Powerful men protecting other powerful men from consequences is not fairness. It’s corruption.
Whether it’s a soccer match, our economy, or our elections, the pattern is the same: rules are obstacles to be changed whenever they threaten the people in power.
Democracy requires rules that apply equally to everyone. Especially those in power.
Keli, The economy and the elections, everyone knows about that but hosting the World Cup and humiliating your country by cheating blatantly in front of the world, then losing anyway, so for nothing. The USA has sunk to a new level of ridicule. Play fair and lose, then there is dignity. Your players didn't deserve this level of shame.
Yep, the world was outraged when Trump called the FIFA boss and had a suspension overturned. Meanwhile, Mike Johnson is working on the same model, only with elections. A preschooler could spot the corruption. Although, to be fair, preschoolers are very alert to other people cheating - unlike the Supreme Court. And after all that, they still lost the game. Perhaps democracy could get that lucky.
TOFU king strikes again. I am ashamed that Trump cheated to win again. It seems that all over the US, Americans have been great hosts welcoming everyone from all over the world.
Thank goodness the US lost to Belgium otherwise the controversy would be even more embarrassing.
The US team was caught in the middle. Indeed, after watching the game I am prone to wonder if Trump’s action and the greatly increased pressure it put on the team didn’t do far more harm than otherwise.
I started playing soccer as a five-year old the year we beat England in the World Cup. I’ve played, coached, and even reffed for years. I don’t think that foul merited a red card, There was no intent involved. But you have to go with the official unless his error is so egregious as to entirely compromise his expertise or the whole structure falls apart. Trump’s action was as corrupt on that level as it is on every other.
What shocked me most in today's letter was Heather's account of the back room dealings that apparently ensued between the time the red card was issued and the call was made. That was new information for me. They had a team of lawyers trying to dig up dirt on the referee, which shouldn't be shocking since it is their MO.
But my God, I guess I should be glad I can still be shocked by the level of corruption within this regime!?!
Folarin Balogun and the US team could have chosen to honor the original penalty ruling, right or wrong, to preserve the integrity of the game. As it is, they chose to go along with the corruption.
I appreciate the fact that you played and were well involved with soccer. Like you James, I also started playing soccer at approximately the age of 5. I carried my love of the game from the streets of Damascus Syria to the playgrounds in the school systems I attended in the States. I played on teams that ranged from community leagues to rather high-level players from universities. I coached on the middle school, high school, and division I university levels. I also officiated professionally for 10 years licensed by the USSF, the American arm of FIFA. I disagree with your analysis. I didn't watch the match but did review the clip of the incident. The red card was legitimate. Many are using the reason of "intent" as to whether Balogun deserved the red card. Intent has nothing to do with it. Balogun's position was behind that of Muharemović. Muharemović beat him to the ball and Balogun was late. In being late, he stepped on Muharemović heel and ankle. For anyone in the HCR community who isn't well experienced in soccer like James or I, there is a reason for red cards given in this situation; this could have been a career ending foul. Yes, they were both going for the ball; however, that's not the point! Muharemović had position and that is shown quite well with Balogun attempting to regain position by wrapping his arm in front of his opponent in order to gain control. One may also ask: "how does one prove or disprove "intent?" Soccer has become a contact sport since I don't know when; when I played in the '60's, it wasn't recognized as a contact sport. However, even the laws in the book today specifically forbid this type of contact. The replay referee had it right. The center ref didn't catch it. And as far as Trump is concerned, he states that "he knows sports really well" - what is clear is that he knows nothing about soccer. That was evident by his questioning what a red card was. He should have stayed out of it (but of course, we all know that isn't within his character or intellect) and let the laws of FIFA, for now, be the laws of FIFA.
Forget Trump, your ending detracted from your excellent explanation. I infer that you're saying players have a responsibility to avoid incidents that can cause injury. That makes sense, at the same time, in many sports with abundant contact, these things happen and, to my naive untrained self, I'd prefer to see a warning or benching for X amount of time when there is no clear sign of intent. Intent should always be stiffly penalized. In US sports, intent is not often enough, and penalties are lame, which results in more violence.
In my playground days we called this ‘cheaters proof! It’s almost like they, in one of great stadiums in the world, and real American soccer fans, decided to…
In a perfect world, that might have been a yellow card call. But it was called as a red card and should have been respected. The US team could have benched Balogun for the game, earned some respect, as well as plausible deniability for the eventual loss. Instead, Trump got involved and they lost both the game and other countries' respect. Par for the course these days.
Turning all that is true and beautiful into shit! What a super power! And 87,000,000 voted for it, that’s worse…of course 70,000,000 sat it out, that’s just sad. We need a voice and leaders to take back the reins…all the living presidents might be a start. To just reform reality…and arm-chair judgement of a man doing an impossible job is sort of cheesy. But that is almost the game these days, complaining…let them play Rugby!
Trump is a wrecking ball-- everything he touches. And he defends himself with his logic. And THREATS. Where is the pushback? Trump loves weakness in people and he smells it like a shark smells blood.
Where is the pushback? Historically, the people's pushback to autocratic power has come from the working-class unions for their fair share of the American pie; from the '60s boomers for peace; from the black churches and communities for their civil rights ; from women for equality; from the Yankees for the Union; and from Native Americans for the land.
Now that the trump/heritage foundation has declared the rule of monarchy/oligarchy/theocracy and targetted the professional class constituting the law firms, the mainstream media, the universities, the civil service, et al., there's been a woeful lack of pushback, because the professional class has an ingrained aversion to and disdain of organizing, as that is beneath their class and status.
For instance, most recently, where was the pushback from the employees of the National Park Service when they were ordered to strip the parks of any and all "woke" history lessons; and why did the Park police go along with arresting innocent people at the Reflecting Pool under the pretense of vandalism?
Why did U.S. Soccer go along with trump's attempt to rig the Belgium/U.S. match?? If U.S. Soccer officials and players believe in the primacy of fair play per the international rules and regulations, then the right thing to have done would have been to pushback by refusing to honor the suspension of the suspension. Instead like most professionals, they took the path of least resistance and obeyed in advance. So, even if the team would have won, Trump's U.S. would still be seen as the loser, bigly time.
"... Where is the pushback? " Quick answer: The 'push back' is waiting for you or I to 'handle it' JK. Personally, I've offered in many places to be the lead, sacrificial lamb - 'cuz my life as it is, isn't worth a plugged nickel for one thing, and 2) this is "not" what I care to pass on to my daughters, your daughters and or sons. Enough so that I would lay down my life again, and with no reservations whatsoever; Righteous anger and actions.
I feel bad for the US players though. What if the shoe was on the other foot and FIFA overruled a red card against the other team? It's a bad look for the sport, but mostly for the US as an entity. The world fully understands that we whine and complain about cheating to get our way. Bunch of spoiled brats on the grocery store floor crying to get their candy.
We HAVE to hope democracy "get(s) that lucky" but even better is to do everything we each can do to make sure that luck isn't needed.
The majority of Americans have to emulate what the Belgians did which is get out and vote no matter how difficult it is, make sure all of the votes are counted and deliver us from this Trumpistocracy that is currently running all three branches of our government. It won't be enough immediately to stop everything Trump has screwed up, but it should make it difficult enough for Trump that we can last the remaining two years of his administration and get rid of them all in 2028.
Or, just maybe, he will be so frustrated that he will simply decide he doesn't want to hang around for two more years. He can issue all his pardons and then resign. I would still be seriously worried about Vance at the top, but getting rid of Trump would be a relief.
Jon, a problem with Trump is that too many people have a distorted idea of who and what he is and refuse to see reality. They will defend him to the death even though he may do harm to them and their families through cutting medical and food supports. They will continue to swear to themselves and whoever that Trump didn't do it, that the "One Big Beautiful Bill" really was "Beautiful" and on and on ignoring Trump's toddleresque tantrums and his MAFIA Don actions related to whoever he comes in contact with or thinks he can and should use.
I do wish he would resign, although I don't see it happening. He is being taken care of now the way a toddler would be. His health is poor and he needs the regular healthcare provided for him along with all the food he could want and all the fawning he can use. He cares nothing for the fact that his "supporters" are being screwed by the things he is pushing through Congress as long as he can keep blaming the "Communists" the "radical left." The one thing that might be positive is that Vance, although somewhat smarter than trump, is not liked by anyone.
"It's all SleepyJoe's fault, and you know it"...Clinically, while anyone can occasionally be defensive, malignant narcissists use DARVO systematically to project their toxic behavior onto others, frequently believing their own fabricated narrative. This behavior is deeply tied to their inability to tolerate shame, which they instantly convert into aggression and blameshifting.
I think those who support him will start changing their views, although they'll never admit it. But it may stop them from voting for the republicans who are allowing this criminality to continue. Hunger and desperation will move one to action, or inaction.
It's still up to the rest of us to get out and vote in huge numbers.
Celeste, maybe we need to call Republicans out. They claim to be so christian, when they approve of cheating, lying, doing harm to others, promoting hate, particularly of immigrants, etc. I want to know where they are finding that in our scriptures. I think that might break us through in some places. I used to say when told all classrooms should have the "ten commandments" that they should be laminated so students can pick a local or national leader each week and put a check mark in front of each of the commandments that person has broken. They should start with Trump because they would be able to check off every single one!
Celeste, I am thinking the same too, so if you and are thinking this so are the repubs. I wonder what carrot they will dangle to entice these would be voters to the polls. These crooks will not go quietly into the night is my guess.
Unfortunately, it's a cult and the cult leader is never wrong. Look at all the people trump has scammed over the years, mainly is supporters, and they stay with him. They live in a silo where only complete loyalty is acceptable and I have no idea how to get real information to them.
Ruth, you are correct, Trump's supporters will defend him to the death. How to explain it? It has the trappings of a cult. They revere him completely. An attack on Trump is an attack on them personally. I've witnessed it personally. The only cure for this is to defeat them at the polls and retake power. They are "lost souls."
Yes an attack on a Trump supporter is an attack on them personally particularly for those still supporting him after all this. I don't know how we change that. 37% is way too high an approval and shows their stubbornness. They apparently cannot be told or even shown (feel the pain) that Trump. is damaging them personally and the country.
Three Twits on a Couch, the Faux Nooz morning group, is the family many people no longer have. They gush over the moron when he calls in and sometimes even shows up.
Their distorted idea is that USA “should have won” and winning is all that matters, no matter how. Today they’ll be yelling about why we are celebrating the loss whereas they don’t get we’re celebrating a loss in spite of cheating interference not because we wanted USA to lose. Life has become so binary to win at all costs for these lawless power and money grubbers. They can’t see a win in dignity and graciousness.
Ruth, the cabal is using him and of course, he has that blond who adores him and probably writes most of the dreck we see. The hard core has not seen the light and I was astounded to read just this last week a woman question what exactly bad he had done. The person answered, but somehow they agreed to remain friends. I no longer have that kind of patience. I am also seeing the MAGAs around here throwing around the word communism, not knowing anything about it.
Michele, it is almost as though ignorance is a sacrament with so many of the inhabitants of Trumplandia. It truly does make me sad that so many would choose to follow someone who has nothing but contempt for them. Maybe that's the reason they are so willing to have contempt for immigrants, people of color, and women in general. I guess some people need to believe they are superior to someone, so they create that someone they can hate and hold in contempt. Truly awful!
Some will always exist, and to be certain, the corrupt media spaces support that. They are more identified with being loyal no matter what than to upholding the Constitution and other laws of this country.
Remember that, in cults, the more information that gets in that contradicts the cult and its leader, the more weight gathers to break the hold of the cult.
Vance is perplexing. Very smart, very mean. I keep asking myself, with a fantasticly smart and decent wife he has, what is going on with his arrogance and mean streak?
Belgians do much more than just vote (which is mandatory in Belgium, by the way). That's why their education and health levels are much higher than those of the US, while their poverty, corruption, and crime levels are much lower, and the income gap much smaller.
Belgians have paid sick leave, real holidays, real social security etc.
How did they get there?
They have strong unions and very strict campaign finance laws. And people talk about politics all the time, rather than avoiding the topic.
The country isn't perfect, but instead of the "shithole" Trump once called it, compared to the US it IS almost paradise.
The result? Competence, excellence, and a strong democracy.
Jen, I was so lucky because my family discussed religion and politics all the time, particularly at meals. My dad was Catholic, my mother Schwenkfelder (a Protestant sect). We were often comparing and contrasting aspects of our faiths. My dad was a Democrat and my mother a Republican, so there was always some kind of election in the works to discuss, and my parents always voted. My dad was a Democratic supporter at the polls for many years. I can't think of more interesting discussions than related to religion and politics! It's healthy, interesting, and exposes those in the conversation to different ideas, particularly when the information is factual with opinions tossed in.
That is true, and God knows how many political parties, some ideological, some confessional, like the Netherlands. You did forget chocolate, though.
The fact that Belgium even exists is a miracle. If Belgians were suddenly transplanted to Lebanon, that country might actually have a chance at survival.
These days, though, a lot of parents encourage their children to cheat, which is, of course, tragic. Remember the college entrance scandal ("Operation Varsity Blues") a few years back? A bunch of otherwise seemingly honest people (including some celebrities like Felicity Huffman) went to jail or prison for bribery or other crimes trying to cheat to get their kids into specific schools.
Jon, I do remember that scandal and the others that crop up now and then. My students didn't understand why anyone would do that or even let their parents do that for them. That's probably because I taught in a disadvantaged school district where the students knew about hard work just to make it through the day, parents having 3 or more jobs between them, kids starting work at age 14, living in a food desert, education grants available then not available, and on and on. Five of my students won Gates education grants and all of them have jobs working with people: 2 teachers, 2 psychologists, and a nurse practitioner. Other students won positions in prestigious schools but could not begin to afford to attend. I don't know that any of them would have chosen to cheat to get in.
Ruth, don't get me wrong here, I expect there are literally tens of thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands of high school students who deal with getting into college honestly and correctly. It was a very small of highly privileged (i.e., wealthy) students and their parents who decided that it was "okay" to cheat on entrance exams and to bribe officials to get their kids into A-list college programs. Fortunately, some of them went to jail as a result and hopefully learned a lesson from it.
Definitely it's a matter of luck Kazz but fundamentally it's a matter of us, it's a matter of we the people. Nothing would happen if we are not committed to what might be our next election, not the last but the beginning of our return to decency and demicracy.
It’s ominous if the act destroying the right to vote is passed. Almost 50 yers ago I was living and working in Florence Italy. The owner of the tourist bar I worked in had a small party in the back to watch the soccer match between Italy and Holland. Holland won that day. But I was never into sports except running. I still run for health. Donald Trump needs to get done asap.
It looked almost like the players felt the same way, based on how they played. A corrupt president calls the corrupt FIFA president and gets his way, again. It's sickening how this guy keeps getting his way while his way is cheating and lies and grifting and stealing. Who supports this type of person? It's crazy.
Joseph, that is what I thought when I learned of their loss and the way it happened. Trump wrecked the chances of the US team. He thinks he saved something. What a jerk!
Yep. He fancies himself the great and powerful Oz. But just like that character, he's a total fake relying on deceit and trickery to try and create fear and obedience in his minions. In my almost 70 yrs on this planet, he is by far the worst president I've lived thru.
None of the members of the Republican Party upholding this man should never be believed again, so long as they want power. Only if they completely give it up should they be listened to.
Playing fair is for suckers. If Trump ever played by the rules he would lose, every time, and he knows it. He has no negotiating skills, no athletic skills, no interpersonal skills, no morals, and no ethics.
He has become the world’s most accomplished con man, the best liar, fraud, and cheater.
But now, those skills have dried up, and he is left using the power of his office to destroy everything he can.
"preschoolers are very alert to other people cheating - unlike the Supreme Court." Wow. You're pretty angry. I thought commenters here + Richardson were all for rule of law? Are you saying the Supreme Court cheats? With your credibility on the line...examples?
A Kauffman, well, the SC did ignore our constitution in various cases and did overturn precedent on partisan grounds. That is a kind of cheating and they knew it, but did it anyway! Overturning Roe v. Wade, ignoring the problem medical effects of pesticides, only a 5-4 decision for birthright citizenship which is clearly stated in the 14th Amendment of our CONSTITUTION. There are so many more and you know it. That is just an "educated" kind of cheating, no less cheating, but it seems to have some legitimacy behind it, or that's what the justices would claim!
But, mailed-in-ballots counted within 5 days of the election protects rural voter in Mississippi & Alaska veers in Point Barrow as well as U.S. Solders abroad.
I've been following Supreme Courrt decisions and trhe court in general for decades. I had two cases there. My former colleagues had dozens of cases there. Sorry to be so blunt, but you don't know what you are talking about. I was in cases in 15 states and many foreign countries as a lawyer. Our Supreme Court is as good as it gets.
I have a strong suspicion you haven't read the cases you mention. And even then, you'd need to read the cases they cite in those cases. That would take, for a single case, about 30-40 hours.
You misunderstand what courts do. They don't make policy. You don't like the policy consequences of a few cases. That has nothing to do with the constitution.
By your definition, Brown v. Board was cheating, as was, many would say, Roe v. Wade (even Ruth Ginsberg thought it was a mistake.
Suggestion: stick to subjects you know about. You're perilously close to the drunks in a bar level of analysis.
Are you joking, A Kauffmann? Like, let's talk about Kavanaugh's dissent-assent in the Birthright citizenship case. He literally says that the Constitution's 14th amendment, which has the same language as a specific Congressional law, does not uphold birthright citizenship but the law does. That is utterly nonsensical, but boy oh boy does it allow those who want to deny citizenship to people born here to pass a new law. That's just one example from this week. It was so vastly unreasonable no one would sign onto it.
We could also talk about Thomas's decision on guns, which is so impossible to follow, lower courts cannot and do not know how to rule.
Or how about the emergency, "shadow" docket, where the court makes decisions without hearing the cases being made.
Or what about Roberts, who said he would get 8-1 or 9-1 decisions by upholding stare decisis, but in the last 5 years, he and his majority have overruled one long-standing decision after another.
If you really believe that this court is not cheating and is upholding the rule of law, read Lisa Graves's book Without Precedent.
Ms. Cummings: I don't know what subject you teach, but it isn't law. Kavanaugh's opinion was the one more in line with court approaches. Normally, the court takes the narrowest path to a decision that it can. It makes exceptions in some cases, and this is one. No one knows why. But Kavanuagh's approach is the more common one. If you can ground the decision in a statute, you do that.
Nothing personal, but all the justices know more about the constitution than any of us, you surely included. If one goes purely by what the constitution says, you never, ever get close to Roe v. Wade. Like that?
The history of the 14th is somewhat complicated. That's why the opinions are so long. You may know more about it than the justices, but I never see your name on list of potential nominees, so perhaps not.
Hey Kauffman, sorry to say this but you sound like a bully. Critique the content in Heather’s post, not people’s opinions. This is a supportive community.
Dear A Kauffmann, thank you again for engaging in dialogue, although your ad hominem attacks show the niggling merit of your participation in it.
Once again, I find myself wondering for an instant if you are joking about Kavanaugh’s opinion. If it were in line, why did no one sign onto it? Why did that ethical jurist, as you claim, Roberts, state that it is “at war with his supposedly unifying principle of the Clause”?
I recognize that the goal of many decisions by the Court is to make narrow decisions, so perhaps you could give some credibility to your unexamined love of the court by explaining how Trump vs. United States is in any way “narrow.”
If you would like to establish credibility, perhaps you could drop the attacks and engage in reasonable debate, which would include specifics.
If you knew anything about the Supreme Court, how it operates, you would come across as more legitimate. The Court is not corruptible. Cheaters standing up in soup are not usually before the court.
By the court being stacked, you surely mean you preferred when it was stacked in favor of things you care about?
The Court issues 55-80 opinions a year. Which ones were the result of "stacking"?
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I am very familiar with the Supreme Court.
Funny, A Kauffmann, you do not seem particularly familiar with the Supreme Court.
If you are, how do you feel about Thomas's close relationship with Harlan Crow? How about sitting on cases that they have a vested interest in? How about Roberts asserting that they do not have to follow a code of ethics.
Which of my friends? Tell me who they are! And by the way, what is a "white supremacist"? I see that phrase used here all the time in so many contexts that I don't see the meaning.
Hi A Kauffmann, I note your continued refusal to respond to any questions I've posed. Perhaps my sense that you are not a good faith interlocutor was a good call. You rely on blanket statements, odd generalizations, refuse to state any specifics, and deflect by stating you don't know the context. As for your friends, it would seem that you don't read the Supreme Court opinions that you claim to be so knowledgeable about. No wonder you believe its members are incorruptible. Perhaps you should begin to include yourself in the 98-99% of people whom you claim know nothing about the Court but only know how they feel about specific decisions. So: Unlike you, I will answer your question by referring you to the removal of protective status from Haitians by the Court, which required the majority to absolutely ignore the statements by this administration regarding the Haitians who were granted protective status in the US. Here, you can read the opinion, along with Kagen's dissent, now. When you get to the dissent, you will see just what makes the majority opinion a testimony to white supremacy: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/25-1083_f204.pdf
What the majority refuses to acknowledge as profound racism -- which would be the legal reason to not grant the administration's request for removal of protective status -- is so vile, I will not quote it here. With my original post, though, I was thinking of the people who support the current administration. If you don't think that white supremacists support it, may I refer you to the people who went to the July 4th "celebrations", including the so called and clearly misnamed Patriot Front: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/patriot-front-dc-protest-viral-photo-b3009291.html Ah, specifics! I love facts. I personally love the truth. Oh, and you wonder again about context? It was July 4th in Washington DC, 2026. The men who are so ashamed of their beliefs they must disguise their faces are headed to the Mall to celebrate with your president. Perhaps, next time, you will try to answer a few questions yourself.
Christopher, I am sure our players felt the pain of the interference by Trump and his minions. I suspect our US team would have done better without that interference. Trump is obsessed with the "connections" he makes that he thinks he can/should use to get whatever he wants. I think of that as toddler America. Where are the adults who can tell these toddler-men "NO?"
I agree! Trump’s interference caused the team to lose the “heart” that they had shown up until last night. Trump lost the game and showed the world how corrupt we are.
He operates like the mafia. He told ‘his’ people to get info on the referee. He already knows about Infantino. Then he goes to Infantino and says drop the red card or some information is going to come out. This is how he makes ‘deals.’
That’s how I see Republicans, “cheaters never win” as we would say as children.
Republicans are and have been cheating for as long as I can remember, we’ve let them. The go along to get along is over, the indignities suffered by approximately 70% of Americans under this regime is making the algae in the Reflecting Pool look electable. The other 30% wear masks when there’s no national health crisis, and cry about wearing one when there is! Do you know how ludicrous you truly are? So weak and cowardly, yet I’m sure you were well paid to toss your integrity in the toilet to show up in Washington D.C. masked and dressed Ken doll style.
Reading this thread, who is the most shocked at Trump’s interfering as POTUS in the outcome of sporting event? Anyone? Anyone at all?
Karen, yes! Great observations! Cheating is the Republican coin of the Realm, and they use it liberally, nearly everywhere and think we are all too stupid to know what they are doing. We know and are working to figure out how to get more people to realize what Trumplandia is doing to them and how they are hurting this nation and the American people, not just the immigrants and other people Republicans don't like! Trump doesn't care much about that, just that he has power and can do whatever he wants, just like a badly-parented toddler. We need to be and find more adults to be in the room.
USA was always going to be an underdog against Belgium, with or without Balogun. But our team had confidence, energy, unity and an ability to block out all the noise. Not only that, they gave so many of us something to feel good about in a time when good feelings are hard to find.
All that went out the window when The Grump injected himself into this. It was no longer about us but about him, and our own support of the team now had to be defended to others who thought “well if you support the team, you must support him, too.” It cast a similar shadow over the team, by injecting them into a political debate they never asked for, and it reminded fans around the world why everybody hates America right now.
While our players were now distracted and confused about how to respond to all this, the infuriated Belgians ratcheted up their intensity and proceeded to whip our asses. Moreover, the whole episode stole the joy out from under us fans. It underscored the sad reality that there can be no nice things as long as this regime has any power.
And perhaps that's the lesson here. Every time he fucks with us, we just get madder and madder. We have all had it with him already of course, but we haven’t gotten a chance to have our say. When we do, it's going to be brutal for him. It will make the beatdown our team took yesterday look like a Sunday picnic.
"I think you're a little suspect." was a famous movie line from the 1997 crime drama Donnie Brasco where mobsters question the loyalty of an undercover agent.
The only "Donnie" and-or "mobster" in this national humiliation is Cheeto or make that Cheato
OMG, Cheato will be headed off to another debacle at NATO meeting shortly.
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My daughter was so upset that she said everyone should boycott playing against the US. We had discussed why these team boycotts are not happening, at least not this year. However, she knows I am boycotting the US World Cup games as a member of Indivisible Abroad which is supporting the Economic Resistance action to boycott the US World Cup games. I have boycotted the entire WC even in Canada and Mexico, because FIFA is a rotten to the core organization. This is my first year of conscious nonparticipation in the rituals surrounding the WC games, which I have viewed in several countries. At this point, Trump and the Infantile Infantino have tainted the games beyond belief. I was fine with my daughter enjoying them though. Now, she is so-o-o disgusted too, and the Welt Meisterschaft is not even over. She was working all night on a presentation and told me in the morning that Belgium had won. You know that all the other countries in the world were sending Belgium positive energy. Now, Trump will not get to take another gold cup from a team that won it.
Meanwhile, Trump touches it and destroys things for the team. His reign is characterized by destruction. That includes of rules and norms and alliances. Here is Ronnie Chieng to tell us about the red card.
It wasn't cheating. Cut the drama. The suspension of the suspension was under a rule that was enacted by FIFA long before Trump.
Did the pressure help? Probably. But there's a somewhat more innocent explanation: that FIFA wanted a vibrant tournament and thought that as hosting country, a good fully stocked US team was good for the game. They were probably right, thought the US collapse was surely not what they had in mind.
Heather, America needs you to step up to the plate and become Maine's Candidate for US Senate. Your ethics, honesty, and knowledge of history would landslide Susan out of office.
In two years you could run for President and red flag trump and the Retrumpicans out, and reverse America's decline.
It's not who she is, but it is a nice thought regardless.
As a complete outsider to Maine and its politics, I'm left speechless about both its Democratic Party and its politics. Were there no guardians at the gate keeping the riff-raff out? Were the red flags waved *before* this insufficient? Was the hatred for Chuck Schumer THAT great that those on the far left rushed to put forward an obviously flawed man (even then) over Janet Mills?
Whatever happens now, it's going to be awkward as all get-out, just at the moment when we need perfect serves, not net calls, in the Senate races.
As a victim of U.S. Senate bait and switch, I say, “Better now than later when you were really stuck with him.” John Fetterman never had my support, I wanted Connor Lamb, and I still do. Then to lose our beloved Robert Casey to a guy living in CT?
Senate malfeasance ran rampant in PA in ‘22 and ‘24. This is a chance to avert disaster. A gift from the universe. Learn from how PA was manipulated. November is infinity weeks from now, no one will remember.
I'm in Sen Brown's corner as well, but I truly wish someone half his age ( like an Ossoff! ) would step up. Hopefully, someone will in a couple years so we can throw Nazi Morino into the same crap heap as Husted!
Karen, I like Brown too and was appalled that someone so well-liked could lose. I think the same device that gave McCormick the victory in PA, also defeated Sherod Brown. I think a lot of our election system was infected with the AI algorithms designed for that state and that district in the case of a few members of Congress, just enough to assure a Republican majority. We do need to be so careful because cheating does not go away on its own; it will continue and possibly escalate if not curbed.
As a Clevelander, I'm a loud and proud supporter of Dr. Acton. I truly believe she will be our next governor, but this IS Ohio, so, inexplicitly, Swampi will be a very close second. That, of course, is assuming the "You're not allowed to vote Act" ( AKA 'Save 'merica ) isn't forced through.
Karen, I am with you. I liked Connor too and voted for him in the primary. I had no choice but to vote for Fetterman in November of 22 because Oz, a non-Pennsylvanian jerk was worse. I do think there was AI manipulated cheating in the 2024 election in the swing states which included PA, which is how we got a CT jerk in place of a good man, Bob Casey elected. We do need to be much more careful about our tallying machines. I believe we should have random recounts to make sure the machines are working accurately and that there are no devices attached to the sockets and cords of the machines that can transmit algorithms to change votes. We all need to be awake and paying attention, even if some people think it looks bad. It looks a lot worse to have Trumplandia in power when it didn't actually win the election.
Same here, Ruth, same here. I think someone hinkyed with the senate races in PA.
I worked the polls in the 2020 election. My sister is the poll judge for her district (beet red), I helped out during COVID. So I have some experience with the system. Random recounts is a good, logical, means to keep vote counts accurate. Vigilance is necessary, with diligence and determination I’m hopeful our elections will remain free and fair despite the machinations we were blindsided with in 2024. In other words, “Winners never cheat, and cheaters never win”.
According to Platner, a committee of Maine Democrats went to Graham Platner's house and met with his wife and him about a year ago. They asked him about his skeletons and he told them about the Reddit posts and some other potential issues. His wife also brought up some things at the time. I have no idea who else they talked to, but they came to an agreement so he ran. He organized a grass-roots movement of over 15,000 volunteers all across the state and has held well over 400 rallies, many of them with national progressive Democrats like Bernie Sanders and Ro Khanna.
Janet Mills only threw her hat in the ring when the Reddit posts and tattoo issue came out. She handled it very badly attacking Platner which alienated her from many of her potential voters. Plus she is 78 years old. If she had been in her 60's it would have been a much closer race I think, but that's neither here nor there.
Anyway, I have met or attended rallies for dozens of politicians over the years in several states. As I have mentioned Tom Harkin was our next door neighbor in IA. He was the real deal as was Tom Osborne in Nebraska. Some politicians are hard to judge, like Platner. His message and his interactions the three times I saw him were charismatic and honest.
If he was a Republican, he could likely weather the rape charges, and I honestly believe that. But, as a Democrat, I think he's toast.
Susan Collins approval rating is in the low 30's in ME, so she is beatable with the right candidate and the stable of Democratic candidates is quite deep. But, so far 97 billionaires have donate almost $10 million to Collins's PACs.
But, her husband divorced his wife of 39 years while she had terminal cancer and married Collins a year later. His wife died before they had been married a year. Rumor has it that Collins and Saffron were having an affair for years in DC where he was a lobbyist, but that has never been confirmed.
Anyway, it's a made for TV movie. The ending should be interesting.
GJ, most of the time, I just don't understand the Democratic Party. It's not like the incident happened ages ago and Platner "forgot" about it. If the alleged rape was disclosed during the initial meetings with Platner, why didn't Democratic organizers just tell him then and there, "You have too much baggage. You can't run."
If the Democratic operatives thought they could keep the scandal under wraps, they're idiots. They had to know Collins has the machine, money and motivation to do the oppo research on Platner and discover this problem, which they probably did. Then, an anonymous phone call to someone at Politico at the last minute would trigger exactly this implosion.
All the time and resources wasted on Platner's campaign could have been devoted to a "clean" candidate who's not an elderly fossil. Now, Maine faces a Biden-to-Harris situation where the front-runner gets shitcanned at the last minute and the replacement doesn't have time to build up the enthusiasm inertia to win.
I totally agree. However, Platner's wife stood up for him which likely helped and he is the most charismatic political candidate I have ever heard and I've heard and met dozens in person. I never met or heard Obama, Clinton or Reagan in person, but IMO, he was in that class.
The bottom line is that we are sick and tired of Susan and ready to have someone that isn't a Republican.
Like Harry Reid said, "Collins is always there when you don't need her."
I don't think these Dem Committees truly VET anyone. If you read the Substack by TFN, (Jonathan Larsen), he's done plenty of reporting work of candidates, where he discovered all kinds of stuff, spoke with many people who had dealing with candidate and never ever had been asked about those dealings by any Dem vetting committee.
The thing is...I don't think people who have no baggage at all--who have lived a life devoid of mistakes and missteps--haven't really lived at all and perhaps haven't learned much in their sojourn thus far. Platner has insisted that he has changed...and perhaps he has. But we need more time to believe it and he needs to work a little harder on owning his most serious mistakes. PTSD can't be blamed for everything.
I also agree that making mistakes is pretty-much the only way we learn in life. However there are mistakes and there are crimes. I think a man (or woman) who has ever forced sex on another person may have changed since it happened, but still needs to seek a career outside of politics. It's a vulnerability that cannot be overlooked.
Troy Jackson, Nirav Shah, Shenna Bellows...all have been campaigning recently. I read something about a poll from Bloomberg which had Troy Jackson beating Collins by 4 points right out of the gate. We HAVE to have someone who can beat Collins and While Governor Mills has been a decent Governor...she only got into this race because Schumer talked her into it. We really needs some young PROGRESSIVE blood and dammit, it sure looked like Platner would have beat Susie and been a great Senator...if only.
I also heard Chellie Pingree's name mentioned, but that would leave a big question mark in ME-1. I have met Shenna and spoken with her several times. She came very close in the governor's race, but Troy Jackson beat her out for 3rd place. Any of the three you mentioned T L, I would support.
I haven't taken our Platner sign down yet, but my wife already said she wouldn't vote for Platner. Too bad he had so much baggage.
I loathe Susan Collins for confirming Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Alito and Roberts, plus not voting for the ACA, releasing the OBBBA from committee and the 6 vacations her and her husband took paid for by lobbyists and corporations. (And so much more).
She certainly is eligible to run, but IMO we need her too much doing what she's doing. She reaches around 7 million people all across the globe every day. It would be hard to do that and be a US Senator as well.
It isn’t the “hatred for Chuck Schumer.” It’s the desperate desire to form a strong opposition party. Unfortunately forming a strong opposition party requires taking risks.
Also, according to The Left Hook, Waj texted with Heather yesterday and she told him she’s thinking about it. My jaw dropped because I didn’t think it was something she was interested in. Listen to ~15:40 of his “breaking news” video about Platner.
ETA: Waj reads her text live at minute 48:45 of his video with Jess Craven yesterday (the video was supposed to be about Michigan). Jess Craven’s jaw drops just like mine did.
I get it that Heather doesn't see herself as a politician or even want to be one. But she is also a patriot and a scholar of history, who surely knows that sometimes, the moment chooses you. This may be that time.
Chris, even if she chose to serve only one term, she would be a valuable asset in the Senate and would get a really good idea of what the Senate is like, particularly when it is so deeply divided.
TL, I have to think that she is thinking about it due to a sense of responsibility to the state/country. Maine is in a really tough spot. I have to imagine she would win that seat if she runs. She probably realizes this and is thinking she can use the collateral she has built up to get Maine out of this awful situation.
L M, the professor may be "thinking about it," but I suspect that after she thinks about it, she will decide against running. Being a great historian and political analyst are not qualifications for being a senator. HCR leads a happy, busy life that allows her to take time off and paddle on the clean waters of the Maine coast. Being a senator is a miserable, dirty business.
I'm reminded of my mentor, Joe F. Brown, Jr., who was a general manager of a couple Leggett stores in Charlottesville, VA, and invested a fortune in company resources in me. He probably had more influence on the company than any of the owners because he trained and groomed young talent who would go on to manage three-quarters of the stores in the chain. The Leggett brothers repeatedly asked him to take a corporate position, which he repeatedly declined. His answer: "Thank you, no. I believe I'm making the best contribution to the company right where I am."
I suspect she is thinking about it out of a sense of responsibility—not because she wants to do it, but because she knows she can help get Maine out of this situation. I’m not even saying she should run. I’m just pointing out to others who said “she would never consider it” that she is apparently actually considering it.
He is the best campaigner I have ever seen and I've lived in 10 states including CA, IL and FL. But, he is likely a rapist and maybe even an alcoholic.
Fortunately, Susan Collins approval has dropped from around 80% in 2012 to around 30% now. She voted against the ACA and many times against raising the Federal minimum wage. She voted for Gorsuch, who never should have been a SCOTUS nominee, Kavanaugh, where she contradicted herself many times during her 45 minute defense of her vote, Roberts and Alito. She did not vote for Comey-Barrett.
Her net worth is near $10 million along with her lobbyist husband and she lives in a 4000 sq ft home in Bangor.
The 18-54 year olds don't support her at all. Her base in 55 and up white people especially evangelicals.
However, It's Come to This, Susan Collins is still a flawed candidate. She has done little to nothing to help the people of Maine, serves her Donnie more than the people of Maine, and will vote for something positive if her vote won't matter in the long run. That is not the kind of person Maine or any other state should have in our Senate.
🤬 Yes, ICTT, you are a complete outsider. WE MAINERS get to decide who we want representing us in the House and the Senate. You can take your pontifications, patronage and inaccurate platitudes and shove them...in the waste basket
I see. So the Maine Democratic Party made a brilliant choice, then? One that, of course, has no effect on the rest of the country during the most critical mid-terms in its history? Is that the point?
Heather has said on at least a few occasions that she has ZERO interest in participating in politics. Her interest is in reporting history, not making it.
Listen to The Left Hook’s “breaking news” video yesterday on this topic. Around minute 15:40, Waj says he texted with Heather yesterday and she said she was thinking about it. My jaw dropped because I also didn’t think she was interested.
ETA: Waj reads Heather’s text during his video with Jess Craven yesterday. Minute 48:45 of the video that was supposed to be about Michigan…. Jess Craven’s face looked like mine.
We need her too badly doing what she's doing. I've seen three names floated to replace Platner. Chellie Pingree, the longtime Congresswoman for ME-1, Troy Jackson, who Platner supported for Governor and Janet Mills. My personal choice would be Shenna Bellows, whose ethics and values are impeccable.
When she spoke at a meeting where she was invited as the Secretary of State, she was asked a question about her governor's bid. She refused to answer the question because she said it would be unethical. She was invited to this event as the Secretary of State.
My next choice would be Pingree but who would replace her for her Congressional seat?
And then there's Nirav Shah who was runner-up in the Governor's Democratic Primary.
As a Mainah and a woman, I struggled with the news about Platner. At first I thought it was another MAGA ploy to get rid of him. As more evidence comes out, it appears the woman is telling the truth! How courageous of her to speak out! Now what to do! I voted for Bellows for governor & would support her as a senate candidate. Since Shah & Jackson are also worthy candidates and already have a structured campaign, they are also possibilities! We need Collins out since she supports a rapist President and his horrific policies. Remember the Epstein Files!
As a life long Mainer, I have the highest respect for Sheena Bellows! Her integrity is unquestionable and she would make Maine proud as. US senator! We must defeat Susan Collins!
Did you go to any of her parties the day before the election? I went to the one in Ellsworth. She was very upbeat and thought she had a chance if it went to four rounds. Her mom introduced her and did a very nice job.
I had seen Shenna a couple weeks previous. At that rally, Graham Platner's mom introduced Shenna. I wish she would have run instead of him.
Paul, and even if she wanted to stay in the Senate, she would be making noise there and calling out false statements, inaccuracies, and just plain lies for what they are! That would be amazing!!
I wouldn’t want Heather to run for office! It’s a nightmare. I prefer that she keeps on doing exactly what she does! She’s brilliant and we need a sane, intelligent, competent voice now.
Robinhood In reverse might as well be the mantra of the whole MAGA GOP, not that their supporters are even remotely aware of the party’s true objectives..
A lot of the “ pulpits” are the problem. I live in the Bible Belt, and the fundamentalist churches have convinced their followers that they will go to hell if they ever vote for a Democrat.
Funny, that. These are the Jesse Helms, Strom Thurmond Dixicrats who in past years would have gladly taken a beating before they would vote Republican.
its a whole chain of power, how does one break this link Kelli, you take one down someone else replaces them...I think governments should be utterly transparent, starting from funds.
Wake up, folks. The July 4 fiasco and the FIFA scandal have been massive distractions- Trump's go-to play. We've all been conned yet again.
When did someone last mention the Epstein files? The boat strikes and the extrajudicial killings of the supposed drug smugglers? The war in Iran and the stalled progress in the "negotiations." The "Board of Peace" and the destruction of Gaza?
Trump and his handlers are relentless in pursuing what they want. And Trump has told us all what he really, really wants: the Save America Act. It is the zombie bill that keeps on coming back. The closer to the midterms that it can be enacted, the more chaos it will cause. Delay is another of Trump's favorite tactics.
July 10 is the deadline by which Trump must veto the housing bill, or it becomes law. If he signs it, he gets to send his MAGA supporters a message that he still cares about them. If he vetoes it, he sends a message to the Republicans who are wavering in their support that he doesn't care if he guts them politically, and he will keep his word that he will not sign any other legislation until he gets his way. At that point, they will be out of politics unless they cheat to win at the midterms by supporting SAVE America. Right now, the obstacle is the Senate parliamentarian, who is holding the line on whether it can be part of a reconciliation bill and avoid the filibuster. The Senate majority leader appoints the parliamentarian and serves at that leader’s discretion, meaning the majority leader can have the parliamentarian removed and a new one installed. So how stiff a reed is John Thune? Would he be willing to do that to give Trump what he wants and save the filibuster?
Trump's handlers have a backup plan that was previewed on July 4th with the Patriot Front display, and the return of the "red menace" of COMMUNISM. And once again, while we have been distracted with FIFA, Trump has rewritten the script for the midterms, turning Democratic Socialists into an existential threat with nobody on the workers' side pushing back.
Honestly Georgia people are just plain worn out. It's been 10 years and 2 terms in office. Everyday it's a tsunami. But you are right. We need to focus.
Yes, Georgia ... All these distractions are to draw attention away from the priority mission at hand: suppressing the vote.
Holy Mike Johnson has just said the quiet part out loud. He intends to push the SAVE act through Congress by using some reconciliation sleight-of-hand.
Dale Rowett, thank you for reminding US about holy baby Johnson. (Will the British please make US a baby Johnson balloon to go with the baby Trump balloon?)
My most respectful salute to you, Georgia, for this truly accurate sit-rep. In response, here are couple of less obvious but nevertheless relevant points.
(1) – A major element of forbidden and thus eternally suppressed USian history explains Trump's threat to exterminate as "communists" of any of us still courageous enough for empathy.
Thanks to the [unprecedented] USian skills at censorship and deception, the vast majority of us here have no idea that what evolved into the New Deal had absolutely [nothing] to do with humanitarianism, equality or democracy. It was instead an expression of the truly bottomless fear and fury with which our masters responded to the Red Army's relentless enforcement of the Soviet Revolution's humanitarian demands. The plutocrats' malignant anxiety triggered a raging but almost entirely clandestine debate* about the relative counter-revolutionary effectiveness of concession verses extermination; concession won, though only because it was recognized as far less destructive of physical infrastructure -- and therefore more profitable -- than expansion of the U.S. military's deadly infantry, artillery and air-corps campaigns against strikers and protestors.
Though readily pimped by USian propagandists into a humanitarian disguise, the New Deal was most assuredly [not] an expression of our overlords' alleged "empathy"; as too many of us are too brain-warped to ever acknowledge, the capitalist is our species' deadliest manifestation of Absolute Evil, perpetrator of the most malignantly self-obsessed, wantonly ecogenocidal sociopathy [ever] to criminally jeopardize this planet. Thus we're denied the vital knowledge that without the overthrow of Tsar Nicholas II and the triumph of Lenin and Trotsky, there'd have been no New Deal, no New Frontier, no Great Society** -- not even as the begrudgingly administered, temporarily pacifying, counter-revolutionary programs many of us in the more politically enlightened quarters of the NYC press corps recognized them to be. Obviously our masters fear that if we knew the bitter truth implicit in this forbidden history -- the paradox that under patriarchy, the only possible preservative of humanitarianism is brute force -- we'd realize the end of Reconstruction in 1878 was also the beginning of the end of the so-called American Dream. But the Red Army was for a time the Dream's valiant restorer -- and that is why Trump is so determined to exterminate all Communists and Marxism itself -- even if it requires toxifying our Mother Earth to [everlasting] Precambrian lifelessness.***
(2) – Given our circumstances, the notion that, “Powerful men protecting other powerful men from consequences is...corruption” is nothing more than a comforting aphorism. From the capitalist perspective, there is no such thing as “corruption.” There is merely profit – no matter the ecogenocidal consequences: think of the planetary suicide of terminal climate change; reflect on the meaning of Triangle Shirtwaist, Bhopal, Exxon Valdez and Deepwater Horizon. What We the People perceive as “corruption” is in fact the capitalist norm, capitalism in action. It is also our extinction. And given the technological omnipotence of those who doom us, it is ever more undeniable there can be no rescue – if indeed any such opportunities ever existed -- until patriarchy itself is no more.
__________________
*My primary sources on the concession-versus-extermination debate are dead relatives. My paternal grandfather, Amos Read Bliss, was one of the founders of the automotive industry. (His widow, my paternal grandmother, lost his estate -- the holdings of which included extensive properties in Canada, most of a county in rural Maine and an entire lake in rural Michigan -- to the Crash of '29.) Our overlords' conflict over how best to preserve capitalist malevolence also surfaced, albeit briefly, in FDR's refusal to prosecute the perpe-traitors of the Business Plot, which we elders are more likely to know as the Bankers’ Plot, a 1933 effort by our Wall Street masters to maximize profit by reducing us to a satellite of Nazi Germany. https://allthatsinteresting.com/the-business-plot
**Each of the half-dozen labor historians I interviewed during my working press years said – off-the-record of course – that [none] of the USian labor movement’s New-Deal-Era successes would have been possible had our masters not been terrorized into compliance by the Soviet Union and its Red Army.
***Most of us who came to age after the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was slain by capitalist attrition have no sense of the Red Army’s breathtaking power at the apex of its might. Here are two indicative examples; much of the footage in the first two links is documentary; the second link is provided both for its translation from Russian to English and for the message implicit in the fact the singers are women. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUVENE9nH3s and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kECQowBmsUo. The third link is to a historical film that continues to get top marks from non-USian reviewers. It is the story of the siege of Fortress Brest in WWII, which Hitler’s Wehrmacht thought could be taken in four hours but which took nearly four weeks instead. More than a few critics describe it as the most accurately telling war film ever made. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lw3mDJ0qdp0 (With my apology for the double-posted first link, since corrected.)
Loren, I must respectfully disagree. I know a lot about the people who worked on the FDR New Deal and even "The Great Society" and it might have been a teeny bit about fear, but they really did want to make things better for the American people. Trump and his white house toddler pool are hoping to bring that red scare BS back in by calling Democrats Communists and other names they have no clue what they mean. We the People don't have to go along with their BS.
Ruth...Thank you. Gave you a "like" for two reasons:
Firstly, we are [not] in disagreement; we are instead viewing entirely different levels of the New Deal, which means your more accessible information is as correct as my disclosures. Think of the New Deal as like the Cassava plant: horrendously toxic roots, but vitally nutritious leaves and tubers (https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_maes.pdf).
Secondly, your description of New Dealers and other USian humanitarians who "really did want to make things better" -- as I can also attest (again from both my childhood and my working-press decades) -- is [entirely] accurate. But the well-wishers were on an entirely different level; they were [not] our true masters, the capitalists who own the nation and with their weaponized wealth dictate its policies. The well-wishers were the New Deal's operatives -- activists, social workers, hard-left documentarians like Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and James Agee, even the very few politicians who had somehow managed to preserve a bit of empathy -- and most of them truly did give it their very best efforts.
In a [just] world -- an utter impossibility under patriarchy and capitalism -- the real New Dealers would be forever honored as revolutionary heroines and heroes.
What We its Victims need to understand about capitalism -- most especially about USian capitalism, which by its embrace of Original-Nazi war-criminals was perfected to USSR-destroying omnipotence -- is that capitalism has always tended toward "der Führerprinzip"; the Original Nazis the U.S. adopted as advisors and comrades-at-arms merely provided the guidance that enabled our masters to permanently institutionalize der Führerprinzip as its sole organizational principle.
Whenever possible -- that is, to exploit populations already subjugated to submission -- our masters enforce der Führerprinzip by bribery. Nor is the bribery always Clarence-Thomas obvious; undoubtedly the most diabolically effective yet suicidally overlooked bribery in our species' entire history is the pimping of computerized convenience to seduce us to embrace the universal enslavement imposed by electronic surveillance -- the enslavement from which apocalypse is the [only] possible manumission or escape. But if a population somehow manages to mobilize [effective] resistance , our masters [gleefully] resort to ecogenocidal violence, often (e.g. Hitler and Pinochet) of the most grotesquely sadistic sort.
Originally, as in the New Deal era, der Führerprinzip applied only to major policy decisions; now -- because of our masters' technological omnipotence -- it literally determines the totality of our lives. Thus the [real] operation of USian governance is [irreversibly] dictatorial: nothing whatsoever obtains until our masters agree to permit it, which is yet another reason our liberation -- like Nazi Germany's -- can be achieved only by humanitarian invasion.
(The astute observer will thus note our circumstances today are identical -- with one definitive difference -- from those intended by the Bankers' Plot perpe-traitors: the failed United States is [not] a satellite of the Third Reich; it is instead its resurrection, this time with doomsday weapons, and therefore in probably unbeatable form.)
America has finally found the one form of due process Donald Trump understands: calling a buddy.
Folarin Balogun got a red card, which in soccer means you did something bad enough to sit out the next game. In Trumpworld, however, rules are merely suggestions for people without phone access to FIFA. So Andrew Giuliani, because apparently one Giuliani was not enough damage for one century, alerted Trump. Howard Lutnick poked around. Lawyers circled. And Trump called FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who promptly discovered that discipline is a flexible concept when the United States president is breathing into the receiver.
Suddenly, Balogun was on probation. Not suspended. Probation. For a red card. The last time that happened was 1962, which tells you everything. FIFA had to reach back to the era of rotary phones and lead paint to find precedent.
Then Trump explained that he knows sports “really well,” which is always the warning siren before he proves he does not. He admitted he did not even know what a red card meant, but somehow knew the referee was “suspect.” Perfect. Ignorance and certainty, the twin engines of MAGA jurisprudence.
This was never just soccer. It was Trump’s entire governing philosophy in cleats: foul, whine, call a friend, attack the ref, and declare fairness illegal.
The same thumb on the scale appears in the economy, where the “One Big Beautiful Bill” showers the wealthy with tax cuts while yanking food and health care from working people. Robin Hood in reverse, only with worse hair, cheaper morals, and more subpoenas.
Now comes the SAVE Act, a voter suppression scheme dressed up as election integrity. Trump says if Republicans pass it, they will not lose for a hundred years.
Belgium beat the United States 4 to 1 anyway.
Apparently, even rigging the rules cannot teach Trump’s team how to defend.
"Ignorance and certainty, the twin engines of MAGA jurisprudence."
Michael, that is a whopper of a truth in a perfect sentence. Congratulations!
I think the US Mens soccer team felt ashamed of tRump's interference, and with shame clouding their minds they couldn't cooperate as a TEAM. I was proud of Belgium for winning in a "rigged" game against them.
Let's hope this is a real metaphor for November -- all their plans turn to shit in an instant. The gerrymanders backfire. Ruby-red districts and whole states once thought safe turn blue as the tsunami of utter disgust rolls in, and millions more understand our President is nothing but a fucking moron with criminal tendencies, and his party is nothing but a group of soulless scalawags lost in an awful cult.
One note -- the Big Ugly Bill would have been toast had Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins actually voted down what they knew was a piece of excrement when it got spewed out of the House at 3:30am in the morning. Just saying...
And the country that had a chance to be a leader in this regard pissed it away. Elected a mob boss with the morals of an alley cat. I apologize to alley cats. They have never, ever claimed to be paragons of virtue. The hypocrisy will reek until we all are tainted. Our country that most celebrated as what is was, has already become as damaged as the pool that reflects our flawed soul…
Trump ensured that the rest of the world was rooting for Belgium. According to my daughter they got their wish with Belgium winning 3:1. Let us hope the midterms go against Trump’s interference too.
What happens when the rules are changed by those who made the rules have been canceled or replaced by corrupted rule makers? Then we are not talking about just rules.
USA cheated and still lost. So being humiliated, ridiculed and despised around the whole world was for nothing. Your players didn't deserve this humiliation. FIFA has corrupted the beautiful game, let's hope it is not beyond repair. Shame, oh the shame.
There are lots of examples in history of great coaches who put sportsmanship above winning and kept their jobs and their integrity. They were great leaders and beloved by their players. There are lots of other examples of coaches (mostly in college basketball and football) who put winning above everything and they are largely relegated to the scrap heap of arseholes you don’t want to emulate. Bobby Knight. Woody Hayes. The list is endless. US players were put in a no-win position by that corruption. If the coach had sat him out he would have shown confidence in the team, respect for the beauty of the sport, and integrity that players love to play for. Big F for Failure in Coaching. But then again, he knows he and his family would have faced death threats by the trumpino family.
What would the outcome be if/when Trump starts calling actual balls and strikes in America’s favorite game? “I saw it with my own eyes - he was out. We have different pictures and videos.”
Word from friends abroad is that their friends who are attending the World Cup are charmed and delighted by the kindness and friendliness of us—the Americans. The game is still a beautiful game. Trump is always a chump. The rest of the world has more experience of terrible tyrants than we have endured. They know the difference between a power mad poseur and the people. Despair not.
He is an unrepentant, egotistical, narcissist and world class jerk. That is all he will ever be.
My problem is in our 250th year, when we should have key phrases in the Declaration committed to memory (American scripture per Pauline Maier) instead we are heading toward the midterms in denial of what Trump is capable of with no apparent plan other than filing lawsuits.
While 250 years ago the founders pledged their loyalty and courage to each other and a fledging nation, we have become a nation of distracted sheep treating the billionaire class as celebrities and our democracy as an afterthought.
Wake up people. We can't afford to lose with a whimper all that the founders risked everything for. The consent of the governed means you need to take a stand. That was their gift to us: not a privilege but an enormous responsibility. Our silence is Trump's permission.
I'm afraid President Bullshit didn't learn a single lesson, and whatever was learned by conscientious people here, he will try to bury -- perhaps with a "splendid little war" in Greenland or something.
Just after the loss, I posted the following on FB:
The USA’s 4-1 loss to Belgium underscores yet again how Trump’s interference can ruin whatever he touches. Did Belgium play better? Yes indeed. But there seemed to be an orange cloud hovering over the US team that nothing could disperse. When Trump decides that the rules don’t apply to him and mounts his bully pulpit, a pall settles over everything. And the estimation of the U.S. in the eyes of the world has sunk even lower.
Nate White, a British writer, was asked his opinion about Trump (republished from Meidas EpluribusUnum). Despite the length, worth reading in full...
"Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?... He has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities which British esteem, and which funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed....the stark contrast does rather throw Trump's limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
“Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever... And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it's a fact. He doesn't even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty. Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn't just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness. There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It's all surface.
“Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. We don't. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He's not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He's more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege....Worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
“He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless or female – and he kicks them when they are down. So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think 'Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy' is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that (1) Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and most are; and (2) You don't need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
“This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. It's impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump...."
Perfect! I can hear that summation being voiced in a proper British accent, as it should be. Paul Simon nets it out in "A Simple Desultory Phillippic": "The man ain't got no culture"
Of course this is a commendable and excellent take down. I did once, while reading it, remember that even though I love Britain and some particular Brits, bullying, while it might now be socially condemnable there, is not missing from British history. Lots of examples. I could list a few, but I’ll leave that historians. Let’s just condemn it and replace it with all that is much better.
Actually, it's not that Trump can ruin whatever he touches it's that he does ruin everything he touches. It's like a law of physics. Trump could ruin a reunion concert by all 4 Beatles.
And yet the majority of those who voted, voted for him. It says something about either the collapse of American virtue or that millions should return their diplomas.
Heard. But I think it transcends anything education could accomplish.
Trumpism and MAGA are identities as deeply held as a religion. To question its validity is heresy, blasphemy and a betrayal of one's friends and family.
Try to explain to a highly religious person that many of the events in the Bible are impossible and scientifically ridiculous.
Trumpism is hero worship on steroids. He can be forgiven for anything. We haven't evolved past the time when we left the trees to walk. We are addicted to "heroes".
We must have a person or a fantasy to worship in order to make sense of the big question: "Why are we here?" or "What are we?"
It is too scary to consider that we are all just temporary products of random evolutionary survival tools and ecological events. Like whales or octopuses. But dumber.
Trump knows this better than anyone. He said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose a vote. He took it a lot further, right? 200 people in open ocean assassinated. Over 100 school children in Iran. And depriving millions of USAID has already cost over 780,000 lives - just a warm up to the genocide.
And they will love him more. Go to church and sing his praises. Jesus Christ. Where are you when you are needed most?
Steve...actually the majority of those who voted did not vote for him. Heather has mentioned this before. 22 other candidates were on the ballot and their voters added up to 2,680,933 votes + write-ins were 235,673 votes. More people (77.9 million) did not vote for him. He received 77.3 million votes. The problem lies with the 77.3 ! and the ~90 million eligible voters who did not vote.
I have heard all this before. Every election comes down to those who vote and he got a majority of those votes. A non vote in this election was a vote for rightest extremism. People also voted for third party
candidates, that is true. But in our system, while perhaps a right or righteous move it only helps support the candidate who gets the most votes and it supports the electoral college selection - and again that was the felon. It is shocking to me that knowing democracy was on the line, so many chose to not vote or chose to support a third party candidate. These are my views as an independent, not having party allegiance.
“And I understand sports really well. Really well” BUT he didn’t know a red card meant he wouldn’t be able to play in the next game. Does DJT have one honest bone in his body?
For 47, honesty is weakness. Admitting a mistake is a fatal error. Roy Cohn and Fred Trump created a monster who should have been incarcerated in the 1980s.
My thought exactly--and, no, he doesn't. Recalling all the subjects he has ridiculously asserted that he understands/knows more about than anyone else.
The real issue is not who wins today's game. It is whether society still believes that rules are more important than those with the power to change them. A level playing field is not only the foundation of sport—it is also the foundation of democracy, justice, and trust.
Or maybe the issue is whether society still believes that rules are more important than those with the power to violate them with impunity. Anyone with even a modicum of wealth or celebrity or status can put paid to the notion that we're a nation that honors the rule of law.
Need we put these positives in the context of criminal Donald – still ruining everything he touches in Washington, D.C.? His tariffs and his Iran war still hurting working-class America? He still covering up for all the rapists of the 1200 girls and young women criminal Donald’s pals trafficked?
Need we put tariffs, foreign war, D.C. demolition, rapes, and their cover-up in the context of what we used to call the Supreme Court? Didn’t its six proto-fascists swear oaths to the Constitution, and then decide to ignore the 14th amendment’s forbidding public office to any insurrectionist such as criminal Donald? Whose four of the six decided that same amendment’s birthright citizenship clause has no force of law if said citizens are black, brown, or some other non-white?
Yes, we’ve got Ukraine. We’ve got Mandami – several other, young public figures of similar decency and energy. Parallel yes, our positives come side-by-side the corrosions of our highest-placed moneyed still worshipping money, criminality, and corruptions.
The whole saga is also really cruel for the player, Folarin Bolagun. He has built a fine career and the last thing he'll want will be for ever remembered for this incident. It is also deeply ironic that he became a US citizen by birth, and would be exactly the sort of person Trump would want to strip of citizenship!! Good luck to him. I'll be making a point of supporting him at Monaco or wherever now.
Oh that IS ironic. I didn't know that Bolagun was a birthright citizen. Apparently his Nigerian parents lived in London and were visiting the US while his mother was in the late stages of pregnancy and the airline wouldn't board her when they were going back to London because of how far along she was. So they stayed in the US and had their child (Bolagun) in New York and thus, he became a birthright citizen! (That is the story as it is written on wikipedia.)
Well, at least Trump won't have to throw a big celebration for the US Soccer team now.
After all, they are "losers" and Trump HATES "losers"!
He cheats at golf. He cheats on his taxes. He cheats on his wives. In the summer of 2019 he made a call to Pres. Zelensky asking him to get dirt on Hunter Biden in exchange for military aid. He put pressure on Pence to pervert the Electoral College vote in 2020. And he made a phone call to Infantino asking for a 'favor.' We're at war, prices are through the roof, the climate is wrecked, and he takes the time to call in a sports fix.
Does anyone in the world trust anything he says or does?
I'm hoping that at the NATO meeting the other attendees will finally make it very clear to him that they do not believe his lies and won't accept them or his bullying. No diplomatic pussyfooting, just bold truthfulness.
When a bully picks on a weakling on the playground, his weak and timid sycophants laugh. This defines the response of Trump‘s Maga army. When they arrived at the fork in the road they took it and they ain’t lookin’ back. They think Trump is absolutely hilarious. The weak, the timid, the cruel.
Alas, I think cheating often wins in the short term, and that's why there is so much of it. It's comes at the expense of the common good though, and the evil that men do lives after them. We are fools if we let it stand.
ICYMI: 7/6/26 An ex-girlfriend of Graham Platner decided to change the story she told the NYT in their hit piece on Platner and now accuses him of sexually assaulting her in an article in Politico and also now in a CNN interview “Woman alleges Graham Platner raped her in 2021 while they were dating, which he denies | CNN”. https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/06/us/graham-platner-racicot-allegation-maine-invs
While Wajhat Ali of the Left Hook was interviewing Jess Craven of Chop Wood Carry Water today 7/6/26 “Michigan Could Decide the Democratic Party's Future | Jess Craven - YouTube”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pT9amVoLtn8 they noticed in real time what was happening with Platner. Since the cut off date for candidate change in the Maine election is July 13th, they got the idea to call Heather and ask her if she would run in Platner’s place. She texted back that she would “have to think about it”. This is a major development because Maine’s U.S. Senate race is considered crucial to winning control of the Senate and then being able to among other things prevent Trump from putting replacement SCOTUS judges like Aileen Cannon on the Court.
We Democrats have a real chance to do the right thing here (which the DNC should've done LONG ago) and WIN with a decent candidate. Get rid of Platner immediately and put real money behind Mills or another patriotic and popular candidate to win this seat in an exciting and crucial contest. IF Heather is even thinking about it, that would be amazing.
Funny how women never report these alleged sexual abuses until their alleged abuser is running for office.. so reminds me of Al Franken.. let her file a police complaint and have her day in court..
She reported the assault to a therapist and a friend. And she just may have her day in court since the statute of limitations hasn't run. So Candidate Platner might become Jailbird Platner.
If you don't understand why a traumatized rape victim might not file a police report, nothing anyone says here will penetrate (to use a figure of speech).
He's not been proved guilty in a court of law yet; no one is claiming he has. But he's certainly been tainted, has tainted himself, by his own past conduct.
Then as I have suggested since a month ago, he should go get treatment for his PTSD and he should have IMMEDIATELY come clean on ALL possible incidents where he might have assaulted (let alone raped) anyone.
He should be FAR AWAY FROM RUNNING FOR PUBLIC OFFICE! The standards for being a Senator, one of the selected 100 people in the United States who represent half of the legislative arm of our federal government, should be WAY ABOVE what Platner can present.
I have never argued he should be jailed for his behavior unless it was criminal as decided by a court, but I have argued strenuously that anyone who has this much baggage to be carried around doesn't belong in government, at least not the federal government.
Yeah, just like Trump shouldn't be there either.
And justifying Platner's run because we have a felon in the White House is nonsensical. It makes us no better than them. And personally, I want to always have a helluva lot higher standards for our representatives than the ones used by the MAGAts currently residing in the White House and Congress and even a few Supreme Court seats .
And also think about everything women have to go through and put up with in order to make such a claim. We would never claim such a thing unless it actually happened.
Bit rich coming from someone from a state who fought to preserve slavery and which only allowed mixed race marriages in 1967..let me guess your parents were proud members of the daughters of the confederacy and KKK?
You know you are a total jerk. You might notice that people of BOTH sides of the political spectrum live in every state. You should be ashamed of yourself, but quite obviously such insight would go right over your empty head.
Sure but for my family’s sake i live in a deep blue state where eduction and health is taken seriously by legislators.. feel free to call me names.. i bet you were the idiot in your family. The creepy uncle who nobody wants to see at family gatherings
Agreed.. more like strange coincidence or happenstance that she changed her initial story to the NYT.. as i said she should absolutely file charges and take him to court or face a defamation suit.
She didn't change her story at all. She supported Platner's political goals and was trying to avoid condemning him for what she thought might be the only issue he had. As she has come to find out that he has a history of this kind of behavior, she decided that she had to make a full presentation.
And if what she did can't be figured out by your obviously worm-like mind, maybe you should just stop commenting since your lack of intelligence is plainly on display here.
As for whether she should press charges or file a civil suit, you don't have to be guilty of a crime or liable for a civil suit to be a lousy candidate as a Democrat. This "VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHAT" is total crap... if someone doesn't have the moral standards to know when to not sext people who don't want to be subject to it, that person doesn't belong in Congress regardless of whether they wouldn't be found guilty or liable in a court of law.
Jon, when someone starts to attack us in these forums - on a personal level, I think we are just wasting time on them. There is a blocking tool to apply when folks run out of good debatable facts and perspectives and descend into petty personal verbal assaults.
I thought there was too, something liike "block" on facebook, but unfortunately I can't seem to find out how to apply it here to hb861. When I do, trust me I will :-).
I also would like to say I appreciate the comment. We don't always see eye to eye, but as with most everyone else here, I think we all try to respect each other's views even when we disagree. Something this other guy (I think they're a guy!) obviously hasn't learned. Sigh...
Like all forms of hate, misogyny makes people stupid. This allegation has been made while there is time to replace him. If the motive was nefarious, she would have waited until the replacement deadline had passed.
If she had been honest she would have disclosed her charges to the NYT when they first interviewed her.. she now retracted her story and made new allegations. I am not from Maine and, If i were, i would not have voted for him.. on the other hand i still believe in justice and innocence until proven guilty.. her credibility is shot and any defence attorney will have a field day with her in court..
Now you choose to misrepresent her. Not surprising - hate and honesty tend to find it difficult to coexist. Hate also makes people incurious which probably explains your complete ignorance of the evidence provided by extensive, high quality research into women's willingness to come forward with their experiences of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape and how they do reveal those experiences if they ever choose to do so.
And why would anyone delve deeply into „extensive, high quality research into women's willingness to come forward with their experiences of sexual harassment“.. do you delve deeply into any and all topics covered by the news?
Yes I do when it comes to the really important ones, and the sexual harassment, assault and rape of women and girls is so incredibly prevalent that it is one of the important ones.
We don't have to dive into the research literature databases to do our own literature reviews, meta-analyses and systematic reviews. We can often explore the research through lay person-friendly versions of the research written by the researchers themselves or through high quality interviews with the researchers and dig deeper into the original research publications later if we want to.
I recommend becoming curious, information literate and a critical thinker. The world is full of fools who talk and wrire drivel to con us, best to arm ourselves with the skills to combat them.
Why is anything about this funny? She even agrees with his politics and didn't want to speak up and ruin his chances to gain the seat. Try having your attackers name in your face every day after trying to forget it. You don't know anything, whoever hb861 you are.
Trump created a teachable moment. For all of us and for our children. He taught us that the rich and powerful tilt the world in their favor. He also taught us that, at least in sports, that kind of tilt does not always work. Had Trump left the issue alone, the US would have been energized to overcome the effect of a bad decision by the referee. The US team would have played using their skill and cohesion. Instead, in the context that Trump created, they were enervated, unable to play at their best. Just as the consequence of Trump's political cheating has made the United States a lesser nation than we would otherwise have been, the US soccer team could not live up to expectation. They were robbed, not of their fine striker, but of their purpose and energy -- by Trump.
My heart breaks for those players who are but pawns in this regime's bullshit. They got caught in the crosshairs of the corrupt leadership aiming to destroy all that is good. Soccer unites us. Tyranny breaks us. Thank you HCR for artfully telling this story. It's a pivot point for humanity, once again, and our light is dimming.
The man who runs FIFA is just like Trump. Mr. Trump has the devil's touch. Whatever he touches dies. Did he affect the US soccer team with his corrupt interference in that game? We will never know, however their loss in the World Cup feels like 'poetic justice.' It is like something deep in the US soccer team said, 'no'. They just couldn't do it to themselves or the game of soccer. This is just like the majority of US people who are saying the same thing to Trump and his corrupt crew: No!!!
I don't give a flying f**k about men's sports but I hope this outrages some people who don't care about politics but do care about sports. It won't change MAGAts but it might bother some "independents."
This "Independent" is outraged every time a narcissistic politician decides to casually insert him or her self into an area for which they have never previously had sufficient commitment to for which to develop any love, proficiency, or expertise. This is hardly only an issue for an occasional major sports event, but daily for science, medicine, education, and other areas essential to the well-being of our nation and ius citizens.
I feel like the ostrich. I have to fess up that I jumped ship this holiday. I didn’t envite the world in. I tried to hide in the high country but the road sluffed off the mountain. Then I tried to trim a horse for the get a way. Got the fronts okay but he said not a chance when it came time for the hinds. So I gave up on the mountain and put my outfit in the drift boat for a float trip. Wouldn’t you know it rained a cloudburst and gave me brown water as the runoff hit the river. Fortunately the micro-wave broke down which remembered me the one in the old camper. I settled for a couple days out back of the barn in the camper and had a heck of a respite from those goddamned republicans and got an old broken down 4-wheeler up and running again. Also got an engine back in the old 3020. So life was what we call normal around here. Didn’t think about the fat turd in the ruins of the White House. I don’t have a clue what stupid did or didn’t do this holiday, but I did think about all of you and all of those who made this world possible for the rest of us. Thank each and every one of you for the beauty the hope and the work you have done by helping shape our democracy.
I didn't hide. I went to the Ashland's 4th of July parade. It was about 2/3 it's normal size, and I'd guess about 75% of its normal crowd. Boy Scouts presented the National Colors (the only real presentation of the colors) to lead the parade. The Ashland City Band and the Ashland Middle School Band marched, while the American Band College* performed on three flatbed trucks (they played "Washington Post" in unison in spite of being separated by 150' from nose to tail). There was one horse group, and gymnastics/stilts/dance teams all performing. Old cars, new cars, and politicians. The ACB played a noon concert at Lithia Park, featuring "Abraham Lincoln" reciting the Gettysburg Address to soft accompaniment of a Civil War music collage.
We went home, grilled hamburgers, and hung out until the evening "Pops" concert by the American Band College and their guest performers, the Boston Brass and Yolanda Pelzer (retired USN and USA vocalist).
*The American Band College is a three year summer intensive Masters Degree program, where music educators can earn a masters degree in conducting. It is administered by Central Washington University and held in Ashland every summer.
Yeah it was made about 60 years ago when I was a freshman in high school. I fell in love with it then but had to wait 50 years for it to get in my price range. Good thing I had the M all these years in between. It still runs the swather, baler and rake. There is a sound to a Harley, a DC-3, and an M that gets in yer blood. Those three engines when they fire up take you back to the good ol’ days.
Yes, those round engines are really impressive. I love the way they cough themselves to life. My favorite is that old D-342 in a 46A model D-8. At idle, when the pony engine runs out of gas, it has this kinda disparate but throaty klunkity klunk. I always felt like I woke something up that demanded my attention fully in the coming day. When the oil pressure is up and it’s good and warm and you get to pushing a full blade and under a load that klunkity klunk turns into this rythmic, chugging coordinated beast. Then you decelerate and and that turbo whines down and it's back again. That is something I remember well.
Ha ha. Yup. Yep. Hooked chokers on one log loads in southern Oregon. Two D-8’s singing together to get one log up to the landing. What children we were with our toys on China Mtn. up Elk River. Respect to those Skinners.
Tainting the World Cup, the national economy, and the American system of laws; destroying the square deal, the fair deal, and the New Deal; the art of the deal indeed. After 250 years the current president of the United States has made a mockery the nation founded to make taxpayers into voters and all people equal before the law. He sees the country as a repository of wealth and the American government as a tool for extracting money. He also wants the admiration of the world and monopolizes all forms of media attention to obtain it. His supporters, enablers, and people who fear his influence let him rampage at will. He needs to be stopped. Keep being informed, contact your representatives, and vote Blue.
I think it is relevant that after he was denied the Nobel Peace Prize, he got FIFA to sponsor a NEW prize, the FIFA Peace Prize (imagine that, a prize issued by a corrupt sports organization!), and he was announced in December as the first honoree.
Powerful men protecting other powerful men from consequences is not fairness. It’s corruption.
Whether it’s a soccer match, our economy, or our elections, the pattern is the same: rules are obstacles to be changed whenever they threaten the people in power.
Democracy requires rules that apply equally to everyone. Especially those in power.
Keli, The economy and the elections, everyone knows about that but hosting the World Cup and humiliating your country by cheating blatantly in front of the world, then losing anyway, so for nothing. The USA has sunk to a new level of ridicule. Play fair and lose, then there is dignity. Your players didn't deserve this level of shame.
Yep, the world was outraged when Trump called the FIFA boss and had a suspension overturned. Meanwhile, Mike Johnson is working on the same model, only with elections. A preschooler could spot the corruption. Although, to be fair, preschoolers are very alert to other people cheating - unlike the Supreme Court. And after all that, they still lost the game. Perhaps democracy could get that lucky.
TOFU king strikes again. I am ashamed that Trump cheated to win again. It seems that all over the US, Americans have been great hosts welcoming everyone from all over the world.
Thank goodness the US lost to Belgium otherwise the controversy would be even more embarrassing.
The US team was caught in the middle. Indeed, after watching the game I am prone to wonder if Trump’s action and the greatly increased pressure it put on the team didn’t do far more harm than otherwise.
I started playing soccer as a five-year old the year we beat England in the World Cup. I’ve played, coached, and even reffed for years. I don’t think that foul merited a red card, There was no intent involved. But you have to go with the official unless his error is so egregious as to entirely compromise his expertise or the whole structure falls apart. Trump’s action was as corrupt on that level as it is on every other.
I think TOFU king's actions motivated the Belgian team to kick some ass.
Or perhaps the American team laid back because winning after trump's reprehensible interference would have been far worse for them, and the country.
So true. They were brilliant! It wasn't just for Belgium, it was for the world of soccer.
I think so, too.
Ya... I'm not happy saying it; however, I think you're right.
What shocked me most in today's letter was Heather's account of the back room dealings that apparently ensued between the time the red card was issued and the call was made. That was new information for me. They had a team of lawyers trying to dig up dirt on the referee, which shouldn't be shocking since it is their MO.
But my God, I guess I should be glad I can still be shocked by the level of corruption within this regime!?!
Folarin Balogun and the US team could have chosen to honor the original penalty ruling, right or wrong, to preserve the integrity of the game. As it is, they chose to go along with the corruption.
I thought about that. If every foul in World Cup competition was called correctly, I would agree with you.
It wasn't corruption, it was naked self interest. Big difference.
I appreciate the fact that you played and were well involved with soccer. Like you James, I also started playing soccer at approximately the age of 5. I carried my love of the game from the streets of Damascus Syria to the playgrounds in the school systems I attended in the States. I played on teams that ranged from community leagues to rather high-level players from universities. I coached on the middle school, high school, and division I university levels. I also officiated professionally for 10 years licensed by the USSF, the American arm of FIFA. I disagree with your analysis. I didn't watch the match but did review the clip of the incident. The red card was legitimate. Many are using the reason of "intent" as to whether Balogun deserved the red card. Intent has nothing to do with it. Balogun's position was behind that of Muharemović. Muharemović beat him to the ball and Balogun was late. In being late, he stepped on Muharemović heel and ankle. For anyone in the HCR community who isn't well experienced in soccer like James or I, there is a reason for red cards given in this situation; this could have been a career ending foul. Yes, they were both going for the ball; however, that's not the point! Muharemović had position and that is shown quite well with Balogun attempting to regain position by wrapping his arm in front of his opponent in order to gain control. One may also ask: "how does one prove or disprove "intent?" Soccer has become a contact sport since I don't know when; when I played in the '60's, it wasn't recognized as a contact sport. However, even the laws in the book today specifically forbid this type of contact. The replay referee had it right. The center ref didn't catch it. And as far as Trump is concerned, he states that "he knows sports really well" - what is clear is that he knows nothing about soccer. That was evident by his questioning what a red card was. He should have stayed out of it (but of course, we all know that isn't within his character or intellect) and let the laws of FIFA, for now, be the laws of FIFA.
Bravo: I am a very schooled / experienced student of that game for decades now. The red card was valid.
As usual, there is disagreement all across the spectrum, even among referees themselves.
Forget Trump, your ending detracted from your excellent explanation. I infer that you're saying players have a responsibility to avoid incidents that can cause injury. That makes sense, at the same time, in many sports with abundant contact, these things happen and, to my naive untrained self, I'd prefer to see a warning or benching for X amount of time when there is no clear sign of intent. Intent should always be stiffly penalized. In US sports, intent is not often enough, and penalties are lame, which results in more violence.
Thank you for your comment, James. I made one based on what I had learned from my retired referee husband, and we agree completely with what you said.
In my playground days we called this ‘cheaters proof! It’s almost like they, in one of great stadiums in the world, and real American soccer fans, decided to…
In a perfect world, that might have been a yellow card call. But it was called as a red card and should have been respected. The US team could have benched Balogun for the game, earned some respect, as well as plausible deniability for the eventual loss. Instead, Trump got involved and they lost both the game and other countries' respect. Par for the course these days.
Turning all that is true and beautiful into shit! What a super power! And 87,000,000 voted for it, that’s worse…of course 70,000,000 sat it out, that’s just sad. We need a voice and leaders to take back the reins…all the living presidents might be a start. To just reform reality…and arm-chair judgement of a man doing an impossible job is sort of cheesy. But that is almost the game these days, complaining…let them play Rugby!
Just a heads up that you inadvertently inverted the numbers. Trump got 77.3 million votes in 2024.
80,000 is approximately how many people did not vote at all, including both registered voters and voters who are not registered, but eligible to vote.
In any case, you're absolutely right that those numbers are shameful. The couch got more votes than either candidate.
Trump is a wrecking ball-- everything he touches. And he defends himself with his logic. And THREATS. Where is the pushback? Trump loves weakness in people and he smells it like a shark smells blood.
Where is the pushback? Historically, the people's pushback to autocratic power has come from the working-class unions for their fair share of the American pie; from the '60s boomers for peace; from the black churches and communities for their civil rights ; from women for equality; from the Yankees for the Union; and from Native Americans for the land.
Now that the trump/heritage foundation has declared the rule of monarchy/oligarchy/theocracy and targetted the professional class constituting the law firms, the mainstream media, the universities, the civil service, et al., there's been a woeful lack of pushback, because the professional class has an ingrained aversion to and disdain of organizing, as that is beneath their class and status.
For instance, most recently, where was the pushback from the employees of the National Park Service when they were ordered to strip the parks of any and all "woke" history lessons; and why did the Park police go along with arresting innocent people at the Reflecting Pool under the pretense of vandalism?
Why did U.S. Soccer go along with trump's attempt to rig the Belgium/U.S. match?? If U.S. Soccer officials and players believe in the primacy of fair play per the international rules and regulations, then the right thing to have done would have been to pushback by refusing to honor the suspension of the suspension. Instead like most professionals, they took the path of least resistance and obeyed in advance. So, even if the team would have won, Trump's U.S. would still be seen as the loser, bigly time.
"... Where is the pushback? " Quick answer: The 'push back' is waiting for you or I to 'handle it' JK. Personally, I've offered in many places to be the lead, sacrificial lamb - 'cuz my life as it is, isn't worth a plugged nickel for one thing, and 2) this is "not" what I care to pass on to my daughters, your daughters and or sons. Enough so that I would lay down my life again, and with no reservations whatsoever; Righteous anger and actions.
I feel bad for the US players though. What if the shoe was on the other foot and FIFA overruled a red card against the other team? It's a bad look for the sport, but mostly for the US as an entity. The world fully understands that we whine and complain about cheating to get our way. Bunch of spoiled brats on the grocery store floor crying to get their candy.
Rooted for losing
As did I.
Ditto.
Ally, yep. Not a soccer fan, but I did want Belgium to win.
Same here.
I still rooted for the US team but trump certainly put a bad taste in my mouth. Belgium just outplayed us.
Defense, was non existent Bill.
Exactly.
GJ, I am glad Belgium won. Such a travesty and the US team certainly felt the tension. Of course, he made it all about himself.
The shame belongs squarely on the 77 million Americans who put a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, and lifelong con man in the White House.
We HAVE to hope democracy "get(s) that lucky" but even better is to do everything we each can do to make sure that luck isn't needed.
The majority of Americans have to emulate what the Belgians did which is get out and vote no matter how difficult it is, make sure all of the votes are counted and deliver us from this Trumpistocracy that is currently running all three branches of our government. It won't be enough immediately to stop everything Trump has screwed up, but it should make it difficult enough for Trump that we can last the remaining two years of his administration and get rid of them all in 2028.
Or, just maybe, he will be so frustrated that he will simply decide he doesn't want to hang around for two more years. He can issue all his pardons and then resign. I would still be seriously worried about Vance at the top, but getting rid of Trump would be a relief.
Jon, a problem with Trump is that too many people have a distorted idea of who and what he is and refuse to see reality. They will defend him to the death even though he may do harm to them and their families through cutting medical and food supports. They will continue to swear to themselves and whoever that Trump didn't do it, that the "One Big Beautiful Bill" really was "Beautiful" and on and on ignoring Trump's toddleresque tantrums and his MAFIA Don actions related to whoever he comes in contact with or thinks he can and should use.
I do wish he would resign, although I don't see it happening. He is being taken care of now the way a toddler would be. His health is poor and he needs the regular healthcare provided for him along with all the food he could want and all the fawning he can use. He cares nothing for the fact that his "supporters" are being screwed by the things he is pushing through Congress as long as he can keep blaming the "Communists" the "radical left." The one thing that might be positive is that Vance, although somewhat smarter than trump, is not liked by anyone.
Husband of Ruth writing:
Shitforbrains is a malignant narcissist. For him other people exist only insofar as they can be of use.
Lol. True.
"It's all SleepyJoe's fault, and you know it"...Clinically, while anyone can occasionally be defensive, malignant narcissists use DARVO systematically to project their toxic behavior onto others, frequently believing their own fabricated narrative. This behavior is deeply tied to their inability to tolerate shame, which they instantly convert into aggression and blameshifting.
and therefore?
I think those who support him will start changing their views, although they'll never admit it. But it may stop them from voting for the republicans who are allowing this criminality to continue. Hunger and desperation will move one to action, or inaction.
It's still up to the rest of us to get out and vote in huge numbers.
Celeste, maybe we need to call Republicans out. They claim to be so christian, when they approve of cheating, lying, doing harm to others, promoting hate, particularly of immigrants, etc. I want to know where they are finding that in our scriptures. I think that might break us through in some places. I used to say when told all classrooms should have the "ten commandments" that they should be laminated so students can pick a local or national leader each week and put a check mark in front of each of the commandments that person has broken. They should start with Trump because they would be able to check off every single one!
And protect voters, particularly vulnerable voters, from the inevitable police-state tactics that are coming.
Celeste, I am thinking the same too, so if you and are thinking this so are the repubs. I wonder what carrot they will dangle to entice these would be voters to the polls. These crooks will not go quietly into the night is my guess.
Unfortunately, it's a cult and the cult leader is never wrong. Look at all the people trump has scammed over the years, mainly is supporters, and they stay with him. They live in a silo where only complete loyalty is acceptable and I have no idea how to get real information to them.
Ruth, you are correct, Trump's supporters will defend him to the death. How to explain it? It has the trappings of a cult. They revere him completely. An attack on Trump is an attack on them personally. I've witnessed it personally. The only cure for this is to defeat them at the polls and retake power. They are "lost souls."
Yes an attack on a Trump supporter is an attack on them personally particularly for those still supporting him after all this. I don't know how we change that. 37% is way too high an approval and shows their stubbornness. They apparently cannot be told or even shown (feel the pain) that Trump. is damaging them personally and the country.
Three Twits on a Couch, the Faux Nooz morning group, is the family many people no longer have. They gush over the moron when he calls in and sometimes even shows up.
Of course these folks can't leave the cult.
They're also scared shitless of the consequences they could face with a loss.
Their distorted idea is that USA “should have won” and winning is all that matters, no matter how. Today they’ll be yelling about why we are celebrating the loss whereas they don’t get we’re celebrating a loss in spite of cheating interference not because we wanted USA to lose. Life has become so binary to win at all costs for these lawless power and money grubbers. They can’t see a win in dignity and graciousness.
Ruth, the cabal is using him and of course, he has that blond who adores him and probably writes most of the dreck we see. The hard core has not seen the light and I was astounded to read just this last week a woman question what exactly bad he had done. The person answered, but somehow they agreed to remain friends. I no longer have that kind of patience. I am also seeing the MAGAs around here throwing around the word communism, not knowing anything about it.
Michele, it is almost as though ignorance is a sacrament with so many of the inhabitants of Trumplandia. It truly does make me sad that so many would choose to follow someone who has nothing but contempt for them. Maybe that's the reason they are so willing to have contempt for immigrants, people of color, and women in general. I guess some people need to believe they are superior to someone, so they create that someone they can hate and hold in contempt. Truly awful!
There are fewer and fewer of them.
Some will always exist, and to be certain, the corrupt media spaces support that. They are more identified with being loyal no matter what than to upholding the Constitution and other laws of this country.
Remember that, in cults, the more information that gets in that contradicts the cult and its leader, the more weight gathers to break the hold of the cult.
Vance is perplexing. Very smart, very mean. I keep asking myself, with a fantasticly smart and decent wife he has, what is going on with his arrogance and mean streak?
Belgians do much more than just vote (which is mandatory in Belgium, by the way). That's why their education and health levels are much higher than those of the US, while their poverty, corruption, and crime levels are much lower, and the income gap much smaller.
Belgians have paid sick leave, real holidays, real social security etc.
How did they get there?
They have strong unions and very strict campaign finance laws. And people talk about politics all the time, rather than avoiding the topic.
The country isn't perfect, but instead of the "shithole" Trump once called it, compared to the US it IS almost paradise.
The result? Competence, excellence, and a strong democracy.
Very good point,
I've always been puzzled by our maxim "never talk about religion or politics".
The two biggest forces that bend our lives, and one simply a fraud of old stories never to be questioned.
Jen, I was so lucky because my family discussed religion and politics all the time, particularly at meals. My dad was Catholic, my mother Schwenkfelder (a Protestant sect). We were often comparing and contrasting aspects of our faiths. My dad was a Democrat and my mother a Republican, so there was always some kind of election in the works to discuss, and my parents always voted. My dad was a Democratic supporter at the polls for many years. I can't think of more interesting discussions than related to religion and politics! It's healthy, interesting, and exposes those in the conversation to different ideas, particularly when the information is factual with opinions tossed in.
I just read that Belgium has three official languages and six parliaments. “The country is held together by “a king, the football team, beers.”
Maybe some diversity doesn’t destroy a country, after all?
That is true, and God knows how many political parties, some ideological, some confessional, like the Netherlands. You did forget chocolate, though.
The fact that Belgium even exists is a miracle. If Belgians were suddenly transplanted to Lebanon, that country might actually have a chance at survival.
Between the devil and the deep blue sea, with icebergs
Totally loving this.
Too many of us teach our children not to cheat and then cheer when favored politicians do it. No wonder youth often feels betrayed.
These days, though, a lot of parents encourage their children to cheat, which is, of course, tragic. Remember the college entrance scandal ("Operation Varsity Blues") a few years back? A bunch of otherwise seemingly honest people (including some celebrities like Felicity Huffman) went to jail or prison for bribery or other crimes trying to cheat to get their kids into specific schools.
Yeah, and it doesn't help when your president presents cheating as a responsible way to get what you want. What a role model!
Jon, I do remember that scandal and the others that crop up now and then. My students didn't understand why anyone would do that or even let their parents do that for them. That's probably because I taught in a disadvantaged school district where the students knew about hard work just to make it through the day, parents having 3 or more jobs between them, kids starting work at age 14, living in a food desert, education grants available then not available, and on and on. Five of my students won Gates education grants and all of them have jobs working with people: 2 teachers, 2 psychologists, and a nurse practitioner. Other students won positions in prestigious schools but could not begin to afford to attend. I don't know that any of them would have chosen to cheat to get in.
Ruth, don't get me wrong here, I expect there are literally tens of thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands of high school students who deal with getting into college honestly and correctly. It was a very small of highly privileged (i.e., wealthy) students and their parents who decided that it was "okay" to cheat on entrance exams and to bribe officials to get their kids into A-list college programs. Fortunately, some of them went to jail as a result and hopefully learned a lesson from it.
No wonder young men feel adrift
Definitely it's a matter of luck Kazz but fundamentally it's a matter of us, it's a matter of we the people. Nothing would happen if we are not committed to what might be our next election, not the last but the beginning of our return to decency and demicracy.
Make decency matter, as indeed, it does.
It’s ominous if the act destroying the right to vote is passed. Almost 50 yers ago I was living and working in Florence Italy. The owner of the tourist bar I worked in had a small party in the back to watch the soccer match between Italy and Holland. Holland won that day. But I was never into sports except running. I still run for health. Donald Trump needs to get done asap.
And Infantino is not only corrupt, but FIFA should fire him.
Nope. I think a new soccer body needs to form by nations that want a decent governing body. FIFA is corrupt through and through.
It looked almost like the players felt the same way, based on how they played. A corrupt president calls the corrupt FIFA president and gets his way, again. It's sickening how this guy keeps getting his way while his way is cheating and lies and grifting and stealing. Who supports this type of person? It's crazy.
Joseph, that is what I thought when I learned of their loss and the way it happened. Trump wrecked the chances of the US team. He thinks he saved something. What a jerk!
Yep. He fancies himself the great and powerful Oz. But just like that character, he's a total fake relying on deceit and trickery to try and create fear and obedience in his minions. In my almost 70 yrs on this planet, he is by far the worst president I've lived thru.
Joseph, I can say that about Trump as president too. Appalling!
yes, the only game the Knicks lost was when trump was there to curse it.
It won't be luck, it will be perseverance fighting for justice in the face of blatant criminality.
Exactly. It's the GOP that has become rotten from the inside. Trump is merely a symptom. We should urgently focus on the GOP instead!
None of the members of the Republican Party upholding this man should never be believed again, so long as they want power. Only if they completely give it up should they be listened to.
Karma
It's a bitch.
Playing fair is for suckers. If Trump ever played by the rules he would lose, every time, and he knows it. He has no negotiating skills, no athletic skills, no interpersonal skills, no morals, and no ethics.
He has become the world’s most accomplished con man, the best liar, fraud, and cheater.
But now, those skills have dried up, and he is left using the power of his office to destroy everything he can.
#PublicHealthHaiku
Bright scenario:
Luck favors democracy
Doesn't seem far-fetched...
Elizabeth, love it. I especially enjoy writing Haiku and it is fun to find someone else who does too.
Excellent comment. And I agree with what you say about children after all “ you have to be carefully taught “
"preschoolers are very alert to other people cheating - unlike the Supreme Court." Wow. You're pretty angry. I thought commenters here + Richardson were all for rule of law? Are you saying the Supreme Court cheats? With your credibility on the line...examples?
A Kauffman, well, the SC did ignore our constitution in various cases and did overturn precedent on partisan grounds. That is a kind of cheating and they knew it, but did it anyway! Overturning Roe v. Wade, ignoring the problem medical effects of pesticides, only a 5-4 decision for birthright citizenship which is clearly stated in the 14th Amendment of our CONSTITUTION. There are so many more and you know it. That is just an "educated" kind of cheating, no less cheating, but it seems to have some legitimacy behind it, or that's what the justices would claim!
But, mailed-in-ballots counted within 5 days of the election protects rural voter in Mississippi & Alaska veers in Point Barrow as well as U.S. Solders abroad.
I've been following Supreme Courrt decisions and trhe court in general for decades. I had two cases there. My former colleagues had dozens of cases there. Sorry to be so blunt, but you don't know what you are talking about. I was in cases in 15 states and many foreign countries as a lawyer. Our Supreme Court is as good as it gets.
I have a strong suspicion you haven't read the cases you mention. And even then, you'd need to read the cases they cite in those cases. That would take, for a single case, about 30-40 hours.
You misunderstand what courts do. They don't make policy. You don't like the policy consequences of a few cases. That has nothing to do with the constitution.
By your definition, Brown v. Board was cheating, as was, many would say, Roe v. Wade (even Ruth Ginsberg thought it was a mistake.
Suggestion: stick to subjects you know about. You're perilously close to the drunks in a bar level of analysis.
Are you joking, A Kauffmann? Like, let's talk about Kavanaugh's dissent-assent in the Birthright citizenship case. He literally says that the Constitution's 14th amendment, which has the same language as a specific Congressional law, does not uphold birthright citizenship but the law does. That is utterly nonsensical, but boy oh boy does it allow those who want to deny citizenship to people born here to pass a new law. That's just one example from this week. It was so vastly unreasonable no one would sign onto it.
We could also talk about Thomas's decision on guns, which is so impossible to follow, lower courts cannot and do not know how to rule.
Or how about the emergency, "shadow" docket, where the court makes decisions without hearing the cases being made.
Or what about Roberts, who said he would get 8-1 or 9-1 decisions by upholding stare decisis, but in the last 5 years, he and his majority have overruled one long-standing decision after another.
If you really believe that this court is not cheating and is upholding the rule of law, read Lisa Graves's book Without Precedent.
Ms. Cummings: I don't know what subject you teach, but it isn't law. Kavanaugh's opinion was the one more in line with court approaches. Normally, the court takes the narrowest path to a decision that it can. It makes exceptions in some cases, and this is one. No one knows why. But Kavanuagh's approach is the more common one. If you can ground the decision in a statute, you do that.
Nothing personal, but all the justices know more about the constitution than any of us, you surely included. If one goes purely by what the constitution says, you never, ever get close to Roe v. Wade. Like that?
The history of the 14th is somewhat complicated. That's why the opinions are so long. You may know more about it than the justices, but I never see your name on list of potential nominees, so perhaps not.
Hey Kauffman, sorry to say this but you sound like a bully. Critique the content in Heather’s post, not people’s opinions. This is a supportive community.
Dear A Kauffmann, thank you again for engaging in dialogue, although your ad hominem attacks show the niggling merit of your participation in it.
Once again, I find myself wondering for an instant if you are joking about Kavanaugh’s opinion. If it were in line, why did no one sign onto it? Why did that ethical jurist, as you claim, Roberts, state that it is “at war with his supposedly unifying principle of the Clause”?
I recognize that the goal of many decisions by the Court is to make narrow decisions, so perhaps you could give some credibility to your unexamined love of the court by explaining how Trump vs. United States is in any way “narrow.”
If you would like to establish credibility, perhaps you could drop the attacks and engage in reasonable debate, which would include specifics.
I’m saying the stacked Supreme Court wouldn’t know a cheater if they stood up in their soup. Have you been living under a rock?
If you knew anything about the Supreme Court, how it operates, you would come across as more legitimate. The Court is not corruptible. Cheaters standing up in soup are not usually before the court.
By the court being stacked, you surely mean you preferred when it was stacked in favor of things you care about?
The Court issues 55-80 opinions a year. Which ones were the result of "stacking"?
Sorry to rain on your parade, but I am very familiar with the Supreme Court.
You live in a dream world. Not corruptible? Why do you think billionaires bestow gifts on Thomas, Alito and Robert's wife.
A Kauffman, dream on!
Funny, A Kauffmann, you do not seem particularly familiar with the Supreme Court.
If you are, how do you feel about Thomas's close relationship with Harlan Crow? How about sitting on cases that they have a vested interest in? How about Roberts asserting that they do not have to follow a code of ethics.
If anyone needs to give examples, you do.
You have to admit it’s a crazy coincidence—FIFA has a President Infantino and so does the U.S. !
Great observation.
Great comment!
They they are twins. Chump looks ahead, he started courting the idiot yesrs ago. No power-grabbing effort is ever wasted. Repub mantra for 40+ years
GW, good point!!
Tee hee! Just Biden' my time here.
It's good to hear you're awake and in good health, A Kauffmann
I'm sorry to recognize your friends are white supremacists (with apologies for the oxymoron).
Blocked under new TOU digital tools
Which of my friends? Tell me who they are! And by the way, what is a "white supremacist"? I see that phrase used here all the time in so many contexts that I don't see the meaning.
Hi A Kauffmann, I note your continued refusal to respond to any questions I've posed. Perhaps my sense that you are not a good faith interlocutor was a good call. You rely on blanket statements, odd generalizations, refuse to state any specifics, and deflect by stating you don't know the context. As for your friends, it would seem that you don't read the Supreme Court opinions that you claim to be so knowledgeable about. No wonder you believe its members are incorruptible. Perhaps you should begin to include yourself in the 98-99% of people whom you claim know nothing about the Court but only know how they feel about specific decisions. So: Unlike you, I will answer your question by referring you to the removal of protective status from Haitians by the Court, which required the majority to absolutely ignore the statements by this administration regarding the Haitians who were granted protective status in the US. Here, you can read the opinion, along with Kagen's dissent, now. When you get to the dissent, you will see just what makes the majority opinion a testimony to white supremacy: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/25-1083_f204.pdf
What the majority refuses to acknowledge as profound racism -- which would be the legal reason to not grant the administration's request for removal of protective status -- is so vile, I will not quote it here. With my original post, though, I was thinking of the people who support the current administration. If you don't think that white supremacists support it, may I refer you to the people who went to the July 4th "celebrations", including the so called and clearly misnamed Patriot Front: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/patriot-front-dc-protest-viral-photo-b3009291.html Ah, specifics! I love facts. I personally love the truth. Oh, and you wonder again about context? It was July 4th in Washington DC, 2026. The men who are so ashamed of their beliefs they must disguise their faces are headed to the Mall to celebrate with your president. Perhaps, next time, you will try to answer a few questions yourself.
Christopher, I am sure our players felt the pain of the interference by Trump and his minions. I suspect our US team would have done better without that interference. Trump is obsessed with the "connections" he makes that he thinks he can/should use to get whatever he wants. I think of that as toddler America. Where are the adults who can tell these toddler-men "NO?"
everything trump touches dies
I agree! Trump’s interference caused the team to lose the “heart” that they had shown up until last night. Trump lost the game and showed the world how corrupt we are.
I credit the Belgian team for being ready to play. They were the better team last night.
Gone silent, sad to say. Cults recruit, not correct
Calvin Ball.
Who do you mean?
Not a name for an adult. "Calvin ball is a game with no rules and played between a child (Calvin) and his stuffed tiger (Hobbs)"
https://calvinandhobbes.fandom.com/wiki/Calvinball
That's the name of our Howard county MD county executive who's been a great person for our county!
I'm sure the rest of the team felt sharply degraded by the notion that they couldn't win without their top scorer.
He operates like the mafia. He told ‘his’ people to get info on the referee. He already knows about Infantino. Then he goes to Infantino and says drop the red card or some information is going to come out. This is how he makes ‘deals.’
That’s how I see Republicans, “cheaters never win” as we would say as children.
Republicans are and have been cheating for as long as I can remember, we’ve let them. The go along to get along is over, the indignities suffered by approximately 70% of Americans under this regime is making the algae in the Reflecting Pool look electable. The other 30% wear masks when there’s no national health crisis, and cry about wearing one when there is! Do you know how ludicrous you truly are? So weak and cowardly, yet I’m sure you were well paid to toss your integrity in the toilet to show up in Washington D.C. masked and dressed Ken doll style.
Reading this thread, who is the most shocked at Trump’s interfering as POTUS in the outcome of sporting event? Anyone? Anyone at all?
It is completely disgusting.
Not me, but I know not to support evil. We’re the choir, are we not.
JDinTX, we are the choir, but sometimes even the choir needs to be reminded of the mission.
In some places, definitely so
Karen, yes! Great observations! Cheating is the Republican coin of the Realm, and they use it liberally, nearly everywhere and think we are all too stupid to know what they are doing. We know and are working to figure out how to get more people to realize what Trumplandia is doing to them and how they are hurting this nation and the American people, not just the immigrants and other people Republicans don't like! Trump doesn't care much about that, just that he has power and can do whatever he wants, just like a badly-parented toddler. We need to be and find more adults to be in the room.
USA was always going to be an underdog against Belgium, with or without Balogun. But our team had confidence, energy, unity and an ability to block out all the noise. Not only that, they gave so many of us something to feel good about in a time when good feelings are hard to find.
All that went out the window when The Grump injected himself into this. It was no longer about us but about him, and our own support of the team now had to be defended to others who thought “well if you support the team, you must support him, too.” It cast a similar shadow over the team, by injecting them into a political debate they never asked for, and it reminded fans around the world why everybody hates America right now.
While our players were now distracted and confused about how to respond to all this, the infuriated Belgians ratcheted up their intensity and proceeded to whip our asses. Moreover, the whole episode stole the joy out from under us fans. It underscored the sad reality that there can be no nice things as long as this regime has any power.
And perhaps that's the lesson here. Every time he fucks with us, we just get madder and madder. We have all had it with him already of course, but we haven’t gotten a chance to have our say. When we do, it's going to be brutal for him. It will make the beatdown our team took yesterday look like a Sunday picnic.
From your lips to God’s ear. 💙
"I think you're a little suspect." was a famous movie line from the 1997 crime drama Donnie Brasco where mobsters question the loyalty of an undercover agent.
The only "Donnie" and-or "mobster" in this national humiliation is Cheeto or make that Cheato
OMG, Cheato will be headed off to another debacle at NATO meeting shortly.
Neat catch Sean. Thanks
Everybody, The Platform, Substack Inc has a new vastly superior "Report" function with specific categories of TOU, Terms of Use, violation categories.
I follow emerging national "case law" on bad actors. Of course, we are all mutually bound to the terms of the existing TOU but, the new "Report" functions are spot on. YES, you can permanently block bad actors.
I have been posting to Substack Inc. my old SF neighbor about digital standards for years now. I am extremely pleased with their new digital discourse "Reporting" rules & enforcement frame work.
Substack Inc: I know now you never thought the Platform would hear this from me but, GOOD JOB!
The USA hasn’t sunk to a new level of ridicule - Trump has. You and I and 330 million US citizens had nothing to do with it.
My daughter was so upset that she said everyone should boycott playing against the US. We had discussed why these team boycotts are not happening, at least not this year. However, she knows I am boycotting the US World Cup games as a member of Indivisible Abroad which is supporting the Economic Resistance action to boycott the US World Cup games. I have boycotted the entire WC even in Canada and Mexico, because FIFA is a rotten to the core organization. This is my first year of conscious nonparticipation in the rituals surrounding the WC games, which I have viewed in several countries. At this point, Trump and the Infantile Infantino have tainted the games beyond belief. I was fine with my daughter enjoying them though. Now, she is so-o-o disgusted too, and the Welt Meisterschaft is not even over. She was working all night on a presentation and told me in the morning that Belgium had won. You know that all the other countries in the world were sending Belgium positive energy. Now, Trump will not get to take another gold cup from a team that won it.
The right thing to do would sit him down for the entire game as required by the red card.
Meanwhile, Trump touches it and destroys things for the team. His reign is characterized by destruction. That includes of rules and norms and alliances. Here is Ronnie Chieng to tell us about the red card.
https://youtu.be/i9EJPcb36ws?si=Tobtv4m2a0xEVDGx
I had to watch the entire thing. I'm still chuckling. Thanks Linda.
😂
We all are tainted
Here is Ronnie Chieng to tell us about it. https://youtu.be/i9EJPcb36ws?si=Tobtv4m2a0xEVDGx
This is just one more example of the fact that anything Agent Orange touches, dies.
Moral antimatter.
It wasn't cheating. Cut the drama. The suspension of the suspension was under a rule that was enacted by FIFA long before Trump.
Did the pressure help? Probably. But there's a somewhat more innocent explanation: that FIFA wanted a vibrant tournament and thought that as hosting country, a good fully stocked US team was good for the game. They were probably right, thought the US collapse was surely not what they had in mind.
Heather, America needs you to step up to the plate and become Maine's Candidate for US Senate. Your ethics, honesty, and knowledge of history would landslide Susan out of office.
In two years you could run for President and red flag trump and the Retrumpicans out, and reverse America's decline.
You can do it. Please do it.
It's not who she is, but it is a nice thought regardless.
As a complete outsider to Maine and its politics, I'm left speechless about both its Democratic Party and its politics. Were there no guardians at the gate keeping the riff-raff out? Were the red flags waved *before* this insufficient? Was the hatred for Chuck Schumer THAT great that those on the far left rushed to put forward an obviously flawed man (even then) over Janet Mills?
Whatever happens now, it's going to be awkward as all get-out, just at the moment when we need perfect serves, not net calls, in the Senate races.
As a victim of U.S. Senate bait and switch, I say, “Better now than later when you were really stuck with him.” John Fetterman never had my support, I wanted Connor Lamb, and I still do. Then to lose our beloved Robert Casey to a guy living in CT?
Senate malfeasance ran rampant in PA in ‘22 and ‘24. This is a chance to avert disaster. A gift from the universe. Learn from how PA was manipulated. November is infinity weeks from now, no one will remember.
Ohio as well
Love Sherrod Brown! I’m in OH often around the Columbus area. He is gaining support by the day. I’m very optimistic for him to win the senate race.
I'm in Sen Brown's corner as well, but I truly wish someone half his age ( like an Ossoff! ) would step up. Hopefully, someone will in a couple years so we can throw Nazi Morino into the same crap heap as Husted!
Karen, I like Brown too and was appalled that someone so well-liked could lose. I think the same device that gave McCormick the victory in PA, also defeated Sherod Brown. I think a lot of our election system was infected with the AI algorithms designed for that state and that district in the case of a few members of Congress, just enough to assure a Republican majority. We do need to be so careful because cheating does not go away on its own; it will continue and possibly escalate if not curbed.
For an Ohio family member & all of us, I am a supporter & donor for Dr. Amy Aton. See, ACTIONFORGOVERNOR.COM.
Dr. Acton is up against a Billionaire & has moved ahead by a sliver.
As a Clevelander, I'm a loud and proud supporter of Dr. Acton. I truly believe she will be our next governor, but this IS Ohio, so, inexplicitly, Swampi will be a very close second. That, of course, is assuming the "You're not allowed to vote Act" ( AKA 'Save 'merica ) isn't forced through.
You have a real point there.
Karen, I am with you. I liked Connor too and voted for him in the primary. I had no choice but to vote for Fetterman in November of 22 because Oz, a non-Pennsylvanian jerk was worse. I do think there was AI manipulated cheating in the 2024 election in the swing states which included PA, which is how we got a CT jerk in place of a good man, Bob Casey elected. We do need to be much more careful about our tallying machines. I believe we should have random recounts to make sure the machines are working accurately and that there are no devices attached to the sockets and cords of the machines that can transmit algorithms to change votes. We all need to be awake and paying attention, even if some people think it looks bad. It looks a lot worse to have Trumplandia in power when it didn't actually win the election.
Same here, Ruth, same here. I think someone hinkyed with the senate races in PA.
I worked the polls in the 2020 election. My sister is the poll judge for her district (beet red), I helped out during COVID. So I have some experience with the system. Random recounts is a good, logical, means to keep vote counts accurate. Vigilance is necessary, with diligence and determination I’m hopeful our elections will remain free and fair despite the machinations we were blindsided with in 2024. In other words, “Winners never cheat, and cheaters never win”.
there were guardians warning the party about platner...they were women's voices...need I say more?
According to Platner, a committee of Maine Democrats went to Graham Platner's house and met with his wife and him about a year ago. They asked him about his skeletons and he told them about the Reddit posts and some other potential issues. His wife also brought up some things at the time. I have no idea who else they talked to, but they came to an agreement so he ran. He organized a grass-roots movement of over 15,000 volunteers all across the state and has held well over 400 rallies, many of them with national progressive Democrats like Bernie Sanders and Ro Khanna.
Janet Mills only threw her hat in the ring when the Reddit posts and tattoo issue came out. She handled it very badly attacking Platner which alienated her from many of her potential voters. Plus she is 78 years old. If she had been in her 60's it would have been a much closer race I think, but that's neither here nor there.
Anyway, I have met or attended rallies for dozens of politicians over the years in several states. As I have mentioned Tom Harkin was our next door neighbor in IA. He was the real deal as was Tom Osborne in Nebraska. Some politicians are hard to judge, like Platner. His message and his interactions the three times I saw him were charismatic and honest.
If he was a Republican, he could likely weather the rape charges, and I honestly believe that. But, as a Democrat, I think he's toast.
Susan Collins approval rating is in the low 30's in ME, so she is beatable with the right candidate and the stable of Democratic candidates is quite deep. But, so far 97 billionaires have donate almost $10 million to Collins's PACs.
But, her husband divorced his wife of 39 years while she had terminal cancer and married Collins a year later. His wife died before they had been married a year. Rumor has it that Collins and Saffron were having an affair for years in DC where he was a lobbyist, but that has never been confirmed.
Anyway, it's a made for TV movie. The ending should be interesting.
GJ, most of the time, I just don't understand the Democratic Party. It's not like the incident happened ages ago and Platner "forgot" about it. If the alleged rape was disclosed during the initial meetings with Platner, why didn't Democratic organizers just tell him then and there, "You have too much baggage. You can't run."
If the Democratic operatives thought they could keep the scandal under wraps, they're idiots. They had to know Collins has the machine, money and motivation to do the oppo research on Platner and discover this problem, which they probably did. Then, an anonymous phone call to someone at Politico at the last minute would trigger exactly this implosion.
All the time and resources wasted on Platner's campaign could have been devoted to a "clean" candidate who's not an elderly fossil. Now, Maine faces a Biden-to-Harris situation where the front-runner gets shitcanned at the last minute and the replacement doesn't have time to build up the enthusiasm inertia to win.
I totally agree. However, Platner's wife stood up for him which likely helped and he is the most charismatic political candidate I have ever heard and I've heard and met dozens in person. I never met or heard Obama, Clinton or Reagan in person, but IMO, he was in that class.
The bottom line is that we are sick and tired of Susan and ready to have someone that isn't a Republican.
Like Harry Reid said, "Collins is always there when you don't need her."
Hear hear!
I don't think these Dem Committees truly VET anyone. If you read the Substack by TFN, (Jonathan Larsen), he's done plenty of reporting work of candidates, where he discovered all kinds of stuff, spoke with many people who had dealing with candidate and never ever had been asked about those dealings by any Dem vetting committee.
The thing is...I don't think people who have no baggage at all--who have lived a life devoid of mistakes and missteps--haven't really lived at all and perhaps haven't learned much in their sojourn thus far. Platner has insisted that he has changed...and perhaps he has. But we need more time to believe it and he needs to work a little harder on owning his most serious mistakes. PTSD can't be blamed for everything.
I agree that vetting is grossly inadequate.
I also agree that making mistakes is pretty-much the only way we learn in life. However there are mistakes and there are crimes. I think a man (or woman) who has ever forced sex on another person may have changed since it happened, but still needs to seek a career outside of politics. It's a vulnerability that cannot be overlooked.
If Platner steps away NOW, who else could jump in at the last minute and have a shot at beating Collins? This is a national crisis.
Troy Jackson, Nirav Shah, Shenna Bellows...all have been campaigning recently. I read something about a poll from Bloomberg which had Troy Jackson beating Collins by 4 points right out of the gate. We HAVE to have someone who can beat Collins and While Governor Mills has been a decent Governor...she only got into this race because Schumer talked her into it. We really needs some young PROGRESSIVE blood and dammit, it sure looked like Platner would have beat Susie and been a great Senator...if only.
I also heard Chellie Pingree's name mentioned, but that would leave a big question mark in ME-1. I have met Shenna and spoken with her several times. She came very close in the governor's race, but Troy Jackson beat her out for 3rd place. Any of the three you mentioned T L, I would support.
I haven't taken our Platner sign down yet, but my wife already said she wouldn't vote for Platner. Too bad he had so much baggage.
I loathe Susan Collins for confirming Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Alito and Roberts, plus not voting for the ACA, releasing the OBBBA from committee and the 6 vacations her and her husband took paid for by lobbyists and corporations. (And so much more).
Heather Cox Richardson
She certainly is eligible to run, but IMO we need her too much doing what she's doing. She reaches around 7 million people all across the globe every day. It would be hard to do that and be a US Senator as well.
Professor Heather Cox Richardson.
Saffron?
It isn’t the “hatred for Chuck Schumer.” It’s the desperate desire to form a strong opposition party. Unfortunately forming a strong opposition party requires taking risks.
Also, according to The Left Hook, Waj texted with Heather yesterday and she told him she’s thinking about it. My jaw dropped because I didn’t think it was something she was interested in. Listen to ~15:40 of his “breaking news” video about Platner.
ETA: Waj reads her text live at minute 48:45 of his video with Jess Craven yesterday (the video was supposed to be about Michigan). Jess Craven’s jaw drops just like mine did.
I love HCR. Been reading her since the inception here. I think she could win but at what cost to her?
Same here...would never have thought being in politics was a thing Dr. Richardson would be interested in.
I get it that Heather doesn't see herself as a politician or even want to be one. But she is also a patriot and a scholar of history, who surely knows that sometimes, the moment chooses you. This may be that time.
Chris, even if she chose to serve only one term, she would be a valuable asset in the Senate and would get a really good idea of what the Senate is like, particularly when it is so deeply divided.
TL, I have to think that she is thinking about it due to a sense of responsibility to the state/country. Maine is in a really tough spot. I have to imagine she would win that seat if she runs. She probably realizes this and is thinking she can use the collateral she has built up to get Maine out of this awful situation.
I totally agree. I think the universe is calling for her to run. She’s thinking about it.
“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them”- William Shakespeare.
And she's always claimed to be a Lincoln Republican.
L M, the professor may be "thinking about it," but I suspect that after she thinks about it, she will decide against running. Being a great historian and political analyst are not qualifications for being a senator. HCR leads a happy, busy life that allows her to take time off and paddle on the clean waters of the Maine coast. Being a senator is a miserable, dirty business.
I'm reminded of my mentor, Joe F. Brown, Jr., who was a general manager of a couple Leggett stores in Charlottesville, VA, and invested a fortune in company resources in me. He probably had more influence on the company than any of the owners because he trained and groomed young talent who would go on to manage three-quarters of the stores in the chain. The Leggett brothers repeatedly asked him to take a corporate position, which he repeatedly declined. His answer: "Thank you, no. I believe I'm making the best contribution to the company right where I am."
I suspect she is thinking about it out of a sense of responsibility—not because she wants to do it, but because she knows she can help get Maine out of this situation. I’m not even saying she should run. I’m just pointing out to others who said “she would never consider it” that she is apparently actually considering it.
If Platner is the best the Maine Democrats could come up with, they are toast.
Doesn't this seem eerily reminiscent of an occasion a couple of years back when a candidate for high office waited too late to bow out of the race?
YES, Platner must officially withdraw. Now less than 7 days.
He is the best campaigner I have ever seen and I've lived in 10 states including CA, IL and FL. But, he is likely a rapist and maybe even an alcoholic.
Fortunately, Susan Collins approval has dropped from around 80% in 2012 to around 30% now. She voted against the ACA and many times against raising the Federal minimum wage. She voted for Gorsuch, who never should have been a SCOTUS nominee, Kavanaugh, where she contradicted herself many times during her 45 minute defense of her vote, Roberts and Alito. She did not vote for Comey-Barrett.
Her net worth is near $10 million along with her lobbyist husband and she lives in a 4000 sq ft home in Bangor.
The 18-54 year olds don't support her at all. Her base in 55 and up white people especially evangelicals.
However, It's Come to This, Susan Collins is still a flawed candidate. She has done little to nothing to help the people of Maine, serves her Donnie more than the people of Maine, and will vote for something positive if her vote won't matter in the long run. That is not the kind of person Maine or any other state should have in our Senate.
Flawed but Rs will vote for her. Unfortunately everything is partisan now.
Correct. ICTT, you are a complete outsider to "Maine & it's politics".
And your asinine point would be...??
I agree. Where was the vetting process for Platner? If there was one incident of sexual harassment, of course there were others!
I don’t know if any of you remember a radio station the used to play episodes of ‘Men from Maine’ . It was hysterically funny, and so appropriate now!
He wasn’t properly vetted. I’m not exactly sure why.
🤬 Yes, ICTT, you are a complete outsider. WE MAINERS get to decide who we want representing us in the House and the Senate. You can take your pontifications, patronage and inaccurate platitudes and shove them...in the waste basket
I see. So the Maine Democratic Party made a brilliant choice, then? One that, of course, has no effect on the rest of the country during the most critical mid-terms in its history? Is that the point?
Heather has said on at least a few occasions that she has ZERO interest in participating in politics. Her interest is in reporting history, not making it.
An additional thought, if I may: Heather is already making history.
Listen to The Left Hook’s “breaking news” video yesterday on this topic. Around minute 15:40, Waj says he texted with Heather yesterday and she said she was thinking about it. My jaw dropped because I also didn’t think she was interested.
ETA: Waj reads Heather’s text during his video with Jess Craven yesterday. Minute 48:45 of the video that was supposed to be about Michigan…. Jess Craven’s face looked like mine.
TRUE Zelita but, sometimes democracy is complicated.
She would win. But. I see her in a more important role. Presidential advisor for the Democrat who will become president in January 2029.
We need her too badly doing what she's doing. I've seen three names floated to replace Platner. Chellie Pingree, the longtime Congresswoman for ME-1, Troy Jackson, who Platner supported for Governor and Janet Mills. My personal choice would be Shenna Bellows, whose ethics and values are impeccable.
When she spoke at a meeting where she was invited as the Secretary of State, she was asked a question about her governor's bid. She refused to answer the question because she said it would be unethical. She was invited to this event as the Secretary of State.
My next choice would be Pingree but who would replace her for her Congressional seat?
And then there's Nirav Shah who was runner-up in the Governor's Democratic Primary.
As a Mainah and a woman, I struggled with the news about Platner. At first I thought it was another MAGA ploy to get rid of him. As more evidence comes out, it appears the woman is telling the truth! How courageous of her to speak out! Now what to do! I voted for Bellows for governor & would support her as a senate candidate. Since Shah & Jackson are also worthy candidates and already have a structured campaign, they are also possibilities! We need Collins out since she supports a rapist President and his horrific policies. Remember the Epstein Files!
"I would vote for a soup can if it would mean getting rid of Collins."
Did you see the story about her accepting 6 luxury vacations?
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/susan-collins-received-several-paid-luxury-vacations/ar-AA27053n
As a life long Mainer, I have the highest respect for Sheena Bellows! Her integrity is unquestionable and she would make Maine proud as. US senator! We must defeat Susan Collins!
Did you go to any of her parties the day before the election? I went to the one in Ellsworth. She was very upbeat and thought she had a chance if it went to four rounds. Her mom introduced her and did a very nice job.
I had seen Shenna a couple weeks previous. At that rally, Graham Platner's mom introduced Shenna. I wish she would have run instead of him.
Totally agree about Bellows. And after the current fiasco, it only seems right to get behind a woman - preferably not a geriatric one.
yes, I know. But sometimes circumstance creates its own path. .
I misspelled Shenna in my haste.
It is a Cincinnatus type moment
I wouldn't wish political office on someone as intelligent, perceptive and active as she.
She might find a more suitable spot behind-the-scenes, in some advisory and policy making role.
We need her commentary. Maine Dems need to take care of this.
As a Mainer I agree!
Paul, and even if she wanted to stay in the Senate, she would be making noise there and calling out false statements, inaccuracies, and just plain lies for what they are! That would be amazing!!
I wouldn’t want Heather to run for office! It’s a nightmare. I prefer that she keeps on doing exactly what she does! She’s brilliant and we need a sane, intelligent, competent voice now.
Robinhood In reverse might as well be the mantra of the whole MAGA GOP, not that their supporters are even remotely aware of the party’s true objectives..
They don’t hear it from any pulpit, I’d venture to say
A lot of the “ pulpits” are the problem. I live in the Bible Belt, and the fundamentalist churches have convinced their followers that they will go to hell if they ever vote for a Democrat.
Funny, that. These are the Jesse Helms, Strom Thurmond Dixicrats who in past years would have gladly taken a beating before they would vote Republican.
Religion has caused more wars than politics.
You are so right, and Jesus kicked to the curb.
its a whole chain of power, how does one break this link Kelli, you take one down someone else replaces them...I think governments should be utterly transparent, starting from funds.
In a government of, by and for the people, who, in the end, is the boss?
In a perfect world, maybe, but we don't live in one of those.
WE CAN TRY.
THE PEOPLE!
Wake up, folks. The July 4 fiasco and the FIFA scandal have been massive distractions- Trump's go-to play. We've all been conned yet again.
When did someone last mention the Epstein files? The boat strikes and the extrajudicial killings of the supposed drug smugglers? The war in Iran and the stalled progress in the "negotiations." The "Board of Peace" and the destruction of Gaza?
Trump and his handlers are relentless in pursuing what they want. And Trump has told us all what he really, really wants: the Save America Act. It is the zombie bill that keeps on coming back. The closer to the midterms that it can be enacted, the more chaos it will cause. Delay is another of Trump's favorite tactics.
July 10 is the deadline by which Trump must veto the housing bill, or it becomes law. If he signs it, he gets to send his MAGA supporters a message that he still cares about them. If he vetoes it, he sends a message to the Republicans who are wavering in their support that he doesn't care if he guts them politically, and he will keep his word that he will not sign any other legislation until he gets his way. At that point, they will be out of politics unless they cheat to win at the midterms by supporting SAVE America. Right now, the obstacle is the Senate parliamentarian, who is holding the line on whether it can be part of a reconciliation bill and avoid the filibuster. The Senate majority leader appoints the parliamentarian and serves at that leader’s discretion, meaning the majority leader can have the parliamentarian removed and a new one installed. So how stiff a reed is John Thune? Would he be willing to do that to give Trump what he wants and save the filibuster?
Trump's handlers have a backup plan that was previewed on July 4th with the Patriot Front display, and the return of the "red menace" of COMMUNISM. And once again, while we have been distracted with FIFA, Trump has rewritten the script for the midterms, turning Democratic Socialists into an existential threat with nobody on the workers' side pushing back.
Honestly Georgia people are just plain worn out. It's been 10 years and 2 terms in office. Everyday it's a tsunami. But you are right. We need to focus.
Yes, Georgia ... All these distractions are to draw attention away from the priority mission at hand: suppressing the vote.
Holy Mike Johnson has just said the quiet part out loud. He intends to push the SAVE act through Congress by using some reconciliation sleight-of-hand.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2026/07/06/speaker_johnson_save_america_act_is_top_priority_house_will_pass_it_one_more_time.html
Dale Rowett, thank you for reminding US about holy baby Johnson. (Will the British please make US a baby Johnson balloon to go with the baby Trump balloon?)
Iran is still in the news because they’re to control the Strait, including shooting at ships.
My most respectful salute to you, Georgia, for this truly accurate sit-rep. In response, here are couple of less obvious but nevertheless relevant points.
(1) – A major element of forbidden and thus eternally suppressed USian history explains Trump's threat to exterminate as "communists" of any of us still courageous enough for empathy.
Thanks to the [unprecedented] USian skills at censorship and deception, the vast majority of us here have no idea that what evolved into the New Deal had absolutely [nothing] to do with humanitarianism, equality or democracy. It was instead an expression of the truly bottomless fear and fury with which our masters responded to the Red Army's relentless enforcement of the Soviet Revolution's humanitarian demands. The plutocrats' malignant anxiety triggered a raging but almost entirely clandestine debate* about the relative counter-revolutionary effectiveness of concession verses extermination; concession won, though only because it was recognized as far less destructive of physical infrastructure -- and therefore more profitable -- than expansion of the U.S. military's deadly infantry, artillery and air-corps campaigns against strikers and protestors.
Though readily pimped by USian propagandists into a humanitarian disguise, the New Deal was most assuredly [not] an expression of our overlords' alleged "empathy"; as too many of us are too brain-warped to ever acknowledge, the capitalist is our species' deadliest manifestation of Absolute Evil, perpetrator of the most malignantly self-obsessed, wantonly ecogenocidal sociopathy [ever] to criminally jeopardize this planet. Thus we're denied the vital knowledge that without the overthrow of Tsar Nicholas II and the triumph of Lenin and Trotsky, there'd have been no New Deal, no New Frontier, no Great Society** -- not even as the begrudgingly administered, temporarily pacifying, counter-revolutionary programs many of us in the more politically enlightened quarters of the NYC press corps recognized them to be. Obviously our masters fear that if we knew the bitter truth implicit in this forbidden history -- the paradox that under patriarchy, the only possible preservative of humanitarianism is brute force -- we'd realize the end of Reconstruction in 1878 was also the beginning of the end of the so-called American Dream. But the Red Army was for a time the Dream's valiant restorer -- and that is why Trump is so determined to exterminate all Communists and Marxism itself -- even if it requires toxifying our Mother Earth to [everlasting] Precambrian lifelessness.***
(2) – Given our circumstances, the notion that, “Powerful men protecting other powerful men from consequences is...corruption” is nothing more than a comforting aphorism. From the capitalist perspective, there is no such thing as “corruption.” There is merely profit – no matter the ecogenocidal consequences: think of the planetary suicide of terminal climate change; reflect on the meaning of Triangle Shirtwaist, Bhopal, Exxon Valdez and Deepwater Horizon. What We the People perceive as “corruption” is in fact the capitalist norm, capitalism in action. It is also our extinction. And given the technological omnipotence of those who doom us, it is ever more undeniable there can be no rescue – if indeed any such opportunities ever existed -- until patriarchy itself is no more.
__________________
*My primary sources on the concession-versus-extermination debate are dead relatives. My paternal grandfather, Amos Read Bliss, was one of the founders of the automotive industry. (His widow, my paternal grandmother, lost his estate -- the holdings of which included extensive properties in Canada, most of a county in rural Maine and an entire lake in rural Michigan -- to the Crash of '29.) Our overlords' conflict over how best to preserve capitalist malevolence also surfaced, albeit briefly, in FDR's refusal to prosecute the perpe-traitors of the Business Plot, which we elders are more likely to know as the Bankers’ Plot, a 1933 effort by our Wall Street masters to maximize profit by reducing us to a satellite of Nazi Germany. https://allthatsinteresting.com/the-business-plot
**Each of the half-dozen labor historians I interviewed during my working press years said – off-the-record of course – that [none] of the USian labor movement’s New-Deal-Era successes would have been possible had our masters not been terrorized into compliance by the Soviet Union and its Red Army.
***Most of us who came to age after the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was slain by capitalist attrition have no sense of the Red Army’s breathtaking power at the apex of its might. Here are two indicative examples; much of the footage in the first two links is documentary; the second link is provided both for its translation from Russian to English and for the message implicit in the fact the singers are women. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUVENE9nH3s and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kECQowBmsUo. The third link is to a historical film that continues to get top marks from non-USian reviewers. It is the story of the siege of Fortress Brest in WWII, which Hitler’s Wehrmacht thought could be taken in four hours but which took nearly four weeks instead. More than a few critics describe it as the most accurately telling war film ever made. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lw3mDJ0qdp0 (With my apology for the double-posted first link, since corrected.)
Loren, I must respectfully disagree. I know a lot about the people who worked on the FDR New Deal and even "The Great Society" and it might have been a teeny bit about fear, but they really did want to make things better for the American people. Trump and his white house toddler pool are hoping to bring that red scare BS back in by calling Democrats Communists and other names they have no clue what they mean. We the People don't have to go along with their BS.
Ruth...Thank you. Gave you a "like" for two reasons:
Firstly, we are [not] in disagreement; we are instead viewing entirely different levels of the New Deal, which means your more accessible information is as correct as my disclosures. Think of the New Deal as like the Cassava plant: horrendously toxic roots, but vitally nutritious leaves and tubers (https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_maes.pdf).
Secondly, your description of New Dealers and other USian humanitarians who "really did want to make things better" -- as I can also attest (again from both my childhood and my working-press decades) -- is [entirely] accurate. But the well-wishers were on an entirely different level; they were [not] our true masters, the capitalists who own the nation and with their weaponized wealth dictate its policies. The well-wishers were the New Deal's operatives -- activists, social workers, hard-left documentarians like Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and James Agee, even the very few politicians who had somehow managed to preserve a bit of empathy -- and most of them truly did give it their very best efforts.
In a [just] world -- an utter impossibility under patriarchy and capitalism -- the real New Dealers would be forever honored as revolutionary heroines and heroes.
What We its Victims need to understand about capitalism -- most especially about USian capitalism, which by its embrace of Original-Nazi war-criminals was perfected to USSR-destroying omnipotence -- is that capitalism has always tended toward "der Führerprinzip"; the Original Nazis the U.S. adopted as advisors and comrades-at-arms merely provided the guidance that enabled our masters to permanently institutionalize der Führerprinzip as its sole organizational principle.
Whenever possible -- that is, to exploit populations already subjugated to submission -- our masters enforce der Führerprinzip by bribery. Nor is the bribery always Clarence-Thomas obvious; undoubtedly the most diabolically effective yet suicidally overlooked bribery in our species' entire history is the pimping of computerized convenience to seduce us to embrace the universal enslavement imposed by electronic surveillance -- the enslavement from which apocalypse is the [only] possible manumission or escape. But if a population somehow manages to mobilize [effective] resistance , our masters [gleefully] resort to ecogenocidal violence, often (e.g. Hitler and Pinochet) of the most grotesquely sadistic sort.
Originally, as in the New Deal era, der Führerprinzip applied only to major policy decisions; now -- because of our masters' technological omnipotence -- it literally determines the totality of our lives. Thus the [real] operation of USian governance is [irreversibly] dictatorial: nothing whatsoever obtains until our masters agree to permit it, which is yet another reason our liberation -- like Nazi Germany's -- can be achieved only by humanitarian invasion.
(The astute observer will thus note our circumstances today are identical -- with one definitive difference -- from those intended by the Bankers' Plot perpe-traitors: the failed United States is [not] a satellite of the Third Reich; it is instead its resurrection, this time with doomsday weapons, and therefore in probably unbeatable form.)
''The Red Card Republic''
America has finally found the one form of due process Donald Trump understands: calling a buddy.
Folarin Balogun got a red card, which in soccer means you did something bad enough to sit out the next game. In Trumpworld, however, rules are merely suggestions for people without phone access to FIFA. So Andrew Giuliani, because apparently one Giuliani was not enough damage for one century, alerted Trump. Howard Lutnick poked around. Lawyers circled. And Trump called FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who promptly discovered that discipline is a flexible concept when the United States president is breathing into the receiver.
Suddenly, Balogun was on probation. Not suspended. Probation. For a red card. The last time that happened was 1962, which tells you everything. FIFA had to reach back to the era of rotary phones and lead paint to find precedent.
Then Trump explained that he knows sports “really well,” which is always the warning siren before he proves he does not. He admitted he did not even know what a red card meant, but somehow knew the referee was “suspect.” Perfect. Ignorance and certainty, the twin engines of MAGA jurisprudence.
This was never just soccer. It was Trump’s entire governing philosophy in cleats: foul, whine, call a friend, attack the ref, and declare fairness illegal.
The same thumb on the scale appears in the economy, where the “One Big Beautiful Bill” showers the wealthy with tax cuts while yanking food and health care from working people. Robin Hood in reverse, only with worse hair, cheaper morals, and more subpoenas.
Now comes the SAVE Act, a voter suppression scheme dressed up as election integrity. Trump says if Republicans pass it, they will not lose for a hundred years.
Belgium beat the United States 4 to 1 anyway.
Apparently, even rigging the rules cannot teach Trump’s team how to defend.
"Ignorance and certainty, the twin engines of MAGA jurisprudence."
Michael, that is a whopper of a truth in a perfect sentence. Congratulations!
I think the US Mens soccer team felt ashamed of tRump's interference, and with shame clouding their minds they couldn't cooperate as a TEAM. I was proud of Belgium for winning in a "rigged" game against them.
Let's hope this is a real metaphor for November -- all their plans turn to shit in an instant. The gerrymanders backfire. Ruby-red districts and whole states once thought safe turn blue as the tsunami of utter disgust rolls in, and millions more understand our President is nothing but a fucking moron with criminal tendencies, and his party is nothing but a group of soulless scalawags lost in an awful cult.
One note -- the Big Ugly Bill would have been toast had Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins actually voted down what they knew was a piece of excrement when it got spewed out of the House at 3:30am in the morning. Just saying...
Nail head hit.
Not just "powerful men". The ENTIRE GOP!!
And the country that had a chance to be a leader in this regard pissed it away. Elected a mob boss with the morals of an alley cat. I apologize to alley cats. They have never, ever claimed to be paragons of virtue. The hypocrisy will reek until we all are tainted. Our country that most celebrated as what is was, has already become as damaged as the pool that reflects our flawed soul…
Powerful men protecting other powerful men from consequences is what hiding the Eipstein files are all about.
Trump ensured that the rest of the world was rooting for Belgium. According to my daughter they got their wish with Belgium winning 3:1. Let us hope the midterms go against Trump’s interference too.
4-1. I was rooting for Belgium.
Truth!!!
Yes!!!!
True!
True!!!!!!!!!
What happens when the rules are changed by those who made the rules have been canceled or replaced by corrupted rule makers? Then we are not talking about just rules.
Hiep hiep hoera voor de Belgen!!
USA cheated and still lost. So being humiliated, ridiculed and despised around the whole world was for nothing. Your players didn't deserve this humiliation. FIFA has corrupted the beautiful game, let's hope it is not beyond repair. Shame, oh the shame.
If the coach had an ounce of integrity, he would have had Balogun sit out the game in a demonstration of true sportsmanship.
Bingo - exactly, but he too has no integrity or spine.
exactly! It would have given the team a mental boost to battle against Belgium
I absolutely agree that the coach should have done the right thing and Balogun out of the game.
Don’t blame the coach who was hired to win, blame the know nothing clod who tried to put his thumb on the scale!
There are lots of examples in history of great coaches who put sportsmanship above winning and kept their jobs and their integrity. They were great leaders and beloved by their players. There are lots of other examples of coaches (mostly in college basketball and football) who put winning above everything and they are largely relegated to the scrap heap of arseholes you don’t want to emulate. Bobby Knight. Woody Hayes. The list is endless. US players were put in a no-win position by that corruption. If the coach had sat him out he would have shown confidence in the team, respect for the beauty of the sport, and integrity that players love to play for. Big F for Failure in Coaching. But then again, he knows he and his family would have faced death threats by the trumpino family.
….. and here in Europe we’re still laughing!
No laughing matter Andrew. Will Jarell Quansah, be able to play against Norway? .... well he should now.
in Canada too!
What would the outcome be if/when Trump starts calling actual balls and strikes in America’s favorite game? “I saw it with my own eyes - he was out. We have different pictures and videos.”
Yay — the world won 4 - 1. If it wasn’t for Trump’s interference I’d’ve rooted for the US soccer team. How humiliating 😩😪
Word from friends abroad is that their friends who are attending the World Cup are charmed and delighted by the kindness and friendliness of us—the Americans. The game is still a beautiful game. Trump is always a chump. The rest of the world has more experience of terrible tyrants than we have endured. They know the difference between a power mad poseur and the people. Despair not.
We can blame Trump all we want.
He is an unrepentant, egotistical, narcissist and world class jerk. That is all he will ever be.
My problem is in our 250th year, when we should have key phrases in the Declaration committed to memory (American scripture per Pauline Maier) instead we are heading toward the midterms in denial of what Trump is capable of with no apparent plan other than filing lawsuits.
While 250 years ago the founders pledged their loyalty and courage to each other and a fledging nation, we have become a nation of distracted sheep treating the billionaire class as celebrities and our democracy as an afterthought.
Wake up people. We can't afford to lose with a whimper all that the founders risked everything for. The consent of the governed means you need to take a stand. That was their gift to us: not a privilege but an enormous responsibility. Our silence is Trump's permission.
Sadly, democrats whimper when a roar is critical
That makes me sick.
Absolutely right, Thomas. I hope (enough) American citizens will wake up, and stand up!
“ . . . instead we are heading toward the midterms in denial of what Trump is capable of with no apparent plan other than filing lawsuits.“
I disagree we are in denial. Besides voting, what is your suggestion for action?
USA learned its lesson--don't get the Waffleheads angry!
I'm afraid President Bullshit didn't learn a single lesson, and whatever was learned by conscientious people here, he will try to bury -- perhaps with a "splendid little war" in Greenland or something.
It’s impossible for a Malignant Narcissist to learn a lesson. They can never be wrong.
who said Trump learned a lesson? USA learned a lesson. We are not Trump.
Ja inderdaad!
:D
Don’t know what you said but I agree
Yeeeeeeeeeeeeees!
Yeeeeeeeeees!!!!
Just after the loss, I posted the following on FB:
The USA’s 4-1 loss to Belgium underscores yet again how Trump’s interference can ruin whatever he touches. Did Belgium play better? Yes indeed. But there seemed to be an orange cloud hovering over the US team that nothing could disperse. When Trump decides that the rules don’t apply to him and mounts his bully pulpit, a pall settles over everything. And the estimation of the U.S. in the eyes of the world has sunk even lower.
Nate White, a British writer, was asked his opinion about Trump (republished from Meidas EpluribusUnum). Despite the length, worth reading in full...
"Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?... He has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities which British esteem, and which funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed....the stark contrast does rather throw Trump's limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
“Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever... And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it's a fact. He doesn't even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty. Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn't just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness. There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It's all surface.
“Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. We don't. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He's not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He's more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege....Worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
“He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless or female – and he kicks them when they are down. So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think 'Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy' is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that (1) Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and most are; and (2) You don't need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
“This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. It's impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump...."
A Shakespeare of Shit. Perfect.
Thanks ICTT — that was/is a masterful takedown.
Perfect! I can hear that summation being voiced in a proper British accent, as it should be. Paul Simon nets it out in "A Simple Desultory Phillippic": "The man ain't got no culture"
Such a perfect take down.
Old but more on target than ever. Priceless.
My goodness! That was so enjoyable! Thanks, ICTT!
Of course this is a commendable and excellent take down. I did once, while reading it, remember that even though I love Britain and some particular Brits, bullying, while it might now be socially condemnable there, is not missing from British history. Lots of examples. I could list a few, but I’ll leave that historians. Let’s just condemn it and replace it with all that is much better.
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👍🏻👍🏻🎯💥
Actually, it's not that Trump can ruin whatever he touches it's that he does ruin everything he touches. It's like a law of physics. Trump could ruin a reunion concert by all 4 Beatles.
And yet the majority of those who voted, voted for him. It says something about either the collapse of American virtue or that millions should return their diplomas.
Heard. But I think it transcends anything education could accomplish.
Trumpism and MAGA are identities as deeply held as a religion. To question its validity is heresy, blasphemy and a betrayal of one's friends and family.
Try to explain to a highly religious person that many of the events in the Bible are impossible and scientifically ridiculous.
Trumpism is hero worship on steroids. He can be forgiven for anything. We haven't evolved past the time when we left the trees to walk. We are addicted to "heroes".
We must have a person or a fantasy to worship in order to make sense of the big question: "Why are we here?" or "What are we?"
It is too scary to consider that we are all just temporary products of random evolutionary survival tools and ecological events. Like whales or octopuses. But dumber.
Trump knows this better than anyone. He said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose a vote. He took it a lot further, right? 200 people in open ocean assassinated. Over 100 school children in Iran. And depriving millions of USAID has already cost over 780,000 lives - just a warm up to the genocide.
And they will love him more. Go to church and sing his praises. Jesus Christ. Where are you when you are needed most?
Steve...actually the majority of those who voted did not vote for him. Heather has mentioned this before. 22 other candidates were on the ballot and their voters added up to 2,680,933 votes + write-ins were 235,673 votes. More people (77.9 million) did not vote for him. He received 77.3 million votes. The problem lies with the 77.3 ! and the ~90 million eligible voters who did not vote.
I have heard all this before. Every election comes down to those who vote and he got a majority of those votes. A non vote in this election was a vote for rightest extremism. People also voted for third party
candidates, that is true. But in our system, while perhaps a right or righteous move it only helps support the candidate who gets the most votes and it supports the electoral college selection - and again that was the felon. It is shocking to me that knowing democracy was on the line, so many chose to not vote or chose to support a third party candidate. These are my views as an independent, not having party allegiance.
Amen!
I am starting to blame the enablers more these days!
from Mirriam -Webster:
bully noun
a
: a blustering, browbeating person
especially : one who is habitually cruel, insulting, or threatening to others who are weaker, smaller, or in some way vulnerable
tormented by the neighborhood bully
b
: pimp
2
: a hired ruffian
3
archaic
a
: sweetheart
b
: a fine chap
bully adjective
1
: excellent
—often used in interjectional expressions
bully for you
2
: resembling or characteristic of a bully
his bully tricks
Methinks the meaning of "bully pulpit" has shifted under Trump.
I so agree Kelly!
“And I understand sports really well. Really well” BUT he didn’t know a red card meant he wouldn’t be able to play in the next game. Does DJT have one honest bone in his body?
"Does DJT have one honest bone in his body?"
Patricia, I know you know the answer to that. And it's not "yes."
Not one single one. I don’t think he has an honest cell in his body
Well, he does admit to a spur in one foot. Lots of us claim we had to take his turn in the draft and go to war while he had to stay home poor guy.
For 47, honesty is weakness. Admitting a mistake is a fatal error. Roy Cohn and Fred Trump created a monster who should have been incarcerated in the 1980s.
It's a preemptive strike against satirization.
No
My thought exactly--and, no, he doesn't. Recalling all the subjects he has ridiculously asserted that he understands/knows more about than anyone else.
The real issue is not who wins today's game. It is whether society still believes that rules are more important than those with the power to change them. A level playing field is not only the foundation of sport—it is also the foundation of democracy, justice, and trust.
Equal Justice Under Law. It's printed on the front of $COTUS. It outta be true.
Or maybe the issue is whether society still believes that rules are more important than those with the power to violate them with impunity. Anyone with even a modicum of wealth or celebrity or status can put paid to the notion that we're a nation that honors the rule of law.
We the people collectively have been asleep at the switch. Here's hoping we wake up enough before it's too late to avert total disaster.
Was, and May it be again. After all, that’s what “all men are created equal” was all about for the founders and for us, so I hoped
Yes to Heather's recounting detail by detail how the corruption goes on, goes on.
But, too, we can admire Ukraine – the greatest uses of drone technology in the world
We can admire Mandami’s great speech for the 250th celebrating U.S. diversity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JztQx56c2nA .
Need we put these positives in the context of criminal Donald – still ruining everything he touches in Washington, D.C.? His tariffs and his Iran war still hurting working-class America? He still covering up for all the rapists of the 1200 girls and young women criminal Donald’s pals trafficked?
Need we put tariffs, foreign war, D.C. demolition, rapes, and their cover-up in the context of what we used to call the Supreme Court? Didn’t its six proto-fascists swear oaths to the Constitution, and then decide to ignore the 14th amendment’s forbidding public office to any insurrectionist such as criminal Donald? Whose four of the six decided that same amendment’s birthright citizenship clause has no force of law if said citizens are black, brown, or some other non-white?
Yes, we’ve got Ukraine. We’ve got Mandami – several other, young public figures of similar decency and energy. Parallel yes, our positives come side-by-side the corrosions of our highest-placed moneyed still worshipping money, criminality, and corruptions.
I know that you know that you are 100% correct on this!!!
Colorado folks are on a positive roll.
The whole saga is also really cruel for the player, Folarin Bolagun. He has built a fine career and the last thing he'll want will be for ever remembered for this incident. It is also deeply ironic that he became a US citizen by birth, and would be exactly the sort of person Trump would want to strip of citizenship!! Good luck to him. I'll be making a point of supporting him at Monaco or wherever now.
Oh that IS ironic. I didn't know that Bolagun was a birthright citizen. Apparently his Nigerian parents lived in London and were visiting the US while his mother was in the late stages of pregnancy and the airline wouldn't board her when they were going back to London because of how far along she was. So they stayed in the US and had their child (Bolagun) in New York and thus, he became a birthright citizen! (That is the story as it is written on wikipedia.)
Well, at least Trump won't have to throw a big celebration for the US Soccer team now.
After all, they are "losers" and Trump HATES "losers"!
Cheaters never win.
Trump has been cheating and losing all his life. It will cost him everything in the end.
He cheats at golf. He cheats on his taxes. He cheats on his wives. In the summer of 2019 he made a call to Pres. Zelensky asking him to get dirt on Hunter Biden in exchange for military aid. He put pressure on Pence to pervert the Electoral College vote in 2020. And he made a phone call to Infantino asking for a 'favor.' We're at war, prices are through the roof, the climate is wrecked, and he takes the time to call in a sports fix.
Does anyone in the world trust anything he says or does?
Not many outside the US.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/10/only-one-in-10-europeans-now-see-us-as-an-ally-survey-suggests
His recent spat with Giorgia Meloni shows that even the European right is losing patience with him.
I'm hoping that at the NATO meeting the other attendees will finally make it very clear to him that they do not believe his lies and won't accept them or his bullying. No diplomatic pussyfooting, just bold truthfulness.
When a bully picks on a weakling on the playground, his weak and timid sycophants laugh. This defines the response of Trump‘s Maga army. When they arrived at the fork in the road they took it and they ain’t lookin’ back. They think Trump is absolutely hilarious. The weak, the timid, the cruel.
His cult seems to be addicted.
Tens of millions of U.S. school graduates, donna, voted yes to this in 2016 and 2024.
All the rich and powerful who raped the 1200 girls and young women also fully trust criminal Donald to protect them indefinitely.
Alas, I think cheating often wins in the short term, and that's why there is so much of it. It's comes at the expense of the common good though, and the evil that men do lives after them. We are fools if we let it stand.
Hurry karma, we’e desperate for you to take over
sadly his cheating affects not just America but the globe .
ICYMI: 7/6/26 An ex-girlfriend of Graham Platner decided to change the story she told the NYT in their hit piece on Platner and now accuses him of sexually assaulting her in an article in Politico and also now in a CNN interview “Woman alleges Graham Platner raped her in 2021 while they were dating, which he denies | CNN”. https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/06/us/graham-platner-racicot-allegation-maine-invs
While Wajhat Ali of the Left Hook was interviewing Jess Craven of Chop Wood Carry Water today 7/6/26 “Michigan Could Decide the Democratic Party's Future | Jess Craven - YouTube”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pT9amVoLtn8 they noticed in real time what was happening with Platner. Since the cut off date for candidate change in the Maine election is July 13th, they got the idea to call Heather and ask her if she would run in Platner’s place. She texted back that she would “have to think about it”. This is a major development because Maine’s U.S. Senate race is considered crucial to winning control of the Senate and then being able to among other things prevent Trump from putting replacement SCOTUS judges like Aileen Cannon on the Court.
Heather….RUN FOR THE SENATE!!
We Democrats have a real chance to do the right thing here (which the DNC should've done LONG ago) and WIN with a decent candidate. Get rid of Platner immediately and put real money behind Mills or another patriotic and popular candidate to win this seat in an exciting and crucial contest. IF Heather is even thinking about it, that would be amazing.
Funny how women never report these alleged sexual abuses until their alleged abuser is running for office.. so reminds me of Al Franken.. let her file a police complaint and have her day in court..
She reported the assault to a therapist and a friend. And she just may have her day in court since the statute of limitations hasn't run. So Candidate Platner might become Jailbird Platner.
If you don't understand why a traumatized rape victim might not file a police report, nothing anyone says here will penetrate (to use a figure of speech).
Good for her and I hope she gets her day in court.. until then whatever happened to Innocent until proven guilty?
He's not been proved guilty in a court of law yet; no one is claiming he has. But he's certainly been tainted, has tainted himself, by his own past conduct.
Perhaps but he has PTSD.. ever worked with Veterans?
Then as I have suggested since a month ago, he should go get treatment for his PTSD and he should have IMMEDIATELY come clean on ALL possible incidents where he might have assaulted (let alone raped) anyone.
He should be FAR AWAY FROM RUNNING FOR PUBLIC OFFICE! The standards for being a Senator, one of the selected 100 people in the United States who represent half of the legislative arm of our federal government, should be WAY ABOVE what Platner can present.
I have never argued he should be jailed for his behavior unless it was criminal as decided by a court, but I have argued strenuously that anyone who has this much baggage to be carried around doesn't belong in government, at least not the federal government.
Yeah, just like Trump shouldn't be there either.
And justifying Platner's run because we have a felon in the White House is nonsensical. It makes us no better than them. And personally, I want to always have a helluva lot higher standards for our representatives than the ones used by the MAGAts currently residing in the White House and Congress and even a few Supreme Court seats .
And also think about everything women have to go through and put up with in order to make such a claim. We would never claim such a thing unless it actually happened.
Anyone can be bought - for the right price.
Remember the Duke Lacrosse rape hoax? The case in Germany where a Woman of Russian origin claimed she was gang raped by arabs in 2016?
You misogynist asshole.
Bit rich coming from someone from a state who fought to preserve slavery and which only allowed mixed race marriages in 1967..let me guess your parents were proud members of the daughters of the confederacy and KKK?
You know you are a total jerk. You might notice that people of BOTH sides of the political spectrum live in every state. You should be ashamed of yourself, but quite obviously such insight would go right over your empty head.
Sure but for my family’s sake i live in a deep blue state where eduction and health is taken seriously by legislators.. feel free to call me names.. i bet you were the idiot in your family. The creepy uncle who nobody wants to see at family gatherings
Get your misogynist anonymous ass out of this forum.
Sure insult me.. you must be real classy in real life.
You are the low life, and you should get the hell out of here.
The creepy uncle again..
There's nothing remotely funny about it.
Agreed.. more like strange coincidence or happenstance that she changed her initial story to the NYT.. as i said she should absolutely file charges and take him to court or face a defamation suit.
She didn't change her story at all. She supported Platner's political goals and was trying to avoid condemning him for what she thought might be the only issue he had. As she has come to find out that he has a history of this kind of behavior, she decided that she had to make a full presentation.
And if what she did can't be figured out by your obviously worm-like mind, maybe you should just stop commenting since your lack of intelligence is plainly on display here.
As for whether she should press charges or file a civil suit, you don't have to be guilty of a crime or liable for a civil suit to be a lousy candidate as a Democrat. This "VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHAT" is total crap... if someone doesn't have the moral standards to know when to not sext people who don't want to be subject to it, that person doesn't belong in Congress regardless of whether they wouldn't be found guilty or liable in a court of law.
Jon, when someone starts to attack us in these forums - on a personal level, I think we are just wasting time on them. There is a blocking tool to apply when folks run out of good debatable facts and perspectives and descend into petty personal verbal assaults.
I thought there was too, something liike "block" on facebook, but unfortunately I can't seem to find out how to apply it here to hb861. When I do, trust me I will :-).
I also would like to say I appreciate the comment. We don't always see eye to eye, but as with most everyone else here, I think we all try to respect each other's views even when we disagree. Something this other guy (I think they're a guy!) obviously hasn't learned. Sigh...
Jon.. you are definitely that creepy uncle that everyone avoids at thanksgiving. Get some help and stay away from children
Like all forms of hate, misogyny makes people stupid. This allegation has been made while there is time to replace him. If the motive was nefarious, she would have waited until the replacement deadline had passed.
If she had been honest she would have disclosed her charges to the NYT when they first interviewed her.. she now retracted her story and made new allegations. I am not from Maine and, If i were, i would not have voted for him.. on the other hand i still believe in justice and innocence until proven guilty.. her credibility is shot and any defence attorney will have a field day with her in court..
Now you choose to misrepresent her. Not surprising - hate and honesty tend to find it difficult to coexist. Hate also makes people incurious which probably explains your complete ignorance of the evidence provided by extensive, high quality research into women's willingness to come forward with their experiences of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape and how they do reveal those experiences if they ever choose to do so.
And why would anyone delve deeply into „extensive, high quality research into women's willingness to come forward with their experiences of sexual harassment“.. do you delve deeply into any and all topics covered by the news?
Yes I do when it comes to the really important ones, and the sexual harassment, assault and rape of women and girls is so incredibly prevalent that it is one of the important ones.
We don't have to dive into the research literature databases to do our own literature reviews, meta-analyses and systematic reviews. We can often explore the research through lay person-friendly versions of the research written by the researchers themselves or through high quality interviews with the researchers and dig deeper into the original research publications later if we want to.
I recommend becoming curious, information literate and a critical thinker. The world is full of fools who talk and wrire drivel to con us, best to arm ourselves with the skills to combat them.
Al was targeted by Roger Stone. I’d bet the farm. Tried and true repub tactic
Why is anything about this funny? She even agrees with his politics and didn't want to speak up and ruin his chances to gain the seat. Try having your attackers name in your face every day after trying to forget it. You don't know anything, whoever hb861 you are.
My jaw dropped when I listened to Waj’s breaking news video minute 15:40.. saying this about Heather considering a run.
Trump created a teachable moment. For all of us and for our children. He taught us that the rich and powerful tilt the world in their favor. He also taught us that, at least in sports, that kind of tilt does not always work. Had Trump left the issue alone, the US would have been energized to overcome the effect of a bad decision by the referee. The US team would have played using their skill and cohesion. Instead, in the context that Trump created, they were enervated, unable to play at their best. Just as the consequence of Trump's political cheating has made the United States a lesser nation than we would otherwise have been, the US soccer team could not live up to expectation. They were robbed, not of their fine striker, but of their purpose and energy -- by Trump.
Exactly! It is hard to do your best when ‘shamed’
My heart breaks for those players who are but pawns in this regime's bullshit. They got caught in the crosshairs of the corrupt leadership aiming to destroy all that is good. Soccer unites us. Tyranny breaks us. Thank you HCR for artfully telling this story. It's a pivot point for humanity, once again, and our light is dimming.
The man who runs FIFA is just like Trump. Mr. Trump has the devil's touch. Whatever he touches dies. Did he affect the US soccer team with his corrupt interference in that game? We will never know, however their loss in the World Cup feels like 'poetic justice.' It is like something deep in the US soccer team said, 'no'. They just couldn't do it to themselves or the game of soccer. This is just like the majority of US people who are saying the same thing to Trump and his corrupt crew: No!!!
I agree. The heart had been ripped out of the American team. That was abundantly clear from the outset of the game. Trump, the destroyer in chief.
It is sorrowful!
I don't give a flying f**k about men's sports but I hope this outrages some people who don't care about politics but do care about sports. It won't change MAGAts but it might bother some "independents."
Thank you Alexandra.
This "Independent" is outraged every time a narcissistic politician decides to casually insert him or her self into an area for which they have never previously had sufficient commitment to for which to develop any love, proficiency, or expertise. This is hardly only an issue for an occasional major sports event, but daily for science, medicine, education, and other areas essential to the well-being of our nation and ius citizens.
I feel like the ostrich. I have to fess up that I jumped ship this holiday. I didn’t envite the world in. I tried to hide in the high country but the road sluffed off the mountain. Then I tried to trim a horse for the get a way. Got the fronts okay but he said not a chance when it came time for the hinds. So I gave up on the mountain and put my outfit in the drift boat for a float trip. Wouldn’t you know it rained a cloudburst and gave me brown water as the runoff hit the river. Fortunately the micro-wave broke down which remembered me the one in the old camper. I settled for a couple days out back of the barn in the camper and had a heck of a respite from those goddamned republicans and got an old broken down 4-wheeler up and running again. Also got an engine back in the old 3020. So life was what we call normal around here. Didn’t think about the fat turd in the ruins of the White House. I don’t have a clue what stupid did or didn’t do this holiday, but I did think about all of you and all of those who made this world possible for the rest of us. Thank each and every one of you for the beauty the hope and the work you have done by helping shape our democracy.
I didn't hide. I went to the Ashland's 4th of July parade. It was about 2/3 it's normal size, and I'd guess about 75% of its normal crowd. Boy Scouts presented the National Colors (the only real presentation of the colors) to lead the parade. The Ashland City Band and the Ashland Middle School Band marched, while the American Band College* performed on three flatbed trucks (they played "Washington Post" in unison in spite of being separated by 150' from nose to tail). There was one horse group, and gymnastics/stilts/dance teams all performing. Old cars, new cars, and politicians. The ACB played a noon concert at Lithia Park, featuring "Abraham Lincoln" reciting the Gettysburg Address to soft accompaniment of a Civil War music collage.
We went home, grilled hamburgers, and hung out until the evening "Pops" concert by the American Band College and their guest performers, the Boston Brass and Yolanda Pelzer (retired USN and USA vocalist).
*The American Band College is a three year summer intensive Masters Degree program, where music educators can earn a masters degree in conducting. It is administered by Central Washington University and held in Ashland every summer.
Yeah! the ol' 3020 is up and running again! A pretty handy tractor that.
Yeah it was made about 60 years ago when I was a freshman in high school. I fell in love with it then but had to wait 50 years for it to get in my price range. Good thing I had the M all these years in between. It still runs the swather, baler and rake. There is a sound to a Harley, a DC-3, and an M that gets in yer blood. Those three engines when they fire up take you back to the good ol’ days.
Yes, those round engines are really impressive. I love the way they cough themselves to life. My favorite is that old D-342 in a 46A model D-8. At idle, when the pony engine runs out of gas, it has this kinda disparate but throaty klunkity klunk. I always felt like I woke something up that demanded my attention fully in the coming day. When the oil pressure is up and it’s good and warm and you get to pushing a full blade and under a load that klunkity klunk turns into this rythmic, chugging coordinated beast. Then you decelerate and and that turbo whines down and it's back again. That is something I remember well.
Ha ha. Yup. Yep. Hooked chokers on one log loads in southern Oregon. Two D-8’s singing together to get one log up to the landing. What children we were with our toys on China Mtn. up Elk River. Respect to those Skinners.
My 4th was hiding also.
Trump embarrasses on the international stage again. There is no shame. None. No self awareness. None.
In this case the same goes for FIFA.
It has been like this for FIFA for years. Its just that most people averted their eyes.
And that lines up so well with the way Trump conducts his own life.
Tainting the World Cup, the national economy, and the American system of laws; destroying the square deal, the fair deal, and the New Deal; the art of the deal indeed. After 250 years the current president of the United States has made a mockery the nation founded to make taxpayers into voters and all people equal before the law. He sees the country as a repository of wealth and the American government as a tool for extracting money. He also wants the admiration of the world and monopolizes all forms of media attention to obtain it. His supporters, enablers, and people who fear his influence let him rampage at will. He needs to be stopped. Keep being informed, contact your representatives, and vote Blue.
I think it is relevant that after he was denied the Nobel Peace Prize, he got FIFA to sponsor a NEW prize, the FIFA Peace Prize (imagine that, a prize issued by a corrupt sports organization!), and he was announced in December as the first honoree.
He found another institution to corrupt, has he tainted all yet. Got quite a body count