Corporate America’s Trash-Talking Tariff
Temper Tantrum
Posted By: RockyTCB, 4/28/2025 9:19:01 AM
Once upon a time, your correspondent was summoned to a New York war room to help develop the announcement of AOL’s acquisition of Time Warner. His immediate response: “Why!? These guys (TW execs) are the sharpest knives in the business!” Two years later, the combined company announced a record $54-billion write-down of “goodwill” — which the Oxford Dictionary defines as “the established reputation of a business regarded as a quantifiable asset.” Credible operational explanations exist for this catastrophic drop of value. But to this commentator, the prime reason was an anonymous media campaign by those C-suite assassins
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Newsom Hits The Gas
14 replies
It wasn’t long ago that a California governor made it clear that oil refineries were not welcome in his state. Then another California governor asked regulators to loosen the chains on refineries to ensure that they will be profitable and remain in the state that every day burns an enormous volume of gasoline.
Actually, it is the same governor, one who has turned his attention from playing to his hard-left, blue-state constituency to shifting toward the middle for a 2028 White House run.
It was just last summer when Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a “plan to prevent Big Oil ‘profit spikes’” that would also “save Californians money at the pump.”
Once upon a time, your correspondent was summoned to a New York war room to help develop the announcement of AOL’s acquisition of Time Warner. His immediate response: “Why!? These guys (TW execs) are the sharpest knives in the business!”
Two years later, the combined company announced a record $54-billion write-down of “goodwill” — which the Oxford Dictionary defines as “the established reputation of a business regarded as a quantifiable asset.”
Credible operational explanations exist for this catastrophic drop of value. But to this commentator, the prime reason was an anonymous media campaign by those C-suite assassins
For some, it’s hard to imagine an unpaid civil servant doing an important job for the government could be treated worse than Elon Musk. The government cost-cutting head of DOGE has been rewarded for his service by a boycott of Tesla and its stock, by death threats, insults, and violent attacks on Tesla dealers and owners. And now, according to the latest I&I/TIPP Poll, a surprisingly large share of the population backs this behavior.
The national online I&I/TIPP poll was taken by 1,452 adults from March 26 to March 28. It has a margin of error of +/-2.6 percentage points. The poll was intended to look at the anti-Musk phenomenon,
Last week, the New York Times discovered that President Donald Trump was serious when he promised to liberate the economy from the oppressive weight of the regulatory state, describing it as “deregulation on a mass scale.”
Cornell’s Donald Kenkel, who was chief economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers in the first Trump administration, told the Times that “It’s going on much more quietly than some of the other fireworks we’re seeing, but it will have great impact.”
Great, indeed. In both senses of the word.
History’s Biggest Liars?
4 replies
The “experts” who have told us that man-made climate change is a grave threat must have stumbled across the Winston Churchill comment about duplicity, because they know the truth has a hard time catching up to lies. They’ve also relied on lying by omission, an offense that can’t be blamed on innocent oversight.
One of Churchill’s greatest quips warns us that “a lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.” Propagandists know this is true.
Fabulists also lie by leaving out important facts. Such as burying the medieval warm period.
You’d think the mainstream press would have learned a lesson or two after committing so many embarrassing mistakes in its effort to “get” Donald Trump and cover up for Joe Biden over the past eight years. But no. It’s already back to its old and terrible habits.
Shortly after the election, Vanity Fair published a story that led with this admonition to the press: “Every outrage and insult can’t be a five-alarm fire, as it’s critical for the media to stay focused on the most serious threats to America’s democratic institutions.”
Former New York Times editor Jill Abramson cautioned her
With their party dragging itself through an existential struggle, Democrats, with of course help from the media, have made the president’s illegal immigrant deportations their raison de etre. They’ve turned to tantrum-laced political theater and seasoned it with a mountain of hypocrisy.
This year’s George Floyd (or Michael Brown) for the Democrats is Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the El Salvadoran and alleged MS-13 gang member who was sent back to his home country. His case, says the Associated Press, is for Democrats “about fundamental American ideals — due process, following court orders, preventing government overreach.”
No Due Process For Illegal Regulations
0 replies
As other opponents of the climate hoax do, I eagerly await the Trump administration’s termination of the Environmental Protection Agency’s so-called endangerment finding (EF). I had imagined that the reversal would be accomplished over the course of at least a year and probably more through the conventional administrative process of notice-and-public-comment. But things may get much more exciting, much more quickly.
Some brief history is in order. The EF is a December 2009 determination by the Obama EPA that emissions of greenhouse gases harm the public health and welfare. Since that time, the EF has been the factual and scientific foundation
In February, a bunch of centrist Democratic officials gathered in ritzy Potomac, Maryland, to complain that the party had become too radicalized and needed to “get out of elite circles and into real communities (e.g., tailgates, gun shows, local restaurants, churches).”
The response of rank-and-file Democrats? “Go left, young gender-fluid person!!”
This week, RealClearPolitics reported on a poll from Survey USA that found 74% of Democrats either want the party to be even more “progressive” (50%) or like it just the way it is (24%). Fewer than one in five wants the party to move toward the center.
Sanity Returns To The Appliance Aisle
5 replies
Acting to please a constituency that prefers scarcity over abundance, Joe Biden ordered up a list of federal rules that restricted consumer choice. Given the exhaustive White House agenda that began when Donald Trump took office on Jan. 20, it would have been unsurprising had he waited to unwind the Biden regulatory knot. But to his credit, Trump has been moving on that, too.
Ignoring the left’s constant “we’re running out of everything” screeching, Trump restored “shower freedom” earlier this month with an executive order “to end the Obama-Biden war on water pressure.” The new rule rescinds “the overly complicated federal rule that redefined ‘showerhead’
“If a commercial company operated the way the federal government does, then it would immediately go bankrupt, it would be delisted, the officers would be arrested.” — Elon Musk in an interview with Fox News’ Bret Baier
It’s Tax Day, and your correspondent is one unhappy camper.
His household will submit an extortion-level payment to the Infernal Revenue Service for a reason this commentator has highlighted for years: Uncle Sam’s collection agency operates like a collection racket.
What if a “commercial company,” to use Musk’s term:
Can Trump Fix His FUBAR Tariff Rollout?
21 replies
So far, President Donald Trump has been piloting his second term like Maverick from “Top Gun.” With one exception. The tariff rollout has been FUBAR, which is troubling since it’s Trump’s signature economic policy issue.
There have been glaring missteps along the way, repeated pauses, confused and conflicting messaging, turf wars. It’s draining public support and causing real economic problems as businesses can’t make plans while all this is in flux.
We aren’t privy to insider gossip to speculate why this is. But we can say that Trump needs to get his tariff act together, and fast.
Consider what has
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Disturbing video has captured the moment a massive brawl broke out among Carnival Cruise ship passengers in Texas — resulting in more than a dozen people being banned from the cruise liner for life.
The violence erupted as scores of passengers were disembarking from the Carnival Jubilee when it docked in Galveston on Saturday following a week-long Caribbean jaunt, according to footage shared on social media.
“It went down this morning,” said Trelle Ray, who shared the clip on Facebook.
The footage showed multiple passengers barging past barriers to trade blows.
At one point, a man was shoved to the floor before a handful of others started violently pummeling him.
From the stage at the New Hampshire Democratic Party’s McIntyre-Shaheen 100 Club Dinner on Sunday, Gov. JB Pritzker, D-Ill., urged “mass protests … mobilization” and “disruption” so that Republicans “cannot know a moment of peace.”
“Never before in my life have I called for mass protests, for mobilization, for disruption. But I am now,” Pritzker said.
“These Republicans cannot know a moment of peace,” Pritzker said. “They have to understand that we will fight their cruelty with every megaphone and microphone that we have. We must castigate them on a soapbox and then punish them at the ballot box.”
In his final act as pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church, Francis, in keeping with his deep commitment to the climate and well-cultivated image of personal humility, could have foregone a papal funeral.
To the thousands of world leaders and dignitaries flying to Rome as required by international protocol, Pope Francis could have extended an invitation to stay home. He could have ordered he not lie in state, preventing the Vatican pilgrimage of hundreds of thousands of faithful to pay their respects. He could have even skipped the motorcade through the streets of Rome. All this, as a memorable gesture to maintain a smaller carbon footprint — one last gift
A bill that would decriminalize welfare fraud under $25,000 in California for simple administrative errors is being pushed by a Democratic lawmaker.
State Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas introduced Senate Bill 560, which would delete criminal penalties for welfare fraud below $25,000, and delete a provision for criminal penalties for any attempt at welfare fraud below $950, according to the legislation, which was introduced in February.
"California’s safety net should lift families up, not trap them in poverty," Smallwood-Cuevas told Fox News Digital. "Right now, a missed deadline or paperwork mistake can lead to felony charges that tear families apart — even when there’s no intent to deceive."
‘Net Zero Madness’: Spain’s Reliance
on Solar Energy Blamed For Massive Nations-Wide
Power Cut 18 replies
on Solar Energy Blamed For Massive Nations-Wide
Power Cut 18 replies
Spain’s power network has remained silent on the actual cause of Europe’s worst power blackout in a generation, but has acknowledged that it is “very possible” that a problem with solar power systems may have contributed to the failure. A freak weather incident was blamed on Monday for a massive power cut that affected the entire Iberian Peninsula, depriving Spain and Portugal of electricity. However, this narrative was quickly questioned by energy industry insiders, and Spain’s national energy company now acknowledges that renewable power failure may have been a contributing factor.
Newsom Hits The Gas
14 replies
It wasn’t long ago that a California governor made it clear that oil refineries were not welcome in his state. Then another California governor asked regulators to loosen the chains on refineries to ensure that they will be profitable and remain in the state that every day burns an enormous volume of gasoline.
Actually, it is the same governor, one who has turned his attention from playing to his hard-left, blue-state constituency to shifting toward the middle for a 2028 White House run.
It was just last summer when Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a “plan to prevent Big Oil ‘profit spikes’” that would also “save Californians money at the pump.”
I realize this may blow Democrats' minds, but 100 days into President Donald Trump’s second term, most of the millions of Americans who cast their vote for him are still happy they did.
And Trump has not been twiddling his thumbs in these first months back in the Oval Office.
There’s plenty to like or dislike, from his large number of executive orders to his federal cost-cutting bonanza with Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
So, it’s telling that a recent poll shows the vast majority of Trump supporters would vote for him again now, if given the opportunity for a do-over.
The Open Records Request filed on April 17 by Tennessee Star Editor-in-Chief Michael Patrick Leahy, seeking video and written records from the Tennessee Highway Patrol (THP) stop of Kilmar Abrego Garcia in December 2022, was denied on Monday without explanation by the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security (TDOSHS).
The Tennessee Public Records Act provides state agencies with seven business days to respond to valid Open Records Requests, and explicitly states that “[f]ailure to respond to the request” constitutes “a denial,” which gives Leahy the right to sue to compel the agency to take action.
David Horowitz R.I.P.
10 replies
On behalf of the David Horowitz Freedom Center, we are very saddened to announce the passing of the Center’s founder, David Horowitz. After a lengthy battle with cancer, David passed yesterday at the age of 86.
The Freedom Center’s founder and guiding force was a relentless conservative warrior who survived a previous brush with death (chronicled in his book Mortality and Faith), confrontations with the Black Panthers, campus radicals, government investigations, death threats, and hate campaigns, some led by his former friends and allies, without ever considering giving up or letting up.
Doug Emhoff Rages As President Trump Reclaims
Holocaust Board From Biden’s Political Cronies 9 replies
Holocaust Board From Biden’s Political Cronies 9 replies
Former second gentleman Doug Emhoff got some pretty brutal news from President Trump on Tuesday: You're fired. Emhoff, along with a slew of other high-profile Democrats, was summarily dismissed from his role on the board that oversees the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC.
And Emhoff, who is Jewish, is not one bit pleased, accusing the president of playing politics with "Holocaust remembrance and education." Here's what Emhoff told one outlet after learning of his dismissal:
“Today, I was informed of my removal from the United States Holocaust Memorial Council. Let me be clear: Holocaust remembrance and education should never be politicized. To turn one of the worst
‘Trump is Hitler!’
9 replies
A cardinal symptom of TDS is the characterization of Trump as Adolf Hitler and a Nazi. The left, not noticeably given to introspection or critical thinking, obviously fails to recognize its own Nazism. A fundamental tenet of Nazism is that all power be vested in the state. Similarly, the Democrat party strives to establish a government that controls society via regulations and central planning — the Green New Deal, E.V. mandates, vaccination mandates, socialized medicine, wealth redistribution, community planning, public education, judicial activism, Obama’s “Life of Julia”, erosion of competing allegiance to family and faith
The first 100 days of President Donald Trump’s second administration have revealed at least one unmistakable truth.
In short, the federal judiciary poses a serious threat to the freedom of the American people.
On Monday, according to The Washington Times, the U.S. Supreme Court announced that it would not take up a case involving a challenge to a sweeping and patently unconstitutional California gun-control law.
Incredibly, California law bans gun shows on state property, including fairgrounds.
The plaintiffs in B&L Productions v. Gavin Newsom had asked SCOTUS to provide relief by blocking the law — already upheld by the notoriously liberal 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — and then hearing arguments. But