Trump Claims He Has A Health Insurance Plan (But It Would Just Make Matters Worse)

 From The Hartmann Report.

Trump's "Peace Plan" Gives Russia Everything It Wants - It's A Bad Plan

Donald Trump has come up with a "peace plan" for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Sadly, it gives Russia everything it wants, while denying Ukraine the ironclad guarantees it needs. I think it's a bad plan, but Trump is threatening to abandon Ukraine if they don't agree.

Here is Trump's plan:

Here is the text of a draft version of the 28-point peace plan for Ukraine backed by the United States, according to a copy seen by Reuters

1. Ukraine's sovereignty to be reconfirmed.

2. There will be a total and complete comprehensive non-aggression agreement between Russia, Ukraine and Europe. All ambiguities of the last 30 years will be considered resolved.

3. There will be the expectation that Russia will not invade its neighbours and NATO will not expand further.

4. A dialogue between Russia and NATO, moderated by the United States, will convene to address all security concerns and create a de-escalatory environment to ensure global security and increase the opportunities for connectivity and future economic opportunity.

5. Ukraine will receive robust security guarantees.

6. The size of the Ukrainian Armed Forces will be capped at 600,000.

7. Ukraine agrees to enshrine in its constitution that it will not join NATO, and NATO agrees to pass in its bylaws not to accept Ukraine at any point in the future.

8. NATO agrees not to station any troops in Ukraine.

9. European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland.

10. The U.S. guarantee:

a. The U.S. to receive compensation for the guarantee;

b. If Ukraine invades Russia, it forfeits the guarantee;

c. If Russia invades Ukraine, in addition to a robust coordinated military response, all global sanctions will be restored and recognition for the new territory and all other benefits from this agreement will be withdrawn;

d. If Ukraine fires a missile at Moscow or St. Petersburg then, the security guarantee will be considered null and void.

11. Ukraine is eligible for EU membership and will get short-term preferred market access to the European market while this issue is being evaluated.

12. Robust Global Redevelopment Package for Ukraine including but not limited to:

a. Creation of Ukraine Development Fund to invest in high-growth industries including technology, data centers, and AI efforts.

b. The United States will partner with Ukraine to jointly restore, grow, modernize, and operate Ukraine's gas infrastructure, which includes its pipelines and storage facilities.

c. A joint effort to redevelop areas impacted by the war to restore, redevelop and modernize cities and residential areas.

d. Infrastructure development.

e. Mineral and natural resource extraction.

f. A special financing package will be developed by The World Bank to provide financing to accelerate these efforts.

13. Russia to be re-integrated into the global economy:

a. Sanction relief will be discussed and agreed upon in phases and on a case-by-case basis.

b. The United States will enter into a long-term Economic Co-operation Agreement to pursue mutual development in the areas of energy, natural resources, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, data centers, rare earth metal projects in the Arctic as well as other mutually beneficial corporate opportunities.

c. Russia to be invited back into the G8.

14. Frozen funds will be used as follows:

$100 billion of the frozen Russian funds will be invested in a US-led effort to reconstruct and invest in Ukraine. The US will receive 50% of the profits from this venture. Europe will match this $100 billion contribution to increase the investment available to rebuild Ukraine. The European funds that are frozen will be released. The balance of the frozen Russian funds will be invested in a separate US-Russia investment vehicle that will pursue joint United States Russia projects in areas to be defined. This fund will aim to strengthen the relationship and increase joint interests to build a strong motivation not to return to conflict.

15. A joint US-Russian Security taskforce will be established to promote and enforce compliance with all of the provisions of this agreement.

16. Russia will legislatively enshrine a non-aggression policy towards Europe and Ukraine.

17. The United States and Russia will agree to extend nuclear non-proliferation control treaties, including the START I Treaty.

18. Ukraine agrees to be a non-nuclear state under the NPT (Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons).

19. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant will be restarted under supervision of the IAEA, and the produced power shall be equitably in a 50-50 split between Russia and Ukraine.

20. Both countries commit to education programs in schools and throughout their society that promotes the understanding and tolerance of different cultures and eliminates racism and bias:

a. Ukraine will adopt EU rules of religious tolerance and the protection of linguistic minorities.

b. Both countries agree to repeal all discriminatory measures and guarantee the rights of Ukrainian and Russian media and education.

c. All Nazi ideology or activity should be renounced and forbidden.

21. Territories:

a. Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk to be recognized De-Facto as Russian, including by the United States.

b. Kherson and Zaporizhzhia to be frozen at the contact line, which would mean a De-Facto recognition at the contact line.

c. Russia to give up other agreed upon territories they control outside of the five regions

d. Ukrainian forces will withdraw from the part of Donetsk region that they currently control, and this withdrawal area will be considered a neutral demilitarized buffer zone, internationally recognized as territory belonging to the Russian Federation. Russian forces will not enter this demilitarized zone.

22. Once future territorial arrangements have been agreed, both the Russian Federation and Ukraine undertake not to change these arrangements by force. Any security guarantees will not apply in the event of a breach of this obligation.

23. Russia shall not obstruct Ukraine's use of the Dnieper River for purposes of commercial activities and agreements will be reached for grain shipments to move freely through the Black Sea.

24. A humanitarian committee will be established to resolve open issues:

a. All remaining prisoners and bodies will be exchanged on the principle of 'all for all'.

b. All civilian detainees and hostages will be returned, including children.

c. There will be a family reunification program

d. Provisions will be made to address the suffering of victims from the conflict.

25. Ukraine to hold elections in 100 days.

26. All parties involved in this conflict will receive full amnesty for wartime actions during the war and agree not to pursue claims or further settle grievances.

27. This agreement will be legally binding. Its implementation will be monitored and guaranteed by a Board of Peace, Chaired by President Donald J. Trump. There will be penalties for violation.

28. Upon all sides agreeing to this memorandum, a ceasefire will be immediately effective upon both parties withdrawing to the agreed upon points for the implementation of the agreement to begin. 

Israel And Hamas Agree To The 20-Point Plan - Will It Lead To Peace?

After it was announced that Israel and Hamas have both agreed to the 20-point plan of the Trump administration, celebrations broke out in both Israel and Gaza. The citizens of both needed this to happen.

It looks like the killing and bombing will cease (at least temporarily), Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners will be released, and food/medical aid will begin to flow into Gaza. Those are good things that needed to happen, and Trump (whatever his other many faults) can rightly claim some credit for it.

Is it the end of the Israeli/Gaza war?  Maybe. Is it a giant step toward peace in the Middle East? Not likely. I hate to be the pessimist, but we are still a long way from either being accomplished. 

The remaining parts of the plan are going to be very difficult. It won't be easy creating a government for Gaza that will be acceptable to all the parties involved. And some other parts of the plan are hard to believe will actually happen.

Will Hamas really give up their weapons? Not likely.

Will Israel completely withdraw from Gaza? Not likely.

And the biggest impediment of all -- none of the participants (Hamas leaders, Netanyahu, Trump) have shown they can be trusted to keep their word. 

And this is not even a tiny step toward a real and lasting peace in the Middle East. 

Hamas (and other Palestinian terrorist organizations) have not said Israel has a right to exist.

Netanyahu has not backed off his statement that there will never be a two-state solution, and continues toctreate new settlements of Palestinian land.

Until those two things change, there is no real hope for a lasting peace.

But the agreement is a small victory - and a small victory is better than none.

This Is The Full 20-Point Peace Plan For Israel/Gaza

Is This A Reasonable Plan To "Save" Social Security?

The following is by Senators Bill Cassidy (Republican) and Tim Kaine (Democrat). They explain their "bipartisan" plan to save Social Security. I think there is a simpler solution (raising the cap on Social Security deductions), but their plan is interesting. What do you think? They write:

If Congress doesn’t act, the Social Security Trust Fund will be insolvent as soon as 2033, and millions of Americans who have been paying into the program will see a significant portion of their promised benefits cut. That’s why we’re working on a bipartisan proposal for a new investment fund that would infuse much-needed money into Social Security, while ensuring no one on Social Security or nearing retirement sees any change to the benefits whatsoever.

Social Security is currently funded through payroll taxes, which are not keeping pace with the amount needed to sustain the program. For now, the Social Security Trust Fund — which is invested exclusively in U.S. government bonds yielding low returns — is helping to fill the gap, but it can’t for long. The most recent Social Security Trustees Report showed that payroll tax revenue will fall more than $25 trillion short of owed benefits over the next 75 years, in today’s dollars, if the trust fund becomes insolvent. We propose creating an additional investment fund — in parallel to the trust fund, not replacing it — that would be invested in stocks, bonds and other investments that generate a higher rate of return, helping keep the program from running dry.

We estimate that it would take a $1.5 trillion up-front investment into the fund to get it going, and we propose giving the fund 75 years to grow. The Treasury would temporarily shoulder the burden of providing benefits to Social Security beneficiaries — but when the new fund’s 75 years are up, it would pay the Treasury back and supplement payroll taxes to help fill the future gap.

The result? The consistent delivery of Social Security benefits for generations of Americans, and a reduction to the United States’ long-term indebtedness by up to 20 percent.

A substantial majority of Americans are concerned about the challenges facing Social Security. We understand if they also question whether politicians could use the proceeds of the new fund we propose for other objectives.

That risk can be effectively managed by putting in place guardrails modeled after those used by the Thrift Savings Plan, including a fiduciary duty to seek a maximal return on investments and deterrence measures to address concerns that a future Congress might want to raid the fund. As for transparency, the new fund should be subject to annual audits published online.

We know a program like this could work because it already has. In 2001, Congress created the National Railroad Retirement Investment Trust — a diversified investment fund designed to ensure retirement benefit payouts for railroad workers. The trust has remained firmly in the black, with returns even exceeding expectations at some points and with payments consistently remaining reliable and on schedule. Our proposal is also consistent with virtually every other pension plan — state and private — currently operating in our country, and it matches the strategy most nations use to fund their retirement programs.

There is a nationwide appetite to implement a bipartisan, commonsense plan like ours. Waiting until the Social Security Trust Fund is on the eve of crisis would have difficult and preventable consequences. Congress should seize the moment.

Trump's "Peace" Plan Is A Very Bad Deal For Ukraine

 

This is from Axios.com.

The Public Thinks "Signalgate" Was A Serious Matter

 

The charts above are from the CBS News / YouGov Poll -- done on March 27th and 28th of a nationwide sample of 2,609 adults, with a 2.3 point margin of error.

Jeffries Outline A Path For His Democratic Colleagues

 

A 900-Page Blueprint For A Trump Second Term

Project 2025 is a dangerous plan that will damage our democracy. Here's what Robert Reich says about it:

“Project 2025” is nothing short of a 900-page blueprint for guiding Donald Trump’s second term of office if he’s reelected.

After the Heritage Foundation unveiled Project 2025 in April last year when Trump was seeking the Republican nomination, he had no problem with it. 

But now that the nation is turning its attention to the general election, Trump doesn’t want Project 2025’s extremism to turn off independents and moderates.

So Trump claimed Friday on his Truth Social platform that he has “no idea who is behind” Project 2025. 

This is another in a long line of Trump lies.

The Project 2025 playbook was written by more than 20 officials who Trump himself appointed during his first term. If he has “no idea” who they are, he’s showing an alarming cognitive decline.

One of the leaders of Project 2025 is Russ Vought. Vought was Trump’s director of the Office of Management and Budget, a key position in the White House. Vought is also drafting Trump’s 2024 GOP platform.

Another Project 2025 leader is John McEntee, another of Trump’s top White House aides. (McEntee recently went viral with a video in which he claimed he gives counterfeit money to homeless people to get them arrested.)

Project 2025’s director, Paul Dans, and both of its associate directors, Spencer Chretien and Troup Hemenway, were in charge of personnel in Trump’s White House.

Even the national press secretary for Trump’s campaign appears in the Project 2025 recruitment video.

Trump says he “knows nothing” about Project 2025. And he says he “disagrees” with it.

As the former chairman of the Republican Party, Michael Steele put it, “Ok, let’s all play with Stupid for minute … so exactly how do you ‘disagree’ with something you ‘know nothing about’ or ‘have no idea’ who is behind, saying or doing the thing you disagree with?”

The Trump campaign platform is basically Project 2025. Trump’s Make America Great Again PAC is running ads calling it “Trump’s Project 2025.” The Make America Great Again PAC also created the website TrumpProject2025.com.

Trump might be trying to distance himself from the Heritage Foundation, concerned that it will also alarm independents and moderates. 

On Wednesday, Heritage president Kevin Roberts raised the prospect of political violence. “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be,” Roberts told the “War Room” podcast, founded by Trump adviser Steve Bannon.

In case there’s any doubt that Trump and the Heritage Foundation are working in close partnership, Trump can be seen in this video praising the Heritage Foundation and saying he “needs” them to “achieve”  his goals.

The close relationship between Trump and the Heritage Foundation goes back years. In 2018, the Heritage Foundation bragged that Trump implemented two-thirds of their policy recommendations in his first year — more than any other president had done for them.

The goals of Project 2025 are the same goals Trump tried to achieve in his first term or has been advocating in this campaign.

One key goal of Project 2025 is to purge all government agencies of anyone more loyal to the Constitution than to Trump — a process Trump himself started in October 2020when he hoped to remain in office.

Trump has promised to give right-wing evangelical Christians what they want. Accordingly, Project 2025 calls for withdrawing the abortion pill mifepristone from the market, expelling trans service members from the military, banning lifesaving gender-affirming care for young people, ending all diversity programs, and using “school choice” to gut public education.

 

Project 2025 also calls for eliminating “woke propaganda” from all laws and federal regulations — including the terms “sexual orientation,” “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” “gender equality,” and “reproductive rights.”

Other items in the Project 2025 blueprint are also what Trump has advocated on the campaign trail, including mass arrests and deportations of undocumented people in the United States, ending many worker protections, dropping prosecutions of far-right militias like the Proud Boys, and giving additional tax cuts to big corporations and the rich.

Trump has repeatedly claimed that climate change is a “hoax.” Project 2025 calls for expanding oil drilling in the United States, shrinking the geographic footprint of national monuments, terminating clean energy incentives, and ending fossil-fuel regulations.

Trump has said he’d seek vengeance against those who have prosecuted him for his illegal acts. Project 2025 calls for the prosecution of district attorneys Trump doesn’t like and the takeover of law enforcement in blue cities and states.

Project 2025 is, in short, the plan to implement what Donald Trump has said he wants to do if he’s reelected. 

Trump may want to distance himself from Project 2025 in order to come off less bonkers to independents and moderates, but he can’t escape it. The document embodies everything he stands for.