WSHazel
WSHazel's JournalUkraine agrees to peace proposal, with only "minor details" to settle, official says, but no word from Russia
Source: CBS News
A U.S. official told CBS News on Tuesday that Ukraine's government had "agreed to a peace deal" brokered by the Trump administration to stop Russia's nearly four-year assault. The American official and Ukraine's national security adviser Rustem Umerov said a common understanding on a proposal had been reached, with details still to be worked out.
Umerov voiced optimism that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could travel to the U.S. before the end of November to finalize an agreement. CBS News was first to report on Sunday that U.S. and Ukrainian officials had previously discussed a potential visit to the U.S. this week by Zelenskyy.
Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ukraine-russia-war-peace-deal-trump-driscoll-abu-dhabi-talks-latest/
There is a better than 50% chance that this never happens, but it is a smart move by Zelenskyy. Russia's military is exhausted, and Trump desperately needs a "win" somewhere, anywhere, so Zelenskyy has leverage. The Russian occupied parts of Ukraine are a wasteland, and anyone who is able will leave. Most importantly, Zelenskyy gets the equivalent of NATO membership while pretending not to be in NATO. The killing will stop, and with peace, Ukraine will get stronger, and Russia will continue to get weaker. Ukraine can go back for the lost territories when Putin dies.
If Russia embarrasses Trump and walks away, then Zelenskyy and the Europeans tried, and Trump will keep up the pressure on Putin.
Additional Epstein files issue
The sex trafficking comes first, but money laundering needs to be on the list of things investigated. Trump is really worried about these files, but so far there have been no witnesses that put him that close to anything serious with sex trafficking.
What if the trafficking is not what Trump is worried about? What if there is evidence of some other crime in those emails or in the file somewhere?
Is there a link to a simple breakdown of how Republicans can get around filibuster?
The nuclear option is one, but can’t they use budget reconciliation too? Either way, they don’t need Democratic votes.
A link would be great.
Trump wanted the shutdown
They were lying the whole time when they blamed it on Democrats. Now the Administration gets to unilaterally decide what is "essential" and "non essential". We may be in shutdown for a while.
https://apnews.com/article/trump-project-2025-russ-vought-shutdown-2d1ea5e6e32c583ddf6b8a8164e523c3
Good Seth Abramson thread
Interesting perspective on a group that is hard to understand.
The picture is starting to become clear. Conventional MAGAs like Governor Cox and Kash Patel can deliberately misread the evidence all they like, but the truth always comes out eventually. Tyler Robinson is a Groyper; it is that theory of the case that explains everything about how we got here.
— Seth Abramson (@sethabramson.bsky.social) 2025-09-14T00:20:54.475Z
Nationalization of U.S. economy continues with Intel
Trump’s government is taking over our economy, first with Nvidia and AMD, now with Intel. A Republican can never utter the words “free market” again.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/intel-stock-surges-on-report-trump-administration-mulls-taking-stake-in-company-204003673.html
Copper market down over 20% today
I don't have a good article for it, but you can look it up. Copper is down over 20% because Trump reversed course on a tariff. I bet people who knew this was coming made a killing. This is what financial markets have become in the Trump era.
The market is the best line of defense against Trump
Some of you may not like this, but Wall Street and financial markets as a whole are the best line of defense against a complete takeover by Trump.
The U.S. financial system is very complex, built on stacks of debt and derivatives, and the envy of the world, which enables the U.S. financial system to keep working the way it does. The rest of the world sends us about $1 trillion every year, although this number will likely be quite a bit less this year. All of this buying of dollars drives up the value of the dollar, and gives those of us paid in dollars more purchasing power than another person in an OECD country of comparable socio-economic status. That is why we have so much stuff relative to those in Europe and Asia. This money coming into the American economy also gives us strong banks and insurance companies, and raises the returns of our retirement and stock portfolios,
This money also is kind of sticky, making investment capital easier for U.S. based businesses, governments and individuals to procure, which drives employment, wages and future innovation in our country. For example, the U.S. receives about half of all venture investment, which is a big reason for the innovation which drives our high standard of living.
This money comes here because until January 20, 2025, the U.S. had the best financial regulatory environment in the world and we are a big market. I also think inertia is a factor. I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but we are not smarter or more "entrepreneurial", whatever that means, than other developed countries. On some level, the money came to us because it had come to us for as long as anyone could remember. Capital providers, and the environment they create, just need a place that has property rights and liquidity. For property rights to exist, and jurisdiction needs Rule of Law and democracy.
In any event, all this investment capital does not need to come here. It can go anywhere, to another OECD country, to China, to India, maybe to all of them, wherever. The U.S. may or may not have democracy, and the Rule of Law is getting shaky. Our President is shaking down major corporations, most recently a major media company, so property rights are not what they once were. We are already witnessing capital flows to other countries, and that can accelerate.
If Trump continues to mess with democracy and the Rule of Law, more investors will get concerned about their property rights, which will cause them to move some of their capital, most likely through selling dollar assets and buying assets in another currency. Trump can't stop this unless they take extreme steps like locking up capital from moving overseas, which would cut off the spigot of new investment dollars (the $1 trillion I mentioned above) and crash the treasury, forcing the U.S. to balance its budget overnight, which would almost certainly cause an economic depression.
Trump and MAGA can do a lot of bad stuff, but the market is a guardrail to his behavior because I don't see a way for Trump or his economic team to get around it or control markets. Investors don't need to send, or keep, their money here, and if Trump spooks them enough, they won't. And if that happens on any scale at all, it won't just be some money being lost. It will ripple through every part of our society. This is a big deal.
Trump says US has reached trade deal with Vietnam
Source: Yahoo Finance
Trump said Vietnam's goods imported to the US would face a 20% tariff, lower than the 46% tariff he had levied as part of his "Liberation Day" plans but higher than the blanket 10% tariff currently in effect. He also said Vietnamese goods would face a higher 40% tariff "on any transshipping" — when goods shipped from Vietnam originate from another country, like China.
Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/live/trump-tariffs-live-updates-trump-says-us-has-reached-trade-deal-with-vietnam-as-deadline-looms-for-deals-200619316.html
This is as TACO as it gets. Vietnamese goods end up with a 20% tax that Americans will pay most of while Vietnam sets tariffs at 0%, mostly for stuff it isn't going to buy anyway. The only major U.S. exports to Vietnam are agricultural, and I believe the tariffs on those were already very low.
Trump and the Right have created a sales tax through these tariffs, which is regressive.
We are losing
We are losing elections, we are losing with Executive Orders, we are losing in the Supreme Court and we are losing in Congress. We are losing at the state level too. Trump's support in opinion polls is in the mid-40's and has not budged much since, despite the horror show our country has become. Absurd, whipsaw decrees making business investment impossible; kidnapping immigrants, tourists, foreign business people, and increasingly American citizens; threatening sovereign nations, individuals and businesses on an almost daily basis, and now this horrible budget bill. Nothing budges Trump's support, and so he gets more vindictive, authoritarian and cruel almost by the day.
The only logical conclusion is that people like Trump, and at least on some level, support what he is doing to our country. Given his rock solid support, we can't blame this descent into chaos solely on Trump. Our fellow Americans are doing this to us. If even a quarter of Trump's current support decided he had gone too far, we could stop him cold. I fear that by the time they reach that conclusion, it will be too late to stop him, and it seems like this 45% doesn't care. I thought there was some shared belief in what our society should be like that would be a guardrail against an autocrat like this, but I was wrong.
I don't have a plan to deal with this. I do know that once a society reaches this point, it typically gets a lot worse before it gets better, if it ever gets better. We may look back on the first half of 2025 as the high point of the Trump reign.
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