Fascism

The Last Day


POST 1192

The BBBB

At last there were just enough Republican cowards, liars and hypocrites to pass Trump’s Big Barfy Betrayal Bill. Who would have thought it possible to amass so many legislators more afraid of losing their privileged seats in Congress than motivated to keep people from starving to death or dying of preventable maladies?

The Congressional Republicans cheered and took a group thumbs-up photo after the signing of that awful legislation that is so destructive of the American people and our way of life. They seemed to say “cheers for our side,” as though getting a legislative win were more important than doing what is best for the people.
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That bill is the gateway to the loss of our freedom.
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Its passage has created the next to the last day.
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Who Doesn’t Care?

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) offered an amendment to stop the Republicans from cutting half the funding for the Consumer Financial Protection Board. That’s the agency that has caused over $20 billion to be returned to Americans who had been cheated by a bank, credit card company or the like. Every Republican voted against her amendment.

Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) submitted an amendment to increase taxes on income over $10 million. Every Republican voted against that.

Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-DE) had an amendment about Medicaid. The Republicans want to take it away from 17 million Americans. Her amendment was to at least keep in place Medicaid for brand new babies and their moms while they are in the hospital. Every Republican voted against it. Hey, if babies die, they die.

Republicans tell us that they care, but here’s their flag

Sen. Adam Schiff’s (D-CA) amendment opposed the Republican plan to cut food assistance for low income families. It would guarantee food assistance at least for families with children under age 12. Every Republican voted against it.

The Republicans are for letting millions of Africans die from lack of medicines and surplus food already paid for and ready to ship.

The answer to the question beginning this section is that Republicans don’t care.

From Robert Reich:

[Their BBBB] establishes an anti-immigrant police state in America, replete with a standing army of ICE agents and a gulag of detention facilities that transform ICE into the most heavily funded law enforcement agency in the government.

That is Trump’s private fascist army.

All of this is stuff you don’t want and perhaps you don’t want to hear about, but this is what you get from Trump and his cowardly Republicans.

And we may have few chances left to vote them out of office. Trump said so.

The Posse Of Destruction Makes It Worse

From The Onion. Click me

John Roberts, Chief Justice to those other 5 black robed thieves of liberty, has placed himself in history to be the leader of the cabal who wouldn’t do their jobs. Instead, they have de facto caved to Trump.

The Roberts Court outrageously gave the President a get out of jail free card, allowing him to commit practically any crime while President and do so with no consequences (Trump v. United States). That matches nearly all of Trump’s no-accountability life. Then the Court put a nail in the coffin of birthright citizenship (Trump v. CASA). That oughta keep non-Whites from voting.

There are more Roberts assaults on our Constitution, of course. These are just two of the most recent.

John Roberts and his Posse of Destruction have abandoned their sworn duty to protect and defend the Constitution and have systematically dismantled our We The People protections from government cruelty. Indeed, they have neutered nearly every avenue to protect this nation from the onslaught of fascism and a cruel dictator.

The Final Manipulation

From Wikipedia:

The Reichstag fire .  .  .  was an arson attack on the Reichstag building, home of the German parliament in Berlin, on Monday, 27 February 1933, precisely four weeks after Adolf Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany .  .  . the Nazis attributed the fire to a group of Communist agitators, used it as a pretext to claim that Communists were plotting against the German government, and induced President Paul von Hindenburg to issue the Reichstag Fire Decree suspending civil liberties and pursue a “ruthless confrontation” with the Communists. This made the fire pivotal in the establishment of Nazi Germany.

That freedom killing Decree lasted until the end of the war.

Trump just got his horrible bill passed. It will give him radically enlarged power; hence, its passage signals the next to the last day. Now he needs something else big to solidify his dictatorship, so watch for some large act that looks like sabotage. He will use it to curtail freedom and to declare a state of martial law. That will put Marines in your town and your freedom will be gone.

Then our Republican controlled Congress will sit like lap dogs, mute and meek, and watch Trump dissolve Congress and the courts. Trump will be a dictator exactly as he declared he would be when he said maybe there won’t be another election.

Then by extension:

Prof. Timothy Snyder’s post Concentration Camp Labor tells us what comes next, powered by ICE thugs, who bring us imprisonments and deportations of innocents, concentration camps, then the normalization of slave labor.

I know that all sounds radical, outrageous. The German people didn’t see it coming, either.

Nevertheless, that will be the last day.
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Unless There Is A Lot Of Action

First, a definition: autocracy = dictatorship

And dictators are never good for the people. The Founders knew that because they lived under a dictator, mad King George III. He was a lot like Dementia King Donald I. We need to get to the same level of clarity as our Founders possessed.

Steven Levitsky, Lucan Way and Daniel Ziblatt wrote How Will We Know When We Have Lost Our Democracy? and I strongly recommend that you read it. The article ends with this:

America’s slide into authoritarianism is reversible. But no one has ever defeated autocracy from the sidelines

Got it?

A Final Question About Our Self-Debasement Into Fascism

Every day Trump and his Gestapo are kidnapping people, beating them, killing them, locking them up and deporting them. Due process isn’t something even thinkable under these circumstances. Now they’re making jokes about detainees being eaten by alligators. They’re even selling Alligator Alcatraz merch. That extreme cruelty is being normalized and it’s being done in your name.

Here’s the question:

Are you okay with that?
The “Deconstructing Trump”* Corner

All Congressional Republicans know that the Big Barfy Betrayal Bill will badly hurt their constituents, but they voted for it, supine before Trump.

Accordingly, we begin this series with two quotations specifically for Congressional Republicans.

  • To sin by silence when we should protest
  • Makes cowards out of men.
  • Ella Wheeler Wilcox, 1914
  • He who does not bellow the truth when he knows the truth
  • makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers.
  • Charles Péguy, 1899
  • _________________________________________

* Deconstructing Trump by friend Mardy Grothe explores The Trump phenomenon through the lens of quotation history. As such, we explore his volume and add the applicable wisdom to these posts.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Big Brother At Our Doorstep


POST 1191

The Swinders

Do you remember Peter Thiel – the billionaire PayPal and FaceBook guy? More significantly, maybe you remember him from his being JD Vance’s sugar daddy, giving that loser a fund manager position and then bankrolling Vance into the Senate. Thiel’s support culminated in Vance white washing all the trash talking he did of Trump (remember his Hitler comparisons when he was a “never Trumper”?) and getting the VP job by means of Thiel’s hand on his butt shoving him there.

Elon Musk and his juvenile delinquent flying monkeys stole our personal data from Social Security and other agencies. They sucked up all of your information – bank accounts, debts – everything – and dumped it in the lap of – guess who? – Peter Thiel and his AI company. I suspect that Musk kept copies for himself. This is true Big Brother intrusion into our lives and there is likely nothing any of us can do about that invasion of our privacy.

Of course, you smelled a rat when Musk was claiming to be fighting waste, fraud and abuse but he never found any waste, fraud or abuse. He promised to save us $2 trillion but actually barely broke even in his rampage of destruction. The rat you smelled was the theft of all of our information and its transfer to Thiel. It was for the benefit of Trump, Musk, Thiel, rich, greedy guys and lovers of dictatorship. That is the real reason for DOGE. Just like the Republican Big Barfy Betrayal Bill, it’s about sending your money to rich people and corporations.

You’ve been swindled by these thieves who invite Big Brother into our house.

This robber baron horror story is spelled out in Robert Reich’s piece, The Most Dangerous Corporation in the World.

Health Beat

From STAT:

79%

That’s the proportion of U.S. adults who say parents should be required to vaccinate their kids against preventa[ble] diseases like measles, mumps, and rubella in order to attend school, according to a new, nationally representative poll from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the de Beaumont Foundation.

You say you don’t want your kids to be vaccinated against these highly contagious diseases, as well as polio and smallpox? Fine. Just move to an unpopulated offshore island and never set foot on this continent again so that your family cannot infect the rest of us, cause a pandemic and make many people die.

While that offshore island cure for anti-vaxxers is, perhaps, extreme, 4 out of 5 adults in this country, including 68% of Republicans, pretty much agree about vaccinating our children. The question is why Secretary “Brain Worm” Kennedy doesn’t get it. Oh right: he has a brain worm.

And he’s a member of the DKS* wing of the Big Brother clan of cruelty.

Bombing Update

From Steve Schmidt, Headed Back To 2003 (when Dubya lied us into war in Iraq):

“CNN is scum, MSNBC is scum, the New York Times is scum. They’re bad people, they’re sick.”

— Donald Trump, June 25, 2025

Donald Trump’s Iran attack was a failure.

The Iranian nuclear program was not destroyed.

Here is what happened.

The United States used more than half of its bunker-busting arsenal of GBU-57s to obliterate a mountain top, and Little Marco, Champagne Pete, and JD Vance got to appear in a prime time episode of national disaster television behind a demented old man filled with malice, delusions and venom.

Here is what was achieved.

Nothing — except for making the Iranian regime more dangerous.

  • That is what a diabolical Big Brother does and that puts us all at risk.
Why Is All This Happening?

From Robert Reich:

.  .  .  Republicans, who hold majorities in both chambers of Congress, won’t defend their constitutional prerogatives. America is becoming a dictatorship because there are not even 4 Republican senators out of 53, nor 3 Republican representatives out of 220, with enough courage and integrity to stand up for Congress’s constitutional responsibilities.

That is a major piece of how Big Brother has come to be at our doorstep. That is why all this is happening.
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Hope

Late last Sunday afternoon a huge thunderstorm rolled through our area. I sat on my front porch and enjoyed the show, the distant crashes of thunder, the torrents of rain overwhelming the roof gutters and splashing onto the ground, the rivers flowing fast in the street – it was glorious.

Then almost suddenly the rain slowed and bright sunshine bathed the area, sparkling off the drops on the leaves of the trees.

Wait: rain and sunshine – there had to be a rainbow somewhere.

I got up from my comfortable chair on the porch and went out into the street, turned my back to the sun and right there, low in the sky was the rainbow, just as they always are when the sun shines through rain.

We are living in a time of dread over all the harm and cruelty and the breaking of our laws, our customs and our hearts. Many people – perhaps you – feel a profound sense of hopelessness. Well, here’s something for you.

There is no executive order to arrest and deport rainbows. No bunker buster bomb can obliterate them and there is no tariff to pay to enjoy them.

The laws of physics haven’t been repealed. Light still refracts through raindrops. The science teachers who told us about that are still here and firm in their knowledge, even in the face of our science deniers and book banners/burners.

Photo credit: Wikipedia

Science still works. It’s like bedrock. It stands ready and able to support us. Much as the greedy, power hungry thieves want to shake our bedrock, we can stop them from upsetting our country. Our beliefs, our values and our spirit stand strong.

So get off the porch and into the street. You did it on NO KINGS DAY. There still are rainbows right here in America.

______________________________________

  • * DKS – adjective: “Don’ Know Shit”
  • ** AI Overview from Google:

    The little girl featured in the 1964 “Daisy” ad was Monique M. Luiz (born Monique Corzilius). The ad, officially titled “Peace, Little Girl,” was part of Lyndon B. Johnson’s 1964 presidential campaign. At the time of filming, Monique was only three years old, according to the Library of Congress. 

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Read This!


POST 1190

The message below has at times been incorrectly attributed to Liz Cheney. According to authentication services, it was written by Dr. Pru Lee.  Makes no difference to the substance and urgency of the message.

It’s long – and worth it.

***

Dear Democratic Party,

I need more from you.

You keep sending emails begging for $15, while we’re watching fascism consolidate power in real time.

This administration is not simply “a different ideology.” It is a coordinated, authoritarian machine — with the Supreme Court, the House, the Senate, and the executive pen all under its control.

And you?

You’re still asking for decorum and donations. WTF?

That won’t save us.

I don’t want to hear another polite floor speech.

I want strategy.

I want fire.

I want action so bold it shifts the damn news cycle — not fits inside one.

Every time I see something from the DNC, it’s asking me for funds.

Surprise.

Those of us who donate don’t want to keep sending money just to watch you stand frozen as the Constitution goes up in flames — shaking your heads and saying, “Well, there’s not much we can do. He has the majority.”

I call bullshit.

If you don’t know how to think outside the box…

If you don’t know how to strategize…

If you don’t know how to fight fire with fire…

what the hell are we giving you money for?

Some of us have two or three advanced degrees.

Some of us have military training.

Some of us know what coordinated resistance looks like — and this ain’t it.

Yes, the tours around the country? Nice.

The speeches? Nice.

The clever congressional clapbacks? Nice.

That was great for giving hope.

Now we need action.

You have to stop acting like this is a normal presidency that will just time out in four years. We’re not even at Day 90, and look at the chaos.

Look at the disappearances.

Look at the erosion of the judiciary, the press, and our rights.

If you do not stop this, we will not make it 1,460 days.

So here’s what I need from you — right now:

⸻

1. Form an independent, civilian-powered investigative coalition.

I’m talking experts. Veterans. Whistleblowers. Journalists. Watchdog orgs.

Deputize the resistance. Build a real-time archive of corruption, overreach, and executive abuse.

Make it public. Make it unshakable.

Let the people drag the rot into the light.

If you can’t hold formal hearings, hold public ones.

If Congress won’t act, let the country act.

This isn’t about optics — it’s about receipts.

Because at some point, these people will be held accountable.

And when that day comes, we’ll need every name, every signature, every illegal order, every act of silence—documented.

You’re not just preserving truth — you’re preparing evidence for prosecution.

The more they vanish people and weaponize data, the more we need truth in the sunlight.

⸻

2. Join the International Criminal Court.

Yes, I said it. Call their bluff.

You cannot control what the other side does.

But you can control your own integrity.

So prove it. Prove that your party is still grounded in law, human rights, and ethical leadership.

Join.

If you’ve got nothing to hide — join.

Show the world who’s hiding bodies, bribes, and buried bank accounts.

Force the GOP to explain why they’d rather protect a war criminal than sign a treaty.

And while you’re at it, publicly invite ICC observers into U.S. borders.

Make this administration explain — on camera — why they’re terrified of international oversight.

⸻

3. Fund state-level resistance infrastructure.

Don’t just send postcards. Send resources.

Channel DNC funds into rapid-response teams, legal defense coalitions, sanctuary networks, and digital security training.

If the federal government is hijacked, build power underneath it.

If the laws become tools of oppression, help people resist them legally, locally, and boldly.

This is not campaign season — this is an authoritarian purge.

Stop campaigning.

Act like this is the end of democracy, because it is.

We WILL REMEMBER the warriors come primaries.

Fighting this regime should be your marketing strategy.

And let’s be clear:

The reason the other side always seems three steps ahead is because they ARE.

They prepared for this.

They infiltrated school boards, courts, local legislatures, and police unions.

They built a machine while you wrote press releases.

We’re reacting — they’ve been executing a plan for years.

It’s time to shift from panic to blueprint.

You should already be working with strategists and military minds on PROJECT 2029, a coordinated, long-term plan to rebuild this country when the smoke clears.

You should be publicly laying out:

• The laws and amendments you’ll pass to ensure this never happens again

• The systems you’ll tear down and the safeguards you’ll enshrine

• The plan to hold perpetrators of human atrocities accountable

• The urgent commitment to immediately bring home those sold into slavery in El Salvador

You say you’re the party of the people?

Then show the people the plan.

⸻

4. Use your platform to educate the public on rights and resistance tactics.

If they’re going to strip us of rights and lie about it — arm the people with truth.

Text campaigns. Mass trainings. Downloadable “Know Your Rights” kits. Multilingual legal guides. Encrypted phone trees.

Give people tools, not soundbites.

We don’t need more slogans.

We need survival manuals.

⸻

5. Leverage international media and watchdogs.

Stop hoping U.S. cable news will wake up.

They’re too busy playing both sides of fascism.

Feed the real stories to BBC, Al Jazeera, The Guardian, Reuters, Der Spiegel — hell, leak them to anonymous dropboxes if you have to.

Make what’s happening in America a global scandal.

And stop relying on platforms that are actively suppressing truth.

Start leveraging Substack. Use Bluesky.

That’s where the resistance is migrating. That’s where censorship hasn’t caught up.

If the mainstream won’t carry the truth — outflank them.

Get creative. Go underground. Go global.

If our democracy is being dismantled in broad daylight, make sure the whole world sees it — and make sure we’re still able to say it.

⸻

6. Create a digital safe haven for whistleblowers and defectors.

Not everyone inside this regime is loyal.

Some are scared. Some want out.

Build the channels.

Encrypted. Anonymous. Protected.

Make it easy for the cracks in the system to become gaping holes.

And while you’re at it?

Stop ostracizing MAGA defectors.

Everyone makes mistakes — even glaring, critical ones.

We are not the bullies.

We are not the ones filled with hate.

And it is not your job to shame people who finally saw the fire and chose to step out of it.

They will have to deal with that internal struggle — the guilt of putting a very dangerous and callous regime in power.

But they’re already outnumbered. Don’t push them back into the crowd.

We don’t need purity.

We need numbers.

We need people willing to burn their red hats and testify against the machine they helped build.

⸻

7. Study the collapse—and the comeback.

You should be learning from South Korea and how they managed their brief rule under dictatorship.

They didn’t waste time chasing the one man with absolute immunity.

They went after the structure.

The aides. The enforcers. The loyalists. The architects.

They knocked out the foundation one pillar at a time — until the “strongman” had no one left to stand on  and his power crumbled beneath him.

You should be independently investigating every author of Project 2025,

every aide who defies court orders,

every communications director repeating lies,

every policy writer enabling cruelty,

every water boy who keeps this engine running.

You can’t stop a regime by asking the king to sit down.

You dismantle the throne he’s standing on — one coward at a time.

⸻

Stop being scared to fight dirty when the other side is fighting to erase the damn Constitution.

They are threatening to disappear AMERICANS.

A M E R I C A N S.

And your biggest move can’t be another strongly worded email.

We don’t want your urgently fundraising subject lines.

We want backbone.

We want action.

We want to know you’ll stand up before we’re all ordered to sit down — permanently.

We are watching.

And I don’t just mean your base.

I mean millions of us who see exactly what’s happening.

I’ve only got 6,000 followers — but the groups I’m in? The networks I touch? Over a quarter million.

Often when I speak, it echoes.

But when we ALL speak, it ROARS with pressure that will cause change.

We need to be deafening.

You still have a chance to do something historic.

To be remembered for courage, not caution.

To go down as the party that didn’t just watch the fall — but fought the hell back with everything they had.

But the clock is ticking.

And the deportation buses are idling.

Jax Responds

Perhaps you’re as sick as Dr. Pru Lee and I are of the Democrats’ begging for bucks but always keeping their feet in concrete. Well, here’s the roadmap and your marching orders. Now, go. Take action. Demand action. Make the difference that must be made.

Love Note To The DNC

We understand that you think Boomers and Boomer mentality will get us where we need to go. But instead it’s brought us here. Doing more of what brought us here won’t get us there. [emphasis indicates that I’m screaming]

If we’re to save ourselves, it will be the Zs who power that. So stop rejecting people like David Hogg. He and others like him will enlist the Zs and they will be the engine of change. Your purity tests – jeez, you must have a death wish.

And get your damned hand away from my wallet and out of my inbox until you wise up and actually do something. I’ve offered help repeatedly but you never – never – reach back. All you do is send my contact info to various Democrats who – guess what? – ask for donations. Screw that.

It’s horrible that we have to appeal to you to fight the good fight, but you’re the only game in town that isn’t fascist or too weak. That doesn’t mean we like you. You’re just the least bad choice. Try standing up and fighting and we might come to like you again.

And tell me: Why do you need all this to be explained to you?

The Debate Between Thomas Jefferson and Trump

In case you are at all unclear about the stakes, read Barbara Powers.

Hypocrisy Corner

Kayleigh speaks!

She’s a liar, just like Trump.

Many thanks to JN for this.

Countdown to November 3, 2026
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Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take ALL OF US to get this job done.

And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Movie


POST 1189

I’m writing in the hours following the U.S. attack on Iranian nuclear and missile facilities and the Iranian response of their announced-in-advance missile attack on the vast U.S. military facility in Qatar. There will surely be more surprises to come, engineered by one of the world’s most awful regimes and more surprises from the other of the world’s most awful regimes. We wait for shoes to drop.

Let’s set aside the typical Trumpian stupidities:

“We’re not at war with Iran; we’re at war with Iran’s nuclear facilities.”

His bombastic claims: “We obliterated their nuclear facilities,” which bomb damage assessment experts have shown to be false.

The idiotic flip-flopping denials: “We’re not after regime change,” then “Make Iran Great Again” through “regime change.”

Let’s instead have a look at serious issues that serious minded leaders would commonly contemplate seriously with advice from serious minded advisors. Not that such advice might be seriously considered by Trump.

Whether you think the attack on Iran was the right thing to do or you see a blisteringly dumb move that is a probable prelude to something very bad happening, that attack will have many consequences.

It isn’t at all likely that, having taken a public drubbing, Iran will let go of its hostilities and go all golden retriever puppy with love for the twin devils, Israel and the U.S. They will want to hit back and are far more likely to be willing to make war than negotiate. It’s about venting rage and proving how tough they are.

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is 86 years old and is not politically strong. He’s already offered recommendations for a successor, including his son, which further complicates the possibility of negotiations and the calculus of predicting what actions that country may take. We’ll leave that speculation to our well informed intelligence people, sadly led by second-raters who owe their suck-up jobs to Trump patronage. Trump will ignore all of them.

What we know is that saving face is critically important to this Iranian regime and to the culture of the country. Nobody reacts well to humiliation and even Khamenei’s detractors in the streets of Tehran will want to hit back, especially because for them this is a holy war. Did anyone at the White House, the Defense, State, Homeland Security or the Intelligence Departments consider what would happen on Day 2?

You know this from at least as far back as Colin Powell invoking the Pottery Barn rule about war: You break it, you own it. And now we own this one.

Here are just a few examples of how the Iranians might strike back.

  1. Physics and chemistry tell us that their 60% enriched uranium cannot be used as is to make a traditional nuclear bomb. But it can be used to make dirty bombs – common explosives laced with radiologically hot material. They could smuggle IEDs or bombs into any country and detonate them in crowded cities. Use your imagination to identify which places would be near the top of their hit list. Dirty bombs don’t have nearly the explosive power of nuclear bombs, but they can make a huge radius of land uninhabitable for hundreds of years.
  2. If they have sleeper cells in the U.S., they can be activated to do damage to us physically and psychologically. If you think we distrust one another now, just wait until Iranian sabotage has occurred in the U.S., some Americans have been killed and you’re suspecting every stranger you see of being a murderer.
  3. They can mine the Strait of Hormuz (see these maps) to shut down shipping of gas, oil and other goods. 20% of global petroleum output travels that narrow stretch of water and shutting it down will drive up oil prices globally and likely tank Trump’s economic agenda.
  4. They can attack U.S. forces in the area, as they did in their retaliatory attack in Qatar on Monday. Given that no substantial damage was done, this was likely intended solely for domestic consumption, a public beating of chests and a saving of face. That may likely prove to be a self-destructive action, but proud, angry people might dismiss the cost to themselves and approve yet more attacks.
  5. They can fire barrages of missiles and drones at Israel, assuming they still have substantial stockpiles.
  6. They can task their tech geniuses to create destructive cyber attacks that disrupt our power grids, businesses, defense capabilities and more.

If they did any of those things, what would our U.S. dictator wannabe do? He’s an amoral, irrational and self-serving narcissist whose mania requires that he be seen as strong, most strongly, and always right. He would insist that any Iranian aggression be countered massively. Bigly. Like nothing anyone has ever seen. There aren’t too many choices available for an all-about-me tyrant trying to show that he can pee higher on the fire hydrant than the other dog.

  1. He could order massive bombing of all Iranian infrastructure. “Bomb ’em back to the stone age” was a very popular phrase after 911, when our proud, angry people wanted retribution. So was Sen. John McCain’s “Bomb, bomb, bomb – bomb, bomb Iran” in 2008, wanting for us to show the world what tough guys we were.
  2. Trump could order 300,000 – maybe 500,000 – troops to invade Iran. That will be a forever war that will kill hundreds of thousands of people, including tens of thousands of our military men and women. We will build an Iran War Memorial on the National Mall. Trump will get to play wartime president to burnish his orange ego. But critically, he will ignore the flag draped caskets carrying suckers and losers, as they arrive at Dover, DE.

It doesn’t appear that anyone is considering what comes next, most dangerously, the President.

Will Russia, China and North Korea supply Iran with war matériel and scientific know how? If they do, what will we do?

If we learn that we didn’t “obliterate” Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities (we didn’t), will Trump order more bombings?

Given their stockpiles of enriched uranium and scientific know how, if Iran continues to refuse to negotiate, what will we do? What will Israel do? What might Iran do?

What will we do to win hearts and minds of Iranians? We weren’t too good at that in Iraq or Afghanistan.

We’ve seen this movie before. We know the plot and that it takes decades to end this bad movie. It will cost thousands of lives and massive treasure that creates trillions of dollars of debt that will never be paid off.

Trump will be long gone when the reality of his ever-expanding war dawns on us. By then there will be someone else in the White House to blame for his war folly. Just like when Dubya was gone and Obama and Biden took the heat for exiting his Iraq and Afghanistan war failures.

Like I said, we’ve seen this movie before. The question for us now is whether we remember the lessons of that movie before a lot of people get killed and whether Congress has the backbone to dial down the madness. Indeed, have we learned anything at all?

From his post on Monday, When Incompetence Goes To War, Dan Rather, with his many decades of reporting and his experience in too many wars, gets the last word.

Truth IS the first casualty of war.

The first things you hear often are untrue, and so are many of the things you hear later.

Wars are by their very nature chaotic and unpredictable. What you most expect frequently does not happen; what you least expect often does.

Up close and personal, wars are almost unbelievably savage. The television screen and the printed word do not come close to conveying their harsh realities.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Trump Derangement


POST 1188

War!

With no authority to do so, the Derangement In Chief has sent our military to war against Iran. First he ordered Iran to give him “unconditional surrender” and did so very strongly, in a strong way like nothing anyone has ever seen. He has no need for strategy because, he figures, Iran will bend the knee to him like so many others have done and he will skate from accountability just as he has all his life.

Iran is yet another country we have attacked that has done us no harm, like Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam. How will we get out of this? What comes next? What will Congress do? Oh wait: they won’t do a thing.

We learn nothing. Not from Vietnam, not from Iraq, not from Afghanistan, not from Libya, not from the repeated economic failure of trickle down economics, not from years of lies about Reagan’s mental degeneration, not from the sale of the U.S. invited by Citizens United, not from 2 mass shootings every 3 days, not from whatever is promised and never arrives, not from a thousand phony declarations that up is down, not from strong bombings that never bring what is promised, not from regime change that brings little more than chaos – nothing. We learn nothing.

From Rep. Ro Khana (D-CA):

Are you with the neocons who led us into [war in] Iraq or do you stand with the American people?

Trump derangement may well get our our military people and Iranians killed and make countless numbers of people refugees.

The Syndrome

It is that, because he really is deranged. We’re paying a price for that and it’s going to become way more expensive. The cost will be in the transfer of your money to the piles of wealth of the already absurdly rich, of course. But far more expensive will be the cost to our bedrock values and our freedom.

Steve Schmidt described Trump as

.  .  .  an American fascist who sits in the White House with a 49.8 percent mandate, and believes that he is Caesar, when in fact he is Nero.

Gotta take issue with Schmidt.

First, 49.8% is no mandate. It’s barely a plurality.

Second, the Nero thing. “Nero fiddled while Rome burned” is a cute sentence, but perhaps a bit misleading. The violin wasn’t invented until about 1,500 years after Nero died, so “fiddled” doesn’t mean he played a musical instrument.

Nero was fond of cruelty and perhaps was less attentive to affairs of state than was needed (hence: fiddling). In 64 AD the Great Fire of Rome engulfed most of the city. It burned for 6 days and 7 nights and destroyed much of Rome. Needing a scapegoat to avoid accountability, Nero is alleged to have blamed that great destruction on the early Christians – might have called them home grown terrorists – who were subsequently persecuted. In effect, Nero declared war on his own country, casting Christians as enemies of the state. Does any of this sound at all similar to events today?

Schmidt seeing Trump as a Nero, what with his attack on our norms and structures and scapegoating of immigrants, is accurate. Same for his anti-Semitic dog whistles. He always has someone to blame in order to dance away from his own accountability, like blaming Dr. Anthony Fauci and China for the “China virus.”

Trump ranted just after NO KINGS day and Schmidt pasted that rant into his post. Read it yourself and see if you can beat my performance. I counted 14 outright lies in those roughly 450 words. That’s one lie every 32 words, although my tally may be low due to my being distracted by Trump’s head spinning idiocy, his extraneous, unrelated inanities, his pandering to extremists and, worst of all, his incitement to violence.*

Tyrants always need a scapegoat, someone for the public to hate, demonize, persecute and blame. For Nero it was the Christians. For Trump, it’s immigrants and the Jews. Are you next?

Trump derangement is now looking to blame others and cause them suffering, kidnapping, torture and death. That’s real.

The Minnesota Murders

They got the bad guy – you know that. But ultimately that won’t be the big story.

The Trump rant you read in Schmidt’s piece was after most of America ignored Trump’s Parade of Narcissism down Pennsylvania Avenue. Instead, over 13 million Americans dissed him and marched in streets all over this nation to oppose his cruelty, his dumb-headedness, his attack on all we hold dear. Go read Trump’s rant again, this time pretending you’re a Trump supporter. I’m guessing you’ll hear the call to division and violence loud and clear, just as do Trump’s supporters, like the Minnesota murderer.

That’s the lede of the Minnesota murderer story and the ongoing Trump insane reality show.

Trump’s calls, largely by dog whistle but sometimes done overtly, is for more killers like the Minnesota murderer. It’s a call to kill Democrats, progressives, liberals, non-suck-up judges, all Trump detractors and, of course, immigrants, all non-Whites and Jews.

If you want to know why there are so many murders and attacks
and death threats done by people on the right,
it’s because the leader of that cult of hatred is calling for them.
.

Trump began demonizing immigrants just after his golden descent on his golden escalator to announce that he was running to be President. His audience was paid actors in his reality show. He proudly vomited to them and his TV cameras that Hispanics are rapists, drug dealers and murderers.

He began calling for violence at his rallies, telling his thug attendees to beat up protesters. He told police not to be “too nice” to perps they loaded into their cruisers. He said to bash them up a bit.

We have right wing violence
because the right wing leader calls for it, eggs on his loyalists
and they feel puffed up by their hatred
and their power to cause death.
.

This isn’t a “both sides” thing.**

From Simon Rosenberg of the Hopium Chronicles:

“The G7 – Trump went to the G7, arrived late for his first meeting, bent the Trumpian knee to Putin, tweeted that Tehran, a city of 10m, needed to evacuate, left a day early blowing off a meeting with Zelensky [sic], refused to sign a joint statement on Iran and Israel, then signed it late last night. In an impromptu press event with UK PM Keir Starmer he dropped papers all over the place.”

“Despite him having all this “strength” the world is not bending the knee to Trump, something all can see; while the world also [sees] him repeatedly, pathetically, urgently, bending the knee and all of his other ugly parts to Putin, again and again and again.”

Trump derangement.

Your Health

From STAT:

.  .  .  the current administration is undermining confidence in vaccines: by canceling or stalling NIH grants focused on vaccine development, especially mRNA vaccines; undermining a separate FDA committee and laying off agency staff; firing the full ACIP*** roster; and putting resources into investigating the long-debunked link between vaccines and autism instead of focusing on more valuable post-licensure monitoring. Read more here.

Trump derangement. It’s not a joke. It’s an actual syndrome and it has already killed Americans.

Message From Sen. Joni “Pig Castrator” Ernst

Click me

_____________________________________________

* David Korn of Mother Jones explains our political violence in this video. Get this: there is no “both sides” in American political violence. When you come across any report that is treating our national insanity of violence as though it is somehow balanced left and right, recognize it for the brain-free substitute for actual journalism that it is.

** Read Marc Elias’ short comments about both-sides in our news media.

*** The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA

 

 

 


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Little Friday Comment


POST 1187

As of this writing President Trump has said that he will make up his TACO mind about whether to go to war against Iran within the next two weeks.* Why he would make such a strategic announcement to our adversaries like a circus barker saying “You ain’t seen nuthin yet?” This comes from somewhere beyond sanity or national security.

This is not a commentary about what Trump’s decision should be. Rather, it’s about his decision making methodology and the limitations of this president of greatly limited capability.

Our news folk are telling us that he is conferring with:

The civilian leader of our national defense. I find no comfort in hearing that he is giving serious consideration to what SecDef Pete Hegseth has to say. He’s the guy who had to overtly declare that he’d stop his drunken ways if he were confirmed for the post he now holds and we don’t know if he’s honored his pledge. He’s the same fool responsible for failing to protect what should have been top secret plans to bomb the Houthis in order to protect our shipping through the Gulf of Hormuz. He instead sent his plans over an unsecured service with at least one participant on the string having no security clearance at all. Are we supposed to trust his advice to the President regarding our military services and security in war?

Our military defense people. Trump dumped all the top people – the generals – who he knew were primarily loyal to the Constitution. He replaced them with people primarily loyal to Trump. Who cares about some pesky solemn oath, anyway?

Can we be confident these replacements will refuse to obey an illegal order?

Our intelligence people. Lots of agencies there, but they all funnel to the Director of National Intelligence, who right now is Tulsi Gabbard. That’s “Putin Talker” Gabbard. That’s “no experience in intelligence work” Gabbard or even at keeping a secret. Not hard to imagine that she might give advice to the President based upon what Vladimir Putin wants us to do, rather than what is in the best interests of our country. Worse, it’s not hard to imagine Trump preferring to hear about Putin’s preferences.

Our Secretary of State. Marco Rubio is a smooth talking, pleasant looking pol who has shown us repeatedly that he is not much more than a political weather vane. He will say and do only what Trump wants him to say and do, leaving decisions and policy without a check or expanded options.

Then there is Trump’s learning disability and gnat-like attention span. This president doesn’t read. They’ve had to put the President’s Daily Brief  (“PDB”) into comic book format. They’ve tried creating videos for this reality show freak of a man to advise him of international threats.

He can’t stay with any train of thought for more than a few minutes. That isn’t sufficient when the topic is anything more complex than how many Big Macs this infant tyrant wants for dinner, much less for the brutal and perilous questions of war.

Fortunately, the power to declare war rests solely with the Congress, not the president. Unfortunately, we have no assurance that the Congress will put on its big boy and big girl pants and stop this president from acting from his dementia addled brain to get a lot of people killed with no thought to the day after.

Our last two forays into war lasted 20 years, got over 7,000 American troops killed, hundreds of thousands of locals killed, millions displaced and upheaval in the region that continues even today. All that was started by a similarly un-serious, incompetent president who listened to the wrong people and whose primary concerns were his popularity and his legacy. He lied us into wars against two nations that had done us no harm and were not a threat to us.

Trump craves grossly narcissistic things, including money, power and adulation. He gets none of those from Benjamin Netanyahu, leaving the possibility of a chip on Trump’s shoulder that may influence his decision about war against Iran. But it shouldn’t.

Now, in this appallingly dangerous world, un-serious incompetence is more lethal than ever and we are once again saddled with it.

__________________________________________

* That “two weeks” business is nothing but a stall to make Trump seem in control, seem assertive and to give him time to do a dozen other outrageous things to distract you so that you stop thinking about whatever he was supposed to make happen in two weeks. Think: Infrastructure Week.

Stop listening to talking heads who grind on about what will happen in two weeks. That grind isn’t worth your time or attention.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Rich Guys Are Coming To Fleece You


POST 1186

Glossary

They – the president, the Republicans in Congress and Trump administration sycophants

Rich guys – the president, the Republicans in Congress, plus the un-elected, all-for-themselves, who cares about you? rich guys.

Bullies – all of the above who are dedicated to cruelty, selfishness and think they’re above the law

Money

It’s your lunch money the bullies are after. Plus your dinner money and the tax refund money you were going to use to buy a big screen TV. They want it all.

They’re taking away your doctor, your hospital and the nurses who help you when you’re sick or injured. They’re doing that by starving them of cash. And they’re taking away your medical insurance so that you have to pay out of pocket, even if the cost drives you into bankruptcy. There goes that money, too.

You’ll only get medical care if you can find it somewhere, if you can afford it –  before you get treatment they’ll check if you’re able to pay them – and you can get there in time. Think: when you or someone you know goes into labor. Or miscarries. Or when something heavy falls on you, you’re bleeding out in your garage and the nearest EMT is a long way off because all the close-by services went belly up when Trump’s cruelty flunkys cut them off.

Taxes

They’re fleecing you by increasing your state and local taxes so that they can lower their own taxes and get a huge pile of cash for themselves – almost $400,000 per year extra for every rich guy.

THEY’RE BORROWING TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS
TO GIVE MORE TO THEMSELVES.
.

They’re doing it, too, by taxing you for the school your kids go to and then taking that money and giving it to private schools for their own kids.

Maybe that isn’t outrageous enough to get your attention. Try this:

THEY’RE DUMPING THAT ENTIRE LIFE-STIFLING
MOUNTAIN OF DEBT
ON YOU, YOUR KIDS AND AND YOUR GRANDKIDS.
AND YOUR GREAT-GRANDKIDS.
.

All that is so that mega-maga-rich guys can have more of your money right now.

Power

They’re eating your lunch by taking away your right to speak up.

They’re doing that by calling every gathering to protest government cruelty a riot and then using grossly excessive force to stop you.

They’re doing it by ordering our National Guardsmen and Marines to point their rifles at you, in case you’re dumb enough to object.

They’re doing it by grossly contorting our Constitution and our laws in order to justify what is unjustifiable.

They’re doing it by incrementally making it more difficult to vote and then by ignoring your vote altogether.

They’re doing it by defying court orders and by threatening members of Congress so that they will never push back. These are the people – mostly Republicans – you sent to DC and to your state capitol to represent you. They have been reduced to sniveling, mute cowards, leaving you powerless.

Rights

The rich guys have them. You don’t, because they can squeeze the system to squash you. You’re just a bug on the windshield of their fancy cars.

You don’t like that? Too bad for you.

Much of what’s above is already true. The rest will be on the way to fleece you if our cowardly Republican Congress passes Trump’s abhorrent, anti-American, anti-Constitution budget bill, which will take from you everything you value.

It’s Crunch Time

You have to make a decision and there are only two choices.

  1. You can go about your everyday life paying attention only to things in your immediate orbit, You can continue to do your job, care for your family and enjoy whatever things you like to do for entertainment. In short, you can live your life as usual, right until the day when everything listed above and yet worse things arrive and you realize that you have been made into nothing but a peasant serving some bastard feudal king.
  2. You can stand up and fight to stop the rich guys from taking your lunch money and everything else you care about. You can get in the streets with millions of other red, white and blue Americans who damn well won’t stand by and be fleeced. You can make it impossible for the bullies to take your lunch money. You can speak up and get good people elected, people who have values like yours. You can vote them into office in DC, in your state capitol, onto your town board and your school board – everywhere there is a political contest. Kick out the spineless, corrupt bums and keep the good guys. You know who they are.

The choices are stark and they are very real. Failure to assertively select choice #2 – to stand strong and fight – is a tacit selection of impotent choice #1.

Pick one.

The Incompetence Report

Kristi “I Shoot Puppies” Noem, our incompetent Secretary of Homeland Security, made it near the top of our list last week.

The LA demonstrations before NO KINGS day were primarily triggered by Trump’s vile, cruel abuses of immigrants. Trump and Noem sicced the National Guard and the United States Marines on those demonstrators. Then Ms. Stupida went on Fox to flex her muscles and make sure everyone knows how tough and powerful she is.

Click me

Memo to Kristi: No people conducted violence against law enforcement officers in LA last week, you lying sack of .  .  .  dead puppies.

BTW

Where were those federalized National Guardsmen and Marines on January 6, 2021 when they were desperately needed in DC to stop the thousands of treasonous insurrectionists from killing our elected leaders, beating and killing cops and trying to overthrow our government?

Oh right: Trump prevented them from being called in to oppose the hoodlums. He even refused Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s pleading to let him send in the Maryland Guard. He just sat back and watched the violence show on TV, as he shoved his Big Mac and fries into his big mouth and threw ketchup onto the wall.

PS

There was an incident last week that resulted in a night time visit from 3 police officers ringing my door bell. They weren’t wearing masks, they wore badges and had name tags and were polite and respectful. Observing that, I knew they weren’t ICE thugs.

Isn’t it truly awful that to assure our safety I had to make that distinction?

Re: the incident last week – all is well. And if there is a next time, I’ll insist that they show me identification.

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Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

IMMIGRANTS UNITE!


POST 1185

First, Minnesota

A thug murdered three Minnesotans, two of them Democratic state legislators. This should come as no surprise, since Trump has been calling since 2015 for violence against Democrats, progressives, protesters and anyone who disagrees with him about anything. He claims to be “your retribution” against “those others.” So of course some wing nut listened to him and took action, perhaps expecting to be pardoned by Trump.

This is just today’s chapter in Trump’s program of I Don’t Care, So Death To You.

To The National Brother/Sisterhood/Childhood of Immigrant Workers
.

Yesterday there was a massive national demonstration, an opposition, a revulsion, the rejection of the tyrant’s attack and his anti-America corruption of the values we hold dear. Indeed, our immigrants, whether documented or not, came here to live by those values and they and we won’t stand for this vile little man’s evil.

This President has unleashed his attack thugs, masked gunmen bearing no identification, no badge of any kind, carrying no arrest warrants and exercising no concern for innocent people. He dispatched them with instructions to kidnap anyone who they think looks like they might be in America without documentation – that means Black and Brown people. They select kidnap victims based on their ignorance.

They have arbitrarily claimed thousands of people to be criminals. They have arrested citizens of the United States with the same right to be here as any of us. They possess no evidence of anyone’s wrongdoing and act in the total absence of due process rights. In short, they are thugs acting illegally at the order of a lawless president and you, immigrants, are their primary target.

Demonstrations against this lawlessness are powerful and good, but it will take more for the American public to become fully aware of what these illegal actions mean to Americans. They don’t realize that they themselves will feel the effects of this. They don’t realize that one day the tyrants will run out of Black and Brown people to abuse and others will be next to be labeled enemies. That’s what tyrants always do.

That is why I’m calling for an ad hoc action, a labor strike, to make clear how Trump’s White, Non-At-All-Christian actions will impact everyone. Specifically, I’m calling on:

hotel and restaurant workers

construction laborers

domestic workers

garment workers

farm workers

landscapers

day laborers, like the folks who hang out early in the morning at Home Depots and 7-11s hoping to earn a day’s pay

It’s time to take a stand, so immigrant workers:

DO NOT SHOW UP FOR WORK THIS THURSDAY OR ANY THURSDAY UNTIL THIS CRUELTY STOPS.

.

Maybe some of the White privilege people who whine and moan their “Replacement Theory” lunacy will show up in California’s Central Valley to do stoop labor, like picking strawberries and lettuce. Maybe they’ll do the work of moving heavy wheel barrows full of cement or removing debris from construction sites. Maybe they’ll scrub the pots and pans in a hot commercial kitchen 14 hours a day, or clean befouled hotel rooms left by hotel guest slobs. Maybe they’ll scrub the floors of rich people’s homes.

But none of that is ever going to happen. Here’s what will happen.

None of those angry, privileged White guys will show up to do the hard work our immigrants do every day. Housing construction will slow to a halt, restaurants will close their doors and produce bins in grocery stores will be empty. And there will be a lot of hotel rooms that don’t get cleaned and landscaping around rich guys’ houses will become nothing but weeds.

It’s time to make the point to all American citizens that their way of life is dependent upon the hard working immigrants to this country and that those tax paying immigrants are a major part of the reason for hope for this nation.

Immigrants to America Unite!

You have nothing to lose but the threat of deportation to a torture concentration camp, never to see your family again.

.
Memo To Silent Americans

.

Turn off the ignorant and the stupid.

.

Treasonous Americans are trying to steal your country, your values, your freedom, your future and your hopes for your children.

They tried an insurrection to murder leaders and take over your government, killing and maiming cops and befouling our Capitol Building.

Trump pardoned the convicted criminals, enabling them to continue to conspire to overthrow us.

The Supreme Court gave the president the right to break our laws with impunity.

Trump and his criminal suck-ups are moving every day to use our military to take action against you and make this a police state.

THAT WILL BE THE END OF YOUR FREEDOM!
.

DO NOT sleepwalk through reality. DO NO be an existential threat to the United States of America through passivity. DO NOT tolerate the murderous Oath Keeper criminals, the DOGE flying monkeys who stole your personal information and the lying Trump bastards violating your Constitution and your rights every day.

Wake up!

.

America isn’t about any king.

It is about We The People.

We declare that in no uncertain terms right here.

.
Pics From The Highland Park NO KINGS Event

Yes that Highland Park. July 4, 2022. 7 killed, 48 wounded. Still this little village turned out over 3,000 yesterday to tell everyone that we will not have a king. We will not tolerate cruelty to anyone. The Law is the law and nobody is above it. Those sentiments were on display in over 2,160 locations nationwide with attendance in the millions.

Paraphrasing Winston Churchill’s address to the House of Commons in the darkest days of the blitzkrieg of the Battle of Britain, June 4, 1940:

We shall fight them on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight them in the fields and in the streets. We shall fight them in our town squares, we shall fight them in the hills. We shall never surrender. We shall fight them in our state houses, we shall fight them in our Congress. We shall fight them in our courts and we shall fight them in our voting booths. We shall rescue and liberate ourselves from their cruelty to carry on the struggle, until, in God’s good time, we restore our promise of America.

 

kakistocracy | kakəˈstäkrəsē | government by the least suitable or competent citizens of a state

 

 

 

Credit to MG for this one

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Now Is The Time – It Always Is


POST 1184

Click the pic

On February 19 Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker delivered his State of the State address. Appropriately, most of it was focused on Illinois issues, but he reserved his final comments for the state of our country and the perils we face moving forward.

We are now four months further down the dangerous path Pritzker described and things are turning more dire with every Trump power grab and his every attack on our Constitution. That makes Pritzker’s warning yet more important and urgent.

Down goes Trumpy! Down goes Trumpy! Down goes Trumpy!
Trump ridiculed Biden for tripping on the Air Force One stairs. Do you think he’ll rip himself for doing the same thing? Click the pic

Watch and listen to Gov. Pritzker’s cautionary message. If you’d like to watch his entire address (36 minutes), click here.

Here’s another framing from Pritzker about where we stand in the march of history:

What we do and don’t do matters. It matters right now more than it ever has before. When my future grandkids look back on this moment, I want them to know that my voice was one of the loudest in the room, screaming for justice and fighting against tyranny.

What do you want your grandkids to know about what you did when everything was on the line?

It’s time to stand strong in the face of the tyrants. Here’s what Churchill said about that in 1940 during the Battle of Britain, even as the bombs of Hitler’s blitzkrieg (“lighting war”) exploded in London.

Click me. Definitely click me.

America isn’t about any king.

It is about We The People.

We declare that in no uncertain terms right here.

.

You and I are just like the Founders in our abhorrence of kings – dictators, really. We are threatened by such people right now. That’s why June 14* is

NO KINGS DAY!*

.

“You have to know what you stand for, or you’ll fall for anything.” – Les Brown

Click the map to find a demonstration near you. As of this writing there are over 1,800 of them, all for people across the nation who won’t tolerate Trump’s reign of scams, cruelties, corruption and the destruction of our Constitution he hopes will lead to his dictatorship and make him Orange King Donald I.

So, show up on June 14 to demonstrate who we really are, what we stand for and what we won’t stand for.

And pass this message to others. This existential battle needs all of us – and we need this battle in order to restore our country.

___________________________________________________

* It’s also the day of Trump’s ego-maniacal military parade. Watch for his lying press secretary Karoline Leavitt to lie in a manic, fantastical frenzy about parade attendance, a la Sean Spicer.

Countdown to November 3, 2026
Mid-Term Election
Countdown Timer
Goes fast, doesn’t it?

Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take ALL OF US to get this job done.

And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

It’s Just A Matter Of Time


POST 1183

Declining Health On The Way

From Heather Cox Richardson’s post of June 1 dealing with RFK, Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” Commission report that’s “full of errors, including misrepresentation of experiments and nonexistent studies:”

Georges C. Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told [reporters] Weber and Gilbert, “This is not an evidence-based report, and for all practical purposes, it should be junked at this point. It cannot be used for any policymaking. It cannot even be used for any serious discussion, because you can’t believe what’s in it.”

Clearly, it’s a fabricated report from a brain worm addled, science ignorant RFK, Jr., backed by our morbidly obese, obviously unhealthy president. It’s yet more proof that we are entirely through the looking glass.

From STAT:

Last week, HHS confirmed it was canceling a more than $700 million contract with Moderna to develop, test, and license mRNA vaccines for flu strains that could cause future pandemics.

This stands in stupid juxtaposition to mRNA-developed vaccines that saved millions of lives during the COVID-19 pandemic, once Trump shut up about injecting Lysol and was kicked out of office. Nevertheless. he’s setting us up for yet more pandemics and death.

Also,

$9.8 billion

That’s how much our dental costs would be if the rest of the country follows Utah and Florida in banning the addition of fluoride to water, according to a study published Friday in JAMA Health Forum.

How come Republicans want us to be sick and toothless?

Pain Is On The Way

Price increases of consumer goods caused by Trump’s Temper Tantrum Trade Tariffs (the “5Ts”) will hit hard starting in July. Because the tariffs have shoved a stick into the gears of global supply chains, consumers will begin to see empty shelves in stores. The reality of tariffs and the idiocy of non-existent subsidizing of other countries will become obvious. We’re going to feel the pain of Trump’s trade and foreign affairs lunacy and it will begin to sting even his most ardent followers.

From STAT:

Facing a shortfall of roughly $40 million in terminated contracts, the nation’s leading advisory body on issues of science and technology has already had to lay off 50 of its 1,000 employees and could lose as many as 250 more by the end of the summer .  .  .

.  .  .  just months into the second Trump administration, more than 2,000 grants have been terminated, totaling around $9.5 billion. [emphasis mine]

$40 million in terminated contracts and the cancellation of $9.5 billion in research grants means that a lot of research will be halted and there will be 300 fewer scientific experts working to keep us healthy. That means that a lot of medical research won’t happen and some ailments and diseases that might have been curable due to that research won’t be available to help us. You, the people you love and even those you’re not too fond of will all suffer completely unnecessary afflictions, even death.

It will take a while to connect the dots from the gutting of the FDA (3,500 layoffs) to outbreaks of avian flu, E. Coli and Listeria. Robert Kennedy, Jr. recommends non-pasteurized (“raw”) milk, an invitation to infections including salmonella, pathogens like bacteria, viruses and parasites that can cause food-borne illnesses and more. What could go wrong?

Wait a second: Pasteurization kills pathogens like parasites? RFK Jr. drinks “raw” milk and he has a brain worm. Coincidence? The American people want to know.

It isn’t clear how long it will take us to figure out the connection between the Kennedy/Trump decimation of our science and medical research capabilities and the diseases we’ll suffer, but we’ll get there. And 99% of Americans are going to be very, very angry. The 1% are the knuckleheads who love their ignorance more than they love granny and babies.

We Don’t Like Being Played For Fools.

Trump promised great “deals” for America would come about through his “5T” tariff madness. But literally the only “deals” he’s managed are an agreement with China to talk about an agreement, plus another like that with the Brits. There’s no substance anywhere in sight.

He promised lower prices, but most have gone up.

He promised he would end the war in Ukraine in one day, but today is the 139th Trump “one day” and the war goes on.

He promised massive reduction of waste, fraud and abuse, but has only managed to put tens of thousands of faithful government employees out of work and has imperiled all of us. The actual net of the DOGE thugs’ actions looks like it will be about $0 – plus a massive invasion of our privacy.

He promised to round up non-citizen criminals and deport them first, but none of those snatched from their homes, our streets, immigration centers, schools and work sites have been proven to be a criminal. It’s that habeas corpus thing that hasn’t happened, like occurs in dictator countries. All that exists of administration justification for its Gestapo-like* raids are completely evidence-free claims of gang affiliation and the crushing of our rule of law and the presumption of innocence.

We’ve all been played for fools, especially the 38% who are loyal Trump supporters. But they, like the rest of us, will feel the sting. It’s just a matter of time.

America isn’t about any king.

It is about We The People.

We declare that in no uncertain terms right here.

.

You and I are just like the Founders in our abhorrence of kings – dictators, really. We are threatened by such people right now. That’s why June 14 is

NO KINGS DAY!**

.

“You have to know what you stand for, or you’ll fall for anything.” – Les Brown

Click the map to find a demonstration near you. As of this writing there are over 1,500 of them, all for people across the nation who won’t tolerate Trump’s reign of scams, cruelties, corruption and the destruction of our Constitution, which he hopes will lead to his dictatorship and make him King Donald I.

So, show up on June 14 to demonstrate who we really are, what we stand for and what we won’t stand for. And pass this message to others. This existential battle needs all of us – and we need this battle.

Finally

From a letter from the Interfaith Alliance:

[Congresswoman Mary Miller (R – IL-15)] attacked Giani Surinder Singh, a Sikh leader, saying it was “deeply troubling” for a Muslim to lead prayer at the House of Representatives because “America was founded as a Christian nation.” Then, she deleted the post when she realized that he was Sikh, not Muslim. So she then posted how troubled she was that “a Sikh” was leading a prayer. Finally, she deleted the second post.

This is a deeply proud Illinois moment. To think that we in Illinois have a congresswoman in serious contention to out-stupid Marjorie Taylor Green! Miller’s comment MUST! get her listed as a finalist in the Deranged Idiot Contest Dipstick (“DICK”).
. 
In addition and because her district (IL-15) is mostly red, all of her constituents but Sikhs are hereby required to immediately write a letter of apology to the Sikh gentleman she insulted (indeed, to all Sikhs and Muslims), and another letter to all Americans, explaining her brain dead, historically false claim, admitting that her saying, “America was founded as a Christian nation” is wrong, cruel and stupid.
.
Anyone keeping score will know that the founders had an abhorrence of forced religion. That’s why freedom of religion is in the First Amendment. Rep. Miller would know that, had she attended a civics class in a public high school, instead of attending Stupid High and learning to be a mean girl.
 . 

So, in her apologies, Miller must write, “America was NOT founded as a Christian Nation” 100 times longhand. Tears of embarrassment dripped onto her 3-ring school binder note paper will be appropriate. Then she may go directly to Detention Hall.

___________________________________________________

* Why do you suppose Trump’s private army of no-warrant, kidnapping thugs wears masks? Why do you suppose Trump’s henchman, Nazi Stephen Miller, tells us, “The cruelty is the point”?

** It’s also the day of Trump’s ego-maniacal military parade. Watch for his lying press secretary Karoline Leavitt to lie about parade attendance.

Countdown to November 3, 2026
Mid-Term Election

Countdown Timer

Goes fast, doesn’t it?

Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too. (IT’S A FREEBIE!) It’s going to take ALL OF US to get the job done.

And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for readability, punctuation, typos, voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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