Judiciary: appointments and ideological alignment with some of the Supreme Court. Thomas and Alito are fully controlled, Kavanaugh just loves a powerful executive, the rest aren't controlled but often in agreement.
Then there's his use of executive power to punish his adversaries, e.g. Perkins Coie.
That tariffs have been so absolutely scattershot, says Trump actually is the one calling the shots there.
The biggest question for me now is how the usual defenders of this lawless administration will try to defend this or both sides it.
This just needs to happen every across all government, it’s like brushing your teeth to kick out the bacteria, but each individual institution needs a different kind of “floss” depending on the nature of the ways they have strayed from their original purposes.
When it crashes (and it's not clear when that will be), it will crash back to a cash-value baseline. And, sigh, it's not clear where that is. But it won't magically start going back up. The cyclic reinvestment engine needs to be reinvented every time.
For many of the smaller players I think there's unfortunately a lot of people who realized there's significant money to be made in grifting. Many of the largest crypto proponents have pivoted into endeavors, whether crypto or otherwise, that profit off of being rewarded for being part of the 'correct' tribe.
The Democrats should play hardball but the geriatrics can barely take a swing.
I can see why someone would have a issues with "a bunch of rich bankers appointed by politicians" controlling American monetary policy. But I can't really see a better way at least, until we can achieve a post-scarcity economy or something.
The investor class has capital, and America is capitalist. I’m not the biggest fan either but we gotta acknowledge the reality we live in.
The Federal Reserve was not created “just because”. The US banking system was wildly unstable when run… largely as the libertarian view would have it.
The long term policy goal (stability in the path of nominal incomes in the very short run, and prices in the medium-to-long run) would be unaffected, but the whole operational aspect would be simplified quite a bit.
or is that the obvious move so it'd be inverse?
(a) >We live in a world where the powerful deceive us. We know they lie. They know we know they lie. They don't care. We say we care but do nothing.
That belief isn't the consequence of the situation, but the cause. There is ample ability to change events, but people must believe they can act and act together, as they have for centuries of democracy and for all human history. They do it in Iran. The Republicans and MAGA movement have made changes that would have been unbelievable ten years ago.
People won't protest or do anything, but sure as hell we make sure to write long comments online!
That sure will send a message to those in power /s
That’s true even if the next administration is Republican (Vance or whoever), but especially true if the next administration ends up being Democratic instead-which while not certain, has decent odds-the more Trump defies norms, the more voters who will wish to go back to a “normal” Presidency
It’s very clear now that we need a lot more regulation of what presidents can and cannot do. Not to mention judicial reform. But if you’re a democrat theoretically getting power in 2028 you’re going to have immense pressure to move forwards, focus on kitchen table issues, yadda yadda.
It's quite impressive how scared everybody is of this administration. News outlets, international leaders even in face of threats, big tech, including the delusional Musk who thought he could've handled the president's rage.
Hell even his own party is scared of speaking up, you either fall in line or you risk falling victim of the most vicious direct attacks, even if you've been a huge and core voice for the president, see senator Marjorie Green.
From Russia, to Belarus, from the Philippines to Argentina, from Hungary to Poland it's crystal clear what a failure of democracy it is to have a presidential republic.
Granted, the Fed is not funded by taxpayer money, but it's entirely circular since it loans money to banks, and the government has to routinely bail out the same banks.
The interest rate can be set via a comprehensible self-algorithm learned over historical data, a job for a mid-level data scientist. As for bank regulation, let the bad banks fail and die. The stock market will manage just fine without their manipulation.
Those downvoting me don't really have a counterargument.
> The interest rate can be set via an algorithm.
Who writes this algorithm? Are algorithms without biases?
> The algorithm is to be tuned over historical data
So you’re saying that historical data can’t have biases? Data cannot be collected and shared (or not collected a la jobs report) to manipulate the output? Seems a bit of a naïve take if you ask me.
How on earth do you think the Fed sets the rate? Each board member probably has a simple spreadsheet, although they use their gut feeling in the end. It's markedly less objective and completely un-transparent.
People here are funny in that when I preach for transparency and objectivity, they preach for obscurity and individual board member bias.
Because as we all know, when it comes to financial markets, past performance guarantees future results. Oh wait . . .
In any event, the point of a decent algorithm is that if the result isn't complying with the action, upcoming updates to the weights will fix it.
Powell normally talks around the political pressure he's been subjected to. Funny to see him call it out right here.
Sure the Fed isn’t perfect. But we don’t really have a better solution as of now because our financial systems are extremely powerful and anyone in office would love to abuse it if they can.
Sure, the renovations are ridiculous. But it’s not like this administration is austere in the slightest, so that’s a bit rich. Not to mention the cronyism prevalent across the cabinet.
Dusseldorf•1h ago