U.S. Politics

[StefanAVFC]

Yesterday I saw a right wing commentator call Obama left wing.

That was enough internet for the day.

[sheepyvillian]

Enough said!

[Genie]

He’ll probably do a photo op at a black church soon to secure the votes of both of groups at the same time. 

[choffer]

32 minutes ago, Genie said:

He’ll probably do a photoshop at a black church soon to secure the votes of both of groups at the same time. 

FTFY 

[OutByEaster?]

In terms of Trumps outstanding court payments, what's the likely timeline, what happens next, what should we look out for?

 

[nick76]

 

[nick76]

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

In terms of Trumps outstanding court payments, what's the likely timeline, what happens next, what should we look out for?

 

25th March is the big due date for the half billion dollar bond for appeal in NY.  Trump has got motions with the court about that because he can’t get the bond for the appeal because nobody will give him one.  So expect some court action later this week but unlikely the judge will give a leniency but not sure what the next level up would do.  I’m assuming he’s going to put up his money on the 25th, if not then James will start seizing assets and she is very eager to do that.  The next week is going to be fun.

[colhint]

I hope they go for Trump towers first. 

 

[bannedfromHandV]

3 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

In terms of Trumps outstanding court payments, what's the likely timeline, what happens next, what should we look out for?

 

A 60% sale on his sneakers range

[sidcow]

9 hours ago, delboy54 said:

I would like to change tack, I hope this is in the correct thread. This is my take on a potential future.

I work for an American faceless corporation and all they are interested in is "the bottom line", returns for shareholders I guess. They view their competitors as the enemy and will do anything to discredit and destroy them, they view it as a war without bullets and killing people.

Now expand this model to the wider picture. The EU is a competitor to the US, what better way to remove that "competitor" by allowing it to be destroyed by a non competitor I.e. by Russia both financially and materially. This will be done by the US disengaging from NATO and then stopping the supplying of Ukraine with weapons. First Ukraine will fall then the Baltic countries will get over run, Hungary will join Russia, then Poland will be absorbed again and then the dominos will fall. In my opinion Russia will not use nukes and the EU, well what is left of it, will not want to be seen as carrying out a first nuke strike. The European countries will be subsumed by Russia. It will be a blood bath and much hand wringing by the US, but they will be quietly happy as a competitor will have been removed.

After all, the US made a lot of money by sitting on the fence in the first and second world war before being forced into taking sides.

This is just my current pessimistic take on things, especially if Trump gets in again. The US will just sit back in splendid isolation and watch while Europe gets torn apart again.

I hope others on here can put a more optimistic spin on the next 25 years. Maybe the Villa might have beaten man yoo again by then or even the FA cup......

Well firstly in your analogy The EU is not simply a competitor, it's also an enormous customer. 

You'd be shooting yourself in the foot to deliberately **** up an enormous customer.

And in the same process strengthening an actual genuine competitor who is not a customer at all, of if it is, a tiny customer. 

But regardless of this I'm now certain Western Europe could defeat Russia without The USA anyway.  Taking Nukes out of the equation our weapons, training and tactics are so overwhelmingly superior it wouldn't even be a fair fight.

Before the invasion of Ukraine it was considered possible but unlikely Europe alone could defeat Russia, but I think a lot of home truths about Russia capability has come home to roost here.

Look at how the Russian Navy is being hit now.  Imagine the combined fleets of The Royal Navy, France, Italy, Spain, Germany etc steaming at them across the Mediterranean. 

Their Airforce is almost impotent right now.  Imagine hundreds of modern jet fighters from The RAF, France, Italy, Spain, Sweden etc flying sorties over their airspace supported by dozens of command aircraft.

Imagine the border with Ukraine seeing the full complement of Challangers, Leclercs, Leopards, Ariete, and various other countries tanks rolling towards it supported by well trained well equipped infantry. 

They wouldn't like it and it would be very painful and costly but I don't see Russia rolling over Europe at all. Not even close. 

Edited March 19 by sidcow

[ml1dch]

18 minutes ago, sidcow said:

You'd be shooting yourself in the foot to deliberately **** up an enormous customer.

[sidcow]

16 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

 

 

[il_serpente]

On 18/03/2024 at 12:36, Genie said:

They’re more than enough if they use Trump’s own valuations  

Only if they base it on the valuations he used to get loans.   If they base it on his declared valuations for tax purposes it's an entirely different story.

[il_serpente]

On 18/03/2024 at 12:42, Genie said:

Look at the motor industry, every single car maker on the planet has a live list of recalls for engineering mistakes. It’s nothing to do with quotas. It’s just an error somewhere with a set of assumptions and their design verification didn’t pick up the failure mode. When it’s a plane door it’s big news. 

Everyone here seems to be ignoring the fact that Boeing's door problem is not an engineering issue.   It's a manufacturing QC issue which, as has been pointed out, stems from cutting corners because of putting profits and share prices before quality.

[Genie]

17 minutes ago, il_serpente said:

Everyone here seems to be ignoring the fact that Boeing's door problem is not an engineering issue.   It's a manufacturing QC issue which, as has been pointed out, stems from cutting corners because of putting profits and share prices before quality.

What was the corner cutting? 

[sidcow]

1 minute ago, Genie said:

What was the corner cutting? 

The bolts weren't all/properly fitted which suggests a) whoever was tasked with fitting them was rushed and b) whatever checking / quality control features which 100% should be in place clearly weren't. 

Aerospace manufacturers SHOULD be subject to ultra cautious quality control with everything checked and re-checked. 

So something has gone very wrong which suggests cost cutting and suggests this has happened not only on the ground within the manual workforce doing the work and also at middle management level as no one is enforcing the procedures. 

All just assumptions on my behalf of course with no inside knowledge but that's what the circumstances suggest to me. 

[il_serpente]

23 hours ago, CVByrne said:

and you then resort to the old trope of making something up and applying it to my comments. I of course believe people should organise to further their own rights but like everything things can go to extremes. Take my cited example of forced DEI hiring by quotas (Amazon Prime and Disney full DEI rules available on internet). All the Reparations bills and demands. This is taking things to the extreme by labeling this all "positive" discriminating. 

ANY discrimination is wrong. It can only lead to bad things. People should be treated equally.

As Dr King Said - "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

All the Reparations bills?  Do you have a secret stash of them that none of the rest of us have seen?  I've seen a number of people propose reparations but am not aware of any actually going through a legistlature.   And there hasn't even been any serious proposal at the national level by an actual legislator.  This is just a further example of the false equivalency you're drawing between the extreme right and "the extreme left" and implying that any non-Republican is part of the extreme left.  The extreme right IS the Republican party given that Trump has even put his daugher-in-law in charge of the RNC.   The extreme left you talk about is a very small faction of the Democratic party.

Are you suggesting that King's quote proves he'd be opposed to reparations?  If so, I think you are way off the mark.  King's quote came at a time when he was dreaming about his kids not being lynched, being able to sit on the bus or at a lunch counter and not being relegated to substandard schools and medical facilities.  He was dreaming of something he had hope he could make a reality some day.   Reparations was so far beyond the initial steps he was working toward that the thought probably never entered his mind and he sure as hell wasn't stupid enough to waste his time pushing for it while he still had to stand at the back of the bus.

And, for the record, I don't consider talk of reparations to be extreme.  A group that makes up a significant portion of the US population continues to find itself in a much worse economic situation because of discrimination and injustices it suffered at the hands of the government despite this treatment being clearly in violation of the words of the constitution.   The racial group that controlled the levers of power (and still does, largely) is in a much better economic situation as a result of this mistreatment.   Is it so extreme to consider trying to offset the gap a tiny bit?   I know the argument that follows is "but I had nothing to do with that" or "my ancestors weren't racists or slave owners, etc.", but we have all benefitted from what was denied to blacks in this country, so we did have something to do with that.

 

[blandy]

28 minutes ago, il_serpente said:

Everyone here seems to be ignoring the fact that Boeing's door problem is not an engineering issue.   It's a manufacturing QC issue which, as has been pointed out, stems from cutting corners because of putting profits and share prices before quality.

The door problem was a build quality and QC issue, absolutely. The previous issue, with the flight control computer causing sudden dives and 2 crashes. That was a design and engineering and safety analysis and corporate culture and … issue. And much much worse.

Also, in aircraft manufacturing putting profits and share price before quality is a complete, day 1, absolute no no and is or should be completely obviously a false assertion anyway. There’s nothing that hits profits and reputation and share prices like crashed airliners and dead passengers and crew.

To stay on topic, the US political culture of both parties has always been very protective of big American companies and always sought to use them as part of wider American policy. “Soft control and influence”, if you like.  Over time Boeing, in this example, almost became part of the state and that’s an enormously dangerous thing, because that broke the model of external, independent, safety oversight.

[Seat68]

I think I trust Blandy on this one. 

[blandy]

21 minutes ago, sidcow said:

The bolts weren't all/properly fitted which suggests a) whoever was tasked with fitting them was rushed and b) whatever checking / quality control features which 100% should be in place clearly weren't. 

Aerospace manufacturers SHOULD be subject to ultra cautious quality control with everything checked and re-checked. 

So something has gone very wrong which suggests cost cutting and suggests this has happened not only on the ground within the manual workforce doing the work and also at middle management level as no one is enforcing the procedures. 

All just assumptions on my behalf of course with no inside knowledge but that's what the circumstances suggest to me. 

Rushed, or ill trained, or careless, or tired, or slapdash, or …

Weren’t in place does not seem credible. Weren’t followed seems certain.

It does not suggest cost cutting, it suggests (to me) an absence of safety culture, or a workforce that is extremely disgruntled to the extent that it, or some of it, has become lax, negligent, slapdash, whatever you want to call it.