In the gym of Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, on March 5, 1946, former and future prime minister of the United Kingdom Winston Churchill rose to deliver a speech.
“We were at war with a dictator,” said French center-right politician Claude Malhuret of Europe’s stand against Putin. “[N]ow we are at war with a dictator backed by a traitor.”
Will someone, please, pound this into the heads of the Republicans in the Congress. And when you're done, pound it into the heads of the Democrats. Neither group seems to understand this basic fact.
Not to be trite Veronica but the saying, "Misery loves company," comes to mind.
Apparently Musk has fits of depression according to a story in The Atlantic yesterday. He is a ketamine addict. One of the side affects of ketamine abuses is decreased cognitive function.
And you're not alone Veronica. There are millions of us that are physically ill.
I think it is important to recognize that HCR was up into the wee small hours getting this informative piece out into the world. This is a vital insight into what is happening in the US and a truly dire warning. Remember in the early nineties the news stories of Russians selling whatever piece of furniture or jewellery they had in order to buy food that had become expensive and scarce? I remember a translated interview with an elderly woman who was selling a chandelier from her dining room on a street in Moscow. She said her children and grandchildren were hungry and they had no heat in their home in the middle of winter. She didn’t know what they would do when they had sold all their furniture. I have always wondered what happened to her and her loved ones in Putin’s Russia.
That could very possibly be a scene from New York or Los Angeles…. or Toronto …. in our future if Trump succeeds in fulfilling Putin’s orders. A slow-motion train wreck while we stand by and watch in horror.
ESPECIALLY if SS is delayed and cut! I am a senior with a few friends/family who rely nearly 100% on their SS, but what tiny pensions or small amount of savings they have will not sustain them should SS fail. My sister lives very frugally and is fearful--she has been watching sales for months now and told me her cabinets and freezer is stocked to capacity. She said she'd be able to to stay in and eat out of her stores for at least two months--be it necessity of shortages, violence in the street or Avian-flu-pandemic. !!
Miselle, I have no doubt this is happening all over the country. SS has saved millions of seniors from abject poverty. Now that and health care are threatened. And why, just so a bunch of greedy vultures can own these programs and make even more money. I confess to losing patience with MAGAs I run across on other threads and have told a few of them very plainly how wrong they are. At least the last one did not answer me. I have also discovered bots or entities I cannot block who appear on the threads of D pols.
Michele, a few years back, I read a biography of Frances Perkins that was suggested here in what I refer to as the "LFAA Bookclub" as I had never heard of her.
I have a dear, dear friend who as about as far left as MAGA is far right. I don't have a term for that, she is very progressive, but like the MAGA, she just can't deal with the other side and immediately cuts them off. (Sometimes with stinging brilliant putdowns, but I digress.) I truly believe that throwing up the "deplorables" like Hilary did is too damaging, however true it might be. I prefer to find SOMETHING of non-political common ground and keep the lines of communication open. I do have MAGA family and friends. I believe as tides turn, IF there is welcoming on our side, we might win them over. Some of these people have been brainwashed.
Dear Michele - thank you for raising the issue of Social Security. Thom Hartmann has a great substack essay on the coming demise of Social Security. Republicans have had Social Security in their crosshairs since at least the 1990s. Republicans want so badly to privatize it much to the delight of private investment firms. In the 1990s, Schwab Investments was the Social Security privatization winner. I pictured Schwab licking their lips over all the investment fees they would make off that money. I don't know who the favored investment firm is currently but the same holds for whomever gets that money to invest privately.
I have lots of soup in cans and my freezer is full. I won't go hungry for a while. However, if I have not electricity my freezer supply will perish very fast. My soup I could heat on my wood stove that I am happy to have!
Please see my post above--we must all get ourselves in gear and truly push every button available to us "Resistance is not Futile", even against the Borg-like creatures such as these two "idiots", these poor players, who "strut and fret their lives upon the stage signifying nothing". may they be "he heard no more (with credit to Jean Luc Picard and William Shakespeare)
It also can damage the urinary tract. The ketamine is definitely causing Muskrat’s escape from reality. He’s probably wearing sunglasses inside to hide the pupils of his eyes.
Heather spelled it out quite concisely. Man has the urge to build only to destroy. It’s in his DNA. We no sooner slay the existing monster then develop a need to slay a new one.
Here is a song I wrote in 2019. As I drove home to Hartford from Nashville, a line kept churning around in my head (one must think of something on long distance journeys) “There are good people and bad ones where ever you go; just seems like the bad ones are stealing the show.” I finally pulled into a truck stop to write it down because we songwriters know that if you don’t jot a line down it’s lost forever. In one week having arrived back home, I had my song titled, “Blue Daze.”
I thought by now those old songs would be buried and no longer needed. I have a date certain to record it as a demo for distribution. It will take a moment to upload. Enjoy “Blue Daze.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYtTGIzb7OA
LOVE your song, Bill -- as well as the place you chose to record/video yourself. We live in Asheville. I'll share your song with my 12-year-old grandson, a budding singer/songwriter. Thank you.
Lincoln had fits of depression. That’s not the problem with Muck (misspelling intended).
Muck’s problem. like Trump’s is that he thinks neither the Constitution nor the law binds him in any way. And half the nation clearly doesn’t think so either, that’s assuming they have any real notion of either.
No, the problem, as the cartoon character Pogo once noted is: "We have met the enemy, and they is us”.
Hahahahaaa.., yeah I agree James, Pogo the visionary. And.., WHO is the Government.., why glory be, that's your neighbor, you know, MTG, RFK, and they go to church with us! And, they're for home-schooling (private religious school funding) because we (yahh Pogo, "we") have bastardized our public school curriculum and silly-buses (syllabus). Haven't we.., neighbor? Ayuhh! We sure have, to the point people are "desperate" (read Jess Piper's article), so desperate that the only hope is with prayer, instead of their "neighbor" (in Government) doing the job they swore they would do. Get religion out of government.., we need common sense, and some education.
🤣🤣🤣...I very much doubt Smuk's depression is caused by any potential scraps of decency still left deep in his conscience--I rather doubt if he even has a conscience left. I suspect his depression is part of the overall issues of being on the spectrum (if indeed he actually IS on the spectrum).
Maybe he does, under the influence of ketamine? He may be high-functioning...I don't know. I do know a couple of high functioning people who have been diagnosed as being on the spectrum. Scary smart, both of them...but they do have some/occasional issues processing certain things.
He's "conscious" that he has money, more than enough, is all that he needs to do with as he pleases. Consciousness? No factor. It's your problem.., err ahh.., OUR problem. Right.. tailgators? uhhuh.., uhhuh.., uhhuhh.
I believe there has been research regarding people winning large lottery prizes, that concluded people have a "set -point" of their happiness. Be it a great windfall or a horrific tragedy, they will have temporary change in their emotion but return to that mindset.
And who knows what goes on in his mind, but unhappiness and depression are not the same thing. Depression is mind chemicals and his self administration of Ketamine is not advisable.
I know far more lottery "winners' that were worse off as early as a year after they "won." There were a few rare ones that I was glad to see win, and actually have their lives much improved.
The most striking example was a classmate who's home burnt down, and took years to get the denied insurance finally paid to them. They lived in the basement with just a tar paper roof basically covering just the first floor (no walls left standing), for a few years. When they finally got the insurance, it seems the house got rebuilt and had enough to buy some lottery tickets, one of which got them something like $35,000 and let them start a small business. I don't know many details, actually, but did see the results of what to me was a too rare case of longer term benefits from winning a lottery.
We rarely bought even one lottery ticket over a few years, and then only when the prize was over $50 million, since it very slightly improved our chances of winning over not buying any tickets.
I respectfully disagree. If Trump were to vanish, Vance would continue to allow Musk to privatize the government. Vance is a puppet of the broligarchs. He is only on the stage because of Peter Thiel. The billionaire "bros" are now in charge.
Trump is enjoying his fame and the attention he never got from his parents. But he is not the ring leader. Trump has no ideology. Just shady techniques to enrich himself and mostly to be the center of attention. He is the toy of the bros and Putin. $Trump is a puppet. A very dangerous tool of the very rich and the very cruel.
Musk is effectively leading the nation right now. And he is indeed on a "spectrum" of some sort. He is a self described "Aspie". There are millions of people who are on that spectrum. Some of them have zero empathy. Some of them are high functioning excellent members of society. But some have no capacity to feel or care about others. That seems to describe Musk, $Trump and now an entire political party.
Musk is a numb monster who uses ketamine (and who knows what else) to treat his self admitted bouts of depression. Follow his tweets and observe mental illness.
Bill A., I think you outlined a good summary of the current state of affairs. I would just suggest that Musk isn't •leading• the nation so much as he is operating it, as one would operate a machine. He's basically pushing buttons to make things happen (all of them bad). There is no leadership involved.
Meanwhile, Donald is like a kid "driving a car" in a carnival ride. He spins the steering wheel violently from left to right, shouting with glee, but the car's direction is controlled by the concealed carnival ride operator. The analogy holds up when you consider that many "carnies" have substance-abuse problems.
I noticed Fulton Missouri has another institution besides Westminster College (where Winston Churchill spoke of the Iron Curtain). It has a long and interesting history of treating mental illness and substance abuse problems that might be appropriate to provide the best treatment of Musk's problems. Their early experiments ran the gamut of less successful methods but seem to always trend toward well intentioned help. See https://dmh.mo.gov/fulton-state-hospital/history
I was too upset yesterday to figure out what to say, particularly since I heard about the apparent arson that destroyed 7 or 8 Tesla Supercharger stations in Littleton, MA (just 5 miles from where I was born, and no more than 2 or 3 times the distance to Concord and Lexington).
It was easy to imagine someone enraged about the cutting off the Intelligence and threat detection services to Ukraine, exposing them to missile attacks and blinding them to critical intelligence by other means.
That generates backlash to all of us who support Ukraine, which I fear even more might have been effectively a false flag act like the Reichstag Fire on 27 Feb, 1933. They still dispute who started that fire, but there is less doubt about the 1999 Russian Apartment bombings in 1999 that helped trigger the 2nd Chechen War.
Whoever did it is playing into the potential propaganda benefit of the MTVP (Musk, Trump, Vance, Putin gang). If it was an enraged opponent of the Cyber surrender, please confess and apologize for such a counter-productive risking action. I'd much rather make restitution and apology as John Quincy Adams and others would for the Boston Tea Party, to avoid it being used as justification for escalation by our enemies.
As I've said before, I was a toddler military dependent in Munich Germany during the Nuremberg Trials and the unimaginably successful Berlin Airlift which was very much the time frame of the start of NATO.
"...World War Two left behind a terrible legacy which even today it takes a great deal of imagination as well as historical knowledge to fully comprehend.
Let me just give you some statistics. In World War Two 36.5 million Europeans were killed. That is the equivalent of the total population of France in 1939. Nineteen million of those were civilians. It doesn’t also of course incorporate all of those who died from natural causes or all of the babies that were not born. The death toll created an enormous imbalance between men and women. In the Soviet Union in 1945, there were 20 million more women than men. In 1946, in the German suburb of Triptal, there were only left 181 adult men between the ages of 19 and 21, but there were 1105 women. A whole generation of Germans including for example Gerhardt Schroeder, the former German Chancellor, were brought up by their moms. There were no dads around. They were either incarcerated in the Soviet Union or had died in the war. There were many orphans. In Berlin in 1945 there were 53,000 lost children wandering the streets, 49,000 orphans in Czechoslovakia, 80,000 in the Netherlands and as many as 200,000 in Poland. Those who did survive were underfed. The calorie intake in Vienna was only about 800 calories a day in 1945. The infant mortality in Austria four times the 1938 rate. In the British zone of Berlin, in December 1945, the death rate of children equalled one in four. The calorie intake in Germany was about 2,500 calories in 1941. It had gone down to around 1000 calories in 1946 and as everybody knows rationing was a very big feature of the post-war years.
The other issue is displaced people. I mean we’ve heard a lot about ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, ethnic cleansing after World War Two was infinitely worse. Stalin and Hitler between them managed to uproot 80 million people in Europe between 1939 and 1945. Thirteen million Germans were expelled from Central and Eastern Europe after the war. In 1947, the United Nations’ recently created Relief and Rehabilitation Administration was caring for 6,795,000 displaced Europeans in 762 camps. Yes, we had refugee camps in Europe in 1945. And the US alone – and this is before the Marshall Plan, before NATO – was spending $10 billion dollars a year on that, on caring for those refugees.
Another issue, the damage to infrastructure. Twenty-five million homeless people in the Soviet Union, 20 million homeless people in Germany, Hamburg alone had half a million homeless people in 1945. If you look at the level of destruction, again even today these figures still strike me as incredible. 70,000 villages, 1700 towns, 32,000 factors, 40,000 miles of railway track destroyed in the Soviet Union alone. France, which suffered of course far less physical damage than the Soviet Union, still lost half a million homes. I could carry on talking about the wastage of agricultural land or even a country like Norway, again which suffered little war damage, still lost 14 % of its industrial capital. These awesome statistics of course could be repeated almost ad infinitum when you talk about World War Two.."
Please don't use "Nothing more". This is a crisis!! Many are working to remove Trump, on the front lines and behind the scenes. Support this effort! and if you can't just yet, keep faith, hope and pray that you will soon know how you can help!!
Don Lemmon did an interview with Musk when he spoke directly about depression and ketamine use and more. The topic of using X to tweet and mood/drug use comes up at about 19 minutes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhsfjBpKiTw
I know that ketamine is a horse tranquilizer. I know ketamine shouldn't be prescribed for some mental health issues. My question is, should it be prescribed for asses?
A seventy year old level-headed guy whom I know has resorted to counselling, so deeply runs his despair. I did think Senator Slotkin's response was a good one.
Ned, I agree with you, Senator Slotkin's reply to the Republican President's travesty was excellent. If you haven't already done so, read Tim Alberta's excellent article in The Atlantic. Slotkin was very specific in what wanted to accomplish in her speech. I think she smart and perceptive.
I have been waking up in the middle of the night. It’s a nightmare! I think many are not informed. They just don’t read/watch/listen to educational news. We need to inform them.
I go to a gym and was discussing things that were happening. The lady said, “You’re talking to the wrong person, I am a Republican.”
Yesterday I simply mentioned that Rachel Maddow suggested to print our Social Security earnings NOW. I said they are coming after Social Security (after Musk falsely claimed it was a Ponzi scheme). I suggested she tell her parents. She didn’t know who Rachel Maddow was.
I thought I would get her thinking if she thought her parents might be affected which would affect HER. Kind of sneaking into her consciousness for her to educate herself.
They haven’t said they would get rid of SS, but they are firing thousands of workers & getting rid of many SS locations people go to.
I called yesterday. The wait was so long you couldn’t even hold.
(I finally figured out how to print my earnings myself, as Maddow strongly encouraged).
Also responses for disability they announced on their recording would take around 250 days! Who could wait that long?
Go onto the website for social security and create an account and set a password. You should be able to see your earnings towards social security.. if you are already on social security you should see a list of your benefits thus far. You may find this hard to do on a phone.but easier to do on a computer. Once you set up the account do not lose your password.
A doctor who was a “lead” when I WAS on Nextdoor.com said about the Republicans who refused to vaccinate or mask, “They will delete their gene pool.” That’s one way of looking at it. Maybe RFJ, Jr, Trump, Vance and their cabinet members will come down with Ebola…
At work the other day I was speaking to a colleague and mentioned Social Security and the fact that musk was planning to go after it. Another employee was in ear shot and laughed out loud. She came over and told me I was an idiot to think anyone would go after SS. All I could say was time will tell. She is collecting SS. It was useless to try and talk to her.....as my father use to say, "Don't confuse me with facts, my mind is made up".
Sounds like most of the MAGA community. My neighbor (I am surrounded!) always talked about politics until Trump won. Now he doesn’t want to. And he has been using his hedge clippers to cut my Arborvitaes.
SS is not the only thing we have to worry about - the BANKS. Read Thom Hartmann’s Substack I posted. Terrifying.
The lady said, “You’re talking to the wrong person, I am a Republican.”
This is the reason I am not that worried about the looming economic catastrophe and the loss of social security (which I rely on). The only thing that MIGHT change many trump supporters minds is if they feel real pain and hardship themselves. Not that I wish that on anyone, it just seems that is the only thing that might get them to wake up to the fact that the trump regime is not a good idea.
Dan, thinking that pain will change MAGA minds is thinking of the wishful variety. As I have previously stated, for people in the cult, there is a total disconnect between cause and effect. They do not associate their voting choices with the resulting conditions they experience.
This disconnect originates in evangelicalism: When things are going well, these are "God's blessings" or "answers to prayer." When circumstances are difficult, this is "God's will." There is no room in this mindset for the possibility that poor choices yielded bad results. The conservative notion of "personal responsibility" applies to them, not me.
LIES, LIES, LIES. Just like what comes out of Trump’s mouth every time he opens it! (And JD Vance and Musk).
The dumb sheep fall for it.
The Vietnam immigrant who did my nails said “Trump must be smart, look at how rich he is.” And “Trump is smart. Better to have Putin as your friend.” He then bragged he collected $1,000 for promising to vote for Trump. Isn’t THAT illegal? Buying votes?
Our gym (which is run by our town's park district) recently sent an email to members reminding us of rules, and adding a new one: if you listen to music or podcasts or whatever, you are supposed to have headphones or earbuds. So perhaps this wouldn't work for you, but if you are on a treadmill or stationary bike or similar machine, could you run some pertinent youtube videos?
This one of HCR is 30 minutes, her others are longer.
But if you want snippets, there are plenty of excellent Youtubers that I recommend, but I do caution that some have an edge that might turn off listeners. I'd suggest Belle of the Ranch as she's pretty fact based and doesn't talk about her personal feelings very much. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1B4e63Yx0c
A great one who does appeal directly to emotions is Tennessee Brando. He's from a small town in Tennessee, a "very red" area.
If you can run these loud enough for her to listen to--maybe just have to strain a bit so as to not be obnoxious in volume, and if she wants to engage with you say "ooo, I just found out about this youtuber and they really tell it like it is. I want to listen, but I can turn it up so you can hear it if you'd like." Maybe toss in a "yes!" every now and then as you listen. ;-D
I purposely did not watch the fiasco called “a joint address to Congress” - the “lowlights” were predictable. Not only were the words and delivery deplorable, but looking at the three stooges on the dais - a convicted felon, JV (Junior Varsity) Vance, and “Milquetoast Mike” Johnson - smirking and nodding at each and every lie, was beyond nauseating.
Vance is like the kid who makes the varsity team because his daddy or mommy is “important” - and then thinks he actually deserves playing time.
I also did not watch, as I didn't want to contribute to the ratings I know Donald cherishes so much. I figured (correctly) that I could save time by watching excerpts afterward to see the worst moments and still be well informed.
The performance of "the backup boys" was, indeed, disgusting.
Me! Every day. As James said above, neither group is doing anyting to stop this insanity. The orange felon is a traitor. He has gone rogue, completely. What he is doing is against our constitution, our democracy, yet the republicans applaud him. I have never understood how the German people stood by and allowed Hitler to do what he did to their country, their people, but now I understand. If you stand back and allow it to happen, it will. As a child of about 8-10 years of age, my best friend was one of the only Jewish families in our town. Her grandparents came to visit every year around Hanukkah. I was sitting on the sofa between her grandparents and noticed numbers tattoo'd on her grandmother's arm. I had never seen a tattoo before. I inquired about it. My friend's grandmother had been in Auschwitz. She explained to me, in simple, kind terms what had happened to her. With tears running down my cheeks I told her I was so very sorry. She told me not to be sorry. She told me that it was my generations job to make sure the world stayed safe and that what we now term the holocaust never happened again. We need to stop the Monster at the Helm before he does anymore damage! We need to unite, not allow him to divide us and take control of our country.
I just lost a long reply to you, Madame Veronica, but at 90, involved in so much of this history and having read much of the rest (including Russia (plus USSR) and Ukraine, I share your physical reaction. My only “medicine” is “doing something” as did the French in 1942 and following.
Yes it's grinding day to day But knowing we're not alone gives me courage. As a contractor at an agency there's palpable fear and Ioathing day to day that it's all going to fall down. Imagine having to change innumerable data just to change the word gender to sex.All across the agencies on a whim. Waste of time and money.
Veronica, lots of people are ill, either physically or mentally or both. No doubt there is a huge increase in anxiety, but worm brain wants to somehow make those his next BS mission. People will turn to alcohol and other drugs.
Thankfully many in the younger generation have chosen not to drink or do drugs. They have laser focus on their goals, eat clean, workout regularly and limit screen time. They prefer to be outdoors in nature and being good stewards of the planet without being cultist climate alarmist. They have no interest in being lifetime consumers of prescriptions from big pharma or the toxins the FDA has no issue leaving in processed foods the majority of obese Americans gobble up.
This is difficult for me, myself, but we do have to step back every now and then. They are firehosing us with this junk, so don't try to stop it all, just do what you can when you can.
I have had intense periods from this where I feel sick, too. There are people (some on here) who have made others feel guilty when they can't manage it all. I like the approach of calling 5 congresscritters a day. You don't have to call them all. But everyone who does 5 helps.
"Russian leaders created a false narrative to get voters to put them in power, where they could privatize public enterprises and monopolize the country’s wealth. " What is a dictator government? Professor, after taking a day off, has written a key sentence in today's letter. That is, Trump, Musk and their associates are trying to own the US wealth to themselves as much as possible. They become kinds and the rest slaves. Communist system does exactly the same thing. Democracy is that people share the nation's wealth. This is the point to emphasize. Dictator vs Democracy is too abstract.
The problem iss that I am an AMERICAN CITIZEN in S.E. Asia. The question I most often hear is: "How could Americans allow this to happen?" I am not qualified to explain our government's system and policies.
There definitely is corruption everywhere. In different measures. But being able to elect a convicted felon, rapist. tax evader, insurgionist, liar, toxic narcissist, for a second time, is not defensible.
Allowing a billionaire and the Russian tyrant to tell this feeble old crominal what and how-to -do it is
Rupert ‘s goal from 1981. He’s still at it. Propaganda works. Of course, it’s more complicated but democrats have never (since Harry Truman) really accepted that republicans have a whole different agenda (currently articulated by Alito) that is at variance with democracy. They gave lip service for awhile but some noticed (Bill Moyers), but The 2000 election (disastrous as W/Dickie were) gave them the belief that cheating was preferable to losing. Has worked like a charm. They call it voter integrity. See how useful propaganda is.
He was the perfect again petulant patsy who came along- the long planned scene of users who created an uneducated society ( and got away with it for 🗣️YEARS) emulating strongmen whose playbook was already written for them.’The Stable Genius’, right?
Beyond the pale, Veronica We're gonna pay for this! For the record.., I was in SEA - 1965. The dumbing-down of America (American's) has continued unabated, the 48% included.
Trump is a traitor for phasing out military equipment and now stopping intel for Ukraine--that's aiding and abetting! What now? Impeach?, but that won't happen. Still, there's always Something you can do besides calling reps and senators, protesting, making signs, donating, etc.
Here's a thought I had: What can an ordinary Missourian do about this Oval Office Trump-Vance debacle and America-to-the-world embarrassment?
Here's what I tried--a direct apology to President Zelensky via the Ukraine embassy WDC: Sent email to Ukraine Embassy WDC emb_us@mfa.gov.ua "Attn: The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United States of America Subject: Apology to President Zelensky
Dear Madam Ambassador Markarova: On behalf of myself and the majority of American people standing for the freedom of Ukraine, may I request that the following subject apology be forwarded to President Zelensky: Please apologize to President Zelenskyy for the shameful behaviour of President Trump and Vice-President Vance on Feb. 28, 2025. It was a despicable, pre-coordinated setup ambush by two bullies against one courageous man standing tall. Trump and Vance have forever stained the sacred honor of the Oval Office. Thank you. Sincerely, (Ordinary American citizen)" s/s (full name and location, Farmington, MO)
Do something. Anything. Never give up--whatever Trump does or says notwithstanding. As a Missourian I follow Harry's Give them Hell approach.
Yes, Constance, in this new chapter of U.S. history, the ink is still wet. But it has renewed my sympathy for the Russian people. All during my life, any time that Russia (or the U.S.S.R.) was mentioned, the assumption was that they are all bad people. Only later in life, when I directly interacted with Russian citizens, did I realize that the overwhelming majority of them are ordinary, decent people no different from you and me. They do not agree with the actions of their government or its leaders, but they feel helpless (or afraid) to criticize or resist.
We are about to experience what it feels like to be hated by the rest of the world, even though we are not making the policy the world hates.
I don't hear the word "traitor" being used by any Democratic office holders. And certainly none are saying Trump should be tried and sent to prison. I am disgusted at their inability to speak the truth!
My Senator is. See Angus King speeches. He is NEVER going to get the corporate media play the DonOld's nutcase friends get.
As a group we have an immense amount of power. 2/3s of us DID NOT vote for Trump. Our friends and family are only buying what is essential and from local merchants only. I understand that isn't possible for everyone, but the consumer in the US controls 70% of GDP.
Since Congress and the courts won't help us, we need to help ourselves.
And those of us that can help our neighbors that are getting hurt by Trump and the oligarchs help them. If you can help a friend or neighbor that purchases most of their things online offer to pick up groceries or staples at the LOCAL grocery store.
Good point, Marj. That is the drawback with mentioning names. Yesterday or tomorrow, Representative Raskin or Senator Sanders might well be mentioned. Consider this short list a representative sample of the people whom I admire.
My Senator, too! Angus King & Sen. Chris Murphy of CT have been speaking out strongly. I write Sen. King weekly to tell him how proud Mainers are of him.
I agree Gary! We have to stop enabling the billionaires that are selling us out to communism. I stopped buying from Amazon; I deleted my Facebook account. Now days I figure out how to buy the products that I need from other sources. I buy local. It isn't as convenient but it is the decision and action that I have control over.
Treason is a unique offense in our constitutional order—the only crime expressly defined by the Constitution, and applying only to Americans who have betrayed the allegiance they are presumed to owe the United States. While the Constitution’s Framers shared the centuries-old view that all citizens owed a duty of loyalty to their home nation, they included the Treason Clause not so much to underscore the seriousness of such a betrayal, but to guard against the historic use of treason prosecutions by repressive governments to silence otherwise legitimate political opposition. Debate surrounding the Clause at the Constitutional Convention thus focused on ways to narrowly define the offense, and to protect against false or flimsy prosecutions.
The Constitution specifically identifies what constitutes treason against the United States and, importantly, limits the offense of treason to only two types of conduct: (1) “levying war” against the United States; or (2) “adhering to [the] enemies [of the United States], giving them aid and comfort.” Although there have not been many treason prosecutions in American history—indeed, only one person has been indicted for treason since 1954—the Supreme Court has had occasion to further define what each type of treason entails.
The offense of “levying war” against the United States was interpreted narrowly in Ex parte Bollman & Swarthout (1807), a case stemming from the infamous alleged plot led by former Vice President Aaron Burr to overthrow the American government in New Orleans. The Supreme Court dismissed charges of treason that had been brought against two of Burr’s associates—Bollman and Swarthout—on the grounds that their alleged conduct did not constitute levying war against the United States within the meaning of the Treason Clause. It was not enough, Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion emphasized, merely to conspire “to subvert by force the government of our country” by recruiting troops, procuring maps, and drawing up plans. Conspiring to levy war was distinct from actually levying war. Rather, a person could be convicted of treason for levying war only if there was an “actual assemblage of men for the purpose of executing a treasonable design.” In so holding, the Court sharply confined the scope of the offense of treason by levying war against the United States.
The Court construed the other treason offense authorized by the Constitution similarly narrowly in Cramer v. United States (1945). That case involved another infamous incident in American history: the Nazi Saboteur Affair. Cramer was prosecuted for treason for allegedly helping German soldiers who had surreptitiously infiltrated American soil during World War II. In reviewing Cramer’s treason conviction, the Court explained that a person could be convicted of treason only if he or she adhered to an enemy and gave that enemy “aid and comfort.” As the Court explained: “A citizen intellectually or emotionally may favor the enemy and harbor sympathies or convictions disloyal to this country’s policy or interest, but, so long as he commits no act of aid and comfort to the enemy, there is no treason. On the other hand, a citizen may take actions which do aid and comfort the enemy—making a speech critical of the government or opposing its measures, profiteering, striking in defense plants or essential work, and the hundred other things which impair our cohesion and diminish our strength—but if there is no adherence to the enemy in this, if there is no intent to betray, there is no treason.” In other words, the Constitution requires both concrete action and an intent to betray the nation before a citizen can be convicted of treason; expressing traitorous thoughts or intentions alone does not suffice.
So then, by these definitions, we are seeing treason being committed within our governmental structure as we speak. Disbanding our cyber-security 'forces', ceasing the electronic surveillance operations, which will now allow 'the enemy' access to much, if not all, of our personal and national data. Why is this not being shouted from the rooftops? If this isn't 'aiding and abetting', I don't know what is!
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were executed in the mid-1950s for allegedly selling atomic secrets to the Russians. You don't think Tramp has shared classified materials with the Russians?
I don't believe he has 'sold' the material, no. But there is ample evidence that he has an ongoing relationship with the Russians, and that the Russians have been working with, and maybe on him, for quite some time. And I believe there are many people with proof of this, both here, and in Russia. And I believe, as you pointed out, that punishment protocols have been established.
I am an erstwhile Republican and share your disappointment, though Senator Slotkin rebutted Trump strongly.
Individual Democrats (e.g., Senators Whitehouse and Schiff as well as Representatives Goldman and Moulton) are speaking up.
The resistance is gathering; I hope not too late. One thing that crosses my mind: Trump has fired off a flood of Executive Orders, mostly proclamations.
The one area, storm-trumped by the DOGE-bags (as Jimmy Kimmel says), where action rather than friction has proceeded -- efficiency -- has shattered the U.S.G.
Gary, great idea. I lived in mi querido México for five years. Canada has always been a land I admire. Please help me out -- I know I am asking a lot, here -- and critique the two hundred-plus words that follow. Of course, anyone else is welcome to; that means you, too, Jon Rosen. 🤝
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On another matter, I must confess to a wondering about tariffs. Trump basically wants the equivalent of "infant industry" tariffs to re-build the manufacturing base. As a PGHer and summer-time mill worker almost half a century ago, I watched first-hand the collapse of the steel industry. 😵
So, the proposal pulls at the heart-strings. Additionally, it seems that these tariffs are creating an incentive for direct investments from allies like Japan and Taiwan. On the other hand, Trump is failing to inform people of the extensive sacrifice to be imposed upon the citizenry by this policy. 🤬
Whether the direct investment by non-U.S. companies will provide the benefits, both direct and consequential, sufficient to outweigh the costs borne by average Americans is anyone's guess. What I struggle with is following the money -- ¿how will Trump et al. enrich themselves? 😳
They will profit, to be sure, but I do not know how; maybe your insight can help here, Gary. Dr Richardson's book, 'Democracy Awakening', argues that foreign investment, more than the protective tariffs of the era, motored the industrialization of the late nineteenth century. 🤔
One difference I see between 'now' and 'then' is that the industrialization of America of the nineteenth century occurred in a wide open open country with a closed economy. Re-industrialization in our century, however, may well fail owing to its setting in a closed country with an open economy. 🫣
Last week, on Deutsche Welle, I watched a story of certain people -- I do not know who they are -- calling for Canada to join the European Union. I say, Canada: ¡Go for it!
What’s amusing about tfg’s cannonfire of EOs is, as Heather has repeated told us, they are really just directives—“proceed like this.” Tfg thinks he’s making law—or overriding it—and acting like he tried to in tfg 1.0. He’s The Boss and you follow his orders.
And somehow awaken fellow citizens. This is not normal, and this is not good. Our regime's intentions are not consistent with the Constitution's mission statement. They are rather, corrosive. Democratic politicians alone, even when insightful and competent, are not enough to win the day, and certainly the Republican agenda betrays the concept of a republic. Communication that lands, startles, and elicits focus must somehow penetrate this pandemonium; attract public sentiment. That's the momentum of "grass roots" as well as salient leadership. They work in tandem.
We may have free speech in theory, but the Citizens United decision precludes it in practice with dark money strangling policy discussions in a choke-hold.
That's their MO and the corporate media is not about to point out that is what they are doing. Musk donates a couple of million and 50,000 Democrats donate $25. He's gonna win almost every time.
Thanks Justice Roberts for the terrible Citizens United decision.
When enough people have been fired, have lost health insurance, have lost access to their doctors/mental healthcare/medications, have lost homes, ad infinitum, and are willing to literally take to the streets in the thousands, and hound their elected representatives 24/7--that's when real grassroots actions take place, it seems.
I'd love to see a nation-wide strike until that reprehensible person, his pet, and every cabinet member are evicted from office and charged with suitable crimes, but that's just a pipe dream (sigh).
I keep preaching that everyday. Consumer spending makes up 70% of the US GDP. Even a 1 or 2% reduction in spending can cause a recession and at the same time hurt the Walton family, Jeff Bezos and several of the overextended oil barons (think Koch brothers and Harold Hamm).
Amazon, Walmart and Home Depot would take notice if their revenue was cut by even 5%.
Sadly JL they have been working on this from the roots up. Starting with the state legislatures and governorships. You saw it happen in Texas. IT was very sad to watch my teacher coworkers and public school parents vote for the republicans candidates time after time. No matter how much I would tell them that were coming after public schools, they still voted for them. No matter how much they would cut, they still voted for them. The agricultural people with rural schools supported them overwhelmingly. The loss of medical care, education, were set aside for tax cuts and deregulation. They are reaping their reward as the shared costs become their costs.
Many only “read” in pictures. We need to get better with this. We need to accept this for now and communicate in every and all ways possible the reality of what HCR has laid out. Where are the bevy of short films and “comic” book like explanations? I’m a former real working class daughter who worked my way through college (as a hair stylist) and law school (as an investigator and policy staff to state AG). We must understand our fellow Americans like the Russians and Chinese do. We are acting in their dreadful planned “movie” now. God help us.
They are finally “stepping up”flooding YouTube, etc. The Republicans lie, that’s the problem (along with the corruption) and people are believing the lies.
Until it hits them at home, such as the cancellation of their Medicaid, there are those who just don’t know or think politics is something that happens far away in DC and doesn’t affect them. It’s really going to have to be painful and personal.
Understand. As a former county commissioner responsible for over a million people, you are correct. We need to pave the way for understanding. Sherrod Brown used to film all over Ohio making vignette spots of real people and us local electeds regarding what Social Security meant. Let’s get out there and do this again. I’m retired having had two cancers. My energy is NOT retired! We MUST do this.
It will be up to us to pound the truth into the heads of the politicians. We the ordinary people, who each have to look up their representatives' office phone numbers and locations and stay on them, every day, to recognize and act on what's right there in front of them. Somebody else' won't do it. We each have to. Make some noise, people.
Problem is: they don’t give a sh*t. As long as they can stay in power and get rich off of it, these congressional critters are perfectly happy to side with a narcissist, fascist dictator and his mentally ill and also narcissistic sidekick (you decide who is which). The only hope is that enough of the American people realize they are, at the moment, engaged in nonconsensual lateral intercourse (i.e. being f*cked sideways) and get really angry.
I watched Heather's Zoom conversation with Simon Rosenberg yesterday. One subject she brought up was that the opposition has yet to find a common message.
I'll be repeating this regularly: its been difficult for Democrats to find a unifying issue to rally around. But we have a message that we can use starting NOW. Call it the Spirit of '76/'26 (or come up with a better slogan.) Next year is the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, when we declared our freedom from kings and independence as a nation. We must forcefully declare once again that America was founded as a constitutional republic and that we must shrug off would-be despots and tyrants. We can organize and message around this basic principle and use it in rallies, in street protests, in the halls of Congress, and on social media. The Spirit of '76/'26. Spread the word.
In the March 5 conversation, Dr. Richardson proposed the creation of our own Declaration of Independence, calling out those egregious acts by our wannabe tyrant similar to Jefferson’s list in 1776. But she called for our modern Declaration to take the form of rap.
I can’t wait to see and hear that!
The conversation was sponsored by Commit2Democracy; I believe a video will be made available but couldn’t find it online this morning.
Marcia, I watched the Zoom conversation so I know what you're referring to (if rap is what it takes to save the republic, so be it, but Im not so sure, given the reaction to Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl show.)
I've been calling for a new Re-declaration of Independence for a while now — it seems so stunningly obvious that our leaders should make the connection, but I haven't seen it yet. I remember the sense of patriotism (another point brought up yesterday: reclaim the word and the flag) during the run-up to the Bicentennial in 1976; it's nowhere to be found now except in the echoes of the DNC last summer. Those of us who reject this usurpation of government must loudly claim the mantle of Patriot. Why, oh why aren't we?
In my neck of the woods (being the state of New Mexico) my Democratic Representatives and Senators both at the federal and state level are standing up...and working hard. I don't "think" they understand this. I KNOW they do. Their actions prove that. Until the red states feel the pain, and some lone Republican stands up to be counted the destruction and chaos will continue.
We are at war with White Supremacy period full stop. Problem is White people don’t see it nor do they know what to do about it that got us here - this awful place. Heather has drummed into us how we have to start at the local and state level. Why don’t they understand how critical this is for all?
Trump is a traitor phasing out military equipment and intel for Ukraine . What now? Impeach? But that won't happen with Rethuglians controlling the Senate. Still, there's always Something you can do besides calling reps and senators, protesting, making signs, donating, etc. And what can an ordinary Missourian do about this Oval Office Trump-Vance debacle and America-to-the-world embarrassment? Here's what I tried--a direct apology to President Zelensky via the Ukraine embassy WDC: Send an email to the Ukraine Embassy WDC.
"Attn: The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United States of America Subject: Apology to President Zelensky Dear Madam Ambassador Markarova: On behalf of myself and the majority of American people standing for the freedom of Ukraine, may I request that the following subject apology be forwarded to President Zelensky: Please apologize to President Zelenskyy for the shameful behaviour of President Trump and Vice-President Vance on Feb. 28, 2025. It was a despicable, pre-coordinated setup ambush by two bullies against one courageous man standing tall. Trump and Vance have forever stained the sacred honor of the Oval Office. Thank you. Sincerely, (Ordinary American citizen)" s/s (full name and location, Farmington, MO)
We are getting ready for massive demonstrations. We Americans are not going accept having a president who is owned by Russia's Putin. Why is tRump in bed with Putin????????
However, the more they complain, the less pressure there is on the GOP (who actually control all of congress) from their constituents, because if "the libs" are angry, then the GOP base and Independents stop being angry at Trump and Musk and the GOP congress. When congressional Dems stay more quiet then the headlines stay on Trump and Musk.
It is a rock and a hard place for them to be in.
Trump tried to goad the Dems into reacting at he speech the other night for that purpose.
Schumer and Jefferies need to be working hard behind the scenes to "sweeten the pot" and get enough in the GOP to switch to Independent and caucus with Dems so they can take back control of congress. It would only take 4 in the Senate and maybe less in the House.
Our job is to pressure congress enough so they know they can't get reelected if they support Trump.
My fear is that the Dems will do what they always tend to do, and attack their own instead.
So the end goal seems to be to crash the United States economy, eviscerate all the governmental agencies vital to the function of the US government, especially the support systems for the non-1%-ers including Social Security and Medicaid, leaving us desperate to go along with whatever ELON/FELON and his broligarch cronies dictate as the new way of life in these United States...
"Jess Piper of The View From Rural Missouri notes that what seems to be a deliberate attempt to crash what was, when Trump took office, a booming U.S. economy, is a feature of the administration’s plan, not a bug. It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices.”"
Jess Piper has it exactly right, IMHO: the aim is to drive the USA into the ground and then sell it for parts to the oligarchs.
-- The orange criminal will pocket most or perhaps all of the sale proceeds and become the actual billionaire he has always wanted to be (and lied about being). And he will be allowed to cosplay being president all the while.
-- Putin will be happy at the demise of a long-time geopolitical enemy.
-- The orange criminal, who more now than ever appears to be a long-time Russian asset, will have relieved some of the extortive pressure on him (although he's kidding himself if he thinks Putin will ever completely release him).
-- The oligarchs will make unimaginable amounts of money via their unregulated and untaxed monopolies and cartels and will continue to plunder relentlessly until something like WWIII or a global climate crash combined with environmental toxicity slows it down.
-- The christo-fascists will sweep in behind the crash and, with the oligarchs' support, impose a fanatical pseudo-christian theocracy.
Midterm elections, you say? We'll turn the bastards out at the midterms and get some better bastards?
What ever makes you think that the midterms will be anything other than a charade? The DOGE wrecking ball has already crashed into multiple offices and groups whose purpose was to ensure election integrity.
And to think that but for the greed and cowardice of a handful of people in 2019 and again in 2021 we wouldn't be where we find ourselves today...
Though nobody knows for sure, it is likely that Putin is the richest man in Russia. For years he has pressured the oligarchs beholden to him to hand over bribes. He owns palatial homes, despite a relatively modest salary. Trump is following his playbook, but more aggressively and openly, by monetizing the presidency. I suspect the bribes will soon follow, once he’s privatized government functions. Maybe loyal suck-up Jeff Bezos will get the USPS?
It's possible that Putin, by hiding his money in multiple places with the help of his oligarch buddies, is actually the richest man in the world - ever.
Ultimately, there will be a "Let them eat cake" moment in Russia. Russians know how to revolt. Life there just has to get a little worse.
And if we had stood strong with Ukraine, eventually Putin's regime would have crumbled. The oligarchs are grumbling. Many sections of the Russian economy are on the verge of bankruptcy.
But wait, wait! Our very own bankruptcy expert is on the job! A bailout for the brutal murdering genocide creating monster is on the way.
Oh wait - need to answer my own question. It will not be in US dollars but the transaction will require cryptocurrency. And as Stephen Colbert’s uncanny Melania impersonator said - it is Me Me coin.
@pts We cannot let Putin have any joy. Full stop. It’s up to us to speak up. Just making calls to ALL elected offices matter…down to any elected dog catchers. No offense to these fabulous public servants! Love them.
It's reminiscent of what has been called "vulture capitalism" (though I think "vampire" is closer to the mark.) Wealthy people buy a company, squeeze it dry of value, and set it, often fatally wounded, adrift. Billionaires prosper, while workers, communities, and less wary stockholders are stuck with the bill.
That phrase “curated failure” is next level of how private equity corporate ambulance chasers operate, and it names the Achilles heel of unchecked capitalism not foreseen by Francis Fukayama at the end of the Cold War and Soviet Union in 1989.
I would add a comment to the Jess Piper quote, "...It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices...”"
I do know some who sold off very much of what had been good investments in normal times, saving as much cash and bonds as possible to buy up what ridiculously over leveraged owners would have to sell at fire sale prices to cover their stupidest bets. The ones I respected most were the ones that sold earlier to avoid becoming contributors to the coming worse times (though some did it just to avoid the risk of waiting too long). Others that we suggested should sell earlier, said they knew what was coming but (correctly as it turned out), knew they could keep making a bit more money and still get out with more additional gains than losses if they played it closer to the collapse.
They were correct, but we wondered how many didn't really care how much they lost by playing it closer to the edge, realizing they could still have a lot more to buy stuff cheaper after the collapse.
Because of Merton's earlier affinity towards higher gains from higher risks, I was especially attentive to Merton's TIPS move from Commercial Real Estate
"...When Solman questioned the experts about the distribution of their own investments, they returned some surprising answers. Solow, who won the Nobel in 1987, said he had no idea what was in his portfolio. “I just never paid any attention,” he said. “That’s because I don’t care. And I’m lucky to have a wife who doesn’t care.”
Merton described his portfolio as “almost perfect — you just have to get short.” The Harvard economist, who won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1997 for his study of stock options, later revealed that the bulk of his portfolio was in a Global Index Fund, Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, and one hedge fund. He said he had been invested in a commercial real estate fund until recently, but dropped that when its value rose too quickly for his comfort..."
Exactly that.👏👏👏 Now, the question is how do we retool how and with what we fight back with to match what we are facing? Time to get creative and remember that we regular folks are the ones who keep this society running. Think what plumbers, electricians, food preparers, mechanics, surveillance experts, day traders, coders and hackers, house painters, housekeeping staff, you name it, could do, either by not showing up to do the work we do or by other means at their disposal, to disrupt this regime by a thousand cuts and, alongside bigger disruptions, topple it.
This across the board in depth mass action could make the difference between the shaky status quo and a large and forceful effective shake up of it. Beyond party, there are more ‘democritarians’ among us with a basic belief in fairness, in law and justice, in right actions, in at least a rough equality, and in the workings of democracy itself in action … to shift and reinstate these qualities in reality.
I thought exactly that when Heather mentioned talk of pardoning Derek Chauvin in Tuesday's live history and politics chat. That would unleash the type of demonstrations this administrations this administration would love to put down with martial law. Deeply frightening.
These transhumanist oligarchs already tried to parcel off Honduras to sell onto private corporations, but failed.
The UK is now their next best chance at succeeding in this neo colonial project. They will then use what they have learned by mistakes made in the UK to roll it out across the US and BRICS.
This is the real reason that Prime Minister Starmer will always finally politically back the Russo-MAGA Trump cartel.
This Europeanpowell Substack is alarmingly eye-opening for the state of the UK, for the limited bit that can be gleaned through the syntax-challenged teaser for subscription to read the rest. Will be looking for alarms from other political writers about the UK.
Agree it is a mare’s nest. With so many powerful and yet conflicting corporate, hedgefund and political interests but all in collusion with their desire to make these criminal actions as difficult to expose as possible. European Powell’s lone voice is trying to sound a warning within a dark and noisy storm 🐈⬛
Jess is correct. Look back to the Great Republican Depression (what is was called at first before the Republicans got so butt hurt at being blamed), and every economic downturn since. The republicans donors sweep in to scoop up the resources as they have the money to buy while the desperate sell off things to survive. Enough is never for these people. Never.
For example, the midwestern farmers who invested in costly improvements to their land (helping to alleviate soil runoff off and erosion) because a Biden-era policy made contracts for the farmers’ reimbursement.
Then musk cancelled the contracts and many farmers suddenly are burdened by unexpected debt.
Who do you think will be buying up their farmlands if/when these farmers go under?
This is beyond the pale! I could not watch the whole ‘shitting on America’ that is Donny’s brand these days. I do wonder at the glee and delight in conservatives at his ascendency to dick-tater! The petulant little boy image in the snippets I watched he was so clear!
That said, we have to come together, put aside the distractions and move to the verdant, powerful middle ground to defeat his party minions in the midterms and begin to heal the scarred ground, and the heal the hurts to the people!
My heart goes out to so many! The young person we were going to hire as an AmeriCorps intern! Who wanted to learn to teach science and help instill care for our public lands.
Instead, we have poisoning of the waters and chaos!
To the actual vertebrates/veterans who actually serviced, they must be sick…of course they are distracted by the fear of trans-men on women’s sports teams unfairly competing.
Will we lose American values and our country? never! But if we allow this, and DEI BS be how we are all branded all the time, we will lose.
So I don’t have the answer to the rats on FUAX but I watched the I am a Canadian ad. Find it, fun! We need creative ‘I am an American’ ads.
And go to all Co-Ed sports in all public schools! Compete for your best on team, not against another…winners makes losers, so instead, run for your Personal Best! Be all you can and want to be! America, once the greatest nation on Earth, now the best nation for the planet!
My experience with my MAGA friends is that it takes real self-control not to talk and yell AT each other and call one another names when discussing "politics." I have had to tell them that I will not continue to engage with them if they refer to me as "you liberals," or "you Dems." (as if I am all liberals/Dems or that being them is bad.) Last night I had a MAGA friend come on my social media page during Trump's speech to freak out over the fact that Dems were being disruptive. I woke up this morning to a long thread tirade he had with himself, but pointed AT me, on one of my posts. My first thought was to reply "awesome!," I wish there had been more disruptors (I do.). But I have really been trying more to connect with these people as individuals, or, in our shared humanity to put it that way. I have been sharing facts and pointing out that if they think a small group of billionaires is suddenly working overtime to make their lives better by firing the woking class, and getting in bed with Putin, then I think they are truly lost. I am pounding this in, respectfully but unceasingly. Somedays I think they kinda hear me. Others, it's back to "you liberals...." Trump is a traitor. Say it often, everywhere. Trump is a traitor. That is the truth, that is a fact. Last night he did make not one mention of affordable housing, food, or medication. Not one mention of veterans. But he had three mentions of Elon Musk. Three mentions of annexing Greenland. Three for the Gulf of America. Five mentions of tax cuts for the super wealthy. And thirteen mentions of.... Joe Biden?! Trump is not doing the job of a president. Trump is an illegitimate president. Say it calmly, say it loud, say it often, to everyone. Trump is a failure and a traitor.
Just spent a couple days with 2 close friends. 2 of us tried to share facts about trump and the take over of our government with the 3rd long time friend. I had all I could do to not scream at her. When after many discussions she said , “Well, trump has only had a few weeks in office, we need to give him a chance to see what he does.” I had to walk away- couldn’t believe this smart woman had her head buried in the sand. This is the battle we’re up against! Sadly, I feel differently towards her and have given up on her. That means those of us who speak truth to power have to fight twice as hard! HCR is a blessing- thank you Heather!
I remember people saying the same thing when trump was elected in 2016….”give him a chance to see what he does”. In 2025 we already KNOW what he’s going to do as he’s doing it! People are being told not to believe what they are already seeing. They only listen to right wing propaganda and Russian propaganda from the White House
Caroline, the more time we give the scumbag president, the more destruction he will bring all the way to the point of no return. If we sit and "give him a chance to see what he does" we'll never come back from the abyss we are falling into. Doesn't your friend have enough clues to see what her president is doing, and to realize that what he is doing is leading to. Do we have to spell out alliance with Russia and the other dictatorships ? Tax cuts for billionaires to our expenses?
Spreading out misery, cruelty, corruption, grafting,and death, yes death. We can give him a chance. It will be the end of decency.
Hello - we all know what he is doing, and we knew what he was going to do. But we did and do not know how to stop it, and once we are all hungry and poor, we will not have the energy to fight back. He has told us many times what his plans were - he told us Putin and he were buddies 8 years ago and he was going to be a dictator on day one. There you have it - and this is kind of new for all of us and the reasonable side believes in nonviolence and the other side has the guns and are not afraid to use them. So people are scared.
Ricardo, We told our friend in detail what Orange Head is doing, what Musk is doing, who is being harmed by all the cuts, spelled out the alliance with Russia, etc. We were very specific and still she doesn't want to believe what is happening!!! We have sent her HCR's posts and other articles. I've known her for decades and feel like I've lost a friend. I didn't watch Orange Head's speech but saw the clip of Republicans clapping loudly during his speech- it's a cult mentality. Appreciate all who are on here- helps not to feel alone in the fight.
I've been following election results since Bush the second and I realized that there's always a 25/30% of voters that no matter what, voted for the formerly republican party, now the maga party. I always said that there's no cure for stupidity. I wouldn't be obsessed with trying to make that percentage of voters understand anything. Thanks for your reply Caroline 😁
Once again I quote Eugene V. Debs : " Informed discontent is the mainspring of civilization. It is agitation or stagnation." Good on you for confronting and agitating. Stay the course!
As a retired career prosecutor, I commend you for presenting a compelling, virtually airtight case proving what I’ve long suspected: Trump really is the non-fictional Manchurian Candidate. There’s no other explanation for the destructive course Trump has pursued since his election. This is Trump, the catspaw of Putin, Thiel and Musk, unbound and unrestrained.
The time is now to re-read the opening & closing statements of Prosecutor Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg Trials after WWII.
Then re-read Justice, yes, Justice Robert Jackson concurrence in the Youngstown Steel Supreme Court case which succinctly lays out the separation of powers in our democratic Republic. During the Korean War the President by so-called "executive order" cannot take over a steel producer & the lives of its workers.
The Senate and our House of Representatives hold the exclusive power of lawmaking not a billionaire not a Hillbilly created by Peter Thiel and most definitely not a purported orange king.
I've just started reading 'The Anatomy of the Nuremburg Trials: A Memoir' by Telford Taylor. He was a member of the American prosecution staff and eventually became chief counsel at the Nuremburg Trials. Such a disturbing subject matter but very important and relevant, we might need something like this again soon or look to this as reference and precedent.
Heather's LFAA community is over 2 Million & does includes screenplay writers & others in that tough SoCal biz. A savy Agent is required among other things.
Trump couldn't get loans from legitimate financial institutions after so many bankruptcies starting in the early 90s. After at least 6 major bankruptcies and no banks to lend him money, Donold turned to Russian oligarchs for funding his schlock and a way for them to money launder, and, more importantly, they could influence him and had continuous knowledge of kompromat information on him. A few former KGB agents have said Donold has been as asset of theirs even as early as 1987. Aka Krasnov.
russian kompromat takes multiple forms and in donald's case the visual is doubtless mingled with other realities. perhaps they have the infrmation that demonstrates he never actually personally attended much in the way of college, paying brighter poorer people to double for himin giant lecture halls and at the the typewriter. That has always been my theory since no one who attended can rememebr him and even then he was a memorable lout.
Yeah, but the Manchurian Candidate figured it out in the end and nips it…don’t see Mump coming ‘round…perhaps someone(s) else will regain their morality/humanity & put the kibosh on this democracy destroying vortex.
It won’t be a single individual who defeats Trump and more broadly Trumpism/MAGA but rather a sustained and widespread revolt. As one who considers himself a cold-eyed realist and political centrist I’m skeptical that enough Americans posses the courage, zeal and moral outrage. I also view the Democratic Party as beyond feckless as an effective counterweight. I think Heather is a national treasure but I suspect she would disagree with me that the Democrats and especially Biden made Trump’s ascension far easier, if not inevitable. But I do. I’m a Dem myself, but unless it sheds its alienating far left baggage, it’s doomed to irrelevance. My hope is for a war-time alignment/alliance between the center-left, center, and center right.
Which "alienating far-left baggage" are you talking about? Protecting consumers via CFPB? Running a competent social security program? Analyzing weather patterns? Acting to counter climate change? Promoting - at the state level - free lunches for school kids whose families can't afford them?
Or are you talking about what Fox 'news' accuses the Democrats of doing, like wanting open borders (never anybody's actual policy, as distinct from finding humane ways to reduce immigration), or performing gender-change operations on school kids?
The Dems needed, and still need, to be WAY more clear about what they are proposing or wanting to keep. During the 2024 election, polls that tested the popularity of platform positions without identifying the party found that the Democratic proposals were more popular - but people didn't associate them with that party. That can be put down to low-info voters, and to incompetent messaging, and to the lack of interest by media in 'boring' stories, but none of it is 'far-left'.
Also - of course - what gets branded as 'far left' in the US would be barely centrist in the rest of the developed, democratic world... So it's not a helpful label, and avoiding 'far left' policies is not helpful advice for opponents of Trump.
Great comment. First, you enumerate all the policies that I absolutely embrace and support. Always have. They promote tangible, material benefits to ALL Americans irrespective of identity or ideology. Great New Deal stuff. Let’s throw in raising the minimum wage and increasing the tax rate on millionaires. I also support single payer healthcare. But you then deliberately elide what f*cking kills us: embrace of identitarian politics, at minimum tacit support for extreme trans policies, soft on Palestinian terrorism, crime the need for public order. And let’s be honest, Dems could do generally much better at governing. Finally, immigration. I was at a gym once where I compelled to watch FOX news. Of course the usual agit prop BUT on a segment about immigration they interviewed Democratic mayors who complained about massive influx immigration. Sorry, immigration matters to most Americans and Biden failed miserably.
And yet we read articles that tell us that Idaho dairy farmers now depend on immigrant labor. That Texas contractors could not build houses or apartment buildings without immigrant labor. That without immigrant labor in California & Florida, strawberries, oranges, lettuce, avocados & many other fruits & vegetables would remain unpicked & the produce sections of our grocery stores would be barren of produce.
Fair point. On illegal immigration the US is a paragon of hypocrisy. But perceptions matter as well. And the perception that Biden made no effort to minimize the huge influx had weight.
and sometimes I went along after reading your comments but after watching (only me to blame) the reaction of the maga legislators to the avalanche of trump's lies, not even you can change my mind.
And making tons of money for him and his family. I've been calling the vice president the Manchurian Candidate puppet of Peter Thiel for weeks but as per you, there's a second one, the scumbag president and I agreed with you Ben. What a show!!!!!
Why could our Democrats, lawyers, business leaders have not accepted our election results just as our country did not accept Ukraine’s election results when there was significant evidence of interference, flaws in our own systems, and even Trump saying you’ll never have to vote again. We just gave the thieves the keys to the kingdom.
It’s too late to investigate the ballot in the last election. If we yell voter fraud now we will just not make an impression we need to work with what we have and get the message out of exactly what Trump is doing and Democrats need to be stand on the table on the floor of Congress yelling from the top of their lungs.
Because in Ukraine's 2010 election there was actual evidence of ballot tampering and other actual election malfeasance. There is no evidence that the 2024 US election had anything similar. Our elections are conducted very differently. Ukraine's election is run nationally and there was a fair amount of actual evidence including testimony by election officials that the was Russian monkeying with the results. Our presidential election is run by the individual states and it is extremely hard to interfere with enough states' individual election processes to effect the national outcome. The fact that each states process is different makes it even harder. And again there have been no authoritative sources within the election community alleging fraud or other election illegalalities.
The situations are very different. Trump won our election as disgusting as it is to admit. Get over it. We need to change things but first we need to win the next set of elections. That's what we should be working on right now.
Elon Musk probably did tamper with the current election. I don’t think we can do anything with that no. Democrats have to get angry. The Democrats have to show resistance. I just listened to some podcast by some Democrats my grandmother on her death bed had more enthusiasm than that.
Until the house & senate are taken back from the Putin & Maga Republicans , if we will survive that long, pressure the Party of Putin ! Their constituents will feel the burn of being lied to about the "economy"
What you say may be true. The country of Georgia held elections near the time that the US held elections. They stopped theirs declaring irregularities and held another. Seems we could have done the same.
True? Hell yes it is true. Remember the first time Trump was impeached. Everyone knew he was guilty of accepting Russian interference for his election. Everyone of those Republicans voted not to impeach, and everyone of them knew his election was interfered with by Russia.
Grow up folks. Stop acting like uneducated grade schoolers. I assume you went to high school and learned something about logic and reasoning.
"Everyone knew he was guilty of accepting Russian interference for his election". Except there was no evidence that the Russian interference (which WAS true) had anything to do with his election (which was never connected via anything except vague innuendo). Read the Mueller impeachment report which I would bet none of you have. There was no accusation in the impeachment that the Russian interference changed the result of the election. So nothing in the first impeachment report ever said or inferred that Trump won because of the interference.
As for "stopping" our election because of irregularities, there weren't any sufficient to change the results of any of the three elections. Hillary Clinton got the majority of the votes in 2016 but because of the way our system works, she still lost. Biden won both the popular vote and electoral vote in 2020 so I assume you agree there was no problem with that election (despite Trump's nonsense that the election was stolen). In 2024, a HUGE number of previously Democratic voters decided to stay home. 7 million of them. No one could make 7 million votes disappear in our system where each state runs its own election for President. If you actually believe that, you are too far from reality to be making pronouncements on election results.
Trump won in 2024 because the Democrats f**ked up by not getting Biden to step aside EARLY enough to come up with a winning candidate. We all love Harris but she was never really viable after she withdrew from the race in 2020 before the first primary and then backed Biden as VP.
People hated Biden. It was irrational and stupid but it was reality. The polls weren't wrong. 70% of the people did not want Joe in 2024. By the time he figured it out, it was too late to nominate a winning candidate and 7 MILLION people who voted for Biden in 2020 refused to vote at all in 2024.
I know you don't want to believe it because conspiracies are easier to use to explain unwanted results. But the fact is Democrats cost Harris the race by not wanting to vote for her for whatever reasons. Trump got almost exactly the same number of votes in '24 as he did in '20. Harris LOST the race, Trump didn't win it.
And none of that had anything to do with "irregularities" in the voting. It was just dumb American politics. Ugly but fair.
Sorry you are disappointed in the results but there is NO evidence that is credible that it wasn't the actual results.
Jon Rosen, today I’m pasting my 4th YouTube where suspicious chatter is speaking of something gave JD / Trump unusual odds…this time it’s Peter Thiel, and he’s pro-Trump.
…
The Real Reason Tech Is Swinging to the Right & It Isn’t What You Think | Peter Thiel
*** Timestamp (3:00 minutes) Peter Thiel remarks how unusual that so many voters had to of changed their mind in order for Trump and JD to win in 2024”.
Sorry you are believing "suspicious chatter" instead of actual counted electing results counted in 50 separate states by 50 different election authorities governed by 50 different political organizations. That's paranoia not election science.
"So many voters had to change their minds". That's just nonsense. In fact very FEW voters changed their minds. Trump got almost EXACTLY the same votes in 2024 that he did in 2020 when he lost. But Harris LOST 7 MILLION votes that Biden won in 2020. And that happened not because of conspiracy but because so many Democrats decided to stay home in 2024 rather than vote for Harris.
The fact is that Harris was NOT popular although she was MORE popular than Biden. In 2024, Biden would have probably lost even MORE Democratic voters than Harris did. It was irrational but it was real. Despite a soaring stock market, Biden was HATED by a large segment of the country and distrusted by many more. He refused to talk to the people who voted for him (I think he gave something like 25 press conferences in his 4 years in office while Trump was doing his nonsensical press word salads every week or more.
It is sad, and may turn out terribly for our country but Trump won the election. You need to get over it because it's not going to change.
I think that we should all register as "Unaffiliated". This way the purging of voters won't be easy. Until a party that represents humanity, I shall stay unaffiliated. I have voted since I was eligible to vote and as a 75 year old, I will continue to do so. I pray we have midterms.
——A deliberate attempt to crash what was, when [ELON/FELON] took office, a booming U.S. economy, is a feature of the administration’s plan, not a bug. It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices.” —— Jess Piper
I would very much appreciate links from this knowledgeable crew of other journalists/papers/channels/Substacks that expand on this, because this is exactly what I think is going on.
Read Sarah Kendzior. She's on Substack and is also the author of two best-selling books on the extraordinary level of corruption in American society. But be careful. You may not like what you learn.
I agree with you. Sarah Kendzior has detailed information, and it is bone-chilling. And I've learned to read it when I am in the right mind. It is not for reading before bedtime.
Thank you. And she has a new book coming out. It chronicles her travels around America and especially Route 66 with her children. She says she wanted them to see their country before it disappears. 😢💔🇺🇸
I agree. If that happens, Russia will own America. I do not believe Panama, Canada and Greenland are ideas generated by the shriveled brain of the orange helium balloon !
Mendacity? Lying? Even Heather has had to take a break from their onslaught.
But the lies took hold in the U.S. Where’s truth gone? In Lyndsey Stonebridge’s new book, “We are Free to Change the World: Hannah Arendt’s Lessons in Love and Disobedience,” she follows Hannah Arendt’s key: truth begins with human dignity. And we can’t defend truth, facts, if we’ve earlier given up on seeing individuals.
We let schools abandon novels, memoirs, biographies, and histories. In tandem with this, dark money has been installing its more lasting fix so the personal never pops up anywhere again. Our ogres, zombies, and ghouls needed this because, if the personal, the individual, is allowed, its light shines. If light shines, if human dignity is honored, its corollary lives: facts get centered; American communities again stand on truth.
For a world based on lies, our ogres, zombies, and ghouls must bury the odd, the spontaneous, the gambits of rhyme and play of love. So they killed the personal by the packaged intimidation where all “life” fits only abstractions, categories, chains of linear chronology. For this fix, for dark money’s lies, all schools reduce all life to A), B), C), or D).
Thanks for the tip on the book about Hannah Arendt. I've recently read Arendt's Origins of Totalitarianism. It's not an easy read but explains so much, including how the followers are immune to truth or facts and will accept any twist or turn of the leader. With what's going on I'm reminded of an easier but just as cogent read: The Tin Drum.
"Hannah Arendt’s key: truth begins with human dignity. And we can’t defend truth, facts, if we’ve earlier given up on seeing individuals."
"Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men (sic), in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors." - Lincoln
I think of dignity as a commitment to "unalienable rights", for oneself and all sentient beings. Not a new idea and one proven to be fruitful; and yet always a tough sell. Individual rights and value is what liberty and justice look like from the inside, and a just and civil society is how it looks as a whole.
Please, remember peace is how we make it. Here within our reach if we are big enough to take it
Great statement. We need more Lincolns. They do not make them like him anymore. If someone tries to emulate him, someone maybe like JFK, they end up dead.
"Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men (sic), in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors." - Lincoln
Many fine people, Sandra, have their columns on Substack.
I follow commenters to Heather's, Rebecca Solnit's, Timothy Snyder's, and Johnny Rochat's. I know several others, and their readers, deserve attention. But other parts of my life having priorities as they do, I balk at paying time and money to get behind pay walls other than the four for which I pay.
Please note, too, Sandra, that over the recent 20 years I commented also (and paid money to do so) to the New York Times columnists, the Washington Post's columnists, and to conversations on the old AlterNet.
In all these years, in all these comments from me, I often got record numbers of replies in conversation from our fellow commenters. But the columnists themselves all went to schools that have taught only that elites are those who receive money. Period. None have ever acknowledged any good points from any mere commenters, we who exist for elites only as sources of revenue for elites.
Same for Dems, impotent for the same posture of ever ignoring all mere working class, and ignoring all novels, memoirs, biographies, and histories of all actual, living working classes.
Heather mentioned that the ‘Trump administration’ intends to fire 80,000 professional civil servants from the Department of Veterans Affairs.
My presumption is that this relates to Chainsaw Musk’s heartless and unprofessional DOGE blitzkrieg in over a dozen federal entities.
Personally I find repugnant a person publicly waving a chainsaw and clearly relishing firing hundreds of thousands of career civil servants by the crudest and most impersonal methods.
Musk, currently the richest person in the world, evidently has Trump’s support (‘fire or semi-fire’ Trump describes it) in gutting the federal government. Musk declared, some time ago, that he could find up-to-$2 trillion in ‘savings’ in the $7 trillion annual federal budget. Even he has subsequently acknowledged that this is nonsense.
Still, he has ruthlessly pursued an assault on the career federal servants who keep government operations functioning reasonably well. While he claims that this will result in significant ‘savings,’ what he has reported so far is statistical rubbish, which often is then removed from his DOGE website.
Clearly any large organization—governmental, corporate, educational—can, with careful consideration and analysis, be made somewhat more efficient. This was demonstrated by two multi-year Hoover Commissions in the 1940s-1950s.
Sending a horde of techies into federal entities, seizing data bases, and then announcing that countless human beings will be fired—20-to-50 % in some instances—is a chainsaw approach.
Summarily abolishing USAID I find stupid, insensitive, and severely detrimental to America’s global humanitarian responsibilities.
I can imagine how Musk’s chainsaw technique could be applied to a train company. Arbitrarily at least 20% of the engineers and signal personnel could be fired. One obvious result is that trains would run less safely and effectively. I submit that this is the likely result of Musk’s federal chain sawing.
Also, government employment is different from corporate. Corporations are businesses that can go bankrupt. As they face market place pressures and new competition, they must readjust to survive.
In sharp contrast, government attracts professionals who seek to serve often at significantly lower compensation than offered in the private sector. The great majority of professional civil servants seek a career in government. Over many years they become an integral part of a functioning $7 trillion operation dedicated to serving the American people.
In return for this service they have been granted security—only being fired for cause.
Musk’s chainsaw approach has violated this pledge of tenure.
What I find especially repulsive in this entire Musk process is its lack of humanity. At no time have I heard Musk lament what his chainsawing is doing to dedicated Americans who have chosen government careers.
My impression, from what I have read, is that Musk, in his turbulent careers, has never face-to-face fired an employee. (I gather that the same is true with Trump.)
I would like to tell both Musk and Trump that they are dealing with the lives of decent people who are serving our government.
In my professional careers I have been obliged to fire employees. I always did this face to face. I found this difficult and totally without ‘joy.’
MUSK AND TRUMP DON’T ACKNOWLEDGE THAT GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES ARE DEDICATED AND DECENT HUMAN BEINGS
Firing someone face-to-face takes courage. Both Trump and Elon are cowards and playground bullies who always see themselves as victims. Retribution is the goal. As a child, Elon was bullied. His ass of a father, rather than comforting and supporting his son, would smack him around and yell at him, telling him to toughen up and fight back. Trump’s relationship with Roy Cohn—the self-loathing, closeted gay man and Sen. Joe McCarthy’s henchman lawyer—was set up by Trump’s father to “toughen him up” and “fight back” against Manhattan real estate developers and dealers who looked down on Trump Sr. and his son as second-class slum lords. Elon and Trump are humiliated little boys pretending to be tough guys. That’s why they have other people do the firing.
Thank you, Dave A. I have just written to Steve Rattner who used graphs to show how DT would increase the national debt with the totality of his campaign promises. I asked how long before reporters would recognize what observers all know:DT is a tantrum-prone child (catsup on the wall of the White House dining room and broken porcelain plates) who does not plan or think. The frolics with Musk at DT rallies is further evidence of the lack of maturity of the two.
As for voters, they are repeatedly lied to and desperate with their poverty while being ruled by multimillion and billionaires, but seem to be learning fast (town halls).
So the question is, what exactly should we do? One thing that would be helpful is to be more precise in our language. These people are not really conservative in any sense. We need a new name for them and we need to use it consistently and continuously to make it stick. Another is to take stock of what power remains to Democrats and to use it wisely. The MAGATs control all three branches of our national government. The Democrats have no national power at all. There only remains the power of the Blue states. And the power of the court system below the Supreme Court. And lastly there is the power of unity. We really, really, really have to stop sniping at each other. We have to stop calling the Democrats feckless and pathetic and stop belittling their individual efforts to push back. We have to stop blaming them for the MAGAT ascendency and put the blame squarely where it belongs, the MAGAT web of lies and false promises. If we don't, if we continue to peck away at one another we will never be able to get ourselves out of this mess. Let's take a page (just one) from the Trump and MAGAT playbook and be relentlessly persistent.
Go online, find your nearest Indivisible chapter or start one. Indivisible originated with congressional staffers and went online with Trump’s win in 2015. At 90, I can no longer march nor spend more than 30 minutes at a local rally, but I can write postcards to voters as do many in my Indivisible chapter. Since 2018 we have seen the success of that function of Indivisible members and at least three organizations provide postcards and voters’ addresses. So there is a starter for what you can do.
Let’s make the shift in our language away from, “Dem’s aren’t doing enough” to “I can’t wait to see more Dem’s acting like _______ when s/he did _______ yesterday.”
By explicitly naming the actions you prefer to see, you’re encouraging that behavior while also withholding from t***p any satisfaction he might feel about Democratic infighting
To this detailed and tragic history of the development of Russia's capacity to win the war between truth and lies, I feel compelled to add the story of an American who contributed what I believe to be key psychological tools to Russia's arsenal. This man's name is Werner Erhard (the name he gave himself after he decided Jack Rosenberg didn't fit his persona as "personal growth guru" when he developed the est Training in the late 1960s).
I came to know of Werner's work when I took "est" in early 1979. At the time, I was impressed with both his "you create your own reality" method of re-framing / re-contexturalizing the traumatic portions of your life's story but also his apparently close friendship with Dr. R. Buckminster Fuller ("Bucky), the author of the landmark book "Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth". That book described the option for society to fundamentally alter from a world view based on "you or me" / scarcity / zero sum thinking to "you and me" / abundance / expanding pie thinking thanks to the application of advances in science (the ability to "do more with less"). Werner did event with Bucky and led a day-long seminar by himself in which he laid out the principles for creating "a world the works for everyone".
I was thrilled in early 1980 when I read in the magazine sent to graduates of "the training" that Werner was setting up a division within the est organization devoted to this cause (which would be much more all encompassing than the already existing world hunger effort known as The Hunger Project. Imagine my dismay when this new effort was never formally launched. While The Hunger Project continued, I knew it would not achieve its goal of "the end of hunger" because that was an anti-systemic goal (fixing one part of what doesn't work about how humanity is organized on the planet). What is really needed (still, today) is an effort modeled on Bucky's life's work: the transformation to a "you and me" world.
I mention all this because Werner gave up this global transformation objective I thought he had adopted as one of Bucky's close friends. And while deciding (for whatever reason) not to pursue societal transformation he ALSO decided to become a consultant to various organizations within the U.S.S.R.
Yes... Werner Erhard taught he extraordinarily powerful "you create your own reality through language" technology to people whose core value system was one of global conquest. I do not have any idea if he ever thought about the risk of teaching his methods there. But what I do know is that he did not care about how his methods were used in the United States. I say that because I tried to get his organization to create a seminar series for graduates of the training on the subject of "politics". And I was turned down more than once. Graduates of "the training" were offered follow-up seminars on every subject imaginable: money, relationships, well-being, etc... but not politics.
I interpreted this as resulting from the organization never taking responsibility for how their methods were used. Literally, I remember them saying "You are responsible for your life... and that includes being responsible for what you do with what we are teaching you." This is the classic mistake when new tech is created. Facebook was launched without there being a value system users needed to promise to use too... resulting in it being home for many harmful lies.
Here are two links to articles about Werner's work in the U.S.S.R. While I would never say he is responsible for how effective Russia is today at destroying truth-based reality. I have to imagine that his teachings played a role in the crisis we face today.
Werner is 89 years old now. And I wish someone would - as they used to say in the training - "call him on his racket" of not caring how his methods are used.
I know a couple people who did this training years ago. I was kinda suspicious of it. I have often wondered what that was all about. Thank you for explaining this.
You're welcome. Using language to re-frame your personal reality - because "you are responsible for your life" - is a powerful approach to teach people. But when that approach is applied to "controlling how other people see you" that's when we get into the abusive use of this technology... especially if you want people to see bad things you are doing in a positive light. One thing I did not include in my comment was the obvious evidence that Werner's techniques were being used when George W. was POTUS and he and his people lied us into the Iraq War. Don Rumsfeld at one point briefed the press and the American people about what they were doing... using the words "There are things we know... things we don't know... and things we don't know we don't know". These are - word for word - things said during introductions to the est Training (now called Landmark Education". When I heard Rumsfeld say this, I knew he (and probably others) had taken "the training". I was mortified!
That dumb fucking Peter Navarro has never forgiven California Democrats for seeing him for the halfwit perfesserator of acadamania he has always been, seeing him as the bad joke he was in Southern California Democratic politics where he was regularly laughed at to his face by some and behind his back be the rest, which is why he - like every other talentless neverwas from Dennis Miller to Ted Nugent - became a right winger where the audience was such a collection of ignoramuses and nitwits that they would mistake him for an intelligent person, so he could "own the libs" for them and for his wounded ego.
The rest of these Russian stooges need to be put against walls and have their damn heads blown off.
Eye-opening historical context for the present, Heather! And now the a-holes are setting us up for committing disaster capitalism on their own country. Bravo. 😑
Dr. Cox Richardson makes it very clear that capitalist and communist men have ended up working together by hook, crook, and performance art to impose themselves on the entire Earth economically. The fight between these two types of governance has just been that, a means of continuous control and distraction that has been going on for at least 14,000 years as the archeologist flies. Men fighting to gain control and reward for their fighting have indeed been in control for as long as we have records. In the midst of this, families have tried to keep children alive. We can see this over all these thousands of years. The men who pursue personal control are the problem, not Nature, not Life, not Deity. The People are the problem in that we are too easily swayed by control tactics and destruction. We have this foolish fight here in the USA between Democrats and Republicans. The fight was built into our Constitution because men fight all the time, and our form of governance gave men a day to day fight that was hopefully more controlled than the fights in Europe and other locations. Today in this fight, we are vulnerable to all the other fighters on Earth, and that is definitely Putin and Xi, but look at the fights in Africa and everywhere else. In these fights, both sides passionately want to win and take over. The other side is evil. Men like Trump, Putin, and Xi are just the latest iteration of this fight. These men want to own the Earth and use its People to enrich themselves and their few cronies. They care nothing for anything else.
Most people just want to live and enjoy their family and friends. They do a job so they can live. But we are too easily manipulated by performance arts of various kinds. We are caught up in the fight. Indeed, we can't evolve past the fight, even as all our resources are devoted to fighting and coming on top to please a few men on top. It is just so easy to control and distract us so we are always fighting.
This is an addiction. It is a type of madness. The only time we stop fighting is when we are too tired to continue for the moment, when we have to pause fighting to briefly rebuild so we can do it again. Here we are, fighting again.
It’s important to understand that Paul Manafort was also one of the architects of the Nixon administration’s 1970 “Southern Strategy aimed at turning the formerly democratic states of the south red by appealing to racism and fear of the “other” namely Black folks. The strategy of driving a wedge between working class white folks and working class Black folks and now immigrants has always served the ruling class. Look at what Trump is doing.
I think there are several forces at play here. Trump and his vanity, Vought's Project 2025 and ideas about remaking the government from Curtis Yarvin, probably brought to Trump's attention by JD and carried out by Musk. It sounds like a crazy conspiracy but try reading this reporter's description.
“We were at war with a dictator,” said French center-right politician Claude Malhuret of Europe’s stand against Putin. “[N]ow we are at war with a dictator backed by a traitor.”
Will someone, please, pound this into the heads of the Republicans in the Congress. And when you're done, pound it into the heads of the Democrats. Neither group seems to understand this basic fact.
James: you hit the nail on the head!
I wonder how many people, besides myself, and,a couple of concerned friends. are getting physically I'll.
Not to be trite Veronica but the saying, "Misery loves company," comes to mind.
Apparently Musk has fits of depression according to a story in The Atlantic yesterday. He is a ketamine addict. One of the side affects of ketamine abuses is decreased cognitive function.
And you're not alone Veronica. There are millions of us that are physically ill.
I think it is important to recognize that HCR was up into the wee small hours getting this informative piece out into the world. This is a vital insight into what is happening in the US and a truly dire warning. Remember in the early nineties the news stories of Russians selling whatever piece of furniture or jewellery they had in order to buy food that had become expensive and scarce? I remember a translated interview with an elderly woman who was selling a chandelier from her dining room on a street in Moscow. She said her children and grandchildren were hungry and they had no heat in their home in the middle of winter. She didn’t know what they would do when they had sold all their furniture. I have always wondered what happened to her and her loved ones in Putin’s Russia.
That could very possibly be a scene from New York or Los Angeles…. or Toronto …. in our future if Trump succeeds in fulfilling Putin’s orders. A slow-motion train wreck while we stand by and watch in horror.
ESPECIALLY if SS is delayed and cut! I am a senior with a few friends/family who rely nearly 100% on their SS, but what tiny pensions or small amount of savings they have will not sustain them should SS fail. My sister lives very frugally and is fearful--she has been watching sales for months now and told me her cabinets and freezer is stocked to capacity. She said she'd be able to to stay in and eat out of her stores for at least two months--be it necessity of shortages, violence in the street or Avian-flu-pandemic. !!
Miselle, I have no doubt this is happening all over the country. SS has saved millions of seniors from abject poverty. Now that and health care are threatened. And why, just so a bunch of greedy vultures can own these programs and make even more money. I confess to losing patience with MAGAs I run across on other threads and have told a few of them very plainly how wrong they are. At least the last one did not answer me. I have also discovered bots or entities I cannot block who appear on the threads of D pols.
Michele, a few years back, I read a biography of Frances Perkins that was suggested here in what I refer to as the "LFAA Bookclub" as I had never heard of her.
I have a dear, dear friend who as about as far left as MAGA is far right. I don't have a term for that, she is very progressive, but like the MAGA, she just can't deal with the other side and immediately cuts them off. (Sometimes with stinging brilliant putdowns, but I digress.) I truly believe that throwing up the "deplorables" like Hilary did is too damaging, however true it might be. I prefer to find SOMETHING of non-political common ground and keep the lines of communication open. I do have MAGA family and friends. I believe as tides turn, IF there is welcoming on our side, we might win them over. Some of these people have been brainwashed.
Dear Michele - thank you for raising the issue of Social Security. Thom Hartmann has a great substack essay on the coming demise of Social Security. Republicans have had Social Security in their crosshairs since at least the 1990s. Republicans want so badly to privatize it much to the delight of private investment firms. In the 1990s, Schwab Investments was the Social Security privatization winner. I pictured Schwab licking their lips over all the investment fees they would make off that money. I don't know who the favored investment firm is currently but the same holds for whomever gets that money to invest privately.
I have lots of soup in cans and my freezer is full. I won't go hungry for a while. However, if I have not electricity my freezer supply will perish very fast. My soup I could heat on my wood stove that I am happy to have!
Isn't insane we have to think about this?!!?
Please see my post above--we must all get ourselves in gear and truly push every button available to us "Resistance is not Futile", even against the Borg-like creatures such as these two "idiots", these poor players, who "strut and fret their lives upon the stage signifying nothing". may they be "he heard no more (with credit to Jean Luc Picard and William Shakespeare)
Clay
Thanks, NL. It’s easy to overlook HCR’s late nights when we’re freaking out about her words.
Heartbreaking!
It also can damage the urinary tract. The ketamine is definitely causing Muskrat’s escape from reality. He’s probably wearing sunglasses inside to hide the pupils of his eyes.
Heather spelled it out quite concisely. Man has the urge to build only to destroy. It’s in his DNA. We no sooner slay the existing monster then develop a need to slay a new one.
Here is a song I wrote in 2019. As I drove home to Hartford from Nashville, a line kept churning around in my head (one must think of something on long distance journeys) “There are good people and bad ones where ever you go; just seems like the bad ones are stealing the show.” I finally pulled into a truck stop to write it down because we songwriters know that if you don’t jot a line down it’s lost forever. In one week having arrived back home, I had my song titled, “Blue Daze.”
I thought by now those old songs would be buried and no longer needed. I have a date certain to record it as a demo for distribution. It will take a moment to upload. Enjoy “Blue Daze.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYtTGIzb7OA
LOVE your song, Bill -- as well as the place you chose to record/video yourself. We live in Asheville. I'll share your song with my 12-year-old grandson, a budding singer/songwriter. Thank you.
Thank you. One is never too young nor too old to make music.
Good ones and bad ones?
How many Congressional Republicans support Putin? https://jerryweiss.substack.com/p/remove-impeach-impeach
The most powerful person in the world has fits of depression? A Conscience still deep inside somewhere?
Lincoln had fits of depression. That’s not the problem with Muck (misspelling intended).
Muck’s problem. like Trump’s is that he thinks neither the Constitution nor the law binds him in any way. And half the nation clearly doesn’t think so either, that’s assuming they have any real notion of either.
No, the problem, as the cartoon character Pogo once noted is: "We have met the enemy, and they is us”.
Muskrat tweeted that he wants ‘Never went to therapy’ carved on his gravestone.
The sickest people are the ones who never go to therapy.
THAT last sentence--so perfectly astute!!
You summed up my family in one sentence.
Musk is a sociopath.
Hahahahaaa.., yeah I agree James, Pogo the visionary. And.., WHO is the Government.., why glory be, that's your neighbor, you know, MTG, RFK, and they go to church with us! And, they're for home-schooling (private religious school funding) because we (yahh Pogo, "we") have bastardized our public school curriculum and silly-buses (syllabus). Haven't we.., neighbor? Ayuhh! We sure have, to the point people are "desperate" (read Jess Piper's article), so desperate that the only hope is with prayer, instead of their "neighbor" (in Government) doing the job they swore they would do. Get religion out of government.., we need common sense, and some education.
No, no conscience. Side effect of drug addiction.
🤣🤣🤣...I very much doubt Smuk's depression is caused by any potential scraps of decency still left deep in his conscience--I rather doubt if he even has a conscience left. I suspect his depression is part of the overall issues of being on the spectrum (if indeed he actually IS on the spectrum).
He certainly seemed like someone on the spectrum in his appearance at Tuesday night's howler of a speech.
Maybe he does, under the influence of ketamine? He may be high-functioning...I don't know. I do know a couple of high functioning people who have been diagnosed as being on the spectrum. Scary smart, both of them...but they do have some/occasional issues processing certain things.
he has Asbergers. https://www.axios.com/2022/04/15/elon-musk-aspergers-syndrome
He's "conscious" that he has money, more than enough, is all that he needs to do with as he pleases. Consciousness? No factor. It's your problem.., err ahh.., OUR problem. Right.. tailgators? uhhuh.., uhhuh.., uhhuhh.
I believe there has been research regarding people winning large lottery prizes, that concluded people have a "set -point" of their happiness. Be it a great windfall or a horrific tragedy, they will have temporary change in their emotion but return to that mindset.
And who knows what goes on in his mind, but unhappiness and depression are not the same thing. Depression is mind chemicals and his self administration of Ketamine is not advisable.
I know far more lottery "winners' that were worse off as early as a year after they "won." There were a few rare ones that I was glad to see win, and actually have their lives much improved.
The most striking example was a classmate who's home burnt down, and took years to get the denied insurance finally paid to them. They lived in the basement with just a tar paper roof basically covering just the first floor (no walls left standing), for a few years. When they finally got the insurance, it seems the house got rebuilt and had enough to buy some lottery tickets, one of which got them something like $35,000 and let them start a small business. I don't know many details, actually, but did see the results of what to me was a too rare case of longer term benefits from winning a lottery.
We rarely bought even one lottery ticket over a few years, and then only when the prize was over $50 million, since it very slightly improved our chances of winning over not buying any tickets.
Please stop talking about Musk he's not even legally part of our government. He's Trump's alter ego
Nothing more. Finding a way to legally remove Trump will send Muskrat running
I respectfully disagree. If Trump were to vanish, Vance would continue to allow Musk to privatize the government. Vance is a puppet of the broligarchs. He is only on the stage because of Peter Thiel. The billionaire "bros" are now in charge.
Trump is enjoying his fame and the attention he never got from his parents. But he is not the ring leader. Trump has no ideology. Just shady techniques to enrich himself and mostly to be the center of attention. He is the toy of the bros and Putin. $Trump is a puppet. A very dangerous tool of the very rich and the very cruel.
Musk is effectively leading the nation right now. And he is indeed on a "spectrum" of some sort. He is a self described "Aspie". There are millions of people who are on that spectrum. Some of them have zero empathy. Some of them are high functioning excellent members of society. But some have no capacity to feel or care about others. That seems to describe Musk, $Trump and now an entire political party.
Musk is a numb monster who uses ketamine (and who knows what else) to treat his self admitted bouts of depression. Follow his tweets and observe mental illness.
Bill A., I think you outlined a good summary of the current state of affairs. I would just suggest that Musk isn't •leading• the nation so much as he is operating it, as one would operate a machine. He's basically pushing buttons to make things happen (all of them bad). There is no leadership involved.
Meanwhile, Donald is like a kid "driving a car" in a carnival ride. He spins the steering wheel violently from left to right, shouting with glee, but the car's direction is controlled by the concealed carnival ride operator. The analogy holds up when you consider that many "carnies" have substance-abuse problems.
I noticed Fulton Missouri has another institution besides Westminster College (where Winston Churchill spoke of the Iron Curtain). It has a long and interesting history of treating mental illness and substance abuse problems that might be appropriate to provide the best treatment of Musk's problems. Their early experiments ran the gamut of less successful methods but seem to always trend toward well intentioned help. See https://dmh.mo.gov/fulton-state-hospital/history
I was too upset yesterday to figure out what to say, particularly since I heard about the apparent arson that destroyed 7 or 8 Tesla Supercharger stations in Littleton, MA (just 5 miles from where I was born, and no more than 2 or 3 times the distance to Concord and Lexington).
It was easy to imagine someone enraged about the cutting off the Intelligence and threat detection services to Ukraine, exposing them to missile attacks and blinding them to critical intelligence by other means.
That generates backlash to all of us who support Ukraine, which I fear even more might have been effectively a false flag act like the Reichstag Fire on 27 Feb, 1933. They still dispute who started that fire, but there is less doubt about the 1999 Russian Apartment bombings in 1999 that helped trigger the 2nd Chechen War.
Whoever did it is playing into the potential propaganda benefit of the MTVP (Musk, Trump, Vance, Putin gang). If it was an enraged opponent of the Cyber surrender, please confess and apologize for such a counter-productive risking action. I'd much rather make restitution and apology as John Quincy Adams and others would for the Boston Tea Party, to avoid it being used as justification for escalation by our enemies.
As I've said before, I was a toddler military dependent in Munich Germany during the Nuremberg Trials and the unimaginably successful Berlin Airlift which was very much the time frame of the start of NATO.
An immensely interesting recap of that time, describing the horrible conditions with was found at https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/opinions_139301.htm
"...World War Two left behind a terrible legacy which even today it takes a great deal of imagination as well as historical knowledge to fully comprehend.
Let me just give you some statistics. In World War Two 36.5 million Europeans were killed. That is the equivalent of the total population of France in 1939. Nineteen million of those were civilians. It doesn’t also of course incorporate all of those who died from natural causes or all of the babies that were not born. The death toll created an enormous imbalance between men and women. In the Soviet Union in 1945, there were 20 million more women than men. In 1946, in the German suburb of Triptal, there were only left 181 adult men between the ages of 19 and 21, but there were 1105 women. A whole generation of Germans including for example Gerhardt Schroeder, the former German Chancellor, were brought up by their moms. There were no dads around. They were either incarcerated in the Soviet Union or had died in the war. There were many orphans. In Berlin in 1945 there were 53,000 lost children wandering the streets, 49,000 orphans in Czechoslovakia, 80,000 in the Netherlands and as many as 200,000 in Poland. Those who did survive were underfed. The calorie intake in Vienna was only about 800 calories a day in 1945. The infant mortality in Austria four times the 1938 rate. In the British zone of Berlin, in December 1945, the death rate of children equalled one in four. The calorie intake in Germany was about 2,500 calories in 1941. It had gone down to around 1000 calories in 1946 and as everybody knows rationing was a very big feature of the post-war years.
The other issue is displaced people. I mean we’ve heard a lot about ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, ethnic cleansing after World War Two was infinitely worse. Stalin and Hitler between them managed to uproot 80 million people in Europe between 1939 and 1945. Thirteen million Germans were expelled from Central and Eastern Europe after the war. In 1947, the United Nations’ recently created Relief and Rehabilitation Administration was caring for 6,795,000 displaced Europeans in 762 camps. Yes, we had refugee camps in Europe in 1945. And the US alone – and this is before the Marshall Plan, before NATO – was spending $10 billion dollars a year on that, on caring for those refugees.
Another issue, the damage to infrastructure. Twenty-five million homeless people in the Soviet Union, 20 million homeless people in Germany, Hamburg alone had half a million homeless people in 1945. If you look at the level of destruction, again even today these figures still strike me as incredible. 70,000 villages, 1700 towns, 32,000 factors, 40,000 miles of railway track destroyed in the Soviet Union alone. France, which suffered of course far less physical damage than the Soviet Union, still lost half a million homes. I could carry on talking about the wastage of agricultural land or even a country like Norway, again which suffered little war damage, still lost 14 % of its industrial capital. These awesome statistics of course could be repeated almost ad infinitum when you talk about World War Two.."
Please don't use "Nothing more". This is a crisis!! Many are working to remove Trump, on the front lines and behind the scenes. Support this effort! and if you can't just yet, keep faith, hope and pray that you will soon know how you can help!!
Don Lemmon did an interview with Musk when he spoke directly about depression and ketamine use and more. The topic of using X to tweet and mood/drug use comes up at about 19 minutes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhsfjBpKiTw
I read that ketamine also can cause delusions and depression. Which explains a lot. 😢
I know that ketamine is a horse tranquilizer. I know ketamine shouldn't be prescribed for some mental health issues. My question is, should it be prescribed for asses?
The whole planet in getting physically ill, in more ways than one.
Yes. I think you are right. But remember that illness is a signal, not a fatality. Act to right things just as you can!
A seventy year old level-headed guy whom I know has resorted to counselling, so deeply runs his despair. I did think Senator Slotkin's response was a good one.
Ned, I agree with you, Senator Slotkin's reply to the Republican President's travesty was excellent. If you haven't already done so, read Tim Alberta's excellent article in The Atlantic. Slotkin was very specific in what wanted to accomplish in her speech. I think she smart and perceptive.
I have been waking up in the middle of the night. It’s a nightmare! I think many are not informed. They just don’t read/watch/listen to educational news. We need to inform them.
I go to a gym and was discussing things that were happening. The lady said, “You’re talking to the wrong person, I am a Republican.”
Yesterday I simply mentioned that Rachel Maddow suggested to print our Social Security earnings NOW. I said they are coming after Social Security (after Musk falsely claimed it was a Ponzi scheme). I suggested she tell her parents. She didn’t know who Rachel Maddow was.
Marlo, next time tell this "lady" that there are no more Republicans or Republican party. It's only maga, maga, maga.
I thought I would get her thinking if she thought her parents might be affected which would affect HER. Kind of sneaking into her consciousness for her to educate herself.
They haven’t said they would get rid of SS, but they are firing thousands of workers & getting rid of many SS locations people go to.
I called yesterday. The wait was so long you couldn’t even hold.
(I finally figured out how to print my earnings myself, as Maddow strongly encouraged).
Also responses for disability they announced on their recording would take around 250 days! Who could wait that long?
Please instruct me how to print out my earnings. Heather's letter today frightened me, but the woman from Missouri was even more scary.
Go onto the website for social security and create an account and set a password. You should be able to see your earnings towards social security.. if you are already on social security you should see a list of your benefits thus far. You may find this hard to do on a phone.but easier to do on a computer. Once you set up the account do not lose your password.
Maybe this "lady's" parents could wait that long Marlo. It's not a nice thing to say but there's no cure for stupidity.
A doctor who was a “lead” when I WAS on Nextdoor.com said about the Republicans who refused to vaccinate or mask, “They will delete their gene pool.” That’s one way of looking at it. Maybe RFJ, Jr, Trump, Vance and their cabinet members will come down with Ebola…
At work the other day I was speaking to a colleague and mentioned Social Security and the fact that musk was planning to go after it. Another employee was in ear shot and laughed out loud. She came over and told me I was an idiot to think anyone would go after SS. All I could say was time will tell. She is collecting SS. It was useless to try and talk to her.....as my father use to say, "Don't confuse me with facts, my mind is made up".
Sounds like most of the MAGA community. My neighbor (I am surrounded!) always talked about politics until Trump won. Now he doesn’t want to. And he has been using his hedge clippers to cut my Arborvitaes.
SS is not the only thing we have to worry about - the BANKS. Read Thom Hartmann’s Substack I posted. Terrifying.
Thank you for talking with her!
The lady said, “You’re talking to the wrong person, I am a Republican.”
This is the reason I am not that worried about the looming economic catastrophe and the loss of social security (which I rely on). The only thing that MIGHT change many trump supporters minds is if they feel real pain and hardship themselves. Not that I wish that on anyone, it just seems that is the only thing that might get them to wake up to the fact that the trump regime is not a good idea.
Dan, thinking that pain will change MAGA minds is thinking of the wishful variety. As I have previously stated, for people in the cult, there is a total disconnect between cause and effect. They do not associate their voting choices with the resulting conditions they experience.
This disconnect originates in evangelicalism: When things are going well, these are "God's blessings" or "answers to prayer." When circumstances are difficult, this is "God's will." There is no room in this mindset for the possibility that poor choices yielded bad results. The conservative notion of "personal responsibility" applies to them, not me.
While I agree with you, I have some friends and family who DID not vote for him that I worry about. The impacts of this could be devastating for them.
Right wing media paints a golden reality for all.
LIES, LIES, LIES. Just like what comes out of Trump’s mouth every time he opens it! (And JD Vance and Musk).
The dumb sheep fall for it.
The Vietnam immigrant who did my nails said “Trump must be smart, look at how rich he is.” And “Trump is smart. Better to have Putin as your friend.” He then bragged he collected $1,000 for promising to vote for Trump. Isn’t THAT illegal? Buying votes?
I remember that. The illegality was bruited, but I never heard of a case in court.
Exactly , yet another headline confession ( per usual) “Ponzi Scheme” /the “Enemy Within” / “rigged” / etc.etc.etc…..…
Thank you Marlo.
Substack…🫶
Marlo--
Our gym (which is run by our town's park district) recently sent an email to members reminding us of rules, and adding a new one: if you listen to music or podcasts or whatever, you are supposed to have headphones or earbuds. So perhaps this wouldn't work for you, but if you are on a treadmill or stationary bike or similar machine, could you run some pertinent youtube videos?
This one of HCR is 30 minutes, her others are longer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5b2eDXD19K8&t=5s
But if you want snippets, there are plenty of excellent Youtubers that I recommend, but I do caution that some have an edge that might turn off listeners. I'd suggest Belle of the Ranch as she's pretty fact based and doesn't talk about her personal feelings very much. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1B4e63Yx0c
A great one who does appeal directly to emotions is Tennessee Brando. He's from a small town in Tennessee, a "very red" area.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrqEZu2P4Bk
If you can run these loud enough for her to listen to--maybe just have to strain a bit so as to not be obnoxious in volume, and if she wants to engage with you say "ooo, I just found out about this youtuber and they really tell it like it is. I want to listen, but I can turn it up so you can hear it if you'd like." Maybe toss in a "yes!" every now and then as you listen. ;-D
Thanks. I’ll check it out. My gym
I purposely did not watch the fiasco called “a joint address to Congress” - the “lowlights” were predictable. Not only were the words and delivery deplorable, but looking at the three stooges on the dais - a convicted felon, JV (Junior Varsity) Vance, and “Milquetoast Mike” Johnson - smirking and nodding at each and every lie, was beyond nauseating.
Vance is like the kid who makes the varsity team because his daddy or mommy is “important” - and then thinks he actually deserves playing time.
I also did not watch, as I didn't want to contribute to the ratings I know Donald cherishes so much. I figured (correctly) that I could save time by watching excerpts afterward to see the worst moments and still be well informed.
The performance of "the backup boys" was, indeed, disgusting.
Me! Every day. As James said above, neither group is doing anyting to stop this insanity. The orange felon is a traitor. He has gone rogue, completely. What he is doing is against our constitution, our democracy, yet the republicans applaud him. I have never understood how the German people stood by and allowed Hitler to do what he did to their country, their people, but now I understand. If you stand back and allow it to happen, it will. As a child of about 8-10 years of age, my best friend was one of the only Jewish families in our town. Her grandparents came to visit every year around Hanukkah. I was sitting on the sofa between her grandparents and noticed numbers tattoo'd on her grandmother's arm. I had never seen a tattoo before. I inquired about it. My friend's grandmother had been in Auschwitz. She explained to me, in simple, kind terms what had happened to her. With tears running down my cheeks I told her I was so very sorry. She told me not to be sorry. She told me that it was my generations job to make sure the world stayed safe and that what we now term the holocaust never happened again. We need to stop the Monster at the Helm before he does anymore damage! We need to unite, not allow him to divide us and take control of our country.
I just lost a long reply to you, Madame Veronica, but at 90, involved in so much of this history and having read much of the rest (including Russia (plus USSR) and Ukraine, I share your physical reaction. My only “medicine” is “doing something” as did the French in 1942 and following.
Here's another one.
Yes it's grinding day to day But knowing we're not alone gives me courage. As a contractor at an agency there's palpable fear and Ioathing day to day that it's all going to fall down. Imagine having to change innumerable data just to change the word gender to sex.All across the agencies on a whim. Waste of time and money.
Thank you for making the ridiculous real.
And losing friends… I can’t be around these people…
Yes! Ill even.
Veronica, lots of people are ill, either physically or mentally or both. No doubt there is a huge increase in anxiety, but worm brain wants to somehow make those his next BS mission. People will turn to alcohol and other drugs.
Thankfully many in the younger generation have chosen not to drink or do drugs. They have laser focus on their goals, eat clean, workout regularly and limit screen time. They prefer to be outdoors in nature and being good stewards of the planet without being cultist climate alarmist. They have no interest in being lifetime consumers of prescriptions from big pharma or the toxins the FDA has no issue leaving in processed foods the majority of obese Americans gobble up.
I am also suffering , physically ill from reading the news.
This is difficult for me, myself, but we do have to step back every now and then. They are firehosing us with this junk, so don't try to stop it all, just do what you can when you can.
I have had intense periods from this where I feel sick, too. There are people (some on here) who have made others feel guilty when they can't manage it all. I like the approach of calling 5 congresscritters a day. You don't have to call them all. But everyone who does 5 helps.
"Russian leaders created a false narrative to get voters to put them in power, where they could privatize public enterprises and monopolize the country’s wealth. " What is a dictator government? Professor, after taking a day off, has written a key sentence in today's letter. That is, Trump, Musk and their associates are trying to own the US wealth to themselves as much as possible. They become kinds and the rest slaves. Communist system does exactly the same thing. Democracy is that people share the nation's wealth. This is the point to emphasize. Dictator vs Democracy is too abstract.
I am.
What is wrenching about this is that United States isn't the traitor, Trump is.
And his merry band of sycophantic oligarchs and Congressional lemmings.
The problem iss that I am an AMERICAN CITIZEN in S.E. Asia. The question I most often hear is: "How could Americans allow this to happen?" I am not qualified to explain our government's system and policies.
There definitely is corruption everywhere. In different measures. But being able to elect a convicted felon, rapist. tax evader, insurgionist, liar, toxic narcissist, for a second time, is not defensible.
Allowing a billionaire and the Russian tyrant to tell this feeble old crominal what and how-to -do it is
shameful and incomprehensible.
Rupert ‘s goal from 1981. He’s still at it. Propaganda works. Of course, it’s more complicated but democrats have never (since Harry Truman) really accepted that republicans have a whole different agenda (currently articulated by Alito) that is at variance with democracy. They gave lip service for awhile but some noticed (Bill Moyers), but The 2000 election (disastrous as W/Dickie were) gave them the belief that cheating was preferable to losing. Has worked like a charm. They call it voter integrity. See how useful propaganda is.
Add manipulation of technology in the hands of the bad guys.
See my comment for more on this.....
I don’t think they did. He CHEATED and nearly 5 million LEGAL votes were PURGED that would have gone to Harris (watch Vigilantes, Inc.). Help Nathan:
https://youtu.be/dLT4HTjaBsA?si=vvy0qJJbx_UAuA-n
https://youtu.be/CtQiMwJcdq0?si=QzUl4fh6kUWSNqPm
https://youtu.be/xyFj3pU7WI0?si=G3Wa_co3903gEquS
https://youtu.be/mR5KDY_zNgA?si=bqDRudTu4Ld_BlNf
He was the perfect again petulant patsy who came along- the long planned scene of users who created an uneducated society ( and got away with it for 🗣️YEARS) emulating strongmen whose playbook was already written for them.’The Stable Genius’, right?
Putin’s Stable…btw!
Beyond the pale, Veronica We're gonna pay for this! For the record.., I was in SEA - 1965. The dumbing-down of America (American's) has continued unabated, the 48% included.
Horrifying…did you read Thom Hartmann’s Substack? Also horrifying.
https://hartmannreport.com/p/could-russia-win-a-war-against-america-608
have they already...
Can only read/listen if paid subscription😳How to reach general public if every good advocacy is only paid????😡
Not tue. Click subscribe then select “free”
Coming soon…
Horrifying, indeed! And dystopian!
Trump is a traitor for phasing out military equipment and now stopping intel for Ukraine--that's aiding and abetting! What now? Impeach?, but that won't happen. Still, there's always Something you can do besides calling reps and senators, protesting, making signs, donating, etc.
Here's a thought I had: What can an ordinary Missourian do about this Oval Office Trump-Vance debacle and America-to-the-world embarrassment?
Here's what I tried--a direct apology to President Zelensky via the Ukraine embassy WDC: Sent email to Ukraine Embassy WDC emb_us@mfa.gov.ua "Attn: The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United States of America Subject: Apology to President Zelensky
Dear Madam Ambassador Markarova: On behalf of myself and the majority of American people standing for the freedom of Ukraine, may I request that the following subject apology be forwarded to President Zelensky: Please apologize to President Zelenskyy for the shameful behaviour of President Trump and Vice-President Vance on Feb. 28, 2025. It was a despicable, pre-coordinated setup ambush by two bullies against one courageous man standing tall. Trump and Vance have forever stained the sacred honor of the Oval Office. Thank you. Sincerely, (Ordinary American citizen)" s/s (full name and location, Farmington, MO)
Do something. Anything. Never give up--whatever Trump does or says notwithstanding. As a Missourian I follow Harry's Give them Hell approach.
Thank you for this. I just emailed a similar letter. I appreciate the information.
We have to be loud and proud to show this is only Trump and his parade of followers NOT we the PEOPLE.
The whole right-wing are traitors.
Yes, Constance, in this new chapter of U.S. history, the ink is still wet. But it has renewed my sympathy for the Russian people. All during my life, any time that Russia (or the U.S.S.R.) was mentioned, the assumption was that they are all bad people. Only later in life, when I directly interacted with Russian citizens, did I realize that the overwhelming majority of them are ordinary, decent people no different from you and me. They do not agree with the actions of their government or its leaders, but they feel helpless (or afraid) to criticize or resist.
We are about to experience what it feels like to be hated by the rest of the world, even though we are not making the policy the world hates.
I don't hear the word "traitor" being used by any Democratic office holders. And certainly none are saying Trump should be tried and sent to prison. I am disgusted at their inability to speak the truth!
My Senator is. See Angus King speeches. He is NEVER going to get the corporate media play the DonOld's nutcase friends get.
As a group we have an immense amount of power. 2/3s of us DID NOT vote for Trump. Our friends and family are only buying what is essential and from local merchants only. I understand that isn't possible for everyone, but the consumer in the US controls 70% of GDP.
Since Congress and the courts won't help us, we need to help ourselves.
And those of us that can help our neighbors that are getting hurt by Trump and the oligarchs help them. If you can help a friend or neighbor that purchases most of their things online offer to pick up groceries or staples at the LOCAL grocery store.
Senators King, Whitehouse, Murphy, and Schiff are *AMONG(oops)* my faves.
Please don't forget Raskin and Bernie
Good point, Marj. That is the drawback with mentioning names. Yesterday or tomorrow, Representative Raskin or Senator Sanders might well be mentioned. Consider this short list a representative sample of the people whom I admire.
My Senator, too! Angus King & Sen. Chris Murphy of CT have been speaking out strongly. I write Sen. King weekly to tell him how proud Mainers are of him.
Maine's governor and junior senator are proving to be my Maine Mills and and my Maine man!
I agree Gary! We have to stop enabling the billionaires that are selling us out to communism. I stopped buying from Amazon; I deleted my Facebook account. Now days I figure out how to buy the products that I need from other sources. I buy local. It isn't as convenient but it is the decision and action that I have control over.
Jess Piper (The View from Rural Missouri)
has posted that many rural counties have one grocery store, Walmart. The local ones have been driven out of business. Sam Walton cheered their demise.
Love your suggestions,Gary!
Also, encourage your Sen King to reach out to Meidas Touch.Angry,white dudes are tuning in to MTN as it continues to beat out Joe Rogan in viewership.
Check out bonhoffertv.com
Emily- I am not finding bonhoffertv.com. Can you elaborate on what it is and if that is the correct link please?
https://sites.google.com/site/bonhoffertv/resist
I got it from a Timothy Snyder reader. The above link should work.
Wow that's an incredibly rich resource for action, education and resistance, THANK YOU!!
The site deliberately is not search engine optimized.
I noticed somewhere that there is a planned MONTH long boycott of Target, and yet another weeklong economic boycott of the major players.
https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/articles/article-iii/clauses/39
Treason is a unique offense in our constitutional order—the only crime expressly defined by the Constitution, and applying only to Americans who have betrayed the allegiance they are presumed to owe the United States. While the Constitution’s Framers shared the centuries-old view that all citizens owed a duty of loyalty to their home nation, they included the Treason Clause not so much to underscore the seriousness of such a betrayal, but to guard against the historic use of treason prosecutions by repressive governments to silence otherwise legitimate political opposition. Debate surrounding the Clause at the Constitutional Convention thus focused on ways to narrowly define the offense, and to protect against false or flimsy prosecutions.
The Constitution specifically identifies what constitutes treason against the United States and, importantly, limits the offense of treason to only two types of conduct: (1) “levying war” against the United States; or (2) “adhering to [the] enemies [of the United States], giving them aid and comfort.” Although there have not been many treason prosecutions in American history—indeed, only one person has been indicted for treason since 1954—the Supreme Court has had occasion to further define what each type of treason entails.
The offense of “levying war” against the United States was interpreted narrowly in Ex parte Bollman & Swarthout (1807), a case stemming from the infamous alleged plot led by former Vice President Aaron Burr to overthrow the American government in New Orleans. The Supreme Court dismissed charges of treason that had been brought against two of Burr’s associates—Bollman and Swarthout—on the grounds that their alleged conduct did not constitute levying war against the United States within the meaning of the Treason Clause. It was not enough, Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion emphasized, merely to conspire “to subvert by force the government of our country” by recruiting troops, procuring maps, and drawing up plans. Conspiring to levy war was distinct from actually levying war. Rather, a person could be convicted of treason for levying war only if there was an “actual assemblage of men for the purpose of executing a treasonable design.” In so holding, the Court sharply confined the scope of the offense of treason by levying war against the United States.
The Court construed the other treason offense authorized by the Constitution similarly narrowly in Cramer v. United States (1945). That case involved another infamous incident in American history: the Nazi Saboteur Affair. Cramer was prosecuted for treason for allegedly helping German soldiers who had surreptitiously infiltrated American soil during World War II. In reviewing Cramer’s treason conviction, the Court explained that a person could be convicted of treason only if he or she adhered to an enemy and gave that enemy “aid and comfort.” As the Court explained: “A citizen intellectually or emotionally may favor the enemy and harbor sympathies or convictions disloyal to this country’s policy or interest, but, so long as he commits no act of aid and comfort to the enemy, there is no treason. On the other hand, a citizen may take actions which do aid and comfort the enemy—making a speech critical of the government or opposing its measures, profiteering, striking in defense plants or essential work, and the hundred other things which impair our cohesion and diminish our strength—but if there is no adherence to the enemy in this, if there is no intent to betray, there is no treason.” In other words, the Constitution requires both concrete action and an intent to betray the nation before a citizen can be convicted of treason; expressing traitorous thoughts or intentions alone does not suffice.
So then, by these definitions, we are seeing treason being committed within our governmental structure as we speak. Disbanding our cyber-security 'forces', ceasing the electronic surveillance operations, which will now allow 'the enemy' access to much, if not all, of our personal and national data. Why is this not being shouted from the rooftops? If this isn't 'aiding and abetting', I don't know what is!
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were executed in the mid-1950s for allegedly selling atomic secrets to the Russians. You don't think Tramp has shared classified materials with the Russians?
I don't believe he has 'sold' the material, no. But there is ample evidence that he has an ongoing relationship with the Russians, and that the Russians have been working with, and maybe on him, for quite some time. And I believe there are many people with proof of this, both here, and in Russia. And I believe, as you pointed out, that punishment protocols have been established.
Georgia: Thank you for the explanation. Very clearly stated. I bet I am not thr only one who thought otherwise.
I am an erstwhile Republican and share your disappointment, though Senator Slotkin rebutted Trump strongly.
Individual Democrats (e.g., Senators Whitehouse and Schiff as well as Representatives Goldman and Moulton) are speaking up.
The resistance is gathering; I hope not too late. One thing that crosses my mind: Trump has fired off a flood of Executive Orders, mostly proclamations.
The one area, storm-trumped by the DOGE-bags (as Jimmy Kimmel says), where action rather than friction has proceeded -- efficiency -- has shattered the U.S.G.
Ned, I think we need to fight back as consumers. Buy Canadian. Buy Mexican. Buy European. Shop local and buy local.
Canada could assist the US conversion to renewables if they cut off electricity to all of the northern border states like ND, MN, WI, MI and ME.
Trump has no clue that many states depend on Canada for their gasoline, electricity, lumber and heating oil to name a few items.
It seems more likely that New England and the west coast would join Canada than Canada would become part of the US.
Gary, great idea. I lived in mi querido México for five years. Canada has always been a land I admire. Please help me out -- I know I am asking a lot, here -- and critique the two hundred-plus words that follow. Of course, anyone else is welcome to; that means you, too, Jon Rosen. 🤝
--------------------
On another matter, I must confess to a wondering about tariffs. Trump basically wants the equivalent of "infant industry" tariffs to re-build the manufacturing base. As a PGHer and summer-time mill worker almost half a century ago, I watched first-hand the collapse of the steel industry. 😵
So, the proposal pulls at the heart-strings. Additionally, it seems that these tariffs are creating an incentive for direct investments from allies like Japan and Taiwan. On the other hand, Trump is failing to inform people of the extensive sacrifice to be imposed upon the citizenry by this policy. 🤬
Whether the direct investment by non-U.S. companies will provide the benefits, both direct and consequential, sufficient to outweigh the costs borne by average Americans is anyone's guess. What I struggle with is following the money -- ¿how will Trump et al. enrich themselves? 😳
They will profit, to be sure, but I do not know how; maybe your insight can help here, Gary. Dr Richardson's book, 'Democracy Awakening', argues that foreign investment, more than the protective tariffs of the era, motored the industrialization of the late nineteenth century. 🤔
One difference I see between 'now' and 'then' is that the industrialization of America of the nineteenth century occurred in a wide open open country with a closed economy. Re-industrialization in our century, however, may well fail owing to its setting in a closed country with an open economy. 🫣
NY, too. A lot of the electricity generated in upstate NY comes from hydropower... in Quebec.
Last week, on Deutsche Welle, I watched a story of certain people -- I do not know who they are -- calling for Canada to join the European Union. I say, Canada: ¡Go for it!
Stephen Colbert on SOTU and the irony of GOP 👏 when T says they we didn’t need legislation, but rather a new president to solve immigration issue.
“I get that he’s your guy…but isn’t it weird for members of Congress to applaud for taking all your power away.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KADW3ZRZLVI
That is great, Kathy. 🙂 As always, I thank you. 🤝 Watching now. 🥳
What’s amusing about tfg’s cannonfire of EOs is, as Heather has repeated told us, they are really just directives—“proceed like this.” Tfg thinks he’s making law—or overriding it—and acting like he tried to in tfg 1.0. He’s The Boss and you follow his orders.
In fairness to Trump, life is lonely at the top . . . of the height-chair.😉
Yep. Same blah that cost them the election.
He cheated & votes were purged. He didn’t win legally.
Feathers of Hope. https://jerryweiss.substack.com/p/remove-impeach-impeach
And somehow awaken fellow citizens. This is not normal, and this is not good. Our regime's intentions are not consistent with the Constitution's mission statement. They are rather, corrosive. Democratic politicians alone, even when insightful and competent, are not enough to win the day, and certainly the Republican agenda betrays the concept of a republic. Communication that lands, startles, and elicits focus must somehow penetrate this pandemonium; attract public sentiment. That's the momentum of "grass roots" as well as salient leadership. They work in tandem.
We may have free speech in theory, but the Citizens United decision precludes it in practice with dark money strangling policy discussions in a choke-hold.
Republicans are spending millions in non-stop trash ads in Wisconsin to buy a critical Supreme Court seat.
That's their MO and the corporate media is not about to point out that is what they are doing. Musk donates a couple of million and 50,000 Democrats donate $25. He's gonna win almost every time.
Thanks Justice Roberts for the terrible Citizens United decision.
When enough people have been fired, have lost health insurance, have lost access to their doctors/mental healthcare/medications, have lost homes, ad infinitum, and are willing to literally take to the streets in the thousands, and hound their elected representatives 24/7--that's when real grassroots actions take place, it seems.
I'd love to see a nation-wide strike until that reprehensible person, his pet, and every cabinet member are evicted from office and charged with suitable crimes, but that's just a pipe dream (sigh).
'I'd love to see a nation wide strike....' Look at Shutdown15 here on substack which is Exactly that!
I keep preaching that everyday. Consumer spending makes up 70% of the US GDP. Even a 1 or 2% reduction in spending can cause a recession and at the same time hurt the Walton family, Jeff Bezos and several of the overextended oil barons (think Koch brothers and Harold Hamm).
Amazon, Walmart and Home Depot would take notice if their revenue was cut by even 5%.
Carolyn: Once in a while dreams do come through. With a little help from our friends.
Sadly JL they have been working on this from the roots up. Starting with the state legislatures and governorships. You saw it happen in Texas. IT was very sad to watch my teacher coworkers and public school parents vote for the republicans candidates time after time. No matter how much I would tell them that were coming after public schools, they still voted for them. No matter how much they would cut, they still voted for them. The agricultural people with rural schools supported them overwhelmingly. The loss of medical care, education, were set aside for tax cuts and deregulation. They are reaping their reward as the shared costs become their costs.
Many only “read” in pictures. We need to get better with this. We need to accept this for now and communicate in every and all ways possible the reality of what HCR has laid out. Where are the bevy of short films and “comic” book like explanations? I’m a former real working class daughter who worked my way through college (as a hair stylist) and law school (as an investigator and policy staff to state AG). We must understand our fellow Americans like the Russians and Chinese do. We are acting in their dreadful planned “movie” now. God help us.
They are finally “stepping up”flooding YouTube, etc. The Republicans lie, that’s the problem (along with the corruption) and people are believing the lies.
Until it hits them at home, such as the cancellation of their Medicaid, there are those who just don’t know or think politics is something that happens far away in DC and doesn’t affect them. It’s really going to have to be painful and personal.
Understand. As a former county commissioner responsible for over a million people, you are correct. We need to pave the way for understanding. Sherrod Brown used to film all over Ohio making vignette spots of real people and us local electeds regarding what Social Security meant. Let’s get out there and do this again. I’m retired having had two cancers. My energy is NOT retired! We MUST do this.
It will be up to us to pound the truth into the heads of the politicians. We the ordinary people, who each have to look up their representatives' office phone numbers and locations and stay on them, every day, to recognize and act on what's right there in front of them. Somebody else' won't do it. We each have to. Make some noise, people.
Problem is: they don’t give a sh*t. As long as they can stay in power and get rich off of it, these congressional critters are perfectly happy to side with a narcissist, fascist dictator and his mentally ill and also narcissistic sidekick (you decide who is which). The only hope is that enough of the American people realize they are, at the moment, engaged in nonconsensual lateral intercourse (i.e. being f*cked sideways) and get really angry.
And that's from the center-right, note.
I watched Heather's Zoom conversation with Simon Rosenberg yesterday. One subject she brought up was that the opposition has yet to find a common message.
I'll be repeating this regularly: its been difficult for Democrats to find a unifying issue to rally around. But we have a message that we can use starting NOW. Call it the Spirit of '76/'26 (or come up with a better slogan.) Next year is the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, when we declared our freedom from kings and independence as a nation. We must forcefully declare once again that America was founded as a constitutional republic and that we must shrug off would-be despots and tyrants. We can organize and message around this basic principle and use it in rallies, in street protests, in the halls of Congress, and on social media. The Spirit of '76/'26. Spread the word.
In the March 5 conversation, Dr. Richardson proposed the creation of our own Declaration of Independence, calling out those egregious acts by our wannabe tyrant similar to Jefferson’s list in 1776. But she called for our modern Declaration to take the form of rap.
I can’t wait to see and hear that!
The conversation was sponsored by Commit2Democracy; I believe a video will be made available but couldn’t find it online this morning.
Marcia, I watched the Zoom conversation so I know what you're referring to (if rap is what it takes to save the republic, so be it, but Im not so sure, given the reaction to Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl show.)
I've been calling for a new Re-declaration of Independence for a while now — it seems so stunningly obvious that our leaders should make the connection, but I haven't seen it yet. I remember the sense of patriotism (another point brought up yesterday: reclaim the word and the flag) during the run-up to the Bicentennial in 1976; it's nowhere to be found now except in the echoes of the DNC last summer. Those of us who reject this usurpation of government must loudly claim the mantle of Patriot. Why, oh why aren't we?
Cowards do NOT die a thousand deaths; they take thousands with them.
In my neck of the woods (being the state of New Mexico) my Democratic Representatives and Senators both at the federal and state level are standing up...and working hard. I don't "think" they understand this. I KNOW they do. Their actions prove that. Until the red states feel the pain, and some lone Republican stands up to be counted the destruction and chaos will continue.
We are at war with White Supremacy period full stop. Problem is White people don’t see it nor do they know what to do about it that got us here - this awful place. Heather has drummed into us how we have to start at the local and state level. Why don’t they understand how critical this is for all?
Trump is a traitor phasing out military equipment and intel for Ukraine . What now? Impeach? But that won't happen with Rethuglians controlling the Senate. Still, there's always Something you can do besides calling reps and senators, protesting, making signs, donating, etc. And what can an ordinary Missourian do about this Oval Office Trump-Vance debacle and America-to-the-world embarrassment? Here's what I tried--a direct apology to President Zelensky via the Ukraine embassy WDC: Send an email to the Ukraine Embassy WDC.
"Attn: The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the United States of America Subject: Apology to President Zelensky Dear Madam Ambassador Markarova: On behalf of myself and the majority of American people standing for the freedom of Ukraine, may I request that the following subject apology be forwarded to President Zelensky: Please apologize to President Zelenskyy for the shameful behaviour of President Trump and Vice-President Vance on Feb. 28, 2025. It was a despicable, pre-coordinated setup ambush by two bullies against one courageous man standing tall. Trump and Vance have forever stained the sacred honor of the Oval Office. Thank you. Sincerely, (Ordinary American citizen)" s/s (full name and location, Farmington, MO)
(Do something. Anything. Never give up)
Not then because they can not hear it but talk about every day problems across the aisle with neighbours and come together around shared problems.
I agree with your post up until you blamed Dems. This is 100% the GOP! We need to stay focused on the real problem.
Please edit,
We are getting ready for massive demonstrations. We Americans are not going accept having a president who is owned by Russia's Putin. Why is tRump in bed with Putin????????
The Democrats in congress "get it."
However, the more they complain, the less pressure there is on the GOP (who actually control all of congress) from their constituents, because if "the libs" are angry, then the GOP base and Independents stop being angry at Trump and Musk and the GOP congress. When congressional Dems stay more quiet then the headlines stay on Trump and Musk.
It is a rock and a hard place for them to be in.
Trump tried to goad the Dems into reacting at he speech the other night for that purpose.
Schumer and Jefferies need to be working hard behind the scenes to "sweeten the pot" and get enough in the GOP to switch to Independent and caucus with Dems so they can take back control of congress. It would only take 4 in the Senate and maybe less in the House.
Our job is to pressure congress enough so they know they can't get reelected if they support Trump.
My fear is that the Dems will do what they always tend to do, and attack their own instead.
“Our job is to pressure Congress enough so they know they can’t get re-elected if they support t***p”.
Yes!
And to always keep in mind that any digs against Democrats by Democrats brings satisfaction to the bad guys.
So the end goal seems to be to crash the United States economy, eviscerate all the governmental agencies vital to the function of the US government, especially the support systems for the non-1%-ers including Social Security and Medicaid, leaving us desperate to go along with whatever ELON/FELON and his broligarch cronies dictate as the new way of life in these United States...
"Jess Piper of The View From Rural Missouri notes that what seems to be a deliberate attempt to crash what was, when Trump took office, a booming U.S. economy, is a feature of the administration’s plan, not a bug. It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices.”"
Jess Piper has it exactly right, IMHO: the aim is to drive the USA into the ground and then sell it for parts to the oligarchs.
-- The orange criminal will pocket most or perhaps all of the sale proceeds and become the actual billionaire he has always wanted to be (and lied about being). And he will be allowed to cosplay being president all the while.
-- Putin will be happy at the demise of a long-time geopolitical enemy.
-- The orange criminal, who more now than ever appears to be a long-time Russian asset, will have relieved some of the extortive pressure on him (although he's kidding himself if he thinks Putin will ever completely release him).
-- The oligarchs will make unimaginable amounts of money via their unregulated and untaxed monopolies and cartels and will continue to plunder relentlessly until something like WWIII or a global climate crash combined with environmental toxicity slows it down.
-- The christo-fascists will sweep in behind the crash and, with the oligarchs' support, impose a fanatical pseudo-christian theocracy.
Midterm elections, you say? We'll turn the bastards out at the midterms and get some better bastards?
What ever makes you think that the midterms will be anything other than a charade? The DOGE wrecking ball has already crashed into multiple offices and groups whose purpose was to ensure election integrity.
And to think that but for the greed and cowardice of a handful of people in 2019 and again in 2021 we wouldn't be where we find ourselves today...
Though nobody knows for sure, it is likely that Putin is the richest man in Russia. For years he has pressured the oligarchs beholden to him to hand over bribes. He owns palatial homes, despite a relatively modest salary. Trump is following his playbook, but more aggressively and openly, by monetizing the presidency. I suspect the bribes will soon follow, once he’s privatized government functions. Maybe loyal suck-up Jeff Bezos will get the USPS?
the bribes were in plain sight in the first admin. Sarah Kenzdior Hiding In Plain Sight. David Cay Johnston - It's Worse Than You Think
Consider reading Bill Browders "Red Notice".
It's possible that Putin, by hiding his money in multiple places with the help of his oligarch buddies, is actually the richest man in the world - ever.
Ultimately, there will be a "Let them eat cake" moment in Russia. Russians know how to revolt. Life there just has to get a little worse.
And if we had stood strong with Ukraine, eventually Putin's regime would have crumbled. The oligarchs are grumbling. Many sections of the Russian economy are on the verge of bankruptcy.
But wait, wait! Our very own bankruptcy expert is on the job! A bailout for the brutal murdering genocide creating monster is on the way.
I believe his Willy Wonka gold card/ticket to citizenship is a bribe. Where is the $5,000,000 going?
Oh wait - need to answer my own question. It will not be in US dollars but the transaction will require cryptocurrency. And as Stephen Colbert’s uncanny Melania impersonator said - it is Me Me coin.
@pts We cannot let Putin have any joy. Full stop. It’s up to us to speak up. Just making calls to ALL elected offices matter…down to any elected dog catchers. No offense to these fabulous public servants! Love them.
Make Americans Peons Again.
We’ve always been peons to the 1%
It's reminiscent of what has been called "vulture capitalism" (though I think "vampire" is closer to the mark.) Wealthy people buy a company, squeeze it dry of value, and set it, often fatally wounded, adrift. Billionaires prosper, while workers, communities, and less wary stockholders are stuck with the bill.
And old folks suffer in nursing homes drained of their community soul as well as their wee profits
It is the predatory aspect on unregulated free markets.
That phrase “curated failure” is next level of how private equity corporate ambulance chasers operate, and it names the Achilles heel of unchecked capitalism not foreseen by Francis Fukayama at the end of the Cold War and Soviet Union in 1989.
ELON/FELON is the best yet - I am adopting immediately! Thank you!
well, we all know there's no FELON without ELON.
I would add a comment to the Jess Piper quote, "...It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices...”"
I do know some who sold off very much of what had been good investments in normal times, saving as much cash and bonds as possible to buy up what ridiculously over leveraged owners would have to sell at fire sale prices to cover their stupidest bets. The ones I respected most were the ones that sold earlier to avoid becoming contributors to the coming worse times (though some did it just to avoid the risk of waiting too long). Others that we suggested should sell earlier, said they knew what was coming but (correctly as it turned out), knew they could keep making a bit more money and still get out with more additional gains than losses if they played it closer to the collapse.
They were correct, but we wondered how many didn't really care how much they lost by playing it closer to the edge, realizing they could still have a lot more to buy stuff cheaper after the collapse.
I am no expert by any means and don't invest in the markets, but my views come from Economics courses using Samuelson texts and watching the event described at https://www.bu.edu/articles/2008/where-nobel-economists-put-their-money
Because of Merton's earlier affinity towards higher gains from higher risks, I was especially attentive to Merton's TIPS move from Commercial Real Estate
"...When Solman questioned the experts about the distribution of their own investments, they returned some surprising answers. Solow, who won the Nobel in 1987, said he had no idea what was in his portfolio. “I just never paid any attention,” he said. “That’s because I don’t care. And I’m lucky to have a wife who doesn’t care.”
Merton described his portfolio as “almost perfect — you just have to get short.” The Harvard economist, who won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1997 for his study of stock options, later revealed that the bulk of his portfolio was in a Global Index Fund, Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, and one hedge fund. He said he had been invested in a commercial real estate fund until recently, but dropped that when its value rose too quickly for his comfort..."
Good one indeed. Spread widely.
JV (junior varsity) Vance and Milquetoast Mike Johnson are also appropriate monikers.
DODO - acronym for Dictator On Day One - what he said repeatedly he wanted to be. TWRP pronounced twerp - acronym for The World’s Richest Person.
Exactly that.👏👏👏 Now, the question is how do we retool how and with what we fight back with to match what we are facing? Time to get creative and remember that we regular folks are the ones who keep this society running. Think what plumbers, electricians, food preparers, mechanics, surveillance experts, day traders, coders and hackers, house painters, housekeeping staff, you name it, could do, either by not showing up to do the work we do or by other means at their disposal, to disrupt this regime by a thousand cuts and, alongside bigger disruptions, topple it.
This across the board in depth mass action could make the difference between the shaky status quo and a large and forceful effective shake up of it. Beyond party, there are more ‘democritarians’ among us with a basic belief in fairness, in law and justice, in right actions, in at least a rough equality, and in the workings of democracy itself in action … to shift and reinstate these qualities in reality.
We should also add... "make so many Americans angry that they take to the streets in ways that permit Trump to declare Martial Law".
I thought exactly that when Heather mentioned talk of pardoning Derek Chauvin in Tuesday's live history and politics chat. That would unleash the type of demonstrations this administrations this administration would love to put down with martial law. Deeply frightening.
The ambition of the Thiel Broligarchy for the replacement of nation state structures by monopolistic corporatisation has already been faciliated by successive political parties in post Brexit UK: https://europeanpowell.substack.com/p/how-big-tech-invited-by-governments?utm_campaign=email-post&r=i28j5&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
These transhumanist oligarchs already tried to parcel off Honduras to sell onto private corporations, but failed.
The UK is now their next best chance at succeeding in this neo colonial project. They will then use what they have learned by mistakes made in the UK to roll it out across the US and BRICS.
This is the real reason that Prime Minister Starmer will always finally politically back the Russo-MAGA Trump cartel.
This Europeanpowell Substack is alarmingly eye-opening for the state of the UK, for the limited bit that can be gleaned through the syntax-challenged teaser for subscription to read the rest. Will be looking for alarms from other political writers about the UK.
Oh! Thank for this source, Ellie, and for your translations. We all benefit from your professional political librarian services!
Agree it is a mare’s nest. With so many powerful and yet conflicting corporate, hedgefund and political interests but all in collusion with their desire to make these criminal actions as difficult to expose as possible. European Powell’s lone voice is trying to sound a warning within a dark and noisy storm 🐈⬛
Jess is correct. Look back to the Great Republican Depression (what is was called at first before the Republicans got so butt hurt at being blamed), and every economic downturn since. The republicans donors sweep in to scoop up the resources as they have the money to buy while the desperate sell off things to survive. Enough is never for these people. Never.
For example, the midwestern farmers who invested in costly improvements to their land (helping to alleviate soil runoff off and erosion) because a Biden-era policy made contracts for the farmers’ reimbursement.
Then musk cancelled the contracts and many farmers suddenly are burdened by unexpected debt.
Who do you think will be buying up their farmlands if/when these farmers go under?
https://sustainableagriculture.net/blog/funding-freeze-impacts-farmers-and-organizations-speak-out/
Excellent article - a must read
Jess' latest piece was jaw dropping and revealing. A must read.
The people in charge now have only two things in their heads:
1. I like my money, I want to keep it, I want more.
2. I don't care about the "others". They need to toughen up. We know best.
Democrats want to help people achieve success by leveling the opportunity playing field.
Republicans are bigots and no different than the nobles of the Dark Ages.
But soon...not soon enough...Americans will feel enough pain to call in the Karma Cops.
This is beyond the pale! I could not watch the whole ‘shitting on America’ that is Donny’s brand these days. I do wonder at the glee and delight in conservatives at his ascendency to dick-tater! The petulant little boy image in the snippets I watched he was so clear!
That said, we have to come together, put aside the distractions and move to the verdant, powerful middle ground to defeat his party minions in the midterms and begin to heal the scarred ground, and the heal the hurts to the people!
My heart goes out to so many! The young person we were going to hire as an AmeriCorps intern! Who wanted to learn to teach science and help instill care for our public lands.
Instead, we have poisoning of the waters and chaos!
To the actual vertebrates/veterans who actually serviced, they must be sick…of course they are distracted by the fear of trans-men on women’s sports teams unfairly competing.
Will we lose American values and our country? never! But if we allow this, and DEI BS be how we are all branded all the time, we will lose.
So I don’t have the answer to the rats on FUAX but I watched the I am a Canadian ad. Find it, fun! We need creative ‘I am an American’ ads.
And go to all Co-Ed sports in all public schools! Compete for your best on team, not against another…winners makes losers, so instead, run for your Personal Best! Be all you can and want to be! America, once the greatest nation on Earth, now the best nation for the planet!
My experience with my MAGA friends is that it takes real self-control not to talk and yell AT each other and call one another names when discussing "politics." I have had to tell them that I will not continue to engage with them if they refer to me as "you liberals," or "you Dems." (as if I am all liberals/Dems or that being them is bad.) Last night I had a MAGA friend come on my social media page during Trump's speech to freak out over the fact that Dems were being disruptive. I woke up this morning to a long thread tirade he had with himself, but pointed AT me, on one of my posts. My first thought was to reply "awesome!," I wish there had been more disruptors (I do.). But I have really been trying more to connect with these people as individuals, or, in our shared humanity to put it that way. I have been sharing facts and pointing out that if they think a small group of billionaires is suddenly working overtime to make their lives better by firing the woking class, and getting in bed with Putin, then I think they are truly lost. I am pounding this in, respectfully but unceasingly. Somedays I think they kinda hear me. Others, it's back to "you liberals...." Trump is a traitor. Say it often, everywhere. Trump is a traitor. That is the truth, that is a fact. Last night he did make not one mention of affordable housing, food, or medication. Not one mention of veterans. But he had three mentions of Elon Musk. Three mentions of annexing Greenland. Three for the Gulf of America. Five mentions of tax cuts for the super wealthy. And thirteen mentions of.... Joe Biden?! Trump is not doing the job of a president. Trump is an illegitimate president. Say it calmly, say it loud, say it often, to everyone. Trump is a failure and a traitor.
Just spent a couple days with 2 close friends. 2 of us tried to share facts about trump and the take over of our government with the 3rd long time friend. I had all I could do to not scream at her. When after many discussions she said , “Well, trump has only had a few weeks in office, we need to give him a chance to see what he does.” I had to walk away- couldn’t believe this smart woman had her head buried in the sand. This is the battle we’re up against! Sadly, I feel differently towards her and have given up on her. That means those of us who speak truth to power have to fight twice as hard! HCR is a blessing- thank you Heather!
I remember people saying the same thing when trump was elected in 2016….”give him a chance to see what he does”. In 2025 we already KNOW what he’s going to do as he’s doing it! People are being told not to believe what they are already seeing. They only listen to right wing propaganda and Russian propaganda from the White House
Caroline, the more time we give the scumbag president, the more destruction he will bring all the way to the point of no return. If we sit and "give him a chance to see what he does" we'll never come back from the abyss we are falling into. Doesn't your friend have enough clues to see what her president is doing, and to realize that what he is doing is leading to. Do we have to spell out alliance with Russia and the other dictatorships ? Tax cuts for billionaires to our expenses?
Spreading out misery, cruelty, corruption, grafting,and death, yes death. We can give him a chance. It will be the end of decency.
Hello - we all know what he is doing, and we knew what he was going to do. But we did and do not know how to stop it, and once we are all hungry and poor, we will not have the energy to fight back. He has told us many times what his plans were - he told us Putin and he were buddies 8 years ago and he was going to be a dictator on day one. There you have it - and this is kind of new for all of us and the reasonable side believes in nonviolence and the other side has the guns and are not afraid to use them. So people are scared.
And we feel like hostages without anyone to negotiate us out of this situation. The WH Felons are using ransomware to hold us against our will.
Ricardo, We told our friend in detail what Orange Head is doing, what Musk is doing, who is being harmed by all the cuts, spelled out the alliance with Russia, etc. We were very specific and still she doesn't want to believe what is happening!!! We have sent her HCR's posts and other articles. I've known her for decades and feel like I've lost a friend. I didn't watch Orange Head's speech but saw the clip of Republicans clapping loudly during his speech- it's a cult mentality. Appreciate all who are on here- helps not to feel alone in the fight.
I've been following election results since Bush the second and I realized that there's always a 25/30% of voters that no matter what, voted for the formerly republican party, now the maga party. I always said that there's no cure for stupidity. I wouldn't be obsessed with trying to make that percentage of voters understand anything. Thanks for your reply Caroline 😁
Once again I quote Eugene V. Debs : " Informed discontent is the mainspring of civilization. It is agitation or stagnation." Good on you for confronting and agitating. Stay the course!
Thank you.
Keep it up, sister; you are doing the work, and we can model your approach. Thank you!
As a retired career prosecutor, I commend you for presenting a compelling, virtually airtight case proving what I’ve long suspected: Trump really is the non-fictional Manchurian Candidate. There’s no other explanation for the destructive course Trump has pursued since his election. This is Trump, the catspaw of Putin, Thiel and Musk, unbound and unrestrained.
The time is now to re-read the opening & closing statements of Prosecutor Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg Trials after WWII.
Then re-read Justice, yes, Justice Robert Jackson concurrence in the Youngstown Steel Supreme Court case which succinctly lays out the separation of powers in our democratic Republic. During the Korean War the President by so-called "executive order" cannot take over a steel producer & the lives of its workers.
The Senate and our House of Representatives hold the exclusive power of lawmaking not a billionaire not a Hillbilly created by Peter Thiel and most definitely not a purported orange king.
I've just started reading 'The Anatomy of the Nuremburg Trials: A Memoir' by Telford Taylor. He was a member of the American prosecution staff and eventually became chief counsel at the Nuremburg Trials. Such a disturbing subject matter but very important and relevant, we might need something like this again soon or look to this as reference and precedent.
Thank you very much for the reminder of Taylor's '' ... A Memoir"🙏
After re-reading both we need folk hero movies to reach everyone that won’t ever read, or re-read these magnificent writings. Hollywood? Hello!
Heather's LFAA community is over 2 Million & does includes screenplay writers & others in that tough SoCal biz. A savy Agent is required among other things.
Trump couldn't get loans from legitimate financial institutions after so many bankruptcies starting in the early 90s. After at least 6 major bankruptcies and no banks to lend him money, Donold turned to Russian oligarchs for funding his schlock and a way for them to money launder, and, more importantly, they could influence him and had continuous knowledge of kompromat information on him. A few former KGB agents have said Donold has been as asset of theirs even as early as 1987. Aka Krasnov.
https://substack.com/home/post/p-158345793
Here are Trump's 6 bankruptcies listed:
1991: Trump’s Taj Mahal
1992: First of two Atlantic City casinos owned by Donald Trump.
1992: Second of two Atlantic City casinos owned by Donald Trump.
1992: Trump’s Plaza Hotel in New York City
2004: Trump’s Hotels and Casinos Resorts
2009: Trump’s Entertainment Resorts
Throw these into a movie…ain’t no Horatio Alger…it’s Bernie…Madoff of bankruptcy infamy.
russian kompromat takes multiple forms and in donald's case the visual is doubtless mingled with other realities. perhaps they have the infrmation that demonstrates he never actually personally attended much in the way of college, paying brighter poorer people to double for himin giant lecture halls and at the the typewriter. That has always been my theory since no one who attended can rememebr him and even then he was a memorable lout.
Mary Trump wrote how Donald paid someone to take his SAT exam for him in her first book.
Wasn't that a hint Kathy?
Yeah, but the Manchurian Candidate figured it out in the end and nips it…don’t see Mump coming ‘round…perhaps someone(s) else will regain their morality/humanity & put the kibosh on this democracy destroying vortex.
It won’t be a single individual who defeats Trump and more broadly Trumpism/MAGA but rather a sustained and widespread revolt. As one who considers himself a cold-eyed realist and political centrist I’m skeptical that enough Americans posses the courage, zeal and moral outrage. I also view the Democratic Party as beyond feckless as an effective counterweight. I think Heather is a national treasure but I suspect she would disagree with me that the Democrats and especially Biden made Trump’s ascension far easier, if not inevitable. But I do. I’m a Dem myself, but unless it sheds its alienating far left baggage, it’s doomed to irrelevance. My hope is for a war-time alignment/alliance between the center-left, center, and center right.
Which "alienating far-left baggage" are you talking about? Protecting consumers via CFPB? Running a competent social security program? Analyzing weather patterns? Acting to counter climate change? Promoting - at the state level - free lunches for school kids whose families can't afford them?
Or are you talking about what Fox 'news' accuses the Democrats of doing, like wanting open borders (never anybody's actual policy, as distinct from finding humane ways to reduce immigration), or performing gender-change operations on school kids?
The Dems needed, and still need, to be WAY more clear about what they are proposing or wanting to keep. During the 2024 election, polls that tested the popularity of platform positions without identifying the party found that the Democratic proposals were more popular - but people didn't associate them with that party. That can be put down to low-info voters, and to incompetent messaging, and to the lack of interest by media in 'boring' stories, but none of it is 'far-left'.
Also - of course - what gets branded as 'far left' in the US would be barely centrist in the rest of the developed, democratic world... So it's not a helpful label, and avoiding 'far left' policies is not helpful advice for opponents of Trump.
Great comment. First, you enumerate all the policies that I absolutely embrace and support. Always have. They promote tangible, material benefits to ALL Americans irrespective of identity or ideology. Great New Deal stuff. Let’s throw in raising the minimum wage and increasing the tax rate on millionaires. I also support single payer healthcare. But you then deliberately elide what f*cking kills us: embrace of identitarian politics, at minimum tacit support for extreme trans policies, soft on Palestinian terrorism, crime the need for public order. And let’s be honest, Dems could do generally much better at governing. Finally, immigration. I was at a gym once where I compelled to watch FOX news. Of course the usual agit prop BUT on a segment about immigration they interviewed Democratic mayors who complained about massive influx immigration. Sorry, immigration matters to most Americans and Biden failed miserably.
And yet we read articles that tell us that Idaho dairy farmers now depend on immigrant labor. That Texas contractors could not build houses or apartment buildings without immigrant labor. That without immigrant labor in California & Florida, strawberries, oranges, lettuce, avocados & many other fruits & vegetables would remain unpicked & the produce sections of our grocery stores would be barren of produce.
Fair point. On illegal immigration the US is a paragon of hypocrisy. But perceptions matter as well. And the perception that Biden made no effort to minimize the huge influx had weight.
I always noted you optimism Barbara
and sometimes I went along after reading your comments but after watching (only me to blame) the reaction of the maga legislators to the avalanche of trump's lies, not even you can change my mind.
🤷🏻♀️☮️
And making tons of money for him and his family. I've been calling the vice president the Manchurian Candidate puppet of Peter Thiel for weeks but as per you, there's a second one, the scumbag president and I agreed with you Ben. What a show!!!!!
It's going to end up tragically.
Why could our Democrats, lawyers, business leaders have not accepted our election results just as our country did not accept Ukraine’s election results when there was significant evidence of interference, flaws in our own systems, and even Trump saying you’ll never have to vote again. We just gave the thieves the keys to the kingdom.
I agree Darlene, with so much fact checking on Election tampering, why aren’t the Democrats investigating and recounting the ballots…
Election Discrepancies: Unveiling the Truth, Nathan Taylor from Election Truth Alliance
https://youtu.be/AWSWqn7UHYM?si=C0TgI1ETz015VRLl
Audit Update March 3rd | ElectionTruthAlliance
https://youtu.be/xyFj3pU7WI0?si=nUyvC15udYbJ1Ci_
How Trump Has RIGGED the Next Election Already w/ Greg Palast
https://youtu.be/Cd3d8iqJyy8?si=mRqOf3yrqdIIHiX6
*** Election Tampering ***
It’s too late to investigate the ballot in the last election. If we yell voter fraud now we will just not make an impression we need to work with what we have and get the message out of exactly what Trump is doing and Democrats need to be stand on the table on the floor of Congress yelling from the top of their lungs.
Because in Ukraine's 2010 election there was actual evidence of ballot tampering and other actual election malfeasance. There is no evidence that the 2024 US election had anything similar. Our elections are conducted very differently. Ukraine's election is run nationally and there was a fair amount of actual evidence including testimony by election officials that the was Russian monkeying with the results. Our presidential election is run by the individual states and it is extremely hard to interfere with enough states' individual election processes to effect the national outcome. The fact that each states process is different makes it even harder. And again there have been no authoritative sources within the election community alleging fraud or other election illegalalities.
The situations are very different. Trump won our election as disgusting as it is to admit. Get over it. We need to change things but first we need to win the next set of elections. That's what we should be working on right now.
Are you concerned about musk tampering & hacking? The electoral college both times put the felon where he is
Elon Musk probably did tamper with the current election. I don’t think we can do anything with that no. Democrats have to get angry. The Democrats have to show resistance. I just listened to some podcast by some Democrats my grandmother on her death bed had more enthusiasm than that.
Here are angry, organized democrats! Watch and share!
https://www.youtube.com/live/uz_1YiNSoxo?feature=shared
Until the house & senate are taken back from the Putin & Maga Republicans , if we will survive that long, pressure the Party of Putin ! Their constituents will feel the burn of being lied to about the "economy"
What you say may be true. The country of Georgia held elections near the time that the US held elections. They stopped theirs declaring irregularities and held another. Seems we could have done the same.
True? Hell yes it is true. Remember the first time Trump was impeached. Everyone knew he was guilty of accepting Russian interference for his election. Everyone of those Republicans voted not to impeach, and everyone of them knew his election was interfered with by Russia.
Grow up folks. Stop acting like uneducated grade schoolers. I assume you went to high school and learned something about logic and reasoning.
"Everyone knew he was guilty of accepting Russian interference for his election". Except there was no evidence that the Russian interference (which WAS true) had anything to do with his election (which was never connected via anything except vague innuendo). Read the Mueller impeachment report which I would bet none of you have. There was no accusation in the impeachment that the Russian interference changed the result of the election. So nothing in the first impeachment report ever said or inferred that Trump won because of the interference.
As for "stopping" our election because of irregularities, there weren't any sufficient to change the results of any of the three elections. Hillary Clinton got the majority of the votes in 2016 but because of the way our system works, she still lost. Biden won both the popular vote and electoral vote in 2020 so I assume you agree there was no problem with that election (despite Trump's nonsense that the election was stolen). In 2024, a HUGE number of previously Democratic voters decided to stay home. 7 million of them. No one could make 7 million votes disappear in our system where each state runs its own election for President. If you actually believe that, you are too far from reality to be making pronouncements on election results.
Trump won in 2024 because the Democrats f**ked up by not getting Biden to step aside EARLY enough to come up with a winning candidate. We all love Harris but she was never really viable after she withdrew from the race in 2020 before the first primary and then backed Biden as VP.
People hated Biden. It was irrational and stupid but it was reality. The polls weren't wrong. 70% of the people did not want Joe in 2024. By the time he figured it out, it was too late to nominate a winning candidate and 7 MILLION people who voted for Biden in 2020 refused to vote at all in 2024.
I know you don't want to believe it because conspiracies are easier to use to explain unwanted results. But the fact is Democrats cost Harris the race by not wanting to vote for her for whatever reasons. Trump got almost exactly the same number of votes in '24 as he did in '20. Harris LOST the race, Trump didn't win it.
And none of that had anything to do with "irregularities" in the voting. It was just dumb American politics. Ugly but fair.
Sorry you are disappointed in the results but there is NO evidence that is credible that it wasn't the actual results.
Jon Rosen, today I’m pasting my 4th YouTube where suspicious chatter is speaking of something gave JD / Trump unusual odds…this time it’s Peter Thiel, and he’s pro-Trump.
…
The Real Reason Tech Is Swinging to the Right & It Isn’t What You Think | Peter Thiel
https://youtu.be/IeiIV5G1vrk?si=3pZM2E2Nz3s0i9Kb
*** Timestamp (3:00 minutes) Peter Thiel remarks how unusual that so many voters had to of changed their mind in order for Trump and JD to win in 2024”.
Sorry you are believing "suspicious chatter" instead of actual counted electing results counted in 50 separate states by 50 different election authorities governed by 50 different political organizations. That's paranoia not election science.
"So many voters had to change their minds". That's just nonsense. In fact very FEW voters changed their minds. Trump got almost EXACTLY the same votes in 2024 that he did in 2020 when he lost. But Harris LOST 7 MILLION votes that Biden won in 2020. And that happened not because of conspiracy but because so many Democrats decided to stay home in 2024 rather than vote for Harris.
The fact is that Harris was NOT popular although she was MORE popular than Biden. In 2024, Biden would have probably lost even MORE Democratic voters than Harris did. It was irrational but it was real. Despite a soaring stock market, Biden was HATED by a large segment of the country and distrusted by many more. He refused to talk to the people who voted for him (I think he gave something like 25 press conferences in his 4 years in office while Trump was doing his nonsensical press word salads every week or more.
It is sad, and may turn out terribly for our country but Trump won the election. You need to get over it because it's not going to change.
Those not getting over are wasting ou time and patience. It's a distraction.
Yeah you're right. I just get so pissed off at the number of people who read Heather and yet seen to show no level of brain matter to explain why!
And it's weird that Heather clearly understands that there was no "theft" of the election. She deals in facts and history.
Sigh, oh well, you are right, it's like banging your head against a wall hoping it will feel better.
As long as wr don't do the same....🤕
Vindman' book The Folly of Realism helps to better understand the perspective from Ukrainian/ Russian dynamics
I want to read it. Alexander Vindman gave an interview on NPR about his book.
" It is hard to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on him not understanding it." Upton Sinclair
Are you posting to social media. You have great points
I think that we should all register as "Unaffiliated". This way the purging of voters won't be easy. Until a party that represents humanity, I shall stay unaffiliated. I have voted since I was eligible to vote and as a 75 year old, I will continue to do so. I pray we have midterms.
My question too, especially when , seemingly, there is more and morecevidence to point at Musk and his wealth for facilitating these wretched events.
——A deliberate attempt to crash what was, when [ELON/FELON] took office, a booming U.S. economy, is a feature of the administration’s plan, not a bug. It creates “curated failure” that enables oligarchs to buy up the assets of the state and of desperate individuals for “rock-bottom prices.” —— Jess Piper
I would very much appreciate links from this knowledgeable crew of other journalists/papers/channels/Substacks that expand on this, because this is exactly what I think is going on.
Like the sale of federal buildings? that belong to we the people
Read Sarah Kendzior. She's on Substack and is also the author of two best-selling books on the extraordinary level of corruption in American society. But be careful. You may not like what you learn.
www.sarahkendzior.com
I agree with you. Sarah Kendzior has detailed information, and it is bone-chilling. And I've learned to read it when I am in the right mind. It is not for reading before bedtime.
Thank you. And she has a new book coming out. It chronicles her travels around America and especially Route 66 with her children. She says she wanted them to see their country before it disappears. 😢💔🇺🇸
I agree. If that happens, Russia will own America. I do not believe Panama, Canada and Greenland are ideas generated by the shriveled brain of the orange helium balloon !
Mendacity? Lying? Even Heather has had to take a break from their onslaught.
But the lies took hold in the U.S. Where’s truth gone? In Lyndsey Stonebridge’s new book, “We are Free to Change the World: Hannah Arendt’s Lessons in Love and Disobedience,” she follows Hannah Arendt’s key: truth begins with human dignity. And we can’t defend truth, facts, if we’ve earlier given up on seeing individuals.
We let schools abandon novels, memoirs, biographies, and histories. In tandem with this, dark money has been installing its more lasting fix so the personal never pops up anywhere again. Our ogres, zombies, and ghouls needed this because, if the personal, the individual, is allowed, its light shines. If light shines, if human dignity is honored, its corollary lives: facts get centered; American communities again stand on truth.
For a world based on lies, our ogres, zombies, and ghouls must bury the odd, the spontaneous, the gambits of rhyme and play of love. So they killed the personal by the packaged intimidation where all “life” fits only abstractions, categories, chains of linear chronology. For this fix, for dark money’s lies, all schools reduce all life to A), B), C), or D).
Thanks for the tip on the book about Hannah Arendt. I've recently read Arendt's Origins of Totalitarianism. It's not an easy read but explains so much, including how the followers are immune to truth or facts and will accept any twist or turn of the leader. With what's going on I'm reminded of an easier but just as cogent read: The Tin Drum.
I didn't find The Tin Drum particularly easy, but then I haven't read Hannah Arendt.
600+ pages in about 10pt in paperback and footnotes in smaller print but totally worth the effort if your eyes can take it.
"Hannah Arendt’s key: truth begins with human dignity. And we can’t defend truth, facts, if we’ve earlier given up on seeing individuals."
"Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men (sic), in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors." - Lincoln
I think of dignity as a commitment to "unalienable rights", for oneself and all sentient beings. Not a new idea and one proven to be fruitful; and yet always a tough sell. Individual rights and value is what liberty and justice look like from the inside, and a just and civil society is how it looks as a whole.
Please, remember peace is how we make it. Here within our reach if we are big enough to take it
Not that it comes easy.
Great statement. We need more Lincolns. They do not make them like him anymore. If someone tries to emulate him, someone maybe like JFK, they end up dead.
I would add to dignity, decency. Two inseparable elements of truth. In very short supply this times. Thanks for your comment JL.
I'm particularly thankful for:
"Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men (sic), in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors." - Lincoln
You have good points. Are you posting these good points on social media?
Many fine people, Sandra, have their columns on Substack.
I follow commenters to Heather's, Rebecca Solnit's, Timothy Snyder's, and Johnny Rochat's. I know several others, and their readers, deserve attention. But other parts of my life having priorities as they do, I balk at paying time and money to get behind pay walls other than the four for which I pay.
Please note, too, Sandra, that over the recent 20 years I commented also (and paid money to do so) to the New York Times columnists, the Washington Post's columnists, and to conversations on the old AlterNet.
In all these years, in all these comments from me, I often got record numbers of replies in conversation from our fellow commenters. But the columnists themselves all went to schools that have taught only that elites are those who receive money. Period. None have ever acknowledged any good points from any mere commenters, we who exist for elites only as sources of revenue for elites.
Same for Dems, impotent for the same posture of ever ignoring all mere working class, and ignoring all novels, memoirs, biographies, and histories of all actual, living working classes.
Facebook and insta are free.
All good points. How much are you posting to social media?
Truth is whatever the man with most money can spread on media.
Yes, Craig, in the world of schools set to standardized testing, truth is as you describe.
I FIND THE CHAIN SAWING OF HUMAN BEINGS REPUGNANT
Heather mentioned that the ‘Trump administration’ intends to fire 80,000 professional civil servants from the Department of Veterans Affairs.
My presumption is that this relates to Chainsaw Musk’s heartless and unprofessional DOGE blitzkrieg in over a dozen federal entities.
Personally I find repugnant a person publicly waving a chainsaw and clearly relishing firing hundreds of thousands of career civil servants by the crudest and most impersonal methods.
Musk, currently the richest person in the world, evidently has Trump’s support (‘fire or semi-fire’ Trump describes it) in gutting the federal government. Musk declared, some time ago, that he could find up-to-$2 trillion in ‘savings’ in the $7 trillion annual federal budget. Even he has subsequently acknowledged that this is nonsense.
Still, he has ruthlessly pursued an assault on the career federal servants who keep government operations functioning reasonably well. While he claims that this will result in significant ‘savings,’ what he has reported so far is statistical rubbish, which often is then removed from his DOGE website.
Clearly any large organization—governmental, corporate, educational—can, with careful consideration and analysis, be made somewhat more efficient. This was demonstrated by two multi-year Hoover Commissions in the 1940s-1950s.
Sending a horde of techies into federal entities, seizing data bases, and then announcing that countless human beings will be fired—20-to-50 % in some instances—is a chainsaw approach.
Summarily abolishing USAID I find stupid, insensitive, and severely detrimental to America’s global humanitarian responsibilities.
I can imagine how Musk’s chainsaw technique could be applied to a train company. Arbitrarily at least 20% of the engineers and signal personnel could be fired. One obvious result is that trains would run less safely and effectively. I submit that this is the likely result of Musk’s federal chain sawing.
Also, government employment is different from corporate. Corporations are businesses that can go bankrupt. As they face market place pressures and new competition, they must readjust to survive.
In sharp contrast, government attracts professionals who seek to serve often at significantly lower compensation than offered in the private sector. The great majority of professional civil servants seek a career in government. Over many years they become an integral part of a functioning $7 trillion operation dedicated to serving the American people.
In return for this service they have been granted security—only being fired for cause.
Musk’s chainsaw approach has violated this pledge of tenure.
What I find especially repulsive in this entire Musk process is its lack of humanity. At no time have I heard Musk lament what his chainsawing is doing to dedicated Americans who have chosen government careers.
My impression, from what I have read, is that Musk, in his turbulent careers, has never face-to-face fired an employee. (I gather that the same is true with Trump.)
I would like to tell both Musk and Trump that they are dealing with the lives of decent people who are serving our government.
In my professional careers I have been obliged to fire employees. I always did this face to face. I found this difficult and totally without ‘joy.’
MUSK AND TRUMP DON’T ACKNOWLEDGE THAT GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES ARE DEDICATED AND DECENT HUMAN BEINGS
Firing someone face-to-face takes courage. Both Trump and Elon are cowards and playground bullies who always see themselves as victims. Retribution is the goal. As a child, Elon was bullied. His ass of a father, rather than comforting and supporting his son, would smack him around and yell at him, telling him to toughen up and fight back. Trump’s relationship with Roy Cohn—the self-loathing, closeted gay man and Sen. Joe McCarthy’s henchman lawyer—was set up by Trump’s father to “toughen him up” and “fight back” against Manhattan real estate developers and dealers who looked down on Trump Sr. and his son as second-class slum lords. Elon and Trump are humiliated little boys pretending to be tough guys. That’s why they have other people do the firing.
Thank you, Dave A. I have just written to Steve Rattner who used graphs to show how DT would increase the national debt with the totality of his campaign promises. I asked how long before reporters would recognize what observers all know:DT is a tantrum-prone child (catsup on the wall of the White House dining room and broken porcelain plates) who does not plan or think. The frolics with Musk at DT rallies is further evidence of the lack of maturity of the two.
As for voters, they are repeatedly lied to and desperate with their poverty while being ruled by multimillion and billionaires, but seem to be learning fast (town halls).
And that is the thing here. The desperation of poverty. The great eqaulizer. How much will we endure?
But neither is a “decent human being” or aware of what that means.
So the question is, what exactly should we do? One thing that would be helpful is to be more precise in our language. These people are not really conservative in any sense. We need a new name for them and we need to use it consistently and continuously to make it stick. Another is to take stock of what power remains to Democrats and to use it wisely. The MAGATs control all three branches of our national government. The Democrats have no national power at all. There only remains the power of the Blue states. And the power of the court system below the Supreme Court. And lastly there is the power of unity. We really, really, really have to stop sniping at each other. We have to stop calling the Democrats feckless and pathetic and stop belittling their individual efforts to push back. We have to stop blaming them for the MAGAT ascendency and put the blame squarely where it belongs, the MAGAT web of lies and false promises. If we don't, if we continue to peck away at one another we will never be able to get ourselves out of this mess. Let's take a page (just one) from the Trump and MAGAT playbook and be relentlessly persistent.
Go online, find your nearest Indivisible chapter or start one. Indivisible originated with congressional staffers and went online with Trump’s win in 2015. At 90, I can no longer march nor spend more than 30 minutes at a local rally, but I can write postcards to voters as do many in my Indivisible chapter. Since 2018 we have seen the success of that function of Indivisible members and at least three organizations provide postcards and voters’ addresses. So there is a starter for what you can do.
On her substack, Ariella Elm presents a listing of Democrats’ “good trouble” activities each day. Here is a link to yesterday:
https://ariellaelm.substack.com/p/daily-dems-doing-the-work-making-3dd
Let’s make the shift in our language away from, “Dem’s aren’t doing enough” to “I can’t wait to see more Dem’s acting like _______ when s/he did _______ yesterday.”
By explicitly naming the actions you prefer to see, you’re encouraging that behavior while also withholding from t***p any satisfaction he might feel about Democratic infighting
https://www.youtube.com/live/uz_1YiNSoxo?feature=shared
WOW! Brilliant synopsis! I will forward to friends and family! Thank you!
To this detailed and tragic history of the development of Russia's capacity to win the war between truth and lies, I feel compelled to add the story of an American who contributed what I believe to be key psychological tools to Russia's arsenal. This man's name is Werner Erhard (the name he gave himself after he decided Jack Rosenberg didn't fit his persona as "personal growth guru" when he developed the est Training in the late 1960s).
I came to know of Werner's work when I took "est" in early 1979. At the time, I was impressed with both his "you create your own reality" method of re-framing / re-contexturalizing the traumatic portions of your life's story but also his apparently close friendship with Dr. R. Buckminster Fuller ("Bucky), the author of the landmark book "Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth". That book described the option for society to fundamentally alter from a world view based on "you or me" / scarcity / zero sum thinking to "you and me" / abundance / expanding pie thinking thanks to the application of advances in science (the ability to "do more with less"). Werner did event with Bucky and led a day-long seminar by himself in which he laid out the principles for creating "a world the works for everyone".
I was thrilled in early 1980 when I read in the magazine sent to graduates of "the training" that Werner was setting up a division within the est organization devoted to this cause (which would be much more all encompassing than the already existing world hunger effort known as The Hunger Project. Imagine my dismay when this new effort was never formally launched. While The Hunger Project continued, I knew it would not achieve its goal of "the end of hunger" because that was an anti-systemic goal (fixing one part of what doesn't work about how humanity is organized on the planet). What is really needed (still, today) is an effort modeled on Bucky's life's work: the transformation to a "you and me" world.
I mention all this because Werner gave up this global transformation objective I thought he had adopted as one of Bucky's close friends. And while deciding (for whatever reason) not to pursue societal transformation he ALSO decided to become a consultant to various organizations within the U.S.S.R.
Yes... Werner Erhard taught he extraordinarily powerful "you create your own reality through language" technology to people whose core value system was one of global conquest. I do not have any idea if he ever thought about the risk of teaching his methods there. But what I do know is that he did not care about how his methods were used in the United States. I say that because I tried to get his organization to create a seminar series for graduates of the training on the subject of "politics". And I was turned down more than once. Graduates of "the training" were offered follow-up seminars on every subject imaginable: money, relationships, well-being, etc... but not politics.
I interpreted this as resulting from the organization never taking responsibility for how their methods were used. Literally, I remember them saying "You are responsible for your life... and that includes being responsible for what you do with what we are teaching you." This is the classic mistake when new tech is created. Facebook was launched without there being a value system users needed to promise to use too... resulting in it being home for many harmful lies.
Here are two links to articles about Werner's work in the U.S.S.R. While I would never say he is responsible for how effective Russia is today at destroying truth-based reality. I have to imagine that his teachings played a role in the crisis we face today.
Werner is 89 years old now. And I wish someone would - as they used to say in the training - "call him on his racket" of not caring how his methods are used.
Werner Erhard in the USSR
Posted April 4, 2012
https://wernererhardandest.wordpress.com/2012/04/04/491/
Werner Erhard, USSR, 1990
5/16/1990
https://wernererhardbiography.com/werner-erhard-ussr-1990/
Thank you for sharing his. I had no idea!
You’re welcome
I know a couple people who did this training years ago. I was kinda suspicious of it. I have often wondered what that was all about. Thank you for explaining this.
You're welcome. Using language to re-frame your personal reality - because "you are responsible for your life" - is a powerful approach to teach people. But when that approach is applied to "controlling how other people see you" that's when we get into the abusive use of this technology... especially if you want people to see bad things you are doing in a positive light. One thing I did not include in my comment was the obvious evidence that Werner's techniques were being used when George W. was POTUS and he and his people lied us into the Iraq War. Don Rumsfeld at one point briefed the press and the American people about what they were doing... using the words "There are things we know... things we don't know... and things we don't know we don't know". These are - word for word - things said during introductions to the est Training (now called Landmark Education". When I heard Rumsfeld say this, I knew he (and probably others) had taken "the training". I was mortified!
That dumb fucking Peter Navarro has never forgiven California Democrats for seeing him for the halfwit perfesserator of acadamania he has always been, seeing him as the bad joke he was in Southern California Democratic politics where he was regularly laughed at to his face by some and behind his back be the rest, which is why he - like every other talentless neverwas from Dennis Miller to Ted Nugent - became a right winger where the audience was such a collection of ignoramuses and nitwits that they would mistake him for an intelligent person, so he could "own the libs" for them and for his wounded ego.
The rest of these Russian stooges need to be put against walls and have their damn heads blown off.
ha! to the first paragraph.
Don’t forget Dennis Prager, he is what they think of as an intelligent person.
Good morning, TC. I feel better.
👏👏👏
Eye-opening historical context for the present, Heather! And now the a-holes are setting us up for committing disaster capitalism on their own country. Bravo. 😑
Dr. Cox Richardson makes it very clear that capitalist and communist men have ended up working together by hook, crook, and performance art to impose themselves on the entire Earth economically. The fight between these two types of governance has just been that, a means of continuous control and distraction that has been going on for at least 14,000 years as the archeologist flies. Men fighting to gain control and reward for their fighting have indeed been in control for as long as we have records. In the midst of this, families have tried to keep children alive. We can see this over all these thousands of years. The men who pursue personal control are the problem, not Nature, not Life, not Deity. The People are the problem in that we are too easily swayed by control tactics and destruction. We have this foolish fight here in the USA between Democrats and Republicans. The fight was built into our Constitution because men fight all the time, and our form of governance gave men a day to day fight that was hopefully more controlled than the fights in Europe and other locations. Today in this fight, we are vulnerable to all the other fighters on Earth, and that is definitely Putin and Xi, but look at the fights in Africa and everywhere else. In these fights, both sides passionately want to win and take over. The other side is evil. Men like Trump, Putin, and Xi are just the latest iteration of this fight. These men want to own the Earth and use its People to enrich themselves and their few cronies. They care nothing for anything else.
Most people just want to live and enjoy their family and friends. They do a job so they can live. But we are too easily manipulated by performance arts of various kinds. We are caught up in the fight. Indeed, we can't evolve past the fight, even as all our resources are devoted to fighting and coming on top to please a few men on top. It is just so easy to control and distract us so we are always fighting.
This is an addiction. It is a type of madness. The only time we stop fighting is when we are too tired to continue for the moment, when we have to pause fighting to briefly rebuild so we can do it again. Here we are, fighting again.
Thank you for the thoughtful comments. Have you read Paul Levy’s books on Wetiko?
I have not. It looks like I have a read in front of me. Thank you.
It’s important to understand that Paul Manafort was also one of the architects of the Nixon administration’s 1970 “Southern Strategy aimed at turning the formerly democratic states of the south red by appealing to racism and fear of the “other” namely Black folks. The strategy of driving a wedge between working class white folks and working class Black folks and now immigrants has always served the ruling class. Look at what Trump is doing.
I think there are several forces at play here. Trump and his vanity, Vought's Project 2025 and ideas about remaking the government from Curtis Yarvin, probably brought to Trump's attention by JD and carried out by Musk. It sounds like a crazy conspiracy but try reading this reporter's description.
https://www.thenerdreich.com/reboot-elon-musk-ceo-dictator-doge/