Trump's Second Term

Trump phone fails to appear:
 
Republican Senator Ron Johnson apparently didn't get the memo, and speaks truth:

Senate Republican: ‘We can’t afford’ $2,000 tariff checks

Republican Sen. Ron Johnson (Wis.), a leading fiscal hawk in the Senate, says the country “can’t afford” President Trump’s proposal to send out $2,000 tariff “dividend” checks to working-class Americans to help them afford higher living expenses.

“Look, we can’t afford it. I wish we were in a position to return the American public their money, but we’re not,” Johnson told Fox Business’s Maria Bartiromo.

“We’ll have at least a $2 trillion deficit this year,” Johnson warned, comparing the staggering national deficit projected for 2025 to smaller deficits under former President Obama and during Trump’s first term.

But somehow, this is all Biden's fault, no doubt.
 
So “Captain” Kelly, not only did your sedition video intentionally undercut good order & discipline…but you can’t even display your uniform correctly.

Your medals are out of order & rows reversed. When/if you are recalled to active duty, it’ll start with a uniform inspection.

Yeah, I'm sure these will make you real popular amongst soldiers, Pete, keep it up !
 
Oh, dear. Women can't compete unless we lower the bar.
Another old post, and yet another idiotic right wing myth I would like to dispel:

This is now 2025. The population of the United States, and that of the world at large, if a hell of a lot larger than ever before. And careers change a hell of a lot faster than ever before. Do you know how many applicants an open position receives? Hundreds, if not thousands, depending upon the position and the location. Even in my small-town little area, a small business could receive dozens, if not hundreds, of applicants.

Statistical rules are a major factor here: The more chances you are given, the more likely you will receive a positive outcome. In this case, a business or government agency hiring for an open position with hundreds of applicants, will ALWAYS receive MULTIPLE qualified applicants, and from multiple different backgrounds. All it comes down to, is how diversified you want your business to be.

Now, as a sports fan, a baseball fan most especially, I can absolutely assure you, 100%, that if you think you can successfully run a sports franchise with players and coaches all with exactly the same skill sets and background, you WILL fail. Guaranteed. 100%. You will fail. Period. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it. A football team full of quarterbacks will lose pretty much every single game. If they're all running backs, guess what? They'll lose!

Skill sets are a product of nurture vs. nature. Yes, skills may come naturally. But you need to work on those skills. How you were raised, as well as the culture you were raised in, will also have some say in whether you actually develop your natural inclinations or not. Prime example:

I am naturally inclined towards studying and loving history and sports. But I was raised in a middle class, Catholic, Italian American household in north central PA. History was scoffed at by those around me, and so, I was deterred away from fully developing that interest. Sports were praised, but I destroyed my ankle as a young teenager playing baseball (my twin brother did me in on a hit and run play when he hit the ball which caught my ankle on a grass cutting line drive. That, and as decent as I was, I was probably never going to be a professional anyway.) I now drive a truck OTR as my source of income. At the age of 42, I am saving towards getting a degree in history and working towards teaching high school or something. But anyway, my point is this:

Diversity. Matters. Period. It just does. A poor black kid from the 'hood in York, PA (a more dangerous city than Chicago BTW!) has a completely different experience from a rich white boy from Beverly Hills. Poor black boys from York can develop their skills, and they often do, in order to meet the standard qualifications for any open position. My case-in-point:

A guy I once went to school with at the Art Institute of York, let's call him Brian. This dude was a mortally obese, poor black guy from Queen St. in the city of York, PA. He weighed over 400 lbs at his heaviest, and grew up with gunfire and gang warfare outside of his window on occassion. His parents never owned any of the houses they lived in. Always had to rent.

Now? The guy is down to 220, built like a body builder, can lift 300 lbs, works for Microsoft as a UX designer, and was moved to Germany where he has also picked up a second language. He is influential enough with his team as a leader, bringing his experiences from the mean streets of York, Pennsylvania, and uses his experience as inspiration for literally everyone around him. His design concepts are influenced by his past experiences. The diverse set of skills and experiences that Microsoft is able to hire and bring to bear, is what makes it a highly successful company. One of the most successful brands on the face of the planet.

Google is an even better example of this, as Google really purposely went completely out of their way to ensure even more creative, outside-the-box thinking and completely diversified in their workforce. They definitely do NOT lower the bar just to diversify, and it is painfully obvious that they don't. You cannot argue with the results of one of the biggest and most instantly recognizable brands on the face of planet earth, worth billions of dollars, now can you?
 
Pete Hegseth
@PeteHegseth
The despicable video urging @DeptofWar troops to “refuse illegal orders” may seem harmless to civilians — but it carries a different weight inside the military.

This was a politically-motivated influence operation:

☑️ It never named a specific “illegal order.”
☑️ It created ambiguity rather than clarity.
☑️ It used carefully scripted, legal-sounding language.
☑️ It subtly reframed military obedience around partisan distrust instead of established legal processes.

In the military, vague rhetoric and ambiguity undermines trust, creates hesitation in the chain of command, and erodes cohesion.

The military already has clear procedures for handling unlawful orders. It does not need political actors injecting doubt into an already clear chain of command.

As veterans of various sorts, the Seditious Six knew exactly what they were doing — sowing doubt through a politically-motivated influence operation. The @DeptofWar won’t fall for it or stand for it.

 
Another old post, and yet another idiotic right wing myth I would like to dispel:

<snipped for space only, not the fine content....>

Google is an even better example of this, as Google really purposely went completely out of their way to ensure even more creative,
outside-the-box thinking and completely diversified in their workforce. They definitely do NOT lower the bar just to diversify, and it is painfully obvious that they don't. You cannot argue with the results of one of the biggest and most instantly recognizable brands on the face of planet earth, worth billions of dollars, now can you?
I think the underlying problem is here. We live on faith and fables and labels, ruled by playground bullies who yell names and pundits whose wisdom distills to "because." There's a right way and a wrong way to do things. It says so right on the box.
 
I wasn't really sure if this should go in the leopards eating faces or this thread, so I'll just post it here:

A majority of Latinos disapprove of Donald Trump and his economic and immigration policies, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center.

After receiving support from nearly half of Latino voters in the 2024 election, Trump had lost the backing of a majority surveyed in October. Pew found that 70% of Latinos “disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as president”, while 65% disapprove of his administration’s approach to immigration and 61% believe his economic policies have worsened economic conditions.

Trump won 48% of the Latino vote in 2024, up from 28% in 2016.

In the wise words of me, "No ◊◊◊◊?". Who would have thought that the guy that ◊◊◊◊◊ on the Latino population every chance he gets would, somehow, be a terrible POTUS for that same aforementioned demographic? I never understood how he got 20% more of the vote in the first place, but I'm kind of surprised that the Latino population didn't see this coming. Mind boggling.
 

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