That would give a disproportionate voice to states of higher population.  

Gullible.
LOL.

Have to say I've enjoyed the reaction from China about Trump taking a phone call from Taiwan. 

So why are people arrested for burning the Koran but not a national flag?

Burning the Koran is not illegal, if anyone ever got arrested for that it'd likely be for a related crime like burning something in a public place.

Just to be clear on my own personal stance on these things, I believe there should be limits to people's freedom of expression so I'm not against a discussion on whether flag burning should be illegal. However, I laugh at the hypocrisy of many that want the freedom to offend with their own pet hates but want to arrest or deport people who offend them.

"The main reason I don't want to burn the flag is because I can"  Anon.

Some states in the USA might have similar fire ban periods such as we have in Australia too.

http://www.snopes.com/trump-won-3084-of-3141-counties-clinton-won-57/

So how's all the recounting going? I haven't been keeping up with it?

-PB

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-04/jill-stein-drops-pennsylvania-presidential-recount/8091082

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/05/politics/michigan-election-recount/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/12/05/the-wisconsin-recount-may-have-a-surprise-in-store-after-all/?utm_term=.501f849381fb

In summary doesn't appear that the recounts are going to change anything (which most predicted anyway). But I guess it could be argued better to be safe than sorry (sure it is helping to boost the American employment a bit too:)

Trump could work it into his employment stats for the next election. 

Trump just said on flag burning "we're gonna look at that"

Could be a tick against his record.

Wonder how much investing $50 billion into tech startups is going to help those outside big cities and in particular people in the states of Washington, California and New York though? 

You'd imagine a tech company that invests in startups will benefit mainly inner city areas, and particular states such as California, Washington and New York. Maybe a condition may be they have to invest in "rural" tech startups first?? (However considering they want to capitalise on Trump's promise of less regulation I doubt that anything like that would be included).

It would be interesting to know what the downside is on the apparent promise of reducing regulations and corporate tax (and if he can get that through congress ... I'd imagine the federal income reserves would take a huge hit). Really depends if America needs to create jobs at the moment more so than maintain a strong national budget. I'd also be a little weary why the regulation is in there in the first place (could it be to protect employees from start ups going belly up ... I think the stat in Australia is something like 75% of new small businesses fail in the first year, and I'd imagine we have much stricter regulations than the States).

As with a lot of these promises being made with Trump the devil is in the detail, and as yet there is no detail.

Trump just spouted a lot of populist demagoguery to get in power & sure enough the illiterates lapped it up.

Trump cares only about one thing, Trump.

Since by his actions so far, everything is on the table for backtracking, I wonder if he will suddenly start accepting the science of global warming. Otherwise Tesla/Solar City (now Tesla Energy after the merger) may be taking their 30,000 jobs off shore...

Regardless, Trump still remains a sociopath which is why he made his millions.

So which banned account are you out of interest?

-PB

Donald Trump's pick for the head of the E.P.A. doesn't believe in climate change.

We're all fucked.

Serious question.  Do you think human activity was responsible for the hole in the ozone layer?

The strength of conservatism is the repression of knowledge

Of all President-elect Donald Trump’s election promises, “draining the swamp” in Washington was one of the most popular. It is also likely to prove one of the most difficult to fulfil. Thinking about why tells us much about the nature of contemporary politics.

Even the incoming president’s biggest admirers would probably concede that he’s not the normal embodiment of republican virtue. Throughout the election campaign – and subsequently, for that matter – many of Trump’s statements have little connection with economic, political or even strategic reality as it is generally understood.

It’s difficult to know whether this is a carefully calculated use of untruth to unsettle opponents, shake up the establishment and generally muddy the political waters. The alternative is that Trump is a congenital confabulator who actually believes in both his own rhetoric and his capacity to change reality simply by saying so.

The latter is the more likely, highly discomforting reality, I think.

The potentially glaring contradictions that are contained in the first senior appointments to his administration are consequently unlikely to trouble him. It is not just his willingness to appoint dangerous racists and ideologues like Steve Bannon that ought to give the rest of us cause for concern though.

Some of his more “sensible” choices are completely at odds with his election promises and demonstrate why the swamp is likely to remain undrained. The nominee for treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, is a prominent former Wall Street banker of a sort that was routinely pilloried in the election campaign.

It’s not just that appointing billionaires like Mnuchin and Wilbur Ross – tipped to run the Commerce Department – doesn’t look in keeping with the swamp-draining imperative, but it’s also unlikely to have any impact on the sort of economic inequality that is at the heart of America’s and the world’s increasingly toxic politics.

On the contrary, across-the-board tax cuts of a sort that are seemingly a key part of the incoming administration’s economic agenda will disproportionately favour the rich.

Perhaps Trump’s legion of admirers among the increasingly angry, not-very-well-educated, white working class will not notice such inconsistencies. Debates about tax policy don’t get the pulses racing in quite the way that bashing immigrants, Muslims or political opponents does, after all.

But surely even the dimmest and/or most enthusiastic of Trump’s supporters will eventually realise that “Washington” – or more accurately, perhaps, the key institutions that govern political and economic activity in the US – is still in the hands of “elites”.

Despite all the bluster and the demonisation, it could hardly be otherwise. It’s not simply that well-connected elites are able to access positions of power and influence in ways Trump’s proletarian diehards could never hope to.

Sure, being a wealthy political donor is not a hindrance to landing a plum appointment, but not all the jobs that need filling are sinecures. At least some degree of competence is usually required.

Given the abysmal performance of America’s mass education system, this already dramatically limits the field of potential recruits. Like much else about that astounding country, America’s education system contains the best and the worst: Harvard, as well as the 25% of Americans that are effectively innumerate.

Not only are such people never going to participate in running the country, but even in the rather unlikely event that Trump manages to “bring the jobs back” to the US, they may not be able to do many of them either. The increasingly vilified idea of “globalisation” really does pit the world’s poor and badly educated in a fairly brutal struggle for a limited number of badly paid jobs.

But if you’re one of the global elite that’s actually running the world, things look rather more agreeable. Not only are you likely to be fabulously well-paid – even for doing a bad job, as we saw in the global financial crisis – but globalisation actually means you are likely to be paid even more in the future.

After all, all your chums in comparable companies around the world are being lavishly rewarded, so it’s only right that you should be, too. Otherwise, you might leave, and where would that leave the rest of us? Corporate and personal tax rates have got to be ruthlessly driven down to reflect global competitive pressures.

Actually doing anything tangible, much less transformative for the people who elected the new president in such circumstances looks improbable and unrealisable. The one area of hope is the – conspicuously unfunded – promise to massively expand infrastructure spending.

If it actually happens it will need to be overseen by a competent central government staffed by unrepresentative elites. It will inevitably be carried out by private sector companies well connected to Washington and Wall Street. It was ever thus.

This is not necessarily a bad thing – unless you promised to overturn the established order and replace it with some unspecified alternative. Perhaps some sort of distraction might be in order? A trade war with China perhaps?

But why stop there? Some of the incoming security advisers to the new regime no doubt have some good ideas on that front, too. They might even be achievable.

https://theconversation.com/trumpian-deswampification-70132

I don't get the whole American system and how the President goes around selecting pawns for different roles in their administration. As far as I am aware the PM in Australia has no say over the heads of different federal government agencies (they may be able to pressure them to resign, but is not on the interview panel for those roles). These roles generally do not change between governments because in Australia the agencies are apolitical. That is they do the bidding of their ministers (which reflect political agendas), but the actual heads of the agencies have no political alliances.

Are the heads of these agencies more like our Minister of Blah Blah??? However, these ministers are still elected members of parliament.

Has it's benefits when done right though.  

I believe in Singapore they can appoint heads of ministries from outside politics and when I lived there I recall them headhunting the head of Deutsche Bank or Merrill Lynch (or someone like that) to run the finance ministry.  Put him on $8 million a year too.  (And this was 15 years ago.  Imagine the cash they'd be on now.)

LOL.  Imagine if Scott Morrison was put on $8 million a year?  There'd be a full scale riot.

Donald Trump picks Goldman Sachs President and COO Gary Cohn the job of National Economic Council Director.

There's no use denying that Trump is part of the establishment, the evidence is right in front of you. He's not draining the swamp, he's just topping it off with even more swamp water and taking a leak in it.

Someone should do a welfare check on 11.mvfc.11 in light of this news.

Apparently Trump reckons he'll be able to continue doing The Apprentice "in his spare time".

Coming from the man who criticised Obama for shooting some hoops.

Let it go Sammy, find a new hobby. 

Triggered.

Trump picks Rex Tillerson, the CEO of Exxon who has ties to Vladimir Putin, for the role of Secretary of State.

Draining the swamp amirite

Donald Trump said that the pledge to prosecute Hillary Clinton played "great before the election", but now "we don't care".

Here's to the first of many 180s, broken promises and failures from Crooked Lyin' Don.