Hottest Summer Yet, and Another Trump Grift
Scientists have told us people will die from heat. Who is listening?
The summer Solstice has come and we are not saved, to paraphrase Jeremiah. This will probably be the hottest summer in human history, likely hotter than the record hot summers of 2023 and 2024. Last summer, in my June 17, 2024 post, I described the National Academy of Sciences study predicting the rise and death and even parts of the world becoming uninhabitable. Of course that NAS is surely out of favor with the new Regime. The Economist magazine, in its May 24th cover, had the following on its cover:
We have a Congress (the Majority at least) and the Trump Regime gutting scientific research of all types, even funding support through universities and the NIH. Of course they don’t believe in global warming. As I write this, there are people stifling in the heat on the East Coast and Upper Midwest, no doubt some of them dying. If the Trump Regime stays in office until 2028 (without Dems taking Congress in 2026) the world will suffer and be behind on progress against diseases, etc. This summer is supposedly the last year that FEMA will exist. I really worry what will happen if we have: a war, a pandemic, or really severe weather events. We are governed by clowns.
Trump Media Group Stock Buyback - An Ass-backwards Financial Move
The following is verbatim fromYahoo Finance yesterday “President Donald Trump's media company plans to buy back up to $400 million of its stock, which have lost 46% of their value this year.” Yes, that is correct. You can look up other similar stories. Trump’s media company, which owns “Truth” social is a publicly traded company trading under the symbol DJT. Look it up.
Normally, when a publicly-traded company buys back stock from the public two things are going on: 1) The Company is doing well (making money) and doesn’t know what to do with all the money it is making; 2) The Company wants to reward shareholders, but does not want to pay a dividend, since dividends are taxable to the stock-owners. Some companies also do “buy-backs” because they think it will make the remaining shares’ value increase (fewer shares get a bigger share of future earnings). This last reason for a buyback has many skeptics, both in finance academia and on Wall Street.
Well, Trump’s company is not making money. Its stock price is down over 40% since the last time it sold shares to the public. If DJT (the company) is buying back $400 million of shares, who are the shareholders selling their stock? Might they be DJT himself? Or his family? Since our dictator refuses to release any of his financial information, we might not know for some time. The US Government, at least Mr. Trump, uses Truth Social for important announcements about things like bombing Iran1. The world is forced to collaborate with Trump media. The last thing I’ll say about Truth Social is that the house organ of the old Soviet government was called Pravda, which means “truth”.
I will declare to readers that my personal belief is that destroying Iran’s nuclear capabilities is/was the right thing to do and would make the world better off. I only hope that the strikes the US Air Force undertook did the job, since it is a tricky operation. I only wish we could be sure the highly-enriched uranium is destroyed and the Islamic Revolutionary government of Iran is toppled. I have nothing against Iran but the IRGC fanatics who took over the country since 1979 are the scum of the earth.