US Presidential Election 2024

[Duke of Marmalade]

This is Bobby Kennedy jnr on bitcoin, when he was a potential presidential candidate.

“I intend as President of the United States to sign an Executive Order on day 1… to transfer approximately 200,000 Bitcoin held by the US Government to the US Treasury where it will be held as a strategic asset. …. On day one as President, I will sign another Executive Order directing the US Treasury to purchase 550 Bitcoin daily until the US has a reserve of at least four million Bitcoin. … our nation holds approximately 19% of global gold reserves; this policy will give us around the same proportion of total Bitcoin. The cascading impact of these actions will eventually move Bitcoin to a valuation of hundreds of trillion of dollars. On day one as President, I will sign also an Executive Order directing the IRS to issue public guidance that all transactions between BTC and the USD are unreportable transactions, and by extension untaxable. … Bitcoin is a technology for freedom, for optimism, for independence, for democracy, for transparency, it is the currency of hope, it is the perfect currency.”

This is unmitigated nonsense. The total US stockmarket is 55 trillion so Bobby sees Bitcoin being worth 100s of trillions of US dollars. This is on a par with his madness on health. Trump 2 is a mad house.

 

[joe sod]

The supposed phone call between trump and Kremlin probably happened even though peskov now denying that any call took place at all, then again most of what he says is lies anyway. But someone was saying that Putin didn't like what trump was planning and that's why they now denying the call took place. The proof is that Russian media released naked pictures of melania trump shortly afterwards as a warning to trump to back off

 

[lff12]

This is Bobby Kennedy jnr on bitcoin, when he was a potential presidential candidate.

This is unmitigated nonsense. The total US stockmarket is 55 trillion so Bobby sees Bitcoin being worth 100s of trillions of US dollars. This is on a par with his madness on health. Trump 2 is a mad house.

I agree, but there's a lot of voters who have skin in the game who might have found Trump's favourable position on crypto as a big boost. However bad for the country and the world this might be.

 

[lff12]

All the better to bring about the end of days.

And he is a self made man too.

Wild thought but RFK Jr was for years HUGELY effective in going after corporates breaching environmental regulations. I think Trump putting him in health avoids him being put in a dept where he actually would have made a difference - the EPA. It suits big business, as RFK will just talk total nonsense in Health.

 

[odyssey06]

Wild thought but RFK Jr was for years HUGELY effective in going after corporates breaching environmental regulations. I think Trump putting him in health avoids him being put in a dept where he actually would have made a difference - the EPA. It suits big business, as RFK will just talk total nonsense in Health.

I hope he just talks nonsense and we don't get repeats of his anti vaccine stance which has cost lives.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/11/15/rfk-jr-global-health-samoa-kennedy/
Case in point re: nonsense, complaining about fast food then couple of days later pictured with Trump eating McDonalds alongside him.

 

[Howth Head]

You really would wish the media here (and the chattering classes) would move on from the fact that Trump won - and he won big. (And that Kamala was a dreadful candidate.)

But having listened to Newstalk earlier with Jonathan Healy predicting all kinds of "terrible things" for people in the US, there's little hope of that. In fairness Ciara Kelly gave a kind of opposing view but still stressing that she "didn't like" Trump. You can hear it online below:

Trump presidency is 'going to be terrible' for many in the US - Jonathan Healy | Newstalk

Donald Trump’s second term as US President is "going to be terrible" for many in the US, Jonath...

www.newstalk.com

Then Pat Kenny had a one-sided discussion with three guests talking about the impending Trump term in apocalyptic terms. After doing the now-obligatory Musk Mocking segment they started off by trying to clutch at straws about the fact that Trump's margin "wasn't really all that big" and that"really all it'll take is a few disgruntled Republicans to vote him down etc."

Some guy from the Clinton Institute at UCD (yes, the "Clinton" Institute!) who does a weekly whinge about Trump - almost went into mourning live on air with dire warnings and stuff about, "this is not the country I was born in etc." (I really wanted Pat to ask him which country did he grow up in? The one where a sitting President was assassinated live on TV and where tens of thousands of young conscripts returned home from Vietnam in body bags?)

Another guest from the Democrats Abroad (yes, the "Democrats" Abroad!) was less dramatic but still on the anti-Trump side. A third guest, a lady - not sure who she was - tried to steer Pat towards a discussion about the Democrats focusing too much on ideology rather than bread & butter issues. But Pat was having none of it - he clearly didn't want to go there despite her mentioning it twice. (It's not online yet)

Not picking on Newstalk in particular (and I've been a guest on it myself in the past) but yesterday on Anton Savage's morning show Fergus Finlay was at the same stuff, speaking for everyone about "the whole world being in a state of foreboding," over Trump 2.0 (By the way, in the article below on the day of the election Finlay not only predicted that Kamala was going to win - but that she will "win handsomely" and it'll all be over in jig time and we can all have, "an early night." You have to love these "experts.")

Fergus Finlay: Tonight has the potential to change the history of the world

All the bad stuff that could happen to the world if Trump becomes US president will not happen, because he is going to lose the election

www.irishexaminer.com

It's truly tedious.

 

[Ceist Beag]

In the interest of balance, Brendan O'Connor had a panelist on his show yesterday who pointed out that the majority of coverage in the US has moved on from the election and is not nearly as negative about Trump being in charge. Admitedly Brendan was quite surprised by this (such is the nature of our view on things this side of the water) but at least there was acknowledgement that the US is moving on with things. Agree with your view though, it's time we did the same.

 

[Peanuts20]

I thought his speech yesterday lacked any grace and he seemed obsessed with continuously scoring points, even though he won in a landslide. There will come a time, maybe in a year or so, when American's will lose interest in that rhetoric and will start looking at his policy impacts on their own lives, and that is perhaps when things will get interesting.

Having said that, I wouldn't argue with some of his decisions. US has a major gang problem and he is taking them on. Likewise, deporting criminals (something we do on occassions over here as well once a sentence is served). Some of it however was clear nonsense and he spoke at one stage around "growing territory" if I heard him right. I do think he is looking for the "big thing" that will be his legacy.

 

[Purple]

We are in for some difficult times over the next few years. The US Multinational gravy train may, at the very least, lose a few carriages. We'll see what Trump aims at Canada and Mexico. After that we'll probably be next.

 

[Howth Head]

I posted the following line yesterday in some of the many WhatsApp groups I'm in (former work colleagues, friends, neigbours etc.) They were all losing their minds posting the same Bad Orange Man memes you've seen a hundred times)

"We will defend our people and uphold our values through strength of arms and rule of law."

I added the words "chilling stuff"....

Several responses came back including the likes of "...OMG he's a tyrant/warmonger/fascist etc" and "he's probably going to start WW3..."


(*It's a quote from Obama's inauguration speech in 2013.)

Inaugural Address by President Barack Obama

obamawhitehouse.archives.gov

Try it!

 

[Peanuts20]

We are in for some difficult times over the next few years. The US Multinational gravy train may, at the very least, lose a few carriages. We'll see what Trump aims at Canada and Mexico. After that we'll probably be next.

We'll certainly lose some of the easy money, but it is very hard to service French, German, Italian customers in their own languague from Boise Idaho,

Counter point of that is if a lot of those companies did take their business back to the US, would a lot of our immigrants leave as a result and what would that mean for housing? Speaking as someone who works for a US firm, I'd say less then half of our Irish team are Irish born.

 

[Purple]

We'll certainly lose some of the easy money, but it is very hard to service French, German, Italian customers in their own languague from Boise Idaho,

Counter point of that is if a lot of those companies did take their business back to the US, would a lot of our immigrants leave as a result and what would that mean for housing? Speaking as someone who works for a US firm, I'd say less then half of our Irish team are Irish born.

I agree that it would be aa disaster for the US as well as us but I think that the presumption of logic in such political decision making would be a mistake. This is an administration build on ideology with a mission to save Western civilisation.

 

[Sophrosyne]

Trump has pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement and also the Global Corporate Tax Deal, the latter was framed mostly around US multinationals..