DONALD TRUMP

The Conversation -  The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, a set of tax cuts Donald Trump signed into law during his first term as president, will expire on Dec. 31, 2024. As Trump and Republicans prepare to negotiate new tax cuts in 2025, it’s worth gleaning lessons from the president-elect’s first set of cuts.  The 2017 cuts were the most extensive revision to the Internal Revenue Code since the Ronald Reagan administration. The changes it imposed range from the tax that corporations pay on their foreign income to limits on the deductions individuals can take for their state and local tax payments.

Trump promised middle-class benefits at the time, but in practice more than 80% of the cuts went to corporations, tax partnerships and high-net-worth individuals. The cost to the U.S. deficit was huge − a total increase of US$1.9 trillion from 2018 to 2028, according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office. The tax advantage to the middle class was small.  Advantages for Black Americans were smaller still

The Hill -  President-elect Trump took issue with fees charged to use the Panama Canal, a vital shipping route, on Saturday night, claiming that he will demand oversight of the waterway be given back to the U.S. when he returns to office if it’s not changed. “The fees being charged by Panama are ridiculous, especially knowing the extraordinary generosity that has been bestowed to Panama by the U.S,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “This complete ‘rip-off’ of our Country will immediately stop….”

Panama charges tariffs for boats and ships to pass through its canal. Fees vary based on the size and purpose of vessels, and the charges range from as low as $0.50 to as high as $300,000...The U.S. uses the Panama Canal more than any other country. Control of the canal was transferred from the U.S. to the Central American country in 1999 as a result of a 1979 treaty under President Jimmy Carter, which Trump said was a foolish decision

Hartmann Report -  The main promise Trump made to American voters before the election was that he’d “immediately” lower grocery and other prices. Anybody with even a tiny bit of civics education knows that’s nearly impossible; the president doesn’t control any agency or have any power other than the bully pulpit to affect marketplace prices. 

Just ask Jerry Ford and Jimmy Carter, who were both one-term presidents largely because of inflation. Nonetheless, Trump repeated that promise over and over and voters believed him. Now, as Todd Beeton points out in his excellent Big Picture newsletter, Trump has dismissed this promise as something he never really intended to do because, as noted, it’s simply not possible. When asked on Meet The Press if he’d keep his promise to lower prices, he replied bluntly, “I can’t promise anything.” 

Right. He’d also promised he didn’t know anything about Project 2025 and their plans to gut Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other popular government programs; now he’s stocking his administration with the actual authors of that document. He’d also promised to end the Ukraine war the day after his election; now it just looks like he’s going to leave that democratic nation and its millions of people to the tender mercies of Russia’s brutal tyrant and his rapist soldiers. Finally, Trump promised not to attack Social Security with his campaign sending out literally millions of flyers to homes in swing states saying he’d protect the program; that’s already in the crapper as the DOGE caucus and Musk’s people are examining the program for cutbacks. Republican Rep. Greg Lopez went so far as to bluntly tell Social Security Works’ president Alex Lawson, ‘there will be some cuts’ to Social Security. The three areas where it appears Trump may keep his promises are putting an anti-vaccine crackpot in charge of our vaccine programs, cutting more taxes for his billionaire donors, and setting out on a revenge spree once he controls the Justice Department.

 Guardian - Tech chief executives, media organisations and foreign leaders are seeking the president-elect’s favor through donations, self-censorship and appeasement. Analysts say the surrender is driven by a combination of greed, fear of Trump’s unfettered power and a belief that resistance is futile.“Part of the shock of the Trump win is how quickly and how many people in various areas, from the media to politicians, are acquiescing in advance,” said Tara Setmayer, a former Republican communications director on Capitol Hill. “People are resigning themselves to self-preservation over the good of maintaining a free and fair democracy and resisting Trump.”

It is an astonishing turnaround. When Trump was impeached in the wake of the January 6 riot nearly four years ago, he appeared to be a political pariah. Dozens of major corporations publicly pledged to freeze their financial contributions to 147 Republican members of Congress who had voted to overturn the 2020 presidential election...

And yet his victory over Kamala Harris in the 5 November election has seemingly expunged his record in the eyes of the rich and powerful. He returns to the White House with the momentum of victory in the national popular vote, a supreme court ruling that implies presidents are above the law and diehard loyalists in the White House and Congress. Steve Schmidt, a political strategist and former campaign operative for George W Bush and John McCain, said: “He’s entering office as the most powerful president in American history. He is an American Caesar, unrestrained. Trump has made a threat and said, I’m coming after people, and he’s appointed people that will do what he wants without him having to tell them to do it.