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Guessing the direction of interest rates and speculation about supposed crimes the president did (for which at this point there has been no evidence of) is a pr

by gfodor 8y ago

Guessing the direction of interest rates and speculation about supposed crimes the president did (for which at this point there has been no evidence of) is a pretty poor foundation to build predictions upon since there's a good chance rates stay flat in 2019 and Mueller comes up empty. In that scenario, the stock market still has downward pressure because of the insane valuations, but the storm clouds outlined here fade away for the most part. One 2019 prediction I have is a resurgence of interest in VR with the release of Oculus Quest. A lot of people have been quietly building for 5 years waiting for this. On politics I'll go out on a limb here and say that the FBI/DOJ will conclude a number of (under reported, multi-year) investigations and bring indictments for a large number of well-known politicians of both parties.

beat 8y ago
Actually, there's a lot of evidence for "supposed crimes of the president". Some of his closest advisors (Cohen, Flynn, Manafort) have been convicted of felonies. All of them have cooperated to some degree with Mueller. The fact that Mueller asked for no prison for Flynn says a great deal about how valuable Flynn's testimony has been. Who else would Flynn be testifying against that's so important to Mueller that he'd pay for it with a no-prison plea bargain? Don't let political bias blind to you the evidence. That said, I'm not at all convinced this will lead to impeachment, although it may lead to resignation. The House isn't going to impeach without a reasonable chance of success in the Senate, and I don't see twenty of McConnell's Republicans voting to destroy Trump, no matter what he did or what he's charged with doing.
- gfodor 8y ago
  I was referring to specific evidence that implies crimes were committed by Trump. So far, no such evidence has been revealed. Pointing to felony guilty pleas for unrelated crimes (except, perhaps, the Cohen campaign finance violation which gave him 6 months of his several year sentence and which arguably may have not been upheld in court) is just guilt-by-association and does not constitute evidence of an unseen crime. I'm perfectly happy to be proven wrong once the report comes out, and I hope that the results are plain as day in either direction, but if you think there has been any objective evidence uncovered by the press or leaked of a real crime being committed then you should also check your political bias. It may exist but it hasn't been made public.
- ryanbrunner 8y ago
  It's not unthinkable that a decent number of Republicans would flip, but a precondition of that would probably need to be a plummeting approval rating for Trump, which hasn't borne out so far - despite all the controversy, he still seems to have a 35-40% floor. One interesting thing about Trump is that he has some of the most stable (albeit somewhat low) approval ratings of any president that there's reliable data for. But he's gone from "historically unpopular" to "about as popular as Reagan, Ford or Clinton" at this point in his presidency.

by gfodor 8y ago

beat 8y ago

Actually, there's a lot of evidence for "supposed crimes of the president". Some of his closest advisors (Cohen, Flynn, Manafort) have been convicted of felonies. All of them have cooperated to some degree with Mueller. The fact that Mueller asked for no prison for Flynn says a great deal about how valuable Flynn's testimony has been. Who else would Flynn be testifying against that's so important to Mueller that he'd pay for it with a no-prison plea bargain? Don't let political bias blind to you the evidence. That said, I'm not at all convinced this will lead to impeachment, although it may lead to resignation. The House isn't going to impeach without a reasonable chance of success in the Senate, and I don't see twenty of McConnell's Republicans voting to destroy Trump, no matter what he did or what he's charged with doing.

gfodor 8y ago
I was referring to specific evidence that implies crimes were committed by Trump. So far, no such evidence has been revealed. Pointing to felony guilty pleas for unrelated crimes (except, perhaps, the Cohen campaign finance violation which gave him 6 months of his several year sentence and which arguably may have not been upheld in court) is just guilt-by-association and does not constitute evidence of an unseen crime. I'm perfectly happy to be proven wrong once the report comes out, and I hope that the results are plain as day in either direction, but if you think there has been any objective evidence uncovered by the press or leaked of a real crime being committed then you should also check your political bias. It may exist but it hasn't been made public.
ryanbrunner 8y ago
It's not unthinkable that a decent number of Republicans would flip, but a precondition of that would probably need to be a plummeting approval rating for Trump, which hasn't borne out so far - despite all the controversy, he still seems to have a 35-40% floor. One interesting thing about Trump is that he has some of the most stable (albeit somewhat low) approval ratings of any president that there's reliable data for. But he's gone from "historically unpopular" to "about as popular as Reagan, Ford or Clinton" at this point in his presidency.