What Trump really needs is his Daddy to come along and clean up the mess he made. Barring that, my impression of what he said last night (I didn’t watch, either; I’ve just read about it) is that he’s trying to re-package the mess he made as something he can walk away from and call a win. Let other countries clean up the mess.
This is a long-standing pattern with Trump. When his many business ventures failed he was pretty slick at dumping the debt on his investors and walking away with a profit. His casinos are an example. In brief, Trump got a casino license and a go-ahead to build casinos in Atlantic City in 1982. He borrowed an enormous amount of money at high interest rates to build his casinos. Then he couldn’t make enough profit to pay off the loans. The casinos went through several bankruptcies to stay afloat. At one point Trump’s father sent a lawyer to Atlantic City with orders to buy $3.35 million in chips, and not use them. This was to get Trump some cash to make a loan payment the next day.
But even as the casinos were failing, Trump was drawing a big salary for himself. See How Donald Trump Bankrupted His Atlantic City Casinos, but Still Earned Millions, published in the New York Times back in 2016.
During a decade when other casinos here thrived, Mr. Trump’s lagged, posting huge losses year after year. Stock and bondholders lost more than $1.5 billion.
All the while, Mr. Trump received copious amounts for himself, with the help of a compliant board. In one instance, The Times found, Mr. Trump pulled more than $1 million from his failing public company, describing the transaction in securities filings in ways that may have been illegal, according to legal experts.
As far as Trump was concerned, the casinos were a cash cow. He walked away with a lot of money in his pocket and left the debt to his investors, who lost big-time. Do read the whole article; it’s mind-blowing. And this is just one example. Trump spent his entire business life tap-dancing on the edge of absolute disaster, saving himself through chicanery and cheating and getting bailed out one way or another. And this was the sort of investigative piece that never made it to television news, so most voters didn’t hear about it.
Now Trump bet big on a war in Iran to make him look like a big hero, and instead it’s just turning into a mess. Analyses I’ve read this morning says he came across as sad and tired last night. He’s not the 30-something hotshot he was when he got the Casino license. He doesn’t have the energy for all that tap-dancing now. He wants out. He’s probably just waiting for an optimum moment for getting out, a moment in which his getting out won’t look so much like an obvious defeat.
Of course, we’re still talking about Trump, in over his head and struggling with dementia. Something in his brain could always turn sideways and persuade him to escalate.
For more analyses:
Josh Marshall, Talking Points Memo, Trump Mini-Speech: the Definitive Reax
Paul Krugman, Trump Doesn’t Even Have the Courage to Run Away
Tom Nichols, The Atlantic, Maybe Trump Should Not Have Given This Speech
Associated Pres, FACT FOCUS: False claims Trump made as he addressed the nation about Iran
He's really flailing. Nobody's coming to rescue him. Watch for Trump's Hail Mary passes.
One thing is certain, another is a maybe. The certain thing is that we're just about at the 4 to 6 week mark since the Iran war started, which is how long it takes to ship oil from the Persian Gulf. This means diminished oil deliveries hereafter, and rising prices, for real, not the 40 to 50 cents we've seen so far, which is just speculation. It's far worse in many other countries which don't have the kind of reserves we have.
The other is his inability to admit to mistakes, and his tendency to double down. I fear and expect a land invasion, boots on the ground in Iran. One psychic I follow expects a wipe out, with significant casualties. She said that Trump managed to evade Epstein with this war, but it's the deaths of young Americans that are going to finally get through to the public who will have had enough.
re: the 4-6 weeks that supplies have been sitting in the Persian gulf instead of going through the straight of Hormuz and proceeding to their destinations, excellent and important point. I'd just like to add that those destinations largely include companies in southeast and east Asia, countries that produce products and/or components that are needed in North American and European markets. Without the oil getting to those countries, the products and components can get to North America and Europe. (Tankers use petroleum based fuels). Shortages in N.A. & Europe will bring significant inflation.
… and that's not to mention the impacts of the fertilizer supply issue: global food shortages.
typo above…should be "the products and components can't get to North America and Europe
For the first time in my memory U.S. oil is more expensive than North Sea oil on the exchange. Now we will see the full force of gusher up economic forces on our economy. I don't know if that possibility has ever been studied by US economists. We could be in uncharted territory here. For most of us it will look a lot like stagflation I would speculate. For the few it is a giant woopie!
I too skipped the April Fool's Day Oration. Opting to wait for the Pinocchio scaled reviews instead, just seemed more sensible. We all should know by now that the horse's mouth is not this orator's primary speaking orifice.
Pam Bondi swims with the buses. So many "good deeds" requiring contingent compensation in the land of sociopathy. She joins the ranks of those awaiting induction into the yet to be named The Sellout's Hall of "Fame", Shame, or Infamy. Benidict Arnold is a top contender for namesake of the institution with you can guess who.
re: the April Fools Day Oration (haha) I don't blame you for skipping it. I watched the whole thing because I wanted to see his demeanor. He looked like an 8 year old who had just gotten a beating from his old fashioned "spare the rod, spoil the child" father.
He looked defeated, unhappy, and what I personally think is the only way he could ever look if he were scared (because of course he can't ever admit to being afraid.)
Pam Bondi's exit is a Hail Mary pass. She bungled Epstein, and failed to jail his opponents, not for any lack of trying. He's getting more desperate by the day.
I was worried that he might announce some kind of terrible escalation against Iran, so I actually watched it. I needn't have worried; he said absolutely nothing substantial. It was all just patting himself on the back for how he's fixed everything, etc; the most surprising thing was how short the speech was (yay!).
"Sad and tired", yes, def. Most of his sentences ended with a downward tone, making it all sound like some sad song in a minor key.
All this – the brevity, and the lack of energy – made it easier for me to stomach. (I think this might be the first Trump speech I have bothered to watch live; I'm generally sickened by his bluster and belligerence).
I really do think that Trump is in a serious mental decline, to the point where we may well see the first invocation of the 25th Amendment.
IMO, Trump will get increasingly frantic and erratic. Iran is a problem he can't solve. He does seem to realize it can get worse if/when his 'victory' is tainted by getting his butt kicked in a ground war where the odds are more even, I think one of the goals was to recover the weapons-grade uranium. It's the mother lode – the product of a few decades of work. Enough for maybe a dozen bombs. But it's where we dropped a bunker-buster eight months ago. And we might not know for sure if the U-238 is where it was or in what condition. (Actually buried or accessible through an underground back door/) But it might take months to dig out and find out. Fun in peacetime but Iran might be successful in turning the excavation into a mass grave. So if we leave, we have NOT ended their nuclear weapons program, and only marginally set it back. And they can dig out the stuff, given time.
Hormuz is a similar problem. There's a reason why we haven't parked a few Guided Missile Destroyers at strategic points along the passage. The experts in the Pentagon won't talk and I was never that connected in the military to exact capabilities. But we haven't done it for two reasons. First, we'd only prove that we can't stop a determined drone attack against tankers. Second, we'd be targets that the Navy is not sure they could defend. (BTW, look at what Ukanine has done with improvised drones against the russian fleet in the Black Sea.) The Staight of Hormuz will open when Iran opens it. NATO has examined the problem. I don't see them jumping in – I'd bet money they won't when the US fleet has left.
Iran is pissed at DJT. Europe is not pleased with DJT. The oil kingdoms that thought they bought the US military will be none to happy to see the US fleet sail, leaving them landlocked on the wrong side of the Hovmuz. India and China have a dog in this fight. So DJT is telling the world to fix his war. I think they will, but not to our liking.
Bingo. He has caused monumental harm to global civilization, and it can't be undone. That's just reality. It sucks.