Mr.TaterSalad

I think we'd be better off without NAFTA or the UMSCA. The free market in general has been a failure with the levels of inequity and outsourcing of labor it has allowed. I do believe that trading with underdeveloped and impoverished economies has done an immense amount of damage to workers in America. One estimate I read from Economic Policiy Institute, which is a union-funded think tank, said NAFTA cost us over 700,000 jobs. Many of the jobs good paying, manufacturing jobs that non-college educated people came out of high school and worked in. Democrats should not ever be the party defending trade deals like NAFTA or promoting new ones like the TPP. Golden is right to rail on NAFTA.

Democrats need to be messaging in-terms of the Lord Farquaad approach that the average voter understands. I think it would be effective to hit Republicans with some version of a "sure that where be pain, job losses, income loss, and higher prices, but that's a sacrifice Trump is willing to make that will hit you and your family hard." Trump's whole game is the economy and if Democrats can make that house of cards fall he's politically in deep ****.

I think the view of the economy has shifted. I think capitalism, whatever Adam Smith intended it to be, has been bastardized and become an exploitative game for the rich. How can I make the most money possible while paying the fewest people, the very least amount possible? Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Peter Thiel, and on are more representative of modern capitalism and its exploits than your average small business owner or business.

I was in Lansing a few weeks back for the first big protest organized. There were about a 1,000 that showed up. Not amazing turnout, but not bad either.

Trump understands things in the most elementary-like terms. He talks about things the way elementary school kids would if you asked them a simple economic or policy-related question. He has no capacity to articulate a factual, measured, thoughtful policy point of view or statement. Mr. Trump, how are you going to lower oil prices? Drill baby drill! Mr. Trump, how are you going to lower natural gas prices? Frack, frack, frack, frack, frack! Mr. Trump, how are you going to lower grocery prices? It will be easy to lower them. We'll just make them lower.

I don't understand the need to have a lower, 10% tariff on natural gas and oil versus the 25% tariff on everything else because Trump and his merrymen told us it's the country that get hits with the tariff that pays it, not consumers in the country levying the tariff.

I don't think society and conditions today are mirror images of the 1970s and what created stagflation back then. But the economic conditions are increasingly becoming an environment where stagflation could return. How can the Fed combat inflation with increased interest rates if the economy is sliding off a cliff? Higher borrowing costs would only steepen a recession I would think. And if the Fed tries economic stimulus through some form of money printing or quantitative easing program, that runs the risk of heating up Trumpflation more and still not actually turning the economy around and getting it out of a recessionary slump.

I disagree. I think we're headed for 1970s style stagflation potentially. A situation where Trumpflation and higher prices are created because of his tariffs, trade wars with other trading partners, and economy volatility. Then, intermixed with that, you will have a recession because of the economic pressures put on businesses by the Trumpflation, trade wars, and overall day-to-day volatility and uncertainty of his policies.

It's TDS alright, Trans Derangement Syndrome. That's what people like our resident MAGA suffer from. They can't stop talking about trans people and other people's private parts and genitalia.

In your esteemed estimations, do one or both of Iffy and Levi come back?

Former Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown gets it. Democrats need to rebuild a bigger, better, economically progressive, New Deal coalition built to take on big corporations and represent the working class.

As long as Mahomes still gets to snap the ball a second after the buzz and Jawaan Taylor gets to keep lining up offsides I think the NFL would be ok with a buzzer. Seriously though, the shot clock in the basketball buzzes loudly, no reason the NFL's play clock cannot either.

You know Pearce is going to end up being drafted by Howie Roseman and the Eagles now.

I don't know if anyone posted this here yet or over in the investment thread. But the Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank is now projecting negative GDP growth for Q1. I would presume this would have to be because of Trump's tariffs and the higher inflationary pressure that comes with them. Due to concerns around Trump's tariffs, increasing Trumpflation, and the volatility of his economic policies, companies may have been pulling ahead on a lot of purchase orders. With the pull ahead of orders and the manufacturing that goes along with it, companies, I would presume, are trying to get ahead of the tariffs. Which means we'll see a dramatic slowdown afterwards. Is this an unfair assessment? https://www.atlantafed.org/cqer/research/gdpnow

Raymond didn't score on it, but that was a nice little move he made.

Michigan hockey has been really good at producing NHL players. Sean McDonaugh mentioned 8 Michigan alumni on the ice for tonight's game between the two teams.

Love those unis live and on the ice.

NFL Network didn't have him listed as an Edge, but a DL. Maybe they don't decipher between Edge guys and interior DL as far as the combine projections go. Also, I just saw what Cardinal posted about him. If Charlie Campbell's scouting report is legit and he has significant character issues then I guess we can forget him.

I've been watching the combine and I came away really impressed by the IDL James Pearce Jr. from Tennessee. Kid seems like he has a really high athletic upside and a pass rush element to his game having had 7.5 and 9.5 sacks in two different seasons.

When even the state propaganda at Fox is criticizing the situation you know it is bad. Today was about as pathetic and unpresidential display as Donald Trump as ever had.

If these people are so obviously dumb and gullible what's to say we welcome them in and then when the next charlatan or huckster comes along they don't just fall for them too? And again, ignorance of the law doesn't mean you can go around and do things without repercussion. The same is true of an ignorant vote.

I wonder if Trump still wishes Ghislane Maxwell well?

Ignorance of the law is not an argument that holds up in court. Why then should we allow ignorance of a candidate for office to hold up at the ballot box? She had access to the same information you and I did about Trump. There wasn't some deep, dark, corner of the internet where we got our information and she didn't. It was all out in the open, all in the mainstream reporting around Trump. From his sexual assault convictions to his fraudulent business practices to Project 2025 to every terrible policy he tried to implement in his first term as President. Should we welcome her into our anti-Trump coalition with open arms? Yes, we should attempt to. But what's to say Trump doesn't try for a third term and there Ms. Cooper is, or some voter like her, making excuses all the way to the ballot box, ready to vote for Trump yet again.

That is definitely a Brad Holmes type of player though because there is contractual value in guys that can't stay healthy.