The Trump Presidency, Season 2

[Isabeau]

 

[detrius]

Sooner or later, fascists always go after for the Jews

Elon Musk, the Anti-Defamation League and the right: what’s behind the latest blow-up?

They also seem to be going after the Mormons this time:

Anti-Mormon pastor appears on 'Charlie Kirk Show' the day after LDS church shooting

Mormons actually were the target of a state-sponsored pogrom in the USA, so there's a precedent.

 

[detrius]

MSN apparently doesn't like me copying the URL. Does this one work?

MSN

 

[Free]

MSN apparently doesn't like me copying the URL. Does this one work?

MSN

It's always fun when they have to pull out their countercult arguments.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

They also seem to be going after the Mormons this time:

Anti-Mormon pastor appears on 'Charlie Kirk Show' the day after LDS church shooting

Mormons actually were the target of a state-sponsored pogrom in the USA, so there's a precedent.

I actually agree that the LDS is a cult, but I consider it a Christian cult. One that got too big for it's britches and controls a state enough with "theocracy-lite" that it expressed political power in a way it shouldn't. And also MLM's ran by folks in tight with the LDS to keep the women busy with downline bullshit instead of rebelling against the patriarchal crap.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

WOW... even for Trump, this is bad. He claims he warned Hegseth about Osama Bin Ladin before 9/11.

 

[Cindy Claveau]

 

[Free]

This sounds like just the thing we need!

Government shutdown hits air travel, closing a control tower and causing delays across the country

A pilot preparing to take off Monday from Hollywood Burbank Airport in California took the routine step of radioing the air traffic control tower.

But instead of the usual back-and-forth conversation of coordinating departure, the pilot received a different response: “The tower is closed due to staffing,” according to audio recorded by LiveATC.net.

The exchange is one example of the impact the ongoing government shutdown is having on travelers across the US as air traffic controller staffing issues have led to delays at major airports and forced pilots in some areas to pivot to alternative workflows.

Controllers are considered essential workers, so they must work during the shutdown, but are not being paid.

Of course congress still gets paid. Their salaries are considered part of mandatory spending,

Twelve Federal Aviation Administration facilities saw staffing shortages Monday night. The control towers in Burbank, Phoenix and Denver had so called “staffing triggers” reported in the public FAA operations plan. Other facilities that handle air traffic around airports in Newark, New Jersey; Jacksonville, Florida; Chicago, Washington, DC, and Indianapolis also were short staffed.

Perhaps the most dramatic impact was at the Burbank airport where the control tower was entirely shut down around 4:15 p.m. Monday afternoon. Flights could take off and land but had to follow procedures typically used at small airports without control towers. Delays of more than two and a half hours were reported at one point.

 

[Free]

The real Americans are doing good.

Indigenous nations plan a tariff-free trade corridor across the US-Canada border

“We’re not begging for crumbs anymore. We’re demanding what’s rightly ours."

www.motherjones.com

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The Financial Times on tariffs

Trump’s tariffs won’t deliver many jobs

Worse, tariffs are a tax on goods. In general, poorer people spend relatively more heavily on goods than richer ones: so, tariffs are regressive. The OBBBA is also regressive, both on taxes and spending. As Paul Krugman emphasises, the cuts in support for health insurance that triggered the government shutdown are going to hit the very people Trump’s tariffs are supposed to help. This is populism for plutocrats.

Another expert on trade, Richard Baldwin of IMD in Lausanne adds that what Trump is trying to do is precisely the across-the-board import substitution industrialisation that many developing countries, notably India and much of Latin America, tried and then abandoned decades ago. They did so because it failed. The protected industries did not catch up with those exposed to global competition and better able to exploit global markets: they fell further behind. In time, much the same will happen even to the US, especially given its rejection of science and abandonment of clean energy. Trump’s protectionism is a crime and a folly.

As the ancient philosopher Heraclitus said, you cannot step into the same river twice. Nostalgia is not a strategy: the past cannot return. As I noted last November, it will be impossible to bring back the lost industrial jobs. Shares of employment in industry have fallen even in countries with huge trade surpluses. In rich countries, the demand for manufactured goods grows relatively slowly, because people desire services, while technology reduces the need for production workers. In the long run, the latter will surely almost all be robots.

 

[Free]

Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com)

Q: Why do you say some federal workers should not get their backpay? TRUMP: Well, you're gonna have to figure that out. Ask the Democrats

bsky.app

Yeah, Trump doesn't know anything about running the government. Ask the Democrats how it's supposed to be done!

 

[Zaida Gearbox]

I posted this to a friend on Facebook:

illegal immigrants cannot get traditional medicaid. What they can get is "emergency medicaid," for emergency medical care, and honestly that is more for the hospitals and for us than the illegal immigrants because let me tell ya what's going to happen if that gets cut off. Hospitals are required by law to provide emergency medical care. Immigration status doesn't matter, and since we claim not to be savages, that is how it should be. So, an illegal immigrant goes to the hospital with a heart attack. The hospital provide him with emergency care. It's the law (passed by Reagan). He runs up a bill in the tens of thousands of dollars - if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. He hasn't got a social security number, so going to court for a garnishment won't work. So, if you cut off emergency medicaid, the hospital has to eat those costs. What ends up happening not even particularly far down the road is that hospitals - especially non-profit and hospitals in rural areas - especially areas with high illegal immigrant populations (*cough Harrisonburg* cough* RMH) go under. Leaving ordinary Americans without access to hospital. What are you going to do if you or your wife has an emergency and RMH isn't there anymore? The nearest hospital over an hour away? Maybe even as far as Richmond or NOVA? Trum and Company know this will be the end result, but they're okay with it because they think ordinary people don't deserve medical care. You really need to stop drinking the poisoned Kool Aid.

 

[Free]

Poor, helpless GOP. Trump and the shutdown is making things hard for them.

Trump's off-script comments cause shutdown headaches for GOP

One week into the government shutdown, top Republican leaders appear to have lost the plot.

President Donald Trump, Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune are straining to project a united front against Democrats, just barely concealing tensions over strategy that have snowballed behind the scenes since agencies closed last week.

In one stark example, Trump scrambled the congressional leaders’ messaging Monday when he told reporters in the Oval Office he would “like to see a deal made for great health care” and that he was “talking to Democrats about it.”

Within hours, Trump walked it back: “I am happy to work with the Democrats on their Failed Healthcare Policies, or anything else, but first they must allow our Government to re-open,” he wrote on Truth Social hours after his initial comments.

 

[Free]

'Hypocrite!' Pam Bondi's attack notes snapped by photographer during contentious hearing

Attorney General Pam Bondi drew reactions from those watching her appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, when, instead of answering specific questions from Democrats, she turned to attack them personally. Bondi attacked Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) over a campaign talking...

www.rawstory.com

Attorney General Pam Bondi drew reactions from those watching her appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, when, instead of answering specific questions from Democrats, she turned to attack them personally.

Bondi attacked Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) over a campaign talking point from more than 15 years ago about his service as a U.S. Marine. She claimed Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) took money from someone who knew sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

When it came to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Reuters photographer Jonathan Ernst noticed that Bondi flipped open a file that provided her with the lines to use in attacking the Senators.

What a lovely game plan.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Brief (8 minutes 17 seconds) video drawing a number of interesting and somewhat alarming comparisons between the careers of Stephen Miller and Joseph Stalin

Stalinism and Stephen Miller (video)

Cause for concern

snyder.substack.com

 

[Free]

More on Miller: He made a Freudian slip on CNN, admitting he believes Trump has absolute authority.

Stephen Miller Gives Strange Interview on Trump’s “Plenary Authority”

The White House aide thinks Trump has ultimate power—and he admitted as much.

newrepublic.com

White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller is facing scrutiny online for his claim about the president’s possession of “plenary authority” in an odd CNN interview earlier this week.

Asked Monday if the Trump administration would abide by U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut’s ruling temporarily blocking the deployment of National Guard troops in Portland, Oregon, Miller abruptly stopped an answer after invoking that legal concept.

The White House aide noted that the administration was appealing the decision. “Under Title 10 of the U.S. Code, the president has plenary authority, has—” Miller added, before stopping short and staring into the camera, blinking silently, as CNN host Boris Sanchez asked if he could hear him.

I expect it would be the same reaction if (?) he accidentally blurted out to his wife Katie that Elon Musk is his sexual matador.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Reuters: Trump’s war on the left: Inside the plan to investigate liberal groups

 

[Free]

They're dotting the I's and crossing the T's. And too stupid to see how obvious this is.

US anti-fascism expert blocked from flying to Spain at airport

Rutgers University professor who published book on antifa was informed at boarding gate that his trip was cancelled

A Rutgers University professor who taught a course on anti-fascism was blocked from leaving the US for Spain on Wednesday night, according to media reports, hours after Donald Trump hosted a White House roundtable highlighting the impact of antifa – or “anti-fascist” – far-left activists.

Mark Bray, an historian who published the 2017 book Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook, and has taught courses on anti-fascism at the New Jersey university, was attempting to board a plane at Newark airport bound for Europe when he was informed at the boarding gate that the reservations for him and his family had been cancelled.

The professor, nicknamed “Dr Antifa” by a group of students, had said he was moving to Europe after receiving death threats. Turning Point USA activists have claimed he is a “financier” for the leftwing movement.

 

[Casey Pelous]

They're dotting the I's and crossing the T's. And too stupid to see how obvious this is.

US anti-fascism expert blocked from flying to Spain at airport

Zere vass ein Problem mit Hiss Papers, hmmm?

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Zere vass ein Problem mit Hiss Papers, hmmm?

Ja, der amerikanische volk muss Ordnung haben. Heil Amerikareich.