Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

We’re not going back!

with the Kraken taking a plea, the Cheese stands alone.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Chutkan laughs. Lauro sits back down.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

People are weird.

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Cole is on a roll !

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Let me file that under fuck it.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

American History and Black History can not be separated.

Innocent people don’t delay justice.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

“Let’s not pretend [Trump] wants to engage in high-minded discourse.”

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: Trump Publicly Offers to Rent Out American Troops

Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: Trump Publicly Offers to Rent Out American Troops

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… which is the most generous possible framing here. Perhaps he hasn’t actually sold American soldiers’ lives to his Saudi bankers — yet. Trump says a lot of stuff that’s ‘just marketing’, after all. Maybe he’s just doing a little advertising, in case anybody in the area’s looking for some well-equipped military muscle…

Elsewhere…

Reader Interactions

68Comments

  1. 1.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    Which bank did the money go in?
    Those troops are HIS and he can sell them as he likes.

    ETA: I’m going to have wine and cheese with some of my women friends here. When I get back, will this thread have devolved into an argument? Let’s see

  3. 3.

    West of the Rockies

    Okay, maybe I’m naive, but I think even fat Sean Hannity and Toad Limbaugh are going to struggle defending this.

  11. 11.

    RepubAnon

    Reminds me of a joke:
    Q: What’s the Saudi government’s favorite song?
    A: “Onward Christian Soldiers…”

  12. 12.

    Cheryl Rofer

    It’s entirely possible that Trump is lying about the whole thing, but it’s clear that this is how his mind works. He’s said it before. He’s fine with selling our military as mercenaries.

  14. 14.

    opiejeanne

    @Cheryl Rofer: I don’t believe SA gave “us” a billion dollars, nor is it in a bank… somewhere.

    This is marketing for the Trump campaign. The rubes will be wowed and shout their approval.

  15. 15.

    cain

    Fantastic .. we aren’t defending Americans but just whoever will pay us. The Iranians could probably do the same thing just to fuck with Trump pay 2 billion.

  16. 16.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cheryl Rofer: By doing this he increases the likelihood that someone will attempt to take an entire patrol or squad or platoon hostage and try to ransom them back. Because he’s already indicated they’re available for the right price.

  18. 18.

    Jinchi

    Sean Hannity and Toad Limbaugh are going to struggle defending this.

    I think it’s going to take them a day or two to realize what the problem is. Trump has always spoken about the military in mercenary terms. Starting with his complaints that NATO, Japan and South Korea “owe” billions of dollars for the protection they get from our alliance.

    Trump wants to sell US protection for money. He thinks we’re suckers if we give it away for free. It’s what he campaigned on.

    Trump’s plan to seize Iraq’s oil: ‘It’s not stealing, we’re reimbursing ourselves’

    He justified abandoning the Kurds, because we had paid them, “The Kurds fought with us, but were paid massive amounts of money and equipment to do so”.

    He excused the murder of Khasshoggi arguing that the billions of dollars the Saudi’s pay for military equipment were more important.

    He has no concept that this is wrong.

  19. 19.

    gene108

    @Baud:

    I have it on good authority that our embassies in Latveria,  Madripoor, Genosha, and Wakanda were under imminent threat from Iran (the Hellfire Club, and League of Evil Mutants).

  23. 23.

    Jinchi

    It’s possible Trump is just lying again. Then again, it’s also possible that when he says “us” he doesn’t mean US. Trump declared before he took office that he was quite happy to accept bribes.

    “I have to say one other thing. Over the weekend, I was offered $2 billion to do a deal in Dubai with a very, very, very amazing man, a great, great developer from the Middle East—Hussain, DAMAC, a friend of mine, great guy—and was offered $2 billion to do a deal in Dubai, a number of deals. And I turned it down. I didn’t have to turn it down, because as you know I have a no conflict situation because I’m president, which is—I didn’t know about that until about three months ago. But it’s a nice thing to have.”

  24. 24.

    ThresherK

    That’s a pretty damn feudal move.

    Isn’t that how so many Hessians fought for George III on these shores during the Thoroughly Polite Dustup of 1776-1781?

  25. 25.

    gene108

    @zhena gogolia:

    Republican cowardice is sad. The worst thing they have to lose is an elected office. They still get their Congressional pensions.

    But I guess those elected offices are more important than any concept of patriotism, and moral conviction

  26. 26.

    zhena gogolia

    Wow, Porky and Petunia have just departed from Gate 35 X at National:

    Glad you asked: You broke the law in front of us after your staff released a summary of you breaking the law and then your handpicked COS & ambassador confirmed you broke the law. You withheld vital military aid to get a US ally to sabotaged your political rival. See why now? https://t.co/BDf0tw24Lr— Ron Fournier (@ron_fournier) January 12, 2020

  29. 29.

    jc

    I’m increasingly convinced that everything about the U.S. government is entirely transactional in Trump’s “mind.” Sell protection to foreign countries, sell favors to big donors, sell deregulation to industry CEOs. You want an executive action to gut the rules on air pollution? What’s in it for me?

  31. 31.

    Van Buren

    I doubt this happened, because we would have heard the howls of outrage coming out of the Pentagon.

  34. 34.

    HalfAssedHomesteader

    From Trump’s repeated insistence that these countries have paid huge sums I think we can safely conclude that no of them has paid anything.

  36. 36.

    Sm*t Cl*de

    You say “rent out”, I say “pimp out”.

    How do the US armed forces feel about trump’s insistence that they’re his prostitutes?

  38. 38.

    debbie

    @zhena gogolia:

    Another good response:

    You have the impeachment stigma attached to your name because, unlike everything else in your life, you’ve EARNED it.

    You cheat, lie, and steal from the American people DAILY. Yeah Spanky, you deserve impeachment AND removal.

    Witnessess and documents will confirm this.
    — BrooklynDad_Defiant! (@mmpadellan) January 12, 2020

  39. 39.

    Jinchi

    @debbie: January 11th, 2017. Just about a week before his inauguration.

    I remembered being pretty shocked by this comment at the time. Back in those days, I assumed Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell would impeach him at the first opportunity and allow the reign of Reverend Pence to begin.

  42. 42.

    Felanius Kootea

    @cain: I was just going to say that Iran could solve its problems with Trump by offering him $3 billion. He’d change his tune so fast it’d be fun to watch the Fox newsbots try to catch up and state that the Ayatollah has always been America’s best friend.

    ETA: Stupid autocorrect…

  43. 43.

    Sloane Ranger

    @James E Powell: Just being pedantic but isn’t Justin Amash a right winger, albeit currently self identifying as an Independent?

    Shoedinger’s(sp?) Cat is right. This is the East India Company of the 21st century.

  44. 44.

    raven

    The total cost to the United States of paying for Korean participation was “peanuts compared to what it would be for a comparable number of Americans,” but those payments are estimated to account for 4 percent of the GNP in 1967 and totalling more than one billion dollars. The war contributed to a boost in the South Korean economy.[52][53] . . .The Korean government refused to provide additional compensation for their war veterans by establishing a “no duplicate reward” in the Constitution. Korean victims of Agent Orange have also not received compensation from the Korean government.[62][63] Since the government had taken most of the monthly salary of the servicemen, the compensation given to individual veterans was quite minimal. Despite the current economic revival in Korea, the Constitution prohibits additional compensation, and the government has no formal means to further compensate them aside from their initial salary”

  45. 45.

    Leto

    @Sm*t Cl*de: I’m increasingly glad I retired last year, and I’m pressing my kid to separate at the end of his first enlistment. He’s excellent at his job, one of those troops that every supervisor dreams about, in a critically undermanned career field, and at this point I want him out. It doesn’t hurt that he’s seen the same things that I have (from a different perspective).

    Every day I hate Trumpov and republicans more. It wasn’t the accident that is going to shorten my life, it’s these mf’ers and everything they do.

  47. 47.

    Kattails

    @Adam L Silverman: I was going to say this is horrifying, and then I read your comment…there is no bottom. Will this finally swing a few RWNJ’s who have family in the armed services? Gotta go catch up on some recent threads.

    And of course Mark Esper did not see any intelligence about imminent threats to the US, and Trump said it wasn’t vengeance, it was to appease Republican Senators who were bugging him.

    My freezer needs defrosting. I’m going to need ice cream to go with the pie from the last thread.

  49. 49.

    oldgold

     

    Setting aside the ethical, tactical and strategic problems this practice poses,   the price seems ridiculously low.

  50. 50.

    raven

    @Leto: We also had KATUSA’s, Korean Augmentation to the United States Army where Korean enlisted troops would fill emty slots in our TOE. It was much better for them to be in a American unit but they still had their own NCO’s and they beat the dog shit out of those poor fuckers.

  51. 51.

    Jinchi

    @Felanius Kootea: I was just going to say that Iran could solve its problems with Trump by offering him $3 billion.

    Maybe his goal is for them to start a bidding war with the Saudis. That would be fun to watch play out on Hannity.

  53. 53.

    West of the Rockies

    @Jinchi:

    Has Trump proposed privatization of law enforcement and the fire department in America yet?  “Nice little business ya got here… Be a shame if something happened to it.”

  55. 55.

    Kattails

    Just received the email from the union about their Bernie endorsement. (Jim, Foolish Literalist was ahead of this in last thread!) I replied with my numerous issues with him and cancelled my membership. I cannot possibly work for that !##*. Sorry if this is divisive here. Told them I’d put my dues toward actual Democratic candidates.

  56. 56.

    joel hanes

    @Jinchi: 

    when he says “us” he doesn’t mean US

    This is a certainty.
    Trump’s “we” is royal — when he says “we”, he means Donald J. Trump, and when he says “us”, he means the Trump Organization. In his eyes, the rest of us are either employees, marks, or enemies.

  60. 60.

    Leto

    @raven: would it surprise you this sounds like my experience with the Iraqi army? Of course it wouldn’t.

    I know I’ve been lurking more, but I do hope you’re enjoying your retirement. 

  62. 62.

    Tehanu

    @gene108: our embassies in Latveria, Madripoor, Genosha, and Wakanda

    What about Freedonia and Sylvania? What do those upstarts in Wakanda have that they don’t?

  63. 63.

    mrmoshpotato

    So ummm….”Nice country you got here.  Be a shame if you didn’t pay me for troops to defend it.”?

    Sounds like an impeachable offense to me.

  65. 65.

    Jinchi

    @opiejeanne: What does those words in the quote box mean? I mean, what the hell is he saying?

    He’s saying that a foreigner offered him a $2 billion “deal” right after his election. And he’s saying that, unlike every other politician in the world, there would be nothing wrong if he accepted it. By his definition, the president is literally incapable of having a conflict of interest. In fact, since it was a personal business deal, he didn’t even think he was required to disclose it.

    This is clearly a bribe. Trump was telling the world, not only that it’s perfectly okay to offer him bribes, he was putting a rough number ($2 billion) on what a reasonable bribe might be.

  67. 67.

    TriassicSands

    Donald Trump, genius, has invented mercenaries. Amazing! No one believed it was possible.

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