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Posted
26 minutes ago, tx 3 putt said:

trump economics - you can finance that door dash order 

You joke, but yesterday they did announced a Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) with the leader Klarna:

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5205786-doordash-klarna-sign-deal-for-deferred-installment-food-delivery-payments/

DoorDash and Klarna, a company that offers “buy now, pay later” programs, have come together on a deal for deferred and installment food delivery payments.

“In the coming months, DoorDash customers will be able to enjoy Klarna’s seamless range of payment options when purchasing groceries, retail, and even DashPass Annual Plan – on DoorDash.com or through the DoorDash app,” according to a webpage on the deal on Klarna’s website.

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Posted
6 minutes ago, Vegas64 said:

You joke, but yesterday they did announced a Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) with the leader Klarna:

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5205786-doordash-klarna-sign-deal-for-deferred-installment-food-delivery-payments/

DoorDash and Klarna, a company that offers “buy now, pay later” programs, have come together on a deal for deferred and installment food delivery payments.

“In the coming months, DoorDash customers will be able to enjoy Klarna’s seamless range of payment options when purchasing groceries, retail, and even DashPass Annual Plan – on DoorDash.com or through the DoorDash app,” according to a webpage on the deal on Klarna’s website.

Sweet. They allow you to spread payments over 36 months for rates between 8 and 34%. My Chipotle lunch today will be paid off by 2028.

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Posted
1 minute ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Sweet. They allow you to spread payments over 36 months for rates between 8 and 34%. My Chipotle lunch today will be paid off by 2028.

It's so stupid and breaks my brain to think about anyone wanting to use this. 

But obviously there is a market for it or they wouldn't have rolled it out. Which makes me weep for our future that Gen Z have been so conditioned to order processed foods at 3x the price because they don't want to leave the house. 

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Posted
2 hours ago, Vegas64 said:

It's so stupid and breaks my brain to think about anyone wanting to use this. 

But obviously there is a market for it or they wouldn't have rolled it out. Which makes me weep for our future that Gen Z have been so conditioned to order processed foods at 3x the price because they don't want to leave the house. 

wall-e-what-do-you-want-to-do.gif

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Posted (edited)
3 hours ago, tx 3 putt said:

trump economics - you can finance that door dash order 

 

"They're called Chimichanga Default Swaps"

 

IMG_3509.jpeg

 

 

 

 

"Collateralized Burrito Obligations"

 

IMG_3510.jpeg

Edited by tx 3 putt
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Posted
1 minute ago, David Dennison said:

Breaking stuff to get credit for fixing it is brilliant.

It also is proof positive that they know how stupid most Americans are.

Undoubtedly.

One polyannaish hope I have for this shit is, assuming we recover and elect a sane candidate again, someone who understands government and the United States will have to rebuild things.

And hopefully we can build it back better, faster, stronger. /six million dollar man

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Posted
6 minutes ago, David Dennison said:

Breaking stuff to get credit for fixing it is brilliant.

It's also proof positive that they know how stupid most Americans are.

That's the whole reason they spiked the border bill in 2024. Can't call for martial law when the border is being handled

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Posted
I thought there was going to be more of a plan this time around. A horrible plan, but a plan nonetheless. Nope. It’s somehow all even dumber than the last time. 

I don’t know man. “Burn America to the ground and give anything left to billionaires” seems to be off to a good start.
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Posted
2 hours ago, tx 3 putt said:

so much winning .....

 

IMG_3508.jpeg

I VOTED FOR TRUMP BECAUSE I BELIEVE IN FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY!

(Cheers firehose spilling billions and billions of taxpayer dollars directly to farmers to pay for the damage the regime's idiotic policies are causing).

Irony is fucking dead.

1 minute ago, Red Five said:


I don’t know man. “Burn America to the ground and give anything left to billionaires” seems to be off to a good start.

Yep, all on track.  Clearly, whatever our problems might have been, the solution is "end democracy, make the poor and middle class suffer, and install an oligarchy."  Don't understand why we didn't try that earlier.

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Posted
1 hour ago, Biff Tannen said:

I thought there was going to be more of a plan this time around. A horrible plan, but a plan nonetheless. Nope. It’s somehow all even dumber than the last time. 

Disruption is the plan, with Elmo running point.

 

Posted
3 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

So if I understand the plight of the farmer:

costs go up they get free money even crop proces go up. 
 

prices tank, they get free money even if costs drop accordingly. 
 

bad crop year?  Free money. 
 

good crop year?  Still free money but yay bumper crop!
 

and they’re mostly all against socialist freeloading policies. 

Simplified, but how far off?

In one, as the Brits say.

Posted
25 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

So if I understand the plight of the farmer:

costs go up they get free money even if crop prices go up. 
 

prices tank, they get free money even if costs drop accordingly. 
 

bad crop year?  Free money. 
 

good crop year?  Still free money but yay bumper crop!
 

and they’re mostly all against socialist freeloading policies. 

Simplified, but how far off?

I think what you are missing is that the concept of a "farmer" is way different in reality than what we grew up thinking. The Iowa State guy can share, but like 80% of farms are owned by massive corporations at this point. They are high-tech, software-driven, autonomous drones and tractors and irrigation systems that rely on a handful of whitecollar tech-enabled guys and an army of Guatamalans doing grunt work for $.17 on the dollar.

The small farms who aren't attractive enough to have already been bought out by big farms struggle to make a middle class living doing yeoman's work. 

It's truly a tragedy what's happened to farms/the farmer. But hey, PROGRESS!!!!1111

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Posted
5 minutes ago, Vegas64 said:

I think what you are missing is that the concept of a "farmer" is way different in reality than what we grew up thinking. The Iowa State guy can share, but like 80% of farms are owned by massive corporations at this point. They are high-tech, software-driven, autonomous drones and tractors and irrigation systems that rely on a handful of whitecollar tech-enabled guys and an army of Guatamalans doing grunt work for $.17 on the dollar.

The small farms who aren't attractive enough to have already been bought out by big farms struggle to make a middle class living doing yeoman's work. 

It's truly a tragedy what's happened to farms/the farmer. But hey, PROGRESS!!!!1111

Not true, ackshually.

960x0.jpg?format=jpg&width=1440

Also:

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Posted
5 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Not true, ackshually.

960x0.jpg?format=jpg&width=1440

Also:

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I don't know. You are using land ownership as the metric to identify, but I don't think USDA does:

Quote

88 percent of American farms are classified as “small” by the USDA. You’d be forgiven for thinking “small” refers to acreage, but it actually means that the farm’s annual gross revenue does not exceed $350,000. Despite comprising the majority of farms, small farms account for only about 5 percent of net farm income in the country, while “large” farms – those grossing over $1 million annually – account for 56 percent of net farm income.

https://modernfarmer.com/2018/06/by-the-numbers-state-of-the-independent-farmer/

Posted (edited)

@TwiceHorn Further, semantically, it sounds like the term "Industrial" farm doesn't mean owned by corporations or trusts or non-operating land owners, but that it refers to the massive private family held farms:

Quote

 

It's crucial to understand that while these large-scale farms contribute significantly to farm revenue, they are predominantly family-owned and operated. In fact, 96% of U.S. farms are family-owned, including many of the largest operations.

Industrial agriculture and farm consolidation have led to an increase in the average farm size and a decrease in the total number of farms. However, this trend doesn't necessarily equate to corporate takeover. The agricultural landscape in the U.S. remains dominated by family farms of various sizes, from small to very large operations.

 

https://www.fb.org/newsroom/fast-facts

Edited by Vegas64
Posted (edited)
24 minutes ago, Vegas64 said:

@TwiceHorn Further, semantically, it sounds like the term "Industrial" farm doesn't mean owned by corporations or trusts or non-operating land owners, but that it refers to the massive private family held farms:

https://www.fb.org/newsroom/fast-facts

Yeah I think your fundamental point that they are sophisticated business operations remains.  And we probably shouldn't think of Farmer Brown and Elsa, Babe and so forth when we think of farms.

Somewhere years ago I had come to the same belief that it was all ConAgra and ADM and all them.  And I usually don't make stuff up out of the whole cloth.  Maybe at one time they were renting and operating a lot of farmland.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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Posted
3 hours ago, Pato del Muerto said:

So if I understand the plight of the farmer:

costs go up they get free money even if crop prices go up. 
 

prices tank, they get free money even if costs drop accordingly. 
 

bad crop year?  Free money. 
 

good crop year?  Still free money but yay bumper crop!
 

and they’re mostly all against socialist freeloading policies. 

Simplified, but how far off?

hmmm i'm starting to think my niece becoming a farmer bc her plans to serve her country in the NPS/USFS/BLM got blown up might not be such a bad career move 🤔

Posted
3 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

Yeah I think your fundamental point that they are sophisticated business operations remains.  And we probably shouldn't think of Farmer Brown and Elsa, Babe and so forth when we think of farms.

Somewhere years ago I had come to the same belief that it was all ConAgra and ADM and all them.  And I usually don't make stuff up out of the whole cloth.  Maybe at one time they were renting and operating a lot of farmland.

Have you ever seen Food Inc?  Came out almost 20 years ago now. Monsanto was strong arming family farms into selling even back then. Big Ag is fucking awful. 

Posted
5 hours ago, Horn Dog said:

IMG_9658.thumb.jpeg.a700deaecf4d1d0aacb61990eb9f892e.jpeg

Cubans deserve all the Leopards possible.

I don’t know, Donnie, there are a whole lot of old Cubans who might’ve been trained by the CIA back in the day. But think how popular you will be in Florida when you get rid of all the Cubans.  If we ever have an election in 2026, I mean.

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Posted (edited)
35 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

Have you ever seen Food Inc?  Came out almost 20 years ago now. Monsanto was strong arming family farms into selling even back then. Big Ag is fucking awful. 

If not that something like it. Monsanto I don't think has ever owned significant farm property. Their main deal is roundup and GMO seed. 

I am, however, extremely familiar with U North's culcitate. 

Edited by TwiceHorn
Posted (edited)
9 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

If not that something like it. Monsanto I don't think has ever owned significant farm property. Their main deal is roundup and GMO seed. 

I am, however, extremely familiar with U North's culcitate. 

image.gif.1afb6524fdd1dd9b406893cb33ec8cc0.gif

Edited by sasquatch69
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Posted
16 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

I VOTED FOR TRUMP BECAUSE I BELIEVE IN FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY!

(Cheers firehose spilling billions and billions of taxpayer dollars directly to farmers to pay for the damage the regime's idiotic policies are causing).

Irony is fucking dead.

Yep, all on track.  Clearly, whatever our problems might have been, the solution is "end democracy, make the poor and middle class suffer, and install an oligarchy."  Don't understand why we didn't try that earlier.

@Anastasis approved. 

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Posted
On 3/21/2025 at 11:11 AM, Vegas64 said:

You joke, but yesterday they did announced a Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) with the leader Klarna:

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5205786-doordash-klarna-sign-deal-for-deferred-installment-food-delivery-payments/

DoorDash and Klarna, a company that offers “buy now, pay later” programs, have come together on a deal for deferred and installment food delivery payments.

“In the coming months, DoorDash customers will be able to enjoy Klarna’s seamless range of payment options when purchasing groceries, retail, and even DashPass Annual Plan – on DoorDash.com or through the DoorDash app,” according to a webpage on the deal on Klarna’s website.

… it’s not worse than the same purchase on a credit card I guess.

Posted
3 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

… it’s not worse than the same purchase on a credit card I guess.

They don't charge interest, but they do have an origination fee. So like a $3 fee to split it. 

I imagine there has to be a minimum dollar limit of $50 or $75 to use it. Kind of crazy

Posted

Until just now, I hadn't yet heard the copium for Wall Street, Mar-a-Lago Accord theory. Someone ping me if they see someone start posting something similar over on the Business & Markets board.

The Wild Trump Theory Making the Rounds on Wall Street
QAnon for tariffs

To the untrained eye, Donald Trump’s tariff policy over the past two months has looked like an incoherent, inconsistent, self-destructive mess. But have you considered the possibility that it is, in fact, the first step of a carefully orchestrated master plan to revive American manufacturing, reduce the national debt, reconfigure the international-alliance system, and deliver the greatest geopolitical deal of the century?

That is the thrust of a new theory that has been gaining currency in Washington, on Wall Street, and in the financial press. The grand bargain that Trump is supposedly planning to strike has even been given a name: the Mar-a-Lago Accord.

The outline of the theory was first articulated not in a MAGA subreddit, but in a November paper by Stephen Miran, an economist who now chairs Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers. Many of the theory’s basic tenets have also been endorsed by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. In its telling, Trump’s flurry of new trade barriers isn’t intended to achieve a particular strategic concession or short-term economic benefit. The goal is instead to force other countries to the table for a grand bargain. Claims that the tariffs are about fentanyl trafficking or illegal migration are simply a decoy, and their seemingly shambolic implementation is just a way to keep the rest of the world suspended in a state of shock and awe. Sure, there might be some bumps along the way, as consumers and businesses scramble to adjust to the new restrictions; the ensuing tumult might even trigger a global recession. But that’s by design. The more Trump can portray himself as a madman willing to tank the world economy, the more fearful and desperate other countries will become for any kind of reprieve.

Once foreign leaders are practically begging for an end to tariff-induced madness, Trump will summon them to his Florida compound, where he will outline a series of demands. First, America’s trading partners must engage in a coordinated effort to raise the value of their own currencies relative to the dollar, a move designed to make American goods cheaper to sell abroad. Countries that have large trade surpluses with the United States, such as Germany and China, may also be required to make major investments to build factories in the American heartland. Foreign central banks will agree to swap their existing holdings of U.S. debt with “century bonds” that don’t pay any interest for 100 years, in effect providing free financing to the United States. Countries that comply will be given relief from tariffs alongside a guarantee of military protection; countries that refuse will be faced with even steeper tariffs and no military support.

These hypothetical provisions tie together two of Trump’s longtime preoccupations: the scourge of the strong dollar and the free-riding of America’s allies. Because of high demand for the world’s global reserve currency, the U.S. dollar tends to be more expensive than it otherwise would be. This in turn makes American exports more expensive, putting American companies at a disadvantage. In Trump’s mind, this dynamic is wholly the result of foreign governments’ currency manipulation and is largely responsible for the decline of American industry. Trump also believes that those same governments refuse to pay their fair share in defense spending, forcing the U.S. to overspend to protect its allies—a project that has driven the national debt to unsustainable levels.

Trump’s grand bargain is designed to put an end to all of that. A weaker dollar will restore America’s manufacturing greatness. An influx of foreign investment will supercharge the U.S. economy. Interest-free financing will help tame the national debt and spread the responsibility of funding global security. Clearly drawn lines between America’s allies and its adversaries will usher in global stability. “Such an architecture would mark a shift in global markets as big as Bretton Woods or its end,” Miran writes, referencing the 1944 agreement that birthed the modern trade regime and the 1971 decision to move the world off the gold standard. The Mar-a-Lago Accord will enter the annals of history as the deal of the century.

cont'd:

Spoiler

This theory has somewhat implausibly gained adherents, if cautious ones, in respectable quarters. Multiple Wall Street firms have publicly briefed their clients about what the Mar-a-Lago Accord would mean for their investments, and dozens of credulous articles have been written about it. “What investors must grasp right now is that Trump’s recent actions are not ‘just’ capricious,” writes Gillian Tett, a columnist and member of the editorial board for the Financial Times. “His team’s vision has a potent internal logic. The current chaos is as much a feature as a bug.” The president’s critics “assume that Trump will huff and puff until reality exposes the emptiness of his economic rationale,” writes Yanis Varoufakis, the left-wing former finance minister of Greece, in an instance of international horseshoe theory. “They have not been paying attention: Trump’s tariff fixation is part of a global economic plan that is solid—albeit inherently risky.”

That’s one way of describing it. Another is that the Mar-a-Lago Accord theory is even more implausible than the more familiar theories of Trump’s actions that it seeks to replace. In its faith that Trump will one day dramatically unveil the product of his secret machinations, the Mar-a-Lago Accord theory has as much in common with QAnon as with economics.

To begin with, two of the principal goals are in direct conflict: Weakening the dollar would require foreign countries to sell off their large holdings of U.S. treasury bonds, but that sell-off would cause interest rates to rise, making the U.S. debt even more expensive to service. (This is where the magical “century bonds” supposedly come in: foreign countries lining up to give America enormous heaps of free money.) Even the core premise underlying the theory—that a weaker dollar is the key to reviving American manufacturing—is shaky at best. Almost every rich country, not just America, has seen a sharp manufacturing decline in recent decades, suggesting that the trend is about much more than the relative strength or weakness of a single currency. “It’s one thing if a plan makes sense in theory but not in practice,” Steven Kamin, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute and the former director of the Division of International Finance at the Federal Reserve, told me. “This one doesn’t even add up in theory.”

Perhaps the biggest hole in the Mar-a-Lago Accord narrative, however, was foreshadowed in Miran’s November paper. “There is a path by which the Trump Administration can reconfigure the global trading and financial systems to America’s benefit,” Miran writes, “but it is narrow, and will require careful planning, precise execution, and attention to steps to minimize adverse consequences.” If that’s true, then no one appears to have told the guy in charge.

Careful planning? Most of Trump’s tariff threats so far have been aimed at Canada and Mexico, which are outside the top-10 dollar-holding countries and therefore have little influence over its price, instead of countries such as Japan, India, and Switzerland, which hold lots of dollars. Precise execution? The Canada-Mexico tariffs themselves were announced, paused, unpaused, given sector-specific exemptions, then semi-re-paused in the span of six weeks, and Trump’s broader suite of tariff threats has been so haphazard that even key members of his own administration have been left completely unaware of what he will do next. Minimize adverse consequences? Far from grinding foreign countries into submission, the tariffs have prompted swift retaliation from allies and adversaries alike and produced a groundswell of anti-American nationalism even in a country as seemingly friendly as Canada.

In fact, Trump himself appears to have no interest in this plan. The president has never been shy about previewing the deals he wants to make (such as his promise to end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours) or floating strange ideas that no one asked for (such as turning Gaza into a resort), yet he has not so much as mentioned the idea of a Mar-A-Lago Accord in public. At times, he has even seemingly gone out of his way to undermine it. Earlier this year, when rumors circulated that the BRICS member countries might create a new currency for international trade—the kind of move that would weaken the dollar—Trump threatened them with 100 percent tariffs if they tried to replace “the mighty U.S. dollar.” Instead, Trump has said that on April 2—which he calls “Liberation Day”—he will impose “reciprocal tariffs” on individual countries to match the trade barriers they have set on the United States. That idea, too, conflicts with the supposed logic of the Mar-a-Lago Accord, because the stated goal isn’t a grand geopolitical bargain; it’s simply to pressure countries into dropping their tariffs on U.S. imports.

Trump’s apparent lack of interest in the master plan attributed to him is probably a good thing. If he did somehow pull off the Mar-a-Lago Accord, disaster could follow. “Success” would mean the destruction of the alliance system that has delivered unprecedented peace and prosperity since it was created after World War II. It would mean a period of international economic chaos as countries scramble to find alternatives to the dollar. It could even trigger a global financial crisis by undermining faith in the U.S. Treasury market, just as the devaluation of subprime loans undermined faith in the mortgage market in 2008, as Kamin and the economist Mark Sobel have written. “The dollar might indeed fall,” they observe, “but not in a way that Trump would like.”

For now, the Mar-a-Lago Accord remains less a genuine plan than a way for Trump’s backers to put a strategic spin on the president’s inchoate impulses. The attention it has received reflects the intense demand for some kind of coherent tariff rationale. But the wait for an explanation may be long.

 

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