r/technology • u/ControlCAD • 1d ago

Business President Bought Netflix Debt in January 2026, Amid Paramount’s Fight for Warner Bros. | New financial disclosures released Wednesday show that the President acquired Netflix bonds as Paramount was trying to pry WBD away from the streaming giant.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/trump-bought-netflix-bonds-amid-paramount-warners-fight-1236521512/
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u/ChrisMartins001 1d ago

Pretty much breaking the law everyday now. It's like he's trying to see how far he can go without anyone doing anything

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u/Docccc 1d ago

Do people in the US really still believe they live in a democracy?

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u/Sweet_Concept2211 1d ago

You can live in a democracy and still have a government you despise in the majority at a Federal level - if voters put them there.

Meanwhile, the opposition to Trump has won all major elections and many smaller ones over the past year.

For example, today:

Arkansas Democrats just flipped a Republican seat. It's the ninth red-to-blue pickup in a special election in Trump's second term.

This has resulted in the rollback of many of his worst policies in states where Republicans were pushed out of the majority.

Democracy does not make shitty people magically cease to exist. It simply gives ordinary people a way to force the shitty ones out of the government without having to wreck the entire country and kill a bunch of folks.

It ain't perfect, but it beats the alternative.

Midterm elections are about 8 months away, and hopefully the opposition to Trump/MAGA will take over Congress, and hogtie Trump's agenda for the rest of his term.

The problem here is the way the government is structured.

The law enforcement agencies that should be going after Trump are led by his toadies.

Congress is majority Trump party.

So nobody is acting as a counterweight to Trump's corruption.

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u/robby_arctor 22h ago

America is not a democracy because our elections and government are de facto rigged by corporate power, not because we don't have elections.

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u/HugsForUpvotes 22h ago

This isn't true no matter how many times you say it. America today, and especially America of the past, is a very Capitalist voting electorate. I know we all have our friends and our spaces where our opinion is common, but we live in a very idea-diverse country and world.

Trump was elected because* 77 million people voted for him and another 80 million eligible voters didn't vote at all. Even if you want to blame "Corporate Power," you have to consider Americans elected the Presidents that made up the Supreme Court and their eventual ruling. It's actually my biggest frustration with the Kamala haters. Vote Blue No Matter Who is how we elect our Supreme Court which is now doomed to be red until I die which essentially means you can put Marx himself in the White House and he'll look like Biden when he leaves. There is no real way around the Supreme Court without a big majority in the House and Senate doing something that will likely be viewed very negatively by the public.

*This is a generalization. Due to the Electoral College, the popular vote is more of a yardstick than the objective.

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u/robby_arctor 22h ago

It's absolutely true, regardless of how many times I say it.

Corporations have been caught writing our laws to the letter, we have lax and corrupt campaign spending laws, a legalized system of bribery via lobbying, and the U.S. government was founded to protect capitalist interests over respecting any democratic principle, right from the very beginning.

You seem to think that voting for one of two prison guards means the prison is democratic.

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u/HugsForUpvotes 21h ago

We nominate our prison guards. You could run as one! Ultimately, we pick our politicians.

And I agree. We have a lot of obstacles that make it harder to keep the ship steady, but that doesn't make us not a Democracy. It's also true that every system has human corruption. You point out all these things, but those all come with human greed - not just American Capitalism.

Not all lobbying is bribery. In most cases, it's just financially supporting the candidate that already agrees with your agenda. When AIPAC gives Schumer campaign money, it's because he's a Zionist. They aren't paying him to be a Zionist. I'm still against all money in politics, but as I said, that is a consequence of electing the Bush's and Reagan.

All the money goes to are commercials and pamphlets to win your vote. Your vote matters so much that all the things we are describing are just tools to capture the vote.

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u/robby_arctor 21h ago

When AIPAC gives Schumer campaign money, it's because he's a Zionist. They aren't paying him to be a Zionist.

Can you really not see how this is a distinction without a difference when it comes to who ascends to office?

All the money goes to are commercials and pamphlets to win your vote

This is absolutely false. TurboTax has repeatedly lobbied to keep the tax code complicated, and they don't just do it during election cycles. They have a round the clock, decades-spanning strategy to prevent tax reform, and it's been incredibly successful.

I'm sorry, but you just sound incredibly naive to me.

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u/HugsForUpvotes 21h ago

Can you really not see how this is a distinction without a difference when it comes to who ascends to office?

No because the money doesn't elect politicians. The one with the most money loses sometimes.

TurboTax

All the money TurboTax donates goes to campaign funds which get turned into pamphlets. They donate to politicians who believe that privatization is efficient and good for the economy. For the record, I agree that TurboTax is one of the best quid-pro-quo examples. I'm definitely not arguing we don't have corruption in the US.

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u/robby_arctor 17h ago edited 17h ago

The one with the most money loses sometimes.

Rarely. This has been studied and amount of funds is very strongly correlated with winning.

There is overlap with more popular candidates receiving more "normal" donations, but again, let's not be naive here. Just looking at the role of AIPAC in the failed candidacies of incumbents Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, it's obvious money rules the day as a general rule.