I don't know why you are asking about pedophiles and sex trafficing - The Dow is over 50,000 right now, the S&P is at almost 7,000, and the Nasdaq is smashing records. Americans' 401(k) savings are booming, thats what we should be talking about.
it was 50k in February but 45k today, S&P down to 6300 from almost 7k in February and the latest 401(k) reports are from Q4 2025 so your numbers are based on months ago before the Iran war.
As opposed to posting on HN complaining about reddit, which is where the real money's at? Nah, this shit was dank enough to make it into popular culture. We have:
1. The shamelessness absurdity of using "market is up" to deflect from a pedo scandal
2. The fact that the market said "nope" and tanked immediately after Bondi tried to lean on it
... and comments requiring the reader to be that way too should be downvoted/flagged. Look at the replies it produced: troll mission accomplished, "productive conversation" not so much.
At the very least, they could have put the comment in quotes to indicate they're quoting someone and it shouldn't be read at the object level.
Edit: Seriously? Am I wrong here? Are you all really okay with Poe's Law-ifying HN, where people post comments that are easy to read as serious when they were intended as ridicule of the person who said them, and the comments erupt in confusion and flames? That's not what we should be expecting out of HN.
It's a quite baffling argument on Bondi's part regardless. As if I wouldn't care about prosecuting sex offenders merely because my 401k was doing well.
Funny how 401ks can make members of the American public think the stock market is really about them. In capitalism, assets follow a Pareto distribution. A small minority hold the majority of assets.
Yeah, it was a big con to get folks to think that what seemed to them a huge amount of money meant that they were participating in a meaningful fashion.
I've never gotten anyone who is educated in economy/finance to provide a reasonable answer to the questions:
"Is the world economy large enough to support a meaningful number of people regularly investing in it, arriving at an amount able to support a comfortable retirement, and then draw said money out on a regular basis? What percentage of the population can be supported thus? What is to be said to that percentage whose participation would exceed the capacity of existing financial markets?"
I've traveled quite a bit, and I'm well aware of both poverty in the U.S. and in other countries --- that's part of what informed my query --- what is the end-game for capitalism as many countries of the world go into steady state or even negative population changes in the future?
Well, in part you are asking about the world economy. Most of the world doesn’t have 401k retirement vehicles, good access to financial markets, or the spare funds to save at all, whether it’s in stocks, bonds, or other investment vehicles.
So the reason you haven’t gotten an answer is because your question doesn’t make much sense.
A 401K is just an investment in indexes linked to your pension, there's nothing stopping everyone putting their own money into an index themselves. The question makes sense, how many people could the market support if everyone was investing and not spending.
> A 401K is just an investment in indexes linked to your pension, there's nothing stopping everyone putting their own money into an index themselves
This is mostly incorrect.
A 401k in the United States is a tax-advantaged investment account. You can buy shares of individual companies, you can purchase index funds, you can leave it there as cash, buy gold, or just about anything you want or you'd expect to be able to purchase using a brokerage account. Depending on the route you take (Roth or Traditional) you can realize tax savings now or at a later point. 401k Accounts are programs offered by your employer as well [1].
One of the many reasons the OP's question doesn't make sense is because not every country in the world has a 401k program.
[1] There are other programs for individual owners or for those who have an employer that does not offer a 401k.
An overabundance of investment without an outlet would just decrease yields. Hypothetically the yield could go negative.
It is a self correcting problem. If the yields are too low people can spend it on hookers and blow before dropping it into a money shredder. The yield shouldn't drop much below the premium for the time preference of money.
>how many people could the market support if everyone was investing and not spending.
I think the more salient question is how many people could the market support if everyone was consuming and not producing.
Not producing as in the goods and services that people want such as clean toilets and food and nursing home care. Or not producing the kids who will go on to produce the aforementioned goods and services.
Investment for retirement…in theory at least, should go to projects that will create more goods and services in the future to actually support that retirement. It isn’t about the economy being large enough today, but growth so that it is larger enough tomorrow when you do actually retire.
Any investment alternative, like a private or public pension, works under the same principle. Even traditional retirement plans depended on investing in having lots of kids to take care of you in old age.
The problem is, in the past, the on-going increase in payouts was covered by increasing populations --- much of the world is now at a stable, or even negative population change state for the foreseeable future, so that well is going dry --- the passing away of the Baby Boomers in the U.S. represents the larges transfer of personal wealth in human history, and a lot of it is going into geriatrics/nursing homes --- what happens as the nursing homes empty out and there aren't sufficient folks to keep them operational?
Thats the old fashioned plan: have lots of kids to fund your retirement. Today, we are investing in AI, automation, and robots, which is similar if you think about. We don’t need a population increase if robots are doing the work instead. China is a good example of making these investments aggressively right now to deal with their demographic cliff.
The market is partly a Ponzi scheme where more people buying inflates the price, regardless of the underlying value. The modern stock market is not focused on dividends (anything but), so there is no'real' return from the actual companies to the shareholders. (Buybacks could be considered similar to dividends).
There is still an element of real economic growth underlying the stock market, but passive investing, derivatives and market manipulation have largely decoupled the stock market from the actual economy.
At least that's my opinion.
I think the answer to your question would be yes IF:
* The world economy keeps growing
* There is a fair distribution of the return on the world economy (which there isn't)
Yes. Fundamentally goods and services at time you retire must be produced by someone. If there is less people producing that means that labour will get more expensive. Or then you must really kick down that population. And well if they don't take it well you might have no retirement...
The stock market is a very large Ponzi scheme. 401Ks are indexed Ponzi schemes. Once the ultra wealthy can disconnect their wealth from any one country, using crypto tokens. The stock market and 401Ks will probably crash. You usually want to do this on a generation that has no real voting block. So it will probably happen when GenX starts retiring.
You understand that those small minority of holders are investing your money for your own gain, right?
Perhaps there is issue with shareholder voting, because the funds largely handle that, but generally they are focused on long term growth and stability, and vote accordingly. I mean, then thing you are paying them to do is ensure you have a good retirement fund, if nothing else.
Even if someone is much richer, 401k owners are still operating out of self-interest. There is still a valid point about income inequality, however I'm not sure that renders 401k into some sort of evil diversion.
Defined benefit pensions are obviously worse. They introduce agency risk where there does not need to be any. I prefer having control of my assets over some fund manager controlling them, it's all going to the same place anyway. Plus you have to pay extra for the fund manager.
Taxpayer funded DB pensions are a little bit better, since they offer outsized benefits due to being able to hose future taxpayers.
It is true enough that "the stock market" is about them.
To stick some concrete numbers on this, combined the world's billionaires have about $15 trillion dollars worth of assets. Combined the world's retirement funds have about $60-$70 trillion dollars worth of assets.
What's driving the major disconnect is the generational wealth divide. Boomers have loads of wealth, housing, their pension funds, non-pension investments. Millenials, not so much. (Obviously, this is in part because wealth builds up during one's life, though the divide is stronger than merely that effect)
If you're a boomer, all this politics that promotes the stock market over the material economy is fucking great. Tech lays off another 16 billion people? Stonks go to the moon, and maybe you'll collect a nice fat severance package on your way out of your last job. If you're young though, it's a nightmare.
It's quite recent that the political balance has changed; Biden fumbled the 2024 election in no small part because of his "But the stock market is good, why are you mad?" stance that had been ol' reliable for the decades prior.
Bad quarter for certain, but to keep things in perspective, the S&P is still up 13% over the past 12 months (likely 14% as soon as the market opens in 20 minutes). There's nothing magical about a "quarter". Had Q1 2025 ended 4 days later, it would have been significantly worse than this, but then the market went on to have a huge rally after that.
Well the thing is -- when you have rampant inflation, the cost of everything in USD goes up -- be it houses, eggs, or even stocks. So when you subtract out how much the value of the USD has gone down relative to other currencies it's basically another 10% drop.
Eggs are pretty cheap right now. Housing and healthcare are why Americans struggle with affordability. Food, gas, etc. are all just drops in the bucket.
Eggs may be cheaper than when they were during culling/avian flu, but food sure isn't. Where I am most grocery items are now 50-70% more expensive than last January. The milk I buy weekly at the grocery store has increased 67% since then. Beef is roughly 50% more, and I haven't even had steak since late 2024 at this point. That isn't sustainable.
A year ago was exactly the market bottom due to tariff drama. 13% up from that isn't exactly a shining achievement.
Go back another couple months to when Trump took office and the total gains have been ~3.5%. A couple more random missile strikes and it'll go into the negative.
The only people making money in today's market are those with insider info about US economic and military actions (aka Trump and his associates).
Do bear in mind the context of that Buffett quote is to not blindly chase market sentiment and the numbers, neither directly nor inversely; Berkshire Hathaway's got quite the pile of cash right now.
I have a feeling Warren Buffet would accept that label, with a chuckle and a smirk!
But I also think Buffet wouldn't characterize the current environment as particularly fearful. We haven't seen a whole lot of panic aside from a couple 1-2% daily swings, which is nothing.
Well there are 3 huge IPOs supposed to go out this year. This hurts liquidity and clogs the pipes.
And then for early stage venture, where I work, it will be harder to raise funds and move new ventures forward. Especially given the extreme shifting of public assets to loyalists.
Overall it’s a bleak time for American exceptionalism. The only companies that are in vogue are AI and Defense. Biotech continues to get hammered because who needs medicine when we can just bomb people with AI right?
I suspect it’s the unwinding of the Yen carry trade and/or indirectly connected to running for shelter for several reasons including the massive bomb in private lending and subsequently private equity that is ticking down and doing so even faster now that Trump cut the wrong wire to distract from the Epstein files and him being a child rapist.
This all seems structural, as indicates that in the middle of a war even military stocks are down, which indicates deep rot or deep lack of confidence in at least the stock market.
That could be at least part of it. My understanding as to why gold dropped is that many countries essentially got market called. The Oil countries don't have cash reserves without selling, but they do have gold. Taking in London is that the Saudi's have sold a good amount of gold. China stopped buying in Q4 2025. Others followed suit. Hell, Russia is blocking gold exports at the end of the month.
The markets go up and down and were expensive and due for a correction but I'm not sure the very stable genius with his tariff and oil wars is helping.
Depending on how you measure, not as bad as the one we had a few terms ago. There was a pandemic, which should have been a unifying event the president just had to straightforwardly lead us through while letting the experts at agencies handle the details. But instead he must have thought he was still campaigning or something, and staked out some edgelord position that we should just ignore it. Predictably, this caused a lot of societal chaos from people who weren't good at thinking for themselves following nonsensical direction from an authority figure. I'm sure glad that guy was only around for one term. I remember him being a pretty sore loser too.
It would be nice if folks would learn from the lessons of the past, and work out how to avoid the mistakes which caused the bad times --- a co-worker and I were unique for having a story/tradition out of the Great Depression, the story was of my grandfather taking his year's tobacco crop in to Richmond in his truck, what it sold for wouldn't buy gas to drive it back home, so he sold it and walked back (a trip I re-created on my bicycle when I was young, my first century), the tradition is that Christmas gifts are described by a riddle, and when gifts are opened, the entire family gathers in a circle, the recipient reads the riddle out loud, and everyone makes a guess (opening presents is an all-day affair).
Maybe folks would be more careful of their money or the economy if there were more oral traditions along those lines --- one of my wife's aunts just passed away, a child of the Depression, her home was filled with home goods and food stuffs purchased when on sale beyond any reasonable expectation of her individual use, but all perfectly organized and ready to prevent future need.
The problem Europe has though is that it can't stand it's own. They have become so accustomed to leaning on the US, that they have grown into it.
People don't like hearing it, but Europe lives on American Tech, powered by American energy, and defended by American defense. There other lifelines being Russian energy and Chinese tech. It's a "pick your poison" situation.
Europe should be able to stand on it's own, but it's going to take much more than 4 years to do it, and Europe will be a different society than it is now after the shift.
I do think your comment is bringing up valid questions/points.
One thing that worries me about the current state of things is scale and speed. Modern technology, markets, communication systems and supply chains make it possible for things to go catastrophically wrong very quickly for a massive number of people.
I think this is somewhat unique to the current era.
I still don’t buy into the belief that we’re absolutely witnessing a collapse. Studying history shows that things have been far worse (politically, socially geopolitically, etc) and we’ve come out the other side numerous times.
So I think “ups and downs” is probably the right way to look at this. I do worry about the impact of modern technology on this equation.
It’s all cycles within cycles, hopefully. If you study dynamic systems then you realize it’s cycles of good and bad, and within those cycles more smaller cycles of ephemeral good and bad.
OP did say declining. By your own accounting there were 500 years across which a Roman too might have correctly observed that they were living in a declining Rome.
The US is still strong as ever. commercially, economically and technologically. It just has a political system that is broken. A mad presidenta and a congress unwilling to constraining him.
In less than a decade, the Dow will likely go over 1,000,000. (Because the Dollar is about to tank)
I used to believe the unwinding of the Petrodollar would take a generation, it's now likely to happen this year.
Trump's wild late night rants threatening civilian infrastructure gave all the cover Iran needed to take out the infrastructure of any of our allies that have US connections or bases. The effects of those attacks on infrastructure already completed will take years, if not decades to repair.
The US, like Russia before it, has shown itself to be a paper tiger.
We need to get the Epstein class out of government at all levels, deal with the consequences of the return to hard currency, and rebuild what we can of our nation.
> I used to believe the unwinding of the Petrodollar would take a generation, it's now likely to happen this year.
Why do you think the specific regime change targets of Venezuela then Iran, and the oil blockade of Cuba? Look at the volume of oil and natural gas from Venezuela and Iran. Look at how much is imported to Cuba. Now, look at what currencies they were using or trying to use instead of the US dollar.
Now, also, look at the extraction and refining capacity in the Middle East that has been destroyed or badly damaged in the past month. Different oil fields produce different types and grades of crude. The US mostly produces sweet light and sweet intermediate crude on land. The US gulf coast has a big refining capacity for sour heavy crude, which is the main exported kind from both Venezuela and Iran. The US right now after all the attacks on Iran and by Iran on US-friendly countries (along with Ukraine damaging capacity in Russia as part of their war) has a huge advantage in LNG production and in refining the very type of oil from Iran and Venezuela.
Put that all together and it looks like rather than only distracting from pedophilia (which is one motive for all sorts of things the administration does) and trying to culturally and ethnically purge the United States that there just might be another reason for all of these things happening within about a quarter. It could be assumed that the guy who said we were going to have a US as the energy leader of the world and who brags about all the access US companies can now have to Venezuelan oil might be trying to prop up the petrodollar through expeditionary warfare.
The Gulf countries are dumping their gold reserves and buying dollars, that put a momentary halt on what was a steady declining trajectory for the USD. But since this blip isn't caused by structural reasons (nothing changed in the US economy), it will only last as long as these countries have gold to sell.
Iran's power structure is unchanged. Oil is more expensive than in a long time. American alliances are fraying. Iran now exerts control over the Strait of Hormuz.
All this has done is to expose the limits of hard power, America's biggest asset.
No one really knows what Irans power structure looks like right now. The supreme leader is in hiding and apparently is only communicating in person, but other leaders are doing the same, and all are scared of getting together.
So it seems more like there is a splintered regime of autonomous cells all kinda doing what they think they should be doing. Whatever general controls the revolutionary guard around the strait could defect tomorrow and sell out to the US, becoming president of his own little carved out country without anyone to really stop him. We known Trump would be falling over himself to make that deal right now.
Trump is the biggest environmentalist terrorist on the planet. Blow up a few schools and cause the world to double down on cutting out their oil usage.
At some point, the only thing that will arrest the fall of the dollar will be backing it with gold, at a MUCH higher price, such that all the dollars outstanding match our gold reserves. It would be somewhere between $50,000 and $150,000 per ounce.
> We need to get the Epstein class out of government at all levels
Okay, I'll assume you're serious about it. If so, the only real way you can contribute this is by 1. Voting for anyone running on this platform at any chance you get, no matter their likelihood of winning 2. _Never_ voting for anyone _not_ running on this.
The US constitution has 2nd amendment exactly for this purpose. Just start the extreme violence already.
These people are killing tens of thousands of people to gain personal wealth and to cover their existing crimes. Maybe millions, if they aren't stopped.
The point of culture war issues is to distract the population so they don't talk about economics. Your rent isn't sky high because of undocumented migrants or because there's a trans girl in Utah who wants to play hockey in college. It's sky-high because landlords have effectively colluded to raise your rent through tools like RealPage. In fact the entire goal of dynamic pricing is to raise prices. That's it.
Undocumented migrants in particular are vital to the economy. The agricultural and construction secotrs would collapse without them. They are paid sub-minimum wage because they're undocumented. And if they complain about low pay or working conditions, you just call in ICE to round them up, pay a token fine and rinse and repeat [1].
While people are distracted with these culture war issues, you proceed with your actual agenda of giving all the money in the government coffers to the already-wealthy.
The problem comes when these culture war issues become the goal not the distraction such as doing mass deportations. At that point you're now molesting the money and the wealthy will only put up with that for so long.
So now we have what is (IMHO) the biggest geopolitical error in US history by starting a war of choice in Iran with no specific goals, no exit strategy and no path to victory (whatever that means).
Sure defense contractors benefit as we have to replenish all those munitions we're using but you're spending $1-2 billion every day for a war you cannot win while strangling the global economy, destroying alliances and eroding US power.
And on top of that you're insider trading, which isn't money for nothing. By manipulating SPY puts, for example, you're stealing money from your donors and from ordinary people. This could ultimately hurt the supposed "integrity" of the markets.
Part of the reason the Cabinet is filled with incompetent sycophants is to mitigate the risk of being 25A'ed, meaning removed from office via the 25th Amendment.
My prediction is that if a large scale ground invasion happens in Iran and it goes badly, which I think it will, to the tune of tens of thousands of casulaties, the president will be 25A'ed.
Crazy how for a guy so obsessed with self image and legacy, Trump is leaving behind a world where he'll be known for making everything shit that it was before him. Amazing. How does this happen?
You can read his book, it's full of things he would do (even if he didn't write it). Typical sales tactics and nothing more sales than tactics even after the snake oil has been exposed.
Oh, yes, I agree. But I now know that they were written by a ghost writer so I'm not sure it it's completely accurate to credit him with all in the books. The ghost writer deff gives it its own flair. But, yes, when Trump was first elected, I've have friends tell me I don't get it, I am hating him because I was told to, I'm not looking past the noise, and I had to clarify to them that no, I have despised him since I read his book "The art of the deal" and came across with the idea he is a corrupt crook. I read it as recommendation and went in with the expectation to read something good, but was not impressed at all.
So, yes, all of this was painfully obvious. But here we are.
It is also exactly these same people of the USA whose thinking is going to matter for determining what happens next, not anyone else. It is immaterial what "everyone else outside the borders of the USA" thinks in the context of the country.
And compensation is based on revenue not profit. A top sales person brings in $5 million of revenue, but it's going to cost the company $7 million to deliver the goods/services. Sales person hit their top goal and will earn his bonuses while making the company worse off.
Trump net worth is $3 billion more than it was before he become a president. Likely more money was made via insider trading by his friends and family. So it's not like no one did benefit. Net loss for the country and the world is orders of magnitude higher though.
The more I see the stock market dropping due to idiotic mistakes that should've been very preventable, the more I think how beneficial it must be to be one of the insiders that accidentally let those idiotic things slip through.
Are we as small savers just idiots feeding this idiot machine?
My working theory is that Trump is best understood as an epically tragic character.
So desperate to be valued and liked, that he desperately grabs at anything and everything to get the acclaim that, under normal circumstances, would signify that.
His besetting character flaws foreclose any possibility of attaining the actual approval he seeks.
And so, with his misguided approaches to getting praise and love, the harder he tries the further they are from his reach.
Adding to that tragedy is that a 180-degree U-turn is still within his reach. He could do it today, and probably get some of what he most deeply wants. But I think the most likely outcome is that he'll keep his current trajectory for the rest of his life.
I don’t think he’s interested in general approval. Having a fervent cultish minority support and being detested by others both seem to suit him. Hell, he seems to enjoy being able to paint himself a victimized underdog to his followers.
> So desperate to be valued and liked, that he desperately grabs at anything and everything to get the acclaim
Like all billionaires, he is an empty void that can never be filled. To borrow a phrase, he is a hungry ghost.
After his first million he needed more, then after a billion he saw that it was not enough, then after becoming president... he is, was, and always will be an empty hole of a person who can never feel satiated and who can consequently never feel genuine happiness.
Interesting reading, but hard to have sympathy when he causes suffering for so many.
I also don't think changing his behavior is within reach. His narcissism prevents him from growth and, like the scorpion in the tale, he can't help but sting.
I don't think it's so clear cut. The problem is that his personality defects have allowed him to be influenced by people who are truly malevolent. Those people lurk more in the shadows and so avoid the condemnation that they deserve. Trump is their obvious useful idiot with the target painted on his head.
Well, you see a black man became president. And what's worse, he was a really good one, articulate, kind, humble, and emodied all the values we cherish. And that broke people so much they would rather burn everything down than build on what he did.
Don't forgot how long Trump and other republicans went on about "birth certificates" during Obama's first term.
The key insight is that Trump is doing what Trump supporters (and fascists in general) want most: punishing The Enemy/Other. Everything else (including gas and grocery prices, etc) is irrelevant. As long as "immigrants" (the "illegal" facade is done by now) and "liberals" are beaten to death by ICE, Trump supporters will honestly and proudly proclaim that he's doing a fantastic job as president.
I'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row.
It was clear that Biden was mentally slipping. Even if you were a fan of his general politics, 4 additional years of mental decline while in office was a scary prospect.
And then Kamala Harris was given very little time to sell herself to the voters.
I'm wondering if Trump would have won had the Democrats presented someone more appealing earlier in the campaign.
I interpreted the clause “two poor alternatives in a row” as Biden + Harris in the 2024 presidential election, and not Clinton + Harris, since Clinton was the 2016 nominee and Harris was the 2024 nominee after Biden dropped out, but the 2020 nominee was Biden, who did successfully defeat Trump that year.
In my opinion, Clinton’s and Harris’ losses had less to do with their gender and more to do with the candidates themselves:
1. Clinton was facing strong anti-establishment headwinds, and Clinton is a very establishment politician. Many people in 2016 were piping mad at establishment politicians. Trump was able to win the GOP nomination on a platform of “draining the swamp” and pursuing an aggressively right-wing agenda compared to more moderate Republicans, and Sanders, who also had an anti-establishment platform, proved to be a formidable opponent to Clinton. Despite Clinton’s loss, she was still able to win the popular vote. Perhaps had there been less anti-establishment sentiment, it would have been a Clinton vs Jeb Bush election, and I believe Clinton would have won that race.
2. Harris never won a presidential primary election. The only reason she ended up becoming the nominee is because Biden dropped out of the race after his disastrous debate performance against Trump, which occurred after the primaries. Since it was too late to have the voters decide on a replacement for Biden, the Democratic Party selected a replacement: Harris. She only had a few months to campaign, whereas Trump had virtually campaigned his entire time out of office.
3. Let’s not forget the Trump factor in 2024. During Biden’s entire presidency, Trump was able to consolidate his hold on the GOP and his voting base, and in some ways he even expanded his base. The conservative media was filled with defenses of January 6, and Trump was able to convince enough Americans that he and his supporters were persecuted in the aftermath of the 2020 election and January 6.
Look, after lurking through that submission about the Olympics a few days ago I get HN is divided on sex/gender identity, but I'm pretty sure that Joseph Biden is absolutely a man. "Cisgender", if you must.
I believe Trump would have won 2020 had the COVID pandemic not happened. Things were very chaotic in 2020 America. Biden and his extensive experience in the federal government looked reassuring to a lot of Americans. Biden would have had a tougher time against Trump had 2020 been more like 2019. I believe Biden would have had a tougher time against Bernie Sanders in the primaries had COVID not happened, though a counterargument is that Super Tuesday happened on March 3, before shelter-in-place policies were in effect in California.
A big reason for Trump's success despite his polarizing nature is the polarizing effects of the platforms of our two parties, which distinguish themselves on "culture war" issues such as abortion, gun rights, immigration, LGBT+ rights, and race relations. There are many Americans who love the MAGA agenda, and there are also many Americans who are not in 100% agreement with MAGA but who'd never vote for a Democrat since they feel that a candidate with the opposite cultural views is anathema. If third parties were more viable in America, the latter group of voters could vote for a candidate that is more to their temperament instead of voting for whomever the GOP nominee is.
Had COVID not happened, Trump might not have gone batshit crazy with a vendetta against the entire concept of independent federal agencies. Working to go against the advice coming from Fauci et al would seem to be a large part of what sensitized him to the larger pattern rather than just writing each instance off as an interpersonal issue.
> I'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row.
Oh please.
Are you seriously comparing the disaster that is Mango Mussolini to the likes of (practically any) alternative candidate?
The sad reality is that the American people wanted Trump and _voted_ for him. TWICE! The rest of the world has come to terms with this and knows there is no going back to the old hegemony (put simply, the American people may vote for another Trump; we now know the USA can no longer be trusted as a good faith partner). The world has changed, and many in the USA who didn't vote for Trump have yet to realise this and still think they can go back.
Besides, if all candidates are crap, you vote for the one that will do least harm. And then look at reforming a political system which leaves voters with such a poor choice.
If you were worried about Biden’s mental decline but looked at Trumps behavior and statements as from someone mentally competent and not also slipping into dementia, then you just wanted Trumps politics and vibes your way into thinking it was ok.
I’m so excited for the future where nobody apparently voted for Trump and never backed him, the same way everyone mysteriously didn’t vote for GWB after his fuckups got too big to ignore
His approval rating is at a historical low for any president at this point in their term, I think. People don't like ICE, pedophiles, or wars in the Middle East.
Trump has been the protagonist of US politics for ten years. Maybe this "actually he really has this all planned out" idea was viable in 2017. But in 2026? We've got years and years and years of examples of how Trump makes decisions. He is not playing 4d chess.
I think the current mafia in charge of the US government, along with their insider trading, needs to financially compensate the rest of the world. First, of course, regular US citizens who were frauded by them; but then also the rest of the world for driving up the prices - first via AI (may be legal but I find it a scam still, look at the RAM prices), now by driving the prices of energy up. Why do I have to pay the recent increase in inflation? Trump and his oligarch mafia should pay for that. The Epstein connection may indeed be much larger than we know - there must be a new, full, thorough investigation, not just by the USA; the USA covers up. ALL countries need to uncover how big and deep the kompromat reaches here.
I don't know why you are asking about pedophiles and sex trafficing - The Dow is over 50,000 right now, the S&P is at almost 7,000, and the Nasdaq is smashing records. Americans' 401(k) savings are booming, thats what we should be talking about.
(Cue the autotune, "The Dow is over Fifty Thou…")
Thank god I am still able to laugh at something during this administration—if only occasionally.
I've heard a few traders refer to it as "The Bondi Top" -- she really top-ticked it to perfection. We all wish she hadn't.
it was 50k in February but 45k today, S&P down to 6300 from almost 7k in February and the latest 401(k) reports are from Q4 2025 so your numbers are based on months ago before the Iran war.
The parent comment is quoting Pam Bondi doing evasive maneuvers a couple of months ago
Sorry guys I don't follow US politics in such depth to get the sarcasm here. Well played by the OP in this context.
A bit of humorous auto-tuning of the hearing: https://youtu.be/Q71Xb1Sd86M
And somehow expecting everyone will get the reference.
There are a huge amount of people that spend their entire life on reddit worrying about politics
I wouldn't would shelve it under "politics", it's not what politics meant just a few years ago.
And I don't think the people you're talking about would have been political before politics became a bag of memes.
Believe it or not; it is an enormous luxury to be able to ignore politics.
How do you figure? Ignoring it or obsessing over it, the outcomes don't change. Just emotional energy expended.
If you interact with other humans then you are participating in politics.
As opposed to posting on HN complaining about reddit, which is where the real money's at? Nah, this shit was dank enough to make it into popular culture. We have:
1. The shamelessness absurdity of using "market is up" to deflect from a pedo scandal
2. The fact that the market said "nope" and tanked immediately after Bondi tried to lean on it
... and comments requiring the reader to be that way too should be downvoted/flagged. Look at the replies it produced: troll mission accomplished, "productive conversation" not so much.
At the very least, they could have put the comment in quotes to indicate they're quoting someone and it shouldn't be read at the object level.
Edit: Seriously? Am I wrong here? Are you all really okay with Poe's Law-ifying HN, where people post comments that are easy to read as serious when they were intended as ridicule of the person who said them, and the comments erupt in confusion and flames? That's not what we should be expecting out of HN.
He was sarcastically paraphrasing earlier deflections from the administration
It's a quite baffling argument on Bondi's part regardless. As if I wouldn't care about prosecuting sex offenders merely because my 401k was doing well.
Funny how 401ks can make members of the American public think the stock market is really about them. In capitalism, assets follow a Pareto distribution. A small minority hold the majority of assets.
Yeah, it was a big con to get folks to think that what seemed to them a huge amount of money meant that they were participating in a meaningful fashion.
I've never gotten anyone who is educated in economy/finance to provide a reasonable answer to the questions:
"Is the world economy large enough to support a meaningful number of people regularly investing in it, arriving at an amount able to support a comfortable retirement, and then draw said money out on a regular basis? What percentage of the population can be supported thus? What is to be said to that percentage whose participation would exceed the capacity of existing financial markets?"
It's impossible to answer because the language is too imprecise.
Poor people in the US live like gods compared to people living in 3rd world jungles, but they complain just as much if not more.
So you quickly realize that "comfortable" is a relative term, and envy poisons any honest measure of "comfort".
I've traveled quite a bit, and I'm well aware of both poverty in the U.S. and in other countries --- that's part of what informed my query --- what is the end-game for capitalism as many countries of the world go into steady state or even negative population changes in the future?
Well, in part you are asking about the world economy. Most of the world doesn’t have 401k retirement vehicles, good access to financial markets, or the spare funds to save at all, whether it’s in stocks, bonds, or other investment vehicles.
So the reason you haven’t gotten an answer is because your question doesn’t make much sense.
A 401K is just an investment in indexes linked to your pension, there's nothing stopping everyone putting their own money into an index themselves. The question makes sense, how many people could the market support if everyone was investing and not spending.
> A 401K is just an investment in indexes linked to your pension, there's nothing stopping everyone putting their own money into an index themselves
This is mostly incorrect.
A 401k in the United States is a tax-advantaged investment account. You can buy shares of individual companies, you can purchase index funds, you can leave it there as cash, buy gold, or just about anything you want or you'd expect to be able to purchase using a brokerage account. Depending on the route you take (Roth or Traditional) you can realize tax savings now or at a later point. 401k Accounts are programs offered by your employer as well [1].
One of the many reasons the OP's question doesn't make sense is because not every country in the world has a 401k program.
[1] There are other programs for individual owners or for those who have an employer that does not offer a 401k.
An overabundance of investment without an outlet would just decrease yields. Hypothetically the yield could go negative.
It is a self correcting problem. If the yields are too low people can spend it on hookers and blow before dropping it into a money shredder. The yield shouldn't drop much below the premium for the time preference of money.
>how many people could the market support if everyone was investing and not spending.
I think the more salient question is how many people could the market support if everyone was consuming and not producing.
Not producing as in the goods and services that people want such as clean toilets and food and nursing home care. Or not producing the kids who will go on to produce the aforementioned goods and services.
Investment for retirement…in theory at least, should go to projects that will create more goods and services in the future to actually support that retirement. It isn’t about the economy being large enough today, but growth so that it is larger enough tomorrow when you do actually retire.
Any investment alternative, like a private or public pension, works under the same principle. Even traditional retirement plans depended on investing in having lots of kids to take care of you in old age.
The problem is, in the past, the on-going increase in payouts was covered by increasing populations --- much of the world is now at a stable, or even negative population change state for the foreseeable future, so that well is going dry --- the passing away of the Baby Boomers in the U.S. represents the larges transfer of personal wealth in human history, and a lot of it is going into geriatrics/nursing homes --- what happens as the nursing homes empty out and there aren't sufficient folks to keep them operational?
Thats the old fashioned plan: have lots of kids to fund your retirement. Today, we are investing in AI, automation, and robots, which is similar if you think about. We don’t need a population increase if robots are doing the work instead. China is a good example of making these investments aggressively right now to deal with their demographic cliff.
The market is partly a Ponzi scheme where more people buying inflates the price, regardless of the underlying value. The modern stock market is not focused on dividends (anything but), so there is no'real' return from the actual companies to the shareholders. (Buybacks could be considered similar to dividends).
There is still an element of real economic growth underlying the stock market, but passive investing, derivatives and market manipulation have largely decoupled the stock market from the actual economy. At least that's my opinion.
I think the answer to your question would be yes IF: * The world economy keeps growing * There is a fair distribution of the return on the world economy (which there isn't)
The problem is that many countries are now steady-state, or even negative for population forecasts, no?
Yes. Fundamentally goods and services at time you retire must be produced by someone. If there is less people producing that means that labour will get more expensive. Or then you must really kick down that population. And well if they don't take it well you might have no retirement...
The stock market is a very large Ponzi scheme. 401Ks are indexed Ponzi schemes. Once the ultra wealthy can disconnect their wealth from any one country, using crypto tokens. The stock market and 401Ks will probably crash. You usually want to do this on a generation that has no real voting block. So it will probably happen when GenX starts retiring.
You understand that those small minority of holders are investing your money for your own gain, right?
Perhaps there is issue with shareholder voting, because the funds largely handle that, but generally they are focused on long term growth and stability, and vote accordingly. I mean, then thing you are paying them to do is ensure you have a good retirement fund, if nothing else.
Even if someone is much richer, 401k owners are still operating out of self-interest. There is still a valid point about income inequality, however I'm not sure that renders 401k into some sort of evil diversion.
Agreed, pensions are obviously better but the private sector collectively decided not to have them much anymore.
Defined benefit pensions are obviously worse. They introduce agency risk where there does not need to be any. I prefer having control of my assets over some fund manager controlling them, it's all going to the same place anyway. Plus you have to pay extra for the fund manager.
Taxpayer funded DB pensions are a little bit better, since they offer outsized benefits due to being able to hose future taxpayers.
It is true enough that "the stock market" is about them.
To stick some concrete numbers on this, combined the world's billionaires have about $15 trillion dollars worth of assets. Combined the world's retirement funds have about $60-$70 trillion dollars worth of assets.
What's driving the major disconnect is the generational wealth divide. Boomers have loads of wealth, housing, their pension funds, non-pension investments. Millenials, not so much. (Obviously, this is in part because wealth builds up during one's life, though the divide is stronger than merely that effect)
If you're a boomer, all this politics that promotes the stock market over the material economy is fucking great. Tech lays off another 16 billion people? Stonks go to the moon, and maybe you'll collect a nice fat severance package on your way out of your last job. If you're young though, it's a nightmare.
It's quite recent that the political balance has changed; Biden fumbled the 2024 election in no small part because of his "But the stock market is good, why are you mad?" stance that had been ol' reliable for the decades prior.
So, they will now start acting on those pedo list?
Oh wait, they have started 2nd Epstein War to distract from the same list.
[dead]
Bad quarter for certain, but to keep things in perspective, the S&P is still up 13% over the past 12 months (likely 14% as soon as the market opens in 20 minutes). There's nothing magical about a "quarter". Had Q1 2025 ended 4 days later, it would have been significantly worse than this, but then the market went on to have a huge rally after that.
SPX performance since 2024, with all the AI hype, was 32%. Gold was 155% in the same period.
Even if you ignore this disastrous quarter, SPX is up mostly in nominal terms only.
Well the thing is -- when you have rampant inflation, the cost of everything in USD goes up -- be it houses, eggs, or even stocks. So when you subtract out how much the value of the USD has gone down relative to other currencies it's basically another 10% drop.
Eggs are pretty cheap right now. Housing and healthcare are why Americans struggle with affordability. Food, gas, etc. are all just drops in the bucket.
Eggs may be cheaper than when they were during culling/avian flu, but food sure isn't. Where I am most grocery items are now 50-70% more expensive than last January. The milk I buy weekly at the grocery store has increased 67% since then. Beef is roughly 50% more, and I haven't even had steak since late 2024 at this point. That isn't sustainable.
> Beef is roughly 50% more, and I haven't even had steak since late 2024 at this point.
Sadly, the nebraska wildfires guarantee that situation isn't getting better anytime soon (and may actually get worse).
A year ago was exactly the market bottom due to tariff drama. 13% up from that isn't exactly a shining achievement.
Go back another couple months to when Trump took office and the total gains have been ~3.5%. A couple more random missile strikes and it'll go into the negative.
The only people making money in today's market are those with insider info about US economic and military actions (aka Trump and his associates).
> There's nothing magical about a "quarter".
There isn't. But everyone knows the US stock market is about run off a cliff. Or rather, it already has.
Everyone is looking at the quarters because they're waiting for Wile E. Coyote to look down.
What's that old saying?
Be greedy when others are fearful, or something like that?
Do bear in mind the context of that Buffett quote is to not blindly chase market sentiment and the numbers, neither directly nor inversely; Berkshire Hathaway's got quite the pile of cash right now.
Never heard that one, but my off the cuff thought was "sounds like something a so-far-lucky gambling addict would say".
I have a feeling Warren Buffet would accept that label, with a chuckle and a smirk!
But I also think Buffet wouldn't characterize the current environment as particularly fearful. We haven't seen a whole lot of panic aside from a couple 1-2% daily swings, which is nothing.
So what does this mean for technology?
Well there are 3 huge IPOs supposed to go out this year. This hurts liquidity and clogs the pipes.
And then for early stage venture, where I work, it will be harder to raise funds and move new ventures forward. Especially given the extreme shifting of public assets to loyalists.
Overall it’s a bleak time for American exceptionalism. The only companies that are in vogue are AI and Defense. Biotech continues to get hammered because who needs medicine when we can just bomb people with AI right?
Not even defenses. How is RTX down?
I suspect it’s the unwinding of the Yen carry trade and/or indirectly connected to running for shelter for several reasons including the massive bomb in private lending and subsequently private equity that is ticking down and doing so even faster now that Trump cut the wrong wire to distract from the Epstein files and him being a child rapist.
This all seems structural, as indicates that in the middle of a war even military stocks are down, which indicates deep rot or deep lack of confidence in at least the stock market.
That could be at least part of it. My understanding as to why gold dropped is that many countries essentially got market called. The Oil countries don't have cash reserves without selling, but they do have gold. Taking in London is that the Saudi's have sold a good amount of gold. China stopped buying in Q4 2025. Others followed suit. Hell, Russia is blocking gold exports at the end of the month.
Is it great yet ?
Archive Link - http://archive.today/xoixt
The markets go up and down and were expensive and due for a correction but I'm not sure the very stable genius with his tariff and oil wars is helping.
Worst President Ever.
Depending on how you measure, not as bad as the one we had a few terms ago. There was a pandemic, which should have been a unifying event the president just had to straightforwardly lead us through while letting the experts at agencies handle the details. But instead he must have thought he was still campaigning or something, and staked out some edgelord position that we should just ignore it. Predictably, this caused a lot of societal chaos from people who weren't good at thinking for themselves following nonsensical direction from an authority figure. I'm sure glad that guy was only around for one term. I remember him being a pretty sore loser too.
It certainly is interesting living in a declining empire.
This is a common refrain you hear a lot. I get why people say it, because it feels good to say when you feel bad.
But the decline of the Roman empire took nearly 500 years.
Even the bronze age collapse, which you might say happened fast, took more than 100.
A thought I have every time someone parrots this is, "what is reasonable to expect?".
Would you have heard people saying the same thing during the civil war?
During the gilded age?
After the stock market crash?
During the 1970s oil crisis or the severe increase in violent crime during the 1970s and 80s?
Spain was an actual dictatorship in recent memory, and now you'll hear Americans fantasizing about fleeing there.
Should we not expect an empire to have ups and downs?
It would be nice if folks would learn from the lessons of the past, and work out how to avoid the mistakes which caused the bad times --- a co-worker and I were unique for having a story/tradition out of the Great Depression, the story was of my grandfather taking his year's tobacco crop in to Richmond in his truck, what it sold for wouldn't buy gas to drive it back home, so he sold it and walked back (a trip I re-created on my bicycle when I was young, my first century), the tradition is that Christmas gifts are described by a riddle, and when gifts are opened, the entire family gathers in a circle, the recipient reads the riddle out loud, and everyone makes a guess (opening presents is an all-day affair).
Maybe folks would be more careful of their money or the economy if there were more oral traditions along those lines --- one of my wife's aunts just passed away, a child of the Depression, her home was filled with home goods and food stuffs purchased when on sale beyond any reasonable expectation of her individual use, but all perfectly organized and ready to prevent future need.
We live in the Information Age. Things happen quicker now.
The Roman Empire took 500 years to decline.
The Soviet Union took 2 years.
The US broke centuries old alliances and upended the global order in a matter of months.
If there is a collapse of the American empire it won’t happen over centuries but in the span of a few tweets.
The problem Europe has though is that it can't stand it's own. They have become so accustomed to leaning on the US, that they have grown into it.
People don't like hearing it, but Europe lives on American Tech, powered by American energy, and defended by American defense. There other lifelines being Russian energy and Chinese tech. It's a "pick your poison" situation.
Europe should be able to stand on it's own, but it's going to take much more than 4 years to do it, and Europe will be a different society than it is now after the shift.
The US is trying to sell out the EU to Russia in a misguided attempt at recruiting a new ally against China.
The obvious move for EU is to go for a Metternich-style rebalancing of powers and get China on their side.
I do think your comment is bringing up valid questions/points.
One thing that worries me about the current state of things is scale and speed. Modern technology, markets, communication systems and supply chains make it possible for things to go catastrophically wrong very quickly for a massive number of people.
I think this is somewhat unique to the current era.
I still don’t buy into the belief that we’re absolutely witnessing a collapse. Studying history shows that things have been far worse (politically, socially geopolitically, etc) and we’ve come out the other side numerous times.
So I think “ups and downs” is probably the right way to look at this. I do worry about the impact of modern technology on this equation.
It’s all cycles within cycles, hopefully. If you study dynamic systems then you realize it’s cycles of good and bad, and within those cycles more smaller cycles of ephemeral good and bad.
OP did say declining. By your own accounting there were 500 years across which a Roman too might have correctly observed that they were living in a declining Rome.
The US is still strong as ever. commercially, economically and technologically. It just has a political system that is broken. A mad presidenta and a congress unwilling to constraining him.
"just"
In less than a decade, the Dow will likely go over 1,000,000. (Because the Dollar is about to tank)
I used to believe the unwinding of the Petrodollar would take a generation, it's now likely to happen this year.
Trump's wild late night rants threatening civilian infrastructure gave all the cover Iran needed to take out the infrastructure of any of our allies that have US connections or bases. The effects of those attacks on infrastructure already completed will take years, if not decades to repair.
The US, like Russia before it, has shown itself to be a paper tiger.
We need to get the Epstein class out of government at all levels, deal with the consequences of the return to hard currency, and rebuild what we can of our nation.
> I used to believe the unwinding of the Petrodollar would take a generation, it's now likely to happen this year.
Why do you think the specific regime change targets of Venezuela then Iran, and the oil blockade of Cuba? Look at the volume of oil and natural gas from Venezuela and Iran. Look at how much is imported to Cuba. Now, look at what currencies they were using or trying to use instead of the US dollar.
Now, also, look at the extraction and refining capacity in the Middle East that has been destroyed or badly damaged in the past month. Different oil fields produce different types and grades of crude. The US mostly produces sweet light and sweet intermediate crude on land. The US gulf coast has a big refining capacity for sour heavy crude, which is the main exported kind from both Venezuela and Iran. The US right now after all the attacks on Iran and by Iran on US-friendly countries (along with Ukraine damaging capacity in Russia as part of their war) has a huge advantage in LNG production and in refining the very type of oil from Iran and Venezuela.
Put that all together and it looks like rather than only distracting from pedophilia (which is one motive for all sorts of things the administration does) and trying to culturally and ethnically purge the United States that there just might be another reason for all of these things happening within about a quarter. It could be assumed that the guy who said we were going to have a US as the energy leader of the world and who brags about all the access US companies can now have to Venezuelan oil might be trying to prop up the petrodollar through expeditionary warfare.
USD is actually stronger these days... I know since I receive USD as payment and convert them to EUR
The Gulf countries are dumping their gold reserves and buying dollars, that put a momentary halt on what was a steady declining trajectory for the USD. But since this blip isn't caused by structural reasons (nothing changed in the US economy), it will only last as long as these countries have gold to sell.
This is likely due to the fact that oil is up. These things are a bit sticky and transfer a bit of momentum to each other.
If Oil goes the USD follow suits thanks to Petrodollar. This will happen until it's still easier to trade oil in dollars.
USD is currently weaker than EUR. That's been the case since before 2016 except for one little dip in late 2023.
It's been trending upward since 2025.
So I have no idea what metric you're using but no, this is objectively not the case.
$100 will buy €87. On January 1st 2025 it bought €96
Had you bought $1000 of S&P on Jan 1st 2025 you'd have $1070
Had you bought $1000 of EUR on the same day and put it under the bed, you'd have $1100
$1000 in DAX in Euros would be $1250 today
Paper Tiger? they just obliterated Iran and have most of the nukes, advanced military tech and AI tech. So no.
And yet, what have they achieved?
Iran's power structure is unchanged. Oil is more expensive than in a long time. American alliances are fraying. Iran now exerts control over the Strait of Hormuz.
All this has done is to expose the limits of hard power, America's biggest asset.
No one really knows what Irans power structure looks like right now. The supreme leader is in hiding and apparently is only communicating in person, but other leaders are doing the same, and all are scared of getting together.
So it seems more like there is a splintered regime of autonomous cells all kinda doing what they think they should be doing. Whatever general controls the revolutionary guard around the strait could defect tomorrow and sell out to the US, becoming president of his own little carved out country without anyone to really stop him. We known Trump would be falling over himself to make that deal right now.
The very best result the US could get now would be the equivalent of the JCPOA, which it already had and tore up.
JCPOA was negotiated under the leadership of the EU, all Trump has done is shown that the EU's soft power is more effective than American hard power.
You literally launched a war on cheap oil.
Trump is the biggest environmentalist terrorist on the planet. Blow up a few schools and cause the world to double down on cutting out their oil usage.
It would be hilarious if people weren't dying.
20x inflation in 10 years? I don't see it. Even unwinding the petrodollar won't do that.
At some point, the only thing that will arrest the fall of the dollar will be backing it with gold, at a MUCH higher price, such that all the dollars outstanding match our gold reserves. It would be somewhere between $50,000 and $150,000 per ounce.
> We need to get the Epstein class out of government at all levels
Okay, I'll assume you're serious about it. If so, the only real way you can contribute this is by 1. Voting for anyone running on this platform at any chance you get, no matter their likelihood of winning 2. _Never_ voting for anyone _not_ running on this.
You can do more than just your vote though. Remember you also have a voice, you can help campaign, organize, etc.
> We need to get the Epstein class out of government at all levels.
This won’t be achieved without extreme violence. These people are entrenched in some of the most powerful positions in our globalized world.
The US constitution has 2nd amendment exactly for this purpose. Just start the extreme violence already.
These people are killing tens of thousands of people to gain personal wealth and to cover their existing crimes. Maybe millions, if they aren't stopped.
The point of culture war issues is to distract the population so they don't talk about economics. Your rent isn't sky high because of undocumented migrants or because there's a trans girl in Utah who wants to play hockey in college. It's sky-high because landlords have effectively colluded to raise your rent through tools like RealPage. In fact the entire goal of dynamic pricing is to raise prices. That's it.
Undocumented migrants in particular are vital to the economy. The agricultural and construction secotrs would collapse without them. They are paid sub-minimum wage because they're undocumented. And if they complain about low pay or working conditions, you just call in ICE to round them up, pay a token fine and rinse and repeat [1].
While people are distracted with these culture war issues, you proceed with your actual agenda of giving all the money in the government coffers to the already-wealthy.
The problem comes when these culture war issues become the goal not the distraction such as doing mass deportations. At that point you're now molesting the money and the wealthy will only put up with that for so long.
So now we have what is (IMHO) the biggest geopolitical error in US history by starting a war of choice in Iran with no specific goals, no exit strategy and no path to victory (whatever that means).
Sure defense contractors benefit as we have to replenish all those munitions we're using but you're spending $1-2 billion every day for a war you cannot win while strangling the global economy, destroying alliances and eroding US power.
And on top of that you're insider trading, which isn't money for nothing. By manipulating SPY puts, for example, you're stealing money from your donors and from ordinary people. This could ultimately hurt the supposed "integrity" of the markets.
Part of the reason the Cabinet is filled with incompetent sycophants is to mitigate the risk of being 25A'ed, meaning removed from office via the 25th Amendment.
My prediction is that if a large scale ground invasion happens in Iran and it goes badly, which I think it will, to the tune of tens of thousands of casulaties, the president will be 25A'ed.
[1]: https://abc7.com/post/ice-agents-arrest-680-in-largest-raids...
Crazy how for a guy so obsessed with self image and legacy, Trump is leaving behind a world where he'll be known for making everything shit that it was before him. Amazing. How does this happen?
You can read his book, it's full of things he would do (even if he didn't write it). Typical sales tactics and nothing more sales than tactics even after the snake oil has been exposed.
Oh, yes, I agree. But I now know that they were written by a ghost writer so I'm not sure it it's completely accurate to credit him with all in the books. The ghost writer deff gives it its own flair. But, yes, when Trump was first elected, I've have friends tell me I don't get it, I am hating him because I was told to, I'm not looking past the noise, and I had to clarify to them that no, I have despised him since I read his book "The art of the deal" and came across with the idea he is a corrupt crook. I read it as recommendation and went in with the expectation to read something good, but was not impressed at all.
So, yes, all of this was painfully obvious. But here we are.
Him and his family will be richer and more famous than ever. I don't think he cares about legacy beyond that.
this and people underestimate how many people in the country still think he's doing a great job.
> how many people in the country still think he's doing a great job.
'In the country' being 'in the USA'.
Everybody else outside the boarders of the USA is thinking "how the mighty have fallen".
Yes, that's what "in the country" means..
It is also exactly these same people of the USA whose thinking is going to matter for determining what happens next, not anyone else. It is immaterial what "everyone else outside the borders of the USA" thinks in the context of the country.
(I think you meant infamous.)
This is what happens when sales is the leader of your organization.
And compensation is based on revenue not profit. A top sales person brings in $5 million of revenue, but it's going to cost the company $7 million to deliver the goods/services. Sales person hit their top goal and will earn his bonuses while making the company worse off.
Stupidity - the most destructive force in the world. Evil at least benefits someone.
Trump net worth is $3 billion more than it was before he become a president. Likely more money was made via insider trading by his friends and family. So it's not like no one did benefit. Net loss for the country and the world is orders of magnitude higher though.
The more I see the stock market dropping due to idiotic mistakes that should've been very preventable, the more I think how beneficial it must be to be one of the insiders that accidentally let those idiotic things slip through.
Are we as small savers just idiots feeding this idiot machine?
>Are we as small savers just idiots feeding this idiot machine?
Yes. 401k should never have been the main retirement plan.
My working theory is that Trump is best understood as an epically tragic character.
So desperate to be valued and liked, that he desperately grabs at anything and everything to get the acclaim that, under normal circumstances, would signify that.
His besetting character flaws foreclose any possibility of attaining the actual approval he seeks.
And so, with his misguided approaches to getting praise and love, the harder he tries the further they are from his reach.
Adding to that tragedy is that a 180-degree U-turn is still within his reach. He could do it today, and probably get some of what he most deeply wants. But I think the most likely outcome is that he'll keep his current trajectory for the rest of his life.
100% this … He’s a wounded Soul … desperate to be loved and admired. As someone else wrote - there’s a void inside him that can’t be filled.
Yes if only he had the heart/insight to make that 180 U-turn. It’d bring him some peace at last.
I don’t think he’s interested in general approval. Having a fervent cultish minority support and being detested by others both seem to suit him. Hell, he seems to enjoy being able to paint himself a victimized underdog to his followers.
> So desperate to be valued and liked, that he desperately grabs at anything and everything to get the acclaim
Like all billionaires, he is an empty void that can never be filled. To borrow a phrase, he is a hungry ghost.
After his first million he needed more, then after a billion he saw that it was not enough, then after becoming president... he is, was, and always will be an empty hole of a person who can never feel satiated and who can consequently never feel genuine happiness.
He is not just a bad person, his is a bad soul.
It's time we take seriously the pathology behind billionaires.
You can't become one as a person with basic empathy. To do so is a moral failing.
Interesting reading, but hard to have sympathy when he causes suffering for so many.
I also don't think changing his behavior is within reach. His narcissism prevents him from growth and, like the scorpion in the tale, he can't help but sting.
Thanks. FWIW I wasn't trying to imply that we should have sympathy for him.
My only point was that so much of this suffering, both for himself and others, could be avoided but for his choices and flaws.
I don't think it's so clear cut. The problem is that his personality defects have allowed him to be influenced by people who are truly malevolent. Those people lurk more in the shadows and so avoid the condemnation that they deserve. Trump is their obvious useful idiot with the target painted on his head.
It turns out you can't run a country the same way you run a New York construction business.
You can, into the ground.
The man bankrupted a casino.
Several, actually
>How does this happen?
Well, you see a black man became president. And what's worse, he was a really good one, articulate, kind, humble, and emodied all the values we cherish. And that broke people so much they would rather burn everything down than build on what he did.
Don't forgot how long Trump and other republicans went on about "birth certificates" during Obama's first term.
... but have you considered the new ballroom?
The key insight is that Trump is doing what Trump supporters (and fascists in general) want most: punishing The Enemy/Other. Everything else (including gas and grocery prices, etc) is irrelevant. As long as "immigrants" (the "illegal" facade is done by now) and "liberals" are beaten to death by ICE, Trump supporters will honestly and proudly proclaim that he's doing a fantastic job as president.
I'm still holding out for this being some 4d chess move that's way over my head. If he really is this foolish, then why did we all vote for him?
"World's most successful con man successfully fools 77 million people" is honestly not that surprising. He is a professional after all.
Define, "we all".
I have an answer to that, but you won't like it.
Obvious question has an obvious answer: America isn't ready to vote for a woman, much less a black woman.
It's not 4d chess.
"We" did not vote for him. Some of y'all did.
I'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row.
It was clear that Biden was mentally slipping. Even if you were a fan of his general politics, 4 additional years of mental decline while in office was a scary prospect.
And then Kamala Harris was given very little time to sell herself to the voters.
I'm wondering if Trump would have won had the Democrats presented someone more appealing earlier in the campaign.
"I'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row."
Women candidates?
Because I am sad to admit that is my takeaway: a significant part of the U.S. appears to be sexist (and plenty of women voters included).
I interpreted the clause “two poor alternatives in a row” as Biden + Harris in the 2024 presidential election, and not Clinton + Harris, since Clinton was the 2016 nominee and Harris was the 2024 nominee after Biden dropped out, but the 2020 nominee was Biden, who did successfully defeat Trump that year.
In my opinion, Clinton’s and Harris’ losses had less to do with their gender and more to do with the candidates themselves:
1. Clinton was facing strong anti-establishment headwinds, and Clinton is a very establishment politician. Many people in 2016 were piping mad at establishment politicians. Trump was able to win the GOP nomination on a platform of “draining the swamp” and pursuing an aggressively right-wing agenda compared to more moderate Republicans, and Sanders, who also had an anti-establishment platform, proved to be a formidable opponent to Clinton. Despite Clinton’s loss, she was still able to win the popular vote. Perhaps had there been less anti-establishment sentiment, it would have been a Clinton vs Jeb Bush election, and I believe Clinton would have won that race.
2. Harris never won a presidential primary election. The only reason she ended up becoming the nominee is because Biden dropped out of the race after his disastrous debate performance against Trump, which occurred after the primaries. Since it was too late to have the voters decide on a replacement for Biden, the Democratic Party selected a replacement: Harris. She only had a few months to campaign, whereas Trump had virtually campaigned his entire time out of office.
3. Let’s not forget the Trump factor in 2024. During Biden’s entire presidency, Trump was able to consolidate his hold on the GOP and his voting base, and in some ways he even expanded his base. The conservative media was filled with defenses of January 6, and Trump was able to convince enough Americans that he and his supporters were persecuted in the aftermath of the 2020 election and January 6.
Look, after lurking through that submission about the Olympics a few days ago I get HN is divided on sex/gender identity, but I'm pretty sure that Joseph Biden is absolutely a man. "Cisgender", if you must.
Or are you misreading the actual argument?
I believe Trump would have won 2020 had the COVID pandemic not happened. Things were very chaotic in 2020 America. Biden and his extensive experience in the federal government looked reassuring to a lot of Americans. Biden would have had a tougher time against Trump had 2020 been more like 2019. I believe Biden would have had a tougher time against Bernie Sanders in the primaries had COVID not happened, though a counterargument is that Super Tuesday happened on March 3, before shelter-in-place policies were in effect in California.
A big reason for Trump's success despite his polarizing nature is the polarizing effects of the platforms of our two parties, which distinguish themselves on "culture war" issues such as abortion, gun rights, immigration, LGBT+ rights, and race relations. There are many Americans who love the MAGA agenda, and there are also many Americans who are not in 100% agreement with MAGA but who'd never vote for a Democrat since they feel that a candidate with the opposite cultural views is anathema. If third parties were more viable in America, the latter group of voters could vote for a candidate that is more to their temperament instead of voting for whomever the GOP nominee is.
Had COVID not happened, Trump might not have gone batshit crazy with a vendetta against the entire concept of independent federal agencies. Working to go against the advice coming from Fauci et al would seem to be a large part of what sensitized him to the larger pattern rather than just writing each instance off as an interpersonal issue.
> I'm guessing that one reason we got Trump is that the Democrats presented two poor alternatives in a row.
Oh please.
Are you seriously comparing the disaster that is Mango Mussolini to the likes of (practically any) alternative candidate?
The sad reality is that the American people wanted Trump and _voted_ for him. TWICE! The rest of the world has come to terms with this and knows there is no going back to the old hegemony (put simply, the American people may vote for another Trump; we now know the USA can no longer be trusted as a good faith partner). The world has changed, and many in the USA who didn't vote for Trump have yet to realise this and still think they can go back.
Besides, if all candidates are crap, you vote for the one that will do least harm. And then look at reforming a political system which leaves voters with such a poor choice.
Yes. Biden was not a legitimate choice. Kamala, crowned in Biden's illegitimate wake, was also not a legit choice.
The people hunger for democracy, not the lesser of two evils.
> The people hunger for democracy,
They surely reform of the two party system (and one where you realistically need to be wealthy to stand a chance of election) is the only solution?
Give people a choice!
If you were worried about Biden’s mental decline but looked at Trumps behavior and statements as from someone mentally competent and not also slipping into dementia, then you just wanted Trumps politics and vibes your way into thinking it was ok.
I’m so excited for the future where nobody apparently voted for Trump and never backed him, the same way everyone mysteriously didn’t vote for GWB after his fuckups got too big to ignore
And no one voted for Nixon. (I'm old enough to remember that.)
Don't worry, the governor of phillidilly told me that Trump's mental acuity scores are top notch.
If you voted for Trump over an inanimate carbon rod then you'd need your head examining.
But America still likes him. The only thing that's tarnished him is that it costs a little more to drive a gas guzzler
"inanimate carbon rod"
I like that—wherever it came from. (And inanimate strangely sells it even harder.)
His approval rating is at a historical low for any president at this point in their term, I think. People don't like ICE, pedophiles, or wars in the Middle East.
Wikipedia says about 40% of America approves of him
Trump has been the protagonist of US politics for ten years. Maybe this "actually he really has this all planned out" idea was viable in 2017. But in 2026? We've got years and years and years of examples of how Trump makes decisions. He is not playing 4d chess.
I think the current mafia in charge of the US government, along with their insider trading, needs to financially compensate the rest of the world. First, of course, regular US citizens who were frauded by them; but then also the rest of the world for driving up the prices - first via AI (may be legal but I find it a scam still, look at the RAM prices), now by driving the prices of energy up. Why do I have to pay the recent increase in inflation? Trump and his oligarch mafia should pay for that. The Epstein connection may indeed be much larger than we know - there must be a new, full, thorough investigation, not just by the USA; the USA covers up. ALL countries need to uncover how big and deep the kompromat reaches here.
It's been a fairly stress free quarter in rainbow bear land.
Buy puts, wait for Trump to say something dumb (don't worry, it won't take long), sell, return to step one.
and you don't even need to hold them until friday. at the very least sell your bullish position on thursday nights.
He says dumb things all the time, but that seems like it would have been a poor strategy from Apr 2025 to Feb 2026.
There’s a good reason common advice is to not time the market
Meh, boom and bust cycles.
more of a completely unforced self-inflicted error than some kind of naturally occurring "bust cycle"