The Conversation -- June 7, 2025
Eric Thayer & Morgan Lee of the AP: “Tear gas and smoke filled the air on the southern outskirts of Los Angeles on Saturday as confrontations between immigration authorities and demonstrators extended into a second day and top Trump administration officials vowed to prosecute anyone who interferes with enforcement. Border Patrol personnel in riot gear and gas masks stood guard outside an industrial park in the city of Paramount, deploying tear gas as bystanders and protesters gathered on medians and across the street. Some jeered at officers while recording the events on smartphones.” ~~~
~~~ Jesus Jimenez, et al., of the New York Times: “The Trump administration said it planned to deploy the National Guard to Los Angeles on Saturday after federal immigration agents in riot gear squared off with hundreds of protesters for a second consecutive day.... California officials, including Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles and Gov. Gavin Newsom, both Democrats, condemned the raids. The governor took particular issue with the arrest on Friday of David Huerta, the president of the California chapter of the Service Employees International Union.”
Hey, Donald. It looks as if Elon and his Chinese friends -- to name a few -- are listening in on your calls. ~~~
~~~ Joseph Menn of the Washington Post: “Elon Musk’s team at the U.S. DOGE Service and allies in the Trump administration ignored White House communications experts worried about potential security breaches when DOGE personnel installed Musk’s Starlink internet service in the complex this year, three people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post. The people ... said those who were managing White House communications systems were not informed in advance when DOGE representatives went to the roof of the adjacent Eisenhower Executive Office Building in February to install a terminal connecting users in the complex to Starlink satellites, which are owned by Musk’s private SpaceX rocket company. The people said those managing the systems weren’t able to monitor such connections to stop sensitive information from leaving the complex or hackers from breaking in.... [A Starlink guest] WiFi network was still appearing on White House visitors’ phones this week.”
Borowitz Report: "In a bold attempt at high-stakes diplomacy, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy offered on Friday to broker a peace deal between Elon Musk and Donald J. Trump." And this, via Borowitz: ~~~
Paige Cunningham of the Washington Post: “Joe Biden’s doctor should have given him a cognitive test during his final year as president because of his age, Barack Obama’s former physician said in an interview, contending that the results would have helped the White House and the public understand whether Biden was up to serving another four years. A report by White House physician Kevin O’Connor in February 2024 didn’t include any mention of neurocognitive testing for the then-81-year-old Biden. Jeffrey Kuhlman, who held the same job under Obama and has called for cognitive testing for presidents and presidential candidates, said Biden would have benefited from such a test given his age.... Kuhlman also said the 2024 report merely assessed Biden’s health when it should have considered his fitness to serve in one of the most taxing jobs on the planet.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: I tend to agree with Kuhlman. However, he should have said in the same sentence, "Whoever has assessed Donald Trump to be fit to serve should lose his medical license." And I'm serious.
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Marie: If you have been living in the United States since January 20, then you have been living in a fascist state for 138 days. Oh, and the dictator guy is a corrupt criminal and a cruel lunatic. If you think I'm making up stuff, think about the nature or implications of many of the stories linked below.
Jilted Old Codger Feigns Indifference. Jonathan Karl of ABC News: "In a phone interview Friday morning ... shortly before 7 a.m., hours after his blistering exchange with Elon Musk..., Donald Trump sounded remarkably unconcerned about their feud.... ABC News asked him about reports he had a call scheduled with Musk for later in the day. 'You mean the man who has lost his mind?' he asked, saying he was 'not particularly' interested in talking to him right now. He said Musk wants to talk to him, but he's not ready to talk to Musk.... One adviser who was with Trump on Thursday night said he seemed 'bummed' about the breakup. And that's the way he sounded on Friday morning. Trump is considering either giving away or selling the red Tesla he purchased to support Musk, a senior administration official told ABC News' Rachel Scott Friday morning. The Tesla was parked just on West Executive Avenue on Thursday....
"The first sign Musk was starting to walk things back came thanks to an account with just over 141 followers on X who suggested to 'cool off' and 'take a step back.' The post from the seemingly random user led Musk to reverse his threat to decommission the spacecraft used to transport astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station, a threat Musk had made just hours earlier. 'Good advice,' Musk responded to the user. 'Ok, we won't decommission Dragon.'" (Also linked yesterday.)
Marie: When I mentioned yesterday that of course Trump was "in the Epstein files," I forgot how much. Chris Hayes remembers: ~~~
Not surprisingly, Jimmy Kimmel here and Stephen Colbert here found something to laugh about. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Maureen Dowd of the New York Times weighs in, in typical Dowd fashion. ~~~
~~~ ⭐Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times: “At the height of the juvenile flame war on Thursday between the world’s richest man and its most powerful one, Donald Trump ... [wrote,] 'The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.... I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!'... In [that post], you can see the transition to a new kind of American regime. Until approximately six months ago, business leaders did not have to worry that voicing their opposition to an American president could tank their enterprises. Now, it’s widely understood and even tacitly accepted that the president will wield the power of his office to crush his enemies.... Musk could say whatever he wanted about Biden without risking the government contracts of his company SpaceX.... He owed [that freedom] to liberal democracy and the very bureaucratic, technocratic structures that he’s spent the last few months trying to destroy.... In trying to liberate themselves from regulation, [billionaires have] trapped themselves in a posture of deep, even existential submission.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: As you may know, a "chiasmus" is a rhetorical device in which words, phrases, clauses, or concepts are repeated in reverse order. Here's one from Goldberg's column:
Americans tend to think that being rich makes you powerful. In fact, what the Trump era is showing is that being powerful makes you rich. -- Prof. Jeffrey Kopstein
~~~ Paul Krugman: “Now, Trump and Musk deserve whatever is coming, good and hard. But don’t let the schadenfreude of this psychodrama distract you from the fundamental point — America has fallen into a deep pit of corruption. Musk believes that he delivered the presidency to Trump, and ... that this entitles him to receive special favors from the White House — not policies he likes in general, but contracts and specific actions that benefit him personally. He even seems to have imagined that he was effectively co-president.... Trump ... has threatened retaliation — again, not in the form of general policies Musk won’t like but in the form of specific actions aimed to hurt Musk’s bottom line.... The point is that both men start from the presumption that the U.S. government is an entirely corrupt enterprise, with the president in a position to hand out personal favors or engage in personal acts of vengeance. And everyone takes it for granted that both men are right.” ~~~
~~~ Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian: “... the rift between the president and Musk has exposed a divide inside the contemporary right, in the US and beyond – and a fatal flaw of the Trump project.... The egos were too large, the narcissism too strong, for their love to survive. In the Trump universe, as in the Musk galaxy, there is room for only one sun.... [Trump's] suggestion that Musk’s driving motive was profit seems to have particularly antagonised the billionaire, prompting him to call for his former paramour to be impeached and to claim that Trump is named in the Jeffrey Epstein files, in effect implicating the president in a paedophile ring. Musk wants to present his objection not as self-serving but as ideological, casting himself as the fiscal conservative appalled by Trump’s 'disgusting abomination' of a bill because it will increase the already gargantuan US deficit by trillions of dollars.... There still remain a few old-school conservatives with a vestigial presence in the Senate, for whom fiscal rectitude remains an article of faith.... Ranged against them are the forces of nationalist conservatism, embodied by former Trump strategist and ex-convict Steve Bannon.”
Marie: Elon Musk is so naive and ham-handed that I find it almost impossible to believe that he has ever come up with any workable innovations on his own. And, no, saying "let's go to Mars" is not an innovation. You may be inclined to cry "Dunning-Kruger!" but I just don't think Musk is particularly bright and he certainly is not at all contemplative. (Okay, I suppose it could be the drugs.) Another DOGE-chainsaw-like case in point: ~~~
~~~ Ashleigh Fields of the Hill: “Elon Musk floated a new political party on Friday after falling out with ... [Donald] Trump over the big, beautiful bill. He launched a Thursday poll on the social platform X.... 'The people have spoken. A new political party is needed in America to represent the 80% in the middle! And exactly 80% of people agree. This is fate,' Musk wrote, citing numbers from his survey. He followed up with a potential name for the group, 'The America Party.'”
Colby Smith of the New York Times: “A solid jobs report for May has reinforced the Federal Reserve’s stance that it can take its time before restarting interest rate cuts, an approach that drew renewed ire from ... [Donald] Trump on Friday. Mr. Trump told reporters in the evening that his pick for the next chair of the Fed was coming soon and that he had a pretty good idea of whom he would select for the role, which Jerome H. Powell will vacate next May. The comments followed a string of attacks on the Fed on Friday by Mr. Trump, who again railed against Mr. Powell for moving too slowly to lower interest rates. In posts on social media, the president called Mr. Powell 'a disaster' and suggested that Fed policymakers cut rates by a full percentage point. 'He is costing our Country a fortune,' Mr. Trump wrote. 'Borrowing costs should be MUCH LOWER!!!'”
Eric Lipton, et al., of the New York Times: “The Trump White House has repeatedly sounded an alarm about visitors with ties to China’s Communist Party coming to the United States, arguing that they are a potential security threat. But the administration appears to have literally left the door open to a member of a Chinese government group when it went along with a plan to give the biggest purchasers of ... [Donald] Trump’s digital currency access to the president and the White House.... One of those [Trump crypto] buyers was He Tianying, who is a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.... That government group ... is an advisory body that seeks to broaden the Communist Party’s influence and solicit support from influential people in Chinese society.... At a time when the administration is seeking to scrutinize and revoke the visas of Chinese students with ties to the Communist Party, the incident illustrates inconsistencies in the Trump administration’s approach to how it handles Chinese nationals, as well as potential weaknesses in the background checks the Trump administration did on the guests who bought his memecoin....
“The day after the dinner at Mr. Trump’s golf club, Mr. He was observed by a reporter from The Times entering the White House for the tour that had been set up by Mr. Trump’s business partner Bill Zanker, who created the Trump memecoin.... The [gracious] dinner invitation sent to Mr. He stands in contrast to the statement Mr. Trump issued on Wednesday, arguing that his administration needed to urgently move to block visas for certain Chinese nationals, including those attending Harvard University.... He said this order was for 'crucial national security reasons.'... Mr. He came to the United States from China about a decade ago to get a master’s degree in finance at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, before returning to China and becoming active in the C.P.P.C.C.... This made Mr. He just the kind of student Mr. Trump is now targeting.”
Trump Distraction Prep. Natalie Allison, et al., of the Washington Post: “Months before ... Donald Trump issued a travel ban on individuals from more than a dozen countries, his team of lawyers and advisers had already started crafting the ban, a process that was underway before he stepped back into the Oval Office in January. Trump announced the proclamation Wednesday night, three days after an Egyptian man with an expired tourist visa was charged with attacking pro-Israel demonstrators in Boulder, Colorado.... A White House official ... confirmed that Wednesday night’s proclamation 'was not a direct response to' the Colorado attack. Trump was always going to implement a travel ban, his advisers say. The announcement was the latest example of how the Trump administration has dipped into its large reserve of proclamations and executive orders — many of which have been long in the making — to drive its chosen narrative, push the president’s priorities and sometimes change the subject when news coverage focuses on topics that Trump officials prefer to downplay.”
Erica Orden & Hassan Kanu of Politico: “A federal appeals court panel on Friday reinstated parts of ... Donald Trump’s ban of the Associated Press from several key areas where presidential press events are typically held, including the Oval Office, Air Force One and the president’s home in Mar-A-Lago. The court left in place part of a lower-court order that required Trump to give AP access to events held in larger spaces, like the East Room. The ruling is a setback to the news organization’s efforts to restore its access to the White House press pool, the small group of reporters and photographers who get access to a variety of White House spaces and other areas frequented by the president. D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Judges Neomi Rao and Gregory Katsas, both Trump appointees, largely granted the government’s request to lift an April ruling from a district judge who blocked the ban. The decision from Rao and Katsas allows most of the ban to go back into effect while litigation over its constitutionality continues.... Judge Cornelia Pillard, an Obama appointee, dissented from the ruling, saying that the Supreme Court has never held that journalists or news organizations can be excluded from a forum based on their viewpoint.” (Also linked yesterday.)
Adam Liptak & Abbie VanSickle of the New York Times: “The Supreme Court on Friday let members of the Department of Government Efficiency ... have access to sensitive records of the Social Security Administration. The court’s order was brief and unsigned, which is typical when the justices rule on emergency applications. The Trump administration said it needed the data to root out waste and fraud and to modernize the agency’s operations. Two labor unions and an advocacy group represented by Democracy Forward Foundation sued to block access, saying that much of the information was deeply personal and protected by privacy laws. The court responded that the agency 'may proceed' to give DOGE access to the records necessary to do its work. In a second unsigned order on Friday the court handed DOGE a second victory, ruling that, for now, the organization does not have to turn over internal records to a government watchdog group as part of a public records lawsuit. The court’s three liberal members — Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson — dissented from both rulings.” (Also linked yesterday.) The AP report is here. ~~~
~~~ The order in the first case is here, and it's worth reading for Justice Jackson's dissent, which fittingly resorts to mockery of her imprudent colleagues: "... once again, this Court dons its emergency-responder gear, rushes to the scene, and uses its equitable power to fan the flames rather than extinguish them." BTW, should you think Big Balls cannot be downloading your bank account number because you don't receive Social Security benefits, Jackson informs us, "Every person who has received a Social Security number appears in the SSA’s data."
~~~ Marie: Thanks to Akhilleus for the heads-up. Say, Elon, while you're sharing my records with every entity who will pay for them, please release to the public every possibly embarrassing, compromising record of your former BFF Donald as well as those of his benefactors on the Supreme Court.
⭐Maria Sacchetti, et al., of the Washington Post: “The wrongly deported Salvadoran man whose removal to a notorious gang prison ignited a standoff between the Trump administration and federal courts has been returned to the United States and charged with human smuggling, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Friday. The charges against Kilmar Abrego García mean he could face prosecution in the United States and possible deportation to his native El Salvador or another country. The federal indictment came weeks after the Supreme Court ordered Trump officials to facilitate Abrego García’s return from El Salvador, where Justice Department lawyers admitted he’d been erroneously sent. The president, his lawyers and Cabinet members had resisted bringing him back, but officials said Friday he was in U.S. custody and back on American soil.” Politico's story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ David Kurtz of TPM: "The Trump administration is finally abiding by a court order and returning the wrongfully deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the United States, ABC News reports, but in a face-saving maneuver it is criminally charging him for allegedly transporting undocumented migrants. As part of the Trump administration’s smear campaign to obscure its error in deporting Abrego Garcia to El Salvador in violation of a immigration judge order, the Department of Homeland Security had trumpeted a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee which yielded no charges against him.... The Trump administration – in a case that drew international attention for how it screwed up – is throwing everything at Abrego Garcia. Of course, it can be true that both the Trump administration and Abrego Garcia engaged in lawless behavior. The fact of one doesn’t excuse the other." Kurtz also provides a copy of the indictment. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ From ABC News live updates: "The decision to pursue the indictment against Kilmar Abrego Garcia led to the abrupt departure of Ben Schrader, a high-ranking federal prosecutor in Tennessee.... Schrader’s resignation was prompted by concerns that the case was being pursued for political reasons, the sources said." The New York Times' live updates are here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ It Depends on the Meaning of the Word “Justice.” Alan Feuer of the New York Times: “When Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Friday that Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia had been returned to the United States to face criminal charges after being wrongfully deported to a prison in El Salvador, she sought to portray the move as the White House dutifully upholding the rule of law. 'This,' she said, 'is what American justice looks like.' Her assertion, however, failed to grapple with the fact that for the nearly three months before the Justice Department secured an indictment against Mr. Abrego Garcia, it had repeatedly flouted a series of court orders — including one from the Supreme Court — to 'facilitate' his release.... Administration officials had tried all means at their disposal to keep [Mr. Abrego Garcia] overseas as they figured out a solution to the problem they had created, The New York Times found in a recent investigation.... Last month, the Justice Department took a somewhat similar approach in the case of Kseniia Petrova, a Russian scientist employed by Harvard....” ~~~
~~~ Marie: IOW, the Department of Injustice followed a well-known rule in the Dictators' Handbook: (1) Trump (double entendre here) up charges and (2) throw him in the Gulag. The Trumpskis are not very bright people, so they did it ass-backwards.
Nidia Cavazos of CBS News: "Many undocumented immigrants who went to their Immigration and Customs Enforcement check-in appointments at a federal building in Los Angeles this week were taken into custody and brought to the basement and held there, some overnight, according to immigration lawyers and family members. One attorney, Lizbeth Mateo, said ... a couple and their two children, one of whom is a U.S. citizen, spent the night in a room with no beds and limited access to food and water. Mateo said the father had previously been issued a stay of removal, barring him from deportation but he and his family were detained anyway. His wife was released Wednesday evening along with their children since she needed medical attention due to a high-risk pregnancy. He was still being detained early Friday, Mateo said." ~~~
~~~ Gabriel Canon of the Guardian: “The Department of Homeland Security conducted raids on multiple locations across Los Angeles on Friday, clashing with the crowds of people who gathered to protest. Masked agents were recorded pulling several people out of two LA-area Home Depot stores and the clothing manufacturer Ambient Apparel’s headquarters in LA’s Fashion District. Immigration advocates said the raids also included four other locations, including a doughnut shop. There has not yet been confirmation of how many people were taken into custody during the coordinated sweeps. At an afternoon press conference, Angelica Salas, executive director for the Coalition of Humane Immigrant Rights, said at least 45 people were arrested without warrants.... By 6pm local time, hundreds of people assembled around the federal building in downtown Los Angeles, where those taken into custody during the raids are being held. Earlier in the day, armed agents clad in heavy protective and tactical gear, including some who wore gas masks, could be seen on video and through aerial footage pushing individuals and trying to corral large groups that congregated to challenge the raids.” Read on. MB: The locations where ICE agents targeted people are places where day-laborers go looking for work. A New York Times story is here. ~~~
~~~ Missael Soto of NBC4 Los Angeles: "The Service Employees International Union California (SEIU) issued a statement Friday that the labor union's president, David Huerta, was detained during the ICE raids across Los Angeles. The labor union is calling for the release of Huerta, who they say was injured during the federal agency's operations. Huerta was released from the hospital, where he was treated for his injuries, but remains in custody.... [Los Angeles] Mayor Karen Bass confirmed to NBC4 that the labor union president was under ICE detention and he was also pepper-sprayed.... According to Bass, it is unclear why Huerta is being detained." According to a tweet attributed to U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli & published within Soto's article, "Federal agents were executing a lawful judicial warrant at a LA worksite this morning when David Huerta deliberately obstructed their access by blocking their vehicle. He was arrested for interfering with federal officers and will face arraignment in federal court on Monday...."
Tyler Katzenberger of Politico: “Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday suggested California consider withholding tens of billions in annual federal tax dollars amid reports Donald Trump is preparing funding cuts targeting the state. Newsom’s suggestion came after CNN reported the president was considering a “full termination” of federal grant funding for California’s universities. 'Californians pay the bills for the federal government. We pay over $80 BILLION more in taxes than we get back,' the Democratic governor said in an X post Friday afternoon, referencing a recent analysis from the Rockefeller Institute that California contributed about $83 billion more in federal taxes in 2022 than it received back from Washington. 'Maybe it’s time to cut that off,' he added.”
Ali Bianco of Politico: “The Trump administration will pay a $4.975 million settlement in the lawsuit over the wrongful death of Ashli Babbitt, who was killed by a U.S. Capitol Police officer after storming the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Babbitt — a 35-year-old from California and veteran of the Air Force who went to Washington for ... Donald Trump’s rally — was among an early group of rioters that reached the doors of the Speaker’s Lobby, adjacent to the House chamber, while lawmakers were still evacuating.... Babbitt is seen on video attempting to enter the ... Speaker's Lobby, adjacent to the House chamber ... through a shattered window. That’s when Capitol Police officer Michael Byrd fired the fatal shot. Byrd was investigated and cleared by local and federal authorities.... Outgoing Capitol Police chief Thomas Manger blasted the reported settlement last month, saying it 'sends a chilling message to law enforcement nationwide, especially to those with a protective mission like ours.'” ~~~
~~~ Oh, here's another chance for Pam Blondie to hand over millions of taxpayer dollars to violent, anti-American criminals. But, hey, "This is what American justice looks like." ~~~
~~~ Ellie Silverman, et al., of the Washington Post: “Five leaders of the Proud Boys, four of whom were found guilty of engaging in a seditious conspiracy to keep ... Donald Trump in power on Jan. 6, 2021, want the government to pay them restitution over claims that their constitutional rights were violated, according to a federal lawsuit filed Friday in Florida. The lawsuit follows Trump’s decision to pardon virtually all Jan. 6. defendants in one of his opening acts as president, an extraordinary attempt to recast the official public narrative about an attack that halted the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in American history. Its language echoes Trump’s own claims that the investigation into that attack was illegitimate and politically motivated. Now, the suit could force the Trump administration to defend the prosecutions, or pay damages at taxpayers’ expense to the Proud Boys, a far-right group with a history of violence, a decision historians warn could amount to an endorsement of using violence for political gain.” The Guardian's report is here.
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: “There is no sanctuary from Trump administration buffoonery.... Nearly five months into this reign of error, the mistakes are multiplying. It becomes more obvious each week that Trump and his aides are just not good at this governing thing.... But nobody has fumbled as frequently as [Kristi] Noem in recent days. Officially, she is in charge of protecting us from terrorists and planning for natural disasters. In practice, she has been on a months-long cosplay adventure....” This is a gift link to a recitation of some of the incidents that have contributed to the reign of errors. Milbank also links to a list by Tim Murphy of Mother Jones of the first 100 days of errors. “Mistakes were made.” Speaking of mistakes ~~~
~~~ Signalgate, Ctd. Dan Lamothe of the Washington Post: “The Defense Department inspector general’s office is examining whether it was Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth or an aide, perhaps acting at his behest, who used Hegseth’s account on the unclassified chat application Signal to divulge detailed information about forthcoming air attacks on Yemen.... The inspector general’s office also is reviewing whether Hegseth’s aides were directed to delete messages they sent through Signal to thwart the government’s recordkeeping laws....” The AP report by Tara Copp, who broke the news, is here.
Carl Hulse of the New York Times: “During his brief tenure in the Senate, Vice President JD Vance blocked Biden administration nominees for U.S. attorney, in a break with past practice. Now, a senior Democrat is citing that as a precedent for insisting on the same standard for ... [Donald] Trump’s federal prosecutor nominees, potentially jeopardizing their confirmation.... Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, [said he] plans to adhere to what he is calling 'the Vance precedent' for Trump prosecutors unless Republicans offer some concessions.... Beginning in June 2023, Mr. Vance, then a first-term Republican senator, said he would oppose moving ahead with all Justice Department nominees, excluding federal marshals, to protest what he contended was the politicization of the department and its pursuit of Mr. Trump in the courts. He said his goal was to 'grind this department to a halt.'... After Mr. Vance headed for the campaign trail as Mr. Trump’s running mate, other Republican senators took up his cause and lodged the objections for him.”
Marie: I never, ever thought I could be opposed to the Anti-Defamation League, but here I am. ~~~
~~~ Arno Rosenfeld & Jacob Kornbluh of the Forward: “Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League CEO, repeatedly compared pro-Palestinian student protesters to Islamist terrorists in comments to Republican attorneys general and said the left harbored the 'real deal threat' to Jews. 'We are an apolitical, non-partisan organization, but you have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to see what’s happening on the left,' Greenblatt said Friday, according to audio from the event obtained by the Forward. 'There is a throughline from Occupy Wall Street to BLM to “defund the police” to “River to the Sea,’” he added, referring to the Black Lives Matter movement launched last decade ago to protest police violence. 'They are the same people, these are the same kind of nihilists.'” MB: This is disgusting stuff, IMO. And as you read through the report, it doesn't get better.
Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post: “Starting July 1, colleges will be permitted to directly pay athletes for the first time, the result of U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken granting final approval to a multibillion dollar legal settlement Friday night. The agreement resolves three antitrust suits against the NCAA — House, Carter and Hubbard — all of which challenged restrictions on athlete compensation. It was hashed out by attorneys for the plaintiffs and six defendants: the NCAA, SEC, Big Ten, ACC, Big 12 and Pac 12. The settlement includes almost $2.8 billion in back damages for former and current athletes (and their lawyers). It also creates a new economic model for top-tier college sports, permitting any Division I school to pay their athletes up to about $20.5 million this coming academic year. That cap will rise incrementally throughout the 10-year life of the settlement. The payments to athletes, colloquially called 'revenue sharing,' will be in addition to scholarships and other benefits.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: While I would hardly deny that the seeds of authoritarian government have been sowed since the founding, this country became a fascist state overnight (or rather, overnoon -- specifically on January 20, 2025). Yet some changes come remarkably slowly: I don't know how long the idea of legally paying college athletes has been around, but we talked about it when I was i college 60 years ago.
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Ukraine/Russia, et al. Constant Méheut of the New York Times: “Russia pummeled Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, overnight on Saturday, using a swarm of drones, bombs and missiles that killed at least three people, according to the local authorities. It was the latest in an escalating series of Russian air assaults on urban centers that have further dampened hopes for a cease-fire. Located just 20 miles from the Russian border, Kharkiv is a frequent target of Russian air assaults. What set the latest attack apart was the sheer volume of weapons launched in a short span of time. The local authorities said that within 90 minutes, Russia struck the city with nearly 50 drones, two missiles and four glide bombs, powerful guided weapons that carry hundreds of pounds of explosives. Kharkiv’s mayor, Ihor Terekhov, said that 40 explosions were heard in the city. He described the overnight assault as 'the most powerful attack' on the city since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began more than three years ago.”
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A version of this clip of josh hawley was linked several days ago. There is a lot to unpack in the exchange, as they say, but one point that seems to be overlooked is just how baldly the Missouri senator is lying and contradicting his own chart. He says:
"So long as it is a Democrat [sic] president in office, then we should have no nationwide injunctions. If it’s a Republican president then this is absolutely fine, warranted, and called for."
And yet his OWN FUCKING CHART shows there have been 64 injunctions against the current oval office occupier, 14 against Biden, 12 against Obama, and 6 against Bush. He doesn't clarify which president Bush he is referring to, but I am pretty sure both of them had an R next to their names.
The clip: https://youtu.be/q3R3xTlkECE?si=0CuWR0WiXLRzN52o
Heather Cox Richardson interviews Gil Duran, on the nutty fascist ideology of Curtis Yarvin and Peter Thiel and other tech-bros that is also influencing t**** policies.
Dark Enlightenment
Benefits of being MAGA
Individual Attacks
"Miles Taylor, the author of the ‘Anonymous’ op-ed opens up on life after being targeted by Trump’s executive order.
“It’s been completely destructive to our lives,” Taylor said in an interview with POLITICO Magazine, adding that he and his family have faced increased security threats because of Trump’s order. “I don’t want to go out there and say this order achieved the president’s objective of destroying my personal life, but the reality is that I had to step away from work because I couldn’t do the work that I did anymore with this blacklisting in Washington.”"
Guardian
"New Zealand MPs who performed haka in parliament given record suspensions
Parliament votes to enact punishment after hours of fraught debate including attitudes towards Māori culture
A committee of the lawmakers’ peers in April recommended the lengthy punishments in a report that said they were not being punished for the haka itself, but for striding across the floor of the debating chamber towards their opponents while they did it. Maipi-Clarke rejected that on Thursday, citing other instances where legislators had left their seats and approached their opponents without sanction."
Sooo…the South African Chainsaw Massacre Monster is starting a new party to represent…what did he say? 80% of the country? Wow. I’m guessing he did some serious number crunching to come up with that figure. Just like his calculations that millions and millions of dead people were collecting Social Security (and not for nothin’, but how did he and Big Balls and the other Hitler Youth think those dead people were cashing those checks? Family members? And no one caught on that millions and millions of families were doing this? Anyway…).
And what will be the name of this cool new pahty? Oh.,,the America Party! Nice. Catchy name. I guess National Socialist German Workers Party was already taken.
And, um, just wondering who this National Social..,er, I mean, “America Pahty” should elect as its Dear Leader?
Hmmm…what I thought.
Will he be doing this at his inauguration?
Ketamine, adderall, mushrooms, and Xtasy for everyone!
Thanks, but one delusional douchebag with monkeys turning the brain gears is plenty.
Test…
@Akhilleus: I don't know why it never occurred to me that Musk named not only Twitter but also his child after a hallucinogenic drug. Sometimes I just miss the obvious. And that's the guy Trump made co-president*.
Marie: I did not know the kid was actually named X (I thought they were protecting his identity by calling him X) and I have not ever given one hoot or thought to Xtasy. So I am right there with you...
Jonathan Greenblatt needs to sit down and decompress or something. Whom does he think has him on teevee all the time, Fox? Hell no. It's the liberals. The left. And River to the Sea refers to Hamas, doesn't it? He is equating all protestors of the genocide enacted by the Israeli government and army with Islamic terror states?? What a great guy, to not even know whom is actually committing terror against JEWS, and thinking not approving Israeli bloodthirstyness is the same thing as people who are Nazis?? I said as much to someone in my family the other day-- there is a huge difference in Jew-haters (Jews will not replace us--) and the students upset about a current genocide in a country coveted by Israel and which it plans to empty out and "replace with Jews," for god's sake.
I guess we can now put Greenblabby right up there in the large group of idiots who are turning on the left like Karine and Jake and the people screaming about Biden's age and illness and the left in general. (Are we ever going to find out who put pipe bombs at the Democratic party site during Jan 6? No-- ) I guess it is now open season on Democrats, even by supposed smart people. I guess we should keep mum about supporting people we care about. It's a fascist festival all around.
Jeff Jarvis
"Can't wait for the #BrokenTimes new book: "A Thousand Ways to Not Say 'Fascism.'"
Return of Wrongly Deported Man Raises Questions About Trump’s Views of Justice"
Jeanne- the son's name is apparently X Æ A-12.
In an April guest essay in The New York Times, Jill Lepore described the "how many of his [musks] ideas about politics, governance and economics resemble those championed by his grandfather Joshua Haldeman, a cowboy, chiropractor, conspiracy theorist and amateur aviator known as the Flying Haldeman. Mr. Musk’s grandfather was also a flamboyant leader of the political movement known as technocracy.
....
Under the technate, humans would no longer have names; they would have numbers. One technocrat went by 1x1809x56. (Mr. Musk has a son named X Æ A-12.) Mr. Haldeman, who had lost his Saskatchewan farm during the Depression, became the movement’s leader in Canada. He was technocrat No. 10450-1.
...
Much that Mr. Musk has attempted to do at DOGE can be found in the technocracy manuals of the early 1930s."
[and it has apparently influenced other of the Silicon Valley billionaires now trying to ruin our lives]
Technocrat No. 10450-1
^gift link
More media help for the fascist moron…
Meant to post this yesterday, but I’m not gonna let it go. This is just one of the many things ways this fat fuck skates away from accountability.
Yesterday on NPR’s All Things Considered, a report on Fat Hitler’s temper tantrum tariffs was opened like this:
President Trump’s are bringing in billions!
Wow! Really? These stoopid tariffs are working?
The report by NPR’s chief economics reporter. Scott Horsley, a guy who usually does a pretty good job, gushed about how much money FH’s douchey tariffs are adding to the federal government’s bottom line. Horsley made a big deal out of how, under Biden, tariff revenues were about 2% of federal income, but under TRUMP!! it’s now doubled, up to 4%.
Yow!
But a few minutes into the report (long after most people have stopped listening), we get what should have been the lede.
“However, those billions are being paid by Americans, not the Chinese or the Vietnamese, or those penguins.
What—-the—-actual—fuck!!!!
This is the radio version of burying the lede! If this were a report in the sanewashing Post or The NY Times, this incredibly important bit of info would have been hidden in the 17th paragraph.
It’s like a report announcing one of Chainsaw Elmo’s Space X rocket launches. But you don’t find out until the seventh paragraph that the fucking thing blew up and rained red hot shrapnel on beachcombers.
So yeah, his tariffs are collecting shitloads of money.
From AMERICANS!!
Fuckin’ hell! This is how he gets away with everything! Maybe NPR bigwigs are shitting bricks about him taking away their funding, but tickling his tiny testes won’t change that situation. Fer crissakes, if you’re gonna go out, at least go out telling the fucking truth.
Sorry, should have done a quick edit of that last post. Just too much head spinning anger!