(04-08-2019 05:20 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(04-07-2019 10:31 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(04-07-2019 09:39 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(04-07-2019 09:31 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(04-07-2019 09:12 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  So why all the anguish over transactions that are not material to Trump's financial condition? If the prime minister of Slobovia spent two nights in a Trump hotel, that's not even rounding error.
I really think it is far more, "Orange man bad, so let's throw up as many roadblocks as we can," than any serious oversight activity.

But those two days all add up, and foreign nationals have admitted to staying there to curry favor.
Heck, even T-Mobile did it: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019...istration/
The Trump hotel is in a good location, but so are the W, JW Marriott, St. Regis, and on, and on. In fact, those are in even better locations.
So are you just comfortable with these types of conflicts of interest?

Yes, because I don't see normal transactions in the ordinary course of business as conflicts of interest.

How do you differentiate normal from influence peddling? Obviously someone could take advantage of someone's business as a way to buy influence, right?

If you think $1000 for a night in Trump's hotel is going to buy influence, what does a night in the Lincoln bedroom get you? One is a normal transaction, the other is purely peddling influence.

This is the point that I don't understand. Trump is supposedly guilty of allowing himself to be influenced by normal business transactions, whereas the left seems okay with abnormal transactions entered into by politicians from the left to enrich themselves while in office.

Trump is rich. He doesn't need to peddle influence in order to get rich. He already is. His wealth is in real estate, not cash in the bank or stocks. That kind of wealth is very difficult to quantify. He may think it's $3 billion based on market value. It may be only $1 billion if he had to get out in a hurry. Either way, it's going to be worth more with a healthy economy. And that is a much bigger factor in his wealth than whether the prime minister of Slobbovia spent two nights there.

As for the blind trust idea, that doesn't really work with real estate. He's not going to be president forever. If as president he makes decisions that enhance the value of his real estate, that's going to enhance that value when he gets out, so blind trust doesn't really work.

So why do we keep seeing news reports of companies lobbying the Trump admin staying at the Trump hotel? Or foreign nationals saying that they stay at the Trump hotel specifically because it’s his hotel?

Trump is vain and petty - he’s the kind of already wealthy person who can be influenced by people even spending a single night at his hotel, let alone 500 nights that Saudi lobbyists booked, totally over $250k.

I think the difficulty of Trump divesting all of his holdings is a fair comment. But it does not absolve him of any criticism and, frankly, it’s willfully blind ignorance to try and argue that these obvious conflicts of interest do not exist.