Trump's Policies Part 2

[Huckleberry]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1897350008019804461

Lutnick: Tariffs are going to drive America better.. Wouldn't it be amazing to stop paying taxes to the internal revenue service and have the external revenue service of make America great again replace our taxes? That is the goal of Donald Trump.

 

[Huckleberry]

Larry Summers Thinks Trump’s Tariffs Are a Disaster

The former Treasury secretary says: ‘I have never seen as irrational a consequential policy put in place by an American administration.’

www.thefp.com

Larry Summers Thinks Trump’s Tariffs Are a Disaster

The former Treasury secretary says: ‘I have never seen as irrational a consequential policy put in place by an American administration.’

 

[arthurdawg]

Once drugs go off patent then anyone with the capacity and funds can step in and compete. Then the only way to make money is to produce it cheaper then everyone else, either through lower labor costs or extreme automation advantages. American companies don't like to compete in markets where the cheapest supplier wins. They would rather cede that market to India or China, as you mentioned, and concentrate on those drugs still under patent.

Exactly... the problem comes when that one factory is found to be full of contaminated product and we can't get essential agents. It would be nice to have the ability to produce these agents here.

We had a shortage of one ancient chemo agent that is used curatively in testicular cancer and Hodgkin's lymphoma a few years back... We had a drug to sub fortunately, and it probably made no difference or even improved outcomes, but we did not have definitive studies to support its usage. And lots of workhorse agents used in the hospital have been off patent for years. Nice to get them at low cost, but not so nice when you can't get them at any cost.

 

[crimsonaudio]

Exactly... the problem comes when that one factory is found to be full of contaminated product and we can't get essential agents. It would be nice to have the ability to produce these agents here.

We had a shortage of one ancient chemo agent that is used curatively in testicular cancer and Hodgkin's lymphoma a few years back... We had a drug to sub fortunately, and it probably made no difference or even improved outcomes, but we did not have definitive studies to support its usage. And lots of workhorse agents used in the hospital have been off patent for years. Nice to get them at low cost, but not so nice when you can't get them at any cost.

I can just imagine a hot war with China where suddenly huge swaths of needed drugs are unavailable.

 

[2003TIDE]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1897350008019804461

Lutnick: Tariffs are going to drive America better.. Wouldn't it be amazing to stop paying taxes to the internal revenue service and have the external revenue service of make America great again replace our taxes? That is the goal of Donald Trump.

That is the dumbest bunch of crap I've ever heard and if you believe tariffs are going to replace federal income taxes i have some beachfront property in Nevada to sell you.

Edit - Not that anyone here is going to read this since yall have it all figured out, but I'll link it anyway

https://www.piie.com/blogs/realtime-economics/2024/can-trump-replace-income-taxes-tariffs

Simply put, no. Tariffs are levied on imported goods, which totaled $3.1 trillion in 2023. The income tax is levied on incomes, which exceed $20 trillion; the US government raises about $2 trillion in individual and corporate income taxes at present. It is literally impossible for tariffs to fully replace income taxes. Tariff rates would have to be implausibly high on such a small base of imports to replace the income tax, and as tax rates rose, the base itself would shrink as imports fall, making Trump’s $2 trillion goal unattainable.

 

[Huckleberry]

The cruelty is the point. All of the Trump pressure is being placed on Ukraine, even after Zelenskyy’s comments about negotiating peace.

 

[JDCrimson]

I don't know what path we are on but I don't think it's the right one.

 

[CrimsonNagus]

As long as it takes to make sure we're handing our kids and grandkids a more stable economy. Someone is going to feel the pain of austerity and moves to rebuild American's manufacturing prowess, especially in areas of national security. Might as well be us as we know full well the previous generations didn't care enough to bite the proverbial bullet.

If these moves mean leaving future generations an America that is able to withstand / avoid foreign threats while being more financially solvent, I'm here for it. Fixing decades of shortcuts and fiscal sloth will take time and will be painful, but someone has to do it.

I'd much rather die poor knowing I tried to help upcoming generations than die wealthy knowing I did nothing but trade my kids' future for comfort now.

Well good for you.

I am not willing to be sent to the poor house by these idiots in DC. Why is it always the middle and lower classes that DC targets? Why are we the ones that have to feel the pain instead of the stuck up elite who hoard everything at the top? Billionaires like Trump and Musk ain't feeling no pain. Strike at them for a change, especially the top 1%. They could foot the bill for most of this crap and still not feel a pinch, but let's keep making it harder on those of us with little. That makes sense.

I will never vote for this type of mindset and I'm pretty confident that most voters will reject it as well. We will see in 2 years if the GOP hold onto their seats when Trump's policies send prices soaring and people are losing their jobs.

 

[2003TIDE]

Well good for you.

I am not willing to be sent to the poor house by these idiots in DC. Why is it always the middle and lower classes that DC targets?

Glance at the link i posted above on the concept of replacing income tax with tariffs. It is basically just a regressive tax that will redistibute even more wealth to the 1%. He is trying to push us back to late 1800's US economy lead by the Robber barrons. Why would anyone want that?

 

[crimsonaudio]

Well good for you.

I am not willing to be sent to the poor house by these idiots in DC. Why is it always the middle and lower classes that DC targets? Why are we the ones that have to feel the pain instead of the stuck up elite who hoard everything at the top? Billionaires like Trump and Musk ain't feeling no pain. Strike at them for a change, especially the top 1%. They could foot the bill for most of this crap and still not feel a pinch, but let's keep making it harder on those of us with little. That makes sense.

I want everyone to feel it if anyone does. I'm a middle-class guy, I've felt the financial overreach of government as much as anyone over the last few decades.

But if we don't try to stop it, we're just doing the same thing we've blamed the Boomers for - leveraging the future for our own comfort and kicking the can down the road.

I will never vote for this type of mindset and I'm pretty confident that most voters will reject it as well. We will see in 2 years if the GOP hold onto their seats when Trump's policies send prices soaring and people are losing their jobs.

I suspect few voters are willing to give up comforts to help future generations - that's precisely why we're $36 trillion in debt and climbing.

 

[rjtide]

Well good for you.

I am not willing to be sent to the poor house by these idiots in DC. Why is it always the middle and lower classes that DC targets? Why are we the ones that have to feel the pain instead of the stuck up elite who hoard everything at the top? Billionaires like Trump and Musk ain't feeling no pain. Strike at them for a change, especially the top 1%. They could foot the bill for most of this crap and still not feel a pinch, but let's keep making it harder on those of us with little. That makes sense.

I will never vote for this type of mindset and I'm pretty confident that most voters will reject it as well. We will see in 2 years if the GOP hold onto their seats when Trump's policies send prices soaring and people are losing their jobs.

i get it. but dammit man we are $36 TRILLION dollars in debt......even if we raised the top marginal tax rate to 90% for the richest 1% that generates about $1 TRILLION over the next 10 years. the country is on a fiscal path to serious trouble if the federal government does not lower its spending. and i ain't mad at ya at all.....just sayin i agree with your take that we dont need tax cuts for the top 1-3 percenters....we dont need tax cuts for anybody......if anything raise taxes on everybody by 2-3% and CUT total government spending by 10-12%

 

[Bamabuzzard]

Same thing with all the money they are shorting farmers. If funding was already approved, and the farmers were told that, pay them then discontinue the program if that is what you want to do.

This is what needs to be done with all of these cuts they are doing. I have zero problem (as you know) with making cuts. But there's a right way and a wrong way to do it. There are people (good people) who have already committed resources to contracts and are depending on that money. Currently, contracts should be honored, and then that particular program should be discontinued afterward. Or buyout the contract so the person who entered it in good faith doesn't end up losing his/her business because they're already financially knee deep in it. I think it is crappy how they're doing a lot of these cuts.

 

[crimsonaudio]

Attorney General Andrew Bailey: I am demanding the DOJ investigated whether President Biden’s cognitive decline allowed unelected staff to push through radical policy without his knowing approval. If true, these executive orders, pardons, and all other actions are unconstitutional and legally void.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1897388657557885403

 

[spidermayin]

View attachment 49618
The cruelty is the point. All of the Trump pressure is being placed on Ukraine, even after Zelenskyy’s comments about negotiating peace.

Donald Trump is a cancer to this country that's only going to hurt us in the long run. People in here screaming about how far we are in debt, guess what? We'll be in more debt after his four years even with your precious DOGE cutting all this "federal waste". What alot of people see as "waste", I see some of it as very important, like medical research. Thankfully, a federal judge blocked it. That begs the question, if Trump had absolute power with no checks at all, how much damage could he do?

Federal judge blocks drastic funding cuts to medical research

A federal judge is preventing the Trump administration from drastically cutting medical research funding.

apnews.com

 

[rjtide]

Donald Trump is a cancer to this country that's only going to hurt us in the long run. People in here screaming about how far we are in debt, guess what? We'll be in more debt after his four years even with your precious DOGE cutting all this "federal waste". What alot of people see as "waste", I see some of it as very important, like medical research. Thankfully, a federal judge blocked it. That begs the question, if Trump had absolute power with no checks at all, how much damage could he do?

Federal judge blocks drastic funding cuts to medical research

A federal judge is preventing the Trump administration from drastically cutting medical research funding.

apnews.com

NIH funding for true benchtop and clinical research is NOT waste. Matter of fact it should be encouraged. Claiming 50% indirect OVERHEAD cost tied to research IS waste. Anyone who thinks more than 20-25% overhead is needed for NIH sponsored research is out of his/her mind imo.

 

[2003TIDE]

i get it. but dammit man we are $36 TRILLION dollars in debt......even if we raised the top marginal tax rate to 90% for the richest 1% that generates about $1 TRILLION over the next 10 years. the country is on a fiscal path to serious trouble if the federal government does not lower its spending. and i ain't mad at ya at all.....just sayin i agree with your take that we dont need tax cuts for the top 1-3 percenters....we dont need tax cuts for anybody......if anything raise taxes on everybody by 2-3% and CUT total government spending by 10-12%

My problem with all this is nothing is big picture, and I don't really think the GOP wants to do anything to fix it and they are really just doing all this now to show "savings" to justify more tax cuts (which as you say is the last thing we need.) It would be pretty easy to balance the budget if they really wanted to without blowing up the economy like this.

 

[rjtide]

My problem with all this is nothing is big picture, and I don't really think the GOP wants to do anything to fix it and they are really just doing all this now to show "savings" to justify more tax cuts (which as you say is the last thing we need.) It would be pretty easy to balance the budget if they really wanted to without blowing up the economy like this.

yes......VERY FEW in dc (maybe 5%) want to cut down on spending......b/c their salaries depend on federal spending. hence the all the decades of ongoing spending on so much defense, NGOs etc.

 

[2003TIDE]

yes......VERY FEW in dc (maybe 5%) want to cut down on spending......b/c their salaries depend on federal spending. hence the all the decades of ongoing spending on so much defense, NGOs etc.

Well that and they are beholden to their corporate donors (both R's and D's.). We really need to undo citizens.

We can't fix the root cause and not hurt corporate profits so we just try and fix the symptom and pretend we did something. A perfect example is health and healthcare in the US. We pushing 20% of GDP on healthcare spending in the US. We spent $4.9T in 2024. The US government spent $1.9T of that. Why not try and reduce spending by addressing why costs are so high vs just cutting programs and making people suffer and or die? Europe averages around 10% of GDP and a lot of those countries have higher life expectancies than the US. If we could be at 10% that is almost a Trillion dollars right there without making a single cut.

On the revenue side if we let all the Trump tax cuts expire that will increase revenue ~$600B a year. So between that healthcare you've made it probably 2/3's of the way through the 1.83T deficit without a single program cut.

 

[Bodhisattva]

yes......VERY FEW in dc (maybe 5%) want to cut down on spending......b/c their salaries depend on federal spending. hence the all the decades of ongoing spending on so much defense, NGOs etc.

I see this firsthand every day. Find something to spend money on. And after you do that, find some more. Mission creep is not an accident; it's a pillar of every government office. And it costs trillions of dollars.

 

[2003TIDE]

I see this firsthand every day. Find something to spend money on. And after you do that, find some more. Mission creep is not an accident; it's a pillar of every government office. And it costs trillions of dollars.

What do you think the legitimate fix is here? I imagine a lot of spend it or lose it next year going on. You think just mandating a 5% reduction or whatever across all agencies would work?

Again I don't agree with what and how DOGE is doing things, but I do agree we need to cut things. it seems like if you tell the agencies to cut 5% they would know the best parts to trim for the least amt of pain.