Trump’s Mega MAGA Day In Saudi Arabia, Hogg Tied & Student Loans - Top 3 Takeaways – May 14th, 2025 - Driven By Braman Motorcars
Takeaway #1: Another Day another $600 billion
It’s safe to say that President Trump has accomplished more within the past week for the benefit of our country than Joe Biden achieved during his entire presidency. Fresh off of the UK trade deal, China trade deal, India-Pakistan ceasefire, securing the last remaining American hostage from Hamas and signing an order than could save Americans hundreds of billions of dollars in prescription drug costs...Trump was at it again on Tuesday securing a new $600 billion investment for the United States – that the president said has the potential to create 2 million new jobs in coming years – this as Saudi Arabia will purchase weapons, microchips and other technology enhancements from US companies. Notably, as a central part of the deal, Nvidia will sell over 18,000 AI microchips to the Saudis. Elon Musk was on hand as well at the Saudi-U.S. investment forum, which was the underlying event, and even had one of his robots do the Trump dance to the Y.M.C.A for the Saudi Royal family and President Trump’s meeting. It’s a remarkable run of success that’s far from being over (even in the middle east) yet. Today the president is set to visit Qatar which figures to be another great economic opportunity as the country’s leadership has already offered President Trump the Royal family’s jumbo jet to serve as Air Force One, as Boeing has been slow to create a new one (that’s unlikely to be the case due to security concerns independent of the Left’s noise on the subject). This run of success wasn’t limited to what was happening overseas as we learned Tuesday that the inflation rate in April fell to just about the lowest level since Trump was previously president of the United States. At 2.3% - inflation is now the lowest since February of 2021. That’s especially notable given that Liberation Day took place April 2nd. The longer-term potential impact of inflation may not yet be known but what was clear was what I said would be the case when the tariff policy was first put into place. This hasn’t been lost on the markets as, importantly, the value of the US Dollar has been on the rise and as stocks haven’t just recovered from “Liberation Day” losses but are now higher on the year. Big wins are coming by the day and I’m not tired of winning yet. On the other hand...
Takeaway #2: Hogg tied
A former, long retired engineer, used to the refer to certain people that he was amazed had jobs in this business as “no talent ass clowns”. As crude as it may seem it’s always stuck with me and every now and then there are certain people in society I look at and think...there’s a NTAC. David Hogg, ever since he leveraged the horrific massacre at Stoneman Douglas as a personal political opportunity, has been one of those people for me. He’s gone from staging “die-ins” at Publix – which probably represented the peak of his desperation for attention, and state-based absurdities - to remarkably becoming the Vice-Chair of the DNC (which was/is as much of a statement about what a dumpster fire that organization actually is, as anything). Nevertheless, it’s been clear that the DNC has had its regrets about elevating said NTAC to vice-chair of the party. Also, as it turns out, Democrats still apparently can’t effectively manage their own party’s elections with integrity, let alone handle general elections legitimately. The DNC has voted to have a redo of this year’s elections placing Hogg’s status and that of one other vice chair up in the air. According to an intra-party challenge to its own election results, it was alleged that the DNC improperly combined two questions and tallied votes together improperly benefiting Hogg, so now a new election will be held. In the words of Hogg: It’s impossible to ignore the broader context of my work to reform the party which loomed large over this vote. The DNC has pledged to remove me. This vote has provided an avenue to fast track that effort. Well, that’s probably what happens when you pledge to spend $20 million dollars to primary your party’s incumbents. Not that the DNC doesn’t desperately need to do things differently but moving in the direction of someone who pulled political stunts and seized to elevate himself during a time of tragedy, and potentially someone to the left of Bernie, isn’t exactly what they need. So, we’ll see what happens with the party that doesn’t even have election integrity within its own elections, although that’s nothing new.
Takeaway #3: No free lunch
One of the great annoyances to me is when officials and reporters suggest that taxpayer provided things are free. A la, “free school lunch” which of course is anything but free. Residents of Palm Beach County paid nearly $1.9 billion in property taxes last year for those so-called freebies. But something that’s more annoying than falsely saying that things are free that are anything but, is insisting that something you’ve already received and agreed to pay for should be free. As it turns out there’s a serious problem with about a quarter of college students pretending that’s reality. While the Biden administration attempted to unconstitutionally move the cost of college education from students receiving the education to you...many former students have decided they won’t pay what’s due and now that’s resulting in deep do-do for them. On Tuesday, The New York Federal Reserve put out a research report showing that a quarter of all student loan debt holders are now in default. A quarter! By way of comparison the loan product with the next highest DQ rate are credit cards at just 4%. The New York Fed notes that stuff is about to hit the fan for those ignoring their student loan debt obligations with credit scores and other outcomes that are about to come their way now that the law is being enforced by the Trump administration once again.