Lacessit

Fred should be flat broke. If he still owns a private jet and a casino, he is not. The solution is not obvious to most. Forget about taxing on profit and deducting on loss, there are too many ways to legally evade taxes with some jiggery-pokery. Tax on revenue instead, 1-2%. Revenue can't be fiddled, it just is. Wealth inequality is created when wages are taxed at far higher levels than billionaires, who can simply take out loans against growing assets to provide the cash for their lifestyle. Wages are revenue. You'll eliminate the debt in 1-2 years. When I was earning six figures, I would have loved to be taxed at 2%.

Quoting from The Matrix doesn't cut it for me. I take medication for BPH. You should take clozapine. OTOH, the laws of Newton and thermodynamics do. Do you remember the one about every action having an equal and opposite reaction? That's what the USA is getting from the rest of the world.

IMO we will have to rely on Asimov's three laws of robotics.

What do you know of the laws of thermodynamics, and how they apply to global warming and climate change? I post facts. I don't post conspiracy theories.

What context would you like? The rich have platoons of tax lawyers working on minimizing the tax they pay, how many does the ordinary wage earner have?

Robots don't need sleep, meal breaks, or health insurance. Once the capital outlay is recovered, it's gravy all the way. Every business using humans for repetitive tasks is looking for a robot to do the job instead.

Trump paid taxes of $750 in 2016 and 2017. Someone working for him on $50,000 pa would have paid $5900.

One less tribe of scooter idiots to contend with on the roads.

It's a common misconception carbohydrates are needed for energy. Fat provides twice the energy sugar and carbohydrates do. Sugar provides rapid energy, hence the term sugar hit. OTOH, fat provides long-term sustained energy. Deprive the body of readily metabolized sugar and carbohydrate, it turns to burning fat instead. With exercise, that means weight loss. Unless excess protein is used to bulk up muscle mass.

Nothing wrong with capitalism per se. When wealth inequality gets to the stage three men in America control more wealth than the bottom 150 million Americans, it's time to say whoa. Trump is whipping the horse instead.

Thai food is healthier because the meals are not super-sized. As for 7/11, nothing wrong with their Caesar salads.

Withdrawing from the WHO means America will be less able to deal with pandemics. Unlike immigrants, bacteria and viruses can evade borders easily. The Paris Climate Accord is aimed at mitigating climate change. America can expect more natural disasters. Check your property insurance premiums. The USA has a positive trade balance with Australia, who charges no tariffs on American imports. Please tell me how Australia is humping America. IMO you are over-optimistic on the savings on government waste. IME any cost-cutting exercise results in overestimates of savings. The real problem is the interest required to service debt. IIRC it's about $1.8 trillion per year, and increases as bond yields escalate. Which is happening now, with a capital flight to the Swiss franc and Japanese bonds.

I can still remember a program in primary school which explained the link between alcohol consumption and cirrhosis of the liver. I wonder if any of that kind of education still exists.

I asked Gemini a slightly different question, how long would it take to travel from England to Thailand by road. The answer was several months minimum. Flight time London to Bangkok 12 hours. IMO the OP is a masochist.

In a number of visits to America, I never ceased to be astounded by the quantity of food heaped onto plates in restaurants. Not a square inch was left uncovered. Roast beef the size of a loaf of bread, starters which were a meal in themselves. The problem with fast food is its quantity of carbohydrates and sugar. Cut out those components from the diet and people will lose weight fast. Our ancestry is hunters and fishermen. We only started getting fat when we began growing crops. It is a myth fat is bad for you. I eat as much cheese as I want, which is 40% fat. I lost 13 kg by banning potatoes, rice, carrots, sugar, and processed carbohydrate from my diet. I eat bamboo, broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage. My BMI is normal. QED.

What do you think happens in Thailand? It's a carbon copy of Chinese policies. I don't do business in China. I am happy to buy their products at the right price and quality. I would not have the skills or temerity to start a business there. Having said that, I have worked with several Chinese. They are smart people. I've worked with smart Americans too, but their numbers seem to be diminishing.

I remember a flight with Air Canada. The hostesses were so overweight they had to go down the aisle sideways. I found myself wondering how much extra fuel was needed for the extra weight.

Who was it that enabled the rise of China, by shifting production there? Apple, Nike, Walmart, GM, Ford, Tesla, Dell - the list goes on and on. Example - Tesla delivered about 337,000 vehicles globally in Q1 2025. Its Shanghai plant has an annual capacity of over 950,000 vehicles. In other words, the Shanghai plant can manufacture 70% of its total output. Nobody likes the CCP. However, blaming them for crapping in your own nest IS childish.

The US government is blinking. China has embargoed rare earth exports. Without them, what's left of American manufacturing capacity is stuffed. That's why Trump is making noises about de-escalating. China holds the aces.

What absolute rubbish. Australia and the Middle East have so much LNG some of it is flared. Australia itself has 157 trillion cubic feet of gas, and that's not even counting coal seam gas reserves. I have no doubt Australia would be quite happy to sell more gas to China.

The obesity level of America is more than 40%. The obesity level in Japan is less than 4%. Per 100,000 population, Japan has about 5 fast food outlets. Per 100,000 population, the USA has about 70.

I wonder if he will get around to closing McDonald's, KFC and Pizza Hut? If America wants to get serious about its obesity epidemic......

It doesn't matter who sits in the White House, Trump has no more answers than Biden or Harris might have had. The problem - America has unsustainable debt and unfunded liabilities. Since Clinton was President, politicians of both parties have been kicking the can down the road. IMO there are two choices. Slash SS and Medicare, or raise taxes. Trump is effectively trying to do the second with tariffs, which is just another word for a sales tax. It's regressive, because it hits the poor hardest. He's hoping his adherents won't notice. He can't raise taxes on the rich, they put him into power. If he hits SS and Medicare, Jan 6 would look like a polite tea party.

Why do you think Trump and Musk have been combining voluntary redundancy offers with firings at the SEC?