• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Trump's Second Term

carlosy said:
...He was ordered to pay 83.3 Million to E. Jean Carroll. How much of it has he paid so far?
Click to expand...
So far? $0.00. The verdict has been under appeal, though trump has lost every appeal. The latest loss was before a three judge panel of the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, which dismissed his appeal -- trump was appealing the denial of an earlier appeal by the same court -- on July 10, 2025
A federal appeals court on Thursday formally closed out President Trump’s appeal of a jury’s verdict finding him liable of sexually abusing and defaming writer E. Jean Carroll. The Hill article link
Click to expand...

However -- and this is a BIG however -- the Court of Appeals gave trump's legal team 90-days to file an appeal with the United States Supreme Court. How that may play out no one knows.
 
Last edited:
jimbob said:
Meanwhile this will help (destroy) the US foreign tourism business.

Click to expand...
They are trying to harass all the cross-border workers and visitors on the Mexican border. So not just harassing the "illegal" brown people, also the "legal" brown people.

And as a potential US visitor myself, paying US$500 extra for my wife and I to visit is effectively adding 50% to the airfare. So even if the USA was not being destroyed by a fascist cabal, travelling somewhere else becomes a far more attractive option financially.
 
Norman Alexander said:
They are trying to harass all the cross-border workers and visitors on the Mexican border. So not just harassing the "illegal" brown people, also the "legal" brown people.

And as a potential US visitor myself, paying US$500 extra for my wife and I to visit is effectively adding 50% to the airfare. So even if the USA was not being destroyed by a fascist cabal, travelling somewhere else becomes a far more attractive option financially.
Click to expand...
AIUI, the feeling only applies to non-immigrant visas. The UK and Australia are part of a visa waiver program so so fees would be required for visits covered by the visa waiver.
 
The Don said:
AIUI, the feeling only applies to non-immigrant visas. The UK and Australia are part of a visa waiver program so so fees would be required for visits covered by the visa waiver.
Click to expand...
The visa waiver is actually a 90-day tourist visa. Or maybe 60 days, I can't remember, it's been 10 years since we last went. It just means we don't have to go to a USA consulate here and get a physical visa page stuck in our passports, at our cost. Our passports are our "visas" on arrival. This new $250 thing is regardless of any of that, apparently. Would they take AMEX at the airport customs control?
 
Norman Alexander said:
They are trying to harass all the cross-border workers and visitors on the Mexican border. So not just harassing the "illegal" brown people, also the "legal" brown people.

And as a potential US visitor myself, paying US$500 extra for my wife and I to visit is effectively adding 50% to the airfare. So even if the USA was not being destroyed by a fascist cabal, travelling somewhere else becomes a far more attractive option financially.
Click to expand...
Supposedly, those who pay the fee will get their money back under these conditions:

How can travelers get reimbursed?

To get their money back, visa holders must comply with the conditions of the visa, which includes “not accept[ing] unauthorized employment,” and not overstay the visa validity date by more than five days, according to the provision.

Reimbursements will be made after the travel visa expires, it says.
Click to expand...

Yeah, good luck with that. :rolleyes:
 
Norman Alexander said:
The visa waiver is actually a 90-day tourist visa. Or maybe 60 days, I can't remember, it's been 10 years since we last went. It just means we don't have to go to a USA consulate here and get a physical visa page stuck in our passports, at our cost. Our passports are our "visas" on arrival. This new $250 thing is regardless of any of that, apparently. Would they take AMEX at the airport customs control?
Click to expand...
It would be about the only place that does accept AMEX. . .
Man, that was a useless card for business travel.
 
...Another big power grab. Really short version? Trump just put out an EO that messes with the Federal employee rules again. If not stopped, a heck of a lot more people are vulnerable to being fired for not being sycophantic enough. Including positions like... administrative law judges.
 
I can't get the lawsuit to copy & paste. So I'll make just a few notes .

"To attempt and inextricably link President Trump to Epstein ..." this just looks amateurish to me, but there are online sources that are fine with "try and" rather than "try to."

Bottom line, I don't see the harm to Trump. Everyone knew they had a close friendship. There's no need to inextricably link Trump to Epstein because Trump did that himself. There's also no need to paint Trump as sexually crude and salacious - because Trump has also done that to himself. This does not hurt Trump's reputation AT ALL. A guy who's already talked about grabbing women by the pudendum doesn't look any worse writing a cryptic birthday letter. He's already said, roughly, "Jeffery likes beautiful women just as much as I do." Doodling the outline of a naked woman is completely meaningless, or rather harmless. One horndog makes cryptic comments about "secrets" to another horndog, including a doodle. That doesn't hurt Trump.

The WSJ doesn't have a copy because Murdoch had the paper shred it. Where the original is, who knows. Probably in safety deposit box. But I'm sure Ghislaine has ammo she hasn't used yet.

ETA: Ninja'd, of course. And re that word "bawdy." It totally sounds like the word a '50s Brit-adjacent tabloid editor would use.
 
Last edited:
Norman Alexander said:
The visa waiver is actually a 90-day tourist visa. Or maybe 60 days, I can't remember, it's been 10 years since we last went. It just means we don't have to go to a USA consulate here and get a physical visa page stuck in our passports, at our cost. Our passports are our "visas" on arrival. This new $250 thing is regardless of any of that, apparently. Would they take AMEX at the airport customs control?
Click to expand...
My cousin flies to Brazil often because his late wife was from there and he has extended family. One of them posted the new language regarding visas. She was in a state of disbelief that a country with a thriving tourism industry would basically tell people, "Don't even try it, we will go through all your social media, and BTW we'll be keeping a close eye on you IF we let you in the country at all."

The Brazilian relatives thought it might be fake. I said it looked more like "malicious compliance" to me. Or maybe it's very deliberately the exact words the State Department wanted to say - in essence, "We don't want your tourism dollars. - consider yourself unwelcome."
 
jimbob said:
Remember that he's declined notably since even 2020

This is how he was speaking in 2008

Click to expand...
So you think it's cognitive decline? I think it's more like, this is who he was before - before he ditched sounding human, before he pivoted from reasonableness to pandering to racial fears and explicitly courting white supremacists. He saw cultivating that persona that as his ticket to the White House and unfortunately he was not wrong.

Now, he's been that person for so long that whatever decency he might have had is gone. His curdled message of hate worked so well, he convinced himself.

That may be cognitive decline, it's not out of the question. In 2000 or so he said he didn't want to be associated with David Duke. In 2016 or so he said "I don't know anything about David Duke." It's really sad. I never cared for Trump but he actually seemed somewhat progressive or at least human in his political dealings. Now he just has his shtick of firing people and hating pretty much the whole world.

I wonder when he'll get around to changing the name of South America.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom