Diversion by design?
Only 1,382 days to go...
“Politics is the diversion of trivial men who, when they succeed at it, become important in the eyes of more trivial men.” ~George Jean Nathan
Do you remember the film, Wag the Dog, with Dustin Hoffman and Robert DeNiro?
If you didn’t see it, Wag the Dog was a 1997 American black comedy political satire. The film centers on a spin doctor and a Hollywood producer who fabricate a war in Albania to distract voters from a presidential sex scandal.
Wag the Dog was released one month before the news broke of the Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky scandal and the bombing of the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan by the Clinton administration in August 1998, which prompted the media to draw comparisons between the film and reality. The comparison was also made in December 1998, when the administration initiated a bombing campaign of Iraq during Clinton's impeachment trial for the Clinton–Lewinsky scandal. It was made again in spring 1999, when the administration intervened in the Kosovo War and initiated a bombing campaign against Yugoslavia, which, coincidentally, bordered Albania and contained ethnic Albanians. (source: Wikipedia)
The title of the film comes from the English-language idiom "the tail wagging the dog," used to indicate attention that is purposely being diverted from something of greater importance to something of lesser.
I’m wondering if we’re seeing a repeat of Wag the Dog with this administration. When Trump was running for president, he promised the following:
Will end inflation and make America affordable again.
Cut energy prices in half within 12 months, or a “maximum 18 months.”
“We will have no tax on tips.”
Eliminate taxes on Social Security. “SENIORS SHOULD NOT PAY TAX ON SOCIAL SECURITY!”
Eliminate taxes on overtime pay. “That gives people more of an incentive to work.”
“I will make interest on car loans fully tax-deductible.”
From what I can see there has been no action on any of these promises. In all fairness, though, he has delivered on some of his promises:
Sign pardons for some or many of those convicted or charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. “I will sign their pardons on Day 1.”
Impose a 25% tariff on everything imported from Mexico and Canada and add a 10% tariff to duties already imposed on goods from China.
Declare a national energy emergency to spur more drilling, pipelines, refineries, power plants and reactors and "a massive increase in domestic energy supply.”
Withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, a global pact to address climate change. “President Trump will once again exit the horrendously unfair Paris Climate Accords."
That said, I don’t recall anywhere in his platform or campaigning for president where he said we were going to annex Canada or Greenland. And yet that has been a big talking point of his administration during the last few months. And now we hear how they are planning for Trump to run for a third term (when he would be 82!!!), even though the Constitution says otherwise.
I’m wondering, if these statements are designed to be merely distractions. Let’s divert everyone’s attention from the fact that we are working to destroy NATO, the rule of law, national security and the first amendment, by making everyone think we’re going to go to war with Greenland. Let’s let our MAGA base eat it up that we’re dismantling the so-called Deep State, while at the same time destroying what was a healthiest economy in the world. Let’s send out mixed social media posts, while the market is down, so that cash-rich folks can buy up stocks at bargain prices… diversion by design?
I think we all need to pay more attention to what this administration is doing every day to destroy our wonderful country. Maybe not pay as much attention to what they’re saying they are going to do. Clearly, the focus has been on destroying the legal system — because right now — they’re the only branch of government that is even challenging the unconstitutional behavior of this administration.
Diversion by design or should we be paying attention? That is the question….
Thought for the day in honor of his birthday…
“We need unity; and we can only have unity with a new face and new ideas and new ideals.” ~Abraham Ribicoff
Must Read Article:
Trump Really Likes It When Things Go Wrong
Bret: I suspect historians will one day remember the Department of Government Efficiency the way we now remember lobotomies. It seemed, to some at the time, like a good idea.
Gail: Hey, maybe future generations will look back on the Trump administration as the lobotomy laboratory….
Bret: The problem isn’t that we shouldn’t pare down spending or rethink the org chart of the federal bureaucracy or get rid of agencies or departments that may be doing more harm than good. For instance, why should universities spend about one-tenth of their budget on government compliance costs instead of scholarships and new labs?
The problem is that competence and execution matter, that public input matters, that the federal government is not a tech company where you can afford to move fast and break things and that you can’t afford to take a hammer to a problem that requires a scalpel without grievously injuring your patient. As for Musk, I’ve been calling him the Donald of Silicon Valley for years.
Quote of the day…
“It was a terrible week. So what happens on Sunday? Trump says, intentionally, 'I'm serious about running for a third term.' He can't run for a third term! ... why does he say it? ... to distract from the terrible week that they've had. We're not gonna take the bait.”
~ Hakeem Jeffries
What I’m reading today…
The overall economic impact of Mr. Trump’s tariff barrage is unknowable—not least because we don’t know how countries will react. If countries try to negotiate with the U.S. to reduce tariffs, the damage could be milder. But if the response is widespread retaliation, the result could be shrinking world trade and slower growth, recession, or worse.
There will certainly be higher costs for American consumers and businesses. Tariffs are taxes, and when you tax something you get less of it. Car prices will rise by thousands of dollars, including those made in America. Mr. Trump is making a deliberate decision to transfer wealth from consumers to businesses and workers protected from competition behind high tariff walls.
The real reason we're in a national emergency
Meanwhile, as Trump declares emergency after emergency to justify his reign of terror, he’s simultaneously eliminating America’s capacity to respond to real emergencies…. Make no mistake about what’s really going on here. While the United States has plenty of real problems to deal with, Trump is ignoring them to manufacture the fake emergencies he needs to further enlarge and centralize his power.
Trump Has Everything Under Control
Gail Collins: OK, Bret, I know you can’t tell the future, but give me a prediction. Will President Trump’s tariffs go down as one of the 100 worst decisions in presidential history? 50? 10?
Bret Stephens: As an economic matter, possibly the worst presidential decision ever. Say what you will about Herbert Hoover, but he was an honorable public servant who didn’t have the benefit of hindsight when he signed the Smoot-Hawley tariff into law in 1930. As a foreign policy matter, it’s at least in the top five worst. It’ll be a few months before we see the full consequences in terms of reciprocal tariffs, broken alliances, destroyed trust and an America that has dethroned itself from global economic leadership. And don’t be surprised if it leads to war, as global economic upheavals often do.
Other than that, Gail, it was a great week. Like millions of other Americans, I barely noticed losing a big chunk of my net worth. Can’t wait for all the price increases to kick in.
Trump’s third term threats are not a distraction
But while the use of “distraction” is understandable, it can also be misleading. For Trump, the most ridiculous things he talks about are often the ones closest to his heart, and the ones which most clearly reveal his outrageous and horrific agenda.
When Trump says he would like to run for a third term, it’s not just a distraction. It’s as close as he gets to telling the truth. He is an authoritarian who hates the Constitution and wants to be in power forever. That’s a message which we ignore at our peril.
What’s really going on with the economy? I believe Trump and his billionaire buddies — the American oligarchy — have a plan. But before I get to it, let me point out what’s happened today.
After three days of consecutive declines on Wall Street, all three major U.S. stock indexes suddenly rose on reports that Kevin Hassett, a top Trump adviser, said the White House would consider a 90-day pause on putting tariffs on all countries but China. Then, once it became clear that the speculation was based on a Fox News interview in which Hassett did not make that suggestion, markets quickly retreated again. The White House dismissed the report as “fake news.”
The extraordinary volatility captured more than Wall Street’s unease with Trump’s massive new tariffs. It also showed how ready speculators are to make money off the downturn….It seems clear that Trump is planning to blame any recession on Powell (and, of course, Joe Biden).
So a recession seems likely. The American economy will contract over the next six months. This will cause massive hardship for lower-income Americans because they’re likely to be the first ones to lose their jobs — at the same time they’re paying more for much of what they need. But a recession is not necessarily bad for Trump and his billionaire buddies. America’s oligarchy depends on periodic recessions. Recessions are opportunities to buy up real estate, companies, and shares of stock at bargain-basement prices. Recessions also give political cover to Trump, Musk, and Republican efforts to reduce labor and environmental standards.
Take Trump Seriously About Greenland
How do we know Trump is serious? “One way or another,” the president crowed in his speech to a Joint Session of Congress last month, “we’re gonna get it.” A few weeks later, in case anyone missed the point, Trump told NBC: “We’ll get Greenland. Yeah, 100 percent.” Trump says a lot of strange things, certainly. He has mused about striking hurricanes with nuclear weapons, running for a constitutionally prohibited third term, staying in office even if he loses, and annexing Canada as the 51st state. But when a president publicly makes a vow to Congress to do something and then repeats that vow over and over, such statements are not trial balloons; they are policy.
President’s Third Term Talk Defies Constitution and Tests Democracy
After President Trump said last year that he wanted to be a dictator for a day, he insisted that he was only joking. Now he is saying that he may try to hold onto power even after the Constitution stipulates that he must give it up, and this time he insists he is not joking.
Maybe he is and maybe he isn’t. Mr. Trump loves stirring the pot and getting a rise out of critics. Talk of an unconstitutional third term distracts from other news and delays the day he is seen as a lame duck. Certainly some in his own camp consider it a joke as Republican leaders laugh it off and White House aides mock reporters for taking it too seriously.
But the fact that Mr. Trump has inserted the idea into the national conversation illustrates the uncertainty about the future of America’s constitutional system, nearly 250 years after the country gained independence.
Ex-Social Security Head: This Is When Elon Musk Will Stop Checks Going Out
“The Trump co-presidency is gutting this agency,” former SSA Administrator Martin O’Malley told the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee on Tuesday. “It is breaking it from within, and it ultimately will lead to cascading failures, interruptions and system shutdowns that will eventually and I think within the next couple of months lead to benefit interruptions for the first time in 90 years.”
Trump Says U.S. Doesn’t Need Canada After All
President Donald Trump appears to have had a change of heart about the United States taking over Canada, claiming that Americans “don’t need anything” from their northern neighbor. Despite his repeated assertions that the sprawling, resource-rich country should become America’s 51st state, the president told reporters on Air Force One Sunday that the “golden age” is coming, sans Canada.
Donald Trump did not attend a Friday ceremony in Delaware where U.S. officials accepted the remains of four soldiers who died during a training accident in Lithuania last month. Instead, the president has been in Florida since yesterday, where he celebrated the beginning of a three-day tournament of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf series at one of his golf courses, then was set for a Friday fundraising dinner at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Donald Trump’s lies come at a high price. The flashes of terror now hitting retirees and other Americans who are freaking out over the security of their 401k plans and other life savings mark only the latest example. Millions of Americans learned this lesson during Covid when Trump tried to hoodwink the public into thinking that alternative remedies like Hydroxychloroquine or, as he infamously pondered aloud, disinfectants could somehow ward off the virus. One of the key members of his Covid task force, Doctor Debbie Birx later estimated that Trump’s mismanagement of the pandemic resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans. Other experts believed it may have been many more than that….
Somebody should break it to the emperor that he has no clothes before we all lose our shirts.
Texas county that swung to Trump grapples with immigration crackdown after bakery is targeted
When Homeland Security Investigations agents showed up at Abby’s Bakery in February and arrested the owners and eight employees, residents of Los Fresnos were shocked. Abby’s Bakery doesn’t employ violent criminals and Baez and Avila-Guel are not the people who border czar Tom Homan calls the “worst of the worst” and says are the priority for mass deportations.
No Tariff Exemptions for American Farmers
Tariffs will indeed hurt farmers badly. Farm costs will rise. Farm incomes will drop. Under Trump’s tariffs, farmers will pay more for fertilizer. They will pay more for farm equipment. They will pay more for the fuel to ship their products to market. When foreign countries retaliate, raising their own tariff barriers, American farmers will lose export markets. Their domestic sales will come under pressure too, because tariffs will shrink Americans’ disposable incomes: Consumers will have to cut back everywhere, including at the grocery store…
But if a farm family voted for Trump, believing that his policies were good, it seems strange that they would then demand that they, and only they, should be spared the full consequences of those policies. Tariffs are the dish that rural America ordered for everyone. Now the dish has arrived at the table. For some reason, they do not want to partake themselves or pay their share of the bill.
That’s not how it should work. What you serve to others you should eat yourself. And if rural America cannot choke down its portion, why must other Americans stomach theirs?
Jason Furman on “Liberation Day”
What’s the actual vision and goal of the administration?
Furman: I don't know the answer to your question for sure. I'm not sure Donald Trump knows the answer to your question. But I think a bunch of these tariffs—though not all of them—are here to stay… I would place no weight on what the economic officials in the Trump administration say. I mean, they have made many statements about tariffs that within hours or days are completely contradicted by the president.
The Trump Doctrine: Breaking Trust at Home and Abroad
Long before he became a reality TV host, Trump was a real estate developer who expanded into hotels, casinos, and even the airline industry. Along the way, he cheated contractors, shortchanged investors, and, through strategic bankruptcies, left financiers with pennies on the dollar. With a mix of financial brinkmanship and clever lawyering, he managed not only to stay afloat but to thrive.
Now, Trump is applying the same pattern of broken promises to international trade, military alliances, and domestic affairs—throwing long-standing partnerships into chaos and eroding trust. Around the world, leaders are concluding that the once-reliable United States can no longer be counted on.
Tracking Trump’s presidential promises
Donald Trump made a lot of big promises during his 2024 run for the White House. The Associated Press is tracking some of them.
"How are soldiers supposed to interpret this?" an Army brigade commander asked Military.com on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation. "It's a cartoonish lapse in security. We still need to take this stuff seriously, but for a while, any security briefing will be peppered with jokes about the secretary of defense."
Despite what amounts to among the most startling security snafus in recent memory -- one that would almost certainly trigger severe disciplinary action for lower-level personnel -- Hegseth and others at the top may yet walk away unscathed, despite growing and increasingly heated calls from Democrats for the defense secretary's resignation.
Trump’s tariff bazooka is one hell of a gamble
That America has in truth done exceptionally well out of the very same, post-war global order it is now, seemingly, intent on destroying, doesn’t seem to bother him…Some of the biggest victims of Trump’s protectionism will moreover be American consumers, who will end up paying more for their goods. Already inflationary expectations in the US are rising strongly. Business and consumer confidence is meanwhile falling precipitously, with a number of indicators signaling a recession in the making.
It’s hard to find any mainstream economist who thinks what Trump is doing is a good idea. It is indeed hard to find any who think it will be a net positive for US manufacturing jobs.
But it is perhaps not the direct consequences for trade and economic activity we should worry about most. Rather it is that sense of America retreating from the world, and of the US abandoning its position as a force for global stability and progress.
Donald Trump’s Honeymoon Is Over
It took Donald Trump a little more than two months to completely squander any kind of postelection goodwill he had. His approval rating has steadily dipped from 47% to 45% to 43%, according to Gallup, as the American people have gotten to actually see what Trump and his team of billionaires had in store for them. That includes diving right into the Project 2025 playbook, the same right-wing blueprint Trump tried distancing himself from on the campaign trail. So far Trump’s priorities have included bizarrely renaming the Gulf of Mexico, threatening Greenland… his market-crushing obsession with tariffs, and musing about running for a third term. Meanwhile, Trump has let unelected billionaire Elon Musk run wild through federal agencies, with government cuts threatening even cancer and Alzheimer’s research. Musk has seen his own favorability drop 10 points from February to March, according to a new Harvard-HarrisX poll, as Tesla protests play out across the country.
Trump is breaking the entire global economy, which is in cardiac arrest over his outrageously nonsensical tariffs. U.S. markets have hemorrhaged $11 trillion in value since Inauguration Day. More than half of that came in just the last few days, as markets have tried futilely to solve for Trump’s brain-boggling policy goal of zero trade deficits with any other country.
Amid their frenzied selloff, traders cling to a single lifeline: the increasingly desperate hope this is all some sort of feint. Surely this must still be a negotiating tactic. The end of this insanity can’t be far off.
What I am listening to…
What I am watching…
What I read every day…
Trump has got people looking at his right hand and it the left that’s pulling the fast one. He’s a showman, and business man
Think P.T. Barnum Lions and Tigers and assholes