Hello. You have reached Tim Coffey's "Morning Shots" autoresponder. You are receiving this message because Mr. Coffey does not have the mental bandwidth to address the topics in this morning's newsletter. However, Mr. Coffey would like to point out that when President Trump complains about the cost of military exercises with South Korea, the president is the same man who wants to spend billions on a "Trump" class battleship, billions on retrofitting the Ford class carrier with obsolete steam catapults, and hundreds of millions on a White House ballroom/Trump bunker. Mr. Coffey would also like to note that the president's "very good relationship" with North Korea's murderous dictator exists only his addled, demented mind. Lastly, Mr. Coffey would like to remind the MAGAe that when South Korea and Japan commence their nuclear weapons program as a result of the president fluffing North Korea's murderous dictator, it is because the MAGAe returned an amoral, weapons grade moron to the presidency, thus making the United States and the rest of the world less safe. You will receive no further comment from Mr. Coffey this morning. Thank you, and have a nice day.
I’ve been waiting for this Trump NK comment since the Iran war began. Of course I wrongly assumed it would be the result of a reporters question along the lines, “why bomb Iran when NK actually has nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them?”. But of course that no one in the press ever asked that question is another story.
Qatar gave Trump a plane. All North Korea needed was a little love letter.
At this point nuclear proliferation is a positive probably. When you have Trump in charge along with Hegseth as Defense Secretary, it’s better to let the other nations step up.
You forgot dump's desire to spend extra money on redesigning future aircraft carriers to resemble WWII carriers because he prefers that aesthetic. Not that he thinks the design is better operationally, but prettier. And he knows this...because...he thinks he's a "Builder". The stupid hurts.
What other president has been lucky enough to find their major economic policies graded on a scale of “if it didn’t spark a once-in-a-century depression, it’s a win”?
I know you were asking this ironically Andrew, but the answer is zero.
The absolute way that so much of the media (not the Bulwark, thank God!) just allows Trump to be graded on a scale that wouldn’t even apply to a preschool toddler is ridiculous.
Great piece, even if it did spike my BP from rage at the double standards this morning.
One aspect of this "grading policy" that I don't see addressed very often is Trump's pennywise pound foolish nature. E.g. How much does scaling back the S. Korean exercises save versus, say, the cost of the ballroom (which no longer comes with the fig leaf of private funding)? How much does cutting SNAP benefits save versus, say, the cost of the Iran war? How much does it save to mass fire federal employees only to hire them back a week later? How much will his already out of date battleships cost versus savings from skimping on NATO? The man just sets money on fire while claiming savings and efficiency and that he will balance the budget (well, I haven't heard him say that in a while, but you get the point).
That's our Wharton School graduate. He failed economics 101, Tariffs 101 and Logic 101. It's a miracle he was able to graduate from Wharton at all. Maybe the university administration said, "Get him out of here! We don't care what grade you give him, but get him out of here!"
It’s the economic version of "person, woman, man, camera, TV" where Trump spent weeks telling everyone no president in history could ever memorize that sequence and Trump said it twice so yeah…
Along with the graded scale are the numerous false equivalencies where Hegseth can communicate top-secret information on non-secure devices, because Hillary blah, blah, blah....
I'm old enough to remember the entire GOP blowing a gasket when Bill Clinton had the gall to meet in private with his AG for all of 5 minutes on an airplane, and now they clap along like trained seals when the AG openly declares that he consults with the President and acts on his behalf.
Clarification: Bill Clinton did meet with Loretta Lynch when she was AG, but it was in 2016, sixteen years after he was no longer President, and, although Hilary Clinton's email servers were under investigation by the FBI, there has never been any evidence Bill asked Lynch to do anything or even discussed the investigation.
Honestly, the hypocrisy is so overwhelming and so constant there’s actually no point in even pointing it out any longer. It just comes with the territory we’re in a corrupt criminal regime at this point, which we can thank the Republicans for.
Yes, a real political party would at this point read the polling and writing in the wall. If we had a parliamentary system where prime ministers can more easily be switched, many would be considering their political futures more carefully.
Politico has been doing this Fox News-esque "Fair and Balanced" garbage for years. I'd much rather spend my money at The Bulwark, where bothsidesism goes to die.
A tiny ray of good news: Over the weekend, my MAGA brother let it be known on a family text chain that he is no longer supporting Trump, calling him corrupt, a liar and a fraud who is driving the country off a cliff. He did not give his reason but I'll take what I can get. And did I refrain from letting him know that I could have told him all that 40 years ago? No, I did not.
Better late than never, I guess, but Trump is a lame duck. Get back to us when he decides to support Vance or Rubio's opponent in the next election. Prediction: There will be something about the Dem nominee that he just doesn't like. (Don't ask me how I know...)
It's going to be interesting (and probably depressing) to see where the line is for people to break free from MAGA. At some point...you have to finally come to the realization that what Trump/MAGA tells you isn't always the truth and often are just lies. Gas prices are probably a HUGE contributor for your bro.
I'm with you...I'm not holding back, but it will depend on how MAGA the person was prior.
Of course Trump won on tariffs. Actually not just Trump but also all his friends. Just think of how many billions they swindled from American taxpayers. If you don’t call that a win (for him), I don’t know how else to call it.
And oh, shocking! Hedge funds and other vultures are buying up businesses' tariff refunds at a discount! https://www.cbiz.com/insights/article/hedge-funds-capitalize-on-tariff-refund-opportunities If you're a consumer who paid a higher price because of Trump's tariffs, you can stop fantasizing about getting any of your money back. (I don't mean "you, Tai", just a general "you". 😊)
The goal of tariffs was two-fold, to raise funds for him to use outside the controls of congress and to get him leverage with countries and businesses to benefit his family and close associates. The “bring back manufacturing to the US” was just a ruse.
Trump won his Iran WAR!!!! the same way. His oil buddies are making bank (and he's def wetting his beak), and he has a nice big distraction he can pull out when he needs one. So why leave?
"Respectful" Kim Jong Un is sending missiles to Russia for killing Ukrainian civilians.
In any Trump post or statement, explaining the depth of the stupidity and wrongness requires, at minimum, thousands of words. A big problem in a country with the attention span of a gnat.
Thank you for pointing out that Blanche made a huge faux pas when he would not say that he is independent of Trump's whims and wishes. I had not thought about that. You're right; certain defense attorneys were probably laughing at the gift Blanche had just handed them and their clients.
I think it was intentional because he is afraid to offend his Lord and Master, Trump. But the possible implications of his intentional sycophancy either did not occur to him or he simply does not care: Pleasing Trump is all that matters to him.
More and more, I'm starting to think that Trump will skate on everything, and that he's essentially Louis XV: "Apres moi, le deluge."
When 2029 comes and a Democrat is elected (or, Zeus help us, Vance, or Rubio) and the house of cards finally comes crashing down, the man who created the trouble will either be dead or once again saying how wonderful things were when he was president. And Politico will back him up.
I used to joke in the good old days (i.e. when Biden first got elected) that they could provide Trump a small adjacent room to the oval office with a little replica of the resolute desk...with a phone and a whole bunch of buttons where he could pretend he was still POTUS. Sounds like what they did for his father when he slid off the reservation mentally.
I think there will be a correction in the AI boom in 2027 or 2028 which would likely pull the carpet out from underneath the money which has pinned up Trump and the economy to a large degree: Ce sera le déluge. That would be a flood that even DJT could not withstand.
When in December 1941 Japan began its rampage across Asia and the Pacific, there were warships out there - American, Dutch, British and Australian. They tried to begin concerted action but never had trained together and never formed a useful way to act together. Our training with South Korea is essential but the man in the White House is far more comfortable with dictators than leaders of free republicns.
The Republicans can/could have taken that hammer away at anytime. Their enabling has turned it into sledgehammers and bulldozers. They love being on top, even if it's atop a pile of rubble.
Deep down, I think Trump knows he’s a loser. It’s perhaps the single force driving his destructive behavior. But he can put on a show to entertain the average idiot so here we are.
The asymmetry that Andrew is highlighting has been a feature of political reporting since at least the 1980s. The right is graded on a massive curve; the left has virtually no margin for error.
I am not particularly strong on economic theory, but it just doesn’t seem possible Trump is winning on tariffs in any way. Of course we need to look at what the administrations incoherent goals are. I also find Vance’s bizarre statement that the dollar being the worlds reserve currency is bad for America because we buy to much stuff fits in. I completely agree that many Americans buy and waste too much stuff, possibly because it compensates for the economic stability that few can afford. Usually looking at the economic goals and the destruction of all our alliance makes me wonder if Trump is working for Russia or China, but today I am starting to think he wants us to become North Korea.
When I heard about Vance saying that the dollar's status as reserve currency is making stuff that Americans buy *too* cheap, I about fell off my chair laughing. Now there's a campaign slogan! "Vance wants to make your stuff more expensive to buy".
Strange how such a bad person can be right and wrong at the same time. It’s true that many Americans can afford decent homes, or health care nor can they look forward to a secure old age. It’s no wonder that they comfort themselves with cheap crap the ends up as landfill, crappy food and loathsome entertainment. While they are distracted with bread and circuses the worst people are making money. Always ask cui bono.
Politico is owned by Axel Springer. Despite the fact that there are some great reporters on staff, doing terrific reporting some of the time, there is also an increasing lurch Trumpward under CEO Mathias Döpfner, who is reported to have sent out notes in 2020 instructing his executives to pray for the reelection of Donald Trump. He says he was being ironic: hmmm, I doubt it, but sure, okay, whatever.
This is the same thing that's happening at CBS and the Washington Post: still some very good reporting some of the time, but the heavy hand of billionaire owners, ardent Trumpistas with nine zeroes at the end of their net worth, makes itself felt.
Hello. You have reached Tim Coffey's "Morning Shots" autoresponder. You are receiving this message because Mr. Coffey does not have the mental bandwidth to address the topics in this morning's newsletter. However, Mr. Coffey would like to point out that when President Trump complains about the cost of military exercises with South Korea, the president is the same man who wants to spend billions on a "Trump" class battleship, billions on retrofitting the Ford class carrier with obsolete steam catapults, and hundreds of millions on a White House ballroom/Trump bunker. Mr. Coffey would also like to note that the president's "very good relationship" with North Korea's murderous dictator exists only his addled, demented mind. Lastly, Mr. Coffey would like to remind the MAGAe that when South Korea and Japan commence their nuclear weapons program as a result of the president fluffing North Korea's murderous dictator, it is because the MAGAe returned an amoral, weapons grade moron to the presidency, thus making the United States and the rest of the world less safe. You will receive no further comment from Mr. Coffey this morning. Thank you, and have a nice day.
Reading this comment has become a highlight of my day.
Ours too!
We've been hearing from Tim Coffey's autoresponder a lot lately. A sign of the times. 😬
I’ve been waiting for this Trump NK comment since the Iran war began. Of course I wrongly assumed it would be the result of a reporters question along the lines, “why bomb Iran when NK actually has nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them?”. But of course that no one in the press ever asked that question is another story.
"Fluffing".
Made my day :)
Qatar gave Trump a plane. All North Korea needed was a little love letter.
At this point nuclear proliferation is a positive probably. When you have Trump in charge along with Hegseth as Defense Secretary, it’s better to let the other nations step up.
You forgot dump's desire to spend extra money on redesigning future aircraft carriers to resemble WWII carriers because he prefers that aesthetic. Not that he thinks the design is better operationally, but prettier. And he knows this...because...he thinks he's a "Builder". The stupid hurts.
"We fell in love."
Gold. And not in the Trump way.
What other president has been lucky enough to find their major economic policies graded on a scale of “if it didn’t spark a once-in-a-century depression, it’s a win”?
I know you were asking this ironically Andrew, but the answer is zero.
The absolute way that so much of the media (not the Bulwark, thank God!) just allows Trump to be graded on a scale that wouldn’t even apply to a preschool toddler is ridiculous.
Great piece, even if it did spike my BP from rage at the double standards this morning.
One aspect of this "grading policy" that I don't see addressed very often is Trump's pennywise pound foolish nature. E.g. How much does scaling back the S. Korean exercises save versus, say, the cost of the ballroom (which no longer comes with the fig leaf of private funding)? How much does cutting SNAP benefits save versus, say, the cost of the Iran war? How much does it save to mass fire federal employees only to hire them back a week later? How much will his already out of date battleships cost versus savings from skimping on NATO? The man just sets money on fire while claiming savings and efficiency and that he will balance the budget (well, I haven't heard him say that in a while, but you get the point).
I’m sure the budget will be balanced in 2 weeks.
It would be nice to see the media asking your very excellent questions.
That's our Wharton School graduate. He failed economics 101, Tariffs 101 and Logic 101. It's a miracle he was able to graduate from Wharton at all. Maybe the university administration said, "Get him out of here! We don't care what grade you give him, but get him out of here!"
Don't we really think he paid someone to take his classes?
And I love that dump's admin is pulling funding on SNAP and Headstart, while pushing women to have more babies. Sigh
It’s the most “Woke” grading scale ever, of course it is.
It’s the economic version of "person, woman, man, camera, TV" where Trump spent weeks telling everyone no president in history could ever memorize that sequence and Trump said it twice so yeah…
Along with the graded scale are the numerous false equivalencies where Hegseth can communicate top-secret information on non-secure devices, because Hillary blah, blah, blah....
I'm old enough to remember the entire GOP blowing a gasket when Bill Clinton had the gall to meet in private with his AG for all of 5 minutes on an airplane, and now they clap along like trained seals when the AG openly declares that he consults with the President and acts on his behalf.
Clarification: Bill Clinton did meet with Loretta Lynch when she was AG, but it was in 2016, sixteen years after he was no longer President, and, although Hilary Clinton's email servers were under investigation by the FBI, there has never been any evidence Bill asked Lynch to do anything or even discussed the investigation.
Nor did Bill claim it was a "perfect meeting."
Thank you for the correction.
Honestly, the hypocrisy is so overwhelming and so constant there’s actually no point in even pointing it out any longer. It just comes with the territory we’re in a corrupt criminal regime at this point, which we can thank the Republicans for.
You didn't really expect them to tut-tut, did you?
A real political party would impeach Blanche and then Trump.
Agreed. Just like there isn’t a tooth fairy. There aren’t any spines in the Republican Party.
Yes, a real political party would at this point read the polling and writing in the wall. If we had a parliamentary system where prime ministers can more easily be switched, many would be considering their political futures more carefully.
Politico has been doing this Fox News-esque "Fair and Balanced" garbage for years. I'd much rather spend my money at The Bulwark, where bothsidesism goes to die.
A tiny ray of good news: Over the weekend, my MAGA brother let it be known on a family text chain that he is no longer supporting Trump, calling him corrupt, a liar and a fraud who is driving the country off a cliff. He did not give his reason but I'll take what I can get. And did I refrain from letting him know that I could have told him all that 40 years ago? No, I did not.
"No, I did not."
Love, love, love it!
Prolly had to fill his gas tank recently. 💰💰💰
Better late than never, I guess, but Trump is a lame duck. Get back to us when he decides to support Vance or Rubio's opponent in the next election. Prediction: There will be something about the Dem nominee that he just doesn't like. (Don't ask me how I know...)
Well at least some are capable of still having a damascene moment.
It's going to be interesting (and probably depressing) to see where the line is for people to break free from MAGA. At some point...you have to finally come to the realization that what Trump/MAGA tells you isn't always the truth and often are just lies. Gas prices are probably a HUGE contributor for your bro.
I'm with you...I'm not holding back, but it will depend on how MAGA the person was prior.
Well, it's more likely to be gas prices than any fine points of concern about the independence of the DOJ.
Your self-restraint is awe-inspiring. Not sure I would have had it in me.
Better reread. Suzanne did not refrain.
Thanks! I feel seen.
I couldn't have resisted the urge either!
Of course Trump won on tariffs. Actually not just Trump but also all his friends. Just think of how many billions they swindled from American taxpayers. If you don’t call that a win (for him), I don’t know how else to call it.
And oh, shocking! Hedge funds and other vultures are buying up businesses' tariff refunds at a discount! https://www.cbiz.com/insights/article/hedge-funds-capitalize-on-tariff-refund-opportunities If you're a consumer who paid a higher price because of Trump's tariffs, you can stop fantasizing about getting any of your money back. (I don't mean "you, Tai", just a general "you". 😊)
I ain't expecting refunds for my purchases of Irish wool sweaters and scarves.
The goal of tariffs was two-fold, to raise funds for him to use outside the controls of congress and to get him leverage with countries and businesses to benefit his family and close associates. The “bring back manufacturing to the US” was just a ruse.
Trump won his Iran WAR!!!! the same way. His oil buddies are making bank (and he's def wetting his beak), and he has a nice big distraction he can pull out when he needs one. So why leave?
Head Trump wins and tail you lose - pretty much story of American politics since he came down the escalator in 2015.
"Respectful" Kim Jong Un is sending missiles to Russia for killing Ukrainian civilians.
In any Trump post or statement, explaining the depth of the stupidity and wrongness requires, at minimum, thousands of words. A big problem in a country with the attention span of a gnat.
He's also sending North Korean soldiers.
Thank you for pointing out that Blanche made a huge faux pas when he would not say that he is independent of Trump's whims and wishes. I had not thought about that. You're right; certain defense attorneys were probably laughing at the gift Blanche had just handed them and their clients.
But is it a faux pas if it is intentional? That's a bit of a rhetorical question but also not. It's quite confusing.
I think it was intentional because he is afraid to offend his Lord and Master, Trump. But the possible implications of his intentional sycophancy either did not occur to him or he simply does not care: Pleasing Trump is all that matters to him.
I'm pretty sure he simply does not care.
Wonder if Blanche has any idea what kind of end Beria ultimately met?
More and more, I'm starting to think that Trump will skate on everything, and that he's essentially Louis XV: "Apres moi, le deluge."
When 2029 comes and a Democrat is elected (or, Zeus help us, Vance, or Rubio) and the house of cards finally comes crashing down, the man who created the trouble will either be dead or once again saying how wonderful things were when he was president. And Politico will back him up.
I used to joke in the good old days (i.e. when Biden first got elected) that they could provide Trump a small adjacent room to the oval office with a little replica of the resolute desk...with a phone and a whole bunch of buttons where he could pretend he was still POTUS. Sounds like what they did for his father when he slid off the reservation mentally.
Would've saved us a lot of trouble!
I think there will be a correction in the AI boom in 2027 or 2028 which would likely pull the carpet out from underneath the money which has pinned up Trump and the economy to a large degree: Ce sera le déluge. That would be a flood that even DJT could not withstand.
When in December 1941 Japan began its rampage across Asia and the Pacific, there were warships out there - American, Dutch, British and Australian. They tried to begin concerted action but never had trained together and never formed a useful way to act together. Our training with South Korea is essential but the man in the White House is far more comfortable with dictators than leaders of free republicns.
The Republicans can/could have taken that hammer away at anytime. Their enabling has turned it into sledgehammers and bulldozers. They love being on top, even if it's atop a pile of rubble.
Andrew, let me make it simple:
Trump is a loser. A loser in war, a loser in tariffs, a loser in love, a loser in court, a loser in popularity, etc.
Deep down, I think Trump knows he’s a loser. It’s perhaps the single force driving his destructive behavior. But he can put on a show to entertain the average idiot so here we are.
The asymmetry that Andrew is highlighting has been a feature of political reporting since at least the 1980s. The right is graded on a massive curve; the left has virtually no margin for error.
Truth!!!
I am not particularly strong on economic theory, but it just doesn’t seem possible Trump is winning on tariffs in any way. Of course we need to look at what the administrations incoherent goals are. I also find Vance’s bizarre statement that the dollar being the worlds reserve currency is bad for America because we buy to much stuff fits in. I completely agree that many Americans buy and waste too much stuff, possibly because it compensates for the economic stability that few can afford. Usually looking at the economic goals and the destruction of all our alliance makes me wonder if Trump is working for Russia or China, but today I am starting to think he wants us to become North Korea.
When I heard about Vance saying that the dollar's status as reserve currency is making stuff that Americans buy *too* cheap, I about fell off my chair laughing. Now there's a campaign slogan! "Vance wants to make your stuff more expensive to buy".
Strange how such a bad person can be right and wrong at the same time. It’s true that many Americans can afford decent homes, or health care nor can they look forward to a secure old age. It’s no wonder that they comfort themselves with cheap crap the ends up as landfill, crappy food and loathsome entertainment. While they are distracted with bread and circuses the worst people are making money. Always ask cui bono.
Trump is personally enriching himself with the tariffs and his co-conspirators
And granting wavers of tariffs in return for fitting remuneration is an up and comer.
Politico is owned by Axel Springer. Despite the fact that there are some great reporters on staff, doing terrific reporting some of the time, there is also an increasing lurch Trumpward under CEO Mathias Döpfner, who is reported to have sent out notes in 2020 instructing his executives to pray for the reelection of Donald Trump. He says he was being ironic: hmmm, I doubt it, but sure, okay, whatever.
This is the same thing that's happening at CBS and the Washington Post: still some very good reporting some of the time, but the heavy hand of billionaire owners, ardent Trumpistas with nine zeroes at the end of their net worth, makes itself felt.