Before the Vatican Conclave chose the world’s next pope, Donald Trump posted an AI generated image of himself as the next pope. Later he claimed he was just joking around and didn’t even know who had posted that image on HIS social media. Really? Come on. We are only 3 months into Trump’s second term but we can all see how he imposes his will on everything he possibly can from demanding a ban on birthright citizenship to taking over the Kennedy Center to telling Americans how many Barbie dolls their kids can have.
As USA Today reports:
First it was fewer dolls. Now it’s fewer pencils.
President Donald Trump reiterated his view that American children don’t need so many personal possessions ‒ pencils were his latest example ‒ as he defended his universal tariffs on imports that could spike the prices of many goods, particularly imports from China.
Trump, during an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” that aired May 4, dug in on a scenario he introduced days before ‒ that little girls in the United States might need to accept having fewer dolls.
“I don’t think that a beautiful baby girl needs – that’s 11 years old – needs to have 30 dolls,” Trump told “Meet the Press” host Kristen Welker. “I think they can have three dolls or four dolls…
Then Trump suggested children are capable of cutting back on a basic school supply: pencils.
“I’m just saying they don’t need to have 30 dolls. They can have three. They don’t need to have 250 pencils. They can have five.”
Trump got a huge amount of push back from Wall Street to Main Street for his tariffs especially on China and his un-empathic comments about dolls and pencils.
And Trump responded to that push back. The US will reset tariffs on Chinese goods to 30% for a 90 day period, while China said it would set 10% tariffs on American imports during the same timeframe while talks are ongoing.
Even though the US and China have agreed to lower the tariffs, there will still be pain for American families.
“While the administration promises that tariffs are designed to encourage reshoring, the immediate effect is a regressive tax system that punishes those least able to afford rising costs. Imported goods, from essential clothing to produce, are unavoidable purchases for many families, making it impossible to escape these price hikes. While reshoring in industries like auto manufacturing could bring jobs back, the long-term benefits must contend with the short-term harm being inflicted on the broader population.”
Trump is trying to sell Americans on the idea of short term pain for long term gain. Trump says that his tariffs will reshore industry to America, which will make America great in the long term. That sounds plausible to many of Trump’s supporters who will be the most hard hit. They didn’t vote for short term economic pain, but many are willing to give him the benefit of the doubt right now. Maybe that’s because the tariffs are just starting to hit their wallets.
This approach comes with an especially glaring problem for Trump:
While Trump is telling Americans they have to get along with less, Trump is making out like a bandit.
Trump gets richer, you get poorer.
TRUMP’S MASSIVE CORRUPTION
The Trump family has amassed close to one billion dollars every month he has been in office so far- that’s almost 3 billion already and this is just the start of his four year term as president. This will be the most corrupt presidency in the history of our country.
I am not pretending that others in Congress never corruptly gained from being in office. Congressmen have insider information about the laws they will be passing and can game the stock market in ways that make them richer even when they know they should not do it. Both Democrats and Republicans have done this. But nowhere near this scale.
When it comes to massive, obscene, shocking levels of corruption, Trump has taken it to a whole new level. He is crimeing on steroids. His cryptocurrency heist alone has catapulted him and his family into the billionaire class. Thanks to the Supreme Court’s immunity decision and the failed past efforts by Democrats to impeach him, that made Trump even stronger, Trump is fearless when it comes to consequences. He thinks he will not be held accountable.
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post reports:
Trump spoke at a dinner for his super PAC, MAGA Inc., for which donors paid $1.5 million apiece for access to Trump and to his artificial intelligence and crypto “czar,” David Sacks. And he posted yet another promotion for a “Most Exclusive Once in Lifetime Invitation” — the chance to “Join President Donald J. Trump at his Private, Members-Only Club in Washington, D.C. for Dinner!” on May 22, awarded to the 220 people who make the largest investments in Trump’s crypto meme coin.
This access-selling scheme is part of a larger crypto racket that has funneled hundreds of millions of dollars into the pockets of Trump and his family and friends, some of it from foreign businesses and governments. Billions more in paper earnings may soon be headed into Trump’s accounts. It appears to be corruption, plain and simple — he’s directly using the presidency to further enrich himself — with the added insult that tens of thousands of novice investors who are presumably his supporters have lost their shirts buying the Trump coins.
While American kids surrender their dolls, Trump is charging $20 million a pop for people to have dinner with him. One international trucking logistics firm is spending as much as that on Trump coins (it’s issuing debt to buy the crypto), because it believes that “the addition of the Official Trump tokens” will help it “advocate for fair, balanced, and free trade between Mexico and the US.” At the same time, an investment firm in the United Arab Emirates announced that it is making a $2 billion investment using Trump’s stablecoins, another crypto scheme the president’s family is running.
GOLDEN PALACE AIRPLANE GRIFT
The Trump administration plans to accept a luxury Boeing 747-8 plane as a donation from the Qatari royal family that will be upgraded to serve as Air Force One, which would make it one of the biggest foreign gifts ever received by the U.S. government. Sold new, a commercial Boeing 747-8 costs in the range of $400 million. “Even in a presidency defined by grift, this move is shocking,” said Robert Weissman, a co-president of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy organization. “It makes clear that U.S. foreign policy under Donald Trump is up for sale.”[NYT]
UNCONSTITUTIONAL
This is unconstitutional under the Emoluments Clause.
The Emoluments Clause, specifically Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the U.S. Constitution, prohibits federal officials from accepting gifts, titles, or emoluments from foreign governments without the consent of Congress. The clause was designed to prevent foreign influence on U.S. leaders by preventing them from being bribed with gifts or positions of honor.
Ranking Oversight Committee Member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) tweeted this: “The Constitution is perfectly clear: no present ‘of any kind whatever’ from a foreign state without Congressional permission”.
Trump might as well be wearing a “for sale” sign around his neck. Countries and individuals have responded by cozying up to Trump and paying to play. Trump has also fired 17 IGs (inspection generals) who used to investigate and ferret out government corruption, report it and get funds returned to government coffers. Federal IGs saved approximately $93.1 billion in 2023 alone. No more. Trump has intentionally shut down our ability to know about the extent of his corruption.
CBS News Reports:
President Trump’s venture into crypto products has increased his family’s wealth by billions in the last six months as his administration continues to loosen the federal government’s regulatory approach to the digital currency industry as a whole.
The group State Democracy Defenders Action estimated in a new report that the president’s crypto holdings now represent nearly 40% of his net worth — or approximately $2.9 billion. That increase is due in part to his release of the $TRUMP and $MELANIA meme coins, in addition to a large stake in World Liberty Financial, a crypto exchange affiliated with the Trump family that launched in October 2024.
The president’s net worth is expected to get another bump, with World Liberty Financial’s announcement this week that a Abu Dhabi-backed firm will invest billions of dollars in the Trump family-affiliated crypto fund. The Emirati firm, MGX, will purchase $2 billion in a stablecoin product offered by World Liberty, the company said in a statement to CBS. The currency, called “USD1” will then be used to invest in Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges.
World Liberty has ties to the president and his sons. The fine print on the company’s website says an entity affiliated with Mr. Trump and his family members own a 60% stake in the company.
According to the company’s public reports, a Trump family entity also holds 22.5 billion of the $WLF tokens –- and takes an additional 75% in net revenue from future token purchases.
MAGA BLOWBACK
MAGA influencers Ben Shapiro and Laura Loomer want Trump to quit crimeing.
Shapiro warned that the Trump family’s crypto ventures are inviting “influence peddling” allegations that could damage the MAGA agenda.
- “I think if we switch the names to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden, we’d all be freaking out on the right,” Shapiro said. “If you want President Trump to succeed, this kind of skeezy stuff needs to stop.”
WHO IS POPE LEO AND WHY DOES HE MATTER?
Pope Leo, by way of contrast, was born Robert Prevost in 1955 and lived with his two older brothers, mother and father in a modest home in Dolton, Illinois, outside of Chicago. He served as an altar boy and was ordained in 1982. Voting records show that he voted Republican. His brothers describe him as a political moderate who was always thought by people who knew him growing up to be destined to become pope because of his disposition. He spent years in Peru helping his parishioners in times of need. Parishioners in Peru remember him in rubber boots, in a devastating flood, working side by side with the Red Cross. They shared images of him on a horse, in the countryside, wearing stylish aviator shades and crooning Christmas ballads — “Feliz Navidad!” — grinning and clapping alongside a rousing crowd.
Pope Leo came from a family of immigrants. His grandparents were Creoles who moved from New Orleans. He does not identify as Black himself, but he understands the pain and suffering of people who were not born into wealth, don’t have connections, and have immigrated to a new country.
Before becoming the new leader of the Catholic Church, Leo told Italian network Rai that he grew up in a family of immigrants. “I was born in the United States… But my grandparents were all immigrants, French, Spanish.
Before becoming the pope he posted on social media about his disapproval of JD Vance and Trump when it came to our country’s treatment of immigrants.
The AP Reports:
[His] account in mid-April reposted someone else’s rebuke to Trump’s meeting in the Oval Office with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, and pointed to an op-ed by auxiliary Catholic Bishop Evelio Menjivar of Washington, D.C., highlighting the suffering of migrants summarily deported by the Trump administration to El Salvador.
“Do you not see the suffering? Is your conscience not disturbed?” the op-ed that Prevost reposted reads.
In a more pointed example, the account in February posted an opinion piece from the National Catholic Reporter, a liberal-leaning Catholic newspaper, titled: “JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.”
POPE LEO FOR PRESIDENT
Pope Leo might agree with Trump that American children don’t need 30 dolls and can make do with 5 pencils, but, unlike Trump, this new pope actually cares about the people instead of the billionaire class. Pope Leo will be an important voice on the world stage who could act as a counter to the overt corruption, cruelty and callousness of Trump and his administration. Maybe the contrast between these two world leaders will get people asking questions like–Why do billionaires need another yacht? Who or what could stop Trump from selling out our country? Since when are Elon Musk and Trump the poster boys for happiness in life?
Pope Leo’s presence on the world stage might help Americans think longer and harder not only about how we are treating immigrants, but how we are treating each other, and who we are choosing to be our leaders. He will, I hope, get people thinking about character and the value of sharing with people less fortunate than you and why it is that being kind to others, and giving to others actually makes people happier and helps people live more fulfilling lives. Perhaps he will get people thinking and talking more about what kind of life is a truly rich life and one that is worth living.
