Week of Trump Flounder
Walz Faces Trump Dump, Hegseth Floats, Tariff Panic, Democracy Attacked

Key strategy:
The thing he has done most consistently since coming the office again is to compromise democratic institutions and the ability of the citizenry to fight back.

Key plan:
Whatever the merits of any of the given changes Trump is proposing, the point is that he is trying to take control of the electoral process itself.

Key blinders:
Too many people here are waiting for some horrific, visible marker that tells them authoritarianism is here: a declaration of Martial Law, tanks rolling down city streets, a violent display of military force against citizens.

Key incident:
ICE agents raided a home occupied by American citizens (the targets have moved out weeks before), made the family stand outside in the rain in their skivvies, stole their shit, and said: “I know this was a little rough.”

I suggest one fact that ought to be obvious. The exercise in cruelty and humiliation would have been evil if agents had managed to attack the exact migrant family they were trying to hit.

On the other hand, Attorney General Pam Bondi points out that each attack on immigrants saves American lives. Enough fentanyl has been seized at the border to have killed 258 million US citizens.
Just 3 problems:

1. Almost all fentanyl seized at the border is carried by American citizens, not immigrants.
2. 258 million would be about 75% of ALL Americans. 75% may be over‑stating the number of fentanyl addicts in the US.
3. There is this, provided by Comrade Misfit:
   

   Seems like a remarkable drop in fentanyl enforcement, doesn’t it?

Key Gallop:
In other words, what the Gish Gallop lacks in substance, it compensates for in sheer volume. It’s the proverbial “fire hose of lies”, a wholesale dump of misinformation and disinformation at such a rapid speed or in such a thick clump that most people won’t bother trying to untangle it.

Key boast:
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I’ve made 200 deals.
TIME: You’ve made 200 deals?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: 100%.

As even those of us who have not been schooled since Hector was a pup have now been informed, there are not that many countries in the world.

Why?
A tariff is a tax.

Hackwhackers brings us PublicSquare, an on-line list of MAGA friendly businesses for the shopping convenience of Trump supporters. Donald the Lessor is one investor.

Turns out there is a problem. The huge and growing body of those repulsed by Trump and Trumpers are using the site to tell who to boycott.

Key unifying appeal:
“We’re a big tent party of people who disagree in good faith and thus don’t all espouse the same policy views” isn’t the absence of appeal, it’s the appeal itself. Are you one of the 55-60 percent of Americans who now sees Trump clearly, and is repulsed? You have a seat at the table here.

Key case study:
In 2019 Pete Buttigieg appeared on a Fox News show and made the case for late-term abortion — and got an ovation from the conservative audience. He did it by putting the issue in human terms, avoiding abstraction and canned rhetoric, and by using plain everyday language instead of focus-grouped campaign-speech slogans.

Key co-example:
In the same vein, two weeks ago Elizabeth Warren posted an op-ed at Fox explaining the DOGE attack on Social Security. Most of what she said is already familiar to the informed left, but by posting it there, she reached people who likely have not had the issue put clearly to them before.

KSDK here in St. Louis provides the video:

Key objective:
Never before in my life have I called for mass protests, for mobilization, for disruption, but I am now. These Republicans cannot know a moment of peace.

Jason Linkins notes the resulting MAGA rage:

Elon Musk, his own self, calls attention to it as he joins the Trumper meltdown:

Fox Network Headline:
Potential 2028 hopeful accused of ‘inciting violence’ after call for ‘mass protests’ against Trump

Key actual call to action (quoting Gov. Pritzker):
They have to understand that we will fight their cruelty with every microphone and megaphone that we have. We must castigate them on the soapbox and then punish them at the ballot box.

I’m often considered elderly, possibly because of age.
Perhaps I’m missing some nuance that the alert minds of Mr Musk, Fox writers, and much of the MAGA world manage to detect.

I am not agile enough to make the leap from microphone, megaphone, soapbox and ballot box to inciting violence and hell in the streets.

Crazy indeed.

Key subheadline (that says it)
Just in time, a Newsmax host says Murrow is overrated. REALLY.

What may have been Murrow’s finest hour – standing up to a powerful political bully at some risk to himself:

It seems pretty much everyone, even opponents, agreed with its meaning and that it would apply to everyone, (REALLY! Everyone!) born in the US. The 14^th Amendment was deliberately worded with that in mind. Supreme Courts have affirmed that for more than a century and a quarter.

Key objection (from Donald Trump):
He claimed that the understanding that anyone born in the United States is automatically a citizen is “based on a historical myth, and a willful misinterpretation of the law by the open borders advocates.”

Key Executive Action:
Reelected in 2024, on his first day in office, Trump signed an Executive Order titled “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship.”

Key legal obstacle:
But an executive order is simply a directive to federal employees. It cannot override the Constitution. Trump’s attack on the idea of birthright citizenship as a “historical myth” is a perversion of our history.

Key violation:
Early yesterday morning, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sent three U.S. citizens aged 2, 4, and 7 from Louisiana, including one with Stage 4 cancer, to Honduras when they deported their mothers.

The same analysis is now available in audio format, as Richardson narrates in podcast.

[Note to self: Explain to MAGA friends what happens when hot air containing water vapor meets cold air]

Key process (quoting former Minnesota GOP official Michael Brodkorb):
This is what happens when party leadership opens the gates of the insane asylum, and people come in off the streets and the inmates run it.

Right Wing Watch brings us Indiana Lieutenant Governor Micah Beckwith, already known for weird comments about the nation’s founding, insisting the ³/₅ Compromise was a great thing, designed to make sure that justice was equal for all people and equality really meant equality for all.

Key quote (from Beckwith):
We got to this place because of DEI in education. We got to this place because you have professors at woke schools who will not teach the history of what actually happened in the foundations of our nation.

[Personal note: I learned about the ³/₅ Compromise in school in the mid‑60s, while Mr Beckwith’s parents were too little to know ‘D’,’E’, and ‘I’ were in the alphabet.]

Key anti-abortion motive:
“At 16 and 17, when you’re going to have a baby and you cannot get married, the chances of having an abortion triple.” Missouri Representative Billington said.

So the new Republican idea, at least here in Missouri, is that victims of statutory rape should be pushed into marriage in order to push them into pregnancy.

At the top of her piece, Jess makes available an audio version (about 6½ minutes).

So, of course, some legislators are trying to get the issue on the ballot again, but this time disguised with misleading language.

Key decisive decision:
Citizens already lent their support to an amendment that protects abortion up to the point of fetal viability, which can occur sometime between 24 and 26 weeks of pregnancy, by voting to add that amendment to the Missouri constitution.

Key “voters got it wrong”:
But that’s not enough for the state’s Republican majority. Apparently, they think voters must have made a mistake, so they brought a bill to the floor that would prohibit abortion after 12 weeks’ gestation—with exceptions tossed in for medical emergencies and fetal anomalies, as well as rape and incest.

Donald Trump, convinced that Canadians love him (How could they not?), endorses Poilievre. So, the lead instantly evaporates and Liberal Mark Carney becomes Prime Minister.

In Canadian satire, The Beaverton has Trump sending Carney a congratulatory basket of deported children.

Sarah Cooper, in 6 seconds, captures the essense of Trump’s tough response to Putin.

Key uncertainty principle (from Trump):
I don’t have 100% confidence that we’re gonna finish this interview.

Key comforting reassurance (from Moran):
We will.

Of course, I must opine:

Beginning with this:

Key National Defense:
Pete Hegseth, drunk, is still there. Despite opening his war plans to any idiot on the internet because he’s too lazy to go thru proper channels, or too loaded.

Key Trump approach to law:
Jesus Christ, now they’re arresting judges, deporting America citizens, raiding night clubs, sticking mug shots on the White House lawn while a 34 times convicted felon runs the show, and inviting paid Russian propagandists to the White House press pool.

Key funeral appearance:
Our illustrious dementia stricken POTUS, The Felon, was there in his blue suit so he could stand out among the rest of the world who followed protocol and wore black. Trumpski sat there, next to Melania (I think it was her) and fell asleep…

Key headline (possibly clothing related):
A Vision in Blue

The Borowitz Report carries news from God that a man who fell asleep at the funeral of Pope Francis was already going to hell.

Key best memory:
She was a delight and I’m terribly sorry she’s been taken from us all.

Sadly, we now have Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth.