"When a feebleminded lunatic runs the world's most well-funded war machine, it's best to worry and risk being accused of overreaction. The problem is that a significant swath of Americans aren't alarmed enough. ...
I am speaking of the 'Trump Always Chickens Out' maxim that has taken root since the beginning of Trump's second term."
~ Jason Linkins
#Trump #TACO #WallStreet #EconomicElites #morality #InsiderTrading #StockMarket
/1
"This refers to the persistent belief that Trump is perpetually climbing down from his most dire threats—a paper tiger forever on the verge of folding. ...
It's fitting that the TACO meme was largely birthed by Wall Streeters, operating under the shield of plutocratic wealth and chronic naïveté that is intrinsic to the financial services sector. ...
Trump's TACO cycle continues to be fodder for insider trading and market manipulation."
"We bear the cost of Trump's belligerence and suffer psychically as he swings from one unimaginable threat to the next. Meanwhile, insiders get to manipulate the mass media and the markets to further their authoritarian political goals and self-enrichment. This TACO party is proving to be extremely profitable for an elite few, but I'd bet you won't be invited to it anytime soon."
#Trump #TACO #WallStreet #EconomicElites #morality #InsiderTrading #StockMarket
/3
"A high-profile US defense department official who oversees the agency’s artificial intelligence efforts made a profit of up to $24m selling a private investment he held in Elon Musk’s AI company earlier this year, according to government ethics records released this month. The value of his stake totaled a maximum of a million dollars when he joined the department."
~ Aram Roston
#Trump #InsiderTrading #EconomicElites #StockMarket
/4
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/09/pentagon-ai-xai-emil-michael
"Emil Michael, who is the Pentagon’s under secretary for research and engineering under the Trump administration, oversees negotiations with AI companies and has been pushing the defense department to rapidly increase the widespread use of AI."
"This is how the ratchet of normalization works—Trump makes the unthinkable thinkable, and when the worst-case scenario doesn’t come to pass, we all breathe a collective sigh of relief. But it’s time to stop seeking refuge in the familiarity of this pattern. Trump threatened to commit genocide in the context of an illegal war."
~ Matt Johnson
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/america-needs-to-impeach-trump-for
" It would be fantastically irresponsible to retreat to comfortable rationalizations about 'TACO' or how Trump should be taken 'seriously' instead of 'literally.' We can’t be expected to know the inner workings of Trump’s mind, but even if he was faking it, the terror for Iranians of the mere hint of nuclear annihilation was all too real. That matters."
@wdlindsy “he never follows through” one day becomes “I can’t believe he did that!!!”
It seems to me like classic “the boy who cried wolf” mentality
William Lindsey 
f*cking b*tch club