Trump - The positives - (see Mod note in OP)

Fr Tod Umptious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079802#Comment_123079802

The idea that Trump has brought one of the best businessmen in the world into a Government department with a remit for efficiency and the powers to implement them is something I can see being copied globally over the next few years. There are a lot of votes to be had and a lot of money could be saved in something like that.

We always hear that in Ireland when people say "Michael O Leary should be minister for finance"

It's far from that simple.

p15574

The MAGAts who elected him are delusional. Trump is all about corruption and grifting for the rich, but the common people who voted for him will never see any benefits. Listening to them being interviewed on the radio yesterday, a number of them complained about inflation, but inflation is currently very low in the States. They just believe whatever lies Trump tells them. The same with tariffs, they think it's a magical solution, not copping on that it'll just make everything more expensive for them. Deporting illegal immigrants? Yes, they'll clamp down on it but it'll be more for show and will taper off after a while.

OK, the price of things has increased since COVID alright, but that was a worldwide thing, not just the States, and they're not going to go down - once prices ratchet up, they're staying there.

Sam Russell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079863#Comment_123079863

There was a time when there was a call for Seanie Fitzpatrick [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Se%C3%A1n_FitzPatrick] should be given a position in Gov because his obvious business acumen. It never happened, and Anglo Irish Bank cost the country and the Irish people billions.

Trump is a convicted felon, a failed businessman with many bankruptcy behind him, and many many failed legal cases.

I cannot see any positives for his term as President.

jimmycrackcorm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079605#Comment_123079605

According to the NY times also, America needs more migrants

https://www.google.com/url?immigrantssa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjam86A24aLAxU0W0EAHcrUES4QwqsBegQIDhAF&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DII1JGgWAopo&usg=AOvVaw3GdJGO2SU-e_frQemxYZBf&opi=89978449

Bidens record on deportations was higher than under Trump

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiStoac24aLAxUtW0EAHfPFMrUQFnoECCYQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fnews%2Farticles%2Fc36e41dx425o&usg=AOvVaw0vp5Foyy-LgYcQgBDSNn8H&opi=89978449

Regardless, Trumps focus on immigrants is no different than in the 1930's when Hitler blamed the Jews for all of Germanys problems.

After all it isn't immigrants that are going around doing school shootings.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080094#Comment_123080094

America is literally built on perpetual immigration. If it ever stops, vast swathes of the country will wither and die. The guff about deportations is just red meat for the base. It stops anyone from having to think too much about actual problems.

The Phantom Jipper

By all accounts, syphilis and gonorrhea are the main ones

Geuze

Positives

(1) dealing with illegal immigration. Hopefully the Irish people and Govt get the message that we don't have to be beholden to "international obligations", and that we can and should take swift action to prevent illegal immigration

(2) scrapping DEI initiatives

Negatives (many of these)

(1) tariffs - protectionism - possibility of trade wars

(2) tax cuts for high earners, with no efforts to reduce the budget deficit

(3) reform of Corporation Tax, to pull more profits back to USA, might lead to a fall in our CT receipts

(4) on-shoring, possible less expansion of US MNC in Ireland, as they are encouraged to expand in USA instead

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079802#Comment_123079802

Nobody in Ireland pays 50% effective income tax rate.

You may face a marginal rate of about 50% on extra earnings, but you do not pay 50% on all your earnings.

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080130#Comment_123080130

Trump has stated he wants to increase legal immigration, but reduce illegal immigration.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080171#Comment_123080171

What did he do last time?

Donald Trump

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080171#Comment_123080171

Sounds a bit Brexiteer-y. Don't think it worked out too well for them over there. Sounded good at the time to many though

Eclectic Econometrics

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080130#Comment_123080130

I think he will increase deportations, by how much and where is the unknown. I noticed the first target was Chicago. What will be interesting is if he ever targets rural areas that then impacts agrarian industries. Or if the deportations rise to the level that affects construction. I agree with you that it is most likely red meat but can't call it for sure.

I will check out your book recommendation above. I know you follow UK politics, too. I would recommend reading Fall Out. It is from Tim Shipman, don't judge it on that. It is surprisingly pretty balanced and a decent book.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080230#Comment_123080230

It's perfectly possible that he will. My concern is that there are whole parts of that country built on it. People who say they want legal immigration usually mean that they want none. Just my experience.

I'm well familiar with Shipman's work. I'm on Out, his finale now!

taratee

Because they believe that they'll have more money in their pockets under a Trump presidency. I think that is the main reason.

scrabtom

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079659#Comment_123079659

Yes, I did.

He has done many more things which are negative even in his first day in office alone.

• Leaving the Paris Climate Accords.
• Leaving the WHO.
• Ending remote working for all federal employees.
• Pardoning the January 6th whackos.
• Shutting down legal pathways for refugees.
• Removed the necessity for vetting White House appointments before the receive security clearance.
• Repealing regulations on emissions from cars.
• Ending the leasing of federal waters for off-shore windfarms.
• Pause the Tik-Tok ban.
• Renamed the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.

He is a loon. It's hard to define what common sense is, but it's certain that he lacks it.

*That list is just things he has already done.

volchitsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079475#Comment_123079475

On his first day he’s saved women’s sports from men.

This was entirely an own goal from the Democrats though. I can't understand how they couldn't see that destroying the whole concept of a female category in sports on the basis of some men having what they imagine to be womanly thoughts and feelings was going to be harmful to women. I can only assume that they didn't think it through, and/or that women's needs just weren't all important to them.

As for prisons, well the idea that convicted rapists would be too principled to abusively declare themselves to be women so as to be put in a women's prison surrounded by vulnerable women is so naive that I can only assume that it was a choice by the people who support it, who just have different priorities than me, and that protection of women is low on their list.

I don't think anyone believes that Trump cares about women, but in practice, he has been handed this by the Democrats. Such a pity.

He’s designated illegal immigrant gangs as terrorists.

This is an interesting one. Does this not mean that people from Central America will be able to claim asylum from terrorism fairly easily? If so, I'd say this has the possibility to become Trump's equivalent to the Dems' determination to rewrite Title IX to include males in female sport.

scrabtom

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080094#Comment_123080094

I think they probably do need migrants, but the policy they had of getting those migrants from unprocessed illegal immigrants was not the right way to do it.

Above all else it just really pisses people off and drives them towards the right.

I agree wholeheartedly that the USA has bigger problems, but that doesn't mean this isn't a problem too.

FishOnABike

"No." is a complete sentence.

Bishop of hope

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080369#Comment_123080369

OK, Fair comment and from your perspective looney stuff and I see where you're coming from.

But from his and many many Americans he basically doing a brexit from the world and is turning America into a country answerable only to itself for its policies. It was his selling point and his winning of the election.

To me, dangerous is how I'd describe him not a loon.

dulpit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079802#Comment_123079802

Taxes are important for the government to provide things for the whole society. In general, European countries recognise this. In the States, the individual is more important that the society, that was my point. Trump targets those people who are, in essence, selfish.

(also - I'm also on the higher band of tax and don't mind paying it. According to Social Justice Ireland after the 2024 budget - i.e. the budget for 2024 that was annoucned in November 2023 - the effective tax rate of somebody €120k is 39% if single, less if a couple).

j62

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123079465#Comment_123079465

That’s not true tho

He said he wanted to ban TicToc only to do a complete u-turn

He said he will “lock her up” yet sat next to her recently

He said he will build a wall only to fail to do so

And so on

AnnieinDundrum

I understand the economic short term imperative regarding fuel costs but oil and other fossil fuels are not sustainable and will cause even more climate change and even more climate refugees.

How can anyone see this an acceptable course of action and support a president with these views

j62

Trump is 78 years old, be 82 by time he’s done (assuming he doesn’t rip up constitution and crown himself king)

Climate change is not something he cares about, refugees is something he thinks his wall would stop

And apparently all the young people who voted in droves from Trump don’t care either

Kaybaykwah

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080523#Comment_123080523

Elon does. The whole idea is to convert his electric cars into internal combustion engines. lol

Potatoeman

The people that don’t like him or conservative politics are just as ideologically driven or even more than the people they criticise. He won a landslide victory just like Obama. Are all the people that voted for both now all racists, as that’s what the loons are saying now.

Here we have seen a massive shift of the public’s view on migration too. The democrats really lost the run of themselves with open boarders and soft on crime. People overlook the impact that migrant crime has on politics. They seem to think Trump is far right, he’s not the ADF in Germany are far right and polling at 30% of German voters. What we hear over here is an echo chamber of the left in the US, the media here and there are completely out of touch with the public.

Trumps biggest advantage as a leader is that’s he’s unpredictable and won’t be pushed around. Which unfortunately for Biden is exactly what happened to him, he was seen as weak and unwilling to use the stick. It looks like Trump will end both the Ukrainian and Israeli war, is that so bad? These are going on far too long and impacting global trade.

ancapailldorcha

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080523#Comment_123080523

Easy. They don't care. They'll start when it affects them but at that point, it'll be far too late. It's like the anti-vaxxers who would ask for the vaccine while on a ventilator.

MrMusician18

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080369#Comment_123080369

What's interesting is that in the items in that list nearly none could be considered active actions - they are all leave, remove repeal.

Lots of tearing down which is easy. Little by way of building up, which is more difficult.

Potatoeman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080523#Comment_123080523

The majority of the world’s fertiliser is a byproduct of gas production. So you shouldn’t get rid of natural gas. The farmers protests in Europe were over an EU mandate to reduce the amount of fertilisers used in agricultural by 50%. Now what idiot thought this was a good idea. We should be tapping into our gas reserves and diversifying our energy infrastructure. We are still buying energy from abroad, not exploiting our natural resources and importing it from abroad is worse than extracting it ourselves.

Sleepy

The only positive I can see is that he's likely to be so corrupt, so ineffective as a leader and so utterly damaging to the US economy and the average American worker that he may end up acting as an inocculation against the Republican Party and lead to a Democrat swing to the left or the AOC / Sanders wing of the party splitting off to form of a third social democratic political party in the US.

The bi-party system is the root of so many of the US's problems. It's effectively lead to voters having to choose between Right Wing politicians that appear to have some semblence of a conciensce when it comes to social issues (but are too greedy/corrupt to actually fund obvious solutions to those issues via universal healthcare and a decent social security net) or further to the right lunatics with fascistic and theocratic tendencies.

With the dismantling of their system of checks and balances, Trump has been given carte blanche to behave as he likes, to steal, embezzle and persecute. Hopefully his doing so will open the eyes of the angry young men that played a big part in electing him. That demographic will be even more important in 2028 as rather a lot of Trump's support base will have died off through age, poor personal choices and the horror show of the American health system.

So, to summarise: the only possiblle positive I can see from a Trump presidency is him being so horrendously bad at it that it could finally help the average American see that that socialism isn't a four letter word and that the billionaire tech-bros don't have their best interest at heart.

AnnieinDundrum

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123080904#Comment_123080904

I wasn’t talking about Ireland.

we, all humans, need to move away from using fossil fuels full stop and find new ways to generate energy and not mock wind farms (can’t watch TV Gladys as it’s not windy) and if that means we need to find new fertilisers as well then we need to research that.

we are burning the entire world. Everyone has to play a part and seeing a world leader mock any efforts to do this is sickening.