Davin News Server

On Sat, 16 Aug 2025 23:09:54 -0600,  Gronk says...  

> Just checking...

Yes... they're called tariffs and trade deals.

Politico: Fact check: Mexico will 'indirectly' pay for a border wall through the new trade deal

A Border Patrol agent walks toward one of the president's border wall prototypes on the U.S. side of the U.S.-Mexico border on 
Wednesday, as seen from Tijuana, Mexico. | Mario Tama/Getty Images

President Donald Trump on Thursday qualified his oft-repeated claim that Mexico will pay for a new border wall, now saying the 
costs will be covered "indirectly" through his new North American trade deal.

"When I said Mexico is paying for the wall in front of thousands and thousands of people, obviously they are not going to write a 
check," he told reporters on Thursday before departing for a trip to the southern border.

"They are paying for the wall indirectly, many, many times over by the really great trade deal we just made," he continued.

But it's still unclear how any indirect economic impact stemming from the trade pact will provide funds for the wall.

The White House and U.S. Trade Representative's Office didn't immediately respond to questions on how Mexico might indirectly pay 
for the $5.7 billion the president wants for the wall.

What is clear is the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement Trump signed with other leaders on Nov. 30 contains no specific provision 
that requires Mexico to fund a wall. The deal requires congressional approval before it can take effect.

Former Mexican officials who negotiated the deal with the Trump administration have repeatedly said there is nothing in the deal to 
fund a border wall.

"Trump says the #border #wall will be paid for through the new #NAFTA (USMCA). That's a chapter you will NOT find in the new 
Agreement, simply because it does NOT exist #MexicoWontPay#factcheckingplease," Kenneth Smith Ramos, who served as Mexico's chief 
NAFTA negotiator under former President Enrique Pena Nieto's administration, wrote on Twitter on Tuesday.

A modernized NAFTA could potentially grow the economy and increase overall tax revenues, but those would be paid by the increased 
output of U.S. companies and workers and not by the Mexican government.

POLITICO has asked the White House to provide estimates of the government revenue that will come from the U.S.-Mexico-Canada 
Agreement, but officials have not responded.

The funds aren't likely to be coming from tariff revenue. Most tariffs between the U.S. and Mexico were waived nearly 25 years ago 
through the original free-trade agreement. The new pact keeps most of those tariff reductions in place, which means not much money 
will be flowing into the Treasury.

The new trade deal does include rules that make it harder for auto companies to build vehicles or certain parts in Mexico and 
export them to the U.S. duty free. More auto companies, both American and foreign, might choose to pay the 2.5 percent tariff 
rather than complying with a new web of content requirements.

The result of more vehicles being charged tariffs could be more money in U.S. coffers, but those costs will likely be paid by 
importers in the U.S. and possibly U.S. consumers if dealers choose to pass on the added cost to the buyer.

White House strategic communications director Mercedes Schlapp acknowledged on CNN on Wednesday that U.S. taxpayers would 
ultimately fund the wall.

Meanwhile, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador declined to tackle the question of Mexico's indirect wall funding when 
asked Wednesday at his daily press conference: "It's a point of view that, in reality, we leave up to the understanding of 
citizens. Let citizens be the ones to analyze these things," he said.

 - Politico

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"Trump Derangement Syndrome" Is a Real Mental Condition

All you need to know about "Trump Derangement Syndrome," or TDS.

"Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) is a mental condition in which a person has been driven effectively insane due to their dislike 
of Donald Trump, to the point at which they will abandon all logic and reason."

Justin Raimondo, the editorial director of Antiwar.com, wrote a piece in the Los Angeles Times in 2016 that broke TDS down into 
three distinct phases or stages:

"In the first stage of the disease, victims lose all sense of proportion. The president-elect's every tweet provokes a firestorm, 
as if 140 characters were all it took to change the world."

"The mid-level stages of TDS have a profound effect on the victim's vocabulary: Sufferers speak a distinctive language consisting 
solely of hyperbole."

"As TDS progresses, the afflicted lose the ability to distinguish fantasy from reality."

The Point here is simple: TDS is, in the eyes of its adherents, the knee-jerk opposition from liberals to anything and everything 
Trump does. If Trump announced he was donating every dollar he's ever made, TDS sufferers would suggest he was up to something 
nefarious, according to the logic of TDS. There's nothing - not. one. thing. - that Trump could do or say that would be received 
positively by TDSers.

The history of Trump Derangement Syndrome actually goes back to the early 2000s - a time when the idea of Trump as president was a 
punch line for late-night comics and nothing more.

Wikipedia traces its roots to "Bush Derangement Syndrome" - a term first coined by the late conservative columnist Charles 
Krauthammer back in 2003. The condition, as Krauthammer defined it, was "the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in 
reaction to the policies, the presidency - nay - the very existence of George W. Bush."