Columbia University, for example, agreed to concessions that included imposing new oversight over its Middle Eastern studies department and creating a security force empowered to make arrests. But that was not enough to restore the more than $400 million in grants that the Trump administration had canceled, or to prevent the administration from making even more demands.
Law firms like Paul Weiss, which thought they had escaped punishment by agreeing to do pro bono work for uncontroversial causes, discovered that Mr. Trump saw their agreements as a blank check for them to do his bidding.As my colleagues have reported, the law firms discovered that they had agreed to deals that “did little to insulate them from his whims.” One expert at Yale Law School said the “administration seems to think that they have subjected these firms to indentured servitude.”
Trump operates on two simple rules:
- For me to win, someone else has to lose; and,
- If someone capitulates to my demands, I can still get more.
If you give in to Trump, he will be back.
…
Trump’s been going after both Big Law and the Ivies, and so far most, though not all, have given in. Four major “white shoe” law firms have offered 340 million in pro bono work for Trump’s causes and promised not to oppose him.
All of them are idiots. Trump is a bully and a blackmailer. You can never “pay off” a blackmailer. They will always come back to the well for more.
And these are some of the most important, powerful and “smart” people in America. They’re morons. Much as I despise Harvard, they at least had the balls to stand and fight. It’s not out of any great principles or anything, they’re still pro-genocide scum, they just aren’t willing to give up their power.
Everyone’s getting this now. Finally. Domestically and externally. Even Japan is threatening Trump with selling Treasuries and standing with China in demanding an end to all tariffs before further negotiations.
I think the odds of significant elite opposition are high. They don’t want to, but Trump has backed them into a corner. It’s fight or exit the elites.
This is going to be a nasty fight. Trump’s weaponization of the immigration system and presidential orders, especially dubious presidential control over spending means he has powerful weapons, including the threat of deporting citizens to prison camps for life.
The fight is developing and the New York Times is the mouthpiece for elite opposition. Trump’s polls are shit, he’s failed to get a peace between Ukraine and Russia and the full tariff effects will start smashing Americans into the dirt in about a month.
Meanwhile Trump’s allies, like the tech bro faction, are not doing well. Tesla is doomed and most of the rest are betting vast sums on AI, which loses money with every single query, even from paying customers and where hallucination rates are increasing, not decreasing. Meanwhile China is working on new types of semiconductors and will soon be independent of Western semiconductor tech, just as ASML’s CEO warned.
Trump is a living embodiment of the “Peter Principle” that people rise to their level of incompetence. He’s going to be more unpopular than any President since Hoover and he’s taking US hegemony, and likely even prosperity, with him.
Tim
Well, at least the Supreme Court Heritage Foundation gave him his Trans Military ban, a hideous and disgusting attack on a vulnerable minority, he can carry on with his crypto scams and flood the zone with ridicuous shit like film tariffs and reopening Alcatraz.
Bill H.
Looks to me like the law firms and Ivies have thought that stopping the bad acts was all that was required. Maybe doing some nice things to counter the bad acts would be required. That’s like a bank robber thinking that upon being caught, all he would have to do is promise to quit robbing banks. Maybe wash the banks windows. A jail term never occurred to him.
NR
You would think that Trump would be using tariff exemptions as a carrot to get big business on board with his plans for a despotic regime, but it turns out that he is being very stingy with those. Apple and Nvidia paid him $1 million bribes only to find out that the exemptions he granted them were only temporary.
It’ll be interesting to see who’s dumb enough to keep bribing him after this.
Feral Finster
This is alsonthe basic logic underlying the “Ukraine mineral deal”. From the point of view of the rulers of Ukraine, it doesn’t matter what they give up, their kids won’t be press ganged, they won’t be personally on the hook for any “loans” so they can promise anything as long as the money and weapons keep flowing.
mago
I certainly hope your forecast that Tesla and the tech bro faction are in for an ass whupping is correct.
Couldn’t happen to a more deserving group of people . . . well there is a West Asia group out there whose name shall not be spoken. . .
Mark Level
This is not a time in history where one can be optimistic at all about humanity’s (& esp. “the West’s” future) but nonetheless–
The actually Great thing about Trump is that his absolute Narcissism, + the insane Ego where he imagines that he is a “world historical figure” on the level with say, Alexander the Great (whom he may not even be aware of) & 3rd, his belief that he can intimidate the subalterns to pay for his Walls (didn’t work with Mexico), his Trump Riviera– if Israel does exterminate and/or remove the entire Gaza/West Bank populations, Trump has already announced that “The US [meaning him personally} will own it” etc., all this means is that with his tiny attention span he stumbles from imaginary Rube Goldberg plans for Conquest over Conquest means he never achieves any of them . . . but a new “Plan” will distract him as an old shoelace will my cat.
Short digression on Alexander Magnus– I’m pretty sure it was Gore Vidal, but it could’ve been Freddy Perlman in “Against His-story, Against Leviathan” or even the late great historian Evan S. Connell– In any case, having read all 3, it seems Alexander was an early Move Fast and Destroy Things Militarist “Creative Destruction” guy who was so obsessed with conquering that he never stopped expanding, until he ended up high and dry somewhere near modern day Pakistan, diseased and dying at age 33, his Empire split up into 3 pieces by Generals . . .
So he can have his little “victories” in the US sandbox, the Trans Ban as the first post notes, or shaking down and humiliating Columbia U dumbass administration, but in the wider world, he will FAIL and FAIL HARD.
He whined incessantly (& falsely) that Russia “Isn’t my war, that’s Biden’s war” but he sees a shiny thing, the promise that Oil, Minerals, Jewels! can be extracted by big Imperial TrumpAmerica and he can’t let go of the tar-baby or extricate himself from the Briar Patch of a war that will be lost (already HAS been lost) to Russia.
He imagines he can establish a permanent foothold in UKraine, but it will be only in the poorest and most corrupt and worthless areas to the West. The Empire might be able to get a fortune out of there in 100 or more years, but it will be spending far more (& eating the War Seed Corn) to do so for decades, so, NA GONNA WORK!!
He imagines he can trick Putin/ Russia into a Cease Fire and extend the war, but there is no way anyone in power in Russia is that stupid or cowed by Diarrhea Mouth Donny!!
If he commits to fighting Russia, even with the bodies of the insane EU slaves, destroying their own welfare states and futures imagining they can beat Russia, then he can never get his (imaginary) “Mideast Peace” or exterminate the Palestinians (likely not, I can’t be sure). He can’t attack Iran, that would lead to immediate oil prices up dozens of percentages or more . . . and he will never get to the Big McGilla, Ghina, the Chinese rise to be the biggest Hegemon (but not a military one, an economic and soft power one) is now guaranteed.
Trump sometimes accidentally tells a half-truth, ‘coz he can’t control his mouth. The EUropean Elites keep whining that “Putin wants Poland, he wants the UK”, etc. etc. when this could not be further from the truth. Trump tailors the lie to his own selfish ends and says, Putin originally wanted to take ALL Ukraine, but because we’re in there now, they will settle for 8 Oblasts and not take it all. Which is the actual Russian goal, not to take over the shithouse Banderite West, which is pretty much like owning a piece of Afghanistan.
Also, the US does not do “Reconstruction,” just typing Afghanistan reminded me of that. We occupied it for over 2 decades, since Bush Jr. and how much got rebuilt? Virtually nothing, everything that wasn’t nailed down was stolen by the canny locals, including the entire Treasury, carried out on the last Vassal’s escaping plane . . .
Popular culture sometimes reflects “Through A Glass, Darkly”– In the Game of Thrones TV series, the Mad King who was killed by Jamie Lannister was clearly based on Bush the Lesser. Trump is the new Mad King, chasing will-of-the-wisp glories!! He affirms whichever conquered people first (I am guessing the Africans, could be wrong) first called the invading Whites “The Hungry Ghosts.”
Trump is a Hungry Ghost. All his administrators are drunks, incompetent fools, or Ketamine addicted (Elon). I have the impression that as evil as the likes of James Jesus Angleton, the Dulles Brothers, et al were, there was some operational competence, which there just isn’t now, clearly. No sane inmates in the Trump White House, just like the Biden one. Everyone is High on their own Exceptionalist Supply. (Even Ro Khanna.)
Since I brought up the historian Evan S. Connell, in his wonderful “The Aztec Treasure House”, his essay on the “7 Cities of Cibolla” explorations is the closest analogy to Trump 2.0 admin. The 7 cities mythos went back to Portugal in the middle ages, a supposed 7 “Christian” Cities that were rich and cultured beyond belief, but disappeared from the face of the earth.
A generation after the real Conquests of Cortes and Pizarro, some patriotic Indios tricked the Spanish Fort in Santa Fe into a quixotic search for the fabled 7 Cities to the West. Their Native “guides” just walked the forces into the empty desert north of Comanche territory and let them be attrited by the desert, hunger and exhaustion. Of several thousand who were sent out something like 70 (as best as I recall) and a few horses made it back. The murdered the Guide when they realized he’d led them astray, but one man’s courage and cunning blunted the Imperialists’ power for considerable time by exploiting their gullibility.
Next Trump will be imagining himself as Pope, as a Nobel Peace Prize Winner, etc. etc. He will end up, at best, like Ahab. A bunch of moronic, rhoided up Frat Boys cannot conquer the whole world. “The chickens are finally coming home to roost,” as Malcolm X noted in 1963. Trump is the perfect Moron who will push the US Hegemon into the dustbin of history for many generations. That is his true role in history, he fits like a glove.
Purple Library Guy
It’s been interesting to watch Putin lately. He’s always willing to talk. Always willing to offer to negotiate. But he’s not confident that such talks will result in anything he wants. So he’s not willing to talk if it means stopping the war before he wins. So he doesn’t want to do any kind of serious cease fire while entering long tangled negotiations. But that’s what people are trying to get him to do.
So what he’s doing is he keeps offering terms for discussion that he knows Zelensky will turn down. Then Zelensky turns them down, and so Putin wasn’t the one who did it, so he can keep winning the war and it isn’t his fault.
Jorge
A fascinating aside about the “pro bono” stuff: big-time law these days have a very weak bench for defending real court cases. Their criminal work is almost entirely negotiated and settled out of court, even the highest stakes stuff. So, when a big celebrity trial happens, like the Ghislaine Maxwell trial, there are few people in the big law firms who are comfortable sparring in court.
Their answer has been to take on, pro bono, cases like defending Guantanamo internees even when it gets them pushback in the media. By going after these law firms on this practice, Trump is hurting their long-term ability to defend major criminal cases.
different clue
@NR,
A million dollars is nothing to Apple and Nvidia and etc. How long did Trump act nice to them after getting the million dollars? A week? 2 weeks? 3 weeks? All that Apple and Nvidia and etc. have to do is keep giving Trump a million dollars every time-interval for another meters-worth of nice things in return, and they will make it to 2028 still gaining vastly more money than they have spent.
So I would expect them to keep paying their Danegeld every few weeks unless it becomes a matter of pride rather than just a matter of business.
Separately, here is an article titled: ” MAGA melts down over ‘WOKE MARXIST POPE’ who is a ‘Never Trumper liberal’ ” As the article notes, if the MAGAs were American Patriots, they would be proud of living to see the First American Pope. The fact that they are not proud is because they are not American Patriots. They are America-hating Maganazi-Republicanazi Cultists worshipping their Dark Lord . . . God-Emperor Trump.
Here is the link.
https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1ki18ju/maga_melts_down_over_woke_marxist_pope_who_is_a/
He looks youngish and healthyish too, relatively speaking. So the Liberals will get to drink MAGA tears for years to come.
Trump hates America. If you like Trump, that means you hate America too. Its only logical. If you ( in the metaphorical general whatever sense) are triggered by that statement, the reason is obvious to the rest of us.
I think its time for protesters and sign-wavers to try re-engineering and meme-ifying another image. Here is the image — a Kliban cartoon titled ” Dirty Fat Person sits on President’s Face”. I could describe the cartoon but that does it no justice. I could find it in the past, but I can’t find it now. I will look later when I can and if I can find it I will bring it here. And then offer suggestions as to how it could be meme-ified and repurposed.
different clue
Okay, I found it. The actual image of the actual cartoon . . . ” dirty fat person sits on president’s face.”
http://coldbacon.com/pics/kliban/bksitonface.jpg
Change the dirty fat person’s head to Trump’s head in profile, in the same style as the rest of the drawing. Now retitle it: ” dirty fat president sits on (whatever’s) face.” And for each particular ” (whatever’s) “, draw the appropriate figure in exactly the same pose as the president whose face is being sat on.
So : dirty fat president sits on American Eagle’s face.
dirty fat president sits on Lady Liberty’s face.
dirty fat president sits on Uncle Sam’s face.
Maybe a creative artist/ photoshopper and meme engineer can draw the appropriate Kliban style pictures in just this pose with the appropriate adjustments. They could go onto posters, on line, on walls, in windows, etc.
Just a little good-natured political fun. Trump and the Trumpanon base should enjoy it.