As Professor Richardson suggested this afternoon in Politics Chat, I listened to the speech Canadian Prime Minister Carney gave at Davos today, as well as the question and answer session that followed. If you want to understand the depth and breadth of the change in our world today, give a listen.
I admit to being neither a diplomat nor an economist, but even I was able to understand and be shaken by his remarks. Simply put, the “rules based order” is dead. It is dead, in part, because it was not really a vehicle for worldwide equality but rather a maintenance of a status quo that allowed the power of wealth rather than arms to dictate the flow of materials that improve wellbeing for more people. In other words, it only worked superficially, and it is the inequities that ordinary people turned a blind eye to that has brought about its downfall.
At a podium in Davos, our closest neighbor and staunchest ally delivered the most honest and damning analysis of our failures to live up to our Constitution that has ever been spoken. To be sure, he rightly laid out the sad history that this failure has happened around the world. By his very honesty, he stripped away both the claims of American exceptionalism and the criticism that we have never lived up to our goals. In short, he said, no country has, because we started the rules based world order from an uneven playing field in which wealth begot wealth, and power begot power. Carney was succinct: we all knew this was true, but pretended it was not.
He spoke of how middle powers, such as Canada, can compete: Canada has lowered its taxes on citizens and corporations alike to strengthen its citizens’ buying power. It has initiated greater efforts to mine and market its natural resources. They learned from their vulnerability from overreliance on the convenient, nearby markets in the US, and are signing agreements with markets on many continents. Canada is also strengthening its military capacity.
In a way, Carney has called the bluff. He is moving his country forward without the US, reminding the world that coalitions among middle powers are not only equal to but can surpass a coalition with a single super power.
Through his remarks I finally understood what Professor Richardson has been preparing us for: the US is no longer a leader in the world, it is an obstacle. Our friends are done mourning the loss, they are working out the path forward, and they are not pretending otherwise.
Many folks decry the loss of civics, humanities, and logic in the last several decades in American schools. It appears as if what rather will be needed in the coming decades are courses in humility, cooperation, and tolerance. We will need to learn to rein in our material appetites and consumption. And we likely will have to learn how to be the objects of pity and scorn rather than admiration. MAGA really meant “Make America Greedy Again. The golden goose is dead.
I have suggested in my most recent blog that we back away from being consumers of everything and maker of more. Food certainly being one. I spend time in my kitchen making my own food. I don’t suscribe to factory standards which is mostly filled with sugars and high carbohydrates. I make my own ketchup why not. It’s only tomato paste, vinegar and spices. I love cucumber chips and I make my own liquid and instead of paying $4 a jar, it costs .79 cents for a cucumber to cut up and no sugar added. I recently bought a key ring for $5 and it fell apart so I returned it for credit and cut a piece of wire to hold my keys. These are only small insignificant things but they add up. We don’t need to buy everything made at the factory conglomerate. We don’t need to constantly buy everything made we can make it ourselves. I’m not impoverished. I just don’t need to do what standardization tells me to do. We are going into a deep freeze. Often I make a big vat of vegetable soup. And I look over at my recent addition to my cat herd Kitty Katz. After two weeks, she has acclimated to the house. And she doesn’t have to freeze her paws anymore forever while waiting for me to bring food to the outside warming house. She now meows at me every morning while I prepare the food and it warms my heart.
I boycotted yesterday and put triple layers of clothing on and danced and yelled with the others. It felt good. A reporter asked me to discuss community improvements in front of cameras next week. I’ll be satisfied with January. My prediction is that our economy will soon take a dive. We have never had such poor leadership ever even under W Bush who was a spoiled brat that failed at everything. Now we have a sick dude who destroys everything because hum… he doesn’t know why he seeks destruction. He just destroys.
Once when I lived in Florence Italy I was at a party and I overheard two Italian women talking and one said “Americani sono stupidi.” I turned around and she immediately apologized to me but I responded, “No, you are correct we are stupid.” That was 50 years ago.
The wealthy and the oligarchs benefit from a less educated population and the rest of us suffer as a result.
Mackenzie Scott has donated hundreds of millions to various organizations many of them universities that cater to people of color. And now she is being sued because white Christian nationalists don't appreciate that she is trying to give a hand up.
Can you imagine, Pam, what Amazon could be for workers, sellers and customers if Mackenzie was the owner/CEO? Good working conditions and pay and STILL spread the wealth around. Seems like, maybe, she might have been the “heart” of the Amazon creation. She’s someone I’d sit with and chat over a pint or tea or coffee….think it would be a fascinating convo!!!
House Republicans need to listen carefully to what Jack Smith has to say, and then join Democrats and impeach this deranged man in the White House while they still can. If they don't, they will be responsible for the down spiral that will follow.
Yes and as Heather has said if just a few republicans voted with democrats to impeach they would be heroes and save this country from the deranged agent orange.
Jack Smith has risked his personal safety to speak the truth. There are way too many cowards in government who will just sit on their hands without doing the right thing of shutting down orange baboon's treachery!
Yes, if Rs could disabuse themselves of Trump’s hold on them, Congress could right the ship and recalibrate with our erstwhile allies. With some humility, we could adopt the mindset of the “middle powers” that Carney defines, after finally impeaching the deranged would-be king.
I think it was on this forum that someone recommended Cory Doctorow's book "Enshittification", and I have started reading it. So far it paint's a picture of the largest tech companies making more money from manipulating the market than from serving it. The thesis seems to parallel Mark Carney's recent words:
"We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient. That trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim."
We are losing our grip on the common good by accepting subjugation by a few powerful narcissists. Reagan successfully branded service and protection of the common good as our nation's greatest folly while in reality it was the foundation of liberty and justice for all. We collectively pretended it was justice, or justice enough while corruption spread. For what?
Enshittification appears to apply to the product or service of a company when it becomes so dominant that it suffers little competition and therefore has little fear from shortchanging the suppliers and ultimate customer. At a point at which CEO collude to squeeze the public, even aside from the political power they have come to wield.
" I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that ... if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge, it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy. "
- Fmr AG Eric Holder (who did not prosecute and made them larger).
GJ Loft ME CA FL IL NE CT MI's comment is interesting and also illustrative in defining the Christian Nationalists. One may ask: "suing for what?" And you rightly point out, "It’s her money and none of their business." However, for me, the darker take away is the illustrative example, cartoonish as it may be, that control is clearly at the top of these nut cases' agenda. This very much explains why Trump and his Christo fascist Nazis think that taking Greenland is a U.S. right. Never mind that it belongs to Denmark; never mind that Greenlanders that have nothing to do with the U.S. nor us as a population, live there peacefully; never mind that they don't want us. With Trump, as is the case with the ChristoNazis supporting him, it's all about what they want and believe that their "faith" is righty meant for all Americans regardless of anyone's opinions. The audacity played out by this administration is not going unnoticed. Just this morning on NPR, George Louis "A" Martínez reported from Moscow on how the Russians were taking this Greenland theft by Trump et. al. Lavrov was quoted as saying, essentially, that if the US takes Greenland, why can't we take the Crimea (and by extension, Ukraine)? Why can't China take Taiwan? We are all now, essentially, living in the Bizarro world, not unlike the one Superman once had to negotiate with his Bizarro counterpart. As Uncle Duke from Doonesbury would day: "bad craziness!" https://www.npr.org/2026/01/21/nx-s1-5683070/trumps-greenland-demand-have-been-a-gift-to-u-s-geopolitical-foes-like-russia
"Bizarro world" is right. This is just one big nightmare. I don't know which is worse: the obvious conclusion that DJT is NOT WELL, or the fact that members of the regime (and many GOP politicians) continue their lies and propaganda to support him. Our country is coming apart at the seams. That can't be good for the economy.
It's vainglorious lack of impulse control. A blotto drunken frat-rat flooring a Ferrari; with no thought to future consequences. In this case the (classic) intoxicant is power.
Who the gods would destroy they first make mad, but that often leaves vast collateral damage in its wake, as it did WWII.
The White Nationalist House is jeopardizing our national security by further emboldening Putin, betraying Zelensky, and our NATO allies. This WH is a gang of traitors, and Congress is complicit by doing nothing to stop this unfolding tragedy. So much for peace and affordability.
"Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises." - Lincoln
I respect those who claim to be "Christian who are humble, inclusive, and helpful. I reject the legitimacy of those who make the same claim yet manifest exclusion, hyper-hubris, and predation. Bizarro if you will. Polar opposites, yet somehow muddled even across the centuries. I see the hand of privileged politics in that.
At Davos. NYT Dealbook...some C.E.O.s openly questioned the president, using words like “wild” and “bizarre.” Yet many of them are planning to attend a reception in his honor, with some even joking about the best way to praise him in person. “Tread lightly,” one C.E.O. said. Contrast that with a number of international politicians wringing their hands over the growing tensions about Greenland.
Also on attendees’ minds: The Supreme Court could finally rule on the legality of some of Trump’s biggest tariffs as soon as today.
Daniel, I fear the ones who are laughing and talking about appeasing him will not be laughing soon. He is not able to be appeased. He’ll turn on them in a second.
Daniel, given that Davos is mostly a performative preening, it’s disgusting that the CEOs are practicing their Trump praise. They all know he’s deranged and completely impossible to satisfy for more than a few minutes. Apparently not a lot of business deals are made at Davos? Thus, rather that play the game and reinforce 🍊’s delusions of grandeur, why the F didn’t they just stay home this year?
Canada, however, spoke truth to power - although the target of some of his comments wouldn’t understand a word. O Canada!
Technically Ms. Scott is not being sued, at least not yet, but the DOJ is investigating, alleging that some beneficiaries of support from her Foundation (i.e. Students for Justice in Palestine and American Muslims for Palestine) have "ties" to Hamas. It strikes me as yet another unserious pursuit by this vindictive regime, attempting to intimidate and discredit anyone who supports liberal causes. It is ludicrous to expect that a private Foundation would have the resources of the FBI or CIA to conduct international surveillance and reconnaissance for every grant application they consider.
"MacKenzie Scott is not currently the target of major lawsuits, but her substantial donations through Yield Giving are facing scrutiny and potential investigation due to links between some recipient organizations and groups suspected of ties to Hamas, sparking congressional inquiries and FBI probes, though Scott herself is not accused of wrongdoing, just of funding networks that support those groups. Separately, her ex-husband Jeff Bezos and his current wife are involved in ongoing legal disputes with Scott's estranged brother, Michael Sánchez, related to alleged leaks during Bezos's divorce from Scott, but this does not involve Scott directly as a plaintiff or defendant."
Mackenzie joins quite a group of kind- hearted, giving people. People like her will never know the impact they have had on another's life. Some people are altruistic. Rightful praise cannot be given to the others who only act in order to gain praise for the 'good' things they do.
One of the many things I like about her is that she gives funds with no strings attached. I don't think she has even requested the Nobel Peace prize as far as I know.
Almost every community have many projects that need funding and it seems that she does an excellent job of funding projects that help a large number of people.
Her money, her choice where it goes. These so called Christians have no idea what it means to be a Christian. They are following the antichrist and can't see it.
And by planting a garden to grow the food we can, to some extent, control what type of fertilizer and pesticides are used. The fresh air and exercise is good for us. Home canned jams make great gifts and jars can be reused. Being debt free may help us weather the economic turmoil coming. The US does not need to be dominant, we need to live in harmony with the world. In Minneapolis we continue to try to help our neighbors and let the world who will listen know just how horrible the current administration is.
During the growing season, we often have more than we can use of perishable items and drop off lettuce, tomatoes, etc. to the local food bank. Our local food bank and our town also have gardens to provide fresh produce. And the local groceries stores also donate fresh produce that may be bruised or about to expire, but is still edible.
We are fortunate to have enough space to have a garden. Many people aren't or else they are too busy with jobs and family.
I am heartened to read that others actually cook real food. I do. And I just ordered my seeds for this years garden. Even the price of sees has gone up. But I am excited, as I am every year, to plant flowers among my veggies. Right now we have lettuce in the greenhouse, and beets and broccoli in the raised beds in the garden.
Check with your local county extension. Here n NC we have an annual Seed Sharing event, free to public. Some seeds are from last year, but the germination is still ok.
I once tended a 50’ vegetable garden with a few pot plants put in between. But when the woodchucks come as well as other vermin, they would eat up so I prefer the creatures so no more planting.
No woodchucks here, but my dogger likes to eat the cherry tomatoes off the vine, snowpea pods & has tugged so hard she’d uproot them….have an espaliered apple tree that over the season gets the two lower laterals plucked of apples which she plays with like a ball before devouring them, and strips the blueberry bushes too! She loves her fruits & veggies! I do have snails & slugs tho’!
Same here, Bill, around 50', now just a few containers. I grew strawberries from seed, melons, tomatillos, blueberries along with all the usual suspects. And I am in Connecticut as well, where there be deer (and now bear!) aplenty.
Pot plants are so beautiful Bill! I had 'volunteer' pot plants growing against my old home- the person before me would clean his pot & throw the pot seeds out the 2nd story window! What a treat.
My slow cooker & cast iron dutch oven get quite the workout in my kitchen! Simple foods cost less, taste better & promote good health. I love beets & maybe this will be the year I finally plant some.
Fun point of view and reference, thanks lin+. Frigid outside here, but with heat mats I sprout indoors and your post is a butt-kick to plant microgreens.
JD, that had been my goal when I bought my house to have it paid off in 15 years by escalating payments, but life & that plan went sideways & unless I win the lotto I’ll never have it paid off! 🤷🏻♀️But I am SO lucky to have a roof overhead and enough food to eat…so counting my blessings indeed.
I went to Prudhoe Bay and worked just long enough to pay off my mortgage. The pay was 29.00/hr 12 hours per day 7 days a week time and a half for overtime double time for holidays. Three weeks on and one week back in the states. One could work their week off in lieu of returning as well. It condensed my mortgage to one year and a couple of months. Debt free has been an enlightenment. I work now only when people over 80 need a hand and can no longer perform hard labor. I don’t have to charge anything and it makes me feel good. Time to give back. Plus’s that’s how I met my 100 year old girlfriend. How lucky was that?
Pat, earlier in the week I told posted how in a recent Politics Chat podcast, Heather asked us all to do kind things for each other. I asked people to post what they had done, or would do, as I was feeling pretty down.
I got three replies--2 that day, one the following. I guess either I posted too late and people didn't see it, because I sure don't believe--CAN'T let myself believe--that the Trump regime has indeed stolen our humanity. Perhaps people are being modest?
Today's Letter has almost put me under. I am so grateful to YOU, for the simple reason that you have posted the good YOU do.
You nailed it--when you do good for someone, you feel wonderful. It's a joy to be needed.
And for those who feel they are necessarily on the taking side, please know that allowing someone to help you is a gift in itself, by allowing them to feel needed.
It's already pretty late in the day, so who knows how many will see this. I'm gathering up strength to call Congress--even though I am sick at heart, and even though it feels useless. I gotta try.
It would do me so much good to log onto my email later, and not see "X liked" my comment, but a comment that says, I did THIS today to help someone else. Please don't be modest, and please don't think the smallest thing is too small.
Barbara, same here. As of this moment, our only ongoing debt is our mortgage, but like you, a solid home, enough in the bank to buy groceries and pay our utilities and mortgage in time, and I would also like to add incredible neighbors!
Janet, my life would be very different if I my house was PIF…I could actually afford to hire folks to help me with the upkeep & finish the stalled renovation (I’ll need to do a refi to fund it) & yardwork on nearly 1/2 acre. My friends worry that I’m still climbing ladders up the side of my house or to prune my high hedges & doing all my own yardwork, fence repair and all home maintenance. Have given serious consideration to selling, but rents are much much higher than my mortgage & availability is very limited.
Except, ever more, it's less doable. Pays haven't kept up with expenses, automobiles are increasingly less affordable and cost of living is skyrocketing. In MA you can barely buy a shed for under $600K. Our son bought his first home in 2020 for a little over $200K. It's valued at well over $300K in five years. His saving grace was that the interest rate was low since he was a first time buyer. Rents are also outrageous, many higher than his mortgage payment.
New cars are close to $25K, if you can even find a car since Americans love those SUVs. We paid almost $30K for our hybrid Elantra in 2024, hardly what anyone would consider a luxury car, but it suit us fine. Still $30K equals about a $600/month car payment excluding insurance. Property taxes are climbing, homeowners insurance is outrageous, ours went up about 50% in one year, even though we have never had a claim. The middle class is getting scroowed left and right, getting more and more in debt. I don't see this correcting any time soon.
I am debt free and I pay off all my credit cards each month.i even cancel the cards that gave me huge air bonus miles before the first $99 annual charge just so I can apply again and receive more bonus miles. Again and again. I’m taking another free air trip again this year. Either to Vilnius, the death camps of Poland or Greenland. But I’ll only take an aisle seat to stretch out my legs or the airlines stuff you in like sardines.
Oh yes! Get out in the garden! Your county extension offices have lots of ways to help. Food education, 4H, master gardeners, fertilizer/pesticides guidelines, plant health, soil health, invasive plant identification.....
Prepare for quite a spectacle as Trump lays out his Greenland acquisition plans and throws in other nationalist ambitions like Canada and Mexico and Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico and Panama and so forth. Probably we'll soon see an AI US flag on planet Mars. Why not go inter galactic? His macho bro base loves the chest beating.
But, it is quite amazing that the delusional Orange menace who can't figure out healthcare, immigration, human rights or constitutional law in the US, will be "running" or "owning" or "kind of owning" or "borrowing" or "whatever" the rights to self rule for other sovereign nations.
We had a couple hundred out last night for a rally at the Williston VT ICE data center, 18 F with a fierce wind. The speeches were great- not just calls to action but specifics on actions we can join. (But boy my toes hurt when I got home!)
Great post! I live in central NC, Costco, target, Walmart, Trader Joe's hobby lobby, their parking lots are packed with cars (big ass expensive pickups ( don't know why they are called pickups, they never pickup anything), people buying stuff they don't need, seriously don't need, like press-on nails, it is out of control!
I know I'm ranting. Here is another crazy thing our country is trapped in....Tell us how you avoid plastic.
I now never buy coffee outside in a paper cup as it’s lined with plastic. I bring my thermos and pour my own coffee. I even get compliments from strangers when they see me do it. Why pay $4 for a cup of micro plastic coffee when I can pour my own .13 cent coffee made from home, lol. I ain’t no dummy. At look dumb but looks are deceiving. And the heat erodes the plastic. I mostly use glass containers to store food. I refill two old beer bottles with filtered water but never buy plastics water bottles. Time will end my life not micro plastics but I don’t need to rush it up with a gut full of it.
With planning one seldom needs to buy anything when out and about. It was around 2010 I was in NY in Feb doing my first art show of the season. I bought a bottle of water for a ridiculous amount of money. I never bought another water or coffee outside or visited NY again.
Little steps sure help Bill. I have gradually replaced whatever plastic containers I had with glass- including what my hot coffee goes into. I know, over these years, I have added to landfill but, few plastics are 'recyclable'.
Janet, I hope my 2005 Dodge Magnum Station wagon lasts until I can't drive anymore. Growing up around strong metal vehicles & muscle cars hasn't helped me feel good about much in the vehicle market. Maybe there needs to be a rule about 'pickup' ownership: you must own farm land, work for a construction company, tow vehicles with it & provide proof before you can sign on the dotted line! Trucks right now are so big they become a hazard to the rest of us just trying to drive. The payments are a joke- and 60 months! to pay it off.
There is a fix for this stupidity, this ignorance. Start teaching critical thinking processes, history, comparative government systems and literature as early as the 6th grade in our public schools. To me MAGA is 21st century KKK. I came to this belief after reading Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland" about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest in the 1920's and HCR's book, "How the South Won the Civil War."
Like your list, Richard, I’d add courses/methods/information on money management/budgeting/banking/savings and other living skills, such as having/managing a household (even if single). In high school (1960’s) I took Home Economics classes—basically cooking & sewing skills (the class only ever had one guy in it & he’d purchased a kit to make a down sleeping bag & needed to learn the skills—the teacher was thrilled he was there—I think these days more guys would be in such classes!); in college, back when my Uni had a Industrial Arts mjr, took auto mechanics, carpentry, welding as well as a Home Ec course in Tailoring….sigh, that’s probably why I was on the “10-yr-no-degree-plan” 🤣(and that’s just listing the vocational classes & not the plethora of “academic” classes across many programs).
I have no degrees but 3 years of technical training, specialized courses that interested me, or that I took just to help them get the minimum number of students (such as a Hot Rod automotive class), while working 19 paid hours a week as an Aeronautics Teaching/Lab Assistant). Before that I spent 5 years as an instructor/researcher, course supervisor, with additional duties as tech library and maintenance supervisor at the Space Systems Command and Control School.
I have to say so much of what I value came from what I learned from some students like you who were life long learners no matter what they were officially credited with.
It always bothered me that the colleges were too ranked by how many entering had achieved degrees, instead of how so many learned through coursework that very often helped them advance in careers or their own businesses so far more than they could have without such a good experience base. So many I know of were able to advance through specialized industry training that few colleges could deliver. Some were able to get credit by testing higher than the degreed graduates.
I have five degrees: A.S., B.A., M.A., Ph.D., J.D., the last coming from Harvard in 1973. Much to my chagrin Harvard Law awarded a J.D. to John Roberts in 1979. When people give me B.S. about my Liberal ideas coming from my Harvard experience I point them to Chief Justice John Roberts, who almost single-handedly has put our democratic process on the brink of collapsing with his stupid Supreme Court decisions - Citizens United and Shelby County vs. Holder, to name two.
When Citizens United was decided, my first reaction was that they knocked out some of the shoring principles that held for 223 years, something we thought would hold forever or at least until we made a more solid foundation through wiser addition to our Constitution.
They effectively breached a levee that seemed unimportant to fix before the river that never breached the old unrecognized one, so was never replaced with something better, or even patched up a bit.
Jim, I sure agree! Measuring ones knowledge isn't necessarily measured by the letters placed after your name. I have learned more in life from untitled people than those with a sheepskin. Learning is a daily task. Until my eyes close a final time.....
Cindy, it could be because of something known as amathia, willful ignorance. Some are so invested in the "truth" of something (religion, racism, etc.) that they cannot, literally cannot, use their brains objectively to dissect certain factual situations. For example, nothing in the New Testament is written by anyone who ever met, saw, spoke to, listened to Jesus. It's all hearsay. Some of it, as with Islam and Mohamed, coming decades later. Is there a chance that Jesus is purely a fictional character? After all, there are two versions in the New Testament about his death.
And I continue with the learning via the OLLI program: Osher Lifelong Learning Institute for those over 50…learning, but no tests!!!! And of course LFAA…what I call my Midnight Online School!!!
Barbara, when schools 'decided' Home Economics wasn't needed for education, we put ourselves in to the consumer mode & it's just gotten worse. Now, we need to figure out a way to get young people's hands off their fancy phones & do something that involves problem- solving.
I think he destroys because he has a black hole inside his heart that no amount of stuff can ever fill or satisfy. He sometimes looks gleeful or gloating but never happy... and Melania... miserable household. As goes the character of a leader so goes the character of a nation.
I commend you for your self-reliance. The majority of Americans can’t do that because they don’t have the space, time, or money. With so many people living on tiny incomes and working multiple jobs, cheap fast food and store-bought foods like ketchup and frozen pizza will continue to be meal staples.
We’re stupid and have been for a long time. We haven’t been a world leader or developed country for so long.
I sometimes in summer sit out in front with my coffee after feeding the herd and watch neighbors having delivered factory food for breakfast. Then I observe kids 250 pounds waddling around. They won’t have a long life.
I spend my first sabbatical working and living in Sweden for a year in 1989 and spent time in a number of other European countries. It was always surprising to me how welcome I was in any environment, and circle of residents of whatever area I was in. Things like being invited to join them in restaurants, pubs and on trains for example. As an American, so many people seemed excited to talk with me and I often heard people say they loved the American people, but the government (G.W. Bush was President then), not so much. Sadly, It's no longer like that; as before, many still like Americans although many feel sorry for us, and they understand the difference between the people and the power. However, many also blame the American people for being so gullible to have elected a charlatan wannabe dictator who's not content to just screw with America, but wants to shake up the entire world.
I feel as bad for the wonderful people of Greenland and Denmark and other countries under attack by this criminal cabal as I do for those of us living it daily here on U.S. soil. I wish more Americans would a) seek more and better education, and b) travel the world to see other peoples and cultures and discover our commonalities and not focus on "the other" as some kind of enemy. As Mark Twain said, "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness."
Good luck to those of us who #resist here in America - we're running out of time!
Oh here is another thing. I love cats, have 4 of them (rescue), but we recently spent $1,400 on one cat and those two visits did not require surgery. I think our society has lost their minds with our pets. The cat & dog food grocery isle has as much variety as the cereal isle! Don't get me started on cereal. Ok, I feel better now.
Always as the vet if they are corporate-owned and stay away if they are. So you have 4 kitties that means you should make your own cat food and fill ball jars and freeze. I max out at about 25 lbs. it’s lasts two weeks. You can do it if I can you can. You need a meat grinder for some of the bones. You need to visit cat nutrition.org and/or Dr Lisa Pierson’s blog and read up on the ingredients. What else… I buy chicken thighs from Costco best deal not the cheapest but best value. You need to add chicken liver, vitamins, lite salt. If you embark on this, I’ll give you info on what I consider the best meat grinder you don’t need to spend hundreds just around $200. Contact: bkatz322 at gmail.com
We make our own dog food. Eggs, (our dogs have meat allergies) rice, apple and Balance-it supplement. It takes 20 minutes to make two days worth and costs around $2 a day to feed our two dogs. We started making food when our previous border collie Haven was diagnosed with severe epilepsy which thankfully was controlled by medication. Chicken breast, always bought on sale, crushed tomato and pasta plus supplement. Both she and her sister were extremely healthy, had no bad breath, no doggie odor, no skin allergies or ear problems and beautiful teeth. Haven never had another seizure but sadly cancer took her at 6 years of age. Her sister lived until 10, a bit on the younger side for border collie life expectancy, but still within the average. She played frisbee up until the day she died and still looked like a pup, especially her beautiful teeth.
NO KIDDING! I often think of Lassie. Lassie would go out all day - off leash - and come back at dark for dinner. We didn't have 1500. dental cleanings! But then we have ninnies that dress their animals like humans. We have collectively lost our minds!
I love it that you make your condiments and soup! You are right that there is a lot we can do to liberate ourselves from the Food-Industrial Complex. But to suggest that means you are “making your own food” is a stretch. Remember the farmers! So nice to hear about your happy cat! Kitty Katz 😂. Thanks for the laugh!
I couldn’t think of a name and was sure of the gender so I began observing her tail up and yep, it’s a girl. When I publish my book on cats, I will marry one of my cats for publicity. I will soon be a justice of the peace with local republican help. Boy are they going to regret they made me a justice after finding out that I used them so I could marry my own cat. Hahahahaha. Great publicity.
This week I will experiment with my black bean burger recipe. Having problems with binders nothing seems to work well so I will mix it with turkey ground and eat Turkey bean burgers, lol. Very healthy and with the right spices, delicious.
I was searching for a recipe and came across a book that my mom gave me for my birthday in 1985 (my mom always inscribed books- that's how I know). It is Frances Moore Lappe's "Diet for a Small Planet". It is the tenth anniversary edition. It's a shame that eating real food and living simply is considered a fad or sort of kooky. I wish I could grow my own food but simply don't have enough sun except little spots here and there throughout the day. My two apple trees give me much joy and some applesauce to can. My two old hens give me a few dozen eggs in the spring. I do spin, knit, and weave ( and sew)so I don't need to buy socks, sweaters, or rugs. Our economy would not thrive if it depended on me.
I grow, cook, and pickle, as you. I am concerned that we will have difficulty getting and affording the ingredients. I am not diabetic, but 75% of insulin is made in Denmark and France. Other pharmaceuticals are made overseas, particularly the new GLP-1. People are going to suffer when they are unable to get their medication, among other shortages.
Congratulations & well done, Bill Katz. I also see national healing in individual & hyper-local - community self-reliance focused on environmental & social justice, organized around the geography of drainage basins. Ideological inspiration & models for it are William James refinement of Emersonian self-reliance as S-R in the context of civic responsibility, and the concepts of Planetarity & subsidiarity as described by Blake & Gilman (2025). I write about the topic in a 4 part Substack series titled, Port Dorchester. (+ ongoing essays)
Thank you for this report on what Carney said. That speech sounds as if it will be in the history books for exposing the truth about America and capitalism in general. Capitalism has never been a socially responsible system, despite certain companies (see the UN Global
Compact) attempting to steer it in that direction. With the failure of the international rules based order, we now have a chance to design an entirely new system for how the world can work (see Buckminster Fuller) and implement that new design on the ashes of what is being burned down by Donald Trump. Perhaps we will come to see Trump as a godsend for having given us the chance to build something truly new.
I said “godsend” because I’m a student of the Idealized Design process taught by systems thinking master Dr Russell L Ackoff. In that process, you first assume the existing system has been destroyed. This frees you up to design something new unconstrained by the past. America needs fresh, clean sheet of paper thinking to fulfill the Founding Fathers vision. By destroying the existing system, Trump is giving us the opportunity to think freely … provided of course he doesn’t starr WW3 🙄
Maybe that's grasping at straws, but it's worth consideration, I would argue. After Monday night's tirade, I expected the world to be seriously rattled on Tuesday. Instead, I suppose, world leaders were scrambling while ours were largely silent. And Canadian PM Carney seems to have been the most productive. If our chief executive is not removed soon, our options are dwindling.
I agree wholeheartedly on removal from office. The midterms are too far away. If left unchecked (as it seems he is), the amount of damage he can do between now and then is formidable. He will try his best to declare an emergency and cancel the election. He must be stopped as soon as possible!
You are giving the power to Vance. Unlike Trump, he may not blather every thought in his head so we will not know what is going on in the White House. With Congress in support of a Republican President, nothing will change. The Democrats in power are too old and too appeasing to bring any change.
Actually, though our individual torments may not be the personalized misogynistic sadism inflicted by the MAGAstapo's lynching of Nicol Good or by Trumpstein's sexual torture of children, We the Empathetic People are nevertheless as much victims of the ChristoNazi Regime as those it has murdered or maimed. That's why, as we suffer the pangs of acknowledging the unspeakably wretched future that awaits us as subjects of a deliberately Failed Nation and reflect on what it means to live within a nation governed by a regime so Evil it has declared itself the global nemesis of all humanitarian achievement, we should not let ourselves be distracted from the need to inform the civilized world of our plight. Thus -- like a signal flare fired as a desperate plea for help by the lifeboated crew of a torpedoed ship -- the full text of the Jane Doe lawsuit against Trump and Epstein is a vital warning of what obtains when sociopathic predators run criminally amok.: https://cdn.factcheck.org/UploadedFiles/Johnson_TrumpEpstein_Lawsuit.pdf Never mind volleys of credible death threats forced the plaintiff to withdraw her suit; its text yet stands as a victim's frantic plea for justice. Please therefore let us ensure it is linked early (and therefore prominently) on as many Resistance sites as possible every day until the traitorous regime of ecogenocidal ChristoNazi pedophiles is no more. (I'll do my best to be responsible for this posting, but I am 85 years old and terminally ill, which means others need be ready to pick up the torch on days I am absent and after I am no more.)
Loren, most people have a conscience that reminds them of their mistakes. What they do with that makes the difference. Oh, woe is me should be the call to action against the shit that is stinking up our WH & the world view of the US. Please, grasp hold of the peace you can get by being reassured your words help us see our duty & yes, we will carry on whatever fight we need to have.
Or gets beaten up and dragged from their home. TACO (Trump always chickens out) should be TOFU (Trump only fucks up).
The Native American indigenous leaders were right about Trump suffering a major health event (stroke) and now he is suffering insanity but the oligarchs have bought and paid for better results. They got their tax cuts in the OBBBA but what has DonOLD done for them lately?
Venezuelan oil? It's like dying of dehydration and finding a large pool of water that is contaminated and surrounded by grizzly bears.
GJ, oh you hit on so many issues! I feel like I get to attend a political science class without leaving the house when I read all the comments. Thanks to all for my new knowledge!
God may just be waiting for us to turn back to God knowing Christ reigns at God's right hand and we believers are empowered by the indwelling Holy Spirit to know we need to turn back to God
Or whatever spirituality one possesses even if not Christian. Genuine empathy and humanity are always works of God or a god, however one sees goodness.
Eleanor, I have lived my life with these views and, no matter what others say about our views & beliefs, this is where I stand. I was raised by 2 preacher/ parents who taught me humility, kindness- and color- blindness, how giving of oneself was a way of life. I cherish their memories & continue to live in the way I was raised.
Trump wasn’t necessarily a ‘godsend’, but the result of an arrogant, lazy, uneducated, greedy, self-ab society that held up a mirror to what we have become.
How many millions didn’t vote?
How many million’s didn’t want to vote for a woman?
How many didn’t vote because of our support of Israel, and now that’s worse because of Trump?
There was a time when we had possibilities of being a better nation.
But Republicans took over after Johnson and in my lifespan that was the beginning of the end!
The only bright spot was Obama!
He tried, but again , Republicans in power are the most bigoted, racist, humans in the country!
We were so hopeful when Obama was in office. It seems like a lifetime ago... well, it probably is for young people, but I lived through Watergate and Reaganomics.
So did I. I will not vote for anyone older than me. In fact, I am seriously thinking of zeroing out my withholdings and not pay one cent in Federal taxes!
I’m also going to see if I can get a dual citizenship in Italy.
Me too Ellen. Such energy was present. Then, to have to watch the Republicans pull their games made me so depressed. So, where are the people who spoke up then? Will they do so again?
Oh Christine! Your words are music to my ears. We have done the damage to ourselves, by ourselves. We should be hanging our heads in shame for not doing more- and, expecting "someone else" would have fixed things. Our collective ignorance is on international display. I feel shame.
The only thing this president did is hold a mirror up to us and show us who we really are. I am so tired of the “this is not America” meme. Sorry but this is. People of color and native Americans have been telling us that for years, and we’ve hidden the Dorian Gray portrait in the attic, too cowardly to do anything but look away. But now the portrait is out in the open and the rest of the world sees our ugliness for what it is. If you don’t like that, then get to work on what it will take to change that (spoiler alert: it’s about a lot more than just changing our politics, which after all, is an outgrowth of our culture).
Boy Chris, Dorian Gray is just a perfect reminder. Wonder how many people even know the reference you allude to? Warts & all, I love my country but, wish more would speak up in whatever way they can.
Exactly. Getting rid of the current regime will be useless if another set of idiots replaces them. That could happen because so many citizens are ignorant of how government works and how the world works. People who say they aren't interested in politics and don't ever read or even watch news sadden and bewilder me. I'm angry at the arrogance and dishonesty of the Republican regime who take advantage of so many gullible and uneducated people.
Like an unregulated vehicular transportation system, unregulated commerce makes no sense whatsoever from a social standpoint. We have been beguiled and bullied into accepting great bags of money disastrously tipping the scales of justice, and we are the ones getting the short shrift. Bigly.
Capitalism, or in any case private enterprise, is not the problem. Unwise deregulation, corruption, and pretending that private enterprise is the superior replacement for the public sector in every case, IS. IF we a really to have a government of the people, by the people, for the people, then we have every right make the rules for commerce, as with any other activity that impacts liberty and justice for all, as well as the common weal.
Governor Newsom is in Davos representing the world's fourth largest economy and around 40 million people. If the west coast economy merged with Canada and Mexico, they might advance to third place and they wouldn't have to put up with an insane leader who has surrounded himself with the most incompetent and cruel people imaginable.
It's time to think outside the box because the cowardly Republican politicians are truly unwilling to.
GJ, yeah I’ve thought of the west coast from Mexico to British Columbia being combined as a country, perhaps named Pacifica? Interesting thought experiment!
I'd for Maine becoming part of East Pacifica if we can't reset our national government on a course more guided by the principles in the Declaration of Independence.
It's contrary to any goal we may have had to form a government in the first place. Opposition to democracy present a phony either this or that - to the favor of 'whom' is my ask. Words and definitions matter.
Apropos words and definitions, I for one am sick unto despair of reading about atrocities we are told we are powerless to stop until some future election that more than likely will not happen. Surely, I tell my self, there must be some more immediately effective alternative....
You know, Loren, our conversations on this site are spread far & wide. Our words reach so many others. THIS is our job! As long as we have breath in our lungs, we keep spreading the truth!
You're doing it. Here, not just reading and watching, but communicating your opinions, your feelings, your humanity in this space. We comfort each other and wish each other well, giving strength by showing we are here and we matter. There are many others who post here with advice on what practical steps to take, how to advocate for our rights, etc., But I also recognize the need to vent, to share and to help one another cope with it all. You are not alone. We are not alone.
As someone who is in the middle of a stalled home renovation on an old house, Jane, I would actually blend the two concepts, restore what’s worth keeping but has been damaged and reform the design to make it more habitable to present and anticipated needs.
Steve, I keep thinking that the proverbial silver lining of the trumpstein years will be that we are now able to recognize the enemy within…and we can now join forces with the so-called “middle powers”, in Carney’s words, and build together a peaceful world.
Carney’s speech before the leaders of the world’s higher powers where dominance of wealth is worshipped will go down in history as the message that finally broke through to the masses of people everywhere where true power and JUSTICE (and I would add, MERCY) can prevail.
How apt that paradoxically, DEVOS was the setting!
"Perhaps we will come to see Trump as a godsend for having given us the chance to build something truly new."
This apocalyptic notion is where the far Right and far Left met to elect Donald Trump in 2016 and 2024. The first by voting for Trump and the second by not voting for Democrats. Elect Trump - Come Heaven on Earth. Elect Trump - Come the Socialist Paradise. The irrationalities of creed and ideology. The banality of evil which gives no thought to the actual harm done.
We don't need to reinvent the wheel of democracy. To repair the damage and prevent future damage, we need reform. The notion of a clean slate is fantastical. Even the Torah rejects it - in the story of God Grows Up - moving from The Flood to Sinai, from destruction to contractual law.
I highly recommend you study Dr Ackoff’s work … and W Edwards Deming, Buckminster Fuller, and Riane Eisler… and British historian James Burke. You will learn that the “clean sheet of paper” approach is basic Innovation theory applied to human development … something that has happened throughout human history.
Perhaps you’ve heard humanity once believed the Sun went around the Earth … that “if man were meant to fly he would have been given wings” … many more such examples taught in Burke’s TV documentary series. And Deming and the others teach the theory. I think you’ll be surprised at what you learn about how societal change has worked and can still work.
I get it, but tearing down has killed thousands of children and people in Africa and other places. Not to mention the other government sanctioned deaths and those to come from our new environmental un-enforcement, and climate change. There is no starting with a clean slate. The only silver lining is that the Republicans get thrown out for the foreseeable future, but that's wishful thinking.
Zelenskyy and Carney and the other movers of the Coalition of the Willing already have organized the parallel organization to NATO. All of the work on the 20-point peace plan for ending the war in Ukraine was a way of doing that organizational work right under Trump's nose. Trump was blind to it as long as his ego was being stroked. Zelenskyy and the others never believed Russia would sign onto the plan until the Russian economy broke.
The latest addition is a call for a 100,000 man standing European army.
Ukraine is taking the hit. PURL, the program that supplies US-manufactured arms to Ukraine bought with COTW money will be ended because of Trump's pique. China is keeping Russia afloat and supplying it with dual-use components for drones and missiles, likely for barter for Russian oil, gas, and mineral rights. Trump helped that along by allowing the sale of Nvidia's H200 chips to China.
As Heather said, there is a realignment based on alliances of common interest. It is well underway. And America is being left to its quasi-isolation. But we have already gravitated towards the Russia/China coalition. Will we continue?
I just realized that calling the defense of Ukraine group the "Coalition of the Willing" began in March 2025, at the London Summit on Ukraine, by Keir Starmer. That was also the time frame when Carney started talking about "Elbows Up."
That suggests that our now former allies were moving towards the new world order that Carney delineated since then. Davos was the public unveiling.
Churches ought to shift to the human-centered also. Their test is whether adherents buy the bullschitt “that we have all the answers, no questions allowed.” Should be replaced with science, “we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the truth of the cosmos.
Yes, JD. In testing the testers "have all the answers, no questions allowed."
But please, replace testing with science -- yes -- and with multiple other fields, humanities, where, as you so well say, “we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the truth of the cosmos."
But please, too, go further, where "we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the" human truths of our neighbors whom now ICE and BCP pursue for only Donald-&-crew's own brutal indulgences in racism, misogyny, social media hate-bait, and churches tectonically far from anything Buddha, the Hebrew prophets, Jesus, or Mohammed ever knew.
A truism I read in the blur of this morning’s news:
The end of America First and the beginning of America Past. (I lost the link—if anyone knows it please drop in a reply. I think I am going to be using it a lot going forward.)
Probably a fading #3 for a while in the shrinking hegemon club of China and Russia as Putin puppeteers Trump and eventually Vance. And as Russia’s economy caves as the war goes on, it will be ever more beholden to China. China is currently providing most of the dual-use technology used in Russian drones and missiles in exchange for natural resources.
Our subservience to China was sealed when Trump allowed Nvidia to sell the H200 dual-use chips to China. That gives China access to chips it could not make for itself for the next 2-3 years. That’s probably 3 generations of AI chips, given how quickly the technology is evolving.
Carney’s speech and von der Leyen’s the day before make it clear that the US will not be trusted again in the remainder of our lifetimes, and likely our children’s. Not in economic terms, not in terms of military alliances, and certainly not in terms of respect for international institutions and state sovereignty.
I broke my leg last June and that feels like what we did as a country. I didn’t cut my throat altogether. In June coming on I should have a decent enough healing to stand confidently again. If we can heal ourselves as a nation and remake our purpose to benefit all of us this time around, remember those nations we could not forgive after WWII were pretty much realigned by the time the baby boom hit the ground running. I haven’t lost my confidence in us and that is saying a hell of a lot. Thanks for your efforts on behalf of the rest of us.
We need to go back and finish the work on the “I want to live in a country where…” posts. That has to go on while we try to clean up the mess in the Auggean stables of our government
I've always wanted to drive one of those electric grocery carts. But vanity and stubborn pride keep me from doing so. Even my kids want me to, but still I refuse..... maybe one of these days I'll get over myself. It may very well be a real adventure..... I could imagine it to be the old '58 Kenworth I learned to drive when I was 14 might help .....
Hello Georgia.... Last Week it was announced that China's Trade Surplus surpassed 1.5 Trillion$.... This began when they were admitted to the WTO... Under GWB, allegedly over 16,000 American Factories were outsourced to China... The largest Tesla Factory is in China.... The US Empire is fading to #2, unless Canada decouples, and draws closer to China... A possible brake on China's Progress is Environmental Catastrophe... Currently, because of Industrial Pollution, most of the Surface Water in China is undrinkable....
The EU and Mercosur "The Southern Common Market" (countries in South America) signed a mammoth free trade agreement after 25 years of negotiation. That is a slap in the face to Trump's Donroe Doctrine, "The US as the hegemon of the western hemisphere" policies.
The EU is moving towards free trade relationships with India. The US is being frozen out around the world and very quickly.
Carney understands economic warfare. It is being waged against us because we are the biggest threat to stability and predictability in the world markets. We are no longer seen as a beacon of people's rights and freedoms.We are the enemy.
"In a surprise move, the European Union’s legislative arm voted by a slim margin to refer the pact with Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, which form the trade bloc known as Mercosur, to the European Court of Justice to examine whether it is compatible with the bloc’s existing treaties.
Waiting for a ruling could delay the treaty’s implementation by as much as two years.
The Mercosur deal, which resulted after more than two decades of negotiations, had encountered bitter opposition from farmers and some environmentalists in Europe who argued that South American agricultural products would not meet European standards and unfairly compete with farmers at home.
Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, thought she had managed to assuage enough opponents to win approval. She was in Paraguay on Saturday to sign the treaty that would create one of the world’s largest free trade zones, connecting more than 700 million people.
“This comes at a time when E.U. producers and exporters urgently need access to new markets,” the commission said in a statement, noting that the delay undermined the bloc’s reputation as “a reliable and predictable trade partner.”"
Well, that's embarrassing for von der Leyen and the EU...
Hello Georgia... A lot depends on Political Stability, and Climate Change.. South America is not known for Stability, Europe has been Unstable lately, and the USA is run by an Unstable Tyrant... Have you seen the latest FNMA TV Commercials?...
I don’t know JD, GWB as flawed as he was never acted as though he hated the very idea of America, I never once thought that he would sell our nuclear secrets for a pile of cash, unlike the insipid orange turd. Or raped a 13 year old while a 12 year old watched, ah the Epstein files…………
That’s what Canada did with its China trade deal on January 16, 2026. BYDs from China for Canadian canola oil and sea food at reduced tariffs, valued at $7 Billion.
Georgia, I have always been interested in the automotive world. In fact, it was the only interest I shared with my late father. Several members of my extended family play significant roles in the automotive industry, including manufacturing, sales and racing.
YouTube knows this and submits numerous auto-related videos in my feed, including many highlighting cars produced in China.
BYD and Huawei are on track to seize the global automotive market and leave ALL the other manufacturers in the dust. The BYD deal with Canada will accelerate (pun intended) that takeover. Imagine buying a car with more luxury and technology than a $400,000 Rolls Royce for a mere $70,000! When those BYDs start rolling into Canada, that will be the end of Ford, Stellantis and GM because they can't compete.
U.S. automakers' markets are about to shrink dramatically, meaning more jobs lost to Donald's ego.
It is the EU pissing on the Donroe Doctrine and Trump’s dreams of America as the hegemon of the Western Hemisphere. So is Denmark’s operation Arctic Endurance.
von der Leyen on Monday and Carney yesterday are making a point that they are seeking other trading partners and are now engaging in a trade war with America by moving into our markets while reducing tariffs and guaranteeing reliability to our former customers. And yes this will reduce American exports and reduce our GDP.
Canada did it last week with its deal with China worth $7 billion for Chinese BYD electric cars for Canadian canola oil and fish. It’s a lot of fish…
Denmark also started selling US bonds in their pension fund. That lowers bond prices and raises effective interest rates.
There is also the “trade bazooka” that Macron wants to use. It refers to the EU’s Anti‑Coercion Instrument, a legal framework adopted in 2023 that lets the EU respond to economic coercion by another country with wide‑ranging trade and financial measures. Macron is using the phrase to signal a readiness to deploy the EU’s most powerful economic weapon, rather than a specific single tariff or measure, given that Trump has said he is applying tariffs to the country’s sending forces to Greenland in Denmark’s Operation Arctic Endurance.
Under the ACI, the EU can impose high retaliatory tariffs, extra duties, or outright restrictions on imports from the coercing country, and it can also curb access to its single market for services.
Measures can include limiting US firms’ access to EU public contracts, restricting investment, curbing banking and digital services, and tightening intellectual‑property or licensing access for targeted companies. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/mep-trade-bazooka-9.7051791
This is another FAFO warning to Trump. Davos is all about saying that Europe is walking away from America and willing to take the economic hit, and has weapons it is ready to hit back with.
Georgia, my hunch is congressional Repubs & cirporate Dems see the unavoidable dissolution of US global power & economic clout but are so deeply complicit in stoking the treasonous, death cult crazy train that they will not impeach & remove the 47 maladministration or corrupt 6/9 SCOTUS that facilitated the fascist overthrow with their unprecedented decisions. They have tacitly seceded from USA as a modern version of enslaver Confederacy & KKK. Defense of democracy & decency is not secession. It is defense of the USA constitution in smaller conformation. What our military will do is a wild card that some highly qualified observers at The Steady State say is likely to protect the revolutionary confederacy of fascist mafia oligarchs as the “USA” corporate hegemon = a huge challenge for states unaligned with the hegemon.
We always say the military will come around to the side of democracy. As I look around the world I see military’s that blend comfortably into regimes that are anything but democratic. As a source of upward mobility to the masses they always find themselves imbedded with the faction in power.
Oh Georgia, a stark reminder of what is to come UNLESS people from all nations say "Enough!" I need to eat some dinner. My mind is spinning with all the new info I have read today. Thanks all!
The "rules based order" is dead because Donald Trump and a cringing, cowardly, empty-brained Republican Party killed it, not because it was dysfunctional. It was murdered, stabbed in the back by a 3-year-old octagenarian and criminal who America was stupid enough to think would actually uphold law and order.
There are problems with every international system that comes about -- this one was no exception. Yet just because it was often asymmetric doesn't mean it was an economic failure or somehow fundamentally unjust. Our entire post-World War II system created great prosperity, political stability, the necessary space for the EU to evolve and for other powers like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan to flourish., to say nothing of presiding over the ending of the colonial order and the birth of many new nations in Africa and the Caribbean. These are true accomplishments, nothing to sneeze at or pretend weren't real, served their purpose and immensely valuable after a world dominated by chaos.
What is now ensuing is a system of regional power-balancing, much like the system that was in place before August 1914, filled with aggression, threats, tariffs, and tremendous economic instability. And this time with nuclear weapons and rogue states ascending. Smart rising powers like Canada will certainly take advantage to the extent they can, but this is not really a moment for rising new democracies, but murderous autocracies.
Worth remembering the famous line by Sir Edward Grey, Home Secretary, as World War I descended: "the lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime." Things do not always work out for the best.
A big question: How do we pull along the MAGAs into the new world? They were living in the white-supremacy of the past and voted for Trump to take the US backward. They loved the violence and destruction. They are dead weight. That is still a problem for the US. Do Blue and Red states need to go their separate ways?
Pulling along MAGAs: We don't. No sense banging our head against a brick wall for a shrinking minority. Our energy and resources are better spent on the persuadables: Independents, Regretful Republicans, and the biggest bloc of all, the Did Not Vote Party. Later some MAGAs will come along after experiencing more-to-come pain, including from eroded healthcare, as well as from attraction.
Blue and Red states separating: Every state has both Democrat and Republican voters, so none is truly Red or Blue, but majority one party or the other. Most significantly, a soft secession is Putin's dream. Let's not give it to him. We are the UNITED States of America who stick together in sickness and in health.
Good Points, Ellie. I live in Ohio, a reliably red state. And yet, our cities are blue, we might even elect a Democratic Governor and re-elect our D senator. We aren’t all that red, we’re gerrymandered so it just looks that way. We’re way more purple than one would think.
After every TV, podcast or social media report I watch or listen to about people concerned about the future, their rejection of trump 2.0, etc ... I wish the reporter, podcaster, etc would ask one last question: Did you cast a vote for president in 2024? I know a lot of my friends & family who voted in 2024, didn't vote trump or Harris; echoes of 2016 for Hillary.
Thanks, Ellie. Arkansas is another one of those "Ruby Red" states that is actually home to a few reliably blue cities. The state has always had its problems with racism, poverty and poor education, but used to be a brilliant shade of purple, electing Democrats Bill Clinton and Mike Beebe as governors, along with Democrats in both state houses.
Two things happened:
1. Chair of the Arkansas Democratic Party, Bill Gwatney, was murdered outside party headquarters; the party has never recovered and gotten its act together.
2. Republicans discovered evangelical preachers and gerrymandering.
Yes, that would be ideal, but how to weed them out? They certainly need education in critical thinking. I would like my state to aggressively implement critical thinking in the public school curriculum beginning with kindergarten. The religious extremists will cry because how can they get followers if people think for themselves.
Yess Red and Blue states need to go our separate ways. I’d prefer that we align ourselves with Canada.
We Baby Boomers need to stop paying our taxes. I’ll pay my state taxes, but I will not support the Trump government. Or the Vance government, or any Republican government.
I think they would need to be repatriated, if they wanted to be. I personally do not want the Republican Party to even exist anymore. They will have to pass a test to prove that they know how government works. If they don’t want to repatriated and swear allegiance to the Constitution, then they can leave the country.
I don't believe it's dead and buried, 'unless' Russia and the U.S. enforce the agreement they signed onto for Ukraine to give up their nukes. Absent Russia, the world must or most must present as united a face as is possible, so that Russia 'pays' for breach of the international agreement that threatens to otherwise make a total mockery of any 'real' rules based order. We also must make reparations for damages by _ rump. I can dream of a formula to base the taxes: voter rolls perhaps ? No, suppose that would be too rich. Better minds than mine must imagine something of a more just framework. Oy vay~
This reminds me of T S Eliot’s Love Song of Alfred J Prufrock. I grow old I grow old. Eliot came from the Eliot family but a branch from St Louis. His mother was a social worker and he lived on the edge street of St Louis Society. His The Wasteland poetic opus based in some ways on the old Fisher King Mythos of a wasted land with a wounded king. Someone has to ask the correct question to save the country. At that time there were lynchings and in East Louis a massacre. I think because of his mother he was aware and no tools to cope with the times abd fled to England and never returned to St Louis. In The Waste Land there is a vivid line about bodies of dead negroes. He must have witnessed or seen deadly racial violence and his art was his tool for coping with it all.
I think as a nation we are beginning to realize we have to ask the right questions. And sometimes some of us will not like the answers.
I don't know. Trump came to power because people are freaked out by immigration. Europe is having the same freak out. This system created winners (Europe, the US, other "white" countries settled by Europeans) and losers (mostly darker skinned peoples from Africa, Asia, the Middle East the victims of colonialism) for decades. Can we really blame the losers for wanting that high life, too? In a twisted way, the racists like Musk are right, he just focuses on the race nonsense too much. This is very much about the rise of Asia which is freaking out all of Europe and people of European descent (they just call it "western civilization"). Unfortunately, the main Asian power is a repressive Oligarchy which is not good for the long term survival of the human race in an advanced tech age.
Dana, the one perspective that influenced me the most about the white world and the non white world was being out of country long enough to understand how that influence played out. As a white man in an Asian country and in a Latin country I began to comprehend Americans were not as pompously arranged as they thought of themselves. Other nations scoff at the American superiority complex. They have a much greater self esteem. They are even able to work up a bit of pity for us. That is when they aren’t too greatly upset. The center of the earth is not the United States. Their own importance heavily prevails. One gets a feel for that in the conversations of those Americans living abroad here in Heatherland.
Because for decades Congress has refused to do its duty in creating sensible immigration laws and procedures in order to use the topic as a political cudgel, here we are. Chaos and Americans’ frustrations reached a boiling point and 47 took advantage. Congress is solely and completely at fault. Trump never wanted any kind of orderly immigration procedures, but to use the chaos for his political advantage.
Well if one looks into the word merchant there is the connection to the business of trade in the so called New World. Each country except the Vatican abd it was complicit in other ways had a company and had stocks to sell. Human labor was part of the equation besides the bibles and rum from the musical 1776. And that wave others came from other periods of time. China has an extremely long history of conquest and power grabs but Japan also invaded as well so still a mixed bag. In the Hebrew Bible all sorts of wars and certain oppressed periods. Persia and Sumeria,and Egypt as well. The Silk Road as the trade route shows how it all evolved. If one takes a long telescope perspective this could be a watermark or a metaphysical shudder the creates better. Hard to say but not impossible.
Carney's speech disagrees with your view that this is "not really a moment for rising new democracies". The alliances of like-minded nations is the point he makes. And the people in new nations like those in Africa and in the Caribbean, so very many of them, are living in abject poverty. The "affordability" crisis in the U.S. exists in other countries, including Canada. And this crisis is the direct result of greedy-guts capitalism as opposed to regulated, checks-and-balances industry. Large corporations are about profits, not social welfare. We can have both a stable economy and programs that benefit our people. We no longer have a choice about this if we are to go forward with the alliances we need to make. Organizations like NATO were created in this way, for this reason. Same for United Nations. Same for the great U.S. Constitution. No Kings, No Bullies. Alliances for peace and prosperity for ALL.
Listening to Carney's speech (and do listen, not just read), I felt relief. An adult in the room not only called out the hubris of USA exceptionalism and Trump's ridiculousness in a well articulated, measured, rational tone--he also laid out the way forward. Carney and the other adults are stepping up, and we're going to be okay.
I heard the decentering of the USA not with sadness, but with refreshing humility, as with decentering the whiteness of Renee Good's killing by making it known that at least 36 to 40 others to date have died by ICE.
As Carney described the necessity of ascendancy of the middle powers as the way forward to a new world order, it reminded me how in this time of needing to expose the many problems, we also need to define the future we want for ourselves and the next generations. A vision is the first step toward formulating plans to manifest the reality. We're gonna be okay.
Carney is a shrewd man who is doing what he must by necessity. The larger point was that structural forces are now in play that will increasingly play the trump card (excuse the mention) in the international system. Optimal results are not favored -- is the best way I know how to put it. Having an established order with clear penalties for breaking the rules of the game reduces uncertainties and costs for everybody. When that order is destroyed on purpose by the power that set it up in the first place --- chaos will ensue. And chaos will be neither pretty nor cheap.
Optimal results may not be favored, resulting in chaos which typically favors autocratic takeover, but at least Carney shows a path forward at a time when we've been experiencing doom and gloom. Can't score if you don't take the shot!
Yes! De-centering the USA is a huge step forward … away from “American exceptionalism” to “one world family” with every member having something to contribute!
We can only hope that Europe comes around and stops trying to appease Trump. We Americans are still going to take it in the teeth but if they can create such an alternative to the 3 Oligarchies of China, the US and Russia, then the "little guy" (most of us) will have some hope of not being born and dying a pawn to the rich and powerful. Someone(s) have to become the real 'shining beacon on the hill' where people can live decent lives with hope, dignity and human rights. Ironically, it was Reagan who talked about the US that way, while sowing all the seeds that have lead to our current suicide.
"Many folks decry the loss of civics, humanities, and logic in the last several decades in American schools. It appears as if what rather will be needed in the coming decades are courses in humility, cooperation, and tolerance."
It seems to me that they sort of go together. It seems to me that our concessions to overblown commercialism are eroding the civilizing as aspects of our character and culture.
"Advertising signs that con
You into thinking you're the one
That can do what's never been done
That can win what's never been won
Meantime, life outside goes on
All around you "
And life is SO much more than that, as we neglect at our own peril. My personal view is that we need to engage in a lot more thinking about what, in the end, really matters to us as individuals and as a species. So often that gets bottled up. I think we need to think a lot more about what wisdom is, as opposed to disjointed information, and what we can do as individuals, as a society, and as a species, to attain it.
JL Graham! Thank you for these famous words! I have long thought that the lies and cons that seem to be necessary for corporations to sell stuff and doodads and unfood to people, are just softening up people’s brains so worse things can happen. People who can swallow ads whole can swallow anything.
Actually I heard this from a finance person over 15 years ago. He said the US was not what it was and never really was how it tried to conceive and push the image . He was saying when the new world order comes our country will be more like France. He wanted me to invest with his company but no idea abd still no idea of anything about money. But it turns out in this regard of now he was spot on.
There never was a golden goose unless it came with a golden spoon. The American people put their shoulders to the wheel and heaved for all they were worth. What leadership did with that labor, yes that was unconscionable. Elitism is the name of the game. No, none of us are in that category no matter how disillusioned we hold ourselves. You are not elite, I am not elite. What we are is blistered and calloused. I don’t mind that. I’m dumb enough to feel the pride inherent in being exhausted after a hard days work. I don’t even mind the vacations I never took. I’m a hard nosed peasant amongst peasants. We took pride in being peons. We built and maintained this country. Our pride is justified. Was it our fault the wealth we created launched billionaires? There is no doubt in my mind that we will continue to put out. There is also no doubt in my mind that our labors will continue to be squandered. The rest of the world will continue to distrust us as they rightly should. When we decide to use our freedom to help raise up the status of our neighbors let me know and I will in all humility kiss your ass.
Canada and USA are married. Carney is the daddy and Trump is the mummy. They are both a bit unfaithful and even if they divorce all us children are still brothers and sisters. We have an inseparable love. Our bloodlines are mixed. Did you ever get in a fight with your little brothers? I was the oldest and completely insufferable. Ever so often they had to realign my thinking. I’m not sure how long it will take but I am sure we will fix it. My apology to all American mothers, and to my Canadian family.
Well stated. I am heartsick for us in the US but glad to see Canada standing up to our sick, demented president and taking leadership of the new order. It’s hard to believe the scope of the damage Trump and his minions have caused in 365 days. I’ve read it referred to an American suicide. I hope we can recover.
This really helped clarify what feels so unsettling about this moment. What stood out to me is how the collapse of the rules based order is not just a geopolitical failure, but an economic one. It was never designed to democratize power or opportunity, only to stabilize an unequal system.
That is where I see a quiet opening for a paradigm shift toward economic democracy. If wealth concentration and overconsumption helped bring this system down, then the path forward may depend on more distributed forms of ownership, decision making, and shared responsibility, especially among middle powers that are not as locked into maintaining the old order.
I appreciate how you named humility and cooperation as the skills we will need. Learning to participate in a more plural world, rather than dominate it, may be the hardest adjustment and the most necessary one.
When will the GOP wake up! They could have rid us of Trump in 2021, yet they lost any sense of morality and ethos and now they have helped destroy our economy, world standing and our moral compass ( whatever we had of one).
I don't think the problem with the GOP is lazing. The GOP died with Ike. Reagan did not even know how bad his handlers were. Nixon did, he was one of them 100%. The people are corporatist fascist; the worst kind of Nazi. Germany had Hitler. American Nazis are the international corporations. These Republicans in Congress, they are corporate replacement parts. The most recent “Fortune Global 500", an annual ranking of the top 500 corporations worldwide, includes 138 headquartered within the United States. Yet many headquartered elsewhere also have significant operational presence within the United States. Many of those 500 are massive, multinational entities holding a financial influence rivaling that of the United States government. Putin wants NATO put down. That is what Trump is doing. The R.I.N.O. Nazi party in Congress is on the take. Trump is not believed as much as even four months ago but he follows Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi Minister of Propaganda, "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it." Thus we hear this nutty lie that we must take Greenland or else we are not safe. The truth is we are safer as is because if Putin tried to take Greenland, or even drive through it, NATO would attack Russia and defend Greenland. Moreover, with us as part of NATO we would also defend Greenland exactly the same as if we controlled Greenland. Its a classic "six of one, half a dozen of the other" B.S. lie! BUT if we try to take Greenland then that will be the end of NATO and maybe even be the start of WWIII because the EU will see that Putin is at least the cause of this, if not the author of it. Whatever the TrumpStein Pedo-Files have on Trump might come second in importance to Trump as what Putin has on him. What did our nasty El Niño (Little Boy in Spanish) do?
Great post, since you reiterate what I got banned for on T and FB in 2020 for saying. Goebbels and MEIN Kampf were the literature that chump read and believes. Or had read to him. He certainly follows to a tee. The Republican redefinition started with Reagan’s campaign and his kneecapping of Carter. Or earlier if one counts the Powell Memo. The 80’s were more consequential than I realized. Same for most of us I guess. Anyway, Putin ruled before Epstein and chump is trying to make enough monuments so that he can’t be erased when the truth comes out. Hope my reason didn’t run amok this early…
Yeah, you hit the nail on its head. I am within a day or two of completing a Memo addressing the mess that followed Justice Louis Powell and that Memo of his and his several Court opinions. It's working title is
OUR DEMOCRACY IS UNDER ATTACK BY THE FREE ENTERPRISE SYSTEM
OUR RESOLVE: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION AMENDMENT.
At the end I propose a five section amendment to resolve the mess we are in. Yeah, at times it feels like we are all being gaslighted and slip into doubting ourselves. But no, we are on the side of the good fight. These Nazis will be exposed. Even many of the suckers who bought that stupid MAGA hat will admit, "We got played." Saul Alinsky warned us about them. He said there is a large mass of people in the southern and mid-western states who feel left out of the American Dream. He said they are good patriotic folks and and we need to organize them before someone else does. Richard M. Nixon popularized the phrase "silent majority" talking about them and they loved him for it. I doubt Nixon was smart enough to coin the phrase, maybe John Ehrlichman wrote it for him. Then came Reagan and Jerry Falwell Sr. became friends and with Falwell's "Moral Majority " really got organized. Anyway, I will soon post a PDF with my Memo and then get some sleep. I hope I don't run amok too often within it. 🙃
Thank You, Albert. There IS a " large mass of people" in the Midwestern states for sure, who feel - and know - they were left out of the American Dream. I was at a meeting in Lansing, Michigan, when Governor Granholm announced that our auto workers would be going back to college to learn how to work the computers that would now be assembling our cars, denigrating a whole class of laborers in one fell swoop. After that, every skilled worker I hired to work on my house had something bad to say about Granholm and our government. They were, and still are, ripe for Trump's piicking.
To Dick Montague: I hope so. There will likely be carpenters from Habitat for Humanity who will give time to rebuild the East Wing and replace the solar panels Reagan removed.
There must be some use for this ballroom. Did you know the plans include a spiral staircase and residence quarters on the second floor? perhaps since it is the people's house, maybe we could hold Senior proms there. or benefit concerts. I know security people would go ape-s--t over that, but if they can handle the Super Bowl and other major sports events that trump has caused havoc in, this should be easy. Imagine having your prom at the White House!
It could have those uses, but it is such a horrible symbol of greed, stupidity and criminality that who would want to be there? It has no resonance in America except insofar as glitter from royalty. Undemocratic!
IMO that large Ball Room will be perfect to create a four floor office for the new Executive Powers Counsel which our Amendment to repeal Citizens United will also repeal the single "President" and replace it with seven executives who will be specialized to properly oversee the fifteen existing Departments plus eleven new ones which are now Agencies. That may sound like "Big Government" but the truth is ever since 1773, as in this present crisis, lowering taxes and regulations on powerful corporations are not the solution to our problem; lowering taxes and regulations on powerful corporations have always been our problem. Consider those three tea ships docked in Boston Harbor in 1773, owned by the British East India Company (hereinafter, The Co.). The Co. became the first multinational corporation. The Co. was given a monopoly on shipping tea and operated like a state with an army larger than Britain's. In May 1773, the British Parliament imposed the Tea Act on the Thirteen Colonies. The Tea Act maintained a prior tea tax against us, but also gave The Co. a tax break. The rest is history but now just like in the film Poltergeist, "They're here!"
Reminds me of Nicolae Ceaușescu in Romania. Romanians I knew wouldn't talk about it, much like some Veterans and Holocaust survivors soon after WWII, when too many people didn't want to hear the their stories so soon after the war ended.
I can find stories that I think help me understand why they didn't want to talk about it, but for people that don't know too much about Ceaușescu, especially younger people, I'd suggest starting with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_revolution
He has been described as simultaneously arrogant and clueless culminating in the call for a huge rally to show support for him (which did the opposite and ended his reign 4 days later.
I haven't been able to vet much of what I find now, so I'll leave it to others to compare other arrogant and clueless leaders like Vidkun Quisling, whom I always thought was too comparable to our current President (with similar corrupt officials in power).
Albert R. Killackey, Esq., it might be preferable to ship the ballroom, piece by piece, to the Smithsonian, in a place next door to the Museum of African American Art with panels to explain the racism that got the ballroom built. Add to it the destruction of the Bonwit-Teller Art Deco destruction earlier in Trump’s career. We can start thinking of his place as the would-be king as we impeach him.
On Jen Psaki's MSNow show,, Governor Pritzker detailed that Illinois is doing much more than recording a database of unlawful acts. Governor Pritzker warns of disruption of the 2026 Illinois' Polls. Illinois has already created a "Accountability Commission", State crimes like Murder 1, do not have a statute of limitations. State statutes can be extended on other crimes by a legislative act. Go Illinois.
********
Judges (plural) have caught up with Lindsey Halligan's criminal acts in the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) voting (led by a Trump pointed Judge) to strip Halligan from her fraudulent masquerade as a U.S. Attorney. Go EDVA - no distractions.
SCOTUS hears on Oral Arguments today on the firing of Federal Board Of Governor, LISA COOK by Trump's AntiSocial Post. JEROME POWELL will attend the oral arguments today as a citizen observer.
1 PM Pacific UPDATE on SCOTUS' Oral Argument:
Per Lisa Rubin, even the right wing Justices were skeptical of Trump's conduct:
Alioto "No court has determined underlying facts". Kavanaugh appears to be disapproving as well. We'll' see.
*********************
SPOILER ALERT:
Subpoenas of any nature & scope can be challenged in Court. Your attorney cannot go inside a Grand Jury room with you, but counsel can stay just outside in the Hall of Justice.⚖️
As it turns out, greed and gluttony have ultimately been proven to be deadly sins for the American people. And our widespread ignorance and intellectual laziness hasn’t helped us out much either.
Because we have benefited so much from the wealth-based order of the last eight decades, we believed our own mythology—that it was our just desert, our divine birthright. So much so, that the idea that we should conquer Greenland “just because we can” has been met mostly with ambivalence instead of the outrage it deserves.
We elected—twice—the perfect embodiment of American hubris, greed and ignorance and while we may mourn our fall from international grace and prominence we should embrace the necessity of a new world order based on fairness and cooperation and aspire to be worthy participants in it.
You don’t understand Carney’s speech. It’s not about Trump and the GOP. The US realignment started under Obama, who let Crimea go with a shrug in 2014. It continued under Trump I, then under Biden, who used subsidies in the U.S. aggressively against E.U. rivals. Now Trump is making it explicit and overtly deploying U.S. power against (nearly) everyone, including traditional allies. The fact that Trump is a wanker, a mafia boss and a madman is the business of the U.S. citizenry. The fact that the U.S. is misusing its power and bullying its neighbours and allies is our business and we’ll do what we must to protect our security, our culture, our democracy and our markets (including our American markets). As I wrote in my own comment, we have options, and since the U.S. is behaving more like China now, we shall also treat it as we do China: an important trading partner and potential rival that isn’t unique and doesn’t get to dictate terms.
The GOP will not wake up. They will eventually become cognizant of the wreckage and try to blame someone else, just like their Confederate predecessors blamed the War of Northern Aggression for their problems. Our job is to ensure they don’t get away with it this time.
It’s true, they do try to blame Democrats for everything. Not that Democrats are blameless in this whole mess but they are mostly guilty of handwringing while Rome burns.
The republican moral compass has been hijacked, if it ever had one. Or Vlad’s compass lured like the sirens of old and were irresistible to foolish, greedy bastards.
They were (and still are) high on their own supply. They’re very self-congratulatory over their long-game victory to tip the Courts to support the might of wealth over the rule of law, and to thoroughly gut the ability of vast swaths of our citizenry to understand what is happening through any form of critical thinking. They’ve enriched themselves on the coattails of the grift of their leader, elevating themselves to the rooms where the super-wealthy make decisions. They’re giddy over their own “promised land” vision of a white Christian country full of perfect little families with mommies and daddies and children who all follow *their* rules.
It's not every day the President of France writes the President of the United States and says: "I do not understand what you are doing in Greenland," invites him to a dinner (with Ukraine and Denmark, as well as major players in the EU), only to be unloaded on by a 2-year-old pooping in his diapers, wingeing and whining about the Nobel Peace Prize.
It's difficult to underestimate the sheer insanity of the moment. Carney is a very smart man, but at this point, a gibbon with ADHD would probably sound more coherent than Trump's deranged cruelty.
It would not be so bad if just the POTUS went bananas, the founders though of that; but plutocrats have managed to stacked the whole deck to support him though his disastrous tantrums.
I do not think they "have stacked the whole deck." Reasonable people may reasonably disagree, but the Rube Goldberg jerry-rigged contraption is literally cracking through to its foundations right now.
The future will belong to those who can think through strategically to that wonderful day when Trump has an aneurism, or walks into the Briefing Room clad only in his diapers or enough Republicans resign from Congress even *before* the mid-terms to ignite the entire tinderbox. What happens the day after that is what we should try our best to prepare for and think through.
That ship sailed long ago. King Charles III doesn't want us back and wishes us well. And there will be no more Mr. Toad's Wild State Carriage Rides around the grounds of Windsor Castle, either.
It was great hearing you today on the Red, Wine and Blue call! Thank you, as always!
And my normal ☺️
Be LOUD. Let Congress hear you!
Use/share this spreadsheet (bit.ly/Goodtrouble) as a resource to contact members of Congress, the Cabinet and news organizations. Call. Write. Email. Protest. Unrelentingly. We deserve better ❤️🩹🤍💙
Reach out (beyond your own) to as many in the Senate and House as you can. All of this is bigger than “I only represent my constituents” issues.
Add a comment to help keep this bumped ✊ New eyes seeing this means new ripples for change 🤞
Hello, Megan. I have been searching for you this morning.
I'm feeling very down, but literally, the sun JUST broke out and is streaming here into our "office". There are blossoms on my Meyer Lemon plant which is surely enjoying it as much as I am.
I made 7 phone calls yesterday. Only one got a real person. It was all I could manage. I am telling myself, even if only HALF of those who read this make even one phone call, it matters. It matters.
Thanks for doing this every day. I have been asking people to post what kindness they are putting into the world, and I commend you for doing this day after day after day.
Megan, I will tell you, I got through 9 phone calls to the Senate. I finally got a "real" person in Sen Wicker's office (Mississippi) where I got a very rude young lady.
My normal resting pulse of about 58 is now up to 82.
I tried. I'm not going to take my bp for awhile.
I hope I can make more calls later. As I've said before, I'm better getting voice mails, as these ignorant (bad BAD words!!) young aide really (milder bad word) me off!
I appreciate what you do and this would be great if we were still in a traditional representative government but I now know that we are not. Our democratic reps have been rendered useless and forget the republican ones. They don’t care what the majority wants anymore. Read Democracy Unchained by Nancy McClean and you will understand what I mean.
While I hear you, and I’ve posted the following before, sometimes our voices to Congress aren’t about changing their minds.
I don’t think we’ll see many big waves (like a major MAGA Congress member changing their opinions), however I think we can cause little ripples. I’m thinking staff members who hear the same thing over and over via voicemail, phone calls, letter after letter, email after email - maybe they’ll be a little more receptive each time they hear from us. Maybe they’ll talk more about our talking points to friends and family, maybeeee they’ll vote differently. I think we can cause ripples to push news organizations to be more honest and maybe even a bit accusatory about what’s happening. As a collective, our volume matters. And, at the end of the day, if we just annoy and overwhelm some staffers working for people hurting the average American, I’m ok with that too 🙃
Carney's speech places the U.S. role in global affairs in the past, and constructively proposes a strategy--one already in place in Canada--for shifting the relationship of "middle powers" to the "hegemons." It is a clear statement of where we are after one year of the Trump administration. And it does not share the view of many U.S. voters that the old status quo can be recovered. The singular "accomplishment" of one year of Republican party rule in the U.S. is not "America first," but "America past."
The comments are interesting too because there are Americans offering help. There are Canadians suggesting what Americans might do for help. I remember the White Rose in Nazi Germany, and many, many other resistance movements, who were not really successful.
A friend was telling me last night that she had watched several videos of Greenlanders being interviewed on their plans. She said one woman was saying they have a hut in Denmark which they will move to. Another said she was taking her family to Denmark but leaving her parents behind because they are old and cannot move. I suspect that is a plan that could change once they find out what the Americans have in store for Greenlanders.
After reading that Trump may have committed sexual murders on film of young girls who were not White, I cannot imagine anything other than the brutality of the Russians for the poor Greenlanders. Notice White Supremacist Trump wants to capture a lot of countries where a lot of the people are not White. He clearly wants to exterminate non-White people, and that is why his MAGA crowd keeps following him no matter what.
I like the point about replacing “America first” with “America past” a lot. Too bad it more than a good phrase / marketing slogan / book title. It’s also the truth. And we Americans did it to ourselves by falling for the GOP con job that started with Reagan’s attack on the government as an agent of progress.
One way to respond to what’s coming is to not just respond but to also proactively plan … plan for replacing the current failed system with one that will actually work for all the peoples of the world. Here’s Buckminster Fuller talking about this back around 1980…
The U.S. is unrecognizable after one year of Trump and the regime, visibly, ideologically, geopolitically, psychologically. Trump and his enablers, sycophants and henchmen did so much damage to this Nation in just one year that it's hard to imagine what it will look like in another year (or 3), only that it will be a much different world because of it.
And the U.S. will be something else too after all the cruelty and chaos, the demolition and destruction of norms and good governance, the malign of this maladministration. Already there's so much that has to be repaired and the regime is still breaking everything they can. Experience and competence that so many federal employees had and were DOGEd, fired or retired has got to be brought back into a functioning government that upholds, preserves and protects the Constitution, the rule of law, longstanding alliances and international goodwill.
I am fearful too. It is discouraging and demoralizing to see what this regime has done to our country and the world, but there are tens of millions more of us then them. We have constitutional rights and solidarity...envision what we want our Nation to be and look like...vote...protest...run for office and/or support candidates for progress and change for the better.
And we,as citizens and voters are the key to where this country goes. The hard core MAGAs are a fairly small minority. They can be effectively ignored. What is important now is to mobilize the people who want “perfection” in their choices at the ballot box to vote, not for a party, but for sanity and integrity. The fear that the right wing has instilled in too many voters that Democrat means socialism is hard to overcome, and let us face it, they have had years to foster this misinformation unimpeded by a Democratic Party that did nothing to counter it.
No, he’s not « leader of the free world » , nor does he want to be. Didn’t you listen to him? He’s no Churchill facing down the Nazi might. He is by nature an organiser and a cooperator. He’s a realist. And he has achieved much in building new alliances (not only with the free world) and new infrastructure to sell Canadian energy to Europe and Asia. His view is « stronger together » when dealing with hegemons, including Canada’s neighbour to the South.
You are a leader in my book if you show people the reality of the situation they face, and model how to respond. NO, he is not going to have Canada in on every deal.
And yes, I did listen to him and annotate the transcript.
We shouldn’t allow the rise of hard power to blind us to the fact that the power of legitimacy, integrity, and rules will remain strong if we choose to wield it together.
I would say that is a statement about adhering to the values of the free world, wouldn’t you?
Most certainly, and I’ll agree is is A leader of the democratic world, and a very eloquent one. But not THE leader, because we don’t want one of those anymore. The point about sovereign democracies cooperating is that they cooperate, they don’t follow.
Nothing is "just like that" and almost never has been in history.
The old order is dying, after having been stabbed in the back by insane people. A new one is not yet born. In the period between, to remember words by an interwar Italian historian, Antonio Gramsci, "morbid realities assert themselves."
On the time scale of history I would say that the10 months from the initiation of the Coalition of the Willing and Carney’s “Elbows Up” to now is barely the wink of an eye.
And the COTWs blizzard of trade deals is likely to cause quite an abrupt change in America’s financial outlook.
Davos is like a declaration of economic warfare. There is a day before and then there is a day after.
All Heather's points today feature Donald as, well -- what?
How about pure egotist. Isn't unalloyed egotism what most floats Donald? And in these areas:
1) Vulgarian style – all that gold glitter smeared everywhere.
2) Out-of-control gorging himself into fatness.
3) Milking extortion schemes from the most cowardly U.S. elites to foreign governments feeding his bitcoin fortune, from his lust for another private jet to selling seized Venezuelan oil to offshore the millions in proceeds into a private Qatari bank account for himself only.
4) The conceit that he, too, can emulate Putin, from surrounding himself with U.S. billionaires as cynical as Putin’s oligarchs, and as willing lawlessly to murder as wantonly as do Putin and Netanyahu, too. This reveling in brutality lets him keep thug fascist Stephen Miller close and lets him deploy thousands of his own vicious private army to terrorize Americans on American streets, and in their homes and cars where they illegally break in, too.
5) Putting his name and image everywhere, from the fatuousness of thinking he alone can rename the Gulf of Mexico to his need to put his name alongside John Kennedy at the Kennedy Center. His grab for Greenland only enlarges this egotism category for himself – totally cynically risking the U.S.’s most vitally necessary European and Canadian alliances.
6) The many, many underage girls his rich pals raped for years in an egotistic flaunting of decency and accountability Donald and his cohort all “take-that” wove around themselves.
Thank you Professor. But I am at a loss for words. Where and how did these psychopaths come to so much power. And why. To me it feels un-American. But I still have hope. I believe in the people. Your words though can alarm my soul, but they also strengthens my wherewithal to be the best I can to all people around me. We are in difficult times and people are fearful. It’s a strange dichotomy. I hear from so many people. They see all the insanity going on yet. They try to live their simple lives. Waking eating working living trying to be happy with their family and friends shopping resting watching TV or reading a book and believing in life, liberty and a pursuit of happiness. But we must believe in each other, by just the simplest ways of smiling to each other and saying it… we have each other‘s back one way or the other going forward. And remember kindness is a powerful weapon for good. So much for my loss of words ha ha ha ha ha. I love you all. I love America. I would prefer not to die for it, but it would be well worth it for the generations to come. My family and friends gave the ultimate for what I have today,( though it is structurally wobbly) They don’t deserve this. And I truly believe that we, if we stand strong, share our commitments ,give of our time, of ourselves or whatever is out of our comfort zone to show that they are solidarity amongst us personally, I love the diversity of life. It makes the world so much more fun and when you interact with like-minded people of different backgrounds and it works out well we have achieved a higher level almost to a divine sense. OK, I’ll shut up for now, but professor your words, give me strength and encourage bless you. Mother nature is my God and I sometimes feel she is sweeping, but she is always there for us just like you are peace out everybody.
In my Political Signal Chat group of Americans in Germany someone mentioned that The King of Norway sent his population a letter that said in wartime the government can appropriate people's property. She said, that since Scandinavia is usually ahead on these things we can expect to be hearing this in Germany too.
Other things being discussed are:
What if we can no longer get Social Security or our pension funds because banks are blocked by the administration from transferring money out of the US?
What will the country we live in do. We will apparently acquire Enemy Agent Status, which leads to surveillance.
What about Dual citizens? Where will we fall?
A Dane warned someone the other day in a restaurant that even though he had had a great time in the US in Wisconsin, that we should not be obvious about being Americans, because everyone hates Americans now, even though they know we are not all for Trump.
How do we prepare for war?
If the US kills soldiers from our country will US military here be taken as prisoners of war since they have not been removed? Could we be taken as prisoners of war.
All of this because Trump wants Greenland and Canada.
Putin has Trump in his pocket. He is enjoying watching his "mentor". Trump is destroying us and Putin is not lifting a finger!!!!
Trump will do anything to impress Putin.
Putin could have Trump and anyone of Trump's "want to be " thugs who are holding high offices within the government of the USA, or anyone of Trump's wealthy supporters, killed anytime he wanted to. Putin is the victor in all of this....he is using the President of the USA to do his bidding....such a tragedy!
I cannot give you any answers for these questions other than to try your level best to stay reasoned, emotionally disciplined and not to tread down the slippery slope of " what if " too far. Also, the EU is much more sane and it's people more empathetic than perhaps you may think.
Indeed so. As you should. An appreciation for and understanding of one's situation, whether it is precarious or otherwise, is quite important. Be of strong heart and good courage in it!
Mark Carney is emerging as a replacement on the world stage for the role U.S. presidents used to hold. How many attendees of Davos will have the moral gumption to publicly acknowledge Trump’s depravity. How many world leaders and corporate heads are groveling before Trump with dollar signs in their eyes? Governor Gavin Newsom is at least one of those who called out complicity. How many others are there?
"For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, we benefited from its predictability. And because of that we could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.
We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient. That trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful. And American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods: open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
So, we placed the sign in the window. We participated in the rituals. And we largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
As Professor Richardson suggested this afternoon in Politics Chat, I listened to the speech Canadian Prime Minister Carney gave at Davos today, as well as the question and answer session that followed. If you want to understand the depth and breadth of the change in our world today, give a listen.
I admit to being neither a diplomat nor an economist, but even I was able to understand and be shaken by his remarks. Simply put, the “rules based order” is dead. It is dead, in part, because it was not really a vehicle for worldwide equality but rather a maintenance of a status quo that allowed the power of wealth rather than arms to dictate the flow of materials that improve wellbeing for more people. In other words, it only worked superficially, and it is the inequities that ordinary people turned a blind eye to that has brought about its downfall.
At a podium in Davos, our closest neighbor and staunchest ally delivered the most honest and damning analysis of our failures to live up to our Constitution that has ever been spoken. To be sure, he rightly laid out the sad history that this failure has happened around the world. By his very honesty, he stripped away both the claims of American exceptionalism and the criticism that we have never lived up to our goals. In short, he said, no country has, because we started the rules based world order from an uneven playing field in which wealth begot wealth, and power begot power. Carney was succinct: we all knew this was true, but pretended it was not.
He spoke of how middle powers, such as Canada, can compete: Canada has lowered its taxes on citizens and corporations alike to strengthen its citizens’ buying power. It has initiated greater efforts to mine and market its natural resources. They learned from their vulnerability from overreliance on the convenient, nearby markets in the US, and are signing agreements with markets on many continents. Canada is also strengthening its military capacity.
In a way, Carney has called the bluff. He is moving his country forward without the US, reminding the world that coalitions among middle powers are not only equal to but can surpass a coalition with a single super power.
Through his remarks I finally understood what Professor Richardson has been preparing us for: the US is no longer a leader in the world, it is an obstacle. Our friends are done mourning the loss, they are working out the path forward, and they are not pretending otherwise.
Many folks decry the loss of civics, humanities, and logic in the last several decades in American schools. It appears as if what rather will be needed in the coming decades are courses in humility, cooperation, and tolerance. We will need to learn to rein in our material appetites and consumption. And we likely will have to learn how to be the objects of pity and scorn rather than admiration. MAGA really meant “Make America Greedy Again. The golden goose is dead.
Carney's remarks start at 9:40 on this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miM4ur5WH3Y&t=2389s
I have suggested in my most recent blog that we back away from being consumers of everything and maker of more. Food certainly being one. I spend time in my kitchen making my own food. I don’t suscribe to factory standards which is mostly filled with sugars and high carbohydrates. I make my own ketchup why not. It’s only tomato paste, vinegar and spices. I love cucumber chips and I make my own liquid and instead of paying $4 a jar, it costs .79 cents for a cucumber to cut up and no sugar added. I recently bought a key ring for $5 and it fell apart so I returned it for credit and cut a piece of wire to hold my keys. These are only small insignificant things but they add up. We don’t need to buy everything made at the factory conglomerate. We don’t need to constantly buy everything made we can make it ourselves. I’m not impoverished. I just don’t need to do what standardization tells me to do. We are going into a deep freeze. Often I make a big vat of vegetable soup. And I look over at my recent addition to my cat herd Kitty Katz. After two weeks, she has acclimated to the house. And she doesn’t have to freeze her paws anymore forever while waiting for me to bring food to the outside warming house. She now meows at me every morning while I prepare the food and it warms my heart.
I boycotted yesterday and put triple layers of clothing on and danced and yelled with the others. It felt good. A reporter asked me to discuss community improvements in front of cameras next week. I’ll be satisfied with January. My prediction is that our economy will soon take a dive. We have never had such poor leadership ever even under W Bush who was a spoiled brat that failed at everything. Now we have a sick dude who destroys everything because hum… he doesn’t know why he seeks destruction. He just destroys.
Once when I lived in Florence Italy I was at a party and I overheard two Italian women talking and one said “Americani sono stupidi.” I turned around and she immediately apologized to me but I responded, “No, you are correct we are stupid.” That was 50 years ago.
The wealthy and the oligarchs benefit from a less educated population and the rest of us suffer as a result.
Mackenzie Scott has donated hundreds of millions to various organizations many of them universities that cater to people of color. And now she is being sued because white Christian nationalists don't appreciate that she is trying to give a hand up.
It’s her money and none of their business.
Indeed! From what I have read she was at least, if not more, 50% of the creation of Amazon.
Can you imagine, Pam, what Amazon could be for workers, sellers and customers if Mackenzie was the owner/CEO? Good working conditions and pay and STILL spread the wealth around. Seems like, maybe, she might have been the “heart” of the Amazon creation. She’s someone I’d sit with and chat over a pint or tea or coffee….think it would be a fascinating convo!!!
Barbara, i agree. Right now I loathe Amazon and I do understand why some people are stuck with it.
Thank you Barbara, my sentiments as well.
House Republicans need to listen carefully to what Jack Smith has to say, and then join Democrats and impeach this deranged man in the White House while they still can. If they don't, they will be responsible for the down spiral that will follow.
Yes and as Heather has said if just a few republicans voted with democrats to impeach they would be heroes and save this country from the deranged agent orange.
The downward spiral has started and they are already responsible,
Jack Smith has risked his personal safety to speak the truth. There are way too many cowards in government who will just sit on their hands without doing the right thing of shutting down orange baboon's treachery!
Yes, if Rs could disabuse themselves of Trump’s hold on them, Congress could right the ship and recalibrate with our erstwhile allies. With some humility, we could adopt the mindset of the “middle powers” that Carney defines, after finally impeaching the deranged would-be king.
The best outcome for Trump would be the 25th amendment. Then it could be argued that he is incompetent to stand trial.
I think it was on this forum that someone recommended Cory Doctorow's book "Enshittification", and I have started reading it. So far it paint's a picture of the largest tech companies making more money from manipulating the market than from serving it. The thesis seems to parallel Mark Carney's recent words:
"We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient. That trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim."
We are losing our grip on the common good by accepting subjugation by a few powerful narcissists. Reagan successfully branded service and protection of the common good as our nation's greatest folly while in reality it was the foundation of liberty and justice for all. We collectively pretended it was justice, or justice enough while corruption spread. For what?
Enshittification appears to apply to the product or service of a company when it becomes so dominant that it suffers little competition and therefore has little fear from shortchanging the suppliers and ultimate customer. At a point at which CEO collude to squeeze the public, even aside from the political power they have come to wield.
" I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that ... if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge, it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy. "
- Fmr AG Eric Holder (who did not prosecute and made them larger).
I may have mentioned the book after reading about it, but I have yet to get the book from our local library, as it's usually out.
GJ Loft ME CA FL IL NE CT MI's comment is interesting and also illustrative in defining the Christian Nationalists. One may ask: "suing for what?" And you rightly point out, "It’s her money and none of their business." However, for me, the darker take away is the illustrative example, cartoonish as it may be, that control is clearly at the top of these nut cases' agenda. This very much explains why Trump and his Christo fascist Nazis think that taking Greenland is a U.S. right. Never mind that it belongs to Denmark; never mind that Greenlanders that have nothing to do with the U.S. nor us as a population, live there peacefully; never mind that they don't want us. With Trump, as is the case with the ChristoNazis supporting him, it's all about what they want and believe that their "faith" is righty meant for all Americans regardless of anyone's opinions. The audacity played out by this administration is not going unnoticed. Just this morning on NPR, George Louis "A" Martínez reported from Moscow on how the Russians were taking this Greenland theft by Trump et. al. Lavrov was quoted as saying, essentially, that if the US takes Greenland, why can't we take the Crimea (and by extension, Ukraine)? Why can't China take Taiwan? We are all now, essentially, living in the Bizarro world, not unlike the one Superman once had to negotiate with his Bizarro counterpart. As Uncle Duke from Doonesbury would day: "bad craziness!" https://www.npr.org/2026/01/21/nx-s1-5683070/trumps-greenland-demand-have-been-a-gift-to-u-s-geopolitical-foes-like-russia
"Bizarro world" is right. This is just one big nightmare. I don't know which is worse: the obvious conclusion that DJT is NOT WELL, or the fact that members of the regime (and many GOP politicians) continue their lies and propaganda to support him. Our country is coming apart at the seams. That can't be good for the economy.
It's vainglorious lack of impulse control. A blotto drunken frat-rat flooring a Ferrari; with no thought to future consequences. In this case the (classic) intoxicant is power.
Who the gods would destroy they first make mad, but that often leaves vast collateral damage in its wake, as it did WWII.
Too true, Ellen.
The White Nationalist House is jeopardizing our national security by further emboldening Putin, betraying Zelensky, and our NATO allies. This WH is a gang of traitors, and Congress is complicit by doing nothing to stop this unfolding tragedy. So much for peace and affordability.
So much for liberty and justice for all.
"Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises." - Lincoln
I respect those who claim to be "Christian who are humble, inclusive, and helpful. I reject the legitimacy of those who make the same claim yet manifest exclusion, hyper-hubris, and predation. Bizarro if you will. Polar opposites, yet somehow muddled even across the centuries. I see the hand of privileged politics in that.
Yeah, go home and pout! Are the white christian nationalists the ones who must have the front pew in the church, to be seen as 'good' people??
Sued by which cretins. The evil surely feels their power these days.
I'm not sure. I just read a headline on my newsfeed. I'm pretty sure it was reported on Fox News.
At Davos. NYT Dealbook...some C.E.O.s openly questioned the president, using words like “wild” and “bizarre.” Yet many of them are planning to attend a reception in his honor, with some even joking about the best way to praise him in person. “Tread lightly,” one C.E.O. said. Contrast that with a number of international politicians wringing their hands over the growing tensions about Greenland.
Also on attendees’ minds: The Supreme Court could finally rule on the legality of some of Trump’s biggest tariffs as soon as today.
And don’t forget that Jack Smith is going to testify in Congress tomorrow. Join me in watching him make mincemeat of the MAGA Mafia.
Daniel, I fear the ones who are laughing and talking about appeasing him will not be laughing soon. He is not able to be appeased. He’ll turn on them in a second.
Daniel, given that Davos is mostly a performative preening, it’s disgusting that the CEOs are practicing their Trump praise. They all know he’s deranged and completely impossible to satisfy for more than a few minutes. Apparently not a lot of business deals are made at Davos? Thus, rather that play the game and reinforce 🍊’s delusions of grandeur, why the F didn’t they just stay home this year?
Canada, however, spoke truth to power - although the target of some of his comments wouldn’t understand a word. O Canada!
Technically Ms. Scott is not being sued, at least not yet, but the DOJ is investigating, alleging that some beneficiaries of support from her Foundation (i.e. Students for Justice in Palestine and American Muslims for Palestine) have "ties" to Hamas. It strikes me as yet another unserious pursuit by this vindictive regime, attempting to intimidate and discredit anyone who supports liberal causes. It is ludicrous to expect that a private Foundation would have the resources of the FBI or CIA to conduct international surveillance and reconnaissance for every grant application they consider.
But they won't hesitate. If the Democrats ever gain control again, they need to put some teeth into the penalties for vindictive prosecution.
She's not being directly sued.
Yet.
"MacKenzie Scott is not currently the target of major lawsuits, but her substantial donations through Yield Giving are facing scrutiny and potential investigation due to links between some recipient organizations and groups suspected of ties to Hamas, sparking congressional inquiries and FBI probes, though Scott herself is not accused of wrongdoing, just of funding networks that support those groups. Separately, her ex-husband Jeff Bezos and his current wife are involved in ongoing legal disputes with Scott's estranged brother, Michael Sánchez, related to alleged leaks during Bezos's divorce from Scott, but this does not involve Scott directly as a plaintiff or defendant."
I believe Michael Sanchez is his CURRENT wife’s brother, as she is Lauren Sanchez.
Mackenzie joins quite a group of kind- hearted, giving people. People like her will never know the impact they have had on another's life. Some people are altruistic. Rightful praise cannot be given to the others who only act in order to gain praise for the 'good' things they do.
One of the many things I like about her is that she gives funds with no strings attached. I don't think she has even requested the Nobel Peace prize as far as I know.
Almost every community have many projects that need funding and it seems that she does an excellent job of funding projects that help a large number of people.
Her money, her choice where it goes. These so called Christians have no idea what it means to be a Christian. They are following the antichrist and can't see it.
And by planting a garden to grow the food we can, to some extent, control what type of fertilizer and pesticides are used. The fresh air and exercise is good for us. Home canned jams make great gifts and jars can be reused. Being debt free may help us weather the economic turmoil coming. The US does not need to be dominant, we need to live in harmony with the world. In Minneapolis we continue to try to help our neighbors and let the world who will listen know just how horrible the current administration is.
During the growing season, we often have more than we can use of perishable items and drop off lettuce, tomatoes, etc. to the local food bank. Our local food bank and our town also have gardens to provide fresh produce. And the local groceries stores also donate fresh produce that may be bruised or about to expire, but is still edible.
We are fortunate to have enough space to have a garden. Many people aren't or else they are too busy with jobs and family.
I am heartened to read that others actually cook real food. I do. And I just ordered my seeds for this years garden. Even the price of sees has gone up. But I am excited, as I am every year, to plant flowers among my veggies. Right now we have lettuce in the greenhouse, and beets and broccoli in the raised beds in the garden.
Check with your local county extension. Here n NC we have an annual Seed Sharing event, free to public. Some seeds are from last year, but the germination is still ok.
I once tended a 50’ vegetable garden with a few pot plants put in between. But when the woodchucks come as well as other vermin, they would eat up so I prefer the creatures so no more planting.
No woodchucks here, but my dogger likes to eat the cherry tomatoes off the vine, snowpea pods & has tugged so hard she’d uproot them….have an espaliered apple tree that over the season gets the two lower laterals plucked of apples which she plays with like a ball before devouring them, and strips the blueberry bushes too! She loves her fruits & veggies! I do have snails & slugs tho’!
Same here, Bill, around 50', now just a few containers. I grew strawberries from seed, melons, tomatillos, blueberries along with all the usual suspects. And I am in Connecticut as well, where there be deer (and now bear!) aplenty.
I have deck gardens too! Critters can't access!
Pot plants are so beautiful Bill! I had 'volunteer' pot plants growing against my old home- the person before me would clean his pot & throw the pot seeds out the 2nd story window! What a treat.
Yes! Seeds save well refrigerated too.
My slow cooker & cast iron dutch oven get quite the workout in my kitchen! Simple foods cost less, taste better & promote good health. I love beets & maybe this will be the year I finally plant some.
"Under the techno-fascist rule of late stage capitalism we are all peasants, and EVERY PEASANT NEEDS A GARDEN!"
- Cj, Founder of Black Lodge Press
Black Lodge Press is the decade-long print project dedicated to all things anarchist, queer and anti-fascist
https://www.itsnicethat.com/articles/black-lodge-press-graphic-design-project-230625
Fun point of view and reference, thanks lin+. Frigid outside here, but with heat mats I sprout indoors and your post is a butt-kick to plant microgreens.
Wow lin. What a collection of great sayings- truthful they are.
Ditto and our fishermen donate fresh fish to our food bank.
Debt -free is rare but hopefully people will realize that means options.
JD, that had been my goal when I bought my house to have it paid off in 15 years by escalating payments, but life & that plan went sideways & unless I win the lotto I’ll never have it paid off! 🤷🏻♀️But I am SO lucky to have a roof overhead and enough food to eat…so counting my blessings indeed.
I went to Prudhoe Bay and worked just long enough to pay off my mortgage. The pay was 29.00/hr 12 hours per day 7 days a week time and a half for overtime double time for holidays. Three weeks on and one week back in the states. One could work their week off in lieu of returning as well. It condensed my mortgage to one year and a couple of months. Debt free has been an enlightenment. I work now only when people over 80 need a hand and can no longer perform hard labor. I don’t have to charge anything and it makes me feel good. Time to give back. Plus’s that’s how I met my 100 year old girlfriend. How lucky was that?
Pat, earlier in the week I told posted how in a recent Politics Chat podcast, Heather asked us all to do kind things for each other. I asked people to post what they had done, or would do, as I was feeling pretty down.
I got three replies--2 that day, one the following. I guess either I posted too late and people didn't see it, because I sure don't believe--CAN'T let myself believe--that the Trump regime has indeed stolen our humanity. Perhaps people are being modest?
Today's Letter has almost put me under. I am so grateful to YOU, for the simple reason that you have posted the good YOU do.
You nailed it--when you do good for someone, you feel wonderful. It's a joy to be needed.
And for those who feel they are necessarily on the taking side, please know that allowing someone to help you is a gift in itself, by allowing them to feel needed.
It's already pretty late in the day, so who knows how many will see this. I'm gathering up strength to call Congress--even though I am sick at heart, and even though it feels useless. I gotta try.
It would do me so much good to log onto my email later, and not see "X liked" my comment, but a comment that says, I did THIS today to help someone else. Please don't be modest, and please don't think the smallest thing is too small.
Thank you.
Barbara, same here. As of this moment, our only ongoing debt is our mortgage, but like you, a solid home, enough in the bank to buy groceries and pay our utilities and mortgage in time, and I would also like to add incredible neighbors!
Janet, my life would be very different if I my house was PIF…I could actually afford to hire folks to help me with the upkeep & finish the stalled renovation (I’ll need to do a refi to fund it) & yardwork on nearly 1/2 acre. My friends worry that I’m still climbing ladders up the side of my house or to prune my high hedges & doing all my own yardwork, fence repair and all home maintenance. Have given serious consideration to selling, but rents are much much higher than my mortgage & availability is very limited.
Except, ever more, it's less doable. Pays haven't kept up with expenses, automobiles are increasingly less affordable and cost of living is skyrocketing. In MA you can barely buy a shed for under $600K. Our son bought his first home in 2020 for a little over $200K. It's valued at well over $300K in five years. His saving grace was that the interest rate was low since he was a first time buyer. Rents are also outrageous, many higher than his mortgage payment.
New cars are close to $25K, if you can even find a car since Americans love those SUVs. We paid almost $30K for our hybrid Elantra in 2024, hardly what anyone would consider a luxury car, but it suit us fine. Still $30K equals about a $600/month car payment excluding insurance. Property taxes are climbing, homeowners insurance is outrageous, ours went up about 50% in one year, even though we have never had a claim. The middle class is getting scroowed left and right, getting more and more in debt. I don't see this correcting any time soon.
I am debt free and I pay off all my credit cards each month.i even cancel the cards that gave me huge air bonus miles before the first $99 annual charge just so I can apply again and receive more bonus miles. Again and again. I’m taking another free air trip again this year. Either to Vilnius, the death camps of Poland or Greenland. But I’ll only take an aisle seat to stretch out my legs or the airlines stuff you in like sardines.
Oh yes! Get out in the garden! Your county extension offices have lots of ways to help. Food education, 4H, master gardeners, fertilizer/pesticides guidelines, plant health, soil health, invasive plant identification.....
Well said cameron!
What a wonderful story of self-reliance! Plus being nice to a cat! 😀😸
And stupid has run amok, little things matter, just a change of attitude will be useful….
Prepare for quite a spectacle as Trump lays out his Greenland acquisition plans and throws in other nationalist ambitions like Canada and Mexico and Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico and Panama and so forth. Probably we'll soon see an AI US flag on planet Mars. Why not go inter galactic? His macho bro base loves the chest beating.
But, it is quite amazing that the delusional Orange menace who can't figure out healthcare, immigration, human rights or constitutional law in the US, will be "running" or "owning" or "kind of owning" or "borrowing" or "whatever" the rights to self rule for other sovereign nations.
Isn't it "aMUCK"? Some sure don't know what they are stepping in with their stupidity.
We had a couple hundred out last night for a rally at the Williston VT ICE data center, 18 F with a fierce wind. The speeches were great- not just calls to action but specifics on actions we can join. (But boy my toes hurt when I got home!)
Great post! I live in central NC, Costco, target, Walmart, Trader Joe's hobby lobby, their parking lots are packed with cars (big ass expensive pickups ( don't know why they are called pickups, they never pickup anything), people buying stuff they don't need, seriously don't need, like press-on nails, it is out of control!
I know I'm ranting. Here is another crazy thing our country is trapped in....Tell us how you avoid plastic.
I now never buy coffee outside in a paper cup as it’s lined with plastic. I bring my thermos and pour my own coffee. I even get compliments from strangers when they see me do it. Why pay $4 for a cup of micro plastic coffee when I can pour my own .13 cent coffee made from home, lol. I ain’t no dummy. At look dumb but looks are deceiving. And the heat erodes the plastic. I mostly use glass containers to store food. I refill two old beer bottles with filtered water but never buy plastics water bottles. Time will end my life not micro plastics but I don’t need to rush it up with a gut full of it.
With planning one seldom needs to buy anything when out and about. It was around 2010 I was in NY in Feb doing my first art show of the season. I bought a bottle of water for a ridiculous amount of money. I never bought another water or coffee outside or visited NY again.
Little steps sure help Bill. I have gradually replaced whatever plastic containers I had with glass- including what my hot coffee goes into. I know, over these years, I have added to landfill but, few plastics are 'recyclable'.
No plastics are mostly non recyclable.. The recycle industry is mostly a fraud.
Janet, I hope my 2005 Dodge Magnum Station wagon lasts until I can't drive anymore. Growing up around strong metal vehicles & muscle cars hasn't helped me feel good about much in the vehicle market. Maybe there needs to be a rule about 'pickup' ownership: you must own farm land, work for a construction company, tow vehicles with it & provide proof before you can sign on the dotted line! Trucks right now are so big they become a hazard to the rest of us just trying to drive. The payments are a joke- and 60 months! to pay it off.
There is a fix for this stupidity, this ignorance. Start teaching critical thinking processes, history, comparative government systems and literature as early as the 6th grade in our public schools. To me MAGA is 21st century KKK. I came to this belief after reading Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland" about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest in the 1920's and HCR's book, "How the South Won the Civil War."
Like your list, Richard, I’d add courses/methods/information on money management/budgeting/banking/savings and other living skills, such as having/managing a household (even if single). In high school (1960’s) I took Home Economics classes—basically cooking & sewing skills (the class only ever had one guy in it & he’d purchased a kit to make a down sleeping bag & needed to learn the skills—the teacher was thrilled he was there—I think these days more guys would be in such classes!); in college, back when my Uni had a Industrial Arts mjr, took auto mechanics, carpentry, welding as well as a Home Ec course in Tailoring….sigh, that’s probably why I was on the “10-yr-no-degree-plan” 🤣(and that’s just listing the vocational classes & not the plethora of “academic” classes across many programs).
I have no degrees but 3 years of technical training, specialized courses that interested me, or that I took just to help them get the minimum number of students (such as a Hot Rod automotive class), while working 19 paid hours a week as an Aeronautics Teaching/Lab Assistant). Before that I spent 5 years as an instructor/researcher, course supervisor, with additional duties as tech library and maintenance supervisor at the Space Systems Command and Control School.
I have to say so much of what I value came from what I learned from some students like you who were life long learners no matter what they were officially credited with.
It always bothered me that the colleges were too ranked by how many entering had achieved degrees, instead of how so many learned through coursework that very often helped them advance in careers or their own businesses so far more than they could have without such a good experience base. So many I know of were able to advance through specialized industry training that few colleges could deliver. Some were able to get credit by testing higher than the degreed graduates.
I have five degrees: A.S., B.A., M.A., Ph.D., J.D., the last coming from Harvard in 1973. Much to my chagrin Harvard Law awarded a J.D. to John Roberts in 1979. When people give me B.S. about my Liberal ideas coming from my Harvard experience I point them to Chief Justice John Roberts, who almost single-handedly has put our democratic process on the brink of collapsing with his stupid Supreme Court decisions - Citizens United and Shelby County vs. Holder, to name two.
When Citizens United was decided, my first reaction was that they knocked out some of the shoring principles that held for 223 years, something we thought would hold forever or at least until we made a more solid foundation through wiser addition to our Constitution.
They effectively breached a levee that seemed unimportant to fix before the river that never breached the old unrecognized one, so was never replaced with something better, or even patched up a bit.
Jim, I sure agree! Measuring ones knowledge isn't necessarily measured by the letters placed after your name. I have learned more in life from untitled people than those with a sheepskin. Learning is a daily task. Until my eyes close a final time.....
Cindy, it could be because of something known as amathia, willful ignorance. Some are so invested in the "truth" of something (religion, racism, etc.) that they cannot, literally cannot, use their brains objectively to dissect certain factual situations. For example, nothing in the New Testament is written by anyone who ever met, saw, spoke to, listened to Jesus. It's all hearsay. Some of it, as with Islam and Mohamed, coming decades later. Is there a chance that Jesus is purely a fictional character? After all, there are two versions in the New Testament about his death.
And I continue with the learning via the OLLI program: Osher Lifelong Learning Institute for those over 50…learning, but no tests!!!! And of course LFAA…what I call my Midnight Online School!!!
Barbara, when schools 'decided' Home Economics wasn't needed for education, we put ourselves in to the consumer mode & it's just gotten worse. Now, we need to figure out a way to get young people's hands off their fancy phones & do something that involves problem- solving.
Good suggestions Richard. Oh drat! here I go again wanting books.
I apologize, Cindy. I only do this to folks who are woke.
I think he destroys because he has a black hole inside his heart that no amount of stuff can ever fill or satisfy. He sometimes looks gleeful or gloating but never happy... and Melania... miserable household. As goes the character of a leader so goes the character of a nation.
'They' never get it, do they Jennifer. Always searching for the magic.
I commend you for your self-reliance. The majority of Americans can’t do that because they don’t have the space, time, or money. With so many people living on tiny incomes and working multiple jobs, cheap fast food and store-bought foods like ketchup and frozen pizza will continue to be meal staples.
We’re stupid and have been for a long time. We haven’t been a world leader or developed country for so long.
I sometimes in summer sit out in front with my coffee after feeding the herd and watch neighbors having delivered factory food for breakfast. Then I observe kids 250 pounds waddling around. They won’t have a long life.
I spend my first sabbatical working and living in Sweden for a year in 1989 and spent time in a number of other European countries. It was always surprising to me how welcome I was in any environment, and circle of residents of whatever area I was in. Things like being invited to join them in restaurants, pubs and on trains for example. As an American, so many people seemed excited to talk with me and I often heard people say they loved the American people, but the government (G.W. Bush was President then), not so much. Sadly, It's no longer like that; as before, many still like Americans although many feel sorry for us, and they understand the difference between the people and the power. However, many also blame the American people for being so gullible to have elected a charlatan wannabe dictator who's not content to just screw with America, but wants to shake up the entire world.
I feel as bad for the wonderful people of Greenland and Denmark and other countries under attack by this criminal cabal as I do for those of us living it daily here on U.S. soil. I wish more Americans would a) seek more and better education, and b) travel the world to see other peoples and cultures and discover our commonalities and not focus on "the other" as some kind of enemy. As Mark Twain said, "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness."
Good luck to those of us who #resist here in America - we're running out of time!
Oh here is another thing. I love cats, have 4 of them (rescue), but we recently spent $1,400 on one cat and those two visits did not require surgery. I think our society has lost their minds with our pets. The cat & dog food grocery isle has as much variety as the cereal isle! Don't get me started on cereal. Ok, I feel better now.
Always as the vet if they are corporate-owned and stay away if they are. So you have 4 kitties that means you should make your own cat food and fill ball jars and freeze. I max out at about 25 lbs. it’s lasts two weeks. You can do it if I can you can. You need a meat grinder for some of the bones. You need to visit cat nutrition.org and/or Dr Lisa Pierson’s blog and read up on the ingredients. What else… I buy chicken thighs from Costco best deal not the cheapest but best value. You need to add chicken liver, vitamins, lite salt. If you embark on this, I’ll give you info on what I consider the best meat grinder you don’t need to spend hundreds just around $200. Contact: bkatz322 at gmail.com
We make our own dog food. Eggs, (our dogs have meat allergies) rice, apple and Balance-it supplement. It takes 20 minutes to make two days worth and costs around $2 a day to feed our two dogs. We started making food when our previous border collie Haven was diagnosed with severe epilepsy which thankfully was controlled by medication. Chicken breast, always bought on sale, crushed tomato and pasta plus supplement. Both she and her sister were extremely healthy, had no bad breath, no doggie odor, no skin allergies or ear problems and beautiful teeth. Haven never had another seizure but sadly cancer took her at 6 years of age. Her sister lived until 10, a bit on the younger side for border collie life expectancy, but still within the average. She played frisbee up until the day she died and still looked like a pup, especially her beautiful teeth.
NO KIDDING! I often think of Lassie. Lassie would go out all day - off leash - and come back at dark for dinner. We didn't have 1500. dental cleanings! But then we have ninnies that dress their animals like humans. We have collectively lost our minds!
Actually saw a poor white poodle yesterday whose owner had dyed its ears and fluffy, unclipped tail ORANGE!
As-ho-e! Geez! Do they think this is OK to do to an animal?
I love it that you make your condiments and soup! You are right that there is a lot we can do to liberate ourselves from the Food-Industrial Complex. But to suggest that means you are “making your own food” is a stretch. Remember the farmers! So nice to hear about your happy cat! Kitty Katz 😂. Thanks for the laugh!
I couldn’t think of a name and was sure of the gender so I began observing her tail up and yep, it’s a girl. When I publish my book on cats, I will marry one of my cats for publicity. I will soon be a justice of the peace with local republican help. Boy are they going to regret they made me a justice after finding out that I used them so I could marry my own cat. Hahahahaha. Great publicity.
This week I will experiment with my black bean burger recipe. Having problems with binders nothing seems to work well so I will mix it with turkey ground and eat Turkey bean burgers, lol. Very healthy and with the right spices, delicious.
Uh, Bill, what time should we all show up for dinner? We’ll do the clean up!!!😁
Bill, if you do find out a binder for black bean burgers, please post it! I love them.
I’m about to try a hybrid black bean and turkey burger. Why not. And turkey binds.
I was searching for a recipe and came across a book that my mom gave me for my birthday in 1985 (my mom always inscribed books- that's how I know). It is Frances Moore Lappe's "Diet for a Small Planet". It is the tenth anniversary edition. It's a shame that eating real food and living simply is considered a fad or sort of kooky. I wish I could grow my own food but simply don't have enough sun except little spots here and there throughout the day. My two apple trees give me much joy and some applesauce to can. My two old hens give me a few dozen eggs in the spring. I do spin, knit, and weave ( and sew)so I don't need to buy socks, sweaters, or rugs. Our economy would not thrive if it depended on me.
I grow, cook, and pickle, as you. I am concerned that we will have difficulty getting and affording the ingredients. I am not diabetic, but 75% of insulin is made in Denmark and France. Other pharmaceuticals are made overseas, particularly the new GLP-1. People are going to suffer when they are unable to get their medication, among other shortages.
Eileen, of course T hasn't thought about things like insulin makers & such. He does not care!
Congratulations & well done, Bill Katz. I also see national healing in individual & hyper-local - community self-reliance focused on environmental & social justice, organized around the geography of drainage basins. Ideological inspiration & models for it are William James refinement of Emersonian self-reliance as S-R in the context of civic responsibility, and the concepts of Planetarity & subsidiarity as described by Blake & Gilman (2025). I write about the topic in a 4 part Substack series titled, Port Dorchester. (+ ongoing essays)
Love it, veggie soup coming up today. It’ll be a slow climb but I gave up on crap food a while back.
My husband grows most of our food and makes his own ketchup. He has talked of this day coming since I met him 15 years ago.
Thank you for this report on what Carney said. That speech sounds as if it will be in the history books for exposing the truth about America and capitalism in general. Capitalism has never been a socially responsible system, despite certain companies (see the UN Global
Compact) attempting to steer it in that direction. With the failure of the international rules based order, we now have a chance to design an entirely new system for how the world can work (see Buckminster Fuller) and implement that new design on the ashes of what is being burned down by Donald Trump. Perhaps we will come to see Trump as a godsend for having given us the chance to build something truly new.
Well, I love everything about your comment except the last sentence. I cannot fathom such evil as a godsend, sorry.
I said “godsend” because I’m a student of the Idealized Design process taught by systems thinking master Dr Russell L Ackoff. In that process, you first assume the existing system has been destroyed. This frees you up to design something new unconstrained by the past. America needs fresh, clean sheet of paper thinking to fulfill the Founding Fathers vision. By destroying the existing system, Trump is giving us the opportunity to think freely … provided of course he doesn’t starr WW3 🙄
Maybe that's grasping at straws, but it's worth consideration, I would argue. After Monday night's tirade, I expected the world to be seriously rattled on Tuesday. Instead, I suppose, world leaders were scrambling while ours were largely silent. And Canadian PM Carney seems to have been the most productive. If our chief executive is not removed soon, our options are dwindling.
I agree wholeheartedly on removal from office. The midterms are too far away. If left unchecked (as it seems he is), the amount of damage he can do between now and then is formidable. He will try his best to declare an emergency and cancel the election. He must be stopped as soon as possible!
Donald Trump Impeachment Odds Hit All-Time High
Published. Newsweek. Jan 19, 2026
59%
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-impeachment-odds-all-time-high-11383438
You are giving the power to Vance. Unlike Trump, he may not blather every thought in his head so we will not know what is going on in the White House. With Congress in support of a Republican President, nothing will change. The Democrats in power are too old and too appeasing to bring any change.
Actually, though our individual torments may not be the personalized misogynistic sadism inflicted by the MAGAstapo's lynching of Nicol Good or by Trumpstein's sexual torture of children, We the Empathetic People are nevertheless as much victims of the ChristoNazi Regime as those it has murdered or maimed. That's why, as we suffer the pangs of acknowledging the unspeakably wretched future that awaits us as subjects of a deliberately Failed Nation and reflect on what it means to live within a nation governed by a regime so Evil it has declared itself the global nemesis of all humanitarian achievement, we should not let ourselves be distracted from the need to inform the civilized world of our plight. Thus -- like a signal flare fired as a desperate plea for help by the lifeboated crew of a torpedoed ship -- the full text of the Jane Doe lawsuit against Trump and Epstein is a vital warning of what obtains when sociopathic predators run criminally amok.: https://cdn.factcheck.org/UploadedFiles/Johnson_TrumpEpstein_Lawsuit.pdf Never mind volleys of credible death threats forced the plaintiff to withdraw her suit; its text yet stands as a victim's frantic plea for justice. Please therefore let us ensure it is linked early (and therefore prominently) on as many Resistance sites as possible every day until the traitorous regime of ecogenocidal ChristoNazi pedophiles is no more. (I'll do my best to be responsible for this posting, but I am 85 years old and terminally ill, which means others need be ready to pick up the torch on days I am absent and after I am no more.)
I can imagine that it's for many Americans a very upsetting thing to realise that things never were as the propaganda portrays them.
Can't change the past, that why it's so refreshing to hear somebody like Mark Carney make such an inspiring speech.
I have agreed with you and disagreed with you. Now I wish you the best during this part of your journey.
If the shoe fits, "... traitorous regime of ecogenocidal ChristoNazi pedophiles..."
My slight variation would build on yours with "Traitorous regime of ecogenocidal White phony -C(KKK)ristian Nationalist pedophile protectors."
I don't want to stray too far from the WCN label they seem too proud of.
Loren, most people have a conscience that reminds them of their mistakes. What they do with that makes the difference. Oh, woe is me should be the call to action against the shit that is stinking up our WH & the world view of the US. Please, grasp hold of the peace you can get by being reassured your words help us see our duty & yes, we will carry on whatever fight we need to have.
KEM - agree. "Godsend" applied to that monster nullifies any other argument attempted.
Hello Alexandra.... Everything that DJT Touches Dies... Pray For Divine Intervention Soon, Very Soon...
Or gets beaten up and dragged from their home. TACO (Trump always chickens out) should be TOFU (Trump only fucks up).
The Native American indigenous leaders were right about Trump suffering a major health event (stroke) and now he is suffering insanity but the oligarchs have bought and paid for better results. They got their tax cuts in the OBBBA but what has DonOLD done for them lately?
Venezuelan oil? It's like dying of dehydration and finding a large pool of water that is contaminated and surrounded by grizzly bears.
Well, how about a tofu taco? I've seen them at a food cart...
GJ, oh you hit on so many issues! I feel like I get to attend a political science class without leaving the house when I read all the comments. Thanks to all for my new knowledge!
God may just be waiting for us to turn back to God knowing Christ reigns at God's right hand and we believers are empowered by the indwelling Holy Spirit to know we need to turn back to God
Or whatever spirituality one possesses even if not Christian. Genuine empathy and humanity are always works of God or a god, however one sees goodness.
Eleanor, I have lived my life with these views and, no matter what others say about our views & beliefs, this is where I stand. I was raised by 2 preacher/ parents who taught me humility, kindness- and color- blindness, how giving of oneself was a way of life. I cherish their memories & continue to live in the way I was raised.
Trump wasn’t necessarily a ‘godsend’, but the result of an arrogant, lazy, uneducated, greedy, self-ab society that held up a mirror to what we have become.
How many millions didn’t vote?
How many million’s didn’t want to vote for a woman?
How many didn’t vote because of our support of Israel, and now that’s worse because of Trump?
There was a time when we had possibilities of being a better nation.
But Republicans took over after Johnson and in my lifespan that was the beginning of the end!
The only bright spot was Obama!
He tried, but again , Republicans in power are the most bigoted, racist, humans in the country!
We were so hopeful when Obama was in office. It seems like a lifetime ago... well, it probably is for young people, but I lived through Watergate and Reaganomics.
So did I. I will not vote for anyone older than me. In fact, I am seriously thinking of zeroing out my withholdings and not pay one cent in Federal taxes!
I’m also going to see if I can get a dual citizenship in Italy.
Me too Ellen. Such energy was present. Then, to have to watch the Republicans pull their games made me so depressed. So, where are the people who spoke up then? Will they do so again?
Oh Christine! Your words are music to my ears. We have done the damage to ourselves, by ourselves. We should be hanging our heads in shame for not doing more- and, expecting "someone else" would have fixed things. Our collective ignorance is on international display. I feel shame.
The only thing this president did is hold a mirror up to us and show us who we really are. I am so tired of the “this is not America” meme. Sorry but this is. People of color and native Americans have been telling us that for years, and we’ve hidden the Dorian Gray portrait in the attic, too cowardly to do anything but look away. But now the portrait is out in the open and the rest of the world sees our ugliness for what it is. If you don’t like that, then get to work on what it will take to change that (spoiler alert: it’s about a lot more than just changing our politics, which after all, is an outgrowth of our culture).
Boy Chris, Dorian Gray is just a perfect reminder. Wonder how many people even know the reference you allude to? Warts & all, I love my country but, wish more would speak up in whatever way they can.
Exactly. Getting rid of the current regime will be useless if another set of idiots replaces them. That could happen because so many citizens are ignorant of how government works and how the world works. People who say they aren't interested in politics and don't ever read or even watch news sadden and bewilder me. I'm angry at the arrogance and dishonesty of the Republican regime who take advantage of so many gullible and uneducated people.
I’m sure he meant it as “a godsend”, not a GODsend…and let’s share Carney’s message far and wide!!
Like an unregulated vehicular transportation system, unregulated commerce makes no sense whatsoever from a social standpoint. We have been beguiled and bullied into accepting great bags of money disastrously tipping the scales of justice, and we are the ones getting the short shrift. Bigly.
Capitalism, or in any case private enterprise, is not the problem. Unwise deregulation, corruption, and pretending that private enterprise is the superior replacement for the public sector in every case, IS. IF we a really to have a government of the people, by the people, for the people, then we have every right make the rules for commerce, as with any other activity that impacts liberty and justice for all, as well as the common weal.
Governor Newsom is in Davos representing the world's fourth largest economy and around 40 million people. If the west coast economy merged with Canada and Mexico, they might advance to third place and they wouldn't have to put up with an insane leader who has surrounded himself with the most incompetent and cruel people imaginable.
It's time to think outside the box because the cowardly Republican politicians are truly unwilling to.
GJ, yeah I’ve thought of the west coast from Mexico to British Columbia being combined as a country, perhaps named Pacifica? Interesting thought experiment!
Pacifica should include Hawaii, if they want. Cascadia could be the three west coast states. Hell, I'd even settle for becoming a Canadian Provence.
I'd have to add Alaska, Guam, and the Marianas to Pacifica.
Of course, New England and the middle Atlantic states except the west half of PA could make up Atlantica.
Don't abandon us in NY! I'd be happy to become part of Canada.
I'd for Maine becoming part of East Pacifica if we can't reset our national government on a course more guided by the principles in the Declaration of Independence.
Yes, agree…and Cascadia is another name that fits well—‘cept it does make me think of the long overdue “big one” that will shake things up a LOT!!
Barbara, I like that name! Pacifica. New passport?
Can we add WA??
It's contrary to any goal we may have had to form a government in the first place. Opposition to democracy present a phony either this or that - to the favor of 'whom' is my ask. Words and definitions matter.
Apropos words and definitions, I for one am sick unto despair of reading about atrocities we are told we are powerless to stop until some future election that more than likely will not happen. Surely, I tell my self, there must be some more immediately effective alternative....
You know, Loren, our conversations on this site are spread far & wide. Our words reach so many others. THIS is our job! As long as we have breath in our lungs, we keep spreading the truth!
You're doing it. Here, not just reading and watching, but communicating your opinions, your feelings, your humanity in this space. We comfort each other and wish each other well, giving strength by showing we are here and we matter. There are many others who post here with advice on what practical steps to take, how to advocate for our rights, etc., But I also recognize the need to vent, to share and to help one another cope with it all. You are not alone. We are not alone.
Civil discussion. It is what we all should be doing. This site allows us this great opportunity.
We need reformation not restoration.
As someone who is in the middle of a stalled home renovation on an old house, Jane, I would actually blend the two concepts, restore what’s worth keeping but has been damaged and reform the design to make it more habitable to present and anticipated needs.
Yes Barbara. You got it right- restore & reform is the way to view our nations situation. Clean house where needed. Where's my Lisol??
Steve, I keep thinking that the proverbial silver lining of the trumpstein years will be that we are now able to recognize the enemy within…and we can now join forces with the so-called “middle powers”, in Carney’s words, and build together a peaceful world.
Carney’s speech before the leaders of the world’s higher powers where dominance of wealth is worshipped will go down in history as the message that finally broke through to the masses of people everywhere where true power and JUSTICE (and I would add, MERCY) can prevail.
How apt that paradoxically, DEVOS was the setting!
The choice could not be clearer.
Mercy. What a concept Jane. This is such a lost concept. Grace & mercy are what keeps people HUMANE.
"Perhaps we will come to see Trump as a godsend for having given us the chance to build something truly new."
This apocalyptic notion is where the far Right and far Left met to elect Donald Trump in 2016 and 2024. The first by voting for Trump and the second by not voting for Democrats. Elect Trump - Come Heaven on Earth. Elect Trump - Come the Socialist Paradise. The irrationalities of creed and ideology. The banality of evil which gives no thought to the actual harm done.
We don't need to reinvent the wheel of democracy. To repair the damage and prevent future damage, we need reform. The notion of a clean slate is fantastical. Even the Torah rejects it - in the story of God Grows Up - moving from The Flood to Sinai, from destruction to contractual law.
I highly recommend you study Dr Ackoff’s work … and W Edwards Deming, Buckminster Fuller, and Riane Eisler… and British historian James Burke. You will learn that the “clean sheet of paper” approach is basic Innovation theory applied to human development … something that has happened throughout human history.
Perhaps you’ve heard humanity once believed the Sun went around the Earth … that “if man were meant to fly he would have been given wings” … many more such examples taught in Burke’s TV documentary series. And Deming and the others teach the theory. I think you’ll be surprised at what you learn about how societal change has worked and can still work.
No discipline starts from a clean slate. They build on and are part of a continuum. Either confirming, amending, or refuting prior articulations.
No human starts from a clean slate - genetically or socially.
Good reminder lin!
And the cost, incalculable
I get it, but tearing down has killed thousands of children and people in Africa and other places. Not to mention the other government sanctioned deaths and those to come from our new environmental un-enforcement, and climate change. There is no starting with a clean slate. The only silver lining is that the Republicans get thrown out for the foreseeable future, but that's wishful thinking.
Zelenskyy and Carney and the other movers of the Coalition of the Willing already have organized the parallel organization to NATO. All of the work on the 20-point peace plan for ending the war in Ukraine was a way of doing that organizational work right under Trump's nose. Trump was blind to it as long as his ego was being stroked. Zelenskyy and the others never believed Russia would sign onto the plan until the Russian economy broke.
The latest addition is a call for a 100,000 man standing European army.
Ukraine is taking the hit. PURL, the program that supplies US-manufactured arms to Ukraine bought with COTW money will be ended because of Trump's pique. China is keeping Russia afloat and supplying it with dual-use components for drones and missiles, likely for barter for Russian oil, gas, and mineral rights. Trump helped that along by allowing the sale of Nvidia's H200 chips to China.
As Heather said, there is a realignment based on alliances of common interest. It is well underway. And America is being left to its quasi-isolation. But we have already gravitated towards the Russia/China coalition. Will we continue?
I just realized that calling the defense of Ukraine group the "Coalition of the Willing" began in March 2025, at the London Summit on Ukraine, by Keir Starmer. That was also the time frame when Carney started talking about "Elbows Up."
That suggests that our now former allies were moving towards the new world order that Carney delineated since then. Davos was the public unveiling.
Hello Georgia... DJT, the WMD of the US, is making China Great Again....
Indeed he is. I am waiting for Trump’s announcement that Taiwan really should belong to China and that they don’t “have the cards.”
Coming…
Good Q, Georgia: "Will we continue . . . towards the Russia/China coalition"?
If our schools continue the reign of standardized testing as most important, yes, we continue to the Russia/China oligarchies.
If our schools shift to the human-centered, we may center ourselves again more towards our former democratic allies.
Churches ought to shift to the human-centered also. Their test is whether adherents buy the bullschitt “that we have all the answers, no questions allowed.” Should be replaced with science, “we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the truth of the cosmos.
Yes, JD. In testing the testers "have all the answers, no questions allowed."
But please, replace testing with science -- yes -- and with multiple other fields, humanities, where, as you so well say, “we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the truth of the cosmos."
But please, too, go further, where "we have no final answers, only questions that we pursue for the" human truths of our neighbors whom now ICE and BCP pursue for only Donald-&-crew's own brutal indulgences in racism, misogyny, social media hate-bait, and churches tectonically far from anything Buddha, the Hebrew prophets, Jesus, or Mohammed ever knew.
So, Georgia, looking ahead to the end of Trump the boneless, where does that position in world order land us? What will we become?
A truism I read in the blur of this morning’s news:
The end of America First and the beginning of America Past. (I lost the link—if anyone knows it please drop in a reply. I think I am going to be using it a lot going forward.)
Probably a fading #3 for a while in the shrinking hegemon club of China and Russia as Putin puppeteers Trump and eventually Vance. And as Russia’s economy caves as the war goes on, it will be ever more beholden to China. China is currently providing most of the dual-use technology used in Russian drones and missiles in exchange for natural resources.
Our subservience to China was sealed when Trump allowed Nvidia to sell the H200 dual-use chips to China. That gives China access to chips it could not make for itself for the next 2-3 years. That’s probably 3 generations of AI chips, given how quickly the technology is evolving.
Carney’s speech and von der Leyen’s the day before make it clear that the US will not be trusted again in the remainder of our lifetimes, and likely our children’s. Not in economic terms, not in terms of military alliances, and certainly not in terms of respect for international institutions and state sovereignty.
I broke my leg last June and that feels like what we did as a country. I didn’t cut my throat altogether. In June coming on I should have a decent enough healing to stand confidently again. If we can heal ourselves as a nation and remake our purpose to benefit all of us this time around, remember those nations we could not forgive after WWII were pretty much realigned by the time the baby boom hit the ground running. I haven’t lost my confidence in us and that is saying a hell of a lot. Thanks for your efforts on behalf of the rest of us.
Heal well, friend.
We need to go back and finish the work on the “I want to live in a country where…” posts. That has to go on while we try to clean up the mess in the Auggean stables of our government
Lordy, the perils of immobilization. Old age has many. I, too, have hope for May stamina. Wish I had hope for national sanity as well.
I've always wanted to drive one of those electric grocery carts. But vanity and stubborn pride keep me from doing so. Even my kids want me to, but still I refuse..... maybe one of these days I'll get over myself. It may very well be a real adventure..... I could imagine it to be the old '58 Kenworth I learned to drive when I was 14 might help .....
Hello Georgia.... Last Week it was announced that China's Trade Surplus surpassed 1.5 Trillion$.... This began when they were admitted to the WTO... Under GWB, allegedly over 16,000 American Factories were outsourced to China... The largest Tesla Factory is in China.... The US Empire is fading to #2, unless Canada decouples, and draws closer to China... A possible brake on China's Progress is Environmental Catastrophe... Currently, because of Industrial Pollution, most of the Surface Water in China is undrinkable....
The EU and Mercosur "The Southern Common Market" (countries in South America) signed a mammoth free trade agreement after 25 years of negotiation. That is a slap in the face to Trump's Donroe Doctrine, "The US as the hegemon of the western hemisphere" policies.
The EU is moving towards free trade relationships with India. The US is being frozen out around the world and very quickly.
Carney understands economic warfare. It is being waged against us because we are the biggest threat to stability and predictability in the world markets. We are no longer seen as a beacon of people's rights and freedoms.We are the enemy.
UPDATE: From the NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/01/21/us/trump-davos-greenland-news
"In a surprise move, the European Union’s legislative arm voted by a slim margin to refer the pact with Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, which form the trade bloc known as Mercosur, to the European Court of Justice to examine whether it is compatible with the bloc’s existing treaties.
Waiting for a ruling could delay the treaty’s implementation by as much as two years.
The Mercosur deal, which resulted after more than two decades of negotiations, had encountered bitter opposition from farmers and some environmentalists in Europe who argued that South American agricultural products would not meet European standards and unfairly compete with farmers at home.
Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, thought she had managed to assuage enough opponents to win approval. She was in Paraguay on Saturday to sign the treaty that would create one of the world’s largest free trade zones, connecting more than 700 million people.
“This comes at a time when E.U. producers and exporters urgently need access to new markets,” the commission said in a statement, noting that the delay undermined the bloc’s reputation as “a reliable and predictable trade partner.”"
Well, that's embarrassing for von der Leyen and the EU...
Hello Georgia... A lot depends on Political Stability, and Climate Change.. South America is not known for Stability, Europe has been Unstable lately, and the USA is run by an Unstable Tyrant... Have you seen the latest FNMA TV Commercials?...
GWB was just practice for chump
I don’t know JD, GWB as flawed as he was never acted as though he hated the very idea of America, I never once thought that he would sell our nuclear secrets for a pile of cash, unlike the insipid orange turd. Or raped a 13 year old while a 12 year old watched, ah the Epstein files…………
That’s what Canada did with its China trade deal on January 16, 2026. BYDs from China for Canadian canola oil and sea food at reduced tariffs, valued at $7 Billion.
Georgia, I have always been interested in the automotive world. In fact, it was the only interest I shared with my late father. Several members of my extended family play significant roles in the automotive industry, including manufacturing, sales and racing.
YouTube knows this and submits numerous auto-related videos in my feed, including many highlighting cars produced in China.
BYD and Huawei are on track to seize the global automotive market and leave ALL the other manufacturers in the dust. The BYD deal with Canada will accelerate (pun intended) that takeover. Imagine buying a car with more luxury and technology than a $400,000 Rolls Royce for a mere $70,000! When those BYDs start rolling into Canada, that will be the end of Ford, Stellantis and GM because they can't compete.
U.S. automakers' markets are about to shrink dramatically, meaning more jobs lost to Donald's ego.
When I was growing up, there was a saying, "The optimist learns Russian, the pessimist learns Chinese..."
What do you (or anyone else) know about this? https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/eu-mercosur-sign-trade-deal-after-25-years-negotiations-2026-01-17/
It is the EU pissing on the Donroe Doctrine and Trump’s dreams of America as the hegemon of the Western Hemisphere. So is Denmark’s operation Arctic Endurance.
von der Leyen on Monday and Carney yesterday are making a point that they are seeking other trading partners and are now engaging in a trade war with America by moving into our markets while reducing tariffs and guaranteeing reliability to our former customers. And yes this will reduce American exports and reduce our GDP.
Canada did it last week with its deal with China worth $7 billion for Chinese BYD electric cars for Canadian canola oil and fish. It’s a lot of fish…
Denmark also started selling US bonds in their pension fund. That lowers bond prices and raises effective interest rates.
This is FAFO time for Trump’s tariff policies.
There is also the “trade bazooka” that Macron wants to use. It refers to the EU’s Anti‑Coercion Instrument, a legal framework adopted in 2023 that lets the EU respond to economic coercion by another country with wide‑ranging trade and financial measures. Macron is using the phrase to signal a readiness to deploy the EU’s most powerful economic weapon, rather than a specific single tariff or measure, given that Trump has said he is applying tariffs to the country’s sending forces to Greenland in Denmark’s Operation Arctic Endurance.
Under the ACI, the EU can impose high retaliatory tariffs, extra duties, or outright restrictions on imports from the coercing country, and it can also curb access to its single market for services.
Measures can include limiting US firms’ access to EU public contracts, restricting investment, curbing banking and digital services, and tightening intellectual‑property or licensing access for targeted companies. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/mep-trade-bazooka-9.7051791
This is another FAFO warning to Trump. Davos is all about saying that Europe is walking away from America and willing to take the economic hit, and has weapons it is ready to hit back with.
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2026/1/20/trumps-greenland-tariffs-whats-europes-bazooka-option-to-hit-back
Georgia, my hunch is congressional Repubs & cirporate Dems see the unavoidable dissolution of US global power & economic clout but are so deeply complicit in stoking the treasonous, death cult crazy train that they will not impeach & remove the 47 maladministration or corrupt 6/9 SCOTUS that facilitated the fascist overthrow with their unprecedented decisions. They have tacitly seceded from USA as a modern version of enslaver Confederacy & KKK. Defense of democracy & decency is not secession. It is defense of the USA constitution in smaller conformation. What our military will do is a wild card that some highly qualified observers at The Steady State say is likely to protect the revolutionary confederacy of fascist mafia oligarchs as the “USA” corporate hegemon = a huge challenge for states unaligned with the hegemon.
We always say the military will come around to the side of democracy. As I look around the world I see military’s that blend comfortably into regimes that are anything but democratic. As a source of upward mobility to the masses they always find themselves imbedded with the faction in power.
As to your last sentence Georgia, I hope not! 🙏
Oh Georgia, a stark reminder of what is to come UNLESS people from all nations say "Enough!" I need to eat some dinner. My mind is spinning with all the new info I have read today. Thanks all!
The "rules based order" is dead because Donald Trump and a cringing, cowardly, empty-brained Republican Party killed it, not because it was dysfunctional. It was murdered, stabbed in the back by a 3-year-old octagenarian and criminal who America was stupid enough to think would actually uphold law and order.
There are problems with every international system that comes about -- this one was no exception. Yet just because it was often asymmetric doesn't mean it was an economic failure or somehow fundamentally unjust. Our entire post-World War II system created great prosperity, political stability, the necessary space for the EU to evolve and for other powers like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan to flourish., to say nothing of presiding over the ending of the colonial order and the birth of many new nations in Africa and the Caribbean. These are true accomplishments, nothing to sneeze at or pretend weren't real, served their purpose and immensely valuable after a world dominated by chaos.
What is now ensuing is a system of regional power-balancing, much like the system that was in place before August 1914, filled with aggression, threats, tariffs, and tremendous economic instability. And this time with nuclear weapons and rogue states ascending. Smart rising powers like Canada will certainly take advantage to the extent they can, but this is not really a moment for rising new democracies, but murderous autocracies.
Worth remembering the famous line by Sir Edward Grey, Home Secretary, as World War I descended: "the lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime." Things do not always work out for the best.
A big question: How do we pull along the MAGAs into the new world? They were living in the white-supremacy of the past and voted for Trump to take the US backward. They loved the violence and destruction. They are dead weight. That is still a problem for the US. Do Blue and Red states need to go their separate ways?
Pulling along MAGAs: We don't. No sense banging our head against a brick wall for a shrinking minority. Our energy and resources are better spent on the persuadables: Independents, Regretful Republicans, and the biggest bloc of all, the Did Not Vote Party. Later some MAGAs will come along after experiencing more-to-come pain, including from eroded healthcare, as well as from attraction.
Blue and Red states separating: Every state has both Democrat and Republican voters, so none is truly Red or Blue, but majority one party or the other. Most significantly, a soft secession is Putin's dream. Let's not give it to him. We are the UNITED States of America who stick together in sickness and in health.
Good Points, Ellie. I live in Ohio, a reliably red state. And yet, our cities are blue, we might even elect a Democratic Governor and re-elect our D senator. We aren’t all that red, we’re gerrymandered so it just looks that way. We’re way more purple than one would think.
Go Amy Acton and David Pepper for Gov and Lt Gov of Ohio!
Heck yeah!
The DNV Party - 90 million strong.
After every TV, podcast or social media report I watch or listen to about people concerned about the future, their rejection of trump 2.0, etc ... I wish the reporter, podcaster, etc would ask one last question: Did you cast a vote for president in 2024? I know a lot of my friends & family who voted in 2024, didn't vote trump or Harris; echoes of 2016 for Hillary.
Thanks, Ellie. Arkansas is another one of those "Ruby Red" states that is actually home to a few reliably blue cities. The state has always had its problems with racism, poverty and poor education, but used to be a brilliant shade of purple, electing Democrats Bill Clinton and Mike Beebe as governors, along with Democrats in both state houses.
Two things happened:
1. Chair of the Arkansas Democratic Party, Bill Gwatney, was murdered outside party headquarters; the party has never recovered and gotten its act together.
2. Republicans discovered evangelical preachers and gerrymandering.
You said it more nicely than I did, Ellie.
I am also dismayed at our US miliary. They took an oath to protect the constitution, not a dictator -- "the enemy within." I sense I am too naive.
Put MAGAs in camps in Texas and sell Texas to Mexico. They will pay for the new wall.
Haha. Maybe we could pay Mexico to take Texas. They could save the money and not build a wall.
Why would you want them to come along? I don’t want them? I’d like to deport them all to a foreign wasteland!
Yes, that would be ideal, but how to weed them out? They certainly need education in critical thinking. I would like my state to aggressively implement critical thinking in the public school curriculum beginning with kindergarten. The religious extremists will cry because how can they get followers if people think for themselves.
The first thing that needs to be done in education is to keep cell phones out of schools.
A curriculum that focuses on actual thinking schools. Kids need to relearn to read, not search on google or any other website.
Put the laptops away. Use paper, pencils, calculators only in high school. Kids need to learn their math facts.
Yess Red and Blue states need to go our separate ways. I’d prefer that we align ourselves with Canada.
We Baby Boomers need to stop paying our taxes. I’ll pay my state taxes, but I will not support the Trump government. Or the Vance government, or any Republican government.
The sky in their world is a different color. Deprogramming is the only thin that will work.
I think they would need to be repatriated, if they wanted to be. I personally do not want the Republican Party to even exist anymore. They will have to pass a test to prove that they know how government works. If they don’t want to repatriated and swear allegiance to the Constitution, then they can leave the country.
I don't believe it's dead and buried, 'unless' Russia and the U.S. enforce the agreement they signed onto for Ukraine to give up their nukes. Absent Russia, the world must or most must present as united a face as is possible, so that Russia 'pays' for breach of the international agreement that threatens to otherwise make a total mockery of any 'real' rules based order. We also must make reparations for damages by _ rump. I can dream of a formula to base the taxes: voter rolls perhaps ? No, suppose that would be too rich. Better minds than mine must imagine something of a more just framework. Oy vay~
This reminds me of T S Eliot’s Love Song of Alfred J Prufrock. I grow old I grow old. Eliot came from the Eliot family but a branch from St Louis. His mother was a social worker and he lived on the edge street of St Louis Society. His The Wasteland poetic opus based in some ways on the old Fisher King Mythos of a wasted land with a wounded king. Someone has to ask the correct question to save the country. At that time there were lynchings and in East Louis a massacre. I think because of his mother he was aware and no tools to cope with the times abd fled to England and never returned to St Louis. In The Waste Land there is a vivid line about bodies of dead negroes. He must have witnessed or seen deadly racial violence and his art was his tool for coping with it all.
I think as a nation we are beginning to realize we have to ask the right questions. And sometimes some of us will not like the answers.
I don't know. Trump came to power because people are freaked out by immigration. Europe is having the same freak out. This system created winners (Europe, the US, other "white" countries settled by Europeans) and losers (mostly darker skinned peoples from Africa, Asia, the Middle East the victims of colonialism) for decades. Can we really blame the losers for wanting that high life, too? In a twisted way, the racists like Musk are right, he just focuses on the race nonsense too much. This is very much about the rise of Asia which is freaking out all of Europe and people of European descent (they just call it "western civilization"). Unfortunately, the main Asian power is a repressive Oligarchy which is not good for the long term survival of the human race in an advanced tech age.
Dana, the one perspective that influenced me the most about the white world and the non white world was being out of country long enough to understand how that influence played out. As a white man in an Asian country and in a Latin country I began to comprehend Americans were not as pompously arranged as they thought of themselves. Other nations scoff at the American superiority complex. They have a much greater self esteem. They are even able to work up a bit of pity for us. That is when they aren’t too greatly upset. The center of the earth is not the United States. Their own importance heavily prevails. One gets a feel for that in the conversations of those Americans living abroad here in Heatherland.
I lived in the UK for 10 years and also saw that. That some American tourists were loud, rude and demanding didn't help our image either.
Because for decades Congress has refused to do its duty in creating sensible immigration laws and procedures in order to use the topic as a political cudgel, here we are. Chaos and Americans’ frustrations reached a boiling point and 47 took advantage. Congress is solely and completely at fault. Trump never wanted any kind of orderly immigration procedures, but to use the chaos for his political advantage.
Well if one looks into the word merchant there is the connection to the business of trade in the so called New World. Each country except the Vatican abd it was complicit in other ways had a company and had stocks to sell. Human labor was part of the equation besides the bibles and rum from the musical 1776. And that wave others came from other periods of time. China has an extremely long history of conquest and power grabs but Japan also invaded as well so still a mixed bag. In the Hebrew Bible all sorts of wars and certain oppressed periods. Persia and Sumeria,and Egypt as well. The Silk Road as the trade route shows how it all evolved. If one takes a long telescope perspective this could be a watermark or a metaphysical shudder the creates better. Hard to say but not impossible.
Did you listen to Carney’s speech?
Carney's speech disagrees with your view that this is "not really a moment for rising new democracies". The alliances of like-minded nations is the point he makes. And the people in new nations like those in Africa and in the Caribbean, so very many of them, are living in abject poverty. The "affordability" crisis in the U.S. exists in other countries, including Canada. And this crisis is the direct result of greedy-guts capitalism as opposed to regulated, checks-and-balances industry. Large corporations are about profits, not social welfare. We can have both a stable economy and programs that benefit our people. We no longer have a choice about this if we are to go forward with the alliances we need to make. Organizations like NATO were created in this way, for this reason. Same for United Nations. Same for the great U.S. Constitution. No Kings, No Bullies. Alliances for peace and prosperity for ALL.
Listening to Carney's speech (and do listen, not just read), I felt relief. An adult in the room not only called out the hubris of USA exceptionalism and Trump's ridiculousness in a well articulated, measured, rational tone--he also laid out the way forward. Carney and the other adults are stepping up, and we're going to be okay.
I heard the decentering of the USA not with sadness, but with refreshing humility, as with decentering the whiteness of Renee Good's killing by making it known that at least 36 to 40 others to date have died by ICE.
As Carney described the necessity of ascendancy of the middle powers as the way forward to a new world order, it reminded me how in this time of needing to expose the many problems, we also need to define the future we want for ourselves and the next generations. A vision is the first step toward formulating plans to manifest the reality. We're gonna be okay.
Carney is a shrewd man who is doing what he must by necessity. The larger point was that structural forces are now in play that will increasingly play the trump card (excuse the mention) in the international system. Optimal results are not favored -- is the best way I know how to put it. Having an established order with clear penalties for breaking the rules of the game reduces uncertainties and costs for everybody. When that order is destroyed on purpose by the power that set it up in the first place --- chaos will ensue. And chaos will be neither pretty nor cheap.
Optimal results may not be favored, resulting in chaos which typically favors autocratic takeover, but at least Carney shows a path forward at a time when we've been experiencing doom and gloom. Can't score if you don't take the shot!
Yes! De-centering the USA is a huge step forward … away from “American exceptionalism” to “one world family” with every member having something to contribute!
Exactly how I felt!
We can only hope that Europe comes around and stops trying to appease Trump. We Americans are still going to take it in the teeth but if they can create such an alternative to the 3 Oligarchies of China, the US and Russia, then the "little guy" (most of us) will have some hope of not being born and dying a pawn to the rich and powerful. Someone(s) have to become the real 'shining beacon on the hill' where people can live decent lives with hope, dignity and human rights. Ironically, it was Reagan who talked about the US that way, while sowing all the seeds that have lead to our current suicide.
"Many folks decry the loss of civics, humanities, and logic in the last several decades in American schools. It appears as if what rather will be needed in the coming decades are courses in humility, cooperation, and tolerance."
It seems to me that they sort of go together. It seems to me that our concessions to overblown commercialism are eroding the civilizing as aspects of our character and culture.
"Advertising signs that con
You into thinking you're the one
That can do what's never been done
That can win what's never been won
Meantime, life outside goes on
All around you "
And life is SO much more than that, as we neglect at our own peril. My personal view is that we need to engage in a lot more thinking about what, in the end, really matters to us as individuals and as a species. So often that gets bottled up. I think we need to think a lot more about what wisdom is, as opposed to disjointed information, and what we can do as individuals, as a society, and as a species, to attain it.
JL Graham! Thank you for these famous words! I have long thought that the lies and cons that seem to be necessary for corporations to sell stuff and doodads and unfood to people, are just softening up people’s brains so worse things can happen. People who can swallow ads whole can swallow anything.
Actually I heard this from a finance person over 15 years ago. He said the US was not what it was and never really was how it tried to conceive and push the image . He was saying when the new world order comes our country will be more like France. He wanted me to invest with his company but no idea abd still no idea of anything about money. But it turns out in this regard of now he was spot on.
Ironic that trump. the man who so despised the "shit-hole countries" has turned America into one. . .
Oh, please, it isn’t over! We aren’t there yet! Don’t say so!
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There never was a golden goose unless it came with a golden spoon. The American people put their shoulders to the wheel and heaved for all they were worth. What leadership did with that labor, yes that was unconscionable. Elitism is the name of the game. No, none of us are in that category no matter how disillusioned we hold ourselves. You are not elite, I am not elite. What we are is blistered and calloused. I don’t mind that. I’m dumb enough to feel the pride inherent in being exhausted after a hard days work. I don’t even mind the vacations I never took. I’m a hard nosed peasant amongst peasants. We took pride in being peons. We built and maintained this country. Our pride is justified. Was it our fault the wealth we created launched billionaires? There is no doubt in my mind that we will continue to put out. There is also no doubt in my mind that our labors will continue to be squandered. The rest of the world will continue to distrust us as they rightly should. When we decide to use our freedom to help raise up the status of our neighbors let me know and I will in all humility kiss your ass.
Canada and USA are married. Carney is the daddy and Trump is the mummy. They are both a bit unfaithful and even if they divorce all us children are still brothers and sisters. We have an inseparable love. Our bloodlines are mixed. Did you ever get in a fight with your little brothers? I was the oldest and completely insufferable. Ever so often they had to realign my thinking. I’m not sure how long it will take but I am sure we will fix it. My apology to all American mothers, and to my Canadian family.
And mummy has gone off to the funny farm.
thank you for the link - will definitely watch this today.
Trump's speech at Davos is scheduled for today, Wednesday at 8:30 AM ET.
Interestingly, when I asked Alexa when it was scheduled for, she told me it was on Thursday, twice.
When I told her she was wrong, she corrected herself.
So much for AI accuracy.
After-hours trading in SPY at 2:56 AM is up slightly from Tuesday's close.
Thank-you for the Carney summary.
Well stated. I am heartsick for us in the US but glad to see Canada standing up to our sick, demented president and taking leadership of the new order. It’s hard to believe the scope of the damage Trump and his minions have caused in 365 days. I’ve read it referred to an American suicide. I hope we can recover.
This really helped clarify what feels so unsettling about this moment. What stood out to me is how the collapse of the rules based order is not just a geopolitical failure, but an economic one. It was never designed to democratize power or opportunity, only to stabilize an unequal system.
That is where I see a quiet opening for a paradigm shift toward economic democracy. If wealth concentration and overconsumption helped bring this system down, then the path forward may depend on more distributed forms of ownership, decision making, and shared responsibility, especially among middle powers that are not as locked into maintaining the old order.
I appreciate how you named humility and cooperation as the skills we will need. Learning to participate in a more plural world, rather than dominate it, may be the hardest adjustment and the most necessary one.
https://open.substack.com/pub/crisistransition/p/a-programmatic-agenda-for-economic?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
When will the GOP wake up! They could have rid us of Trump in 2021, yet they lost any sense of morality and ethos and now they have helped destroy our economy, world standing and our moral compass ( whatever we had of one).
I don't think the problem with the GOP is lazing. The GOP died with Ike. Reagan did not even know how bad his handlers were. Nixon did, he was one of them 100%. The people are corporatist fascist; the worst kind of Nazi. Germany had Hitler. American Nazis are the international corporations. These Republicans in Congress, they are corporate replacement parts. The most recent “Fortune Global 500", an annual ranking of the top 500 corporations worldwide, includes 138 headquartered within the United States. Yet many headquartered elsewhere also have significant operational presence within the United States. Many of those 500 are massive, multinational entities holding a financial influence rivaling that of the United States government. Putin wants NATO put down. That is what Trump is doing. The R.I.N.O. Nazi party in Congress is on the take. Trump is not believed as much as even four months ago but he follows Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi Minister of Propaganda, "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it." Thus we hear this nutty lie that we must take Greenland or else we are not safe. The truth is we are safer as is because if Putin tried to take Greenland, or even drive through it, NATO would attack Russia and defend Greenland. Moreover, with us as part of NATO we would also defend Greenland exactly the same as if we controlled Greenland. Its a classic "six of one, half a dozen of the other" B.S. lie! BUT if we try to take Greenland then that will be the end of NATO and maybe even be the start of WWIII because the EU will see that Putin is at least the cause of this, if not the author of it. Whatever the TrumpStein Pedo-Files have on Trump might come second in importance to Trump as what Putin has on him. What did our nasty El Niño (Little Boy in Spanish) do?
Great post, since you reiterate what I got banned for on T and FB in 2020 for saying. Goebbels and MEIN Kampf were the literature that chump read and believes. Or had read to him. He certainly follows to a tee. The Republican redefinition started with Reagan’s campaign and his kneecapping of Carter. Or earlier if one counts the Powell Memo. The 80’s were more consequential than I realized. Same for most of us I guess. Anyway, Putin ruled before Epstein and chump is trying to make enough monuments so that he can’t be erased when the truth comes out. Hope my reason didn’t run amok this early…
Naw, you're good.
Thanks, never used to doubt my sanity. Hard not to these days
It’s a hell of a thing, ain’t it.
Yeah, you hit the nail on its head. I am within a day or two of completing a Memo addressing the mess that followed Justice Louis Powell and that Memo of his and his several Court opinions. It's working title is
OUR DEMOCRACY IS UNDER ATTACK BY THE FREE ENTERPRISE SYSTEM
OUR RESOLVE: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION AMENDMENT.
At the end I propose a five section amendment to resolve the mess we are in. Yeah, at times it feels like we are all being gaslighted and slip into doubting ourselves. But no, we are on the side of the good fight. These Nazis will be exposed. Even many of the suckers who bought that stupid MAGA hat will admit, "We got played." Saul Alinsky warned us about them. He said there is a large mass of people in the southern and mid-western states who feel left out of the American Dream. He said they are good patriotic folks and and we need to organize them before someone else does. Richard M. Nixon popularized the phrase "silent majority" talking about them and they loved him for it. I doubt Nixon was smart enough to coin the phrase, maybe John Ehrlichman wrote it for him. Then came Reagan and Jerry Falwell Sr. became friends and with Falwell's "Moral Majority " really got organized. Anyway, I will soon post a PDF with my Memo and then get some sleep. I hope I don't run amok too often within it. 🙃
Thank You, Albert. There IS a " large mass of people" in the Midwestern states for sure, who feel - and know - they were left out of the American Dream. I was at a meeting in Lansing, Michigan, when Governor Granholm announced that our auto workers would be going back to college to learn how to work the computers that would now be assembling our cars, denigrating a whole class of laborers in one fell swoop. After that, every skilled worker I hired to work on my house had something bad to say about Granholm and our government. They were, and still are, ripe for Trump's piicking.
We are going to bulldoze everything he built as if he had never existed. 🤬
To Dick Montague: I hope so. There will likely be carpenters from Habitat for Humanity who will give time to rebuild the East Wing and replace the solar panels Reagan removed.
There must be some use for this ballroom. Did you know the plans include a spiral staircase and residence quarters on the second floor? perhaps since it is the people's house, maybe we could hold Senior proms there. or benefit concerts. I know security people would go ape-s--t over that, but if they can handle the Super Bowl and other major sports events that trump has caused havoc in, this should be easy. Imagine having your prom at the White House!
It could have those uses, but it is such a horrible symbol of greed, stupidity and criminality that who would want to be there? It has no resonance in America except insofar as glitter from royalty. Undemocratic!
IMO that large Ball Room will be perfect to create a four floor office for the new Executive Powers Counsel which our Amendment to repeal Citizens United will also repeal the single "President" and replace it with seven executives who will be specialized to properly oversee the fifteen existing Departments plus eleven new ones which are now Agencies. That may sound like "Big Government" but the truth is ever since 1773, as in this present crisis, lowering taxes and regulations on powerful corporations are not the solution to our problem; lowering taxes and regulations on powerful corporations have always been our problem. Consider those three tea ships docked in Boston Harbor in 1773, owned by the British East India Company (hereinafter, The Co.). The Co. became the first multinational corporation. The Co. was given a monopoly on shipping tea and operated like a state with an army larger than Britain's. In May 1773, the British Parliament imposed the Tea Act on the Thirteen Colonies. The Tea Act maintained a prior tea tax against us, but also gave The Co. a tax break. The rest is history but now just like in the film Poltergeist, "They're here!"
At the very least get rid of the trump -Kennedy center and put back Gulf of Mexico and Denali. Also put his impeachments back into history books.
Reminds me of Nicolae Ceaușescu in Romania. Romanians I knew wouldn't talk about it, much like some Veterans and Holocaust survivors soon after WWII, when too many people didn't want to hear the their stories so soon after the war ended.
I can find stories that I think help me understand why they didn't want to talk about it, but for people that don't know too much about Ceaușescu, especially younger people, I'd suggest starting with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_revolution
He has been described as simultaneously arrogant and clueless culminating in the call for a huge rally to show support for him (which did the opposite and ended his reign 4 days later.
I haven't been able to vet much of what I find now, so I'll leave it to others to compare other arrogant and clueless leaders like Vidkun Quisling, whom I always thought was too comparable to our current President (with similar corrupt officials in power).
Albert R. Killackey, Esq., it might be preferable to ship the ballroom, piece by piece, to the Smithsonian, in a place next door to the Museum of African American Art with panels to explain the racism that got the ballroom built. Add to it the destruction of the Bonwit-Teller Art Deco destruction earlier in Trump’s career. We can start thinking of his place as the would-be king as we impeach him.
The answer to that question may also be in the Epstein files…
Ahup. (That’s down east for yes, sir.)
In New Hampshire, we pronounce that sentiment: ayuh or yup!
Many US corporations are located in Minnesota. Have any spoken out against ICE or this regime? There is our answer.
Putin is ecstatic that Trumpskkkii is on the verge of destroying NATO.
Correct you are, TPJ (MA). Just what he’s been telling DT to do.
Criminal Netanyahu just signed on to Trump’s ‘peace’ group. Birds of a feather…
No Greenland Didtractions
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On Jen Psaki's MSNow show,, Governor Pritzker detailed that Illinois is doing much more than recording a database of unlawful acts. Governor Pritzker warns of disruption of the 2026 Illinois' Polls. Illinois has already created a "Accountability Commission", State crimes like Murder 1, do not have a statute of limitations. State statutes can be extended on other crimes by a legislative act. Go Illinois.
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Judges (plural) have caught up with Lindsey Halligan's criminal acts in the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) voting (led by a Trump pointed Judge) to strip Halligan from her fraudulent masquerade as a U.S. Attorney. Go EDVA - no distractions.
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SCOTUS hears on Oral Arguments today on the firing of Federal Board Of Governor, LISA COOK by Trump's AntiSocial Post. JEROME POWELL will attend the oral arguments today as a citizen observer.
1 PM Pacific UPDATE on SCOTUS' Oral Argument:
Per Lisa Rubin, even the right wing Justices were skeptical of Trump's conduct:
Alioto "No court has determined underlying facts". Kavanaugh appears to be disapproving as well. We'll' see.
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SPOILER ALERT:
Subpoenas of any nature & scope can be challenged in Court. Your attorney cannot go inside a Grand Jury room with you, but counsel can stay just outside in the Hall of Justice.⚖️
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JACK is BACK: More JACK SMITH testimony LIVE Tomorrow January 22, 2026!
A nearby home that used to be plastered with--no joke!--about a dozen Trump signs, one I'd estimate was 6'x8', has removed them all. Hmmmm.....
What does remain is one about 2'x3' that proclaims "Pritzer Sucks"
Whatever.
The GOP will never wake up.
Accept that reality.
Some have, more will, but way too late.
The GOP needs a forever sleep.
As it turns out, greed and gluttony have ultimately been proven to be deadly sins for the American people. And our widespread ignorance and intellectual laziness hasn’t helped us out much either.
Because we have benefited so much from the wealth-based order of the last eight decades, we believed our own mythology—that it was our just desert, our divine birthright. So much so, that the idea that we should conquer Greenland “just because we can” has been met mostly with ambivalence instead of the outrage it deserves.
We elected—twice—the perfect embodiment of American hubris, greed and ignorance and while we may mourn our fall from international grace and prominence we should embrace the necessity of a new world order based on fairness and cooperation and aspire to be worthy participants in it.
The Christian nationalists aka American Taliban are taking control. They control all, or almost all 7 of the dominions.
You don’t understand Carney’s speech. It’s not about Trump and the GOP. The US realignment started under Obama, who let Crimea go with a shrug in 2014. It continued under Trump I, then under Biden, who used subsidies in the U.S. aggressively against E.U. rivals. Now Trump is making it explicit and overtly deploying U.S. power against (nearly) everyone, including traditional allies. The fact that Trump is a wanker, a mafia boss and a madman is the business of the U.S. citizenry. The fact that the U.S. is misusing its power and bullying its neighbours and allies is our business and we’ll do what we must to protect our security, our culture, our democracy and our markets (including our American markets). As I wrote in my own comment, we have options, and since the U.S. is behaving more like China now, we shall also treat it as we do China: an important trading partner and potential rival that isn’t unique and doesn’t get to dictate terms.
The GOP will not wake up. They will eventually become cognizant of the wreckage and try to blame someone else, just like their Confederate predecessors blamed the War of Northern Aggression for their problems. Our job is to ensure they don’t get away with it this time.
It’s true, they do try to blame Democrats for everything. Not that Democrats are blameless in this whole mess but they are mostly guilty of handwringing while Rome burns.
The republican moral compass has been hijacked, if it ever had one. Or Vlad’s compass lured like the sirens of old and were irresistible to foolish, greedy bastards.
Mitch McConnell!!!!!!!!!!!!
They were (and still are) high on their own supply. They’re very self-congratulatory over their long-game victory to tip the Courts to support the might of wealth over the rule of law, and to thoroughly gut the ability of vast swaths of our citizenry to understand what is happening through any form of critical thinking. They’ve enriched themselves on the coattails of the grift of their leader, elevating themselves to the rooms where the super-wealthy make decisions. They’re giddy over their own “promised land” vision of a white Christian country full of perfect little families with mommies and daddies and children who all follow *their* rules.
Carney's speech was measured, intelligent, acute and deeply saddening. The contrast to Trump's malignant insane raving could not be greater.
It's not every day the President of France writes the President of the United States and says: "I do not understand what you are doing in Greenland," invites him to a dinner (with Ukraine and Denmark, as well as major players in the EU), only to be unloaded on by a 2-year-old pooping in his diapers, wingeing and whining about the Nobel Peace Prize.
It's difficult to underestimate the sheer insanity of the moment. Carney is a very smart man, but at this point, a gibbon with ADHD would probably sound more coherent than Trump's deranged cruelty.
It would not be so bad if just the POTUS went bananas, the founders though of that; but plutocrats have managed to stacked the whole deck to support him though his disastrous tantrums.
I do not think they "have stacked the whole deck." Reasonable people may reasonably disagree, but the Rube Goldberg jerry-rigged contraption is literally cracking through to its foundations right now.
The future will belong to those who can think through strategically to that wonderful day when Trump has an aneurism, or walks into the Briefing Room clad only in his diapers or enough Republicans resign from Congress even *before* the mid-terms to ignite the entire tinderbox. What happens the day after that is what we should try our best to prepare for and think through.
After reading Mark Carney’s remarks at Davis and pondering his brilliant leadership, I want America to become part of Canada.
Canada has offered to buy California and most of us are really looking forward to that! 😉
Yes, good!
That ship sailed long ago. King Charles III doesn't want us back and wishes us well. And there will be no more Mr. Toad's Wild State Carriage Rides around the grounds of Windsor Castle, either.
It was great hearing you today on the Red, Wine and Blue call! Thank you, as always!
And my normal ☺️
Be LOUD. Let Congress hear you!
Use/share this spreadsheet (bit.ly/Goodtrouble) as a resource to contact members of Congress, the Cabinet and news organizations. Call. Write. Email. Protest. Unrelentingly. We deserve better ❤️🩹🤍💙
Reach out (beyond your own) to as many in the Senate and House as you can. All of this is bigger than “I only represent my constituents” issues.
Add a comment to help keep this bumped ✊ New eyes seeing this means new ripples for change 🤞
Thank you, Megan! Now more than ever, We the People need to make our voices heard.
Thanks!
Hello, Megan. I have been searching for you this morning.
I'm feeling very down, but literally, the sun JUST broke out and is streaming here into our "office". There are blossoms on my Meyer Lemon plant which is surely enjoying it as much as I am.
I made 7 phone calls yesterday. Only one got a real person. It was all I could manage. I am telling myself, even if only HALF of those who read this make even one phone call, it matters. It matters.
Thanks for doing this every day. I have been asking people to post what kindness they are putting into the world, and I commend you for doing this day after day after day.
Megan, I will tell you, I got through 9 phone calls to the Senate. I finally got a "real" person in Sen Wicker's office (Mississippi) where I got a very rude young lady.
My normal resting pulse of about 58 is now up to 82.
I tried. I'm not going to take my bp for awhile.
I hope I can make more calls later. As I've said before, I'm better getting voice mails, as these ignorant (bad BAD words!!) young aide really (milder bad word) me off!
I appreciate what you do and this would be great if we were still in a traditional representative government but I now know that we are not. Our democratic reps have been rendered useless and forget the republican ones. They don’t care what the majority wants anymore. Read Democracy Unchained by Nancy McClean and you will understand what I mean.
While I hear you, and I’ve posted the following before, sometimes our voices to Congress aren’t about changing their minds.
I don’t think we’ll see many big waves (like a major MAGA Congress member changing their opinions), however I think we can cause little ripples. I’m thinking staff members who hear the same thing over and over via voicemail, phone calls, letter after letter, email after email - maybe they’ll be a little more receptive each time they hear from us. Maybe they’ll talk more about our talking points to friends and family, maybeeee they’ll vote differently. I think we can cause ripples to push news organizations to be more honest and maybe even a bit accusatory about what’s happening. As a collective, our volume matters. And, at the end of the day, if we just annoy and overwhelm some staffers working for people hurting the average American, I’m ok with that too 🙃
As always, Megan.
Thank you Megan. I had lost your list and now have it again- so helpful. I have been emailing my NYS congress.
Thank you for reposting!
After I calmed down, I opted to emailing a few more.
Thank you, Megan.
Carney's speech places the U.S. role in global affairs in the past, and constructively proposes a strategy--one already in place in Canada--for shifting the relationship of "middle powers" to the "hegemons." It is a clear statement of where we are after one year of the Trump administration. And it does not share the view of many U.S. voters that the old status quo can be recovered. The singular "accomplishment" of one year of Republican party rule in the U.S. is not "America first," but "America past."
John, here is Dean Blundell today talking about Canada's plan if/when attacked by the US.
https://open.substack.com/pub/deanblundell/p/breaking-canada-has-quietly-modelled?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
The comments are interesting too because there are Americans offering help. There are Canadians suggesting what Americans might do for help. I remember the White Rose in Nazi Germany, and many, many other resistance movements, who were not really successful.
A friend was telling me last night that she had watched several videos of Greenlanders being interviewed on their plans. She said one woman was saying they have a hut in Denmark which they will move to. Another said she was taking her family to Denmark but leaving her parents behind because they are old and cannot move. I suspect that is a plan that could change once they find out what the Americans have in store for Greenlanders.
After reading that Trump may have committed sexual murders on film of young girls who were not White, I cannot imagine anything other than the brutality of the Russians for the poor Greenlanders. Notice White Supremacist Trump wants to capture a lot of countries where a lot of the people are not White. He clearly wants to exterminate non-White people, and that is why his MAGA crowd keeps following him no matter what.
I like the point about replacing “America first” with “America past” a lot. Too bad it more than a good phrase / marketing slogan / book title. It’s also the truth. And we Americans did it to ourselves by falling for the GOP con job that started with Reagan’s attack on the government as an agent of progress.
No it’s not « « America past », it’s America next. The next chapter in your history is opening. What will you make of it?
America is at a breaking point. We are not prepared for what's coming. I fear for America. This really feels like a dangerous turning point.
One way to respond to what’s coming is to not just respond but to also proactively plan … plan for replacing the current failed system with one that will actually work for all the peoples of the world. Here’s Buckminster Fuller talking about this back around 1980…
https://youtu.be/LQ3DXDONKmQ?si=ASPDj07VMwvdLBDt
Watch it and weep.
The U.S. is unrecognizable after one year of Trump and the regime, visibly, ideologically, geopolitically, psychologically. Trump and his enablers, sycophants and henchmen did so much damage to this Nation in just one year that it's hard to imagine what it will look like in another year (or 3), only that it will be a much different world because of it.
And the U.S. will be something else too after all the cruelty and chaos, the demolition and destruction of norms and good governance, the malign of this maladministration. Already there's so much that has to be repaired and the regime is still breaking everything they can. Experience and competence that so many federal employees had and were DOGEd, fired or retired has got to be brought back into a functioning government that upholds, preserves and protects the Constitution, the rule of law, longstanding alliances and international goodwill.
I am fearful too. It is discouraging and demoralizing to see what this regime has done to our country and the world, but there are tens of millions more of us then them. We have constitutional rights and solidarity...envision what we want our Nation to be and look like...vote...protest...run for office and/or support candidates for progress and change for the better.
It's OUR republic! if WE can keep it!
And we,as citizens and voters are the key to where this country goes. The hard core MAGAs are a fairly small minority. They can be effectively ignored. What is important now is to mobilize the people who want “perfection” in their choices at the ballot box to vote, not for a party, but for sanity and integrity. The fear that the right wing has instilled in too many voters that Democrat means socialism is hard to overcome, and let us face it, they have had years to foster this misinformation unimpeded by a Democratic Party that did nothing to counter it.
And just like that there is a new world order.
And a new leader of the free world.
It is Canada and Mark Carney.
No, he’s not « leader of the free world » , nor does he want to be. Didn’t you listen to him? He’s no Churchill facing down the Nazi might. He is by nature an organiser and a cooperator. He’s a realist. And he has achieved much in building new alliances (not only with the free world) and new infrastructure to sell Canadian energy to Europe and Asia. His view is « stronger together » when dealing with hegemons, including Canada’s neighbour to the South.
You are a leader in my book if you show people the reality of the situation they face, and model how to respond. NO, he is not going to have Canada in on every deal.
And yes, I did listen to him and annotate the transcript.
We shouldn’t allow the rise of hard power to blind us to the fact that the power of legitimacy, integrity, and rules will remain strong if we choose to wield it together.
I would say that is a statement about adhering to the values of the free world, wouldn’t you?
Most certainly, and I’ll agree is is A leader of the democratic world, and a very eloquent one. But not THE leader, because we don’t want one of those anymore. The point about sovereign democracies cooperating is that they cooperate, they don’t follow.
We will have to agree to disagree. I take leader in the meaning of first.
Nothing is "just like that" and almost never has been in history.
The old order is dying, after having been stabbed in the back by insane people. A new one is not yet born. In the period between, to remember words by an interwar Italian historian, Antonio Gramsci, "morbid realities assert themselves."
On the time scale of history I would say that the10 months from the initiation of the Coalition of the Willing and Carney’s “Elbows Up” to now is barely the wink of an eye.
And the COTWs blizzard of trade deals is likely to cause quite an abrupt change in America’s financial outlook.
Davos is like a declaration of economic warfare. There is a day before and then there is a day after.
ICTT: how do you view the impact of his speech?
Jimmy Kimmel: https://youtu.be/22TJbqBCQA0 🙂
Stephen Colbert: https://youtu.be/-Mk_DD5inuc 🙂
A touch of sass teams with a touch of class to unload on a ton of crass. 🙄
Thank you for these links 😊
You are welcome, Steve. Just *too much for me to read tonight.
Well worth watching. Thanks.
Great to hear from you, Steve. Hope all is going well in Oklahoma on Route Sixty-Six!
All good. Take care on the wintery roads.
All Heather's points today feature Donald as, well -- what?
How about pure egotist. Isn't unalloyed egotism what most floats Donald? And in these areas:
1) Vulgarian style – all that gold glitter smeared everywhere.
2) Out-of-control gorging himself into fatness.
3) Milking extortion schemes from the most cowardly U.S. elites to foreign governments feeding his bitcoin fortune, from his lust for another private jet to selling seized Venezuelan oil to offshore the millions in proceeds into a private Qatari bank account for himself only.
4) The conceit that he, too, can emulate Putin, from surrounding himself with U.S. billionaires as cynical as Putin’s oligarchs, and as willing lawlessly to murder as wantonly as do Putin and Netanyahu, too. This reveling in brutality lets him keep thug fascist Stephen Miller close and lets him deploy thousands of his own vicious private army to terrorize Americans on American streets, and in their homes and cars where they illegally break in, too.
5) Putting his name and image everywhere, from the fatuousness of thinking he alone can rename the Gulf of Mexico to his need to put his name alongside John Kennedy at the Kennedy Center. His grab for Greenland only enlarges this egotism category for himself – totally cynically risking the U.S.’s most vitally necessary European and Canadian alliances.
6) The many, many underage girls his rich pals raped for years in an egotistic flaunting of decency and accountability Donald and his cohort all “take-that” wove around themselves.
Thank you Professor. But I am at a loss for words. Where and how did these psychopaths come to so much power. And why. To me it feels un-American. But I still have hope. I believe in the people. Your words though can alarm my soul, but they also strengthens my wherewithal to be the best I can to all people around me. We are in difficult times and people are fearful. It’s a strange dichotomy. I hear from so many people. They see all the insanity going on yet. They try to live their simple lives. Waking eating working living trying to be happy with their family and friends shopping resting watching TV or reading a book and believing in life, liberty and a pursuit of happiness. But we must believe in each other, by just the simplest ways of smiling to each other and saying it… we have each other‘s back one way or the other going forward. And remember kindness is a powerful weapon for good. So much for my loss of words ha ha ha ha ha. I love you all. I love America. I would prefer not to die for it, but it would be well worth it for the generations to come. My family and friends gave the ultimate for what I have today,( though it is structurally wobbly) They don’t deserve this. And I truly believe that we, if we stand strong, share our commitments ,give of our time, of ourselves or whatever is out of our comfort zone to show that they are solidarity amongst us personally, I love the diversity of life. It makes the world so much more fun and when you interact with like-minded people of different backgrounds and it works out well we have achieved a higher level almost to a divine sense. OK, I’ll shut up for now, but professor your words, give me strength and encourage bless you. Mother nature is my God and I sometimes feel she is sweeping, but she is always there for us just like you are peace out everybody.
Thank you for this, Mike. I am going to print it and keep it close to turn to for inspiration…Have a beautiful day!!!
In my Political Signal Chat group of Americans in Germany someone mentioned that The King of Norway sent his population a letter that said in wartime the government can appropriate people's property. She said, that since Scandinavia is usually ahead on these things we can expect to be hearing this in Germany too.
Other things being discussed are:
What if we can no longer get Social Security or our pension funds because banks are blocked by the administration from transferring money out of the US?
What will the country we live in do. We will apparently acquire Enemy Agent Status, which leads to surveillance.
What about Dual citizens? Where will we fall?
A Dane warned someone the other day in a restaurant that even though he had had a great time in the US in Wisconsin, that we should not be obvious about being Americans, because everyone hates Americans now, even though they know we are not all for Trump.
How do we prepare for war?
If the US kills soldiers from our country will US military here be taken as prisoners of war since they have not been removed? Could we be taken as prisoners of war.
All of this because Trump wants Greenland and Canada.
Trump wants to rule over everything. He would betray Putin in a heartbeat if he thought he could.
JL Graham,
Putin has Trump in his pocket. He is enjoying watching his "mentor". Trump is destroying us and Putin is not lifting a finger!!!!
Trump will do anything to impress Putin.
Putin could have Trump and anyone of Trump's "want to be " thugs who are holding high offices within the government of the USA, or anyone of Trump's wealthy supporters, killed anytime he wanted to. Putin is the victor in all of this....he is using the President of the USA to do his bidding....such a tragedy!
NO ONE PLAYS WITH PUTIN!
And the whole frickin' former "Party of Lincoln" plays along.
I cannot give you any answers for these questions other than to try your level best to stay reasoned, emotionally disciplined and not to tread down the slippery slope of " what if " too far. Also, the EU is much more sane and it's people more empathetic than perhaps you may think.
Gregg Scott,
The EU has had more years/history of very personal experiences with death and destruction and rebuilding than we have.
The leaders and the citizens of the world, are paying close attention to us....we the nation " the huddled masses" once came to, to find FREEDOM!
We are still consumed by football and the start of basketball season as well as other favorite sports.....except for Minneapolis.....
And I appreciate that.
Gregg, I know the EU is more sane. That is why I am here. Still, I like understanding the situation I am in.
Indeed so. As you should. An appreciation for and understanding of one's situation, whether it is precarious or otherwise, is quite important. Be of strong heart and good courage in it!
Thanks Gregg!
His lunatic ramblings make me think he’s nearing either a coronary infarction or a brain aneurism.
One can only wish.
Mark Carney is emerging as a replacement on the world stage for the role U.S. presidents used to hold. How many attendees of Davos will have the moral gumption to publicly acknowledge Trump’s depravity. How many world leaders and corporate heads are groveling before Trump with dollar signs in their eyes? Governor Gavin Newsom is at least one of those who called out complicity. How many others are there?
Canada's PM Mark Carney's speech is worth reading and/or listening to in full.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mark-carney-speech-davos-rules-based-order-9.7053350
Also a YouTube link shared by KEM in one of the comments made about 35 minutes ago:
Carney's remarks start at 9:40 on this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miM4ur5WH3Y&t=2389s
==================================
An excerpt:
"For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, we benefited from its predictability. And because of that we could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.
We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient. That trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful. And American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods: open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
So, we placed the sign in the window. We participated in the rituals. And we largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
This bargain no longer works."
The dementia of the
Fat Flatulent Felon endangers us all. The remedies are clear. The question remains, will our supposed “leaders” initiate the necessary changes?