The grown-ups have left the building - Trump thread #136

[Spandauer]

As we descend into 4 years of madness...

(thanks @Jaichangecentfoisdenom and* *@AcrossthePond55 for the suggestions)

Previous thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5200273-hands-across-the-water-trump-thread-135

Splendid

but sadly fake by the look of it

Final US house race (in California) called and it's a flip for the Democrats.

Final total is Republican majority 220-215.

That's actually down one seat. It means the Republicans will have the second smallest majority (in % terms) in history.
Second only to 1917-19.

WTF is happening

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/crmn2ry1224t in NYC ?

Here's to the Republicans haemorrhaging many more at the midterms.

It will still be the bigliest win ever.

Apparently it's an AI generated image genuinely posted by Trump.

In other news... Rumours abound that Hesgeth may be dropped in favour of Ron de Santis for Defence Sec and in a quid pro quo de Santis appoints Lara Trump to fill Rubio's Florida senate seat.

Hesgeth has said that he will not drink at all if confirmed

Wonder if his mum believes him.

I'm trying not to think about how sad it is we've come to the day where Ron DeSantis looks like a normal option.

I've been keeping my head down since election day as I am a coward and can't face the relentless horror of Trump and co's behaviour. However, I happened upon this article and words fail me even more than they did before. I have no other comment to make, you can all guess it anyway.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/pete-hegseths-secret-history

I hope the link works, if it doesn't, I'll copy and paste it if anyone is interested.

That article isn't shocking to me. Change names and dates and it could have been talking about Trump. He seems to surround himself with people just like him. I'd be more surprised if there was a genuinely nice person with good moral fibre in his entourage.

What was it Abe Lincoln said about Grants drinking, when advisors tried to use it as a bar to promotion ?

@SerendipityJane
Footage shows the guy waiting till his target showed up : professional hit

Begs more questions than it answers.

Healthcare being what it is in the US (is it true that one insurance company is now only paying for anaesthetic up to the expected duration of an operation and beyond that you are on your own ?) it's tempting to speculate it is an aggrieved claimant. However it's hard to believe someone pissed off with an insurer has the wherewithal to pay for a professional murder.

Occams razor would suggest some sort of involvement with organised crime.

BTC soaring. Good news for anyone who bought some back in 2011 like wot I did (shame it wasn't much). I wonder what will happen when Trump is running the US treasury ?

@SerendipityJane when you have sold some of your bitcoin back into sterling, how much did you pay in fees ?
as in what was your crystallised gain ?

Odd that a sensible question about the exchange rate of bitcoin has been hidden ....

I think its automatic - a robot thingy recognises the key word and blocks it until a real person checks it and unblocks it. Its annoying, but I imagine probably preferable to threads getting spammed with people advertising scammy products and less labour intensive than having people do the front line checking (very easy to overwhelm moderators with repeated posts etc).

Thus far I've never "cashed in" any BTC. I started with 1 back in 2011 when I was evaluating the technology and have sliced off pieces to pay for a few things - mainly for novelty value. I've not got enough to retire, but considering I thought I had about £500 a year ago. I am quite a happy camper for now.

Obviously the key question is sell or hold ? With the understanding very few people are capable of employing that a hold and subsequent decline in value is not a "loss". It's just an unrealised gain.

Last time I spent any was 2016 - when I can be arsed I will load up the chain and see what the fees were.

On the basis the same people who laughed at $100k had the same laugh for $250k, who knows where we are going ?

They must be drowning in tears in Tory HQ. Imagine not being in power while all this is going on ?

Memory was a bit out - it was 2018

It could be worth Newport council offering to go halves on the search for the missing hard disk.

Why ? They own it outright. If I were them, I'd let the careless previous owner take them to court and establish that beyond doubt at his expense, and then quietly retrieve the hard drive (some reports say it's an actual dedicated crypto device) and add the funds to Newports balance of payments.

I like your thinking @SerendipityJane.

Sounds like Hegseth is a gonner. Any hope we can get Gabbard shot down too for the hat-trick?!

So Trump did “Meet the Press” over the weekend.

He’s still saying he wants to end automatic birthright citizenship, though seemed to acknowledge that it may “have to go back to the people” to pass a Constitutional amendment.

He also (unsurprisingly) said he will be looking at pardoning some of the Capitol rioters.

As with all of these things, we need to try not to react to everything he says, and rather focus on what he does. Much of this will amount to nothing.

More here: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj30er1d6mxo