Former President and Convicted Felon Trump Thread

Of course not, he's been going back and forth on this every time someone speaks up. I don't think he'll ever make a decision on what he really wants because he doesn't want anything except for his base to love him.
That's not fair. He also wants to make a shit ton of money.
 
I know that at this point trump's corruption is just kinda background noise but this is...wow.

I don't know. Hillary was spending $212k in rent each month for her campaign headquarters, and yet the press made a huge deal out of how much money Trump's campaign was paying his businesses for his headquarters - even though it was significantly less even after the huge increase after the republican primaries finished:

http://fortune.com/2016/08/23/trump-campaign-rent/

So unless you have something more than "$130k rent" to Trump Towers, such as $130k more than any other month, or similar, then I'm not sure there's a smoking gun here.

But in truth your first sentence could easily describe me with a little modification:

"I know that at this point political corruption is just kinda background noise"

And I'll be surprised if anyone suggests that Clinton never paid off anyone to keep them silent during her run.
 
And I'll be surprised if anyone suggests that Clinton never paid off anyone to keep them silent during her run.
Given how incredibly desperate the republicans are with sticking bullshit scandals on Hillary, you'd think they'd fully publicize any real own they could get their hands on.
 
Given how incredibly desperate the republicans are with sticking bullshit scandals on Hillary, you'd think they'd fully publicize any real own they could get their hands on.
I'm surprised you're suggesting Clinton never paid anyone off during her campaign. (note that I'm restricting this specifically to her campaign because her earlier alleged misconduct related to the alleged sexual misconduct of President Clinton is 20 years ago. Perhaps it never happened, and even if it did we should give her the benefit of the doubt and hope that she's every bit the champion of women she now claims to be)

Hillary paid rent. Contrast with Trump paying hush money to a porn actress.
I only brought up Clinton's rent to show that the bill in the tweet is perfectly reasonable, and as a single item of evidence holds no weight because it's a reasonable rent payment. I asked for further evidence that it was an unusual rent payment.

I'm aware there are message boards committed to discussing how President Obama is a terrible person and trading conspiracy theories as though they were true - we mocked them as "birthers".

So I guess this is where we're at here?

Isn't there some terrible law, executive order, or injustice President Trump has heaped upon us lately that's more important - and relevant - to us than an alleged affair he had 10 years ago?

Maybe we should change the thread title to "Trump Conspiracy Thread".
 
Guys, it's steinman. For him, murderous cops are never guilty, and Trump's not as corrupt as everything that gets brought to light would indicate.
 
Guys, it's steinman. For him, murderous cops are never guilty, and Trump's not as corrupt as everything that gets brought to light would indicate.
I don't know. He did just say Trump heaps terrible laws and injustice on y'all daily.

And this Stormy Daniels thing is ridiculously less significant than colluding with Russia. I think @stienman's saying that's the sort of thing your country should be keeping focused on.
 
It's this media version of ADHD that's saving Trump. Every scandal gets a news cycle, and event cycle there's either a new scandal, or a new take on an old one. Which means "the president likes prostitutes to piss on him" gets the same amount of time as "the president has sold off the White House and is turning it into a hotel" or "the president bought 10 million votes from a hacker collective". Some of the things happening with and around Trump are horrible, and some are...a completely different caliber.
By now, for most people, he's pretty much become a running joke..."a buffoon in office, haha, haven't had that since Dubyah!". This is dangerous, because the way Trump is changing things is a fair bit more dangerous to the future puree the USA than anything Bush ever did.
All of the crap is being normalized and equalized, while our shouldn't be normal and definitely isn't all equal.
 
I don't like this, but it's been a long time coming:

The duties are lower than the 35 percent rate the U.S. International Trade Commission recommended in October after finding that imported panels were harming American manufacturers. The idea behind the tariffs is to raise the costs of cheap imports, particularly from Asia, and level the playing field for those who manufacture the parts domestically.

For Trump, they may represent a step toward making good on a campaign promise to get tough on the country that produces the most panels — China. Trump’s trade issues took a backseat in 2017 while the White House focused on tax reform, but it’s now coming back into the fore: The solar dispute is among several potential trade decisions that also involve washing machines, consumer electronics and steel.
Further, as the article points out, 1) the first 2.5GW of solar panels imported each year are zero tariff, and 2) they may be opposed by the WTO anyway.

So this has caused a lot of uncertainty in that market.

All that said, the solar industry is probably going to take a hit, but will recover quite a bit. Panel prices have been falling faster than the savings you'd gain. If you bought a system last year, you would have saved money if you waited and bought on this year. Prices are in a bit of a freefall right now (one of the many reasons the US ITC recommends tarrifs).

On top of all that, the federal government subsidy for solar installations (still about 1/3 the total cost to consumers) is set to expire after 2019. So in a year we're going to have a big wrestle in congress about whether to extend or modify them.

All that said, I suspect that the tariff will measurably increase solar costs, and decrease adoption, but it'll go down to maybe 2014 levels, rather than increasing at the furious pace is has been these last few years.

It's something I'm watching carefully as I'd like to be a little more self sufficient in energy consumption (and we eat a lot of energy in the Davis household).

Here's the report from October where the commission made the recommendation, the reasons behind it, and the reaction from the industry:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/31/business/solar-industry-import-tariffs.html
 
We could avoid the tariffs by importing them all to extreme northern Mexico, but then we would have to bust a hole in the wall to run the cables.

—Patrick
 
We could avoid the tariffs by importing them all to extreme northern Mexico, but then we would have to bust a hole in the wall to run the cables.

—Patrick
The funny thing is that Mexico imports a lot of energy (natural gas and electricity) from the US, and it looks like this is going to be an issue coming up over the next few years:

https://www.google.com/search?q=nafta+energy

Interestingly, this should boost solar panel production in Mexico and Canada, since the tariff shouldn't apply to NAFTA signatories, but Canada's biggest solar companies produce all their panels in Asia, so they're still affected. I don't think shipping panels through Canada would get around the tariff.

Should actually drive down solar costs for everyone else in the world, though.

I'll have to convince the duty free shops near the US/Canada border to start carrying solar panels.
 
Revealed earlier that Sessions went before Mueller last week. Marking the first cabinet member to testify.

So trump had a staff turn over rate in the range of 35% in year one. With the one year milestone and the fancy tax thingamabob reached many are predicted to depart shortly. What would be a good shortlist of those leaving?
 
Isn't Musk trying to make solar cells that would be cheaper than shingles?
Yes, and I'm sure he and many other US solar companies have been heavily lobbying for just such a tariff. Tesla's cells are manufactured in the US:

https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/09/tesla-now-manufacturing-solar-roof-tiles/

Also I haven't read the tariff itself, so I'm not sure if it's imposed on all photovoltaic cells, or just consumer ready cells. We could see cells come across the ocean as wafers and assembled into panels in the US if the tariff is limited to finished modules.
 
Yes, and I'm sure he and many other US solar companies have been heavily lobbying for just such a tariff. Tesla's cells are manufactured in the US:

https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/09/tesla-now-manufacturing-solar-roof-tiles/

Also I haven't read the tariff itself, so I'm not sure if it's imposed on all photovoltaic cells, or just consumer ready cells. We could see cells come across the ocean as wafers and assembled into panels in the US if the tariff is limited to finished modules.
Looks like the tariff covers both modules and cells: http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/370171-trump-imposes-30-tariffs-on-solar-panel-imports

Also, the provision Trump used for this tariff has rarely been successful, it's almost always thrown out by the WTO:

The dispute is likely to be settled eventually by the Switzerland-based World Trade Organization (WTO), where China and other countries are nearly certain to challenge the tariffs as a violation of international law.

The provision under which Trump took action has been used rarely, and its tariffs are almost always struck down by the WTO. The last time it was used was in 2001 for steel imports, and the WTO overturned the penalties.
So it's likely to be business as usual long before we hit the first 2.5GW of imports this year.
 
Actually, I think I'm gonna run for office on that platform.

I promise to build a wall (built out of Solar Panels) across our Southern border to keep out the rapists and gun nuts. The electricity generated will be used to power massive sun lamps to chase away the dreary, early winter nights.

Make Canada Bright Again.
 
I did consider building it along the Canada side to avoid the whole Trump’s Wall issue, but you know...it’s Canada, so they wouldn’t really get a lot of sunlight.

—Patrick
 
I'm getting tired of all the puffer pieces in the papers about Mueller wanting to talk to trump according to "sources" and how the trump team is deciding how and if that conversation will occur.

There have been no leaks from the Mueller team about anything and it's been 7 months. The only information from the investigation is coming people after their testimony and none if it involves the actual testimony itself.

Funny thing I learned today, trumps lawyers do not have and do not plan to seek the security clearance required to speak to Mueller on trumps behalf.

Clearly he hires the best people.

Oh @GasBandit could you get me the names and addresses of all the latin people in Texas. Asking for a friend....
 
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