Mostly posted this for the picture of trump looking "old and quite weird".

>The meeting at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence was requested by Netanyahu, sources familiar with the planning told CNN. It comes on the heels of the prime minister’s address to Congress and meetings with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at the White House. Harris, now the presumptive Democratic nominee, conveyed a forcefulness on civilian suffering and ending the war following her time with the prime minister.

Remember this shit? Fucking vote.

>The president also appeared to have trouble raising a glass of water to his mouth during a speech at West Point a day before he turned 74, the oldest a president has been in his first term.

>President Trump faced new questions about his health on Sunday, after videos emerged of him gingerly walking down a ramp at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and having trouble bringing a glass of water to his mouth during a speech there. > >Mr. Trump — who turned 74 on Sunday, the oldest a U.S. president has been in his first term — was recorded hesitantly descending the ramp one step at a time after he delivered an address to graduating cadets at the New York-based academy on Saturday. The academy’s superintendent, Lt. Gen. Darryl A. Williams, walked alongside him. Mr. Trump sped up slightly for the final three steps, as he got to the bottom.

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> President Donald Trump stood in front of the White House press corps on Tuesday afternoon and vented. > >What was billed as a press conference rapidly turned into a quasi-campaign event, with the President of the United States free-associating about his general election opponent, the state of the country and the media. Even by Trump standards, it was a shocking performance – suggesting a level of volatility and unpredictability that has to terrify Republicans trying to run and win campaigns while sharing the same ballot with Trump in November.

>10) “Because you talk about a certain power of the telephone and the calls where they would call and say, no, we don’t want to do that.”

>33) “That basically means no windows, no nothing. It’s very hard to do. I tell people when they want to go into some of these buildings, how are your eyes because they won’t be good in five years.”

>39) “But you can’t make a left anymore and come into the United States loaded up with human traffic.”

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>White nationalist: Trump gives nothing but racist tweets

> President Donald Trump’s racist comments about Democratic congresswomen have won him renewed support from white supremacists who had been losing faith that he was the hero they wanted to create a prospering White America. > >Trump told the four women of color that they should “go back” to the “crime infested places” they came from, even though three of the four were born in the US and the fourth is a naturalized citizen. > >“Man, President Trump’s Twitter account has been pure fire lately. This might be the funniest thing he’s ever tweeted. This is the kind of WHITE NATIONALISM we elected him for,” wrote Andrew Anglin on his Daily Stormer site – one of the most highly trafficked neo-Nazi websites.

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> Trump: We are all to blame for Russia relations

> US President Donald Trump, in a stunning rebuke of the US intelligence community, declined on Monday to endorse the US government’s assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election, saying he doesn’t “see any reason why” Russia would be responsible. > >Instead, Trump – standing alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin – touted Putin’s vigorous denial and pivoted to complaining about the Democratic National Committee’s server and missing emails from Hillary Clinton’s personal account. > >“I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today,” Trump said during a joint news conference after he spent about two hours in a room alone with Putin, save for a pair of interpreters.

Background on the disaster.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Chicago_disaster

The black enlisted workers were specifically selected to be the dumbest and least competent:

>None of the new recruits had been instructed in ammunition loading.

>At NSGL, the enlisted African Americans who tested in the top 30% to 40% were selected for non-labor assignments. Port Chicago was manned by workers drawn from those remaining. The Navy determined that the quality of African American petty officers at Port Chicago suffered because of the absence of high-scoring black men

>The Navy's General Classification Test (GCT) results for the enlisted men at Port Chicago averaged 31, putting them in the lowest twelfth of the Navy.

The white officers in charge had no training with munitions, and refused to train the men:

>Prior to his being sent to command Port Chicago, Kinne had no training in the loading of munitions and little experience in handling them.[12] Loading officers serving underneath Kinne had not been trained in handling munitions until they had been posted to Mare Island Navy Yard, after which they were considered adequate to the task by the Navy.

>Later the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) responded to word of unsafe practices by offering to bring in experienced men to train the battalion; the Navy leadership declined the offer,[16] fearing higher costs, slower pace, and possible sabotage from civilian longshoremen.[17] No enlisted man stationed at Port Chicago had received formal training in the handling and loading of explosives into ships.

Finally, a civilian plumber working right before the explosion described the poor conditions:

>While at work he witnessed a man accidentally drop a naval artillery shell two feet onto the wooden pier, but there was no detonation. Carr waited until the African-American winch operator tested the repaired winch and then left the pier, thinking that the operation appeared unsafe.

The explosion:

>At 10:18 p.m., witnesses reported hearing a noise described as "a metallic sound and rending timbers, such as made by a falling boom."[26] Immediately afterward, an explosion occurred on the pier and a fire started. Five to seven seconds later[16][30][31] a more powerful explosion took place as the majority of the ordnance within and near the SS E. A. Bryan detonated in a fireball seen for miles. An Army Air Forces pilot flying in the area reported that the fireball was 3 mi (4.8 km) in diameter.

Just a reminder of how trump's presidency went, since many people have forgotten. This article is from exactly 7 years ago.

> Trump’s job approval rating at the 6-month mark is lower than eight of the past nine presidents’. He’s tied with Gerald Ford, who had taken over from Richard Nixon, who had fled Washington in the wake of the Watergate scandal and whom Ford, very controversially, pardoned. > > Despite his braggadocio, Trump has a pittance of legislative accomplishments to tout. Health care appears to be dead in the water – and even Trump can’t seem to decide what the right next step should be. There is currently zero new funding for Trump’s much-touted border wall. Tax reform still in its infant stage, with few details added to the first, basic proposal. Infrastructure proposals are in limbo. There is no announced strategy on the raising of the debt ceiling. And on and on and on. > > A special counsel was appointed and is investigating Russia’s attempts to meddle in the 2016 election and the possibility that members of the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to aid his campaign. That investigation has triggered a major lawyering-up of all the major players – including several Trump family members – and a series of ever-changing stories about who said what and when.

>Just 36% of people approve of the job Trump is doing, via a Washington Post-ABC News poll released over the weekend, while 58% disapprove. More troubling for Trump (and his party) is the fact that the intensity is all on the anti-Trump side; 48% strongly disapprove of how Trump is doing the job while just 25% strongly approve.

Fucking vote.

>Thousands more firearms dealers across the United States will have to run background checks on buyers when selling at gun shows or other places outside brick-and-mortar stores, according to a Biden administration rule that will soon go into effect. > >The rule aims to close a loophole that has allowed tens of thousands of guns to be sold every year by unlicensed dealers who don’t perform background checks to ensure the potential buyer is not legally prohibited from having a firearm.

>“This is going to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and felons,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. “And my administration is going to continue to do everything we possibly can to save lives. Congress needs to finish the job and pass universal background checks legislation now.”

From May 2024:

> As he seeks a second term, Trump has promised to remain an unflinching supporter of the NRA and its agenda to unravel four years of Biden’s actions on guns. Biden’s campaign has branded Trump “the greatest defender of the Second Amendment to ever occupy the White House.” > > Trump’s speech was short on specifics about what he would do to protect or expand gun rights in a second term, but he promised to “roll back every Biden attack on the Second Amendment.” He sought to remind the friendly crowd of his administration’s accomplishments while arguing that another four years of Biden’s leadership would result in more firearms and gun owners being targeted.

Old, but seems relevant today.

>President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law the first major federal gun safety legislation passed in decades, marking a significant bipartisan breakthrough on one of the most contentious policy issues in Washington. > >“God willing, it’s going to save a lot of lives,” Biden said at the White House as he finished signing the bill.

Another Republican turns away from donald trump. It's not clear what his response will be, as he has been generally absent from the public eye for weeks.

Who knows how long his campaign can last with Republican Senators speaking out against him? Maybe a heavily scrutinized press conference might be necessary, with his leadership skills (and mental capacity) in doubt.

> President Joe Biden on Wednesday awarded the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry to two Union soldiers who stole a locomotive deep in Confederate territory during the Civil War and drove it north for 87 miles (140 kilometers) as they destroyed railroad tracks and telegraph lines.

The Biden administration is moving Ukraine ahead of other countries that were slated to receive air defense missiles, the latest move in its effort to rush urgently needed weapons to Kyiv.

The U.S. will “reprioritize” deliveries of Patriots and National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems missiles planned for a select group of other countries so that the munitions coming off the production line will instead go to Ukraine, John Kirby, spokesperson for the National Security Council, announced Thursday.

I had an idea that would allow people to buy their own homes that they are currently renting:

1. Every home gets appraised to determine what it would sell for. This is done by the county and is used for property taxes too.
2. Every renter is allowed to buy a percentage of their primary residence from the owner. The owner has no choice in this. It's a requirement for being able to rent a property. Edit: Since people are confused about this, the renter is not required to buy anything. They have an option to buy.
3. Renters can pay as little as $100 extra per month and the county puts their percentage ownership on the deed. If the home is sold, the renter can't be kicked out involuntarily. If they do leave, they get the percentage of home value they own.

Pros:

• This would avoid the issue of high interest rates hurting primary homeownership.
• This would blunt the impact of corporate landlords having a monopoly where they refuse to sell. They are forced to sell at a fair price.
• This would create a simple decision between owning their home and spending money on luxuries or eating out.

Cons:

• This would hurt small landlords who would have their property bought out from under them. This is actually a good thing because the benefits of rising property values are now shared.
• The implementation is hard. This is actually a good thing because bad landlords would sell property they didn't want to manage, lowering prices for renters who want to buy.
• It would cost the county money to hire appraisers. But this could be paid for by increased property taxes due to better appraisals.
• Property taxes would go up for landlords. But this would be good, as it encourages them to sell the property. This appraisal process and increased property taxes wouldn't affect people who just lived in their home without charging rent.

> “Something snapped in this guy—for real—when he lost in 2020,” Biden said. “He can’t accept the fact that he lost, it’s literally driving him crazy.”

>"First of all, he's actually not comfortable with going to jail. That is just bravado." > >He said that he has "talked to Trump associates" who said Trump "doesn't want to serve time."

You can't cut any taxes or programs to fund your idea. Nothing else in your government is going to change. It can't be a tax that you avoid somehow. The money comes from you and similar people in your situation. Don't try to get around it in some way.

What would you pay more taxes to support?

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>Net profit margins are pacing for 11.7% growth in the first quarter, above the five-year average of 11.5% growth and higher than the same period a year ago, per FactSet. > >Largely, this has been driven by cost-cutting, not rising revenues. In 2023, investors cheered Big Tech's cost-cutting efforts that led to significant earnings growth. In 2024, companies outside the tech sector have tapped a similar playbook, setting up the rest of the index for earnings growth through the rest of the year.