Donald Trump the Megathread part II - mod warnings in OP, Updated 18/03/25

He left early too probably because the MAGA team were getting a shallacking.

MAGA were big mad at the half time show also.

Bad day all around for them.

I can appreciate that Trump needs to be “seen” to be doing things in his first 100 days- I get that. Is it wishful thinking that this will settle down in say 6 months time? Placing the markets in turmoil with the aluminium tariffs seems a daft move and medium term trust will be eroded -tit/tat tariffs from other countries on US exports etc leading to stagnation - no winners and a lot of losses.

It suits Trumps base support and popularity to announce all of this but when Americans start hurting in a few months time it’s not going to be pleasant - if you ramp up production basing the market on the new tarries what happens when they’re negotiated downwards even 1 year later? US Companies will fold in debt and job losses - I’m all for disruption where progress is achieved but this is simple protectionism that is anything but stable.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/09/trump-steel-aluminum-tariffs

Israel (mainly with US weapons) destroyed Gaza

I never called it a plan- I called it a stance

I don’t see it settling down because he’s not really doing anything apart from signing a bunch of executive orders. He has no interest in going through proper channels to try and enact legislation, because that’s too much like work. The bonus for him is that he looks busy and the sheer volume of things he’s trying to do makes it difficult for opposition to block it effectively.

So I would expect it to continue - more tariffs out of nowhere, more unconstitutional executive orders, more access for Elon to do whatever he likes within the government. The moment he settles down is the moment he gives the opportunity for the democrats to get their shít together. And the reality is that he has an industry of people putting it all together, so all he has to do is sign a few things, make a few speeches and play a hell of a lot of golf.

In the American context I think it is fairly easy to determine where at least a significant portion of the population thinks it went too far when you look at the actions the Trump administration have taken. Hiring targets is obviously one. I can't say for sure what the author of the piece had in her mind without rereading it. I'll try to find it again, but a lot has been written in the last week.

The pendulum will swing too far back the other way now.

Insulting people who take an opposing viewpoint won't change any minds by the way.

Equality in employment is the word. Using "traits" as a reason to deny some-one a job over some-one you feel is more able says a lot.

Give him time, he's only a month into the job. Musk hasn't got into his stride yet on cost-cutting returns to the taxpayer and recipients of federal tax dollars.

Taylor Swift going out with a Kansas City player booed by the opposing fans who would have guesssed

Trump is proposing a 25% tarrif on steel (and aluminium), but I have a vague memory of reading something to the effect that US steel is not the same as steel from other places and is not suited to some uses, so that could create some issues, if I have it correctly.

Edit. No, it appears I am wrong, the difference is that US steel is more expensive because of environmental and labour requirements. So Trump could easily deal with that.

Anti-discrimination legislation has been around for decades - it then moved towards targets and quotas simply because whilst companies may have complied with this legislation it didn’t necessarily mean greater opportunities for minorities and disadvantaged materialised -ie they got an interview but never got a job sorrta thing -which I think then led it down this path.

Whilst it has brought great improvement in terms of respect at work culture which was well needed, I think it became overly complicated - you don’t need to employ a bunch of fulltime staff banging this drum - it should become business as usual and instead became a very complicated and quite a confrontational and aggressive industry- I’ve known of very experienced senior managers very well read on this area corrected by young upstarts at meetings over maybe a debatable mis-use of a word, and I’m not talking pronouns here either - it needs to settle down a bit and find its equilibrium.

Most powerful man in the world.

Emasculated by a female pop star half his age.

Particularly with his USAID shuttering and his tariffs lark, he really has opened the door for Russia and China to strengthen relationships. They must look at posts of his like that and literally rub their hands in glee.

This was after Jan 6th, irrespective of the banners in the back in the first image. I knew then we were in trouble.

What's that real Christians say about Worshiping False Gods?