Well, that didn’t take long.  About a decade ago we needed a phrase to describe a very specific set of republican senators, thus originated the term “Decepticons”.
Decepticons are different from traditional ‘establishment’ types in that they are a cloistered club, a sub-set of the upper-tier within the GOPe, and they protect their exclusive position because of the payments and benefits they receive from an individual lobbyist, Tom Donohue.

Tom Donohue is the President of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the largest single lobbying group in all of Washington DC.   Donohue represents the interests of massive financial institutions and multinational corporations.  Donohue receives hundreds of millions from his corporate conglomerates; and he controls the distribution of tens-of-millions toward individual senators on capitol hill who agree to uphold those interests.
A ‘Decepticon’ will NEVER break ranks with the Chamber. EVER.  Regardless of the Chamber position.  That character trait is what makes them uniquely “Decepticons.”

WASHINGTON DC – Senate Republicans are growing frustrated with what they see as a lack of clear direction in President Trump’s trade agenda, which they warn is hurting U.S. exporters.
Republican members of the Senate Finance Committee vented their concerns in a recent meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer.

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Initial 2017 sales growth estimates exceed $33 billion (almost 6%), for a total of $598 billion, according to analysis by Customer Growth Partners.
Consumer spending represents two-thirds of total GDP; and with initial Q4 sales growth estimates coming in much higher than anticipated – this puts even more fuel into fourth quarter GDP growth estimates that have been hovering near 4%.
The stunning retail growth increases have been noted in both on-line and brick-and-mortar stores which reflects a more broad increase, driven by consumer confidence, likely to exceed these initial estimates.

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CBS – […] Total retail sales this holiday season added up to a record $598 billion dollars — up $33 billion from last year. “This is literally the best season since before the recession,” business owner Craig Johnson said.

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A quarter billion here, a quarter billion there, and pretty soon we’re talking about Bigly money.  LOL  While T-Rex is achieving State Department spending reductions of 30%, Nikki Haley joins the ‘walking in a winner wonderland” party…

(USUN) Today, the United Nations agreed on a budget for the 2018-2019 fiscal year. ‎Among a host of other successes, the United States negotiated a reduction of over $285 million off the 2016-2017 final budget. In addition to these significant cost savings, we reduced the UN’s bloated management and support functions, bolstered support for key U.S. priorities throughout the world, and instilled more discipline and accountability throughout the UN system.

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Oh, we have no idea yet how big and consequential the synergy between all of President Trump’s economic policies are toward an almost unfathomable MAGAnomic result; but we’ll find out really soon, BIGLY.
The international community is just now beginning to recognize how intensely sequential the domestic MAGAnomic tax policy is when combined with the international America-First trade policy therein.

2018 will be the year when every international trade partner reassess their best financial interests; and with the tax outline codified into law, POTUS Trump, Secretary Ross, Secretary Mnuchin and U.S. Trade Representative Lighthizer are about to initiate the biggest multinational trade shift in the history of international economics.
Yes folks, I’m actually talking about that phase when we discover we are living within the orbit of: “almost too much winning”.   This is where we begin to recognize that 5%, 6% and even 7% GDP growth is easily attainable. Here’s how it works.
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Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin departed Camp David last night and appears on Fox, CNN and CBS Sunday talk shows to discuss the pending historic vote on Tax Reform.
Fox News Sunday:

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CBS Face the Nation:
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When candidate Donald Trump campaigned and won the election in 2016 he promised to cut the massive regulatory burdens that were strangling the U.S. economy.  Together with several cabinet members, today President Trump celebrated the administration’s efforts at achieving the biggest cut in federal regulations in history.
“For the first time in decades, the government achieved regulatory savings,” President Trump said, boasting that “we blew our target out of the water”. “The administration, over its first 11 months, we canceled or delayed over 1,500 planned regulatory actions – more than any previous president by far.”

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Earlier today President Donald Trump and Vice-President Mike Pence participate in a White House signing for HR2810 the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2018.  This spending authorization represents the first time the defense budget has increased in many years.

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[Transcript] 12:03 P.M. EST – THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Mr. Vice President, Secretary Mattis, General Dunford, senior military leaders, and distinguished guests, thank you all for being here as we prepare to sign something that is extremely important: the National Defense Authorization Act. We’re signing it into law.
This historic legislation demonstrates our unwavering commitment to our men and women in uniform — the greatest fighting force in the history of the world. And we’re making it a lot better than even that.
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There’s a lot of people who don’t have a comprehensive understanding of what it takes to battle the multinationals in economic warfare.  Those same people don’t like Gary Cohn.
CTH recognizes the inherent value in Mr. Cohn as director of President Trump’s national economic council.  The guy knows the economic schemes better than almost all of the globalist adversaries.  Like Wilbur Ross, the former executive of U.S. Steel, Gary Cohn is one of the well dressed “killers”; an apex financial predator who’s eyes will contract while he shakes your hand just before he rips your throat out during negotiations.  Departing he’ll wink at your carcass, and still make your team pay for the clean up.
In this interview segment Director Gary Cohn discusses the Republicans’ tax reform plan, infrastructure initiatives and laughs out loud at President Barack Obama taking credit for the economy.  Director Cohn is a bad, bad man; perhaps the best of the bad men.

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Despite the negative banter from the gnats the U.S. economy is continuing to outpace economic expectations.  More importantly the gains are within targeted sectors long-ago written off.  Yes, Trump’s MAGAnomic policies are proving it was always possible.
Job gains exceeded 280,000 as the Main Street economy continues gaining momentum. The manufacturing sector added 31,000, a slight deviation from ADP payroll actuaries a week ago, which remains a complete reversal of prior historic job growth.   For the past three decades manufacturing jobs had been shrinking, now the sector is growing.  This is the important part of the overall picture.

The unemployment rate remains at 4.1%, because the underlying data has been strongly manipulated for the past several years.  If the data ran negative the statistical ruse would be evident; so the explanation remains that workers who left the economy have reentered, ie. “slack“.  :::eyeroll:::
Wage growth was estimated at 2.5%, which is in line with our previous analysis.  We do not anticipate massive wage rate gains until the full ‘slack‘ is taken up within the employment market.  Our prediction remains that Quarter #2 2018 (April, May, June) will be approximately the time-frame when wage rates increase at 5% and more.
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President Trump and Vice-President Mike Pence met earlier today with congressional leadership: House Speaker Paul Ryan, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
[Video and Transcript of remarks below]  When Nancy Pelosi began talking the look on VP Pence’s face is, well, priceless. Additionally, anticipating Pelosi and Schumer are going to hold up the budget by threatening military spending, the ever-strategic Trump invited General Mattis into the discussion so the Democrat leadership could tell him to his face why they would be willing to put American military lives at risk.  Epic.

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[ Transcript] 3:08 P.M. EST – THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. We’re all here as a very friendly, well-unified group. It’s a well-knit-together group of people. And we hope that we’re going to make some great progress for our country. I think that will happen, and we appreciate it very much.
And, Chuck, Nancy, would you say anything — like to say anything? Chuck?
LEADER SCHUMER: Well, we hope we can come to an agreement. Funding the government is extremely important, helping our soldiers is very important, and helping average citizens is very important.
So we’re here in the spirit of: let’s get it done.
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