Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, outside the dinner where Trump recognized and thanked the largest purchasers of Trump's meme cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrency is a marketable entity looking for a legitimate use.
They are a "collectable," like baseball cards, rare stamps and coins, limited-edition Beanie Babies, numbered art prints, tulip bulbs, and NFTs. NFTs are non-fungible-tokens, i.e., a specific digital reproduction of something, most famously of the face of a gorilla.
What is useful about cryptocurrencies is that there is a market for them. A person can profit if one can sell the collectable for more money than one paid to buy it. There had been one giant use for crypto currencies. As a secret digital market, they facilitate tax cheating, money laundering, drug trafficking, and other financial transactions that are best done secretly.
Trump created a second use case, and he deserves recognition as an innovator. He monetized his shamelessness. Trump created a perfect vehicle for giving a government official a bribe. It is a way to buy influence, a 21st-century version of 16th-century papal indulgence, something good to have in the favor bank. Trump created his own branded cryptocurrency, the Trump coin, and he made it available for sale. Like a ticket to heaven, Trump's cryptocurrency was created at a marginal cost of zero. Trump fans bought them, pushed the price up, and created a chance for the Trump family and friends to profit on day one. That was use number one: quick money. Use number two is that now foreign and domestic countries, businesses, and individuals can buy the tokens and support the price. There is no use bribing Trump if he doesn't know you bribed him. A bribed politician needs to communicate that he knows you made the bribe and that he appreciates you. The recognition dinner serves a purpose for both sides of the deal.
This is a nice clean transaction, but the corruption of government is not complete without the corruption of truth. You are not seeing what you are seeing. Trump's press secretary, Karoline Leavitt held a news conference on Thursday. She said, “It’s absurd for anyone to insinuate that this president is profiting off of the presidency."
Yes. Not just incorrect. Absurd.
She says this on us. If we see corruption right in front of our eyes, then we must be deranged.
Note: To get daily delivery of this blog to your email go to: https://petersage.substack.com/ Subscribe. Don't pay. The blog is free and always will be.
4 comments:
Trump is going to be the cause of his own downfall. Greed is a bad thing, and Trump is afflicted.
Trump’s corruption won't be the downfall of Trump. Corruption at this level will be the downfall of America. Trump will wreck our financial base as he did with all his enterprises; the difference is that this time, it will be the US financial system. Like the white collar criminals who sold bundled securities as AAA-rated investments, buyers learned too late that they were nearly worthless. In this case, the rating agency isn't financially accredited; it's the Republican Congress.
And somehow the working class is supporting Trump even more. The Republican base is growing among non educated voters. I don’t understand how or why, but it’s reality. I don’t think they care he is what he is, but maybe when costs go up and their paychecks don’t, then they will care?
The more Democrats and nonaffiliated voters are damning him for is corruption, MAGA-base supporters feel vindicated that Trump is moving in the right direction. No MAGA influencers are denouncing the corruption, or their siloed news source doesn't report the facts as they are.
Post a Comment