Tag Archives: Steve Mnuchin

economic news

Mnuchin joins Trump casualty list

By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin might have thought he was indestructible, that Donald Trump wouldn’t — couldn’t possibly — throw him under the proverbial bus.

Then came Trump’s bizarre video tweet and his rejection of a COVID-19 relief package that Mnuchin negotiated with congressional Democrats and Republicans on Trump’s behalf.

He now has joined the list of Cabinet officers who have fallen out of favor with a president who first picked them, then turned on them. Rex Tillerson, James Mattis, Jeff Sessions all have been booted or quit because they no longer could work for Trump. I haven’t even counted the multiple White House chiefs of staff and national security advisers.

Mnuchin’s betrayal might be the most bizarre of all.

As the Washington Post reported: The president’s denunciation of the agreement represented a stunning public broadside against his own treasury secretary, who for four years loyally shielded the president’s tax returns, endured repeated presidential tirades in private, and defended even Trump’s most incendiary and contradictory remarks. Through it all, Mnuchin had emerged with the unique ability to walk a tightrope between Trump and congressional leaders, serving as an emissary in difficult negotiations. That all ended on Tuesday, when Trump posted a video on Twitter ridiculing the agreement.

Mnuchin’s loyalty to Trump could end with painful setback as president shreds stimulus deal (msn.com)

The deal called for $600 payments to Americans; it extended unemployment insurance for millions of Americans; it keeps the government running past next Tuesday. Mnuchin packed Trump’s load for this deal while working with members of Congress. Now he’s been stabbed deeply in the back.

Wow! That’s all I have at this moment.

Trump’s chaotic end as president could possibly inflict an enormous number of casualties. I do not include Secretary Mnuchin among them. They would include millions of Americans who are waiting on some form of relief from their government. Now comes this astonishing rejection by the man elected president of the United States — the guy who took an oath to protect Americans — of a deal his team negotiated on his behalf.

Can there be anything more disgusting than this? Sure, but holy smokes, man! This really stinks!

Steve Mnuchin now stands as the latest example of how Donald Trump measures loyalty. It goes only in one direction. This individual does not return it … to anyone!

national news

Mnuchin takes one for the team?

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has come clean … I guess.

He told CNN’s Jake Tapper today that putting Donald Trump’s name on the stimulus checks that are coming to millions of American households was, um, his idea.

Yep. Mnuchin said he brought up the idea of putting Trump’s name on the checks, given that the Treasury boss’s signature already is on the checks. Trump’s name appears on the memo line.

Hmm. I’m trying to digest that one.

It looks to me as if Mnuchin is throwing himself in front of the proverbial bus on that one. My own belief since this matter came to light was that Trump wanted to put his name somewhere on the document as if to remind recipients — many of whom are, uh, voters — that the president is somehow responsible for the money that will land in people’s mail boxes soon. Trump is responsible for the relief coming in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

I’m still waiting for someone on the Trump team to spill more beans, revealing who, indeed, came up with this nutty notion. You see, I consider Mnuchin to be a serious Trump toadie.

None of this really amounts to anything more than just idle gossip, except for the potentially political consequence of Trump’s name showing up on these government checks in what has been called an “unprecedented” event.

national news

What? Mulvaney might get canned? No-o-o-o!

This just in: Mick Mulvaney, the “acting” White House chief of staff who’s had this job since January, might get the boot from Donald J. “Boss of the Best People” Trump.

How come? Trump is angry at Mulvaney for admitting in public that there was a “quid pro quo” with Ukraine, that Trump held up military aid in exchange for dirt on political opponents.

Mulvaney told us all to “get over it,” and said that politics inevitably gets intertwined with foreign policy.

Trump is steamed. He has floated the names of Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and White House senior counselor Kellyanne Conway as possible chief of staff successors to Mulvaney.

Let’s see, that would chief of staff No. 4 for the Trump White House. Reince Priebus was replaced by John Kelly, who was replaced by Mulvaney. Now it’s Mulvaney who’s on the proverbial gurney, awaiting a form of political execution.

This is not a “fine-tuned machine” operating inside the White House.

The machine is close to exploding.

International news

Economic sanctions, yes; going to war, no!

Count me as one American who far prefers the measures that Donald Trump has taken to respond to provocation in the Persian Gulf region than what has been threatened over the course of the past several days.

The president has signed an executive order that imposes harsh economic punishment on the Islamic Republic of Iran. The alternative? That would be sending planes and missiles into Iran to strike military targets and quite probably provoke a military response from the mullahs who run the show in Tehran.

Option No. 1 is far better than Option No. 2.

What might the Iranian response be to the economic sanctions? I suppose they can close the Strait of Hormuz, where a lot of shipping hauls petroleum to points around the world. The good news for the United States is that this country is far less dependent on Middle East oil than it has been in the past.

However, I much prefer the economic sanction route than the military strike option that has been on the table. How much sense does it make to send young Americans into harm’s way because Iran is shooting down unmanned, unarmed surveillance aircraft? None, if you want my to know my humble view on it.

The sanctions imposed by the United States include freezing of assets owned by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and others within the Iranian government. As NPR reported, it is not entirely clear how the United States is able to obtain access to those assets, but Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin assures us that the assets are frozen; the ayatollah can’t get ’em.

Fine. Then perhaps now we can actually talk to the mullahs and try to calm the tension that has rattled the world, not to mention governments in Saudi Arabia and Israel, two of the mortal enemies Iran has targeted with threats.

As the late, great Winston Churchill once noted, it is far better to “jaw, jaw, jaw than to war, war, war.”

national news

Trump ‘happy’ with Mnuchin? Let’s see about that

Donald “Serial Liar” Trump says he is happy with Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin. He disputes a Wall Street Journal report about the president’s so-called unhappiness with Mnuchin’s handling of recent stock market volatility.

I have taken the posture that nothing Donald Trump says about anything or anyone is to be believed 100 percent, without question.

Nothing, I tell ya, is totally credible when it flies out of the president’s mouth.

I really hate thinking that, let alone writing it and publishing it on this blog. It’s just that when a reputable media outfit such as the Wall Street Journal reports potential tumult between Trump and a member of his Cabinet . . .

I happen to believe the Wall Street Journal. I disbelieve the president of the United States.

national news

Oh, that POTUS is such a comedian

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has mounted a curious defense of Donald Trump’s penchant for profane name-calling.

He said the president “likes making funny names.”

Hey, Trump’s latest funny-name tirade this week included these two knee-slappers. He referred to “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd a “sleeping son of a bitch.” Oh, and then — at the same political rally in Pennsylvania — he described Democratic U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters as a “low-IQ individual.”

I cannot stop laughing. The president just cracks me up. What a card, a comedian. He needs to take his act on the road. Oh, wait! That’s what he did when he hurled those insults at (a) a prominent broadcast journalist and (b) a leader of the congressional Democratic caucus.

Mnuchin’s defense of Trump came, interestingly, on “Meet the Press,” the program Todd has moderated for the past several years. I didn’t watch it in real time. I’m quite sure that Todd didn’t crack up at Mnuchin’s defense of the president. Oh, no. Todd is too much of a pro to do something so stupid.

As Politico reports: “I’ve been with the president and at campaigns. You know, he likes to put names on people,” the Treasury secretary said. “He did that through the entire presidential election, including all of the Republicans that he beat. … These are campaign rally issues.” 

That is supposed to excuse the kind of hideous language that Trump spews? Give me a break.

“Campaign rally issues” often produce free-form rhetoric. However, we are talking here about the president of the United States of America. Isn’t this individual supposed to elevate the quality of political discourse?

national news

HHS boss grounds those spendy private jets

There’s some of this going around the Trump administration.

The “this” is a penchant for spending lots of money needlessly. Taxpayer money, at that!

The latest perp happens to be Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Tom Price, who until just this weekend had been using private jets to travel to hither and yon to do the public’s business. What’s more, the public has been picking up the tab.

Secretary Price has grounded the private jets pending a government review of the practice. “We’ve heard the criticism. We’ve heard the concerns. We take that very seriously and have taken it to heart,” Price said.

Fair enough. This is a bad habit that has emerged during Donald J. Trump’s time in the White House.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin wanted the federal government to fly him and his new bride to a honeymoon location. I took note of that request in an earlier post and pointed out that Mnuchin is worth an estimated cool $500 million. I believe he could afford to pay for his own air transportation, although the secretary did mention “security concerns” as his reason for seeking government travel.

Back to Price for a moment.

Price’s travel habits came under scrutiny from Politico, which reportedly identified about $400,000 in private jet travel by Price since he took office earlier this year. Price hasn’t defended his use of private jets; indeed, he acknowledges the “optics don’t look good.”

While he was a Republican member of Congress, Price criticized then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s use of luxury jets to fly around the country. Pelosi in fact had access to government air travel, given that at the tsheecond in line of succession to the presidency. She was criticized correctly for her use of the luxury aircraft.

As Politico  has reported, Price’s use of these private jets breaks with recent custom: Price’s use ivate jets breaks with the practices of Obama administration HHS secretaries Sylvia Mathews Burwell and Kathleen Sebelius, who flew commercially while in the continental United States and deliberately avoided taking charter jets. HHS staff last year scrapped a proposal for Burwell to take a multi-city tour linked to the kickoff of annual Obamacare enrollment because the trip would have required charter aircraft and cost about $60,000. 

I just want to offer a word of caution here.

Everyone, it seems, is mindful these days of profligate spending at all levels of government. Secretary Price needs to re-calibrate his public-relations radar to ensure he can avoid getting caught in this PR trap. Don’t blow the public’s cash for the sake of convenience.

national news

Even rich guys need a government hand, eh?

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is a mega rich fellow. He’s got more cash than he knows what to do with.

So, why does this guy ask the federal government to allow him to use a public airplane to jet him and his wife off on their honeymoon?

I probably shouldn’t even comment on this one. But now that I’ve opened this door, I’ll walk on through for just a moment.

The guy’s chutzpah is quite fascinating, don’t you think?

I mean, Mnuchin is worth about $500 million. That’s half a billion bucks, man! His wife, Louise Linton, got into a Twitter snit with a young woman who took her task after she boasted on social media about all the fashionable labels she wears. Sheesh, lady!

This little dust-up will fade away soon.

But I’ll just note that a government plane that would have jetted Secretary and Mrs. Mnuchin off to wherever they celebrated their marital bliss would have cost about $25,000 per hour.

I know that Donald Trump once said he prefers to surround himself with fellow rich people. He believes their wealth means they’re successful and that their success can transfer to sound public policy.

But, c’mon, Steve Mnuchin. Rich guys can afford to pay for their own jet plane rides to exotic honeymoon locales. Go ahead and show off your success, man … but just do it on your own dime — not mine!