Political Posts

[Spekulatius]

4 hours ago, Sweet said:

 

See article below.
 

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/albertans-say-theyre-serious-about-separation-after-liberal-win
 

No feel for whether they would be successful, but 3 in 10 is a lot as a starting point.

 

 

How many Californians feel they should secede from the US? I think it’s more than 3/10. A lot of political will is needed to do a major change like that.

[changegonnacome]

4 hours ago, WayWardCloud said:

Economic pain in the US is transmitted almost instantly via 401ks and public opinion can change much faster, regardless of political family, when it feels like your nest egg is vanishing.

 

Yes - and your always less than 24 months away from being meaningfully able to express your frustration at the ballot box.

 

Its both a feature and bug of the US system and one of the big reasons why the deficits & debts are where they are......American politicians and their parties live in a constant state of electioneering.

[Hektor]

7 hours ago, dwy000 said:

Not a word about 51st state or Governor or anything.

I wonder how and how much of this "51st state" thing is covered in UK, and what do people there think. After all, this will affect the King too.

[thepupil]

factually conveying recently enacted taxes is..."a hostile and political act". 

 

I guess the $40 million tribute to the king wasn't enough. 

 

 

 

 

Quote

White House Calls Amazon ‘Hostile’ for Reported Tariff Displays

Summary by Bloomberg AI

• The White House has denounced Amazon's reported plan to display the cost of President Donald Trump's tariffs on products, calling it a "hostile and political act".
• Amazon's move is seen as a response to the US government's decision to end the "de minimis" exemption for small packages from mainland China and Hong Kong, which will result in a 120% tariff on many products.
• A CNN poll shows that 59% of the public believe Trump's policies have made the economy worse, and nearly seven in 10 believe an economic recession is somewhat likely next year.

By Skylar Woodhouse

(Bloomberg) -- The White House denounced Amazon.com Inc’s reported move to display the cost of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on products, setting the stage for a high-profile clash between the administration and the popular online marketplace.

“This is a hostile and political act by Amazon,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Tuesday. “Why didn’t Amazon do this when the Biden administration hiked inflation to the highest level in 40 years?”

The comments from Leavitt came after Punchbowl News reported that the e-commerce giant would “soon” begin displaying the cost of US tariffs on individual products next to the total listed price. The report included few other details about the plan. Amazon representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Companies like Amazon and fast-fashion giant Shein Group Ltd. are bracing for a 120% tariff on many of their products due to the US government’s decision to end the “de minimis” exemption for small packages from mainland China and Hong Kong.

Exporters in recent years had capitalized on the exemption, which allowed goods valued at under $800 to enter the US without tariffs or customs duties. 

Leavitt said she had spoken to Trump about the report, and went on to criticize Amazon’s compliance with censorship demands by the Chinese government. 

Leavitt declined to answer when asked if the move had strained the relationship between the president and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who has sought to curry favor with Trump in recent months. Bezos and Trump frequently clashed during the president’s first term over the billionaire’s ownership of the Washington Post. 

“I will not speak to the president’s relationships with Jeff Bezos,” Leavitt said.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who attended the press briefing, said any move to highlight tariffs was unfair when the costs of policies implemented by other administrations — including regulations — weren’t broken out.

“The big tax on consumers that goes unnoticed is deregulation or regulation, and we are deregulating and bringing that down,” Bessent said. “So you know, from a household income point of view, we would expect real purchasing increases that we’ve seen over the first 100 days, and we would expect that to accelerate.”

A CNN poll released this week showed 59% of the public believe Trump’s policies have made the economy worse, with six in 10 believing his efforts have increased their cost of living. Nearly seven in 10 of survey respondents say they believe an economic recession is somewhat likely in the next year.

 

[Sweet]

4 minutes ago, thepupil said:

factually conveying recently enacted taxes is..."a hostile and political act". 

 

I guess the $40 million tribute to the king wasn't enough. 

 

 

 

 

 

Wild.

[Pelagic]

32 minutes ago, thepupil said:

factually conveying recently enacted taxes is..."a hostile and political act". 

 

I guess the $40 million tribute to the king wasn't enough. 

 

 

 

 

 

Looks like Temu and Shein have already done this as well. Amazon has the analytics backend to see how displaying tariff data influences consumer habits, it will be interesting if the end result is that consumers like having this data or we'd rather just see a single price at checkout. Personally I think I'd be more likely to just not buy something if I saw I was paying $100+ in tariff fees on an order as it just feels like throwing money away.

 

 

 

[Gregmal]

Supply and demand exercise in real time. All you academic economists  should be excited to see how the experiment unfolds 

[John Hjorth]

57 minutes ago, Hektor said:

I wonder how and how much of this "51st state" thing is covered in UK, and what do people there think. After all, this will affect the King too.

 

Hentor [ @Hektor ],

 

I think it's fair to say it's all over the place, not only in UK, but in most of Europe. Here is a clip from the main page of Danmarks Radio - dr.dk - today :

 

 

with a video clip of Carney's '... It's never going to happen.'

[Gregmal]

The other more pertinent long term observation is how it relates to the question of “why do 152M Americans feel the NEED to buy made in China crap on Temu?” Or substitute the numbers and add in Frito Lay and Coca Cola products….

 

The answer probably also plays into why so many need Wegovy now.

[gfp]

19 minutes ago, Pelagic said:

Looks like Temu and Shein have already done this as well. Amazon has the analytics backend to see how displaying tariff data influences consumer habits, it will be interesting if the end result is that consumers like having this data or we'd rather just see a single price at checkout. Personally I think I'd be more likely to just not buy something if I saw I was paying $100+ in tariff fees on an order as it just feels like throwing money away.

 

 

 

 

 

Imagine being so clueless that you don't question a figure like this:

"

there 152 MILLION Americans who use Temu daily. "

[Malmqky]

5 minutes ago, gfp said:

 

 

Imagine being so clueless that you don't question a figure like this:

"

there 152 MILLION Americans who use Temu daily. "

 

Wonder if it's something likes 152m sessions. No way it's actually almost half of America.

Edited April 29, 2025 by Malmqky

[dwy000]

11 minutes ago, Gregmal said:

The other more pertinent long term observation is how it relates to the question of “why do 152M Americans feel the NEED to buy made in China crap on Temu?” Or substitute the numbers and add in Frito Lay and Coca Cola products….

 

The answer probably also plays into why so many need Wegovy now.

Americans don't "need" most of what they buy.  Look at Instagram and you just shake your head and go "why?".  But they WANT all that stuff.  The Frito Lay is the perfect example. They will choose the enjoyable but unhealthy option every time and then demand another product (wegovy) to offset it. It's the American way. 

[Hektor]

30 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

I think it's fair to say it's all over the place, not only in UK, but in most of Europe. Here is a clip from the main page of Danmarks Radio - dr.dk - today :

Thanks John

[Pelagic]

11 minutes ago, Malmqky said:

 

Wonder if it's something likes 152m sessions. No way it's actually almost half of America.

Given their ad spend on Instagram and Facebook up until recently it probably accounts for both ad clicks on social media and a smaller but more active subset of users who've downloaded the app and are sucked in by it returning to the app multiple times a day to view deals it sends them.

[73 Reds]

12 minutes ago, dwy000 said:

Americans don't "need" most of what they buy.  Look at Instagram and you just shake your head and go "why?".  But they WANT all that stuff.  The Frito Lay is the perfect example. They will choose the enjoyable but unhealthy option every time and then demand another product (wegovy) to offset it. It's the American way. 

The highly imperfect place we Americans call home gives us the right to make bad decisions.  Wouldn't trade it.

[james22]

21 minutes ago, dwy000 said:

Americans don't "need" most of what they buy.  Look at Instagram and you just shake your head and go "why?".  But they WANT all that stuff.  The Frito Lay is the perfect example. They will choose the enjoyable but unhealthy option every time and then demand another product (wegovy) to offset it. It's the American way. 

 

As though others wouldn't do the same if they could.

 

Just like weaklings can't claim to be peaceful, the Poors can't claim they are virtuously minimalist.

 

But that's the human way as well.

[Blugolds]

45 minutes ago, Gregmal said:

The other more pertinent long term observation is how it relates to the question of “why do 152M Americans feel the NEED to buy made in China crap on Temu?” Or substitute the numbers and add in Frito Lay and Coca Cola products….

 

The answer probably also plays into why so many need Wegovy now.

 

I find the fact that 152M Americans use TEMU daily very very hard to believe. Ive never used to once, Ive asked everyone around me if they have used it and they said no, and further asking reviewed one person that said they did just to try it and the item was junk and it turned them off to using it. 

 

Granted I could be in a small cohort that is not reflecting the majority but I find it hard to believe as that is basically half of all Americans, the claim is that they use it daily…there is no way. 

 

 

Edit, I responded before I saw others also question that figure, when I first saw it I literally chuckled out loud at such an outlandish claim, then after posting saw that others had questioned it also. Yeah that figure is complete BS. 

Edited April 29, 2025 by Blugolds

[Xerxes]

2 hours ago, Hektor said:

I wonder how and how much of this "51st state" thing is covered in UK, and what do people there think. After all, this will affect the King too.

It affects the King as a royal person, but not as a King of GB and Northern Ireland.

Said differently, we share the same mortal as our head of state, but his duty one side of the pond has no relevance to his titles and duties on the other side. 
 

If UK ever to become a republic, Charles III will continue to be King of Canada.

 

If Northern Ireland were to be reunited with Ireland, than there is a material scope change on his current duty as King of GB. 

 

[Xerxes]

12 hours ago, Parsad said:

Red wave surging in Canada...looks like the Liberals win this one handily. 

 

A few months ago, Pierre Poilievre was essentially Prime Minister Elect...then Poilievre experienced an outlier event like no other...Trump stupidity!  Cheers!

Trump last night tweet about our election seemed so deranged and funny at the same time. 
 

Re Reading the tweet this morning it is almost as if he is thinking he was running alongside Pierre and Mark.  

[Hektor]

2 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

It affects the King as a royal person, but not as a King of GB and Northern Ireland.

Said differently, we share the same mortal as our head of state, but his duty one side of the pond has no relevance to his titles and duties on the other side. 
 

If UK ever to become a republic, Charles III will continue to be King of Canada.

 

If Northern Ireland were to be reunited with Ireland, than there is a material scope change on his current duty as King of GB. 

Thanks Xerxes. Hypothetically, IF Canada ever opts in on this, how will the UK Monarchy, the UK Govt. and the UK people react? 

[KJP]

45 minutes ago, gfp said:

 

 

Imagine being so clueless that you don't question a figure like this:

"

there 152 MILLION Americans who use Temu daily. "

 

I had the same reaction, so I looked into this.  TL;DR -- the claim seems obviously wrong, yet someone repeating it doesn't surprise me because most people either do not or cannot perform basic dimensional analysis in their head, perhaps because they lack basic numerical knowledge, e.g., rough size of US population, US annual GDP, etc.

 

In response to the query "How many active daily U.S. users does Temu have?" both he Google AI that comes up after a search and ChatGPT say 152 million.  They appear to be relying on this website which says that Similarweb has made that estimate:  https://amzscout.net/blog/temu-statistics/

 

But that AMZscout website has the 152 million number hyperlinked to a BBC article that says the following:  "SimilarWeb data suggests individual visitors to the platform worldwide were up by nearly a quarter on the day of the Super Bowl compared with the previous Sunday, with 8.2 million people browsing the website and app. In the same period, Amazon and Ebay's visitors were down by 5% and 2% respectively."

 

After a quick scan, I didn't see any support in the linked article for the 152 million number nor can it be squared with the 8.2 million number in the linked article.  It seems AI can easily be seeded with garbage when it relies on web searches for rare, non-public data.

 

I then asked ChatGPT this followup: "How plausible is it that Temu has 152 million daily active users in the United States? That would imply 4.5 billion monthly orders (152 million x 30) in the US alone."

 

It gave me this followup answer:

 

The claim that Temu has 152 million daily active users (DAUs) in the United States appears implausible when scrutinized against available data and broader market context.

Evaluating the Claim

While a report from AMZScout cites Similarweb data stating that 152 million Americans use Temu daily , this figure raises questions:AMZScout

• Population Consideration: The U.S. population is approximately 330 million. If 152 million individuals were using Temu daily, it would imply that nearly half of the entire population engages with the app every day, which is unlikely.

• Comparison with Monthly Active Users: Other sources report that as of August 2024, Temu had 185.6 million monthly active users (MAUs) in the U.S. . If 152 million were daily users, it would suggest that over 80% of monthly users are active daily, a ratio that is unusually high for e-commerce platforms.Backlinko

Supporting Data

• Weekly Active Users: Sensor Tower data indicates that in Q2 2024, Temu's weekly active users in the U.S. increased from 21 million to over 25 million . This suggests that daily active users would be a subset of this weekly figure, making the 152 million DAU claim questionable.Sensor Tower

• Order Volume: In Q4 2023, Temu processed 170 million orders globally . If there were 152 million daily users in the U.S. alone, it would imply an implausibly low order rate per user.Backlinko

Conclusion

Given the U.S. population size, reported monthly active user figures, and global order volumes, the assertion that Temu has 152 million daily active users in the United States is highly unlikely. It's more plausible that this figure represents monthly active users or is a misinterpretation of the data.

 

[Xerxes]

3 minutes ago, Hektor said:

Thanks Xerxes. Hypothetically, IF Canada ever opts in on this, how will the UK Monarchy, the UK Govt. and the UK people react? 

I think it is completely independent from United Kingdom. No further action required from London in that hypothetical case. 
 

Not exactly the same, but I would compare this to King’ duty pre-1947 as emperor of India. Same person as the sovereign but two different sovereignty, as India was considered as a distinct empire. Queen Victoria became empress of India mid-1850s displacing the Moghul emperor and post independence the new Federal Government in Delhi displaced George VI as emperor and took up his duties. 

In an hypothetical case, that UK somehow became a republic pre-1947 and overthrow the monarchy, King would have continued his duty as emperor of India. As one was not related to the other.  

 

[Hektor]

Would the monarchy/govt/people of UK sit on their hands IF this ever came to pass?

[changegonnacome]

1 hour ago, thepupil said:

factually conveying recently enacted taxes is..."a hostile and political act". 

 

I guess the $40 million tribute to the king wasn't enough. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-28/us-shoppers-pay-for-trump-tariffs-on-temu-doubling-some-prices

 

This stuff is the administration's worst nightmare........across ecommerce it seems folks are going to come across alot more discreet tariff surcharges called out front and centre at checkout......it's just terrible politics full stop....but coming off the back of the recent COVID inflation pain which got Trump re-elected its close to insanity......on current trajectory GOP is going to get slaughtered at the midterms......now folks might say but the tax cuts are coming etc etc.....but behavioural economics is clear.....folks feel a loss 2.5x more than they feel a gain......every tariff surcharge a consumer/voter comes across on receipts is going to really really piss them off.

 

@Gregmal mentions why folks feel the need to buy crap on Temu......I could expand it out and ask why American culture is so indexed to the consumption and pursuit of material things.......I'm not sure what the answer is but deferred gratification of goods is not a hallmark of the US consumer the opposite in fact.....so the reality can't be ignored.....consumerism but more precisely over consumption is part of the zeitgeist here more so than anywhere else that I'm aware of.....Captain Chaos is going to find out at the ballot box how deeply cherished folks right to buy cheap crap is......I dont think we get there.....Donald knows the answer already.

[Xerxes]

5 minutes ago, Hektor said:

Would the monarchy/govt/people of UK sit on their hands IF this ever came to pass?

in what sense; are we taking about an actual military attack to overthrow Ottawa. That is highly unlikely. 
 

An actual submission by the people of Canada (also highly unlikely) to become part of United States has no bearing on the United Kingdoms. 
 

Except that the King will lose his part time job as a royal person. But nothing to do with UK. 
 

That said the more likely scenario is that United States will be violate Canadian sovereignty when it comes to North West Passage, our water, our air, our border. The usual run of the mill imperialist stuff that United States does when it feels throwing around it weight.