Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[gondrin]

Alcatraz was shut down because it was horribly expensive and inefficient to run and held very few prisoners.


But just like all things trump, it “gives the illusion of being tough” on whatever right-wing imagined grievance without having to… you know, actually do anything about it. Just like the random whack-a-mole deportations, or the calls to “build a wall” (we aren’t hearing much about that this time around, are we?), or other such nonsense.

This.

We have the equivalent version of it in Colorado. They needed somewhere to basically put the worst of the worst back in the 1930s and no other prison was capable of basically limiting escapes in a way Alcatraz did. Now we have Supermax Prisons that, for all intent and purposes, outperform Alcatraz by light years in that regard.

[btlcryct]

10 bucks, he wants it be a mirror image of CECOT.

[Edge-]

Speaking of this, even conservative talk show hosts and the CATO Institute caught onto that and basically called it for what it is.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...87750507&ei=19

“This is not a good angle from President Trump,” Erickson said. “It is the worst California or European style nanny statism — the government knows best how many dolls and pencils you need. Not you. Not your parents. In government we trust.”

It would help if I felt like they actually learned anything from these momentary realizations.

Anyways - https://www.reuters.com/business/med...us-2025-05-04/

U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Sunday a 100% tariff on movies produced outside of the United States, saying the U.S. movie industry was dying a "very fast death" due to the incentives that other countries were offering to draw American filmmakers.

"This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Translation: Donald functionally killed a ton of lower budget flicks that film abroad to save money. Also jacked up the prices on a ton of big budget flicks that film in places like Canada because it's cheaper to film city shots there than it actually is in NYC and shit.

Weird choice for a guy who watches a lot of movies. Also, F in chat for all my fellow weebs who have enjoyed anime releasing in theaters and shit.

This is probably gonna cause China to completely shut out Hollywood, too.

Just L after L after L because Donald is a very stupid man surrounded by other very stupid people who don't understand how the world works.

[Breccia]

This is probably gonna cause China to completely shut out Hollywood, too.

Good.

I wish no ill will towards Hollywood, but I trust them to respond to such a response by China by repeatedly accurately pointing out whose fault it was. And they specialize in getting the attention of people easily distracted by shiny objects, so Trump might actually feel it.

[Endus]

Good.

I wish no ill will towards Hollywood, but I trust them to respond to such a response by China by repeatedly accurately pointing out whose fault it was. And they specialize in getting the attention of people easily distracted by shiny objects, so Trump might actually feel it.

Also, no crap to China specifically, but man has the film-making cooperation between Hollywood and Chinese studio been INCREDIBLY forced and generally unpleasant to experience, as it's so clearly bent on trying to ensure the film's marketable to Chinese audiences before telling a good story.

Like, there's tons of Chinese actors I love, I grew up loving Hong Kong action cinema. It's not that they're Chinese, or that there's cooperation. It's franchises like The Meg where it's just so blatantly forced together that it shows that I'm complaining about, here. It's just the latest crass commercialization where decisions are made for profit's sake, not the product's.

[fwc577]

Any little girl caught with more than 3 dolls will be sent to The Colonies!

[Milchshake]

New script spec.
Rasputin whisper crazy ideas into the emporer's ear. Except Rasputin is really just three crazy racists in a trenchcoat; Stephen Miller, Elon Musk, and Jon Voight?!



That was Jon Voight asking for a tax break for domestic production. And 1000% tariff otaku grandpa turned that into “tariff foreign films!!”

TRUMP TAKE ANIME!

Time for all the incel to feed their darling waifu avatars to the leopards.

[Edge-]

New script spec.
Rasputin whisper crazy ideas into the emporer's ear. Except Rasputin is really just three crazy racists in a trenchcoat; Stephen Miller, Elon Musk, and Jon Voight?!



That was Jon Voight asking for a tax break for domestic production. And 1000% tariff otaku grandpa turned that into “tariff foreign films!!”

TRUMP TAKE ANIME!

Time for all the incel to feed their darling waifu avatars to the leopards.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

So you are advocating on raising the minimum age of enlistment to 23 years old? Joining the military is a life changing and potentially life ending experience and most 18 years old is not ready to make such a decision.

Agreed. I think old men sending 18 yos to die is Hunger Games. Old folks on both sides sending patriotic young kids to kill each other. In my perfect world, no member of Congress could vote to put troops in harm's way unless they were prepared to personally serve on the front lines.

- - - Updated - - -

Since he both sides it with the misinformation thing he's already on the enlightened centrist path than leads to Drumpism.

Not at all, but you won't fix things while half the country trusts Fox & Newsmax as their trustworthy news sources. So how to wean them off their echo chambers unless we get *them* to trust our new fact-check panel? Fact Checkers that are only trusted by half the country are not much help.

My idea is not to compromise on the facts, only to have some members of the panel drawn from people trusted by Republicans. Trick would be finding some trusted Republicans with integrity to speak truth.

[Draco-Onis]

Not at all, but you won't fix things while half the country trusts Fox & Newsmax as their trustworthy news sources. So how to wean them off their echo chambers unless we get *them* to trust our new fact-check panel? Fact Checkers that are only trusted by half the country are not much help.

My idea is not to compromise on the facts, only to have some members of the panel drawn from people trusted by Republicans. Trick would be finding some trusted Republicans with integrity to speak truth.

How about we just restore media standards so that places like Newsmax and Fox News have to follow the law? the only reason things have gotten this bad is due to deregulation in the name of profit. It will affect both sides since now there would be standards if violated will lead to expensive lawsuits and / or losing your license.

[Fugus]

Weird choice for a guy who watches a lot of movies. Also, F in chat for all my fellow weebs who have enjoyed anime releasing in theaters and shit.

As someone who enjoys anime, I honestly don’t recall the last time I saw anime ever hit theaters. I only watch dub though, don’t read fast enough to keep pace with many of them and hate missing half of what is going on. But also dislike how half the females talk with a high pitch and breathy voice when they talk in the English dubs but that’s more tolerable than reading my shows.

Also Disney really annoyed me with how they bought the rights to Tokyo Revengers only to stop the English dubs. That series was honestly better than it had any right to be and is finished, just not in English for the last 2 seasons.

[Kaleredar]

This.

We have the equivalent version of it in Colorado. They needed somewhere to basically put the worst of the worst back in the 1930s and no other prison was capable of basically limiting escapes in a way Alcatraz did. Now we have Supermax Prisons that, for all intent and purposes, outperform Alcatraz by light years in that regard.

Nor does America lack prisons.

And if it does, it’s because too many people are being put in jail, not that there “simply aren’t enough prisons.” And I don’t foresee incarceration rates going down under Trump.

And even if all of those things were true, building new prisons would be the actual solution, not reopening moldering relics. Prison escapes aren’t tremendously common, so it being on an island wouldn’t matter worth a shit.

No, this simply boils down to inarticulate GOP bloviating as amplified by a morally and mentally compromised Trump. “Alcatraz big strong island. Surrounded by water, big water. Big water prison opened? Criminals see we no want them. We tough on crime. Crime now solved.”

[Endus]

Not at all, but you won't fix things while half the country trusts Fox & Newsmax as their trustworthy news sources. So how to wean them off their echo chambers unless we get *them* to trust our new fact-check panel? Fact Checkers that are only trusted by half the country are not much help.

My idea is not to compromise on the facts, only to have some members of the panel drawn from people trusted by Republicans. Trick would be finding some trusted Republicans with integrity to speak truth.

Why wean? Just make violation of journalistic ethics the kind of thing you get fined tens to hundreds of millions for, per lie. Or make it a felony, even.

Once Newsmax and Fox News are bankrupt or everyone there is now in prison, they're no longer sources anyone is able to watch. Their echo chambers no longer exist.

That's how you get rid of disinformation. By getting rid of disinformation.

Edit: Before anyone says "they'll just go to Youtube/AM radio/whatever instead"; same rules would apply, just scale the fines by the size of the audience. Joe Rogan pushing some bullshit should get fines into the hundred million plus range, too. Let's just say a nice round $100 per audience member.

[DarkTZeratul]

New script spec.
Rasputin whisper crazy ideas into the emporer's ear. Except Rasputin is really just three crazy racists in a trenchcoat; Stephen Miller, Elon Musk, and Jon Voight?!

Eh, as you say below, this isn't really "Rasputin whispering ideas into the emperor's ear" the way it is with Miller and Musk:

That was Jon Voight asking for a tax break for domestic production. And 1000% tariff otaku grandpa turned that into “tariff foreign films!!”

"Tax breaks for domestic production" is something Hollywood has wanted for years, and Voight likely figured that being a well-known Republican meant he had a good shot at actually getting it. Almost certainly, somebody would have asked whoever the president was. Unfortunately, "whoever" turned out to be the dumbest motherfucker we've ever had in office, and so their wish got extremely monkey's paw-ed into something nobody in Hollywood was asking for, and none of them want.

[Kaleredar]

And as we know, every movie made in Hollywood only ever takes place exclusively within the United States. No movies are ever shot anywhere else, ever.

[Captain N]

And as we know, every movie made in Hollywood only ever takes place exclusively within the United States. No movies are ever shot anywhere else, ever.

Wait are you telling me that when Clark Griswold took his family on that European Vacation where they saw Big Ben and Parliament a bunch of times that Europe isn't in the US?

[Kaleredar]

Also, no crap to China specifically, but man has the film-making cooperation between Hollywood and Chinese studio been INCREDIBLY forced and generally unpleasant to experience, as it's so clearly bent on trying to ensure the film's marketable to Chinese audiences before telling a good story.

Like, there's tons of Chinese actors I love, I grew up loving Hong Kong action cinema. It's not that they're Chinese, or that there's cooperation. It's franchises like The Meg where it's just so blatantly forced together that it shows that I'm complaining about, here. It's just the latest crass commercialization where decisions are made for profit's sake, not the product's.

This “problem” had already kind of started to solve itself, in that China has been allowing fewer and fewer foreign releases in China.

Hollywood had been relying on their schlock CGI noise fest movies with 200 million dollar budgets (think transformers) to break a profit because those films did big money in foreign markets, but China pulling the rug out from a couple dozen of those caused them to tank and Hollywood has (mostly) moved away from making them now.

Now whether that’s good for China, in that it highlights a further monocultural monopolization at the behest of an authoritarian government by heavily restricting which narratives are allowed into the country, is another question.

But at least for the US it hopefully means creatives are a bit more free to express themselves without having to worry about studio overreach telling them to boost foreign product sponsors or insert scenes or cut out characters/narratives certain foreign governments might find “objectionable” and a general rein-in of bloated film budgets, knowing that there isn’t some (generally) quality-agnostic ~100 million dollar windfall to be had on any project with enough cgi explosions you can just assume will crop up.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

How are they so fucking stupid? who doesn't know that a red light saber means you are Sith aka the bad guys /facepalm.

To be fairer than I should be...anyone CAN have a Red Lightsaber...it's just more commonly associated with the Dark Side. There was a time (now no longer Canon) that Luke Skywalker used a red lightsaber:

[Rasulis]

https://apnews.com/article/trump-alc...d44e50efb3c1fb



Donald, a fucking weirdo, wants to make Alcatraz a prison again.

Alcatraz is rad. They do tours there. I'm sure they still have Scout troops come to do volunteer work and get to spend the night in the cells, which was a ton of fun and super cool.

It's going to be enormously expensive to reactivate the prison again, and honestly this probably won't even happen.

But that he's even talking about it is very stupid an also very weird.

Can anyone check to see if The Rock (the movie) has been on TV recently?

I have been to Alcatraz many times including two nighttime tours. It is pretty run down and will need to be demolished and replaced with a new prison. Cheaper to build a brand new Supermax in states like Alabama or Louisiana.

[SAY HER NAME]

The interview on meet the press was unhinged. I cant believe he tripled down on the whole dolls thing and added pencils to it. Also five pencils only??? I am sorry but as someone that has nephews living with me, we need more than five pencils XD