601
Trump’s “Swiss” Watches Traced to Derelict Wyoming Strip Mall
(newrepublic.com)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2024
601 points (99.0% liked)
politics
19244 readers
2667 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
I just don't understand how the place isn't shut down already.
They know the "business" behind the product is some shady LLC in a warehouse in Wyoming. There are no watches being produced there. There are no sneakers being produced there. And there never will be. This is a money laundering scheme and nothing more. And even if they do get some rubes dumb enough to part with their money, their orders will just be "temporarily delayed" while the customer is sent circling around LLC hell trying to get a refund on a product that never existed in the first place.
Seriously. $100,000 watches? Who the fuck is the target audience for this? Even if it were on the up-and-up (it isn't), there's only a sliver of a sliver of the population who could afford to even if they wanted to. And you're not going to reach them through some random late-night commercial on OANN. If this were a legit product made by a legit company, their entire sales wing would have known that commercials targeting inbred hicks at 3:00 in the morning is a complete waste of money.
Trump and whoever else is behind this should have just quietly taken out a couple of back-of-the-magazine ads in some no-name magazine to give their product a veneer of legitimacy and then just quietly did their crime stuff with nobody being any wiser. But no, this is Trump, who must always, always pick the worst and most absurdly inane option available. Every time. Like picking a smart choice would cause him torturous pain or something. I've never seen a man who so masterfully looks at all of the options available to him, and somehow manages to come up with and select an exponentially worse option with such consistency.
Trump fanatics with a lot of money. Which if even one person buys one (And Im sure someone has) The entire charade becomes worth it.
My money is on it being a way to get around political donation limits - if you're buying a product, you aren't donating. Elon can buy a handful of these to give out to his buddies, and it doesn't count as donating a million dollars to Trump's campaign.
If the business were actually about selling watches (which like you said, it isn’t) it would still make sense to have an extremely expensive model as a sales tactic so that the affordable ones seem more valuable. Another example of this is the $10,000 solid gold Apple Watch. Obviously they don’t expect to sell many watches at that price when the battery is sealed into the device and it’s guaranteed to fail after a few years, but it exists just to make the normal models seem fancy by proxy.
Oh, I absolutely agree. But when was the last time you saw a Rolex ad in the middle of a Duck Dynasty rerun or something? Any company able to actually produce and sell watches worth $100k is going to know who their target audience is and how to reach them.
Trump's commercials scream less of an attempt to reach people who may genuinely be interested in his product (He'd probably be better off selling them at his golf courses), and more of an attempt to be able to say that there was even a product in the first place when people eventually start questioning where $15,000,000 magically appeared from. Point to the ads, say all 147 of them were bought by clients who wished to remain anonymous, and say you closed up shop after they were sold. Money laundering made easy.
Appliance stores uses that tactic all the time, the 2000 fridge doesn't look at expensive when is side to side with a 10000 one.
Cops have better things to do than shutting down obvious money laundering enterprises - like, shaking down obvious money laundering enterprises for a cut of the action.
I lived in Daytona Beach a few years ago, and one day I noticed that a small store had opened up that sold nothing but Super-Whisks, plastic whisks that cost $1 each. They were never open (a hand-written sign said the nail salon next door had a couple of whisks if you wanted one) and they were a quarter of a mile from a Publix and three dollar stores, all of which also sold $1 plastic whisks, so they weren't exactly satisfying an unmet demand. The most ridiculously obvious money laundry I've ever seen and yet they were never investigated by anyone.
There was an old video store that opened up in my neighborhood in the late 80s. Now it did have an adult section in the back, so there was at least a hint of legitimate business. Now remember. I'm saying late 80s here. VHS. A circulation of movies that was never updated. For decades. Well, well beyond VHS's expiration date. But when you walked in there, that's what you saw. "Modern-day" movies like Roadhouse and Howard the Duck. In like 2005. And when you walked in, the guy at the counter gave you a look as if you were definitely not welcome, and even the adult section (where I figured the "real" business took place) was "closed".
The place closed down sometime during the late 00s, but to this day I firmly believe the store was a front for some kind of mob operation and money laundering and the adult section was for......members only, ifyaknowwhatimean.