Apollo Global Management, Inc‘s chief economist warned on Saturday that the odds of a U.S. recession in 2025 are 90%.But don't worry, because President Trump has a ready response: It's all the Fed chairman's fault.
... Torsten Slok predicts the U.S. will fall into what he labelled a "Voluntary Trade Reset Recession.” He attributed the high risk to the economic impact of President Donald Trump's trade and tariff strategies.
... Trump's current plan calls for double-digit tariff rates. Slok calculated that this could subtract nearly 4 percentage points from 2025 GDP. This does not include additional negative effects from uncertainty on consumers and corporate decisions.
Other prominent economists and financial institutions see an elevated risk of recession, but none as high as Slok's 90% call. A recent Wall Street Journal survey indicated that economists have raised their estimated likelihood of a recession in the next 12 months to 45%, a significant increase from 22% in January.
President Trump is signaling that he will blame the Federal Reserve for any economic weakness that results from his trade war if the central bank doesn’t cut interest rates soon....Yup. Meanwhile, Republicans are looking to shift the blame for impending Medicaid cuts:
In a social-media post on Monday, Trump repeated last week’s demand that the Fed reduce interest rates now. “There is virtually no inflation,” he said, blasting Fed Chair Jerome Powell as “Mr. Too Late” and “a major loser.”
... Some analysts said the president’s attacks on the Fed simply represent an attempt to scapegoat the central bank for impending economic weakness. “It’s tempting to want somebody else to ride to the rescue, or at least have someone else to blame,” said former Sen. Phil Gramm, a Texas Republican.
And as we're learning that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared classified information with his wife and brother in a second Signal chat, and also learning that the information included specifics about an ongoing bombing mission, it's beginning to appear as if Hegseth might lose his job soon. But I think this offers the Trump regime and the GOP a new opportunity to shift blame.
Yes, NPR has reported that the White House is looking at potential replacements for Hegseth. But I'll remind you that back in December, after the press had unearthed the first skeletons in Hegseth's closet, it briefly appeared as if Trump might withdraw Hegseth's nomination in favor of another candidate, possibly Ron DeSantis. That never happened. Trump dug in. Hegseth was confirmed.
John Stoehr believes it's categorically impossible for Dictator Trump to suffer a political scandal.
As I said after the first Signalgate story, there are no political scandals under autocratic rulers, because there are no standards to which an autocratic ruler feels he must subordinate himself. The only thing that matters to Trump is whether Hegseth is loyal....I disagree -- Trump does care about public opinion -- but Stoehr is right about this:
Naturally, the press corps will keep bird-dogging Signalgate. If this were a normal president who respected the constitutional role of the media, as Joe Biden did, Hegseth might be gone by now. But this is Trump we’re talking about. He has united his party against reporters so that virtually anything they say can and will be used against them.Anything that goes wrong on Hegseth's watch will now be the fault of the people who write critical stories about him, and the fault of the sources for those stories. Thus we have this headline at The Federalist:
New Anti-Hegseth Op Illustrates The Media’s Campaign To Protect The Pentagon Status QuoRemember, in the eyes of the MAGA base, Trumpers in good standing can do no wrong, while anyone who criticizes a Trumper in good standing is not only wrong but evil. Everything that's not MAGA is part of a vast conspiracy to weaken and ultimately destroy America.
That Federalist piece tells us this:
... the D.C. establishment’s continued campaign to oust Hegseth comes from its fervent opposition to the much-needed change he’s bringing to the Pentagon.So I assure you that if there's a major Pentagon failure while Hegseth is in charge -- an actual disaster for America, not just a reckless exposure of classified data that luckily appears to have had no negative consequences -- the Trumpers won't blame it on him. They'll blame it on "deep state" saboteurs who want to preserve the pre-Trump, pre-Hegseth status quo because they hate America. And the majority of Republican voters will accept this assertion uncritically.
For years, the Defense Department has operated within the best interests of the agency’s higher-ups and D.C.’s notorious defense-industrial complex. While high-ranking officials used their coveted positions of influence to advance neo-Marxist ideologies throughout the Pentagon and defense contractors got rich off of America’s military involvement in nonsensical overseas conflicts, rank-and-file service members’ needs were ignored, the country’s military infrastructure crumbled, and the priority of winning wars went out the window.
Unlike his predecessors, Hegseth is someone who comes from outside this incestuous system that’s responsible for the decay witnessed throughout America’s armed forces. Much like Trump, he’s a disruptor — and by every measure, he’s doing exactly what the president appointed him to do.
... the loudest voices within the D.C. establishment aren’t concerned that Hegseth doesn’t have what it takes to lead the Pentagon. Rather, they’re afraid of the changes he is and will continue to implement that directly disrupt the status quo they’ve spent years protecting.