REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Do you feel like the winds of change are blowing today too?

POSTED BY: 6IXSTRINGJACK
UPDATED: Thursday, May 1, 2025 08:45
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Thursday, February 20, 2025 10:13 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Give me Greenland or you're dead – Trump

Exclusive: Denmark’s PM Opens Up About Fiery Trump Call, Greenland, and NATO’s Future

By Simon Shuster | February 20, 2025 8:03 AM EST

https://time.com/7259818/exclusive-denmark-frederiksen-trump-greenland
-interview/

Speaking anonymously since then to the media, European diplomats called the tone of the phone call “horrendous” and said the Danes are “freaked out” about the pressure Trump could bring to bear against them. In an exclusive interview with TIME on Feb. 16, Frederiksen spoke out in detail for the first time about her call with Trump, what it means for his relationship with Europe, and how she’s navigating new transatlantic tensions on Ukraine and NATO.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 12:25 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
The entire atmosphere surrounding all of this is completely different than it was in 2016 and 2020.

Things just kind of feel normal again.

It's like all the loudest voices either screamed themselves out or they aren't being platformed anymore and/or we just finally, collectively tuned them out for a change.

It's kind of nice, innit?


Happy Inauguration Day!

Feels normal if you are a disgrace to the human race:

'It's morally disgusting': Trump torched for lying Ukraine 'should have never started' Putin's war

Trump is siding with Putin against Ukraine, just as he famously sided with Putin over the FBI.

And just as — or at least reminiscent of the way that — Charles Lindbergh and the America First Party sided with Hitler in 1938 when he invaded Austria.

And again in 1939 when he invaded Czechoslovakia and Poland.

And in 1940 when he invaded Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, and France.

And in 1941 (Yugoslavia, Greece, Albania, the Soviet Union) — until Pearl Harbor, when they dropped their opposition to opposing Hitler.

And it got worse yesterday, as I’m sure you know, when Trump explicitly doubled and tripled down.

https://andrewtobias.com/must-watch-siding-with-putin/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 12:40 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


FUCK UKRAINE.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 12:51 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
FUCK UKRAINE.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
Why not say fuck GOP Congressmen for being ungrateful for what Musk gives them?

After ceding power of the purse, GOP lawmakers beg Trump team for funds

Republican senators find themselves in an unusual position these days: begging Trump officials to release funds they themselves appropriated.

Senators have in recent days made the case to Cabinet secretaries and other Trump officials to let money flow back into their states. They are trying to finagle exceptions to President Donald Trump’s sweeping executive orders or cuts made by billionaire Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service that freeze hundreds of billions of dollars, including money for farmers and infrastructure projects. That push comes as the administration has also sought to fire a wide swath of federal employees — some of whom live in red states.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/19/trump-musk-senators
-funding/


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 6:38 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


“He’s a fantastically bad manager — a tone-deaf bully who inspires ridicule rather than trust.”

On Monday, President Donald Trump nominated Ed Martin to become the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, and thus one of the most powerful prosecutors in the country. Martin has been serving in the role on an interim basis for a month.

Because of Martin’s inexperience, he will need to persuade someone in his office to carry out his projects. Thus far, he seems to have done a terrible job of ingratiating himself to others: Most recently, the office’s top criminal prosecutor resigned rather than follow his allegedly improper orders. One former prosecutor in the office said, “He’s a fantastically bad manager — a tone-deaf bully who inspires ridicule rather than trust.” Perhaps as a result, Martin’s officewide emails are often leaked, including a message complaining about leaks.

More at U.S. Attorney Ed Martin May Have Already Messed Up Trump’s Retribution Tour
By Brendan Ballou | Feb 20, 2025 2:43 PM

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/02/ed-martin-musk-trump-reven
ge-prosecutions-fail.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 6:55 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
FUCK UKRAINE.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
Why not say fuck GOP Congressmen for being ungrateful for what Musk gives them?


Fuck GOP Congressmen regardless.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 6:57 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
U.S. Attorney Ed Martin May Have Already Messed Up Trump’s Retribution Tour
By Brendan Ballou | Feb 20, 2025 2:43 PM


Been hearing shit like this out of you for over 8 years now.

Nobody gives a shit.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Thursday, February 20, 2025 8:24 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
U.S. Attorney Ed Martin May Have Already Messed Up Trump’s Retribution Tour
By Brendan Ballou | Feb 20, 2025 2:43 PM


Been hearing shit like this out of you for over 8 years now.

Nobody gives a shit.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
Donald Trump says he's going to expand IVF. Not quite, it turns out:

Within 90 days of the date of this order, the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy shall submit to the President a list of policy recommendations on protecting IVF access and aggressively reducing out-of-pocket and health plan costs for IVF treatment.

A list of policy recommendations falls a little short, no? What's more, Congress would have to pass these recommendations, something they've shown no inclination of doing in the past. It's just more smoke and mirrors.

“Don’t be fooled. Donald Trump’s executive order does nothing to expand access to IVF,” Duckworth said in a statement. “In fact, he’s the reason IVF is at risk in the first place. But if he is actually serious about taking real action to accomplish his own campaign promise to make IVF free for everyone, there’s a simple way he can prove it: He can call on Senate Republicans to immediately back my Right to IVF Act that would require insurance plans to cover IVF. Otherwise, it’s all just lip-service from a known liar.”

https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2025-02-19/what-to-
know-about-trumps-ivf-executive-order

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 5:25 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump’s Economic Promises Timeline (Many promises of fast improvement before the election. After the election, promises changed to either slow or no improvement. Sometimes Trump even changed the prediction to economic conditions getting worse. Sad for you but that makes life easy for Trump.)

https://doggett.house.gov/issues/trumps-economic-promises-timeline

8/9/24:
NBC Montana, Trump Rally in Bozeman, MT, YouTube (August 9, 2024).

“Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again, to bring down the prices of all goods.”

8/14/24
PBS NewsHour, Trump Rally in North Carolina, YouTube (August 14, 2024).

“Under my administration, we will be slashing energy and electricity prices by half within 12 months, at a maximum 18 months”

“Prices will come down. You just watch: They’ll come down, and they’ll come down fast, not only with insurance, with everything.”

8/17/24
PBS NewsHour, Trump speaks at campaign rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, YouTube (August 17, 2024).

“Starting the day I take the oath of office, I will rapidly drive prices down and we will make America affordable again. We’re going to make it affordable again.”

“We’re going to get your energy prices down. We’re going to get your energy prices down by 50%.”

9/5/24
NBC News, Trump Addresses Economic Club Of New York, YouTube (September 5, 2024).

@ 10:56 “We will bring our auto-making industry to the record levels of 37 years ago, and we’ll be able to do it very quickly through tariffs and other smart use of certain things that we have that other countries don't.”

@ 18:05 “Energy is going to bring us back. That means we’re going down and getting gasoline below $2 a gallon, bring down the price of everything from electricity rates to groceries, airfares, and housing costs.”

@ 48:04 “We will eliminate regulations that drive up housing costs with the goal of cutting the cost of a new home in half. We think we can do that.”

9/18/24
Former President Trump Campaigns in Uniondale, New York, C-SPAN (September 18, 2024).

“While working Americans catch up, we’re going to put a temporary cap on credit card interest rates. We can’t let them make 25 and 30%.”

9/29/24
Speech: Donald Trump Holds a Campaign Rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, Roll Call (September 29, 2024).

“We're going to get the prices down. We have to get them down. It's too much. Groceries, cars, everything. We're going to get the prices down. While working Americans catch up, we are going to put a temporary cap on credit card interest rates at 10%. People are being made to pay 25%. Temporary ban.”

10/1/24:
PBS NewsHour, Trump delivers campaign remarks in Waunakee as vice presidential debate set to begin, YouTube (October 1, 2024).

“Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again. We’ll do that. We’ve got to bring it down.”

11/04/24
Former President Trump Campaigns in Pittsburgh, C-SPAN (November 4, 2024).

“A vote for Trump means your groceries will be cheaper”

12/12/24
Time Staff, Read the Full Transcript of Donald Trump’s 2024 Person of the Year Interview With TIME, TIME (December 12, 2024).

“I can’t guarantee anything. I can’t guarantee tomorrow”

1/5/25
Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump), X (January 5, 2025, 9:11PM).

“We must secure our border, unleash American energy, and renew the Trump tax cuts, which were the largest in history, but we will make it even better - There will be no tax on tips. It will all be made up with tariffs, and much more, from countries that have taken advantage of the U.S. for years.”

1/7/25
Associated Press, Trump holds a press conference at Mar-a-Lago, YouTube (January 7, 2025).

“We’re going to have prices down- I think you’re going to see some pretty drastic price reductions.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 5:28 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


DOGE Said It Cut $232 Million From Social Security Budget. It Was Only About Half a Million.

By Matt Sledge | February 20, 2025, 3:54 p.m.

https://theintercept.com/2025/02/20/doge-social-security-cuts-musk-rec
eipts/

The “Department of Government Efficiency” claimed to have saved the American taxpayer nearly $232 million by canceling an IT contract for the Social Security Administration.

They were only off by about $231 million.

In fact, the government cut only $560,000, a paltry savings generated by yet another Trump administration anti-trans attack: the elimination of a project to develop an “X” gender marker for the agency’s internal databases. The Social Security Administration Wednesday confirmed the discrepancy between the DOGE claims and the actual total, which was first uncovered by The Intercept.

DOGE’s mixed-up math came as no surprise to Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, the director of government affairs at the Project on Government Oversight, who testified before the House DOGE subcommittee last week about the shortcomings of the Elon Musk effort.

“This, to me, is just part and parcel of the amateur-hour nature of what DOGE is doing,” he told The Intercept. “They’re going to destroy more than they help. It’s absolutely counterproductive.”

“They’re going to destroy more than they help.”

When Musk’s “Department of Governmental Efficiency” — officially the U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization — was first announced in November, it seemed like little more than a stunt. Immediately following Trump’s inauguration, however, the initiative sprang into action with murky processes and unclear outcomes. The Social Security contract snafu is just the latest example of confusion spread by Musk and DOGE as they boast of big cuts that vanish upon closer inspection.

On Monday, in response to criticisms from Democrats that the entity was not producing evidence to back up Musk’s extravagant claims of success, DOGE first posted its “wall of receipts,” an effort billed as follow-through on promises of transparency.

The rollout since then has been anything but smooth. On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that one claim of having saved $8 billion by axing a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement contract was wildly incorrect, since the underlying contract only amounted to $8 million.

On Wednesday, other media outlets such as CNN picked apart DOGE’s claim to have saved $1.9 billion from USAID contracts — the hypothetical maximum of contracts that have so far only cost the government $55 million over several years.

The Cut That Wasn’t

The mislabeling of savings from cuts to the Social Security Administration stem from apparent confusion — or misdirection by DOGE — around a massive IT contract with Leidos, a Fortune 500 company that also contracts for defense and intelligence agencies.

Since 2018, Leidos has billed $1.5 billion to the Social Security Administration through an overarching contract that currently has a ceiling of $1.9 billion.

On the surface, the contract’s goals of upgrading Social Security software systems seem to align with Musk’s stated concerns about outdated technology.

Still, DOGE claimed that it had taken a hatchet to the contract, in the process slashing $231,864,794 in government spending.

The actual savings were limited to the funds allocated to the Gender X Marker project, and were orders of magnitude smaller: According to a Social Security spokesperson, DOGE snipped a grand total of $560,000. Somehow, by the time that cut appeared on the “wall of receipts,” the amount it purported to save the government had ballooned by hundreds of millions.

“The task order referenced on the DOGE receipt website includes numerous IT development efforts, one of which was Social Security’s former Gender X Marker project,” said the spokesperson, Darren Lutz. “While the overarching task order was not terminated, we continue to assess and identify other projects under this task order that may be cancelled or streamlined to create further cost savings.”

The cancellation of the Gender X Marker project was first reported earlier this month, when DOGE claimed that it would save over $1 million. DOGE said at the time that the project was eliminated in line with Trump’s executive order stating the government would only recognize “two sexes, male and female” — a frequent right-wing anti-trans talking point that has no grounding in biological science.

In response to questions about the Social Security contract from The Intercept, a White House spokesperson gave a general defense of Musk’s work.

“DOGE has already identified billions of dollars in savings for American taxpayers,” said press secretary Karoline Leavitt, “and President Trump will continue to direct this effort until our government is truly for the people, and by the people.”

DOGE’s “receipts” about the Social Security Administration contract came as its co-creator, Musk, began spreading false claims about the crucial old-age program, alarming Democrats who saw his jawboning as a prelude to benefit cuts.

Congressional Democrats say they are alarmed in particular by DOGE’s attempts to access recipient data, which prompted the agency’s acting administrator to leave her job over the weekend.

Rep. John Larson, D-Conn., said he had yet to see meaningful information about what DOGE has been up to.

“They seem to be operating with impunity under the leadership of an unelected, unaccountable billionaire,” he said. “Elon Musk’s companies are supported by $15 billion in government contracts, yet he is looking at slashing Americans’ hard-earned benefits to pay for trillions in new tax cuts for the wealthy.”

For Hedtler-Gaudette, of the Project on Government Oversight, the list of supposed savings on the DOGE “wall of receipts” had created more questions than answers. The list contains little more than a bare-bones contract description, a savings figure, and a link to a federal procurement website.

“We don’t have any of that additional context or analysis,” he said. “We just have to take their word for it.”

“I don’t think they’ve earned the benefit of the doubt.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 6:32 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by second:

“I don’t think they’ve earned the benefit of the doubt.”
Not only does Musk lie about DOGE numbers, inflating to make himself look competent, but he pretends to have knowledge he lacks. He is not trustworthy with facts and numbers:

Musk Blows Up at Astronaut for Calling Out His Space Station Lie

The billionaire lost it after Andreas Mogensen corrected his false claim

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/elon-musk-bashes-a
stronaut-space-station-lies-1235274293/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 7:17 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump’s Putinization of America

It’s not just in foreign policy that the President is turning Russia’s way.

By Susan B. Glasser | February 20, 2025

https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-trumps-washington/trumps-pu
tinization-of-america

No matter how many times Donald Trump openly parrots the Kremlin line, it’s never not going to sound wrong coming from the President of the United States. In 2018, at a press conference in Helsinki, Trump announced that he accepted Vladimir Putin’s claim that Russia did not intervene in American elections, despite our own intelligence agencies’ conclusion to the contrary. I watched the scene sitting outside in the glaring Finnish summer sun on a CNN set, with Anderson Cooper, who, after a short, stunned silence, concluded, “You have been watching perhaps one of the most disgraceful performances by an American President.” Later, Fiona Hill, the National Security Council senior director who had staffed Trump at the summit, would recall what it felt like inside the room when she heard Trump’s words: she thought about faking an illness, pulling a fire alarm, anything to stop him from talking.

On Tuesday afternoon, a few hours after his foreign-policy team met in Riyadh with Russian officials to discuss how to end the war in Ukraine, the President had what can only be described as another Helsinki moment. Holding forth at a press conference at Mar-a-Lago about why he had refused to include the Ukrainians in the Saudi meeting, Trump said that there was no reason to have done so, since Russia’s invasion, three years ago this week, was actually Ukraine’s fault. “You should never have started it,” he said, addressing Ukraine’s President, Volodymyr Zelensky. “You could have made a deal.” To hear Trump tell it, Ukraine might as well be bombing its own cities and killing its own citizens. He claimed that the United States had spent three hundred and fifty billion dollars helping Ukraine, and that Zelensky’s popularity had plummeted to just four per cent in recent polls — both statements so far divorced from reality that Putin himself might not have been brazen enough to make them.

By Wednesday, Zelensky pushed back on Trump’s ridiculous assertions by saying that he was living in a Russian-made “disinformation space,” and, in response, Trump attacked the Ukrainian leader as a “Dictator without Elections” in a long, falsehood-riddled social-media post. His officials, meanwhile, have made clear in the course of the last week that Trump’s pro-Kremlin rhetoric is more than just empty words; he appears ready to concede to Russia on most of its major demands for a peace deal, including pledging that Ukraine will never join NATO, not allowing U.S. troops to participate in providing security for Ukraine after a ceasefire, pressuring Ukraine to cede illegally occupied territory to Russia, and lifting Western sanctions imposed on Russia. Trump’s embrace of America’s adversary and rejection of its ally has been so swift and complete that even top Kremlin officials are astonished. “If you’d told me just three months ago that these were the words of the US president, I would have laughed out loud,” the former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev posted on X.

That all this has taken place exactly one month into his second term seems fitting, however, for an American President who’s never made much secret of his inexplicable desire to suck up to Putin. One difference from Trump’s first four years in office, though, is that he has now adopted not only a pro-Putin take on Russia’s conflict with Ukraine but an approach to foreign policy over all which echoes Putin’s throwback view of the world, as a playground for predatory great powers to exert nearly unlimited control over the smaller nations that fall within their sphere of influence. How else to explain Trump’s initial moves on the world stage since returning to office, as he threatened to outright seize territory in the Western Hemisphere, from Canada to Greenland and Panama? Surely he has been emboldened by Putin’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014 — and one of many concessions Trump will now press on Ukraine is to admit that this territory has been lost to Russia forever. Trump’s second Inaugural Address, in stark contrast to his first, even resurrected the nineteenth-century term “manifest destiny,” invoking the idea of American expansionism as a divine right that should extend not only to making Canada the “fifty-first state,” as Trump has taken to calling it, but all the way to the planet Mars.

Trump’s overt endorsement of a pro-Putin foreign policy has, understandably, shaken the world in the last few days. Just as jarring, in my view, has been Trump’s embrace of Putin-like tactics at home, a hallmark of his return to power which has unfolded with a speed and ferocity far different than what Trump was able to pull off in his first term. Call it the Putinization of America.

A quarter-century ago, as a young foreign correspondent for the Washington Post based in Moscow, I reported on Putin’s takeover of Russia, a process of crushing the country’s nascent, flawed democracy. Targets included any possible rival power centers that did not owe their authority to Putin, from independent media and wealthy oligarchs to elected governors. Within a few years, the Kremlin had dismantled or defanged them all. At the same time, Putin empowered former K.G.B. colleagues from the security services, who created a modern-day dictatorship for him from their stronghold in what Russians call the “power ministries.”

This playbook is the same one being followed now by Trump. It’s important to be clear-eyed about this. I don’t know where it will end, or how far Trump will take it. America, thank goodness, is still a vastly different country from Russia, with a long tradition of democratic freedoms, decentralized power in the states, and constitutional governance. But tally up the damage from one month, and it is considerable. And no, I’m not just talking about ominous theatrics like Trump openly musing about staying in office for an unconstitutional third term or, just one day ago, proclaiming himself a “king” on social media and having his White House circulate a fake image of him wearing a crown on the cover of a Time-like magazine.

Washington today echoes with so many uncomfortable reminders of that transitional moment in Moscow — the sudden, fearful silence of critics who had previously spoken out, the business tycoons rushing to kiss the President’s ring, the lying and reality distortions to fit the official narrative. Trump’s consolidation of power this time has been fast and consequential. In a slew of executive orders, he has asserted the right to unilaterally revoke the Constitution’s guarantee of birthright citizenship, cancel billions of dollars in federal funding, and assume executive control over independent federal agencies. He has empowered the world’s richest man to fire tens of thousands of government employees and eliminate long-established, statutorily authorized programs, ranging from America’s famed Epidemic Intelligence Service to its entire foreign-aid program. Although some of the cuts are being fought in the courts, the G.O.P.-controlled Congress has allowed this unprecedented usurpation of its prerogatives with hardly more than a few isolated bleats of concern. In the Senate, Republicans have rolled over on even his most controversial, unfit nominees, including, most ominously, voting on Thursday to confirm Kash Patel as director of the F.B.I., despite (or perhaps because of) the prospect that Patel will use the agency to go after Trump’s enemies — a list of whom Patel helpfully itemized in a book published last year.

In some ways, Trump seems to believe he’s already a dictator with unchecked power. That certainly was the message of his social-media post over the weekend, channelling his inner Napoleon with a quote often attributed to the nineteenth-century French emperor: “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.” Just this week alone, Trump has ordered New York to stop charging cars extra for driving into Manhattan, has mused out loud about bringing the District of Columbia under federal rule, and has confirmed that he banned the Associated Press from the White House press pool for refusing to go along with his personal whim — codified in yet another executive order — to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. In a federal courtroom on Wednesday, Trump’s Deputy Attorney General, Emil Bove, personally argued to drop the corruption prosecution of New York’s mayor, Eric Adams, so that he could help advance Trump’s anti-immigration policy agenda — a quid pro quo so obviously crooked that it led to multiple prosecutors quitting in protest. Coming soon, according to multiple news reports on Thursday, is a loyalty purge of top generals at the Pentagon, including possibly the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This time, Trump wants to insure that the power ministries are fully in his control.

Back in 2019, Putin crowed in an interview with the Financial Times about the end of the “obsolete” liberal world order that had long since “outlived its purpose.” The President of the European Council at the time, Poland’s Donald Tusk, pushed back on him, insisting that what was “really obsolete” was Putin’s own heavy-handed brand of governance, with its “authoritarianism, personality cults, and the rule of oligarchs.” Just a few years later, reading that sentence evokes only sadness: it’s no longer just Putin’s Russia that threatens the foundations of Western liberal democracy but Trump’s Washington.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 8:29 AM

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The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump's failure to challenge Putin in Ukraine ceasefire talks would cause a war in Europe in five years warns Former Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Richard Shirreff.



The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 8:57 AM

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The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


In an editorial, the Wall Street Journal says:

Trump on Tuesday mimicked Russian propaganda by claiming Ukraine had started the war with Russia and that Kyiv is little better than the Kremlin because it hasn’t held a wartime election. Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky replied on Wednesday that Mr. Trump was living in a “disinformation space,” which may have been imprudent but was accurate.

Mr. Trump escalated on Wednesday, as he usually does, calling Mr. Zelensky a “dictator,” and suggesting Ukraine’s leader snookered the U.S. into supporting a war “that couldn’t be won, that never had to start.” Mr. Zelensky “refuses to have Elections, is very low in Ukrainian Polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden ‘like a fiddle.’” It’s tempting to dismiss this exchange as mere rhetoric, but it has the feel of political intention for Mr. Trump. He may be trashing Ukraine’s democracy to make voters think there’s no real difference between the Kremlin and Kyiv. He may think this will make it easier to sell a peace deal that betrays Ukraine.

We doubt most Americans will overlook his false moral equivalence. Mr. Putin’s war of conquest started three years ago this month when Russian troops rolled over the border and tried to capture Kyiv. The war began not because Mr. Putin had legitimate security fears — but because the aging former KGB agent wants to reassemble most of the Soviet empire he saw crumble as a young man. Ukraine has delayed elections while it is operating under martial law and fighting a war for survival. Its constitution allows this, and Britain under Nazi siege didn’t hold an election during World War II. Was Churchill a dictator?

The U.S. has a profound interest in denying Mr. Putin a new perch on more of the NATO border, which is the real reason America has been right to arm Ukraine. A deal that amounts to Ukrainian surrender will be a blow to American power that will radiate to the Pacific and the Middle East. It would be the opposite of Mr. Trump’s promise to restore a golden age of U.S. prestige and world calm.

Last week Mr. Trump said Ukraine can’t join NATO and must give up much of its territory to Russia — concessions to Mr. Putin with nothing in return. Mr. Putin’s response this week has been more drone attacks on Ukraine. And here we thought Mr. Trump doesn’t like being played.

As it stands now, Mr. Trump’s seeming desperation for a deal is a risk to Ukraine, Europe, U.S. interests — and his own Presidency.

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-vladimir-putin-russia-ukraine
-volodymyr-zelensky-10464d9c

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 8:59 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Since 99% of your sources are proven wrong, sometimes within hours, I'm gonna assume you're sucking up to more neocon bullshitters, SECOND.

You really should learn to distinguish fact from fantasy.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger


AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA


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Friday, February 21, 2025 9:07 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Since 99% of your sources are proven wrong, sometimes within hours, I'm gonna assume you're sucking up to more neocon bullshitters, SECOND.

You really should learn to distinguish fact from fantasy.
Signym, for all the years you have been on fff.net, you have constantly bragged about being right and praised yourself for your "Critical Thinking Skills", and yet you don't bring the proof.

When the news media was counting Trump's lies, he got into the thousands, mostly because he was claiming knowledge and attributes he did not have, much like Signym has always done.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Trump's+lies

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 11:16 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump is dropping fast in the polls

Did you know that the all-time record holders for the poorest early approval ratings are Donald Trump and Donald Trump?



https://jabberwocking.com/trump-is-dropping-fast-in-the-polls/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 11:26 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump is one month in and Americans are already mad at him about inflation

Trump vowed repeatedly that he’d bring prices down “starting on Day One” if elected. Consumer prices rose 0.5% last month compared to December — the fastest monthly increase in prices since August 2023, according to Consumer Price Index data.

Vice President JD Vance said, “Consumers are going to see lower prices at the pump and at the grocery store, but it’s going to take a little bit of time.” Translation: My boss misspoke previously.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/21/economy/us-economy-trump/index.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 11:50 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Since Musk insists the Truth is a falsehood, he cannot be trusted with DOGE.
The same goes for Trump.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/02/21/elon-musk-fix-x-users-
correct-trumps-ukraine-claims/

Elon Musk has vowed to crack down on X users who have tried to correct false claims by Donald Trump that Volodymyr Zelensky’s approval ratings have collapsed.

The billionaire said he planned to “fix” the social network’s system of community notes, which allows users to label fake news and add fact-checks or further context. Mr Musk claimed the system was being “increasingly gamed by governments [and] legacy media” and said he was “working to fix this”.

On X, users have pushed back on the US president’s claims that the Ukraine president’s approval rating has collapsed to 4pc. One widely shared poll from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology suggested his popularity was closer to 57pc.

In response, Mr Musk said that it was “utterly obvious that a Zelensky-controlled poll about his OWN approval is not credible”.

The billionaire claimed that Mr Zelensky was “despised by the people of Ukraine, which is why he has refused to hold an election”. Mr Musk added: “If Zelensky was actually loved by the people of Ukraine, he would hold an election. He knows he would lose in a landslide, despite having seized control of ALL Ukrainian media, so he canceled the election.”

His remarks come after the Ukrainian president said Mr Trump lived in a “disinformation bubble”. Mr Trump has repeated a series of inflammatory claims about the war in Ukraine that have echoed Kremlin talking points, including labelling Mr Zelensky a “dictator”.

Polling experts have dismissed Mr Trump’s suggestions about Mr Zelensky’s popularity among Ukrainians.

Prof Olga Onuch, of the University of Manchester, which has conducted polling in Ukraine, said: “Trump’s claim is not only factually incorrect, but also irresponsible and anti-democratic – Zelensky remains a fairly popular political leader in Ukraine.

“Spreading misinformation about his legitimacy directly aids Kremlin propaganda and undermines the Ukrainian people’s right to determine their own future.”

Mr Musk has championed the use of community notes on X as a means of providing context to misleading posts. The notes are crowd-sourced from contributors and voted on by other users. But the billionaire has increasingly fallen foul of his own system as dozens of his own posts receive fact-checks.

In response to a community note on another of his posts, Mr Musk said: “This Community Note is False. Legacy media is NOT a reliable source.”

Researchers have said the notes have been helpful in diverting users away from disinformation. A 2024 paper suggested they reduced the spread of a false claim by 61pc, although noted they were often too slow to stop the initial viral spread of fake news.

The system was praised by Mark Zuckerberg, who scrapped independent fact-checkers at Meta in the US last month and pledged to bring community notes to Facebook.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:13 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Since 99% of your sources are proven wrong, sometimes within hours, I'm gonna assume you're sucking up to more neocon bullshitters, SECOND.

You really should learn to distinguish fact from fantasy.


He's either a deep state plant or he's irredeemably stupid. There is no 3rd option.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:17 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Since Musk insists the Truth is a falsehood, he cannot be trusted with DOGE.
The same goes for Trump.
Tens of millions of dead people aren’t getting Social Security checks, despite Trump and Musk claims

https://apnews.com/article/social-security-payments-deceased-false-cla
ims-doge-ed2885f5769f368853ac3615b4852cf7

The Trump administration is falsely claiming that tens of millions of dead people over 100 years old are receiving Social Security payments.

Over the past few days, President Donald Trump and billionaire adviser Elon Musk have said on social media and in press briefings that people who are 100, 200 and even 300 years old are improperly getting benefits — a “HUGE problem,” Musk wrote, as his Department of Government Efficiency digs into federal agencies to root out waste, fraud and abuse.

What are some of the concerns about misinformation on Social Security payments?

Chuck Blahous, a senior research strategist at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, said, “Two cheers for Elon Musk if he can root out and put a stop to improper payments.”

But to pick the places in the federal government where error rates are high, “Social Security would be near the bottom of the list, not near the top,” Blahous said. “Medicaid improper payment rates are quite substantial, and soared after the Medicaid expansion of the ACA.”

“By all means — go after any improper payments that are found, but let’s not pretend that’s where the system’s biggest financial problems are,” he said.

Sita Nataraj Slavov, a professor of public policy at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, said the claims by Musk and Trump will make people think the solutions to the government’s financial problems are simpler than they appear.

“The real concern is that this claim may mislead people into thinking there’s an easy fix to Social Security’s financial problems — that we can somehow restore solvency without making sacrifices through higher taxes or lower benefits,” Slavov said. “This is simply not true.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:24 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Since 99% of your sources are proven wrong, sometimes within hours, I'm gonna assume you're sucking up to more neocon bullshitters, SECOND.

You really should learn to distinguish fact from fantasy.


He's either a deep state plant or he's irredeemably stupid. There is no 3rd option.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
There is a third option, one that I see every day while watching Trumptards, such as yourself, at work or not: Trumptards are full of shit. They are also lying sacks of shit, as are Trump and Musk. Those extremely salient Trumptard Characteristics should make Trumptards reevaluate the true cause of their struggles to prosper in America. The power to improve your Trumptardy lives is within yourself, but you must stop lying about yourself and others before the power can make a difference.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:26 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Since Musk insists the Truth is a falsehood, he cannot be trusted with DOGE.
The same goes for Trump.
Tens of millions of dead people aren’t getting Social Security checks, despite Trump and Musk claims

https://apnews.com/article/social-security-payments-deceased-false-cla
ims-doge-ed2885f5769f368853ac3615b4852cf7

The Trump administration is falsely claiming that tens of millions of dead people over 100 years old are receiving Social Security payments.

Over the past few days, President Donald Trump and billionaire adviser Elon Musk have said on social media and in press briefings that people who are 100, 200 and even 300 years old are improperly getting benefits — a “HUGE problem,” Musk wrote, as his Department of Government Efficiency digs into federal agencies to root out waste, fraud and abuse.

What are some of the concerns about misinformation on Social Security payments?

Chuck Blahous, a senior research strategist at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, said, “Two cheers for Elon Musk if he can root out and put a stop to improper payments.”

But to pick the places in the federal government where error rates are high, “Social Security would be near the bottom of the list, not near the top,” Blahous said. “Medicaid improper payment rates are quite substantial, and soared after the Medicaid expansion of the ACA.”

“By all means — go after any improper payments that are found, but let’s not pretend that’s where the system’s biggest financial problems are,” he said.

Sita Nataraj Slavov, a professor of public policy at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, said the claims by Musk and Trump will make people think the solutions to the government’s financial problems are simpler than they appear.

“The real concern is that this claim may mislead people into thinking there’s an easy fix to Social Security’s financial problems — that we can somehow restore solvency without making sacrifices through higher taxes or lower benefits,” Slavov said. “This is simply not true.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two



Your bullshit article counters its own headline. A headline which is a blatant lie, which they offer no proof to support.

We're getting rid of all of the Democratic Party corruption and waste.

Meanwhile, sit down and shut the fuck up, idiot.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:30 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

Your bullshit article counters its own headline. A headline which is a blatant lie, which they offer no proof to support.

We're getting rid of all of the Democratic Party corruption and waste.

Meanwhile, sit down and shut the fuck up, idiot.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, you are literally full of shit, as are Trump and Musk. The power to improve your Trumptardy lives is within yourself, but you must stop lying about yourself and others before the power can make a difference. That is the ultimate self-help message for Trump voters: fix yourself rather than blame others for your sad predicament.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:32 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Trump is dropping fast in the polls


No he's not. He's holding quite steady. Not sure what poll that idiot Kevin is cherry picking here, but he is not living in reality.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:32 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

Your bullshit article counters its own headline. A headline which is a blatant lie, which they offer no proof to support.

We're getting rid of all of the Democratic Party corruption and waste.

Meanwhile, sit down and shut the fuck up, idiot.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, you are literally full of shit, as are Trump and Musk. The power to improve your Trumptardy lives is within yourself, but you must stop lying about yourself and others before the power can make a difference. That is the ultimate self-help message for Trump voters: fix yourself rather than blame others for your sad predicament.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two



Sit down and shut the fuck up, retard.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 12:46 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Did you know that the all-time record holders for the poorest early approval ratings are Donald Trump and Donald Trump?


No he's not. He's holding quite steady. Not sure what poll that idiot Kevin is cherry picking here, but he is not living in reality.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, you really are totally committed to being a fruitcake. Trump's Job Approval Rating is 45%. Republicans Register High Approval of Trump at 93%, which indicates they are out of their tiny minds. Being crazy correlates perfectly with struggling to be successful in America. Only about 7% of Trumptards are in any way successful people, which is about same number who disapprove of Trump. What about the rest of Trumptards? They are big flops.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/656891/trump-job-approval-rating-congress
-jumps.aspx

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 1:22 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

Sit down and shut the fuck up, retard.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
Call It eXtortion

Elon Musk really is intimidating an advertising agency to do business with X or else he will prevent their merger with another company:

A lawyer at advertising conglomerate Interpublic Group fielded a phone call in December from a lawyer at X. The message was clear, according to several people with knowledge of the conversation: Get your clients to spend more on Elon Musk’s social-media platform, or else.

....Interpublic leaders interpreted the communications from X as reminders that the recently announced $13 billion deal to merge Interpublic with rival Omnicom Group could be torpedoed, or at least slowed down, by the Trump administration.

....The push for agency agreements follows a flurry of brands returning to spending on X, including Amazon...Apple...and telecom company Verizon.

....“We now see brands returning in quite significant numbers, because the easiest route is to just spend a minimum viable amount on the platform,” said Ebiquity’s Schreurs. “Not because they want to advertise there and run their ads adjacent to the content on X, but because they are afraid of legal and political ramifications of not doing so.”

For some reason, the judge in this case—Northern District of Texas, natch—seems surprisingly sympathetic toward Musk. Golly, I wonder why?

https://www.wsj.com/business/media/x-hinted-at-possible-deal-trouble-i
n-talks-with-ad-giant-to-increase-spending-feb122a6?st=88VbZ8&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 1:41 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Did you know that the all-time record holders for the poorest early approval ratings are Donald Trump and Donald Trump?


No he's not. He's holding quite steady. Not sure what poll that idiot Kevin is cherry picking here, but he is not living in reality.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon
6ix, you really are totally committed to being a fruitcake. Trump's Job Approval Rating is 45%. Republicans Register High Approval of Trump at 93%, which indicates they are out of their tiny minds. Being crazy correlates perfectly with struggling to be successful in America. Only about 7% of Trumptards are in any way successful people, which is about same number who disapprove of Trump. What about the rest of Trumptards? They are big flops.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/656891/trump-job-approval-rating-congress
-jumps.aspx

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


You're just angry because you wake up to more losing in the headlines every day.

Must be rough.

Get used to it. Your party is dead.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 2:29 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Very soon we will be seeing the official end of Birthright Citizenship.

It will either be codified by congress, or it will end up in the Supreme Court where it will finally die the death it has deserved for generations now.



I guess Democrats will have to come up with another plan to Grow voters.

Not that this plan worked out very well for them in the first place. A majority of Mexican Americans voted for Trump.

Gee. Imagine that, huh? It turns out that once they're citizens they don't agree with you giving all of their shit away either.



--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 3:39 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


‘Mar-a-Lago Accord’ Chatter Is Getting Wall Street’s Attention

Ill try to re-org and summarize, the article is scattershot

Liz Capo McCormick
Fri, February 21, 2025

(Bloomberg)

The term ‘Mar-a-Lago Accord’ is a riff on the on the 1985 Plaza Accord and, before that, the 1944 Bretton Woods Agreement, both major milestones in the establishment of the modern global economic system. Each were named after the resorts where they were negotiated.


The idea of dramatically restructuring America’s debt load is part of the Trump team’s agenda to revamp global trade via tariffs, weaken the dollar and ultimately reduce borrowing costs, all with the goal of putting US industry on more even footing with the rest of the world, said Bianco, an over three-decade market veteran and founder of Bianco Research.

Many of the ideas behind the agenda come from a November 2024 paper by Stephen Miran, Trump’s nominee to lead the White House Council of Economic Advisers. In it, the former Treasury official laid out a road map for reforming the global trading system and weeding out economic imbalances driven by “persistent dollar overvaluation.”
This may not happen "anytime soon, if ever".

“The whole idea hopefully is lower the value of the dollar, lower the value of interest rates, bring down the debt burden in the country. And that’s what they [Miran, Bessent] are trying to do.”

Bianco, like Miran’s paper, referenced the work of former Credit Suisse Group AG strategist Zoltan Pozsar, who has for several years called for a “Bretton Woods III” revamp as part of his theory that the dollar will play a much less dominant role in global finance in the coming decades.

[One element is to reduce the actual deficit- which Trump's team is supposedly already doing. Altho those savings may be completely undone -and more- by tax cuts. - SIGNY]

[Another] element[s] of the plan include[s] the creation of a sovereign wealth fund — which Trump has already set in motion

[Another element includes] forcing America’s allies to shoulder a larger share of security spending. One key idea of Pozsar’s is that other nations should pay more for the security and stability provided by the US. A way to do so would be by swapping some of their Treasuries into 100-year, non-tradeable zero-coupon bonds. If these nations needed cash quickly, the Federal Reserve could make it temporarily available to them through a lending facility.

“It’s time to take the risk of the Trump administration orchestrating a weaker dollar more seriously. The Trump administration has a proclivity for bold, high-stakes maneuvers.”— Simon Flint, macro strategist

Bianco stressed that this type of debt swap may not actually happen, and if the US were to pursue it, it would require significant international cooperation and could potentially impact global financial stability. Bond investors are so far showing little sign of concern, with trading in the Treasury market particularly calm in recent days.

Still, the point of discussing these ideas with clients is to emphasize the magnitude of the potential changes in store, Bianco said.

“Take them seriously, don’t take it literally,” he said referring to the debt swap idea and some of Trump’s more radical proposals in general. “If Trump is willing to blow up NATO, why wouldn’t he be willing to blow up the financial system?”

*****

So, OOC I looked up who holds the most in US treasuries and who might be "persuaded" to accept a debt swap. Currently, formal NATO allies hold about 1.6 trillion. Japan holds 1.2 trillion. China holds 0.8 trillion, and other misc nations about 1.8 trillion. I think we can forget China agreeing to a debt swap. Japan and NATO might agree. Other misc nations, I assume mostly in the global south, don't actually get "protection" from the USA. Some might be arm twisted, some not. Given that there appears to be a split among holders, I can't imagine any nation agreeing to be put at a relative disadvantage compared to others.

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger


AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA


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Friday, February 21, 2025 5:23 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Parks were already facing a staffing problem. Then came the government purge.

America’s beloved national parks face a problem that could, in a matter of weeks, grow into a full-blown crisis.

https://www.vox.com/down-to-earth/400209/national-parks-trump-governme
nt-layoffs-visit-data

The number of people visiting areas managed by the National Park Service — which includes national parks, monuments, and other sites — is way up. In 2023, the most recent year for national data, parks had more than 325 million visits. That’s about a 16 percent bump relative to 2010. At least in some parks, visitation rates have continued to rise.

Meanwhile, staffing at the National Park Service is down, having dropped about 13 percent over that same period, according to the National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group. Staffing specifically in parks has fallen even further in that time, the group said, as the agency’s budget has failed to keep pace with rising personnel costs. That means there are fewer employees to oversee more visitors and mitigate their impact on our public lands and ecosystems.

And this was before the recent layoff.

Late last week, the Trump administration laid off roughly 1,000 workers in the National Park Service, or about 5 percent of its workforce, as part of a broader gutting of the federal workforce. The latest cuts targeted employees who were still in a probationary period, often meaning they were recently hired or had just moved into a new role. The layoff does not include many additional employees who opted for a deferred resignation or had offers for full-time employment rescinded.

“In an agency that has already experienced a significant staffing decline over the past decade, these layoffs will severely affect park operations and the visitor experience,” Phil Francis, chair of the Executive Council of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, a group representing current and former employees and volunteers of the National Park Service, said in a statement Friday. “National Park Service employees dedicate their careers to preserving our nation’s most treasured landscapes and historic sites. We should be supporting them — not jeopardizing their livelihoods.”

The Department of the Interior and the National Park Service did not respond to a request for comment.

Reporting by the Washington Post indicates the National Park Service will reinstate 5,000 seasonal job offers that were previously rescinded under a government-wide hiring freeze. That may help fill some immediate needs; seasonal employees perform a range of tasks, from collecting fees to researching wildlife. Yet it’s not clear when those jobs will be reinstated and they won’t make up for the permanent roles that have been lost, said John Garder, senior director of budget and appropriations at the National Parks Conservation Association.

“Those seasonal employees, who are critical to serving visitors during the busy season, are no substitute for the permanent employees who manage those seasonal workers and provide the expertise and institutional knowledge and experience to ensure resource protection and a well functioning park,” Garder said.

The National Park Service is among the most popular US government agencies, ranking above the Postal Service and NASA for favorability, according to a 2024 poll by the Pew Research Center. Parks are also an economic engine, contributing some $56 billion to the US economy in 2023.

“Did those who made the decision know or care that the main objective of my position is to provide preventive search and rescue education, to keep park visitors safe?” Stacy Ramsey, a worker at the Buffalo National River in Arkansas who was fired, wrote in a now-viral Facebook post. “Did they know that I am part of the visitor and resource protection division, and that I spent my days on the frontline, looking out for the safety of park visitors?”

Over the weekend, Travis Mason-Bushman, an employee at Great Basin National Park in Nevada, wrote on LinkedIn that he lost five colleagues. “These are people who lead tours, clean toilets, answer phones, design signs, and support search and rescue operations,” he said in the post. “You cannot lay off half of any organization’s frontline staff and carry on as if nothing has happened.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 5:32 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Thanks to Trump's tariffs and other economic illiteracies, inflation expectations have gone up 1.7 percentage points since Election Day, from 2.6% to 4.3%. Aside from the 2022 inflationary surge, this is the highest that consumer expectations have been over the past decade.

https://jabberwocking.com/inflationary-expectations-are-up-a-lot-since
-november/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 6:36 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


The Psychological Phenomenon at Play in Every Elon Musk Move

By Denise Cana | Feb 21, 2025, 3:30 PM

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2025/02/elon-musk-doge-psychology-
government-workers.html

The administration’s framework for governance is known by its acronym from psychology, DARVO: Deny, attack, reverse victim and offender.

First: Deny. Any and all claims of wrongdoing are derided as false. They’re baseless lies, slander, misinformation.

Next: Attack. The accuser is cast as the enemy. The people pointing out missteps and misconduct? They’re not trustworthy, they aren’t properly virtuous, they’re too stupid to understand the situation, or they’re so gullible they’ll believe anything.

Finally: Reverse the positions of victim and offender.

DARVO is a small-minded and petty ploy. And it is the go-to move at every level of this administration.

Presented with mounting evidence of and growing public concern for institutionalized racism, the administration says, No, you’re the racist! And then it sets about dismantling diversity, equity, and inclusion programs with a doth-protest-too-much fury.

Called out by reporters for demonstrably spreading misinformation and baseless conspiracy theories, the administration insists, No, you’re spreading misinformation. Or, an oldie but a goodie: No, you’re selling fake news.

Caught exchanging favors for prosecutorial leniency in a quid pro quo to blackmail indicted New York Mayor Eric Adams into doing Donald Trump’s bidding, the administration shouts: No, you’re weaponizing the Justice Department! or No, your motives are partisan and political!

Across the executive branch, workplaces are seeing the rollout of senselessly inefficient return-to-office protocols that will likely force people to work while sick, that will punish families with children, that will pressure employees to take leave even when they would otherwise be willing and able to work, and that even fail to recognize that some offices might need to collaborate across time zones. And when we point out incongruities or inefficiencies in these policies, we’re told: No, you’re inefficient and lazy.

These are the adult tantrums of “I know you are, but what am I?” bullies, vacuous but vicious. And they have the desired effect of confusing the story, forcing onlookers to choose a side based on whom they trust rather than the evidence. Is the whiny deep state complaining about losing a cushy work-from-home gig? Or is the Musk–Trump appointee twisting the screws on well-meaning civil servants just because he can?

At every level, the administration implements a DARVO protocol, the modus operandi of abusers looking to control a situation that has spiraled out of hand or spilled into public view.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, February 21, 2025 8:07 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK




--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Friday, February 21, 2025 8:07 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Why are you looking for the government to make your life better, Second?

Nobody is going to help you except for yourself.



--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 8:46 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Why are you looking for the government to make your life better, Second?

Nobody is going to help you except yourself.
6ix, what I am doing is very simple, but you have no true sense of what it is, do you? Trumptards have so many misadventures in life because they misconstrue the motivations of the people all around them. Here is something you will misunderstand but I've posted it despite your silly way of dealing with even the simplest things in the world:

Trump has now fired seven senior military officers, including the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff; the Chief of Naval Operations; the Commandant of the Coast Guard; the vice chief of the Air Force; and three judge advocate generals (Navy, Army, and Air Force). All were apparently fired for being too DEI. Take a look:

Two things are going on here.
(1) high-ranking officers who are not white or not men were fired. (Top row.)
(2) JAG lawyers, even if they are white men, need to be replaced by the most hackish lawyers Trump can find who will NOT tell him, when he tries to issue an illegal or unconstitutional order, that it's illegal or unconstitutional. (Bottom row.)

https://jabberwocking.com/trump-fires-diverse-military-officers/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 9:15 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Here is Elon Musk explaining that he has to fire people to save Social Security from bankruptcy. He is a hero! Just kidding. Only a Trumptard would believe that is Musk's true motivation:

https://imgur.com/gallery/there-wont-be-money-social-security-theres-n
o-social-security-YiDyCNN

If Musk fired everybody, cutting all personnel costs to zero, he would save 2.4 million employees times $106,382 per employee per year. That is $255.3 billion per year. But Musk's goal is $2,000 billion per year (or maybe $1,000 billion) since he is unsure which it is. On the other hand, there is $1,000 billion in unpaid taxes each year. That is where Musk should go to get the money. But Musk does not want to pay his taxes. He'd prefer to fire everybody before he'd pay.

1) What the data says about federal workers
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-data-says-
about-federal-workers/

2) Offshore Tax Evasion by Big Corporations, the Wealthy Cheats American People
https://www.budget.senate.gov/chairman/newsroom/press/whitehouse-offsh
ore-tax-evasion-by-big-corporations-the-wealthy-cheats-american-people

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 9:38 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Fact Sheet: Trump Administration, DOGE Punish Agencies Investigating Elon Musk’s Companies

Several Federal Agencies That Were Investigating Elon Musk’s Companies Have Become The Early Targets Of The Trump Administration And Musk’s Department Of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

Details here: https://democrats-judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/2025.02.13_fact_sh
eet_re_musk_investigations.pdf

Musk fires the government employees who fined him for breaking rules.
The White House and Musk deny doing today what they did yesterday. Blame Amnesia!
https://www.newsweek.com/white-house-elon-musk-doge-sec-target-conflic
t-2032567

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 11:25 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Americans sharply divided over Trump’s embrace of Putin

While US allies are alarmed at changing loyalties, ordinary Americans are starkly divided on the president’s shift away from Ukraine and Europe

By Joan E Greve in Washington | Sat 22 Feb 2025 03.01 EST

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/22/trump-putin-friendship

Donald Trump’s shocking and mendacious attack this week on the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as a “dictator” while cozying up to the Russian president and indicating that traditional US security support for Europe is waning may have alarmed US allies abroad but has prompted a more starkly divided response among Americans at home.

Reflecting the country’s deeply partisan attitude to the new president and his “America first” foreign policy doctrine, polling suggests that Republicans are much more likely to oppose additional help for war-torn Ukraine. A Pew Research Center survey earlier this month found that 47% of Republicans but just 14% of Democrats thought the US was providing too much support to Ukraine – views that have changed dramatically since the war began three years ago, when just 7% of all American adults (9% of Republicans and 5% of Democrats) said the US was providing too much support to Ukraine.

Many voters on the left say Trump’s comments make them fearful that the president’s stance toward Ukraine could further embolden the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, and jeopardize national security.

“It is an outrageous denial of the truth and shows his allegiance to Russia and to Putin especially,” said Carla Bayles, a voter from Washington state who supported Kamala Harris in last year’s presidential election. “We are alienating our allies and getting us closer to a world war.”

Other Harris voters feel the same, though many say they aren’t surprised given Trump during the campaign expressed minimal support for Ukraine, dubiously claiming that the war would not have begun if he had been president in 2022. But Trump attacking a US ally and implicitly blaming Ukraine for Russia’s invasion, suggesting that Kyiv could have “made a deal” to avert war, have them watching in horror.

“I’m disgusted by Trump’s foreign policy,” said Dawna Williams-Landis, a Harris voter from North Carolina. “He has discarded 200 years of intentional diplomacy that would have built peace by negotiation and freedom.”

Some Americans went so far as to compare Trump to historical world leaders who shrank in the face of fascism, such as Neville Chamberlain, the former UK prime minister who adopted an ultimately disastrous approach of appeasement toward Adolf Hitler.

“I can’t figure out whether Trump is Neville Chamberlain at Munich, or Vidkun Quisling in Norway,” said David Cohen, a Harris voter from Connecticut. “Either way, his approach is bad for Europe, the US and democracies.”

Among Republicans, Trump himself maintains nearly unanimous support with a 93% approval rating, but his denunciation of Zelenskyy could still leave him vulnerable to criticism, even among his most loyal supporters. The Gallup poll showed that 80% of Republicans approve of Trump’s approach to the situation in Ukraine, marking one of his weakest policy areas with fellow members of his party.

Judy Kim, a registered Republican voter in California who nevertheless supported Harris in the election, accused Trump of attempting to create a dictatorship and aligning himself with authoritarian leaders like Putin.

“Isolationism has never worked,” Kim said. “The American people support Nato and Ukraine. We should encourage ties with our democratic allies in Europe and the world, not with dictators like Putin.”

Another Trump voter from California who chose to remain anonymous said she did not support the president’s embrace of Putin and feared he would drive the US to the brink of calamity.

“It has put the US and the world in a very dangerous situation,” the voter said. “I did not vote for his stance towards Europe.”

But some of Trump’s supporters celebrated his approach to Ukraine and foreign policy more broadly, insisting US allies had previously relied too much on the country’s financial assistance.

Peter Jorgenson, a Trump voter from Pennsylvania, described the president’s handling of foreign policy as a “win-win” for the US, adding, “I think it is a clear message that the handouts, finance-wise, are over, and everyone should be alert to their own security.”

It remains unclear whether Trump’s attacks on Ukraine will have a negative effect on his standing with the US electorate. A Gallup poll conducted earlier this month, before Trump unleashed his attack against Zelenskyy, found that Trump’s approval rating stood at 45%, virtually unchanged from last month.

Zelenskyy himself remains broadly popular with Americans, with 47% expressing a positive opinion and 28% a negative one, according to a YouGov/Economist poll conducted this week – though again, Democrats skewed much more favorable than Republicans, who were evenly split.

In at least one case Trump’s approach to Putin has already cost him a vote: a man from Florida who spoke on condition of anonymity and said he supported Trump in 2016 and 2020 – but not 2024, precisely because he feared the president was alienating allies at a time when the US needs them most.

“Trump has some sort of infatuation with Putin,” the voter said. “He doesn’t seem to understand that Putin will lie, cheat and do anything to control Russia and win internationally at any cost. Putin wants to rule all of Europe and wouldn’t stop there.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 1:18 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Why are you looking for the government to make your life better, Second?

Nobody is going to help you except yourself.
6ix, what I am doing is very simple, but you have no true sense of what it is, do you?


You're a idiot and a chronic liar. Nobody cares what you think you are doing. Go call your mom and tell her about it.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 1:21 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Americans sharply divided over Trump’s embrace of Putin

While US allies are alarmed at changing loyalties, ordinary Americans are starkly divided on the president’s shift away from Ukraine and Europe

By Joan E Greve in Washington | Sat 22 Feb 2025 03.01 EST

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/22/trump-putin-friendship

Quote:
In at least one case Trump’s approach to Putin has already cost him a vote: a man from Florida who spoke on condition of anonymity and said he supported Trump in 2016 and 2020 – but not 2024, precisely because he feared the president was alienating allies at a time when the US needs them most.


Yeah. Okay Joan.

You couldn't write better fake dialog than this for your fake Floridian?

Quote:
“Trump has some sort of infatuation with Putin,” the voter said. “He doesn’t seem to understand that Putin will lie, cheat and do anything to control Russia and win internationally at any cost. Putin wants to rule all of Europe and wouldn’t stop there.”


That is not something that a real person says. That is just 3 sentences you will hear on MSNBC 150 times every evening.

You don't have to keep doing this now Joan. That USAID money is never coming back to you.


Fuck Ukraine.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 1:59 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's a tornado, and it's going to be a wild ride.



-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger


AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA


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Saturday, February 22, 2025 2:06 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's a tornado, and it's going to be a wild ride.




You've sown the fucking wind. Now reap the whirlwind. ~Carl Benjamin

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 2:33 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Pentagon Purge: Trump Fires Chairman Of Joint Chiefs, Navy Chief And Other Top Brass


https://www.zerohedge.com/military/pentagon-purge-trump-fires-chairman
-joint-chiefs-5-more-senior-pentagon-officers

-----------
"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." - Henry Kissinger


AMERICANS SUPPORT AMERICA


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Saturday, February 22, 2025 7:59 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

That is not something that a real person says. That is just 3 sentences you will hear on MSNBC 150 times every evening.

You don't have to keep doing this now Joan. That USAID money is never coming back to you.


Fuck Ukraine.
If Trump/Musk were real, they wouldn't be talking about sending out $5,000 checks until after they have the money. But since they are a pair of lunatics, they will say anything.

Trump/Musk are counting their chickens before they hatch:

DOGE savings to give a $5,000 refund to every taxpaying household in the country.

A "DOGE dividend" to be exclusively funded by the department's $2 trillion savings target. DOGE could take 20% of that savings ($400 billion) and divide it between roughly 79 million taxpaying U.S. households, approximately $5,000 per household.

On Feb. 19, Trump told attendees of the FII PRIORITY Summit investment conference in Miami Beach, Florida, that his administration was deliberating the proposal. In a video of his speech posted by the White House YouTube channel, he said:
Quote:
There's even under consideration a new concept where we give 20% of the DOGE savings to American citizens and 20% goes to paying down debt. Because the numbers are incredible, Elon. So many billions of dollars — billions, hundreds of billions. And we're thinking about giving 20% back to the American citizens.
Some experts have expressed skepticism regarding the claim that DOGE could cut $2 trillion from the federal budget. Musk even cast doubt on the figure in early January 2025, telling political strategist Mark Penn in an interview broadcast on X:
Quote:
I think we'll try for 2 trillion. I think that's like, the best-case outcome. But I do think that you kind of have to have some overreach. I think if we try for 2 trillion we've got a good shot at getting 1 [trillion]."
Fishback's plan suggested that, should the proposal be accepted, the tax refund could be sent after the expiration of DOGE in July 2026.

We contacted the White House for comment and will update this story if we receive a response.

Trump previously issued government-issued checks during the coronavirus pandemic, when he sent out stimulus checks that had his signature on them to millions of Americans.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/musk-taxpayer-5000-refund/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Saturday, February 22, 2025 9:45 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:

That is not something that a real person says. That is just 3 sentences you will hear on MSNBC 150 times every evening.

You don't have to keep doing this now Joan. That USAID money is never coming back to you.


Fuck Ukraine.
If Trump/Musk were real, they wouldn't be talking about sending out $5,000 checks until after they have the money. But since they are a pair of lunatics, they will say anything.

Trump/Musk are counting their chickens before they hatch:

DOGE savings to give a $5,000 refund to every taxpaying household in the country.

A "DOGE dividend" to be exclusively funded by the department's $2 trillion savings target. DOGE could take 20% of that savings ($400 billion) and divide it between roughly 79 million taxpaying U.S. households, approximately $5,000 per household.

On Feb. 19, Trump told attendees of the FII PRIORITY Summit investment conference in Miami Beach, Florida, that his administration was deliberating the proposal. In a video of his speech posted by the White House YouTube channel, he said:
Quote:
There's even under consideration a new concept where we give 20% of the DOGE savings to American citizens and 20% goes to paying down debt. Because the numbers are incredible, Elon. So many billions of dollars — billions, hundreds of billions. And we're thinking about giving 20% back to the American citizens.
Some experts have expressed skepticism regarding the claim that DOGE could cut $2 trillion from the federal budget. Musk even cast doubt on the figure in early January 2025, telling political strategist Mark Penn in an interview broadcast on X:
Quote:
I think we'll try for 2 trillion. I think that's like, the best-case outcome. But I do think that you kind of have to have some overreach. I think if we try for 2 trillion we've got a good shot at getting 1 [trillion]."
Fishback's plan suggested that, should the proposal be accepted, the tax refund could be sent after the expiration of DOGE in July 2026.

We contacted the White House for comment and will update this story if we receive a response.

Trump previously issued government-issued checks during the coronavirus pandemic, when he sent out stimulus checks that had his signature on them to millions of Americans.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/musk-taxpayer-5000-refund/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two



20% of DOGE savings and $5,000 per person are two very, very different things, Snopes.

Which one is it?


I've already done the math for that here...

http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=66530


Quote:
This number, at 20% of the savings, would be a hell of a lot less at least than the number I heard some people floating around yesterday.

I was hearing $5,000 per person. Fucking ridiculous, whether that's for every American Citizen or even if it's only for those 170.7 Million Americans currently working.

$5,000 x $170,700,000 comes out to $853.5 BILLION, which is $12.1 Billion more than the US Military cost to run in 2024.

There are roughly 297.5 Million American Citizens after your remove the 14.3% of people who don't matter and won't be here for much longer. $5,000 x 297.5 Million comes out to $1.487 TRILLION.



If we're talking 20% of anything DOGE saves, that depends on how much they save.

Well... how much do they spend in total? In 2024, the US Government spent $6.9 Trillion in total.

https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-budget/where-do-our-federal-tax-
dollars-go

20% of $6.9 Trillion is $1.38 Trillion.

That means if Elon and Trump shut down the Federal Government completely and not a single dime is spent in 2025, the amount of money coming back to US Taxpayers at 20% would still be less than $5,000 per person if every American citizen, excluding illegals, got that money. As stated in the quote above, you'd need to spend $1.487 Trillion to do that.



So, how much could DOGE realistically save? $1 Trillion? $2 Trillion?

20% of that is only $200 Billion to $400 Billion.

That's less than 1/4 to 1/2 the money that you would need if you wanted to give only the 170 Million working Americans a $5,000 payday, and you excluded everyone else, including the tens of millions of seniors that voted for Trump.

In order for Trump to give only every currently working American a $5,000 check that is only 20% of the money they cut from the budget, Trump and Elon are going to have to remove around $4.5 Trillion, or roughly 2/3rds of 2024's budget to make that happen.


So what is it? $5,000 or 20%, because those two things aren't even remotely close.



This is just another reason nobody takes you or any of the media you choose to ingest seriously, Second.

Every single argument you have ever made can easily be dismantled with just a small amount of effort and a moderate IQ.

Nobody gives a fuck about your feelings in 2025.

Most of us never did.

--------------------------------------------------

"I don't find this stuff amusing anymore." ~Paul Simon

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Sunday, February 23, 2025 9:54 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump has been recently trying to extort Ukraine out of half its mineral wealth. The odd thing about this is that Ukraine doesn't have very much mineral wealth.

Revenues from Ukraine’s resources would be directed to a fund in which the United States would hold 100 percent financial interest, and that Ukraine should contribute to the fund until it reaches $500 billion.... That figure far exceeds the country’s actual revenues from resources, which were $1.1 billion last year.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/world/europe/ukraine-trump-minerals
.html

Trump has also been nonsensically insisting that Ukraine started the war even though we were all there and saw Russia cross the border and try to run a tank column into Kyiv. And he's been calling Zelensky a dictator even though if there's a dictator around it's obviously Vladimir Putin.

There's nothing complicated here. In 2019 Trump asked Zelensky for dirt against Joe Biden in return for military aid. Zelensky declined and Trump was impeached. Trump has felt aggrieved ever since.

Trump is motivated by revenge and now he's getting it. He's a simple man.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, February 23, 2025 10:53 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Trump’s 13 biggest lies since he was inaugurated on January 20. It was hard to choose.

The (non-)uniqueness of birthright citizenship: Trump offered what might have sounded like a reasonable rationale for his attempt to get rid of birthright citizenship. The United States, he said, is the only country that has birthright citizenship.

Except that is not true. Dozens of countries, including Canada and Mexico, also grant automatic citizenship to people born on their soil.

More up-is-down reversing of the reality of January 6: For years now, Trump has presented a version of the Capitol riot of January 6, 2021, that bears little resemblance to what actually happened. When he was asked in early February why he granted pardons to people who assaulted first responders, he said the people he pardoned were actually “assaulted by our government” and that “they didn’t assault.” This “they didn’t assault” claim was a brazen denial of the obvious truth, clear in video after video and trial after trial. The Justice Department has said more than 140 officers were assaulted on January 6, and that more than 170 people pleaded guilty to such assaults.

A gusher of deceit about California water policy: Amid disaster, more dishonesty. First, Trump linked the Los Angeles wildfires to California’s decision to use some of its water to protect a fish species in the northern part of the state – even though the two things have nothing to do with each other, as befuddled experts explained to anyone who would listen.

Then, after ordering the sudden release of billions of gallons of water from Central Valley reservoirs for no apparent good reason, Trump declared that some of this water was heading to Los Angeles – even though it wasn’t heading to Los Angeles and couldn’t go to Los Angeles.

The election lie he refused to let die: What can you even say about this one at this point? Trump’s win in the free and fair 2024 election did not convince him to abandon his endless lying about his defeat in the free and fair 2020 election. More than four years after his loss to Joe Biden, he repeated his “rigged” nonsense during at least three events on his 2025 inauguration day alone, then a bunch of times after that.

That fable about Olympic boxers, again: Trump, once a prominent promoter of lies about President Barack Obama’s birthplace, continued to demonstrate no hesitation lying about not only policy issues but also individual people. This time, to promote his push to try to get transgender athletes banned from the Olympics, he told his familiar story about how two gold medalists in women’s boxing at the Games in Paris last year were men who “transitioned.”

Wrong. As the International Olympic Committee repeatedly noted during the Olympics, when Trump and others made such claims, neither champion had transitioned; both were born as female and have always competed in women’s events. Even the discredited boxing authority that controversially disqualified the women from a 2023 competition, vaguely claiming a test had found they had unfair competitive advantages, did not allege they had transitioned.

The president’s fictionalized northern neighbor: Before taking office, Trump casually asserted that the Canadian people “like” his idea of Canada becoming the 51st US state. That was the opposite of the truth; the idea is hugely unpopular with the Canadian public. Then, after his inauguration, Trump continued to make stuff up about Canada – at one point posting on social media and then saying out loud that Canada prohibits US banks from doing business there. He added, “Can you believe that?” No doubt some Americans believe it, but it’s false.

Blasting Biden for a program launched under Trump: After the deadly January collision between a military helicopter and a passenger jet, Trump blamed Biden administration diversity initiatives at the Federal Aviation Administration without providing any evidence any FAA diversity policy had anything to do with the crash. He added in a fictional story about a frantic last-minute Biden push to hire people with significant disabilities as air traffic controllers, failing to explain that this FAA pilot program was actually a years-old initiative launched during his own administration in 2019.

Relentless deception about who pays tariffs: When Trump talked about the tariffs he imposed on Chinese imports in his first presidency, he spoke of how much money “from China” these tariffs generated for the US Treasury. When he talked about the additional tariffs he plans to impose on various other countries during his current presidency, he spoke of a need to “charge them.” At no point did he acknowledge that US importers, not foreign countries, are the ones who pay the actual tariff charges – or that study after study, including one from the federal government’s bipartisan trade commission, found that Americans ended up bearing almost the entire cost of his first-term tariffs on Chinese products.

A wild exaggeration of the increase in autism rates: Trump keeps flirting with, though not explicitly endorsing, the thoroughly debunked conspiracy theory that childhood vaccines cause autism – and in a social media post in early February, he inflated the extent of the increase in the known prevalence of autism over the last two decades. “20 years ago, Autism in children was 1 in 10,000. NOW IT’S 1 in 34,” Trump wrote. “WOW! Something’s really wrong.” Aside from the fact that experts say the increase in autism diagnoses (to 1 in 36 children by age 8 in 2020) likely has to do with greater awareness of the symptoms and improved screening practices, public statistics from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the known prevalence in 2004 was 1 in 125 children, not “1 in 10,000.” That’s a pretty big difference.

China’s (non-)operation of the Panama Canal: Much of Trump’s lying is ad-libbed. Some of it, however, is planned in advance. Some of it, however, is written into his prepared speeches. He said in his inaugural address in January: “Above all, China is operating the Panama Canal. And we didn’t give it to China, we gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back.”

This would have been a good line if China was actually operating the Panama Canal. It isn’t; Panama is.

Trump’s invented dominance with “the youth vote”: Trump said some accurate things while touting his victory in the 2024 election, such as the fact that he swept all seven swing states. But in keeping with his longstanding practice of exaggerating even legitimate accomplishments, he also kept sprinkling in a claim that wasn’t even close to correct – an assertion that he won the youth vote “by 36 points.” In fact, exit polls show he lost the youth vote to then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Even if these polls were off, there’s no basis for the claim that he won the youth vote by 36.

The tale of the $50 million – no, make it $100 million – in condoms for Hamas: When press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced at her first official White House briefing that Trump had thwarted a plan to spend $50 million “to fund condoms in Gaza,” it was immediately clear the claim was highly dubious; the Trump administration had no evidence to substantiate it. But Trump not only repeated the $50 million figure the next day, he added an incendiary claim that the condoms were “for Hamas.” Then, days after it had become obvious the $50 million figure was pure fiction, he inflated it to “$100 million.”

This was another example of Trumpflation – the president’s years-old habit of making his inaccurate stories more and more inaccurate over time.

Blaming Ukraine for starting the war on Ukraine: Russia started the war in Ukraine when it invaded Ukraine in 2022. That is an obvious fact. But on Tuesday, when Trump dismissed Ukrainians’ complaints about their exclusion from US-Russia negotiations about ending the war, he falsely accused Ukraine of starting the war – saying, “You should’ve never started it. You could’ve made a deal.” Laughable Kremlin-style propaganda, this time from the president of the United States.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/cnn-anchors-roast-trump-over-1
3-biggest-lies-of-first-month/ar-AA1zzXld

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, February 23, 2025 11:11 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


It's remarkable how much conflict of interest Elon Musk has with the federal government he now controls. A few examples:

1. Musk has been fighting with the FAA for years over regulation of SpaceX, culminating in a couple of large fines levied against SpaceX last year. Musk wanted administrator Michael Whitaker out and said so in no uncertain terms. And guess what? After the election, Whitaker announced he would resign years early before Trump could fire him.

2. The NHTSA is America's premier highway safety agency. Among other things, this makes it the agency in charge of investigating crashes of driverless cars—like Elon Musk's Tesla. But unlike Google's Waymo, which cooperates with the NHTSA, Tesla decidedly doesn't:

Musk has accused NHTSA of holding back progress on self-driving technology with its investigations and recalls.... NHTSA has mandated that Tesla and other automakers using self-driving technology report crash data on vehicles, a requirement that Tesla has criticized and that watchdogs fear could be eliminated.

No matter. Musk is in charge of firing workers, so he decided to slash nearly half the jobs at the specialized unit overseeing the safety of autonomous vehicles:

“If the question is, will this affect the federal government’s ability to understand the safety case behind Tesla’s vehicles, then yes, it will,” said one terminated engineer. “The amount of people in the federal government who are able to understand this adequately is very small. Now it’s almost nonexistent.”

It must be nice to complain about over-regulation and then actually do something about it by firing half the regulators.

3. Donald Trump has ordered the removal of all 8,000 EV chargers installed at government buildings nationwide. Why? It's one thing not to build any more, but why demolish the ones that are already there?

Who else has a profitable network of high-speed chargers that doesn't need any competition? That would be Elon Musk and Tesla.

4. When he took office, Donald Trump promised to end the federal $7,500 subsidy for electric vehicles. This may just be part of Trump's jihad against EVs, but it's worth noting that it would help Tesla:

“Take away the subsidies. It will only help Tesla,” Musk wrote in a post on X as he campaigned and raised money for Trump in July. Auto industry experts say the move would have a nominal impact on Tesla — by far the largest electric vehicle maker in the U.S. — but have a potentially devastating impact on its competitors in the EV sector since they are still struggling to secure a foothold in the market.

It's all a zero-sum game. Subsidies might benefit Tesla, but they benefit smaller EV companies a lot more. Getting rid of them now would be a big net positive for Tesla.

5. When the Ukraine war started Elon Musk immediately activated his Starlink network for use by Ukraine's military. But that turns out to be a two-edged sword:

The US has threatened to cut off Ukraine’s access to Starlink — the global satellite network that has proven essential on the battlefield — if Kyiv does not accept the White House’s deal to exchange its rare earth minerals for continued security guarantees, according to anonymous sources.... “Ukraine runs on Starlink. They consider it their North Star,” the source told Reuters. “Losing Starlink... would be a massive blow.”

This is less an example of Musk benefiting from his control over government than it is the opposite. The government, it turns out, can benefit by knowing Musk will cooperate with them since he doesn't want to lose his access or inadvertently annoy his patron Trump.

https://jabberwocking.com/how-elon-musk-benefits-from-being-elon-musk/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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