Flaming June - Will The Wheels Finally Fall Off Don Snoreleone's Bus? - Trump Thread #165

[Spandauer]

Nobody likes you, everybody hates you.
Guess you should go and eat worms.

Trump’s Final Term Ends in: - Countdown Timer

Previous thread:
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5529015-nacho-nacho-man-trump-thread-164

They obviously want 🍊 to sit (not a typo) on the floor.

MAGA have gone from don’t be ridiculous of course it won’t turn green to someone has sabotaged it by putting algae in it to they algae was in the pipes it was always going green to of course they are putting hydrogen peroxide in that’s how you keep water clear so fast they must have made themselves dizzy.

Surely algae = pond scum, therefore entirely appropriate?

As my mother remarked once, scum tends to rise to the top. (She was talking about Stalin, but it's true today too: Putin, Trump.....)

https://bsky.app/profile/meidastouch.com/post/3mogjbxa5ps2p

Trump starts wandering off in the wrong direction after a G7 photo and world leaders have to step in and redirect him

I spent 3 ghastly hours in the dentist’s chair this afternoon and laughing at this, and the comments on Bluesky, has alleviated much of the residual pain from the toothache. Thank you

The pond as a metaphor for Trump's war with Iran.
Say you're going to make a situation you identified as a problem, better. Throw taxpayers' money at it. But you're back where you started.

FOLLOW DA MONEY!!!!

Trump's investment accounts saw thousands of trades totaling hundreds of millions of dollars between January and March. This feverish activity, dominated by tech stocks, has drawn scrutiny from lawmakers and ethics experts over potential conflicts of interest, though the Trump Organization denies the president's direct involvement.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/global-trends/trumps-unusual-stock-frenzy-portfolio-shows-3600-trades-in-90-days/articleshow/131773421.cms?from=mdr

I would have left him go that way.
It will avoid for him to grab any of them and push past them.

I think the negotiations with Iran should continue.
Trump is fully going for it.
Pezeshkian also, opposing the hardliners. There were some rumours of him going, but he is staying so far. And I think he wants peace for his people.
Bibi apparently has said, himself, that the agreeent does not apply to Israel. But I reckon he is going to find out what opposing Trump means if he pushes it. I think this time there is no turning back. Well, hope that this was the end of the war.

For those who have recently discovered the existance of dark fleets and the shenanigans they get involved in ( like me), UK and Russia have just started at it, with UK seizing a Russian flag oil tanker (which was sanctioned, but still moving around!)

It's a grey area so far as I can tell.

If a ship has EU sanctions on it, and it is in EU waters, then it's fair game. But on the high seas, outside any EEZ, not really. And any navy can assist if they are working with whoever has the EEZ.

Same with drug ships I think. When they are seized, it's usually inside an EEZ, and is done in corporation with the nation whose EEZ it is.

This is the issue with the US and it seizing ships/ blowing up speed boats. They do it based on their own laws and sanctions, so it's not really legal.

Negotiations will only continue as long as both sides see merit in continuing.

A possible sticking point, so far as I can see, is Iran's insistence in adding Israel to the conditions when Israel has already said they won't be part of any peace deal. But we have yet to see what is in the MOU. Wasn't Israel bombing Lebanon yesterday?

Trump has no control over what Bibi does (see above). In the US, support for Israel is changing along bipartisan lines, and by population age, but that's not expected to influence current WH policy. I very much doubt that even Trump is stupid enough to withdraw all financial and other support for Israel to try to force Bibi to comply in an effort to gain him a Peace prize for ending a war he started.

Any student of the post revolution Iranian regime (so that pretty much exludes all of the US administration) will know that ever since 4th November 1979, they have had a deep, intimate and incredibly useful knowledge of how US politics work.

I am betting that they have decided to wait the Trump years out, and may even as we speak start to be preparing for his successor. Remember how they played Carter after team Reagan asked them to delay releasing the US hostages because he would give them a better deal ?

We do remember that, don't we ?

Photo attached. Clipped from CNN just now.

It looks as if he has a different chair. Or maybe he remembered his booster cushion ?

How much do incontinence pads add ?

In other news, in my ongoing efforts to lower the tone of the conversation, here is a short of Aussie soccer fans in Vancouver before their match against Turkey at the week-end:
https://x.com/WUTangKids/status/2066906145600520334

Full or empty ?

Haha - please keep on lowering the tone.

Guess it’s best they’re in Vancouver though!

Thanks @MsJinks, you can count on me for that!
Unfortunately, the Socceroos are now headed for Seattle, where it is not sure whether their antics will land them in jail, or being ICE’d.

My feeds are filled with various positive stories of how Boston and the tartan army seem to have absolutely hit it off.

Makes you proud to be ... oh, what's that word ? It'll come to me

(goes off to Google)

Ah, yes, I've got it now. Makes you proud to be British !

I think Trump will press Bibi to adhere to whatever is in Trump's interest. I think he will do it. He is likeky to send Vance on that front. Not sure it will be Rubio this time around
How Netanyahu will react is other issue. But he will have to think twice. Because the big fish is, and always has been and will be, the US.

I do actually think that linking both fronts is of use to the world as we want to see an end to bombings up and down the ME and people losing live, family and roof over their heads.
It would be great if we can have peace in Ukraine too. Finally.
And that will involve squaring up to the shadow fleet.
Apparently, they change flag more often than tshirts. So, well, down this rabbit hole and let's see where we end up.

The comments are 💥

https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3moia4oenbb2x

Trump on Egyptian President el-Sisi: "He was in a hotel and I met him. We fell in love, deeply in love ... we didn't know each other before that. We had great chemistry, and I stayed twice as long as I was supposed to."

Is the million dollar question.

In terms of the shadow fleet, I will say the crew are usually fairly blameless. They tend to be Indian or from a few other places as India makes up a really big proportion of container ship crew. And they often don't know they are signing up to be in a shadow vessel. It's just a job. I feel really sorry for the container ship crews in general since they always get the short straw in most world crises (unable to come ashore for months during COVID, trapped on their boats during the astrait of Hormuz closure with concerns about food, sometimes "abandoned" on their boats when a company goes bust. Plus the additional risks of being fired onnin these conflicts. Shadow fleet crew experience the same issues but because the ships aren't even insured usually they are more at risk of being left without help if anything goes wrong.
So yeah, I do agree with the UK etc taking a stronger line on the shadow fleet so long as it involved boarding the boats and seizing them/maybe arresting the captain. But not sinking them.