Tag: trump

Trump’s trade war is hurting the dairy industry

Seth Anderson0 comment

CE Zuercher Co Wholesale Cheese
CE Zuercher & Co Wholesale Cheese

As part of our continuing mocking of Trump-voting industries being screwed by Trump, Slate reports:

As the Wall Street Journal reports Thursday, Mexico and China have decided to target up to $986 million worth of American dairy exports with tariffs as retaliation for the Trump administration’s protectionist moves. Mexico is increasing its duty on cheese, while China is hitting cheese and whey. With their growing middle-class populations, both countries have become important markets in recent years for the U.S. dairy industry, which has found itself struggling with overproduction in the face of declining domestic milk consumption. Milk futures for July are down since Mexico announced its tariffs earlier this year—the last time the country imposed similar tariffs on U.S. cheese, shipments fell by 26 percent—and companies are already fretting. The president of Wisconsin’s BelGioioso Cheese called the situation “a nightmare.”

This is part of a larger pattern for the Trump administration, which the New York Times documents at length. So far, the administration’s efforts on trade and regulation have ended up hurting the very industries they claim to be helping. The 10 percent tariff Trump placed on aluminum, for instance, has made raw materials more expensive for most of the companies that actually produce aluminum products in the U.S., since they’re generally in the business of importing those raw materials and shaping them into more valuable upstream products. Steel tariffs have made pumping crude more expensive for oil companies by adding to the cost of building rigs and buying equipment. Soybean prices are crashing in response to Chinese tariff threats. Detroit’s car-makers are worried about potential tariffs on foreign autos, with executives warning about possible retaliation. The law of unintended consequences is playing out, or about to play out, in sector after sector of the economy.

(click here to continue reading Trump’s trade war is hurting the dairy industry..)

I would guess many dairy company owners and employees in Wisconsin are starting to regret voting for the Trump trauma train… 

Global Cheese
Global Cheese, Kensington Market, Toronto

WSJ:

 Cheese makers that rely on foreign sales are suffering as China and Mexico raise tariffs on U.S. mozzarella and provolone.

 BelGioioso Cheese Inc., a second-generation family company in Wisconsin, has seen sales to Mexico drop since officials there implemented tariffs of up to 15% in early June on most U.S. cheese. The levies were a response to tariffs the U.S. placed on Mexican steel and aluminum.

 On Thursday, Mexico was slated to raise its levy on most U.S. cheese to as much as 25%, while China on Friday is implementing tariffs on $34 billion of U.S. goods, including cheese and whey, a dairy byproduct often fed to livestock.

 “It’s a nightmare,” said BelGioioso President Errico Auricchio.

…

The Trump administration’s trade agenda is threatening that growth, dairies say. The Mexican tariffs affect as much as $578 million in U.S. dairy goods, while China’s duties could hit $408 million of cheese, whey and other products, according to U.S. Chamber of Commerce data.

July milk futures have dropped 12% since Mexico announced May 31 that it would strike back with tariffs. The price for a barrel, or 500 pounds, of white cheddar last week hit its lowest level since 2009. More cheese is in cold storage in the U.S. than any time since the U.S. Department of Agriculture began keeping track in 1917.

…

U.S. dairy exports last year totaled $5.5 billion, including $1.3 billion to Mexico, the top market, according to the Export Council. China, meanwhile, bought more than $577 million in U.S. dairy products last year, nearly half of it whey. (The recent tariffs don’t affect all dairy exports to Mexico and China.) Almost half of U.S. whey sales went to China last year, the Export Council said. The threat of the Chinese tariffs that take effect Friday has already hurt those sales. 

 

(click here to continue reading Take Our Cheese, Please: American Cheese Makers Suffer Under New Tariffs – WSJ.)

How Trump’s Policy Decisions Undermine the Industries He Pledged to Help

Seth Anderson0 comment

Trump As Joker
Trump As Joker (source unknown)

As part of a continuing series about Trump supporters who have gotten screwed by Trump’s erratic trade policy pronouncements, the NYT reports:

In late March, the Trump administration began imposing a 25 percent tariff on steel and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum from countries including Russia, China, Turkey and Brazil. On June 1, it expanded the levies to include Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

While the steel industry supports the tariffs, the aluminum industry is mostly opposed. The tariffs raise prices for aluminum, which helps smelters, the companies that make raw aluminum here. However, only a handful of smelters still operate in the United States.

The Aluminum Association, which represents the bulk of the American industry, says that 97 percent of American jobs in aluminum are at what are called “downstream” businesses that shape the metal into things like auto parts or other goods. Those companies are hurt by Mr. Trump’s tariffs, because they must now pay higher prices for their raw materials.

(click here to continue reading How Trump’s Policy Decisions Undermine the Industries He Pledged to Help – The New York Times.)

It turns out electing a president who gets all his policy ideas from Fox News maybe isn’t such a good thing for the nation. Who woulda guessed?

Storing Wheat Agfa Scala 200
Storing Wheat / Soy – Agfa Scala 200

And yet, despite all the evidence of Trump’s incompetence, and indifference, some Trumpsters remain on the Trump train:

“I would like to tell the president, ‘Man, you are messing up our market,’” said Kevin Scott, a soybean farmer in South Dakota and the secretary of the American Soybean Association. The idea of changing Nafta, he said, “gives us a lot of heartburn in farm country.”

 At the same time, Mr. Scott said, China’s threat to impose tariffs this weekon United States soybeans — in direct response to Mr. Trump’s tariffs on other Chinese-made products — is already having a negative effect on the prices farmers see. In recent days, Canada imposed its own retaliatory tariffs against the United States. And on Friday, General Motors warned that Mr. Trump’s threat of tariffs on imported cars could backfire, killing American jobs and leading to “a smaller G.M.”

Mr. Scott voted for Mr. Trump, and he approves of administration efforts to roll back environmental regulations, “But if we lose those Chinese and Mexican markets, it will be hard to get them back,” he said. China and Mexico are the two biggest markets for American soybean exports.

Richard Newell, president of Resources for the Future, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, described the administration’s overall approach as “whac-a-mole policy” that suggests a lack of appreciation of the complexity of global commerce. “The law of unintended consequences abounds,” Mr. Newell added.

Trump repeatedly suggested invading Venezuela

Seth Anderson0 comment

Trump Eventually We Will Get Something Done
Trump: Eventually We Will Get Something Done

The Guardian UK reports on an AP story filed earlier today:

Donald Trump repeatedly raised the possibility of invading Venezuela in talks with his top aides at the White House, according to a new report.

Trump brought up the subject of an invasion in public in August last year, saying: “We have many options for Venezuela, including a possible military option, if necessary.” But the president’s musings about the possibility of a US invasion were more extensive and persistent than that public declaration, according to the Associated Press.

The previous day Trump reportedly took his top officials by surprise in an Oval Office meeting, asking why the US could not intervene to remove the government of Nicolas Maduro on the grounds that Venezuela’s political and economic unraveling represented a threat to the region.

Quoting an unnamed senior administration official, the AP report said the suggestion stunned those present at the meeting, which included the then national security advisor, HR McMaster, and secretary of state, Rex Tillerson. Both have since left the administration.

The administration officials are said to have taken turns in trying to talk him out of the idea, pointing out that any such military action would alienate Latin American allies who had supported the US policy of punitive sanctions on the Maduro regime.

Their arguments do not seem to have dissuaded the president.

A grim-faced Tillerson stood alongside Trump the next day at his New Jersey golf course at Bedminster as the president warmed to his theme.

“We have many options for Venezuela, this is our neighbour,” Trump said.

“We’re all over the world and we have troops all over the world in places that are very very far away, Venezuela is not very far away and the people are suffering and dying. We have many options for Venezuela including a possible military option if necessary.”

(click here to continue reading Trump repeatedly suggested invading Venezuela, stunning top aides – report | US news | The Guardian.)

Honestly, this scares me quite a bit. Trump is a creature of the corporate media (Fox, obviously, but CNN and the major newspapers too – Trump cares if they cover him), and has been trained by years of corporate media’s jingoistic support of any military action the United States happens to be involved in. Trump saw what happened to Bush’s ratings during the Iraq War1, how the invasion of Grenada played out, Noriega’s overthrow, yadda yadda. Trump is looking for any excuse to send our troops into battle, not for any geopolitical reasons, but to juice his approval ratings.

Footnotes:
  1. both of them, actually, Bush the Smarter, and W’s adventures in the Middle East [↩]

The Shrinking Ambitions of Donald Trump’s Infrastructure Plan

Seth Anderson0 comment

Stop Standing So Still 

The Nation reports:

Other than shouting about building a wall on the US-Mexico border, one of Donald Trump’s most frequently proclaimed promises on the 2016 campaign trail was the launching of a half-trillion-dollar plan to repair America’s crumbling infrastructure (employing large numbers of workers in the process). Eighteen months into his administration, no credible proposal for anything near that scale has been made. To the extent that the Trump administration has a plan at all for public investment, it involves pumping up Pentagon spending, not investing in roads, bridges, transportation, better Internet access, or other pressing needs of the civilian economy.

Not that President Trump hasn’t talked about investing in infrastructure. Last February, he even proposed a scheme that, he claimed, would boost the country’s infrastructure with $1.5 trillion in spending over the next decade. With a typical dose of hyperbole, he described it as “the biggest and boldest infrastructure investment in American history.”

Analysts from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania—Trump’s alma mater—beg to differ. They note that the plan actually involves only $200 billion in direct federal investment, less than one-seventh of the total promised. According to Wharton’s experts, much of the extra spending, supposedly leveraged from the private sector as well as state and local governments, will never materialize. In addition, were such a plan launched, it would, they suggest, fall short of its goal by a cool trillion dollars. In the end, the spending levels Trump is proposing would have “little to no impact” on the nation’s gross domestic product. To add insult to injury, the president has exerted next to no effort to get even this anemic proposal through Congress, where it’s now dead in the water.

(click here to continue reading The Shrinking Ambitions of Donald Trump’s ‘Infrastructure’ Plan | The Nation.)

Is anyone surprised? Really? Has Trump acted upon any of his campaign promises, other than his anti-immigrant histrionics? Even that is more flailing about than pouring concrete to build his Mexico wall. Creating actionable political plans is not something Trump’s team has ever been competent at, why should infrastructure be any different? 

A Poem Interrupted By Jealousy
A Poem Interrupted By Jealousy

Trump Tells Congress it Has Deal to Help Out ZTE

Seth Anderson0 comment

Up To 10 1 11 Number of People Dump Chinese Communist Party
Up To 10-1-11, Number of People Dump Chinese Communist Party

The New York Times reports:

The collapse of ZTE would be an embarrassing outcome for China and the company’s fate has become a hurdle in trade negotiations between the two countries. President Trump directed the Commerce Department to re-examine ZTE’s penalty based on a personal request from Chinese president Xi Jinping, triggering a fierce pushback from some of Mr. Trump’s national security advisers, as well as lawmakers from both parties.

Mr. Trump, however, has appeared unmoved by those concerns and has been pushing to reach some type of trade resolution with China, which has so far proved elusive. The administration wants to cut a deal on ZTE in exchange for trade concessions from China, including purchases of American agriculture and energy products, people familiar with the discussions said.

Such an agreement is likely to face fierce resistance on Capitol Hill. Top lawmakers, including Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic senate leader, and Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, have urged the administration not to bend on ZTE, which they consider a law enforcement and national security issue.

“ZTE presents a national security threat to the United States — and nothing in this reported deal addresses that fundamental fact,” Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, said in a statement. “If President Trump won’t put our security before Chinese jobs, Congress will act on a bipartisan basis to stop him.”

(click here to continue reading Trump Administration Tells Congress it Has Deal to Revive ZTE – The New York Times.)

Make China Great! Isn’t that what the Trumper hat said?

Pope Doesn t Want to Wear Her Make Donald Drumpf Again Hat for some reason
Pope (RIP) Doesn’t Want to Wear Her Make Donald Drumpf Again Hat for some reason

Especially because the reason why ZTE was penalized is such a talking point of the right wing, trade with Iran and North Korea:

 

 

Last year the US imposed a trade ban on American companies supplying equipment to Chinese telecoms giant ZTE Corp. Now, it appears the two countries are trying to work things out. According to sources briefed on the confidential negotiations, there has been a “handshake deal” between US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He which will lift the ban that effectively crippled ZTE’s operations.

 

The ban was imposed after ZTE was found to be illegally shipping US goods to Iran and North Korea. The US hit the company with a $1.9 billion fine, and originally agreed to suspend the ban for a three-year probation period. However, after the company was then caught lying about the way it punished those involved in the scandal, the ban was revived.

 

 

(click here to continue reading The US will help save ZTE even though it broke international laws.)

Trump vents his anger over immigration at Homeland Security secretary

Seth Anderson0 comment

Symphony of White Number 97
Symphony of White, Number 97 

The Washington Post reports:

President Trump began berating Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen in the Oval Office earlier this spring, according to administration officials, griping about her performance and blaming her for a surge in illegal border crossings. 

Chief of Staff John F. Kelly, who installed her in the job, jumped in to defend her. 

The two men then sparred over Nielsen as she silently watched.

…

[Trump] has also seen her as a proxy for Kelly, whose relationship with the president has frayed in recent months. Trump has decided, according to several aides, that Nielsen is a George W. Bush kind of Republican, the worst in his view.

President Trump walks with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen during his visit to Joint Interagency Task Force South anti-smuggling center in Key West, Fla., in April. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP) Nielsen has complained that it is almost an impossible task working for Trump, according to administration officials and others familiar with her thinking, and that he doesn’t understand the nuances of immigration law.

…“The president has a very rudimentary understanding of what the border is all about and how you secure it,” said a former DHS staffer who worked closely with Nielsen. “And she’s also not one of the border fire-eaters that have his ear right now. She’s in an impossible, no-win situation.”

Tensions between the two could soon flare again — the Border Patrol’s May arrest numbers are due to be released early next month, and immigration hawks, including the president, now treat them as a kind of barometer for Nielsen’s performance.

…

Now, five months into her tenure as Homeland Security secretary, the measures Nielsen has implemented — separating families, boosting arrests, increasing prosecutions — have made her a villain to many Democrats and immigrant rights’ groups. 

But they have not delivered the immediate results the president demands. In April, the number of illegal border crossers arrested by U.S. agents topped 50,000 for the second consecutive month. The increase has stripped the president of one of his proudest accomplishments — the sharp drop in illegal migration in the months immediately following his 2016 win.

(click here to continue reading ‘We’re closed!’: Trump vents his anger over immigration at Homeland Security secretary – The Washington Post.)

I have zero sympathy for any of these thugs, Ms. Nielsen included. However, Trump and Kelly seem even worse. What evil people…

The NYT reports about the “pro-lifers” in the White House:

 

A top official with the Department of Health and Human Services told members of Congress on Thursday that the agency had lost track of nearly 1,500 migrant children it placed with sponsors in the United States, raising concerns they could end up in the hands of human traffickers or be used as laborers by people posing as relatives.

 

The official, Steven Wagner, the acting assistant secretary of the agency’s Administration for Children and Families, disclosed during testimony before a Senate homeland security subcommittee that the agency had learned of the missing children after placing calls to the people who took responsibility for them when they were released from government custody.

 

The children were taken into government care after they showed up alone at the Southwest border. Most of the children are from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, and were fleeing drug cartels, gang violence and domestic abuse, government data shows.

 

 

(click here to continue reading Federal Agencies Lost Track of Nearly 1,500 Migrant Children Placed With Sponsors – The New York Times.)

You’d think misplacing 1,500 children would be as big a story as the so-called Fast and Furious pseudo-scandal. But to the right wing, guns are more important than children. If it were 1,500 fetuses, maybe the Fox News team might mention it, but kids and especially immigrant kids are not important to the GOP.

Alice in Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland

And as a parenthetical:

Many senior staffers at DHS were stunned when Nielsen was appointed to lead the department. She had never lead a large organization, let alone one as unwieldy as DHS.

Nielsen, 46, worked as a Homeland Security adviser and DHS staffer under George W. Bush, then spent the Obama years remaking herself as a cybersecurity expert. Her high-level management experience was thin.

When Trump was elected in 2016, Nielsen was running Sunesis Consulting, a firm whose online profile listed her as its lone employee. The company’s business address was a condo in Alexandria. The firm’s phone number, still visible online, is Nielsen’s personal cellphone.

All the best people:

 

Contact Information Sunesis Consulting, LLC 926 N Columbus St Alexandria, VA 22314

 

Contact: Kirstjen Nielsen Title: President Phone: (202) 841-2107 Website: www.sunesisconsultingllc.com

 

Sunesis Consulting, LLC is the only company located at 926 N Columbus St, Alexandria, VA 22314

 

 

(click here to continue reading Sunesis Consulting, LLC in Alexandria, VA – (202) 841-2107 – Profile.)

China has called Trump’s bluff

Seth Anderson0 comment

Storing Wheat Agfa Scala 200
Storing Soy – Agfa Scala 200

The NYT reports:

China has called President Trump’s bluff.

Chinese negotiators left Washington this weekend with a significant win: a willingness by the Trump administration to hold off for now on imposing tariffs on up to $150 billion in Chinese imports. China gave up little in return, spurning the administration’s nudges for a concrete commitment to buy more goods from the United States, and avoiding limits on its efforts to build new high-tech Chinese industries.

…

China’s propaganda machine took a victory lap after the talks, proclaiming that a strong challenge from the United States had been turned aside, at least for now. “Whether in Beijing or Washington, in the face of the unreasonable demands of the United States, the Chinese government has always resolutely fought back, never compromised, and did not accept the restrictions set by the other side,” the official Xinhua news service said in a commentary on Sunday.

In a cheeky expression of China’s rising power, two juxtaposed photos were widely circulated on Chinese social media, a post that was shared (but later deleted) by the Communist Youth League. One photo was taken during the trade talks in Washington, appearing, if somewhat biasedly, to trumpet the youthfulness of Chinese delegates compared to American lawmakers. Another, dated from 1901, showed the opposite as representatives from China and colonial powers signed an accord to end the Boxer Rebellion, considered a national humiliation.

(click here to continue reading Trump’s Charm and Threats May Not Be Working on China. Here’s Why. – The New York Times.)

Like so many of the other self-given descriptions of the Orange Dotard, the Best Negotiator is a lousy deal maker. 

China gave up nothing, and Russian farmers got a big sale of soy beans that American farmers lost. Heck of a job, Trumpie…

Wheel of Life
Wheel of Life

As Bloomberg reported:

 

China, the world’s biggest soybean importer, almost tripled purchases from Russia amid a trade dispute with the U.S., the biggest producer.

 

Russia sold about 850,000 metric tons of soybeans to China from the start of the 12-month season in July through mid-May, according to Russia’s agriculture agency Rosselkhoznadzor. That’s more than during any season before and compares with about 340,000 tons sold during all of the previous period, Chinese customs data show.

China has already canceled several shipments from the U.S. in anticipation of tariffs on the country’s products. While Brazil is expected to take much of that market share, Russia is also benefiting.

 

 

(click here to continue reading China Buys Record Amount of Russian Soy as It Shuns U.S. Growers – Bloomberg.)

Trump personally pushed postmaster general to double rates on Amazon

Seth Anderson0 comment

Post Office Gilbert Ark
Post Office Gilbert Ark

The Washington Post reports:

President Trump has personally pushed U.S. Postmaster General Megan Brennan to double the rate the Postal Service charges Amazon.com and other firms to ship packages, according to three people familiar with their conversations, a dramatic move that probably would cost these companies billions of dollars.

Brennan has so far resisted Trump’s demand, explaining in multiple conversations occurring this year and last that these arrangements are bound by contracts and must be reviewed by a regulatory commission, the three people said. She has told the president that the Amazon relationship is beneficial for the Postal Service and gave him a set of slides that showed the variety of companies, in addition to Amazon, that also partner for deliveries.

Despite these presentations, Trump has continued to level criticism at Amazon. And last month, his critiques culminated in the signing of an executive order mandating a government review of the financially strapped Postal Service that could lead to major changes in the way it charges Amazon and others for package delivery.

Few U.S. companies have drawn Trump’s ire as much as Amazon, which has rapidly grown to be the second-largest U.S. company in terms of market capitalization. For more than three years, Trump has fumed publicly and privately about the giant commerce and services company and its founder Jeffrey P. Bezos, who is also the owner of The Washington Post.

…

Trump’s attacks on Amazon date to 2015, when he accused Bezos of using The Post as a tax shelter to allow Amazon to avoid paying taxes, a false accusation. (Amazon is a publicly traded company, and The Post, wholly owned by Bezos, is private. The companies’ finances are not intermingled. The Post’s editors and Bezos also have declared that he is not involved in any journalistic decisions.)

Bezos responded to Trump’s 2015 attack with a tweet.

“Finally trashed by @realDonaldTrump. Will still reserve him a seat on the Blue Origin rocket. #sendDonaldtospace,” Bezos, who owns a space company, tweeted in December 2015.

This angered Trump, who at the time was fighting for credibility during the GOP primary.

(click here to continue reading Trump personally pushed postmaster general to double rates on Amazon, other firms – The Washington Post.)

It isn’t that Amazon irks Trump, it is that the Washington Post is reporting on Trump’s (mal)administration, and by the transitive property, since Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post, and is a majority owner/founder of Amazon, Trump is angry at Amazon. 

Bezos is no saint, the USPS certainly has issues, the Washington Post has published plenty of ignorant or misleading articles over the years, but there is no reason Trump should be foaming at the mouth like this towards a corporation, much less a journalistic institution like the Washington Post.

The Irony of Freedom
The Irony of Freedom

NRA gathers docs amid scrutiny over ties to Kremlin-linked banker

Seth Anderson0 comment

Buy A Dog Not A Gun
Buy A Dog Not A Gun

CNN reported recently:

The National Rifle Association is setting aside years of documents related to its interactions with a Kremlin-linked banker, as the gun-rights group appears to be bracing for a possible investigation, according to sources familiar with the situation.

The NRA has faced fresh scrutiny from congressional investigators about its finances and ties to Alexander Torshin, one of the 17 prominent Russian government officials the US Treasury Department recently slapped with sanctions. The gun-rights group has said it is reexamining its relationship with Torshin, who is a lifetime NRA member, in the wake of the sanctions. The renewed attention has highlighted the close-knit if sometimes uneasy alliance between top NRA officials and Torshin — a relationship that ensnared members of Trump’s team during the presidential campaign, inviting further congressional scrutiny.

Those inquiries could shed light on the tightly held fundraising practices and political activities of the NRA. The political powerhouse shelled out more than $30 million in 2016 to back Donald Trump’s candidacy — more than it spent on 2008 and 2012 political races combined, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

(click here to continue reading NRA gathers docs amid scrutiny over ties to Kremlin-linked banker – CNNPolitics.)

A deep, longstanding relationship between Russia and the NRA would not surprise me in the slightest. Where does the NRA get all of its funds anyway? Not from individual contributions, the math doesn’t work. At best, the NRA has 5 million members, and allegedly, many of these are inactive.

I find it extremely plausible that the Russians were funneling funds through the willing NRA leadership to help Trump, and other Republicans. 

FCK NRA
FCK NRA

McClatchy reported earlier this year:

The FBI is investigating whether a top Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association to help Donald Trump win the presidency, two sources familiar with the matter have told McClatchy.

FBI counterintelligence investigators have focused on the activities of Alexander Torshin, the deputy governor of Russia’s central bank who is known for his close relationships with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and the NRA, the sources said.

It is illegal to use foreign money to influence federal elections.

It’s unclear how long the Torshin inquiry has been ongoing, but the news comes as Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s sweeping investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election, including whether the Kremlin colluded with Trump’s campaign, has been heating up.

…

Last February when Torshin visited Washington, Rockefeller heir and conservative patron George O’Neill Jr. hosted a fancy four-hour dinner for the banker on Capitol Hill, an event that drew Rohrabacher, Erickson and other big names on the right. Rohrabacher has labeled Torshin as “conservatives’ favorite Russian,” Torshin was in Washington at the time to lead his country’s delegation to the National Prayer Breakfast, where Trump spoke. The banker also was slated to see the presidentat a meet-and-greet event prior to a White House breakfast, but Torshin’s invitation was canceled after the White House learned of his alleged mob connections, Yahoo News reported.

Torshin’s involvement with the NRA may have begun in 2013 when he attended the group’s convention in Houston. Keene, the ex-NRA leader and an avid hunter, was instrumental in building a relationship with the Russian, according to multiple conservative sources.

Keene also helped lead a high-level NRA delegation to Moscow in December 2015 for a week of lavish meals and meetings with Russian business and political leaders. The week’s festivities included a visit to a Russian gun company and a meeting with a senior Kremlin official and wealthy Russians, according to a member of the delegation, Arnold Goldschlager, a California doctor who has been active in NRA programs to raise large donations.

Others on the trip included Joe Gregory, who runs the NRA’s Ring of Freedom program for elite donors who chip in checks of $1 million and upwards, Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke and Pete Brownell, a chief executive of a gun company and longtime NRA board member.

In a phone interview, Goldschlager described the trip as a “people-to-people mission,” and said he was impressed with Torshin — who, he noted, hosted both a “welcoming” dinner for the NRA contingent and another one.

“They were killing us with vodka and the best Russian food,” Goldschlager said. “The trip exceeded my expectations by logarithmic levels.”

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article195231139.html#storylink=cpy

 

(click here to continue reading FBI investigating whether Russia funneled cash to NRA to aid Trump’s campaign | McClatchy Washington Bureau.)

Trump cuts to H-2B guest worker visas hurt small business

Seth Anderson0 comment

Stark beauty of snowy cemetery
Stark beauty of snowy cemetery

There’s an evergreen news topic: Trump voter screwed by Trump. It’s almost a joke, but certainly real for the people and business screwed by Trump and the GOP.

The Lexington Herald Leader reports:

Eddie Devine voted for President Donald Trump because he thought he would be good for American business. Now, he says, the Trump administration’s restrictions on seasonal foreign labor may put him out of business.

“I feel like I’ve been tricked by the devil,” said Devine, owner of Harrodsburg-based Devine Creations Landscaping. “I feel so stupid.”

Devine says it has been years since he could find enough dependable, drug-free American workers for his $12-an-hour jobs mowing and tending landscapes for cemeteries, shopping centers and apartment complexes across Central Kentucky.

…

Devine says he lost a $100,000 account because he didn’t have enough men to do the job. He’s worried he may be out of business next year if things don’t improve.

He isn’t alone. Cuts in H-2B visas are hurting small businesses across the country that can’t find Americans willing to do hard, manual labor: Maryland crab processors, Texas shrimp fishermen, and Kentucky landscapers and construction companies.

…

But what makes him most angry is that Trump’s properties in Florida and New York have used 144 H-2B workers since 2016. “I want to know why it’s OK for him to get his workers, but supporters like me don’t get theirs,” Devine said.

(click here to continue reading Trump cuts to H-2B guest worker visas hurt small business | Lexington Herald Leader.)

Do I have sympathy for Eddie Devine? Not much. Trump’s anti-immigration stance wasn’t some secret, only known to Steven Miller and John Kelly, no, Trump led chants of “Build the Wall” at seemingly every rally. Perhaps in the future, Trumpers might think a little bit harder about what they are really voting for, instead of becoming part of the Fox News mob. I doubt it, though. 

Fading One By One
Fading One By One

Thomas Frank wrote a book about this phenomena, even before Trump made this worse:

Wikipedia:

 

What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America (2004) is a book by American journalist and historian Thomas Frank, which explores the rise of populist anti-elitist conservatism in the United States, centering on the experience of Kansas, Frank’s native state. In the late 19th century, says Frank, Kansas was known as a hotbed of the left-wing Populist movement, but in recent decades, it has become overwhelmingly conservative. The book was published in Britain and Australia as What’s the Matter with America?.

…

Frank applies his thesis to answer the question of why these social conservatives continue to vote for Republicans, even though they are voting against their best interests. He argues that politicians and pundits stir the “Cons” to action by evoking certain issues, such as abortion, immigration, and taxation. By portraying themselves as champions of the conservatives on these issues, the politicians can get “Cons” to vote them into office. However, once in office, these politicians turn their attention to more mundane economic issues, such as business tax reduction or deregulation. Frank’s thesis goes thus: In order to explain to the “Cons” why no progress gets made on these issues, politicians and pundits point their fingers to a “liberal elite,” a straw man representing everything that conservatism is not. When reasons are given, they eschew economic reasons in favor of accusing this elite of simply hating America, or having a desire to harm “average” Americans. This theme of victimization by these “elites” is pervasive in conservative literature, despite the fact that at the time conservatives controlled all three branches of government, were being served by an extensive media devoted only to conservative ideology, and had won 6 of the previous 9 presidential elections.

 

 

(click here to continue reading What’s the Matter with Kansas? – Wikipedia.)

Maryland seafood industry loses 40 percent of work force in visa lottery

Seth Anderson0 comment

Claw
Crab Claw

The Baltimore Sun reports about another industry who voted for Trump with no regrets, yet is now feeling the effects of Trump’s campaign promises:

Maryland’s seafood industry is in crisis: Nearly half of the Eastern Shore’s crab houses have no workers to pick the meat sold in restaurants and supermarkets.

They failed to get visas for their mostly Mexican workforce, including many women who have been coming north to Maryland for crab season for as long as two decades. The Trump administration for the first time awarded them this year in a lottery, instead of on a first-come, first-served basis.

…

Maryland’s 20 licensed crab processors typically employ some 500 foreign workers each season, from April to November, through the H-2B visa program, Seiling said. The visas are for seasonal workers in non-agricultural jobs. Pickers are paid by the pound of meat they produce, and the most productive ones make up to $500 a week.

“Nobody wants to do manual labor anymore,” Seiling said. “Its just a very, very tight labor market right now, particularly in industries that are seasonal.”

(click here to continue reading Crab crisis: Maryland seafood industry loses 40 percent of work force in visa lottery – Baltimore Sun.)

Hmm, the best, most productive, hardest workers get nearly $500 a week ($2,000 a month). I’m guessing there aren’t many benefits included: no healthcare, no pension, and probably not including taxes. Doesn’t sound a great job for most.

And then there’s this:

“I voted for Donald Trump and I’d vote for President Trump again,” he said. “But I think in small rural towns in America, we’re getting the short end of the stick on labor.”

Personally, I don’t have a lot of sympathy for this dude. Trump repeatedly sneered loudly of his plans to stop immigration, but crab man decided   ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ the racism and Hillary bashing and so on was enough to earn his vote.

I Am Going To Eat You - Paul Noth 

King Crab Stuffed Tuna Kamehachi
King Crab Stuffed Tuna – Kamehachi

The Guardian/Observer followed up:

Nearly half of the Eastern Shore’s crab houses have lost the temporary workers, mostly from Mexico, who come every season to pick crabs, The Baltimore Sun reported last week. The businesses couldn’t get visas for the crab pickers because the Trump administration awarded them by lottery this year, instead of on a first come, first served basis.

Just one month into crabbing season, everyone here is feeling it. The guy who builds the crab pots, the bait fishermen, the crabbers, the crab house suppliers, the little roadside crab shack, the local general store, the waterman’s wife who can’t afford to stay home with the kids anymore – all of them are in trouble thanks to the fear of immigrants that helped elect President Trump and is now shaping the administration’s hardline approach towards legal and illegal immigration.

…

Harry Phillips, owner of Russell Hall Seafood, understands that. Like his neighbours, he voted for Trump and supports him. But he believes the president has been misinformed on the seasonal H-2B worker visas and would see the devastating results in one quick visit to the island.

“We’re 15 minutes away from Washington by helicopter,” says Phillips, whose crab house was quiet Sunday morning, with empty bushel baskets stacked high because the crab pickers aren’t coming. “There’s a landing pad for the helicopter, and we would welcome him here. If the president could just come and see what’s happening to American workers, he could see it right here, the effects of all this.”

 

(click here to continue reading Trump’s tighter immigration restrictions causing ‘crab crisis’ in Maryland | The Independent.)

Yeah, that’s not happening. Trump doesn’t give a shit about anyone other than himself. You were just fooled. Were you one of those chanting “build the wall”? What did you think that meant? Keep those other immigrants out, but not the ones you need for your business?

World Without Borders
World Without Borders

Personally, I have no problem with as many immigrants coming to the US as can make it here. Money doesn’t have to respect borders, why do people? Have you ever driven in rural America? Say Iowa, or South Dakota? Or West Texas? There’s a lot of empty land out there. I think the US could continue to grow and thrive by going back to an open door immigration policy. 

Russia-linked company Columbus Nova that hired Trump lawyer Michael Cohen registered alt-right websites

Seth Anderson0 comment

Part of Your Secret Life
Part of Your Secret Life

An odd thing for an investment firm to spend money on, wouldn’t you say?

The Washington Post reports:

A company at the center of widening questions involving President Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen is listed as the organization behind a string of websites targeted toward white nationalists and other members of the alt-right.

Columbus Nova, a company whose U.S. chief executive, Andrew Intrater, and Russian investment partner Viktor Vekselberg have both reportedly been interviewed by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s team, is listed as the registrant behind a handful of domains for websites named after the alt-right that were created during the 2016 election.

It is unclear if any of these websites were launched or ever hosted content.

These sites include Alt-right.co, Alternate-right.com, Alternate-rt.com, Alt-rite.com, and other similar combinations, which were all registered in the two days following a speech given by then candidate Hillary Clinton in August 2016 in which she excoriated the far-right movement known for its extremist, racist, anti-Semitic and sexist viewpoints.

(click here to continue reading Russia-linked company that hired Trump lawyer Michael Cohen registered alt-right websites during election – The Washington Post.)

Columbus Novus has been around for while, acting as an Angel Investor firm.

Crunchbase reports on typical investments that Columbus Novus has made in the past, like Atlis:

 

– Local search platforms using average star ratings are antiquated, creating a poor user experience, and causing significant harm to local business reputations. These products still live in the desktop era.

 

– The system has removed negativity from the consumer feedback loop to prevent toxicity and abuse of local businesses, instead empowering satisfied customers to have a larger voice than ever before.

 

– Atlis has taken the preferred channel of “friendly advice” and applied it to a city-wide audience, letting users ask each other for various local businesses, products, and services to receive suggestions directly in real-time.

 

– Atlis tracks user preferences and collects a repository of the word-of-mouth advice across an entire city, making that dataset consumable via a passive search experience, as well. Machine learning will eventually transform this the data collection into smart, personalized search results that knows what people would have suggested to you.

 

– Company launched in NYC in October 2016 with its R&D team based in Tel Aviv. It has already built an engaged user base of over 10,000 and has signed up over 200 local businesses (without any B2B efforts). It has also secured valuable partnerships with Google, OpenTable, and others.

 

 

(click here to continue reading Atlis | Crunchbase.)

How does one make a business case that purchasing alt-right domain names is part of investment strategy? Unless your real strategy is assisting Putin put Trump in office by any means available.

The secrets of the world are whispered
The secrets of the world are whispered

I guess the Russians didn’t want to spend all of their funds with the NRA, and decided to spread it around a bit?

Natasha Bertrand, when she was with Business Insider, reported:

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin has emerged as a hero of several prominent alt-right figures, raising new questions about the Kremlin’s influence on the far-right, white nationalist movement that has asserted itself as a new force in American politics. Whether Russia has played a direct role in awakening the American alt-right, whose resurgence as a crusade against establishment politics coincided with the rise of President-elect Donald Trump, is debatable.

 

But the extent to which the alt-right has found a natural ally in Russia’s current zeitgeist — which perceives the US as a globalist, imperialist power working on behalf of liberal elites — is hard to overstate.

 

Self-described white nationalist Matthew Heimbach, who said he identifies as a member of the alt-right, has praised Putin’s Russia as “the axis for nationalists.”

 

“I really believe that Russia is the leader of the free world right now,” Heimbach told Business Insider in a recent interview. “Putin is supporting nationalists around the world and building an anti-globalist alliance, while promoting traditional values and self-determination.”

 

 

(click here to continue reading Alt-right connections to Putin and Russia – Business Insider.)

or as Michelle Wolf put it:

 

 

Trump is racist, though. He loves white nationalists, which is a weird term for a Nazi. Calling a Nazi a ‘white nationalist’ is like calling a pedophile a ‘kid friend,’ or Harvey Weinstein a ‘ladies man,’ which isn’t really fair — he also likes plants.”

 

 

(click here to continue reading Michelle Wolf’s Best White House Correspondents Dinner Jokes.)

As headlines swirl, Trump grows frustrated with Giuliani

Seth Anderson0 comment

Don t Bring Your Dog Shet to Town
Don’t Bring Your Dog Shet to Town

Speaking of that repugnant person, Rudy Giuliani, the AP reports:

President Donald Trump is growing increasingly irritated with lawyer Rudy Giuliani’s frequently off-message media blitz, in which he has muddied the waters on hush money paid to porn actress Stormy Daniels and made claims that could complicate the president’s standing in the special counsel’s Russia probe.

Trump has begun questioning whether Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, should be sidelined from television interviews, according to two people familiar with the president’s thinking but not authorized to speak publicly about private discussions.

Trump also expressed annoyance that Giuliani’s theatrics have breathed new life into the Daniels story and extended its lifespan.

(click here to continue reading As headlines swirl, Trump grows frustrated with Giuliani.)

What a surprise!1

Rudy “9/11” Giuliani has always been a carpet stain, and a media hog, just like his motorboating buddy, Trump. The smart money was on betting that Rudy and Trump would not have a long time working relationship, too much competition for the same attention.

Footnotes:
  1. nobody is surprised [↩]

Will Trump Testify in Mueller Probe?

Seth Anderson0 comment

Dump Googly Eyes Trump
Dump Googly Eyes Trump

The WSJ reports:

Mr. Giuliani said he came into the case last month skeptical about letting Mr. Trump testify, based on his own experience as a former U.S. attorney and private lawyer.

“I’m not sure any client of mine has ever testified, and I sure as heck have benefited from ones who were dumb enough to do it” when he served as a prosecutor, Mr. Giuliani said.

Another consideration is how Mr. Trump would perform as a witness and whether he has the discipline to avoid unnecessary tangents that open himself to new questions.

“Anyone can see he has great difficulty staying on a subject,” one person familiar with the legal team’s deliberations said.

A person familiar with the legal team, i.e., Rudy Giuliani, admitting that Trump has the attention span of a gnat. 

Preparing Mr. Trump to testify would be a serious distraction to his work as president, eating into time he needs to deal with pressing global issues, Mr. Trump’s lawyers contend.

In an informal, four-hour practice session, Mr. Trump’s lawyers were only able to walk him through two questions, given the frequent interruptions on national-security matters along with Mr. Trump’s loquaciousness, one person familiar with the matter said.

(click here to continue reading Trump Lawyers Aim to Decide by May 17 Whether President Testifies in Mueller Probe – WSJ.)

Yeah, there’s so many television shows he needs to keep up with; I’m certain his DVR is nearly full because he never has time in his busy day to watch the shows and delete them from his playlist. Oh, and golfing of course.

On the second quoted sentence, I think Mueller’s team would be fine with Trump rambling on and on, contradicting himself every other sentence, spinning tales that will reveal more than they conceal. Trump is a lot of things, but he isn’t shy about voicing his opinions, especially opinions that have no basis in fact. 

Oath
Under Oath

Trump’s new legal team doesn’t have a security clearance, but that’s never stopped Rudy Giuliani in the past from reading classified documents1 – allegedly.

Meanwhile, the turnover has created a separate problem for Mr. Trump’s defense: His lawyers lack security clearances, which could limit the documents and materials they can see.

When Mr. Dowd left in March, he was the only outside lawyer who held a clearance. The outside team as it now stands—Jay Sekulow, Marty and Jane Raskin and Mr. Giuliani—are all in the process of applying for security clearances, a person familiar with the matter said.

 

(click here to continue reading Trump Lawyers Aim to Decide by May 17 Whether President Testifies in Mueller Probe – WSJ.)

The best and the brightest people…

Footnotes:
  1. and leaking [↩]

Whose Bubble Is It Anyway?

Seth Anderson0 comment

Hay Bales
Hay Bales 

Rebecca Solnit eloquently writes about the rural bubble that racists like Charles Murray want the rest of us to enter:

 The exhortations are everywhere. PBS News Hour featured a quiz by Charles Murray in March that asked “Do You Live in a Bubble?” The questions assumed that if you didn’t know people who drank cheap beer and drove pick-up trucks and worked in factories you lived in an elitist bubble. Among the questions: “Have you ever lived for at least a year in an American community with a population under 50,000 that is not part of a metropolitan area and is not where you went to college? Have you ever walked on a factory floor? Have you ever had a close friend who was an evangelical Christian?”

The quiz is essentially about whether you are in touch with working-class small-town white Christian America, as though everyone who’s not Joe the Plumber is Maurice the Elitist. We should know them, the logic goes; they do not need to know us. Less than 20 percent of Americans are white evangelicals, only slightly more than are Latino. Most Americans are urban. The quiz delivers, yet again, the message that the 80 percent of us who live in urban areas are not America, treats non-Protestant (including the quarter of this country that is Catholic) and non-white people as not America, treats many kinds of underpaid working people (salespeople, service workers, farmworkers) who are not male industrial workers as not America.

More Americans work in museums than work in coal, but coalminers are treated as sacred beings owed huge subsidies and the sacrifice of the climate, and museum workers—well, no one is talking about their jobs as a totem of our national identity.

PBS added a little note at the end of the bubble quiz, “The introduction has been edited to clarify Charles Murray’s expertise, which focuses on white American culture.” They don’t mention that he’s the author of the notorious Bell Curve or explain why someone widely considered racist was welcomed onto a publicly funded program. Perhaps the actual problem is that white Christian suburban, small-town, and rural America includes too many people who want to live in a bubble and think they’re entitled to, and that all of us who are not like them are menaces and intrusions who needs to be cleared out of the way.

(click here to continue reading Rebecca Solnit: Whose Story (and Country) Is This? | Literary Hub.)

We’ve discussed this before a few times. The rural voters may have disproportionate power in Congress, but they don’t have much cultural power. Urbanites are not clamoring to move out to small towns in Alabama or Iowa, places where the Walmart and four Protestant churches are the sum total of cultural life. Not all rural folk are racist assholes wallowing willfully in their ignorance, by the way. And in truth, there are liberal-minded folk all over the country, even in pockets of small town America. Jefferson’s America is long, long gone though. 

I actually have lived in rural America, years ago, albeit not by choice. I have no desire to move back. 

I mean, sure, who wouldn’t like being wealthy enough to have a place to go and unwind, some isolated thousand acre ranch in beautiful country, maintained by staff, but I wouldn’t want to live there more than a few weeks a year.

Rural Still Life
Rural Still Life

Back to the main point, why aren’t there a gazillion think pieces on the bubble of the rural Trump supporter? Coal jobs are not coming back, women are going to be able to vote, and drive, and make reproductive decisions for themselves; and non-white people are going to have civil liberties and be able to vote for their own interests. Supporting reactionaries like Trump and Scott Pruitt and the like is not going to alter the march of human history towards inclusion.

Quoting myself:

 

As somebody said on the internets (sic), the corporate media and the political chattering classes are treating the Trump base as if they are superdelegates. These reactionaries who voted for Trump despite all the warning signs of Trump’s incompetence are never going to be convinced to vote for progressive policies, why do we need to devote so much effort trying to cater to them? Are the Deplorables the only citizens who matter? Why not spend resources convincing the sometime voters who lean left to come to the polls instead?

 

 

(click here to continue reading Democrats Can Retake the House in 2018 Without Converting a Single Trump Voter at B12 Solipsism.)