Only the "good" stuff is bought: that Trump isn't as bad as feared, and that his anti-GOP spending plans will all go ahead, possibly leading to more QE to pay for it. The "bad" stuff is ignored: that he's in way over his head as shown most recently with the Taiwan debacle, that his cabinet isn crony capitalism and conspiracy theorists, and inexperienced for the job, etc.

It's good to be king, right? Did you hear that all those billionaires in his cabinet get to sell their assets tax free, to ensure they are conflict-free for the job. How convenient! At some point in the future they would have paid taxes on that, either when sold or via estate tax, and now it's all tax free for them. Don't get me started on Trump's conflicts of interest being blatantly shown with multiple countries recently, including Ivanka jumping in on a call between the Argentine leader and Trump, and guess what, the Trump resort in Beunos Aires is suddenly no longer mired in red tape!

That was some deal for Carrier. Before, there were 1K jobs and no tax credits. After, there are 1K jobs with $7M tax credits, which will pay for nearly half the $16M they plan to spend to increase automation to reduce jobs later. Brilliant! When Sarah Palin is talking sense against something, you know it's bad.

2.65M votes ahead and still loses. I don't get it. I've seen this electoral college explained and it still makes no sense. Something about giving more weight to lower population areas? But isn't that the same as giving less weight to votes in denser population areas? Aren't all votes supposed to be equal? And on a State level, someone in rural NY or CA or IL sees their vote ignored by those "big city folk" dictacting where all of the State's electoral votes go, which is the same thing they want to avoid on the national level. Also those electoral votes can be sent wherever by some "faithless elector", whoever the hell that is, just deciding to do what he wants. Bizarre.

Idiocracy in action.

Jester,

All too true. Nailed, I'm afraid. I think some of the 'positive' light Trump is being cast in seems to be the result that everyone is sucking up to him, because, well, as you said - he's King. Lot of important people being called into the royal court at Trump tower, and acting humble, wishing to share the crumbs of that power, and everyone who called him a scumbag now think he's a skilled and benign figure. No ones talking about his 'shoot from the hip' erractic style, because he hasn't started a nuclear war with Iran - yet. 

Enough of that. The electoral college system was set up by the founding fathers - some of the richest men in America, all large landholders (including farmland), and one can make the argument (as James Beard did in the 1920's, to a lot of hell for telling a different story than George Washinton chopping down a cherry tree, got confronted about it, and said famously, "I cannot tell a lie") copping to the 'crime'. One can see them as the 'owners of production' of their time. And their fear was, that direct elections might pose a challenge to this priviledged positions and monetary interests. So, under the guise of having a 'safeguard' against a population that might make 'unwise' decisions, the vote of each state generated members of the 'electoral college', that could overturn an 'unwise' decision by the people, if such circumstances came to pass. (Well, that sure didn't work in Trump's case - but at first there were some futile public pleas for electoral college members to not vote for Trump. And Jill Stein's 'recount' demands have everything to do with changing who gets to vote in the electoral college.)

So, what was designed as a way to protect the voting public from making bad decisions, really has a least one other agenda of not rocking the boat for the rich. At least that's what I remember from my American History class in high school. And yes, for whatever reason, the votes of states with higher populations got more electoral college votes. (The density of local populations leading to some 400+ members of the House of Representatives, I suppose as  a way to somewhat 'balance' against the fact that each state gets two Senators, regardless of population. (not to mention that the South kept its slave practices in effect - by counting each black slave as representing 3/5th of a vote - enough to vanquish abolitionist demands.)

A long-winded way to say you're absolutely right - the electoral college is outdated and sucks. One person, one vote. Should be simple, right? Your system of a parlimentary political power is much closer to that. Perhaps we ought to notfiy England that we've changed our minds - we'd like to apply to be their colony again.

It will be quite a ride with Trump, I tend to agree with you, but for the sake of this country I hope it goes well.  This rally is truly for the 10%, but I am sure the 1% is taking the lion share of it. the 1% should be feeling so good!!!

Back to Trump:  How do you like the fact that he has chosen a Fast Food Exec for the Labor Department?  One of the lowest paying industries in the USA?  I believe he has opposed raising the minimum wage.

Wonder how those blue collar workers that voted for Trump view this ironic appointment?  He sure BSed his way through the campaign and now he is changing his tune on many issues, but that should upset some of his base??

lt cap,

I really don't know what quite to make of such cabinet choices myself. He's certainly not only reneged on some of the more extreme campaign promises - jailing HIlary, building a wall with Mexico, repealing Obamacare on Day 1, etc.

And yes, he's appointing fat cats for cabinet posts based on they were 'successful businessmen' and he 'admires success.'  I'd guess that means that he doesn't want anything to do with Appalachian 'losers' with 'Hillbilly teeth." A status quo policy? - You didn't have a job and health insurance then, and you don't have it now, either. You're lucky things aren't getting worse 'believe me.'

Jamok,

The Trump administration promises to bring us the most  unorthodox administration this country has ever seen.  He is a lose cannon, the mdeia will have tons of material to deal with. 

Yesterday I heard that the CIA had determined that the Rusians had interfered with the election to favor him.  But the report lacked specifics.  Was it through fake news on social media sites?  Has anyone read or heard more on this subject?

lt cap,

In terms of actual reality, the most useful posts are the ones you're spelling out about NOK insider buying. If we have another 'downdraft' (not attributable to starting a nuclear war ;-) ) I will need to consider buying some at those/these prices.

On Russia conducting cyber-interference: I am partly bemused by the huge outpourings of 'outrage' (every news source I turn to today has people turning purple yelling about it), and partly disgusted by hypocrisy and political manner this is being used by people who not only ought to, but I believe do, know better.

Let us suppose the Russians are guilty of doing the worst of the accusations. Do people not think about that we are doing the same to other countries, and even our own allies? Did our and the Israelis' dropping the stuxnet 'bomb' on Iran that destroyed their nuclear centrifuges not be an act of cyber-sabotage? (And that the only one we *found out* about - how many things never reach the public eye - such as our spying on/hacking into phones/monitoring conversations by our *friends*, such as the recording of Germany's Merkel and other European allies' phone calls revealed by Snowden about the NSA?) 

And so we are shocked! shocked!, and outraged! outraged!  by such Russian meddling which must be punished. What??? And the really disgusting BS is that there are people who know better: The Senate oversight Intelligence Commitee surely has for years gotten briefed (or I sure hope so) on what we're doing in terms of cyber warfare, and what we plan to do going forward. I find it beyond belief that legislators like McCain never heard of such a thing, and now is howling for blood. And to top it off, the White House just made an anouncement of the evidence it has of Russian hacking, delivered by the CIA. Are you kidding me? Is even the President not briefed on what cyber-operations  we are perpetrating that probably makes the Russian interference seem puny? Was Snowden more than right when suggesting that the intelligence community is so 'rogue' as to operate on its own, informing nobody of what they're doing? I find that hard to believe. 

What I don't find hard to believe is that, slim as the chances may be of success, that the uproar over this presents the last, desperate political agenda of finding a way to de-legitimatize (is that a word?) the election of Trump, and do a 'do-over' election, presumably for 'reasons of health' dumping Hilary for Peewee Herman, as almost anybody but Hilary could defeat Trump in a cakewalk. Trump is as much a danger to the Republicans as he is to the Democrats. They both have interests in him going back to the Apprentice show. I doubt it'll work, regadless of how 'whipped up' the public becomes. But it's a shot.

Some of the anti-Trump almost universal chorus of the media might be seen in 'today's tweet': He's being whipped for questioning the cost of the F-35 plane made by Lockheed Martin. The facts are that 1. It ran waaaaay over the original budget and 2. It became an 'all-purpose' airplane - it could fill the roles of fighter/bomber/escort/etc. jet, and the fact is that being so broad-based, it does none of them particularly well, and not as well as new Russian jets that are much more focused in their roles. So regardless of what he says, he's treated like an ignorant liar. Which, in fact, he may be. And as President, he's downright scary. But discovering a plot by the Albanians to get their ancient dial-up phone network updated, so they could make 'prank calls' to American phone numbers really deserves looking into.

It's getting surreal. I had to laugh at this story with Deutsche Bank giving their expected market reaction to the Fed statement, and every scenario for equities is "Higher".

zerohedge.com/ne...e-hike

I see useless Rick Perry is now going to be in charge of the Dept of Energy, that same department he wanted to get rid of. This furthers Trump's pattern of putting opposite people in charge, which SNL called before this news about Perry.

youtube.com/wa...bu7GBE

Jester,

We both know up close what Perry is like - an intellectual light weight whose policy as governor was to give the go-go-go to any and all oil production. As you say so correctly, this is surreal. Quite like when Enron was writing energy policy for....I forget which president - before scandal and fraud against shareholders drove them out of business. But there is some organization - wish I could remember the name - that almost all Republicans support and very few Democrats - some kind of 'partnership' - which boils down to Republicans meeting with industry leaders who tell them what laws they want to pass, and the Republicans do it, under the aegis of promoting businesses and jobs. And of course these Republicans get campaign $$ in return. Might've seen it on a PBS 'Frontline' documentary or something like that. Surreal that Trump is doing that with no 'camoflage'. Surreal that he's appointing people who during the campaign called him a dangerous jackass. So now he's.....a felicitious jackass? In an earlier, simpler era of American history, the popular slogan was, "What's good for GM, is good for America." So there we are.

 In an earlier, simpler era of American history, the popular slogan was, "What's good for GM, is good for America." So there we are.

Replace GM with "Trump Resorts and Putin".