the most Trump support area of the US of A.  But I also see an incredible dependence of these people upon the very government they claim to dislike.  As I've said before, it is believed that Trump will greatly harm others while helping "us".   That's without a doubt the most generalized irrational thinking in my lifetime.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[rogermunibond]

+1 @dealraker

[Rainier]

15 hours ago, Blugolds said:

Reminds me of a book I read about Vince Lombardi, if I remember correctly he was instructed/raised by Jesuits, all his players loved him. His management/leadership style was to taylor it to the individual. He said that some guys, you only got their best with negative reinforcement, they wouldn’t give you everything unless you challenged them, ie. “that guy is kicking your ass out there! I can’t believe you were a first round pick, my kids play better than that!” And that would make them rise to the challenge to prove you wrong..but other players needed the positive reinforcement to get the best out of them..ie. “I’ve seen you play and you’re 10x better than that DB, you have the ability to be in the hall of fame, now go out there and show him how unlucky he is to have to guard you” etc.

 

The quality of a great leader IMO is the ability to read the room, and individually Taylor the needs of each team member and figure out what motivates them to get the best out of them. Lombardi was a master at this, he knew what motivated every single player on the team and the coaching staff. 
 

They all said he was tough but fair and they lived him for it, because they didn’t know it at the time but he was pulling the trigger on every one of them in their own unique need/way. 
 

He also said if you take a blanket approach it will only work for half. If you’re the hardest, some will benefit but the others will shutdown, and if you’re gentle, some will respond and some will shutdown, so the only logical answer is to individualize your style to each player if you want the very best they have to give…but that takes times, effort, knowledge and understanding, you’ve got to know yourself as well as others, and it’s difficult. There also was a thread of empathy that ran through his style, he genuinely wanted the player to be at their best.

I have always thought this was the best way to lead/manage/train/mentor people.

 

Ive also never understood those who argue against it and say that its manipulative or try to cast the leader in a negative light for it.

 

To analogize - Let’s say you are a parent of two children and you can see that one responds well to discipline/negative reinforcement and another responds well to praise/positive reinforcement. Obviously you need both aspects in parenting (or coaching or leadership) and you basically have to mask or emphasize the two aspects while still doling out both. But wouldn’t you be failing one of your kids if you didn’t tailor your parenting style for each kid?
 

And the other side of the equation to this is that, when they’re grown and let’s assume they are excellent at self-reflection and are objective about everything, wouldn’t the kids be appreciative if they got the tailored parenting that best helped them be successful (by whatever measure)? And wouldn’t one kid be pissed if their life was less than it could have been if the parent only had one style? 

[Spooky]

15 hours ago, Blugolds said:

Reminds me of a book I read about Vince Lombardi, if I remember correctly he was instructed/raised by Jesuits, all his players loved him. His management/leadership style was to taylor it to the individual. He said that some guys, you only got their best with negative reinforcement, they wouldn’t give you everything unless you challenged them, ie. “that guy is kicking your ass out there! I can’t believe you were a first round pick, my kids play better than that!” And that would make them rise to the challenge to prove you wrong..but other players needed the positive reinforcement to get the best out of them..ie. “I’ve seen you play and you’re 10x better than that DB, you have the ability to be in the hall of fame, now go out there and show him how unlucky he is to have to guard you” etc.

 

The quality of a great leader IMO is the ability to read the room, and individually Taylor the needs of each team member and figure out what motivates them to get the best out of them. Lombardi was a master at this, he knew what motivated every single player on the team and the coaching staff. 
 

They all said he was tough but fair and they lived him for it, because they didn’t know it at the time but he was pulling the trigger on every one of them in their own unique need/way. 
 

He also said if you take a blanket approach it will only work for half. If you’re the hardest, some will benefit but the others will shutdown, and if you’re gentle, some will respond and some will shutdown, so the only logical answer is to individualize your style to each player if you want the very best they have to give…but that takes times, effort, knowledge and understanding, you’ve got to know yourself as well as others, and it’s difficult. There also was a thread of empathy that ran through his style, he genuinely wanted the player to be at their best.

 

Thanks for this, really interesting and inspiring. The manager I look up to the most is Sir Alex Ferguson, former manager of Manchester United and possibly the greatest soccer / football manager of all time. I believe he had a similar approach where he was able to get the best out of each player on the team and built up the structures for them to succeed. He has a great book on leadership which I highly recommend. The first chapter is all about listening, he always knew what the players were thinking and what was going on in the dressing room.

 

[Blugolds]

5 minutes ago, Rainier said:

I have always thought this was the best way to lead/manage/train/mentor people.

 

Ive also never understood those who argue against it and say that its manipulative or try to cast the leader in a negative light for it.

 

To analogize - Let’s say you are a parent of two children and you can see that one responds well to discipline/negative reinforcement and another responds well to praise/positive reinforcement. Obviously you need both aspects in parenting (or coaching or leadership) and you basically have to mask or emphasize the two aspects while still doling out both. But wouldn’t you be failing one of your kids if you didn’t tailor your parenting style for each kid?
 

And the other side of the equation to this is that, when they’re grown and let’s assume they are excellent at self-reflection and are objective about everything, wouldn’t the kids be appreciative if they got the tailored parenting that best helped them be successful (by whatever measure)? And wouldn’t one kid be pissed if their life was less than it could have been if the parent only had one style? 

 

Yes exactly, discipline without love is abuse…but love without discipline can also be abuse. It’s that balance/dance but always out of love ultimately 

 

Parenting is challenging no matter the style needed. As a simpler analogy I worked a summer job in HS for a well known K9 breeder, specifically LE and Schutzhund, all Shepards and Malinois…he trained and bred at his kennel, competed, trained and shipped globally. He also bred, puppies were screened after 8 weeks or so to determine drive. Some were “treat’ motivated and some were “toy” motivated, the training and future potential (bite work.vs potential pet) was in large part determined by these early screenings. Additionally, the shepards would “bite someone because you asked them to” whereas the Malinois “wanted to bite everything, and only are prevented because you are telling them not to”…Both required different styles of training (ie leadership) to get the best out of the dog.  It wasnt one size fits all. 

 

I think Parsad mentioned Phil Jackson in his post, he was another guy that was phenomenal at reading people ands determining what they needed in order for them to be at their best. I think there was a part in the series The Last Dance ( I love that series and I’ve watched it a couple times now) where they discuss Phils coaching style and his ability to get the best out of Dennis Rodman. Phil was able to empathetically realize that there was more there. If he had been a hard ass, Rodman would have rebelled, but since he took a more tailored approach, it worked out well for the Bulls. 

[John Hjorth]

39 minutes ago, dealraker said:

Choosing who to read as to COBF has been the best decision I've made.  The posters who dominated the climate, their hyper-sensitive grievance rage, on COBF well over a decade ago still dominate today...or at least did a couple of months ago when I read the last of those posts.  My view is the attempts of these posters towards macho alpha presentation is actually a fragile frailness and wide open obvious panic when anyone disagrees with them.  What I still read today, but will gradually work on avoiding, is the endless responses to those posts.  

 

The video of Charlie Munger discussing Donald Trump is simply my view, nothing more and nothing less.  DJT's incredible talent at gaining attention is a net negative to business and investing leading to a sad and awful decade plus of wasted world energy and focus.  It matters little what someone's goal is when that person has no skills towards attaining that goal and surrounds himself with even more inferior helpers.

 

Most days of the week I leave my home to engage in volunteer work.  What do I encounter?  I exist in a world of people with mostly similar views, that others are the problem...that government is the problem...that Trump and only Trump can fix it.  Yes I live in what is described as the most Trump support area of the US of A.  But I also see an incredible dependence of these people upon the very government they claim to dislike.  As I've said before, it is believed that Trump will greatly harm others while helping "us".   That's without a doubt the most generalized irrational thinking in my lifetime.

 

To me, it's just an observable fact, that there are a few active members of CofB&F, who really aren't able to discuss politics within the framework of generally accepted principles for logical and civil discussion, which fact make me sad.

 

[73 Reds]

1 hour ago, dealraker said:

 

Choosing who to read as to COBF has been the best decision I've made.  The posters who dominated the climate, their hyper-sensitive grievance rage, on COBF well over a decade ago still dominate today...or at least did a couple of months ago when I read the last of those posts.  My view is the attempts of these posters towards macho alpha presentation is actually a fragile frailness and wide open obvious panic when anyone disagrees with them.  What I still read today, but will gradually work on avoiding, is the endless responses to those posts.  

 

The video of Charlie Munger discussing Donald Trump is simply my view, nothing more and nothing less.  DJT's incredible talent at gaining attention is a net negative to business and investing leading to a sad and awful decade plus of wasted world energy and focus.  It matters little what someone's goal is when that person has no skills towards attaining that goal and surrounds himself with even more inferior helpers.

 

Most days of the week I leave my home to engage in volunteer work.  What do I encounter?  I exist in a world of people with mostly similar views, that others are the problem...that government is the problem...that Trump and only Trump can fix it.  Yes I live in what is described as the most Trump support area of the US of A.  But I also see an incredible dependence of these people upon the very government they claim to dislike.  As I've said before, it is believed that Trump will greatly harm others while helping "us".   That's without a doubt the most generalized irrational thinking in my lifetime.

 

 

 

 

 

 

<<The video of Charlie Munger discussing Donald Trump is simply my view, nothing more and nothing less.>>

No argument here.  The only caveat being Munger didn't know who and what Trump would be running against.

[SharperDingaan]

4 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

You should be worried if the treasury secretary tells you to stop worrying.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/treasury-secretary-scott-bessent-to-americas-biggest-ceos-stop-worrying-121627070.html

 

Treasury yields continue to rise, and USD keeps falling ... net capital outflows. Q2 numbers will also suck as most overbought in Q1 to get under the tariffs. Q2 unemployment and inflation adding to the misery. Lots of reasons to reduce US exposure, and expect the indexes to fall accordingly.

 

SD

 

 

 

[james22]

4 hours ago, dealraker said:

The video of Charlie Munger discussing Donald Trump is simply my view, nothing more and nothing less.

 

Funny how the video of Bill Maher explaining how his time with Trump went got no response.

 

No one wants to risk their assumptions?

 

It seems possible Trump's puffery and vainglory is mostly an act.

 

(Not that choosing to act that way isn't damning as well, but it's very different.)

 

From the comments, someone related that Trump has said he learned The Apprentice's ratings only improved when he played an asshole.

 

Maybe that was the wrong lesson. Maybe not.