Donald Trump: Classic or Dud?

Mitchell Epner shared this read from David Cay, who Epner describes as someone "who has been following Trump's finances for decades," and it's worth a gander.

https://www.dcreport.org/2024/02/19/trumps-legal-delay-tactics-will-lead-to-further-self-destruction/

Epner himself is skeptical, saying:

Even if Trump can't raise the funds to deposit with the courts, he can appeal - it just doesn't stay enforcement. If he appeals but does not post the $, it would put the onus on E. Jean Carroll and/or the NYAG to seek to enforce the judgments. That process would be ugly for Trump, but it would allow him to play to the MAGA masses. A personal bankruptcy filing strikes at his core identity. It also would open Trump up to extremely invasive discovery to find his assets and liabilities.

The only thing that I know *for certain* about the future is that it has not happened yet, so Mr. Johnson's prediction may be proven accurate.

We will see.

I lean Epner but then again, this is a scenario Trump has never wanted, and here he is.

xxp, I'm glad Obama ranks in the top 10 in that poll. I think he is still the best president of my lifetime, for being the originator of Obamacare if for nothing else.

But he was also essentially scandal-free and was someone who really understood what he could achieve - the limitations that were imposed on him by society and government - and was nevertheless able to lead us into the future without mishap

If new presidents are often the opposite of the last presidents, that swing was never as wide as after his 8 years

obama middling at best

maybe not at best obama solidly middling

But he was also essentially scandal-free and was someone who really understood what he could achieve - the limitations that were imposed on him by society and government - and was nevertheless able to lead us into the future without mishap

― Dan S, Tuesday, February 20, 2024 8:06 PM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

as evidenced by the arguments that fans of his make

whatever, wish I hadn't posted

cmon that wasnt that bad

I've got friends who can get dialyses and health care thanks to Obamacare, which has the highest enrollment in the country in the reddest parts of Miami-Dade, so he's automatically better than Bill Clinton. So he ranks high among the sociopaths in this bunch; he killed American citizens and their children with drones vs. FDR and his internment camps, which is why I have no heroes

Obama was the best president of my life so far. I was born during the Johnson administration, so you might say that's slim pickings, but still.

whatever, wish I hadn't posted

― Dan S,

Your post was fine. It's better than if you'd triggered one of us in the ILX film threads with praise of Oppenheimer.

oppenheimer was so bad, much worse than obama

lol Alfred

Oppenheimer’s fans are certainly more annoying than Obama’s fans

johnson was maybe better than obama, carter maybe too, biden before the whole genocide situation, tho to obamas credit he did win twice which is certainly isnt nothing, clinton won too tho, kind interesting to consider them the bookmarks of dem neoliberalism

"Oppenheimer showed us how Americans can achieve great things when they dare to dream big."

- Barack Obama

Carter nominated some of the first female judges, kept Israel and Egypt from overtly killing each other, and...what else? He fought against full employment, was no fan of unions, brought the shah to America -- some vile shit.

Honestly, the ACA is responsible for me staying alive and remotely solvent. I am not the biggest fan of Obama, but I know to give credit where credit’s due.

he inspired the classic song i cant drive 5 by sammy the red rocker hagar xp

I'd be approx $500 poorer every month without Obamacare, table otm. it's not as good as a real single payer system but it's a band-aid that actually helps.

All this Carter talk has made me wanna blast David Sylvian brb

obamacare obamacare is pretty weak sauce forget about single payer it was pretty lame for what it was even and a bunch of it has predictably been rolled back since but tbf it was an improvement over the status quo for sure tho not good from the opportunity cost pov, however the best thing he did in his presidency was expand medicare as part of obamacare

*for states that accepted the money haha america gotta love it

Obama is a 70’s Republican. He lost every ounce of credibility he had within months of entering the Oval Office, and he just got worse

Obamacare was amazing for the insurance companies that OK’ed every line of it. America’s only hope of ever having single payer is states doing it one by one, and I do think Gen Z is pissed off enough to demand it. That, or WWIII will end everything

Carter also got the ball rolling on genocide in Nicaragua, which Reagan gets much of the brunt for nowadays. He had the same bullshit foreign policies as every other POTUS.

But, hey, he does book signings in grocery stores and put up solar panels

was nevertheless able to lead us into the future without mishap


how did that future work out, I can’t remember

Carter doing better out of office puts him ahead of every other president I know of tbf

Anybody who runs for President and wins is the worst President

Obama went on the Daily Show and John Stewart called him "timid" to his face.

I was initially skeptical about Obama (during the primary campaign, I thought he overpromised) but I do think he did some good things in spite of massive headwinds.

Has everyone somehow forgotten how much Republican obstruction he had to overcome?

It's like, yeah, why are you not able to achieve unprecedented groundbreaking political miracles in spite of massive racist resistance = you suck.

Republicans are so racist they're *still* running against Obama. And not even his policies, really, the very *idea* of Obama. You want reactionary, Trump originally ran and has always been more or less an explicitly anti-Obama reactionary, in as much as he has any consistent beliefs.

Back when I first realised that the GOP were working to obstruct Obama, I called it ‘cold civil war’ and nothing that has happened since 2008 in American political life can persuade me that I was wrong.

Seriously. Literally refusing to allow Obama to appoint a Supreme Justice might be the most audacious political act of my lifetime.

democrats always getting obstructed by those nasty republicans whatre you gonna do you know its unfortunate how theres always nothing they can do

the filibuster seems more and more like a convenient crutch to give them an out from legislating

democrats are born to lose, just playing their role

The general anti-government, anti-tax, "party of no" grievance shit was already present in the Newt era. But having a Black president pressed the accelerator.

CSA / Jim Crow / Contract With America / Tea Party / Limbaugh / Fox / MAGA bullshit... all a continuation of previously existing bullshit, but it's still odious.

And I don't see a lot of solutions except the stuff most of us are already doing.

how much of this could have been avoided if you hadn't given the south control of the narrative as a consolation prize?

how much of this couldve been avoid if democrats actions werent such that they receive multimillion dollar payouts from wall street immediately upon leaving office

The thing to do is blow up the part of West Virginia where Joe Manchin and his boat hang out.

without manchin someone else will just have to play the role

Right, I think the Manchin is helping to provide cover to other senators who are not comfortable with losing the filibuster.

also just the legislation he was blocking was stuff that for sure at least a handful of other dems were probably not enthusiastic about

Right.

At any rate he and the seat are gone in November, so the Dems will find another Trojan horse.

hey I didn't know anything about James Hemings until today*, so thanks Donald Trump thread Josh!

* pedantic note: saying he "invented" ice cream is not accurate—it had existed for thousands of years before he was born—but he did introduce it, macaroni and cheese, french fries, and a bunch of other French dishes to the US

At any rate he and the seat are gone in November, so the Dems will find another Trojan horse.

― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, February 21, 2024 9:39 AM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

theres a term for it i was trying to google it only turned up heat shield but i dont think thats it

I think Jefferson/Hemings are credited with popularizing it in America, that's why he gets a lot of credit. This is a good history:

https://www.monticello.org/research-education/thomas-jefferson-encyclopedia/ice-cream/

A little later another Black White House chef, Augustus Jackson, is credited with modernizing it in the US:

Jackson worked in the White House, too, as a chef for the First families, including James and Dolley Madison. (Apparently, the First Lady had eclectic taste that included ice cream studded with oysters.) After his tenure, he launched an ice cream business in Philadelphia, where many other Black pastry chefs and confectioners specialized in ice cream.

One of Jackson’s big innovations was making ice cream more stable by adding salt to the recipe, which lowers the freezing temperature. It also enhances other flavors. But that’s not all that Jackson did for ice cream.

While most early ice creams were frozen egg custards, Jackson developed a lighter kind of ice cream. “It was this eggless, uniquely American style,” Hopkins says. “And at some point, we made an industry out of it.” Jackson is the reason why many ice cream recipes now do not have eggs.

Jackson prospered by selling his ice cream to parlors and ice cream vendors in Philadelphia who were predominantly Black. And as Black ice cream entrepreneurs moved north during The Great Migration, as Hopkins’ podcast details, they spread ice cream culture.

the First Lady had eclectic taste that included ice cream studded with oyster

baller move

At any rate he and the seat are gone in November, so the Dems will find another Trojan horse

That being once again being the minority party in the Senate, no?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ut6MSMqxmlE

ah yeah I read about Jackson too! Super interesting history

trenchant thought: historians should stop doings surveys on which slaveowning aristocrat and/or war criminal presidents had the best vibes, and start telling us about the history of mac and cheese