November 20, 2025

Thursday, November 20, 2025. Annette’s Roundup for Democracy.

Trump is destroying our economy.

His cult doesn’t recognize this, but Trump is a failed businessman- with 4 (some say 6) corporate bankruptcies under his watch.

Additionally, Trump collected other multiple failed entities and projects, including: Trump University which promised real-estate investing expertise and mentorship and instead offered fraud and deceptive practices and resulted in students rewarded with a $25 million settlement in 2016; Trump Steaks; Trump Credit Card / Trump Rewards Visa; Trump Network, a multilevel marketing vitamin & supplement business; Trump Home (Furniture Line); Trump Magazine; Trump Telecom / GoTrump.com (Travel Booking Site); Trump Vodka; Trump Mortgage and 4 failed casinos.

Some other lesser known failures round out Trump’s pre- political business career: Trump Fragrance Collection, Trump bottled water, Trump Shuttle (Airline), Trump: The Game (twice ); Trump Casinos Online, and Trump Institute (seminars).

No one can say the man did try.

Branding is the reason he is in the White House. Thanks to Jeff Zucker, president of NBC Entertainment, Trump became a household name - playing a successful and rich businessman on television, flashing gold on buildings, and plastering his name on anything he could.

Now he occupies the White House where he makes decisions without knowledge and claims expertise about matters he knows nothing about.

The only question remaining is which will give Trump a more egregious place in history - his moral failures or economic ones.

That will likely depend on where he does the most damage.

Today’s headline in the New York Times should come as no surprise.

Trump tariffs are killing us. Imports may be down, as is th deficits but prices are rising. So much for affordability.

President Trump’s sweeping tariffs took a toll on trade in August, as imports of goods and services dropped 5.1 percent, to $340.4 billion, after taxes on exports from roughly 90 countries went into effect on Aug. 7, newly released data from the Commerce Department showed Wednesday.

The data, which incorporates less than a month of Mr. Trump’s new tariffs, illustrates how the sharp increase in trade taxes has scrambled life for international business.

U.S. firms clamped down on purchases of foreign machinery, industrial supplies, pharmaceutical ingredients and telecom equipment as tariffs went into effect in August, after months of stockpiling that had filled their store rooms and warehouses. Roughly half the drop in imports was because of a decline in purchases of gold, which investors had rushed to buy the previous month as a safe haven for their investments.

U.S. goods exports also fell in August, shrinking $500 million to $179 billion as the rest of the world bought fewer American consumer goods, cars and car parts, and gold. That was offset by an increase in exports of U.S. services, including travel.

Because of the fall in imports, the U.S. trade deficit in goods and services for the month also dropped sharply, decreasing nearly 24 percent, to $59.6 billion, compared with July.

The data, which is compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau, had been delayed by more than a month because of the government shutdown. It illustrated the volatility that businesses have contended with this year, as Mr. Trump introduced what is effectively a new trading system for the United States.

The president announced global double-digit tariffs in April on what he called “Liberation Day,” saying that the previous system had cheated the United States and cost Americans jobs and money. While his tariffs briefly went into effect, they were then largely paused for four months as the administration tried to strike deals with trading partners.

On Aug. 7, the tariffs again went into effect, with a 15 percent rate on goods from Bolivia, Ecuador and Nigeria, 20 percent on Taiwanese products and 50 percent on Brazilian exports.

Altogether, they brought the U.S. effective tariff rate to more than 18 percent, the highest level since 1934, according to the Budget Lab at Yale.

U.S. imports and exports had risen in July, as companies that depend on goods from other countries tried to get their shipments in before those tariffs went into effect. In August, trade then dropped, as American businesses imported fewer industrial supplies, food and beverages, and machinery, according to an analysis by Moody’s Analytics.

The sharp drop in the U.S. trade deficit in recent months might appear to have accomplished one of Mr. Trump’s goals. Although some economists still disagree with the idea, the president has often looked at the trade deficit as a sign of weakness for the U.S. economy. He has argued that the United States should make more of its own goods.

Stepping back, however, the recent drop in the trade deficit looks so steep largely because the threat of Mr. Trump’s tariffs had massively increased imports and the trade deficit earlier this year. After Mr. Trump’s election, the U.S. trade deficit spiked as companies rushed to try to game the system and bring in goods ahead of tariffs coming into effect. Those shipments started to drop after April, when the president announced his global tariffs.

The same effect played out on a smaller scale in July, as companies brought in more goods ahead of the tariff deadline in August.

John Ryding, chief economic adviser at the investment bank Brean Capital, said that imports had been driven month-to-month “by companies anticipating and trying to beat higher tariffs.”

“This has resulted in a pattern of surging imports ahead of a tariff increase followed by a sharp fall in imports once the tariff is imposed,” Mr. Ryding said. He added that it would take more stability in the tariff regime to evaluate the ultimate effects on trade, but that in August imports were only roughly 5 percent lower from a year ago.

Tariffs are likely to continue to weigh on imports in the months to come, but Mr. Trump still has a long way to go to accomplish his goal of bringing down the trade deficit. Because of the rush of imports earlier in the year, the U.S. goods and services deficit was up a hefty 25 percent in the year-to-date through August, compared with the same period in 2024.

The stockpiling from businesses before tariffs went into effect has also been a significant factor in mitigating the economic impact of the levies. For months, U.S. companies have been able to hold off on increasing their prices as they worked through older inventory.

But as time went on and that inventory dwindled, more companies have begun to pass the burden of tariffs on to American consumers in the form of higher prices.

That has weighed on Mr. Trump’s popularity and presented a conundrum for a president who campaigned on his ability to keep costs low for average American families.

This month, Democrats won elections around the country in large part by harnessing worries about the cost of living. Last week, the Trump administration introduced new tariff exemptions in an effort to lower some food prices. It remains to be seen if concerns about high consumer costs will encourage the administration to further back down on its tariffs.

Many of the president’s tariffs, including those he issued in early August, could also be undermined by a challenge at the Supreme Court. The court is weighing whether Mr. Trump exceeded his legal authority with those tariffs, and it could curtail or strike them down in the coming weeks or months.

Even so, the president has other legal authorities he can use, and is likely to announce new measures to replace at least some of them.(New York Times)

DelusionalDonald continues his claims, but his popularity falls and prices go up.

Why do you suppose this is happening? 👇🤔

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Trump’s Quiet Piggy remark to a female reporter is reverberating.

The Epstein Files wouldn’t go way. Now Trump’s misogyny and disdain for journalists, especially female journalists, doesn’t seem to be vanishing either.

Sample postings from Twitter yesterday.

Touch to watch.👇

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Funeral for Dick Cheney, Vice President under Bush, in DC today.

Dick Cheney funeral: Biden to attend, Bush to deliver tribute

Video. Touch.👇
https://youtu.be/3ZOkLAKMj3E?si=MMtAQlfLTRvnIjgh

Former Vice President Dick Cheney's funeral will be held in Washington on Thursday, with several high-profile political figures set to be at the service for the man considered one of the most influential vice presidents in U.S. history.

Former President Joe Biden plans to attend, a spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.

The funeral will be held at Washington National Cathedral at 11 a.m. ET.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney's funeral will be held in Washington on Thursday, with several high-profile political figures set to be at the service for the man considered one of the most influential vice presidents in U.S. history.

Former President Joe Biden plans to attend, a spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.

The funeral will be held at Washington National Cathedral at 11 a.m. ET.

A polarizing and powerful figure, Cheney worked for four decades in Washington. He served in Congress, was secretary of defense under President George H.W. Bush and then vice president under President George W. Bush.

He played a leading role in the response to the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, including the war on terror and invasion of Iraq.

Bush, in a statement after Cheney's death, called Cheney "a patriot who brought integrity, high intelligence, and seriousness of purpose to every position he held."

Washington National Cathedral, situated just miles north of the White House, has been the site of several state funerals for former presidents, including Jimmy Carter, Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush.

After news of Cheney's death earlier this month, the White House lowered flags but made no major proclamation.

President Donald Trump was silent on Cheney's death. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Trump was "aware" of his passing.

Trump and Cheney have a history of tensions, as Cheney became a blunt critic of Trump following his push to deny the 2020 election results and the pro-Trump mob attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Cheney, a lifelong conservative voice, endorsed then-Vice President Kamala Harris over Trump in 2024. Explaining his decision, Cheney said "there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump."

Trump responded at the time by calling Cheney an "irrelevant RINO" and "King of Endless, Nonsensical Wars, wasting Lives and Trillions of Dollars."(ABC News)

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Charlotte! North Carolina

The fight against ICE expands. Youth fights back.

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New York City.

Jewish Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch will continue to serve under Mamdani.

Jessica Tisch will remain NYPD commissioner under Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani

NEW YORK (WABC) -- New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani will have one familiar face in his administration when he takes office in January.

NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch announced Wednesday that she accepted Mamdani's offer to remain in her position when Mamdani succeeds Mayor Eric Adams.

Late into his mayoral campaign, Mamdani, 34, said he would not replace the commissioner if elected. The mayor-elect cited the city's drop in shootings, murders and transit crime since Tisch, 44, began her tenure as the commissioner in November 2024.

"I look forward to working with Commissioner Jessica Tisch to deliver genuine public safety in New York City. I have admired her work cracking down on corruption in the upper echelons of the police department, driving down crime in New York City, and standing up for New Yorkers in the face of authoritarianism," Mamdani said. "Together, we will deliver a city where rank-and-file police officers and the communities they serve alike are safe, represented, and proud to call New York their home." (ABC New York)

Tomorrow, Mr. Mamdani goes to the White House, Stay tuned.

Trump’s remark on Truth Social suggests the meeting might not go too well. 👇

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