Out of all his pie-in-the-skies this is Trump’s worst idea ever, sure to set the region on fire and send all involved into a spiral of evil. The only way he can redeem himself is if this turns out to be some negotiating tactic. — NOS4A2

That is the craziest shit I have ever heard. Let's do it!!

Yeah, it’s a bad idea. I cringed when I heard it. It contradicts “America first” and the reasons people voted for him.

What makes Iraqi Sesame Street "bullshit"? It's been part of the effort to restore the country to normalcy after the devastation inflicted by Bush's war. Pottery Barn rule.

Regardless, Trump could have ordered review of all the programs and done selective shutdowns. It's a product of executing a simplistic solution with callous disregard for the consequences. That's why I labeled it manslaughter, and not murder.

Sesame Street is normalcy in Iraq? USAID is a division of America’s so-called “soft power”, an imperialist arm of the US government. Think of what they did in cuba, for instance. There is no intent to restore anything to normalcy, but to further US interests in those regions and abroad.

That didn’t take long.

If it's a negotiating tactic it isn't a bad one.

By threatening to give Netanyahu what we wants he's showing Netanyahu's intentions for all the world to see.

The world reacts with outrage, the Middle-East threatens to explode, international support for Israel erodes further, etc.

Trump has all the room he needs to back out, Netanyahu takes another blow, and hopefully that will be the final straw that does him under.

Let's see what happens.

Trump’s strategy:

Turn around 180 degrees, arrive in the same exact spot, rebrand or rename, then claim everything is different and has been fixed. See NAFTA. See healthcare (oh wait, 0 was done on that), see oil production (already highest ever under a Biden), see massive voter fraud (which doesn’t exist), see border crossings (which were steady for years before and during his first term), see stock market (was trending upward first term, has hit record highs under Biden), etc etc.

His only positive accomplishment is that he doesn’t like wars because he knows they’re unpopular, and may affect his popularity. Otherwise the only thing that will change is the government will be even shittier and Wall Street will get their tax cuts again. Woohoo.

In any case it’s an innovative and bold idea. Though if Biden’s Gaza Pier is any indication (another wasteful USAID boondoggle), it will be difficult to implement. Let’s see what comes of it.

In any case it’s an innovative and bold idea. — NOS4A2

:rofl:

Partisan hacks are funny.

Curious were you saying this about Biden's Gaza policy?

Let’s see what comes of it. — NOS4A2

They could build a golf course through the graveyards where 70% of the dead are women and children.

Let’s just kick them all out and develop the area?

Bold and innovative!

Of course not, because Biden did not have any intention besides placating the lobby in the hopes it would secure him the election.

Trump pressured Netanyahu to accept a cease-fire. For now that's the status quo, and it's the only reason I'm reserving judgement on what it is we are looking at.

To be clear, the forced displacement of 2,000,000 Palestinians at the end of an American rifle barrel is an outlandishly awful idea, which is why I am assuming Trump has a different intention.

Given that Israel has stomached becoming a rogue state for over a year then I don't see how Trump can use international criticism as a threat, especially since he seems to be the one taking ownership of the whole situation. All the international criticism isn't directed at Israel, but at the US. Netanyahu knows this which is why he can't help but smile and stay silent as Trump gives his speech about Gazans being displaced.

I'd say the whole idea that Trump pressured Netanyahu to get a cease-fire is put into question now. Since you love speculating on negotiating tactics then this could've all been one big trade off for Netanyahu to pretend to end the war and give an optical win in exchange for Trump taking Gaza off of Israel's hands. Who knows just one theory for how things played out.

In any case if you're gonna act like this is some 4D chess move by Trump then at least come up with something better.

Not sure why you're getting so snarky all of a sudden. Of course I am speculating, and everything depends on what happens next. :brow:

Because I've seen this play from you before and I know you're not speculating in good faith. Trump is literally doing a worse version of what Biden did but you paint one as a fool and the other as a secret genius.

I've said some words you didn't like so now I must not be 'speculating in good faith' and some Trumpster or something.

Whatever you say, buttercup.

outlandishly awful idea, which is why I am assuming Trump has a different intention. — Tzeentch

Right, because his long history of great ideas forces one to pause.

“Oh, hey, we’re going to impose huge sanctions on our two nearest and main trading partners, Mexico and Canada. …Wait on. What? They’re on the phone? Lemme talk to them…”

“OK, we’re NOT going to impose huge sanctions on our two nearest and main trading partners, Mexico and Canada. They were real nice to me, told me what a great president I am, and said they’ll send troops.” — Wayfarer

Meanwhile the markets went down, and then the market went up, and some people played the market and made a lot of money very quickly indeed. And in another month they can do the same again. And that is what it's about making big big bucks from insider trading.

Other factions have bigger ambitions that encompass surviving the societal collapse on the horizon becoming the elite of sovereign individuals served by techie servants and robots. The rest of us have no place in this imagined future. This is of course a conspiracy theory based on The Sovereign Individual, by William Rees-Mogand James Dale Davidson.. The author was a right wing hereditary peer, not to be confused with his son Jacob Rees-Mog, who was active in promoting, and making large amounts of money from, the disaster that was Brexit. Peter Thiel wrote the preface to the 2000 reprint of the book.

If anyone has an old guillotine in their basement somewhere, now might be a good time to check it for woodworm and renew the ropes and such.

The old GOP died when Trump took over. The Dems are a walking corpse.

Watch Netanyahu squirm here. If the Whitehouse press secretary was right, Trump thought up his Gaza idea on the spot and Bibi found out on live television.

Trump's presidency is heading for ever-greater amounts of turmoil and instability. He completely blindsided Congress with his ridiculous Riviera in Gaza thought bubble, but the really major chaos will erupt in March, when the floor votes begin on funding the Federal Government and raising the debt limit. A government shutdown - and recall, Trump presided over the longest of these to date and mainly out of pique - is quite possible.

Meanwhile, Hakeem Jeffries spells out the Democrat view on MAGA extremism.

If you are linking things, I cannot see them. Not sure if that's a problem on my end or yours.

Right, because his long history of great ideas forces one to pause. — Mikie

But he is not fond of war.

And even the staunchest Trump critic would have to admit that the idea that the US is going to volunteer to conduct Israel's 'Endlösung' for them is virtually unimaginable.

He completely blindsided Congress with his ridiculous Riviera in Gaza thought bubble, — Wayfarer

His first final solution speech. Now Hitler never made a final solution speech, it was implemented discreetly. It is difficult to tell the difference between market manipulations that will be flip-flopped, and real policies that await only a further accumulation of power. But the trend towards sovereign individuals is a global, economic fact, and automation leaves no place for the masses either as producers or consumers,

Added to that, addressing climate change or not addressing climate change means a population collapse. So taking over Greenland, and Canada accord with the long-term good sense of Sovereign Survivalists and wars with Panama, Denmark, Palestine address the climate crisis in their own way.

Unfortunately, the democrats have no plan at all other than resistance, and they are resisting economic and environmental necessity with no actual policy apart from "being agin'it".

I am somewhat gloomy; Nation states are going to cease to exist and most of humanity likewise. I don't have any plan that will contrive this without huge pain and suffering, and massive further damage to the environment. I don't think any decent, sensible human being would even be prepared to preside over such a transition, and thus we have Trump.

Yeah they’re X posts. God, have I been the only one seeing them this whole time I wonder?

Possibly. I've seen you posting empty messages for a while and was wondering what's up.

I see them when I both preview and look at my posts. They are still there when I look right now.

Thanks for letting me know I probably looked like a madman without all that context.

I can see a little vid of Netanyahu looking 'quizzical' in an X screenshot thingy, a few posts back.

Which i interpret as "you weren't supposed to say that bit out loud yet." or thereabouts.

I can see the link. Yeah, Bibi likely learned a lot new when listening to Trump. But it was a beautiful sound for him. Now ethnic cleansing or "moving people" is well in the Overton window of Middle-East political rhetoric.

Even if the Mar-a-Gaza project talk is ridiculous with Trump making large parts of the plan up on the spot, we still listen to what the US president says. And as I've stated, it just doesn't go off as "a negotiation tactic" or Trump playing "4D-chess". What the US president say does have consequences. At least knowing Trump.

So we can assume that once the next crisis just around the corner blows up, then perhaps Denmark can be more calm and not worrying that a NATO member state could annex by military force it's territory (which is btw goes against NATO article 1. but who the fuck cares anymore about international agreements between nation states or members of NATO). Even Panama might think they are off the hook. As if the threats are only a "negotiating tactic". But all it takes is someone to ask Trump still considers that Panama and Greenland should be part of the US, guess what he will say? Even if he can say a lot, one likely response is that both goals "are still under work".

And the damage has been done.

“After this therefor because of this”. The consequences and damage occurs in the reaction to Trump’s statements, not in the statements themselves. The ebbs and flows of the markets are indicative of this.

Too bad then that people take seriously what an US president says. Of course the better response would never to listen to anything Trump says or tweets, just wait if an ultimatum is given to your country by the US embassador or through diplomatic channels. Only then be worried.

But when you threaten others, yeah, they'll notice that you are bully (just like Mexico and Canada showed by not basically doing much). Yet the effect is simply untrustworthiness: you simply cannot trust the US because one administration will say one thing and another something totally else. I think this view is getting very popular.