Tuesday, July 19, 2022

Conflicted Trump Endorses LIV Greed


Former President Donald Trump's Bedminster and Doral Golf Clubs will host LIV golf events.  His son-in-law Jared Kushner's private equity firm Affinity Partners received billions from LIV's owner, Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund headed by the murderous Saudi Crown Prince.  

Trump wrote on his social media site:

"All of those golfers that remain 'loyal' to the very disloyal PGA, in all of its different forms, will pay a big price when the inevitable MERGER with LIV comes, and you get nothing but a big 'thank you' from PGA officials who are making Millions of Dollars a year," Trump wrote on Truth Social Monday. "If you don't take the money now, you will get nothing after the merger takes place, and only say how smart the original signees were."
Ethically challenged Trump ignored a letter from families of 9/11 victims urging him to cancel the tournament, citing LIV Golf's Saudi ownership. 
 
Ethics are passe and no one declares conflicts of interest anymore.  Trump sells LIV Golf to his and his family's benefit.  Thugs win
 
Update 7-20-22:  The field for LIV Golf's Bedminister event is set with three open spots for new players willing to take dirty Saudi money.

Update 8-3-22:  One story got the mean greed vibe but did not explore the possible role of Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners in LIV Golf.  Is Jared coaching Affinity Partners' affiliate LIV Golf alongside former Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer? The Trump team's disregard for the law can be seen in its Mafia-like behavior according to a former FBI official.
 
Update 8-16-22:  Bad leadership world wide means lots more opportunities to get one's undies in a wad and resort to violence.  Trump's undies have a quick wad trigger that unleashes his ceaseless retaliatory impulse.  
 
A Saudi woman studying at Leeds University was sentenced to 34 years in prison for using Twitter to follow and retweet activists and dissidents.  The World Economic Forum ran a piece on using AI to reign in abuse on the internet:

By bringing human-curated, multi-language, off-platform intelligence into learning sets, AI will then be able to detect nuanced, novel online abuses at scale, before they reach mainstream platforms.
I imagine the Crown Prince would be most interested in such technology. 

Update 8-17-22:  The Saudi Crown Prince already has such an app.  Someone "reported her on the Saudi app, which is called Kollona Amn, or We Are All Security."

Her alleged crimes including using a website to “cause public unrest” and “assisting those who seek to cause public unrest and destabilise civil and national security by following their Twitter accounts” and by retweeting their tweets.
The World Economic Forum welcomed the Saudi Crown Prince in 2018 and now appears to endorse something similar to his security app.  
 
Update 9-14-22:  Trump's Sterling, Virginia golf course will host LIV Golf in May 2023.  It will be the third LIV event at a Trump owned course.