Trump celebrates tax bill victory at Iowa fairground rally
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South China Morning Post
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Trump uses antisemitism slur ‘Shylock' in rally, denies knowing it's offensive
US President Donald Trump used an antisemitism slur during a rally in Iowa as he celebrated the passage of his tax cuts and spending bill but insisted he did not know the word was offensive to Jewish people. 'No death tax, no estate tax, no going to the banks and borrowing from, in some cases a fine banker, and in some cases Shylocks and bad people,' Trump told the crowd on Thursday at the Iowa State Fairgrounds in Des Moines. The term 'Shylock' is borrowed from William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. The tale features a Jewish character, who is portrayed as a ruthless moneylender demanding 'a pound of flesh' from a merchant unable to repay a loan. The word refers to loan sharks and has long been considered offensive, playing on stereotypes of Jews and greed. The Trump controversy echoes a similar incident in 2014 when then-Vice-President Joe Biden used the term while describing exploitative lenders. Biden later apologised, calling it 'a poor choice of words'. 03:02 US House passes Trump's bill, sending it to White House for president to sign US House passes Trump's bill, sending it to White House for president to sign 'We see once again how deeply embedded this stereotype about Jews is in society,' Abraham Foxman, then-director of a Jewish activist group, the Anti-Defamation League, said at the time.
South China Morning Post
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How to undermine the US dollar and destroy its monetary system
As a professional journalist dedicated to objectivity and detachment, I am totally uncalm about the US president. But you would be too if he had burned a big hole in your wallet. Since Donald Trump returned to power, the US dollar has dropped more than 10 per cent against the dollar index consisting of six major currencies, reportedly the worst fall since the oil shock of 1973. As you may have guessed, I am paid by my employer in Hong Kong dollars. So thanks to the US dollar peg, I had just had to exchange HK$5.8-plus for one Canadian dollar, instead of the roughly average HK$5.4 until recently. On a monthly basis, the difference is roughly equivalent to, for my wife and me, 6 to 7 visits to our favourite grocery store where the real inflation rate for some items, I suspect, is 10 times the headline Canadian rate of under 2 per cent. Every time Trump attacks or insults US Fed chair Jerome Powell, I weep. Posting on his own Truth Social platform, he has just openly called on Powell to resign: ''Too Late' should resign immediately!!!' The president has called him 'Mr Too Late', 'a numbskull', 'an average mentally person…Low IQ for what he does'. It's been a long list of insults. Poor Jerome. Financial historians may correct me but probably no previous Fed chair had to endure such prolonged public humiliation. Since Trump's avowed goal for his almost universal tariff war is to promote Made-in-America exports, he obviously wants a weak dollar. So there is a method in the madness in attacking Powell; and Trump seems personally to enjoy it. But there is no reason to doubt that he wants Powell out and replace him with what he calls 'a low rates guy', a complete sycophant just like he has with those put in charge of public health, education, defence, national security and intelligence, and much else. Powell's term ends next May.
South China Morning Post
7 hours ago
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Did Trump get his ‘Big Beautiful Bill' at the US dollar's expense?
The passage of a sprawling budget bill has raised concerns over the long-term debt of the United States, which analysts said could compound already heightened worries over the reliability of the country's currency as a safe-haven asset. Advertisement Winning a narrow 218-214 vote in the House of Representatives on Thursday, the 'One Big Beautiful Bill Act' – which raises spending on border security and defence while making the record tax cuts enacted in 2017 permanent – now heads to US President Donald Trump for his signature, which he is expected to give on Friday. It is also set to raise the federal government's debt ceiling by US$5 trillion, surpassing the US$4 trillion allocated by an earlier version of the bill. This creates more room for the Treasury Department to borrow to repay future obligations, but allows for greater debt accrual in the future. Raymond Yeung, chief Greater China economist at ANZ, said while the bill may lower the immediate risk of a government default, it also deepens worries over US debt sustainability and the interest rate structure. 'In the months leading up to the bill's passage, investors had already been discussing how to diversify risk and reduce their exposure to US dollar assets,' he said. Advertisement Even without the bill, Yeung noted, momentum for diversification has been building in a number of countries.
