President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

I have little sympathy for the guy. He's really sharp. He was very capable at Exxon. He also chose to leave his dignity at the door when he signed on for thisparticular job with that particular moron. I actually kind of believe the "wanted to serve his country" thing at this point in his life, and MAYBE he was naive enough to think that what he was walking into wouldn't be what it turned out to be. But he got into bed with something he (and everyone else) knew was a dog -- a particularly untrained, unruly, nutso dog. I'm not going to feel sorry for him for the outbreak of fleas that he got hit with. He should have known it was inevitable.

 

Also, I find this a bit unfair. He's not getting a "tax break." In order to enter government, he had to divest himself of of his Exxon holdings. It was required. That would normally trigger massive cap gains for someone who owned as much stock as he did. The thing is, the only reason he did that transaction was that it was required for him to be Secretary of State. It's not like the stock was driving his decision making. The requirement waives those cap gains if you make it last at least a year. He'll still get hit with cap gains if he had gains on the treasuries he had to put his money into. It probably turns out to be a net benefit if it now allows him to diversify some of his holdings in a way that might have triggered more cap gains tax if he had skipped the stop of Secretary of State in between and just sold his Exxon stock. But you have to be really cynical to think he did any of that with a plan. He's got enough money where he doesn't have to use the nightmare of signing on to be Trump's Secretary of State as some kind of convoluted tax planning tool. I believe he simply wanted to be Secretary of State and serve his country in a way he thought was meaningful. And he didn't make the requirements of divesting himself of the stock.