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Why Venezuela?


POST 1246

Severe Mental Illness

This pic is small because*

Mary Trump’s book, Too Much and Never Enough, details the background of her severely emotionally damaged and galactically needy Uncle Donny. She knows the details because it is family lore to her. Alas, I’ve heard her speak many times but have not read her book. Nor do I have formal training or credentials as a mental health expert, but why should that stop me from explaining the real story about Venezuela?

We start where Trump started: his daddy didn’t care much about him and paid him no attention, no matter how outrageously he acted. He was left with massive validation deficits and lifelong severe daddy issues.

He was sent to military school in the hope that the discipline there would magically convert this primitive savage into a civilized human being, but that hope was dashed. His school record shows that he was a bully and actually tried to throw a fellow cadet out a window.

He was mentored by his father’s attorney, Roy Cohn, an awful man who aided Joseph McCarthy in his communist witch hunts that ruined countless lives.

From Google AI:

.  .  .  Roy Cohn was Donald Trump’s fiercely loyal mentor, trusted advisor, and surrogate father figure, teaching [Trump] ruthless tactics for business and media manipulation;

So, Trump found a daddy to give him attention and who taught him world class manipulation. Cohn taught him to never apologize for anything and to never admit making an error. He taught Trump to always double down and attack. Trump was a good student of Cohn’s lessons in cruelty, as the past 10 years attest.

Of course, you’ve observed his excessive need for adulation, including those disgusting, fawning Cabinet meetings. You’ve seen his inability to remain focused, his need to constantly attack others and much more mentally unstable stuff. In fact, he just attacked a sovereign nation and brought charges against its president that are laughably amateurish. And that leads to the reasons for that invasion and kidnapping.

You may recognize the pic to the left, as it was published in the Disambiguation last Sunday as The Onion used it. Trump does this show off pose for his executive orders, so I proposed that because his actions are so blatantly an infantile lurch for attention, the proper caption for the picture is, “Look! Look! I made a boom-boom!“. It’s a piece of his lifelong mania of craving attention, which brings us to Venezuela.

Little Donny had his sycophantic, brain-free bumblers cobble together a massive invasion force. They bombed an apartment building, destroyed infrastructure in Caracas and killed what’s estimated to be 32 members of the Venezuelan military and an unknown number of innocent civilians, all to kidnap the president of that country and his wife.

Trump has admitted repeatedly that the invasion was about securing Venezuelan oil. He’s going to sic our big petro companies on the country and its oil fields, they’ll rebuild oil pumping infrastructure and everyone will make a lot of money. Which is a load of horse pucky, because the petro guys don’t want the opportunity to spend billions of dollars in such an unsure venture. They were burned badly doing that years ago, plus the price of oil is so low that it’s uneconomical to pump it at all.

Trump hasn’t even mentioned drug smuggling as a motivation for his cruelty heaped on Venezuela, which is sensible, since most illicit drugs shipped from Venezuela go to Europe, not to the U.S. Plus, he had already pardoned Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who had shipped over 400 tons of cocaine and illegal weapons into the U.S. After that outrageous pardon, it’s hard for Trump to claim he’s tough on the illegal drug trade.

He’s already rattling his sabre at neighboring Columbia and Cuba and threatening to buy Greenland or just take it from Denmark.

That is a map of Greenland overlaid by the red, white and blue, captioned, “SOON”. It’s from the wife of American chief Nazi Stephen Miller. It was posted Saturday on X after our invasion of Venezuela. Not surprisingly, the Danes, who own Greenland, don’t like it.

So, now we’re down to the real reasons for Trump’s invasion and kidnapping of the head of a country.

His messages and his actions couldn’t be clearer: he’s demonstrating that he’s so powerful that he can do anything, he can dominate anyone, that he has no need to be truthful or obey the law and that he can intimidate everyone. Said another way, his message is,

Look! Look! I’m so special! I’m so powerful!
Look at the impressive things I’ve done, Daddy!
Now for sure you’ll love me!
.

But Daddy will never love him. Never.

Nothing will ever be enough for Trump and he doesn’t care how many people he harms in his quest for what he cannot have, including the 32+ he just killed in Venezuela and the over 100 he blew up in their small boats; including the people he bombed in Nigeria and Syria; including the people victimized by Trump’s Gestapo, our unaccountable ICE thugs. He loves fascism for its gift of absolute power. There’s no need for him to consider other people, because he can just run over them, and even whole countries.

From Rick Wilson, Venezuela is the Iraq of Vietnams, The Easy Part Is Over:

Snatching the bad guy is the easy part.

The hard part is what happens next: when the cameras leave, when the speeches fade, and when reality shows up with the butcher’s bill.

And this is where the danger starts, because the Trump administration is built to win news cycles, not outcomes.

Be clear that winning news cycles is solely about “Look at me!”

Trump is locked in his constant parade of ever-expanding, ever more outrageous actions to gain attention and approval that he didn’t get and will never get from Daddy.

About the Fascism Part

From Steve Sheffey:

Here’s a “Clip from the 1942 Spencer [Tracy] / [Katherine] Hepburn film Keeper of the Flame that could have been filmed today.”

The film’s message of lawlessness, domination and crushing cruelty is frighteningly familiar.

At the time of this film we were fighting fascism and fascists and between 50 – 85 million people died. We had our democracy wits about us then. We won the fight and saved our democracy and made democracy available to all who wanted it. We need those same wits about us again to once more fight fascists, except this time we have to fight them here in America.

All because Trump has gigantic daddy issues.

And that’s why we invaded Venezuela. Or maybe it was a practice run for invading Cuba, as Lawrence O’Donnell posited last night. Regardless, it’s all about daddy issues.

For further context and some actual reality in this fabricated, Trump-led awful fantasy that darkens our skies every day, read Heather Cox Richardson’s January 6 post. Who but a mentally and emotionally compromised person would do all that harm?

___________________________________________

* This pic is small because I can’t stand looking at that crepe’s face and because he’s such a small, insignificant person. He knows it and he’s terrified that you’ll figure that out.

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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 or Barnes & Noble 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 comments I deem inappropriate.
    7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine. Unless it’s a guest essay, in which case, blame the guest.

    Click me

    JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Doing “Things”


POST 1245

Preface: Nearly all of this post was written prior to the American invasion and kidnapping done in Venezuela yesterday. Consequently, there are just a few comments about that particular dog wagging and lawbreaking included here. We will do a deeper dive soon. Meanwhile, keep your eye on the prize.

Click me for the story by The Onion. My preferred caption for all of the posed pictures of Trump signing an executive order is, “Look! Look! I made a boom-boom!”

We the People are an endlessly clever and creative band and we relentlessly ridicule those who have earned and richly deserve our contempt and shaming. The year just past provided non-stop material for satire and verbal punches in the nose to our national abusers of decency, the law, the Constitution and even rational thinking. A few favorites are sprinkled in this post.

First, though, please accept my thanks for reading these posts and sometimes commenting on them. We all can do our part in this war to stop fascism, to protect and defend our Constitution, our democracy and our way of life and to restore decency to its place at the forefront of our cherished values. These posts are part of my modest effort to do just that. Indeed, when you see a message in these posts encouraging you to share them and to encourage others to subscribe (one more time: it is still and will remain a freebie!) it’s for the purpose of stretching the reach of the message from those of us who think democracy is a pretty good thing worthy of our collective moral muscle, to those who need our encouragement.

This particular post is less my words than direction to the brilliance of others. We start with the year end post of Prof. Heather Cox Richardson.

Click me

She brings context and points a finger at the guilty responsible for so many deeply destructive, anti-Constitutional and outright illegal things that have happened since January 20. Most examples are blood boilers, preludes to full-on fascism, but some really good stuff happened, too, like judicial decisions that pinned Trump’s ears back. Those are fun.

Many commentaries are persuasive, yet most often we’re left not knowing what to do to make the change we want to come about. Turns out some people can help fill that “huh?” hole.

For example, Robert Reich published 10 Crucial Things You Can Do in 2026 and it’s a really good list. You’ll know how to do every one of those “things”.

Here’s one of my “things”.

Are you on the fence about mean girl puppy murderer and poser in front of men illegally jammed into a torture prison at her direction, Christie Noem? Should she be removed from her post as Secretary of Homeland Security?

First, Watch this little video of Congresswoman Delia Ramirez (IL-3) as she skewers Noem by detailing her lies, her law breaking and her joyful cruelty. Then decide a proper fate for her.

Next, call your representative and senators and demand that they oust this talent-less Eva Braun by means of a humiliating impeachment. That’s a “thing” you can do.

Now Some Bitter, Well-Earned Congratulations:

Watch and listen to Jesse Welles’ message about recruiting ICE thugs. If you want more to make you think, click here.

– to the many millions of Americans who voted for Trump and who have lost their Obamacare subsidy so that their healthcare insurance now costs more than double what it cost last week. That will make it completely impossible for millions to get insurance at all and they will be relegated like so many to only the hospital emergency room for healthcare, including for their children. Millions of them live in red states and they didn’t vote for this to happen.

– to the hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens and legal residents who have been unjustly thrown to the ground, handcuffed, their faces mashed into the pavement, thrown into unmarked vans and either imprisoned or deported, all without an arrest warrant or even reasonable suspicion of any wrongdoing. It sucks to be an American with fascists in power and only the sociopaths voted for this.

– to the millions of kids who now go hungry because of the cruel withholding of SNAP benefits, a huge proportion of which used to go to families in red states. Again, they voted for Trump, but they didn’t vote for this to happen.

Grifting with Jesus

– to all the dozens of Venezuelans who have been illegally murdered at sea and now on land, but who were never formally accused of, incarcerated for, convicted of or sentenced for any crime.

– to all of us for our windfall benefit created by Trump’s piracy at sea of at least two oil super tankers filled with Venezuelan oil.

– to the hundreds of thousands of people around the world who have died of starvation or lack of inexpensive medicines because Trump ended the USAID program.

– to all of us for the blatant crushing under heel of the First Amendment on Christmas day by Trump and various departments of what’s left of our government. “If lawmakers could destroy the right of freedom of conscience, they could destroy all other unalienable rights. Those in charge of government could throw representative government out the window and make themselves tyrants.” Read Heather Cox Richardson for this sad story.

Maybe you’d prefer an upside down Bible from the steps of St. John’s Church.

– to the terrorist cult of MAGA for its cheering Trump auctioning off a hastily painted Jesus, where he announced through his actions yet again that there is no bottom. There is nothing so undignified, so clownishly demeaning of our country that Trump will refuse the opportunity to grab it by its septic tank and tarnish our nation before the world.

– to Merrick Garland and his timid DOJ for epic, even galactic foot dragging, thereby refusing to enforce our laws. That allowed Trump to run in and win the 2024 election. See William A. Finnegan’s take down of what happened. This story will gnarl your innards yet again over the DOJ cowardice that enabled the current, ongoing destruction of our Constitution and blatant lawlessness, every bit as much as our lap dog Republican Congress has enabled that through the same cowardice.

Yes, really

– to the people of Venezuela for losing their country to Donald Trump. He’s made it clear that he admires and wants to be like Vladimir Putin, invading a sovereign nation, bombing facilities and killing its citizens. Trump has gone even farther by kidnapping its leader. Now he’s just like Putin. Maybe worse.

NOTE: Don’t be distracted. This invasion and kidnapping have nothing to do with drugs, democracy, elections or how bad or how illegitimate is Maduro as president of Venezuela. It is about the massive reserves of oil beneath that country and what that’s worth to Trump. That’s why we’ll “run the country.” Plus it’s a first step toward domination of all of South America and maybe Greenland, because Trump desperately needs to show what a strongman he is.

– finally, congratulations to us, for our dog being wagged relentlessly by yet another illegal Trump military distraction. But We The People will not let the Epstein scandal go away and Trump will get what he is due.

You know that this congratulatory list could be very long and you understand the sarcasm. You get that we cannot – we must not – tolerate more of this, which means that you and I must take action because our dire circumstances have become worse. Whatever you and I are doing, it isn’t enough. This is a great and lasting task before us. But, what to do? Try this to jump start your engine:

  • I can’t vouch for the claimed connection to anyone named Van Gogh, but the message is clear and compelling. There is a blank page before us waiting for what’s next in our story of democracy and it is our honor to write that story.

I repeat: Whatever you and I are doing, it isn’t enough. But we can do “things” and keep on doing “things”.

Many, many thanks to all who step up, do “things” and carry a load for the sake of all of us.

  • Goes fast, doesn’t it?

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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 or Barnes & Noble 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. Unless it’s a guest essay, in which case, blame the guest.

    Click me

    JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Year End – Part Two


POST 1243

The Terrible Truth

The DOJ, led by fearless suck ups Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche, has complied with about one smidgenth of what is required of them by law. Legislation demands that they turn over to Congress all – as in: ALL – files, documents, images, video recordings and the rest of the material in its possession related to Jeffrey Epstein and his heinous crimes, not later than midnight, December 19. Instead they turned over just a small fraction of the materials, saying they’d dribble out more over the next weeks.

In addition, they redacted documents so heavily that there is page after page with nothing but a solid black mask. The redactions were supposed to be used only to protect the names of the over 1,200 victims of child sex trafficking and rape and to protect national security, in the imaginary instance that such protection were necessary. Instead what Congress and We The People received was an extensive exercise in the use of black ink, likely protecting those who deserve no protection. Worse, our corrupt DOJ exposed the names of many of the victims of those horrible abuses.

We are left to realize that any evidence of wrongdoing by Trump and those he wants to protect (read: donors, rich supplicants and political power suppliers) will suddenly vanish – POOF! – just like the text on those wholly redacted pages.

TOL’ Ya So

I told you this was going to happen and it took no clairvoyance to figure that out, because dishonest, illegal and morally corrupt is what Trump and his fawners do. Expect many months of stalling and lies waiting for the required documentation. And expect evidence of wrongdoing by big fish to somehow be “lost.” But something deeper is showing itself.

Given the disparity of the obscene tormenting by ICE and the Department of Justice of everyone who looks even a little Hispanic and the special rules that continue to enrich the already rich and the faux release of Epstein documents, we now have our perfect polar opposites richly displayed. Together they illustrate what we all know is the terrible truth:

  • There is a special version of justice
  • for the rich and powerful
  • and a very different and cruel version of it
  • for the rest of us.
Humans

Rodney King:

“Can’t we all just get along?” *

Me:

No. It’s not even a remote possibility.

You:

Why not?

Me:

Because some people are maniacal about dominating others. Fight them and there is literally or figuratively blood in the streets. Or if you go along to get along with the power Nazis, that will mean surrender and submission. Loss of your autonomy. Life as a door mat.

Some other guy:

But most major religions – that’s where we commonly turn for moral guidance – talk about some version of wolves living with the lamb and the leopard lying down with the kid and the calf lying with the young lion – Isaiah 11:6.

Me:

Right. But the actual outcome of that co-habitation is well fed wolves, leopards and lions. It’s the same kind of contradiction with beating swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks – Isaiah 2:4. There will always be bad guys and we better have more than fanciful wishes and bits of messianic philosophy for dealing with them.

Democrats are beginning to go on the offensive against the domination brutes and the freedom thieves, like taking the reins to drive the Epstein investigation. We are hearing from people with stiffened spines. Maybe we’re seeing the beginnings of hope.

See footnote ** below

Here’s an accurate, if hand-wringing, description from Bret Stephens about the orange menace to the world:

— what more is there to say about the character of this petty, hollow, squalid, overstuffed man? — sometimes the point bears stressing: We are led by the most loathsome human being ever to occupy the White House.

And from Steven Beschloss

No matter how long I live after we get through this dark chapter, I will never get over the immorality, the amorality, the corruption, the criminality and the cruelty in service to one of the worst humans to ever walk the earth.

Key Learning

That is our starting point.
.

There will be a ton of work to do and it is going to take over a generation to fix what loathsome Trump has broken and to establish a new national ethos worthy of a democracy. A key question for all of us is whether we have the grit to stay that course. That won’t be easy in a country where instant gratification isn’t fast enough. Nevertheless, keep the faith and do the work, because it falls to us to fix this.

Finally, Ending the Year Like An Odd Animal

President Donald Trump continues to wag the dog to distract us from the Epstein trafficking and pedophilia and his cover-up. Here are some of those wags.

  1. Last week Trump had our mighty military send deadly rockets into northwest Nigeria. He said it was to attack ISIS because they were killing Christians. That looked so very satisfyingly protective of Christianity until the leader of Nigeria said that ISIS brutality wasn’t focused on Christians.
  2. Then he attacked Syria the same way and with the same lame excuse.
  3. Last week Trump also pirated another Venezuelan oil tanker and threatened to steal a third.
  4. Even as courts have slapped his hand he’s ramped up recruiting and training of new ICE agents. He promised yet more bonuses to them to induce more thugs to join and pretend to fight the few criminals they can find. Plus get them to imprison and rendition people who are here legally, including U.S. citizens.

Watch for more tails wagging the dog – they’re on the way. Woof.

_______________________________________________

* King is commonly quoted as having said that, but what he actually said was, “People, I just want to say, you know, can we all get along? Can we get along?”

King said that during the 1972 riots in LA, this from a guy whose Wikipedia entry begins, “Rodney Glen King (April 2, 1965 – June 17, 2012) was an American victim of police brutality. On March 3, 1991, he was severely beaten by officers of the Los Angeles Police Department . . . ” That’s how the lambs, leopards and lions thing worked for him. Even so, he called for peace. If you need a dose of injustice outrage, read the Wikipedia entry of how he was brutalized. If you want to hear about a guy with class, you’ll get that from that Wikipedia entry, too.

Note that the Los Angeles riots were triggered by the police officers being found not guilty for beating the snot out of King. We humans don’t respond well to such injustice, so people spoke out in the only way they would be heard.

Come to think of it, those LA cops kicked and beat King as he lay on the pavement, even as he posed no threat to anyone. That sounds a lot like today’s ICE agents, our American Gestapo. It also sounds like our Defense Department dealing with shipwrecked survivors.

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 or Barnes & Noble 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. Unless it’s a guest essay, in which case blame the guest.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Your Government At Work – Maybe


POST 1237

Click me

Today is Pearl Harbor Day. No one alive on that day could have foreseen the intentional decline of the United States of America that has occurred, brought to us by political self-dealing, greed, power lust and voter indifference. Those at Pearl Harbor 84 years ago didn’t fight and die for the mess we have now. Read this.

The Rusty Wheels of Government

Take a look at this:

H.J.Res.54 – Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States providing that the rights protected and extended by the Constitution are the rights of natural persons only. (119th Congress)
Sponsor: Rep. Jayapal, Pramila [D-WA-7] (Introduced 02/12/2025)

Has changes in:

    • Cosponsors (1 new, 68 total)
      • Cosponsor: 12/03/2025: Rep. Goldman, Daniel S. [D-NY-10]

My representative hasn’t sponsored this critical bill yet, so I wrote to him asking him to cosponsor this legislation that is designed to allow for the elimination of Big Money from our elections, our politics and our laws and to ensure that the protection of our rights extends only to flesh and blood human beings. You know: reverse the dreadedful Citizens United manipulated Supreme Court decision.

If your rep hasn’t signed on yet, tell them what you want. Here’s a link to find his/her contact info. Just enter your zip code in the lookup box on the top right of that page. Your doing that will be part of lubrication for those rusty wheels of government.

Got The Alleged Bad Guy

You’ll recall that Trump directed thousands of people to storm the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021, inciting that insurrection. When they had vandalized everything they could find, tried to find Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi so they could lynch them and had defecated in the halls of Congress, they left with Trump saying he loved them and that they were fine people and patriots all.

Over 1,500 were tried and convicted of crimes. Then Trump, the tough on crime president, pardoned all of them in 2025, including the thugs who tried to kill cops. Isn’t he just the epitome of tough-on-crime?

Last Thursday our government bad guys catchers announced that they had arrested the guy they are sure planted the backpack bombs in DC just before that January 6, 2021 insurrection. Did I mention that it was planned and incited by Donald Trump.

The alleged perp catching isn’t the news. What is most significant is how the presenters of this nab spoke in a news conference. Note that the team included Attorney General Pam Bondi, Director of the FBI Kash Patel, Assistant FBI director Dan Bongino and U.S. Attorney for DC, Jeanine Pirro. Here’s what they did and said that is worthy of note.

  1. The entire event was little more than a self-congratulatory victory lap, all speakers chanting their own version of, “We’re so great! We’re so great! Na, na, noo, noo! We’re so great!” like so many high school jerks. They are so pleased to take nearly all the credit for the bust and give just an honorable mention to the FBI agents who did all of the hard work. So much for professionalism.
  2. Every speaker presented with righteous superiority the various failings, ineptitude and the unworthiness of President Biden and his entire administration. They’ll have us know that for four years they did nothing to find the bad guy, our performative ones say. And weren’t we lucky to finally have these real professionals at work for the American People? No, really, they’re just so great!

And there was more embarrassing stuff.

Please watch the 26 minute circus sideshow for yourself. Then come back to the Comments section below and let everyone know what other horribles I missed.

This complete lack of professionalism and childish bravado is what Americans voted for, however unknowingly. Now we wait as this story plays out, There will be charges made of possession of forbidden materials and whatever other charges they can conjure. There will be a trial held and the perp will go to prison, unless, of course, Bondi’s DOJ geniuses find ways to screw up this trial, too, like they did the James Comey and Letitia James prosecutions. If all that happens while Trump is still in office, watch for this perp to receive a January 6-worthy presidential pardon, unless, of course, Trump finds out that the guy is Black.

In Yet Another Attack .  .  .

.  .  .  on American values, the Trump White House issued its 2025 National Security Strategy (NSS) of the United States of America. Giving credit where it might be due, it’s possible that there isn’t even a handful of staffers who can spell “strategy,” much less know what it is, but their numbers wouldn’t include key players, because they’re just players.

This is a document that blows off all U.S. obligations to NATO, abdicates international order, promotes U.S. imperialism, embraces tough guy murderous rulers and promises to roll over all of Latin America to “protect our interests,” whatever that convenient phrase might mean when uttered by any Project 2025 extremist.

This document is an ugly read that will offend your very being, so instead read Heather Cox Richardson’s piece about it from her December 5 post. Be sure to first take your heart attack pills.

The Ignoble Prize

It became clear even to Trump he will never be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, this for substantial reasons having to do with a lack of peace influenced by him, plus his continuing international belligerency. But his fragile ego needs a prize, so a solution was found. It is for Trump to award himself the first ever FIFA (soccer) Peace Prize. That brought raucous international disapproval and booing of fans, who declared, “This is pathetic.” The inscription on the medal reads, “For continuing discreditable service against the common man and attacks against laudable values.”

In receiving the award Trump said that he was so moved that he was speechless. He then proceeded to babble incoherently for 40 minutes, mispronouncing slurs against Presidents Obama and Biden and mimicking his insults of Sen. Adam Schiff. Reporters around the world once again bemoaned that America chose Trump as the best we could offer.

es
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 or Barnes & Noble 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 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Open Letters


POST 1229

Open Letter To Republican Senators and Representatives

You know that Trump is solely about becoming King Donald I. And you know that his lawlessness has no bounds. You know that with your help he’s placed painfully unqualified sycophants into cabinet and other positions positions where they are doing abhorrent things to our country. You know that he is murdering people in international waters (16 so far) and supplying no evidence or justification for his murders that could pass even his bogus IQ test.*

You know he’s plunging millions of Americans into destitution, sickness and death. You know he’s running scam after scam from the Oval Office while you look away from the intentional cruelty and admire his new marble and gold latrine.

You have the power to stop these egregiously anti-American actions, but you sit in chambers trying to look like a statesman, while knowing you’re nothing but a coward and hypocrite. Gotta suck to be you.

John Thune (R-SD) is the wimpy Republican Senate leader, endowed by his master with certain Trump bestowed rights, including the right to suck up, the right and duty to block everything not specifically beneficial to Trump and the right to lead the 52 other Republican senators to impotence. They are the key enablers of Trump’s ultimate betrayal of our country.

Plus, of course, House Speaker Mike Johnson. He’s the guy leading 850,000 of his fellow Louisianans into starvation because he snapped the SNAP benefits. Gonna be a real interesting campaign for his seat a year from now.

Clearly we have to contact Republican senators and representatives and demand that they find their courage and obey the oath to which they swore to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, that thing that Trump has said he wants to terminate. Not that the congresswimps might have even a smidgen of courage. Still, one must do more than hope. So call them.

Hurry. People are dying.

Open Letter To Immigration Hardasses

Click for the story – be sure to read the comments

Click and read the Chicago Tribune story

It’s easy to watch the news, see  ICE cruelty and lawlessness and say, “Isn’t that AWFUL!” and then go back to whatever we were doing. It’s harder to redirect ourselves when the awful is happening down our own street, like it is this week in Illinois towns like Northbrook, Mt. Prospect, Evanston and Arlington Heights.

ICE holes are chasing down and arresting landscapers and even daycare workers in quiet neighborhoods. They’re terrorizing children and spreading cruelty everywhere.

So, I’ll tell you what, Mr. Immigration Hardass: You come do the clean up of the blizzard of fall leaves in my yard. You mow my lawn and trim my bushes. You go wash dishes, pots and pans in a steamy hot kitchen of some restaurant where you like to dine and be treated like royalty. You go do the stoop labor in the fields of California’s central valley picking fruits and vegetables.

That won’t happen, though, because you won’t work that hard. But you’re eager to stand on the necks of people who will, people who have hopes for their children, who work harder than you’d ever work.

Here’s the dirty secret: those people would be legal residents, many full citizens, if you’d stop wailing hyperbolic idiot slogans and lies to enrage our citizens against Brown people and instead you would actually fix our horrible immigration system.

But you don’t want to do that, because you and our federal White Citizens Council equivalent in DC want to get rid of Brown people. Then you parade your faux Christianity before the cameras.

I had a dream last night that a bunch of us started rounding up ICE holes, stuffing them into airplanes and dumping them in El Salvador. Maybe that treatment should be extended to our self-righteous politicians. Let them get a taste of the cruelty they condone.

Untold millions of people have entered this country over the centuries without having been processed by some Ellis Island equivalent, including all of our Founding Fathers, Davy Crockett’s family and most of our presidents’ ancestors. You get the idea.

Every one of those immigrants was looking to make a better life. They were no different than the landscapers in my neighborhood who were chased, thrown to the ground and dumped into unmarked vans, bound for a rendition destination, never to be heard from again.

So, as you vilify Brown people, Mr. Immigration Hardass, think of them as being just like your grandparents. In fact, exactly like your grandparents. Would you rendition Grandma and Grandpa to a gulag in El Salvador?

If your answer is any shade of yes, Mr. Immigration Hardass, you are way beyond irredeemable. You’re hopeless.

See Beaten, Trampled and Tear-Gassed After Deportation to a Salvadoran Prison, online as ‘You Are All Terrorists’: Four Months in a Salvadoran Prison”

Your felonious president cut a deal with Nayib Bukele, the brutal dictator of El Salvador, to incarcerate our deported. But he does way worse than just imprisoning them. Keep in mind that none – NONE! – of the deported prisoners has been convicted of any wrongdoing through due process of law. No matter. They are tortured regardless.

Do you still want to rendition Grandma and Grandpa, Mr. Immigration Hardass?

BTW

What company rents those black, unmarked vans, SUVs and sedans to ICE? Someone should track down those license plates so we can boycott the sell-out rental agencies.

Click for the story in The Onion

Click for the story in The Onion

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

________________________________________

Click the “elephant”

* Trump’s recent “IQ test” was actually the Montreal Cognitive Assessment designed to identify dementia in patients. Why do you suppose he had to take that test a second time?

Trump said he “aced” the test, but the MCA does not measure intellectual capacity (IQ). He said, “The first couple of questions are easy. A tiger, an elephant, a giraffe.” Have a look- how’d he do?

Perhaps he knows the difference between a lion, a rhino and a camel. Sadly, there is little value of that animal knowledge in the Oval Office, even if he had given the right answers.

Goes fast, doesn’t it?

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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 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 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Two Cruelties


POST 1228

Keeping Score

Trump’s Reichsführer, Stephen Miller, White House Nazi-in-residence, has an important goal. He says that we must deport (not incarcerate; deport) 1 million people per year, regardless of anyone’s absence of criminality, lawful U.S. residency or even citizenship. That may have to do with something primitive about blood and  soil.

Here’s the math.

1 million people removed in a year will require 2,739 people to be disappeared every day. ICE reports that they’ve disappeared 527,000 – about 1,370 per day. Clearly, Trump’s Thug Corps. is not on pace to brutalize people to match up with Miller’s nutso number. And there is nobody checking ICE’s number – could be worse – any more than there is anyone stopping their cruelty, so there is no particular credibility to their body count.

Now you see the reason for the Jonathan Swift solution proposed in POST 1227. It should appeal to psycho Stephen Miller as a serious recommendation cruel enough even for Trump, especially as a distraction from the Epstein files and rumored pedophilia and sex trafficking of little girls. And that perpetuates the cruelty to all of the victims of Epstein and his clients.

They messed up. They let us know there’s an Epstein black book and a gazillion documents of his crimes and those of his allegedly wicked “clients.” Trump can dance, deny, and distract, but he and his bootlickers can’t make us forget that the incriminating evidence exists. I just hope that someone is retaining unaltered copies of the evidence so that suck up sycophant Pam Bondi can’t redact all of it into a black blob.

Congressman Brad Schneider (D-IL 10) and the Republicans

From Rep. Schneider’s October 31 newsletter:

On Monday [October 27], as chair of the New Democrat Coalition (New Dems), I reached out to my counterparts in the Republican Main Street Caucus and the Republican Governance Group (RG2), proposing we sit down to look for common ground and shared ideas for breaking the impasse between Republicans and Democrats  I was hopeful they would agree to join me in bipartisan conversations. Unfortunately, neither one was willing to engage. [I]nstead they leaked my outreach to the press and told us to effectively “pound sand.” Click here for [the] MSNBC story on my letter.

That’s what we can count on for help to get justice for Epstein’s victims and ICE’s victims. And that should tell you all you need to know about how desperate Trump and Speaker Johnson are to maintain distractions to prevent the Epstein files from being made public and how desperate Republicans are to avoid displeasing Trump. No amount of food shortages, economic woes and healthcare suffering by the public will dissuade them and fellow Republicans from stalling and covering up the horrific crimes likely to be found in those Epstein documents or stop the ICE unlawful cruelty.

From Steve Schmidt, November 3

The American people are besieged by malice, indifference, corruption, incompetence, venal leaders and a boiling hot lava of stupidity, which truly appears to be bottomless. It seems that a corrosive awfulness has saturated everything, everywhere, and that nothing decent remains.

Of course, that is the hope of the architects of our shared misery. Hopelessness is their greatest weapon. Fear is the poisoned tip of their arrow.

We’ve seen the poison tipped arrow up close in Chicago and now in Mt. Prospect, IL at the Randhurst Mall, in quiet residential neighborhoods in Northbrook and in Evanston. Rachel Maddow covered the ICE-hole* brutality on Monday, including an interview with Mayor Daniel Biss. Click here and then on the right for the Chicagoland Sets The Example segment. And click here for an ICE deportation tracker.

There are no riots, there is no vandalism, there are no attacks on people or property in our cities by We The People who are protesting ICE cruelty and Epstein victim cruelty. No one in the streets is rioting, regardless of the phantasmagoria spouted by the Liar In Chief.

Our police cannot fight ICE because doing so would be a violation of the law. The Republicans in Congress could fight the ICE cruelty as well as the cruelty to Epstein victims, but they are spineless cowards. That leaves the opposition to the fascists to you and me.

And that calls on us for our courage.

As your blood boils seeing the cruelty done to the survivors of Epstein and his clients and the cruelty to our neighbors in our streets, remember that any violence by We The People in the streets will give Trump his unwarranted excuse to send the Marines to permanently occupy our country and our freedom will be lost. That is what the domestic terrorists headquartered in Washington want. So .  .  .

Speak up. Show up. Take a stand. And remain non-violent. Always.

__________________________________________

* “ICE-hole” – kudos for the creativity and thanks to MHA for use of the term.

Goes fast, doesn’t it?

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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 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 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Another Modest Proposal – Plus What Americans Want


POST 1227
Most Important First

You MUST read Prof. Timothy Snyder’s warning, The Next Terrorist Attack And What Comes After (Updated). It is an urgent warning for all of us.

The Jonathan Swift Solution

Click me

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is expensive. We’re paying over $28 billion per year plus another $170 billion from a bill passed in July for their president-led cruelty. This is your money, honey, that we’re giving to ICE thugs in a time of reduced food availability, vastly increased unemployment, a severe housing shortage, skyrocketing healthcare costs and more.

“Enough!” I say, There is a simple solution at hand, similar to A Modest Proposal offered bu Jonathan Swift to the people of Ireland in 1729. Trump and 4th Reichsführer Stephen Miller are sure to love this.

Instead of doing all the pesky legal things like due process that lefty vermin demand for Hispanics, whether they’re criminals or legal immigrants or simply Hispanic-looking American citizens, we will arrest and slaughter them. It will be a fine start for reversing the Great Replacement of White Americans.

But slaughter isn’t enough. We must not waste. We must process the slaughtered ones like beef and feed the meat to our poor people. That will provide multiple benefits:

Click me for the gold plated story.

  1. We’ll get those pesky non-White Christian pretenders off our streets.
  2. We’ll free up housing for real Americans.
  3. We’ll put our legal poor to work processing the meat so they will no longer be unemployed drags on our White population.
  4. Our poor will be fed this new food supply and thereby avoid compromising our regular food stocks intended for the rest of us.
  5. The savings will be enormous and crime rates will plummet.

We at last will be harvesting value from those caravans of immigrants, the murderers, the rapists and the ones hauling drugs to poison real Americans whom Trump warned us about in that golden escalator moment in 2015. How very Final Solution this will be!

Once we’re done with the Browns we can harvest the Blacks, then the Jews and the Muslims. Important footnote*

What Real Americans Want – The Numbers**

It’s cringe worthy when any Republican or former Republican gets misty-eyed in their self-certainty and lets roll off their tongues that this is a center-right country. I’ll give them a good score for being glib, but not for being accurate. Here, updated from June 4, 2025 is truth about where we’re at.

85 – 92% of Americans believe Social Security benefits should be maintained or increased.

58 – 73% of Americans support raising (not cutting) taxes on the wealthy and big corporations.

56 – 70% of Americans want Medicare For All (MFA). Enough with the ridicule of Bernie Sanders.

63% of Americans believe abortion should be legal.

52 – 63% of Americans believe automatic weapons should be banned.***

56 – 60% of Americans want stricter gun laws.

70 – 85% of Americans want strong red flag laws to keep guns out of the hands of abusers.

67% of Americans want the minimum wage to be $15/hour.

74% of Americans want Dreamers to have legal status in the U.S.

62 – 66% of Americans believe medication abortion should be legal.

82% of Americans want Medicaid to either stay the same or increase.

63 – 67% of Americans oppose ICE raids in schools and places of worship.

80% of Americans support maintaining or increasing SNAP (food stamp) benefits.

75 – 90% of Americans oppose redistricting (gerrymandering) for political advantage.

When asked if they’re righties or lefties, millions of Americans claim to be conservatives – center-right or even more to the right. But when they’re asked specifically about their views on the issues above, they respond just as you see – like progressives. That’s why conservative blabbers really should stuff a sock in it. Their center-right claim just isn’t true.

If We The People want these things – and we’ve wanted them for a very long time – how come we don’t have them? Click here for the answer.

About the Kids Who Sat At The Back of the Classroom Shooting Spitballs Instead of Paying Attention
.

30% of Americans believe the 2020 election was stolen from Trump but have no – zero – evidence for their belief. ZERO!

35% of Americans cannot name the 3 branches of government.

26% of Americans believe the sun orbits the Earth.

There will be no Blue Light Special to save us from the craziness on the cheap. This is going to cost our blood, sweat and tears. And it is a challenge worthy of America.

4 – 10% of Americans believe the Earth is flat. *****

27% of Americans distrust science.

The roughly 30% who are spitballers blindly follow Trump and they say and believe preposterous things. But many of them align with the list above of What Real Americans Want, even as they mindlessly continue to believe they are righties and continue to shoot spitballs.

If we want something better, like the center-left policies listed above, we’ll have to do something different, like elect Democrats to power who will get off their timid, boring, lazy butts and craft a comprehensive, audacious plan for We The People to get what we want.**** To that point, click to Ben Cominos’ post,

Project 2029: The Blueprint the Left Has Been Too Afraid to Write
.

It will take generations to fix the damage we’ve allowed to be done by our self-serving cowards and hypocrites who cower before bullies and debase themselves to lobbyists. And we’ve been let down – harmed, really – by the willful indifference of the over 90 million eligible voters whose butts remain on their couches every election.

Now is the best time to start the clean-up of the terrible Republican mess in Aisle 2025.

The Department of Hope

If we are to have hope for a better tomorrow we must stop wringing our hands. We have to reach down and grab our grit and use it to attack what deserves to be attacked. It’s time to speak the truth about America and Americans and demand the America We The People want. You know: center-left. That fight is what gives us hope. Plan the work. Work the plan.

Every day in every way, punch the bully in the nose and demand Project 2029 from the Democrats. Maybe then enough people will vote for them and we can start to get what we want.

Don’t back down. Don’t ever back down.
.

Click me. Definitely click me.

Update to Post 1226: Feel Better Now?

Americans are facing imminent food and healthcare shortages, loan defaults and other sufferings. Tens of thousands of federal workers are being forced to work for no pay, including air traffic controllers, TSA personnel and more. Your travel safety is in their hands. Do you really want them going to work hungry, worried about the mortgage, the car payment, feeding their kids, and cranky? And is any of that even remotely fair or right or decent?

Even as workers suffer, federal legislators are receiving full pay for not doing their jobs and the President of the United States is receiving full pay while expanding his grift, graft and cruelty. In addition,

ICE THUGS CONTINUE TO RECEIVE FULL PAY
FOR DOING THEIR CRUELTY AND BRUTALITY.
.

Betcher not feeling better about that.

__________________________________________________

* This section is satire; i.e. not a real recommendation. It is an exaggeration in all ways to highlight the brutality that is our every day lived experience in America today. In that way it is like Jonathan Swift’s original essay. Go read it – both links.

This writer and these posts DO NOT EVER advocate and they specifically oppose and reject cruelty, violence, murder, cannibalism, forced labor and other forms of official White House policy savagery. No person, whether or not holding the legal right to be in the United States either temporarily or being a citizen of the United States should be subjected to discrimination of any kind other than for specific, fact-based suspicion of criminality, and then only meted out with proper restraint and with the full due process of law.

** I once again looked up all the numbers presented here and easily found them from reputable sources with a simple search, “What percentage of Americans want .  .  . ” There are many reports on each of these topics, so some variation in the percentages can be found, but none that challenge the meaning of what is presented here.

*** In the wake of every mass shooting (think: Sandy Hook; Parkland; Topps Supermarket; Las Vegas Route 91 Harvest Music Festival; Emanuel AME Church; Tree of Life Synagogue; Tucson-Giffords; etc.) the percentage of Americans who want automatic weapons, large capacity magazines, bump stocks and silencers to be banned goes up to 80-92%.

**** Gallup reports that approval of Congress is roughly 38%. That means that over 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of our Congress. 54 – 60% of us disapprove of the job Trump is doing. Why in the world should we tolerate such horrid job performance? Fire these guys!

***** For those who have forgotten history, John Glenn was the first American to orbit Earth. That was only possible because the Earth isn’t flat. It’s round. Really.

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 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

In Case You Didn’t Hear About These


POST 1225

Live fire across I-5

1. From Robert Reich on October 20: The Other Demonstration on Saturday – what happened during the NO KINGS demonstrations:

The Marine Corps — under the watchful [creepy] eyes of JD Vance and Pete Hegseth — staged a demonstration on Saturday in southern California.

It wasn’t a No Kings demonstration, though. It was more like a Yes Kings demonstration.

Some of the Marine Corps’ [live fire] shells that were fired by M777 howitzers across California’s Interstate 5 prematurely detonated, sending shrapnel down on what could have been hundreds of motorists.

Why the hell did the Marine Corps fire [live] artillery shells over Interstate 5 anyway?

Dick Altschuler, 1943

Note that the Marines have a live fire range not too far east of where they instead stupidly put people in danger. It was apparently for the benefit and entertainment of Fauxbilly Vance and Hopeless Hegseth.

Dad risked his life over and over to fight fascism, as did 16.1 million of his brothers in arms. We saw many of their pictures at the NO KINGS protests, held by descendants of those democracy heroes.

We damn well are nearly all anti-fascism – antifa – except for our simple minded, who want quick, simplistic solutions to our complex challenges and grievances. They got no stinkin’ reason to think. Their dictator will do all the thinking for them.

Note for fools believing Republican demonizing idiocy:

THERE IS NO ANTIFA ORGANIZATION. NO OFFICIALS. NO OFFICES. It’s just a catch-all term for we Americans who are against fascism and for democracy of, by and for We The People. It’s people like my dad and his brothers in arms. It’s like my family, friends and neighbors from sea to shining sea. It’s like all 7 million of us who marched on October 18.

Got it MAGAs and Republicans in Congress? Ah, probably not.

One more thing: We damn well have no business firing live artillery shells across Interstate 5. I bet those war lovers, Vance and Hegseth, got their sophomoric jollies over that stupidity. Think about that as you look forward to Trump being confined in a mental hospital and Article 25 bringing us Vance behind the Resolute Desk. Shivers.

—————————————–

2. From Daniel Lippman in Politico last Tuesday:

Paul Ingrassia, President Donald Trump’s embattled nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, told a group of fellow Republicans in a text chain the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday should be “tossed into the seventh circle of hell” and said he has “a Nazi streak,” according to a text chat viewed by POLITICO.

You’re surprised that Trump would nominate a creep like Ingrassia, right? Not likely.

As serial creep and sex predator Matt Gaetz did, Ingrassia has removed his name from nomination, both of them because they hadn’t a ghost of a chance passing muster. The real question is why a Nazi was nominated by Trump. You don’t suppose Trump thinks of himself as Der Führer, do you?

—————————————–

The Trump East Wing Death Star Ballroom under construction – thanks for this, RT

3. From Donald Trump, via Steve Schmidt: about his $300 million dollar ballroom to replace the East Wing of the White House.

“It won’t interfere with the current building. It won’t be. It’ll be near it, but not touching it — and pays total respect to the existing building, which I’m the biggest fan of. It’s my favorite. It’s my favorite place. I love it” — Donald Trump

In July he said the ballroom he expected to build would not touch the East Wing. Now the East Wing is gone, there are no permits or approved plans to build or even weather proofing plans for the remaining building to protect it through the coming winter months and there is no authorization from Congress to demolish government property that is a national treasure.

Listen for, “Believe me: you’ve never seen anything like this. Nothing like it anywhere in the world. It will be the best. Nobody has ever seen anything like this. Believe me.”

And our cowardly Republican Congress stands mute watching this, doing their constant impersonation of dead crickets.

Note that Trump brought in cranes to demolish the East Wing just after the NO KINGS protests. Maybe he thought nobody would notice, that he could sneak this past us. Kinda hard to miss that kind of destruction, though. It like – yes, it’s very much like the destruction he did to the Rose Garden (take that, Michelle Obama!) and the destruction he’s doing to the Constitution.

These are hard times that are getting harder for We The People. Inflation is shrinking the value of paychecks (3% year-over-year), millions are going without a paycheck at all and soon millions more will be in financial peril because of Trump’s economic blitzkrieg on America. He’s managed to shut down the government, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, so actual employment numbers are unknown, but nobody is hiring. Tariffs derived from Trump’s vacuous brain are making things more expensive and new car sales are declining. And while people suffer, Trump is building a $300 million golden ballroom that no one but Trump wants or needs. This truly is our Marie Antoinette moment. Let the rubes eat cake.

—————————————–

Click me if you think you can stomach this.

4. Here’s yet more of Trump’s crude, crass embarrassment of our nation.

Immediately following the NO KINGS marches Trump posted his AI video of him as king piloting an F-18 and dumping feces on marchers.

Just when you thought that there was no way for Trump to debase himself and our country worse than he’s already done. Just when you foolishly thought there was a bottom to Trump’s awfulness. Just when you thought the dip shit had run out of shit.

Wake up. There is no bottom to what Trump will do or say. He’ll always find yet worse ways to be worse.

There is something so very emboldening about hatred and cruelty. And Trump’s MAGAs, hypocritical non-Christian Evangelicals, overt racist, misogynist, xenophobic, toxic masculine morons gorge themselves on it. They puff themselves up on that feeling of power. That’s Trump’s base.

Trump will always flatulate ever-more outrageous idiocy to distract you from the Epstein files. This destruction of the White House East Wing and his poopy plane are just the most recent chapters in his ongoing saga, “Bright, Shiny Objects Distract the Dopes From My Villainy.” Which leads to,

—————————————–

5. Raise your hand if you give so much as a rat’s ass if the Epstein files made public will embarrass Trump and others and send some to court and then to prison. Oh, golly: no hands.

You must (as in ‘MUST“) read Thom Hartmann’s fiery piece,

Trump’s Elite Pedophile Protection Program: Who are they Protecting?
.

It’s subtitled,

Amy Wallace says the FBI and DOJ have the list. Twenty abusers. Zero accountability. How long will we tolerate this cover-up?
.

Making this more personal, how long will YOU tolerate this cover-up? Call your senators and representative, especially if they are Republicans. You’ll know what to say to them.

—————————————–

6. We are required by all that is right to offer yet another apology to our Canadian friends. Reported by The Washington Post*: Trump cancels trade negotiations with Canada over anti-tariff ad.

That’s right. Our Infant In Chief is once again in an electric purple temper tantrum, pounding his fists and his bone spur heels on the floor and screeching his tyrannical obscenities. Now he’s yelling at a maple leaf flag, “I’ll never play with you Canadians again because you do stuff I hate so you’re a doo-doo. Maybe I’ll drop you from my kingly poo-poo-dropping airplane, too.”

Apologies to you, Oh Canada! You deserve far better from the U.S.

Now Some Good News!

Just imagine a day when the Supreme Court and we Americans can once again tell the difference between We The People and a fiction written on a piece of paper.

Many thanks to LR for passing this along.

________________________________________________

* 13 months ago Jeff Bezos caved to Trump, bent his knee and kissed the ring. He withheld the Post’s endorsement of Kamala Harris for president, betraying the newspaper’s motto on its masthead, “Democracy Dies In Darkness.” Indeed, it does and Bezos clouded the sun.

He forever stained his integrity. That’s when the Post began to bleed its finest reporters and opinion writers. I terminated my subscription. There have been no mentions of that formerly great newspaper in these commentaries since then.

I have not been able to shut off their solicitations, though, which include a daily list of their stories. I confess to being impressionable, so when they offered a year digital subscription for 50 cents per week, I accepted the offer. And yes, I feel a little slimy about doing this.

Question: How desperate must the Post be for readers if they are offering a 50 cents per week rate?

Fear not: I’ve tagged my calendar to cancel the subscription next year before the cost jumps to $3 per week. We’ll see if I can tolerate the slimy feeling that long.

Mid-Term Election
Goes fast, doesn’t it?

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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 or intentionally cruel. If you must post something cruel, stop reading these posts immediately and instead invest your time with a good therapist.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally and unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Cruelty


POST 1223

  • When your political universe is sorted into “pure” and “traitor,” cruelty becomes a tool. The point isn’t just to be offensive—it’s to police loyalty.
  • – Dean Blundell
  • _______________________________________

Here’s some clarity from @JoJoFromJerz:

@JoJoFromJerz is right, of course. This intentionally cruel material dumps onto us every day. Here’s another example.

Click the pic and watch the short video.

In Cicero, IL (Chicago area) ICE thugs dragged two women from their car in an elementary school pickup line and “arrested” them. In ICE-speak that means they brutalized them, threw them to the ground, handcuffed them and jammed them into an unmarked van. They did this without a warrant or even a faint suspicion of these women having broken any law. After hours of being “detained” – that’s ICE-speak that means the women were locked up incommunicado – then they were released. Turns out those women are in this country legally, but they were treated worse than hardened criminals would be.

And the kids exiting that school were terrorized by seeing that cruelty, as were all the moms and dads in that after school pickup line.

It appears that Trump’s main Nazi, Stephen Miller, was telling the truth about ripping babies from the arms of their mothers at our southern border during Trump’s first term.* When confronted about the cruelty, the horrible barbarity his thugs were inflicting on moms and their little kids, Cruelty-Meister Miller said, “The cruelty is the point.” And he’s doing it again.

This is what Nazis do and why they do it. This cruelty toward anything not Trump and MAGA is why we have to banish these thugs, these Nazis, these fascists from any position of power in our country. It would be fine with me were we to rendition them to that El Salvador gulag. If we keep them here for a little while we must prosecute them for the laws they are breaking. We’ll bankrupt them via lawsuit, just like Trump is trying to do to people on his enemies list. Trump’s cruelty is why we must vote for Democrats.

No, the Dems aren’t perfect. But they are the only path to rid ourselves of the vicious, anti-Constitutional, anti-American, hatred-fueled Republicans. As Obama advised, “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.” Vote for the good. Things will be better.

Maybe you aren’t convinced that we need to vote for Dems. That’s okay. But before you reject the idea entirely, read the Politico report, ‘I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat.

You read the title correctly. Cheering cruelty, racism, misogyny, murder and the joy of inflicting pain on others is sport to these degenerates, these Young Republicans, these Hitler Youth. It makes no difference if you believe these Young Republicans really mean the filth they mouth. Maybe it’s just youthful “locker room talk,” like Trump’s Access Hollywood filth was fraudulently called by Trump apologists. At the very least these Young Republican degenerates are enablers of such barbarity. And they are unchecked by Republicans with power today. Crickets from them.

Check the subtitle of the Politico essay: Thousands of private messages reveal young GOP leaders joking about gas chambers, slavery and rape. Politico found that these horrible messages were sent over at least seven months. Clearly, these egregious cruelties that are chuckled over by today’s Republicans aren’t one-offs. This is standard Republican stuff.

These are the children of Trump, the spawn of the Republican Party.

Almost as bad, Vice President J.D. Vance defended these miscreants with whataboutism. And on the Charlie Kirk Show he said,

“I really don’t want us to grow up in a country where a kid telling a stupid joke—telling a very offensive stupid joke—is cause to ruin their lives.” He called them “kids” seven times.

Julianne McShane of Mother Jones checked out Vance’s assumptions for his exoneration of the vile texters.

I found ages for eight of the 11 people included in the chat. And, spoiler alert: None were minors. The youngest appear to be 24, the oldest 35. (I could not find publicly available ages for three of the participants.) This information raises the question: At what age does the vice president believe people become grown adults who should be held responsible for their actions?

It turns out none of the participants sending and reading those abhorrent, hateful messages is an adolescent. Nevertheless, Vance wants to exonerate them, effectively saying, “They’re just kids, you know?”  But even if they were all under 18 years old, their messages and their senders would still be abhorrent.

Here’s the worst part:

The senders of these horrible messages are
the future leaders of the Republican Party.
.

.And as you can see, they will be welcomed by today’s Vice President of the United States.

That’s why you must promote and vote for Democrats now.

NO KINGS

The NO KINGS protests – “.  .  .  the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances .  .  .” are like the Boston Tea Party, of proud American heritage. Read Heather Cox Richardson’s post of October 16 and you’ll understand.

And for sure read Ira Leavitt’s post,

Those ICE Guys Could Have Been Worse!
But Not Much Worse
.

This is cruelty. On We The People. Every day.

And we are as many as 8.2 million of We The People marching in the parks and in the streets, declaring,

NO DAMN WAY WE’LL HAVE A KING!

.

We sent one packing 242 years ago and we’ll send away this one or his 25th Amendment replacement not later than January 20, 2029. Until then and following the mid-term election next year we’ll tie them up with a stout rope made from the same parchment our Constitution is written on.

.

 

 

 

“Together Strong!!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your intrepid chronicler reporting from Highland Park, IL. NO KINGS, DAMMIT!

_________________________________________

* The last count I heard was that despite the hard work of good people in the Biden administration, having reunited over 4,000 kids with their moms, there were about 1,000 still separated, Stephen Miller did his proud, goose stepping, swastika waving work for his boss by refusing to document separations. That made reuniting moms and kids impossible for so many and that has heaped ongoing cruelty onto defenseless people.

Miller’s mother must be so proud.

Mid-Term Election
Goes fast, doesn’t it?

Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe at no charge – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too, because 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 or intentionally cruel. If you must post something cruel, stop reading these posts immediately and instead invest your time with a good therapist.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally and unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Making a Difference


POST 1216

What If You Could?

Many people have doubts.

“I’m just one tiny voice.”

“I don’t have any special skills or power.”

“This is too big for me.”

“I don’t even know what to do.”

“I hate what’s happening to our country, but I’m no billionaire.”

“What good would it do?”

My friend MG of The Deconstructing Trump Corner posted the lyrics of Leonard Cohen’s song Anthem recently. I think it’s for all the perfectionists, those of us who hold back because they fear their efforts will be imperfect or of little value. If you’re one of those, pay attention to these lyrics. They give you permission to be human.

  • “Ring the bells that still can ring.
  • Forget your perfect offering.
  • There is a crack in everything.
  • That’s how the light gets in.”

Oh, and how we need that light right now!

Your imperfect efforts will be good enough. They will join with tens of millions of other imperfect offerings to crash through the crass dishonesty and the cruelty and the light will once again get in.

All because you rang the bell that still can ring.

RING THAT BELL!

Perhaps you’re a biblical type and would like the message in that context. Try this.

Imagine Moses, Miriam and Aaron leading the Hebrews from Egypt. They have arrived at the shores of the Red (“Reed”) Sea. They have no boats, so they have stayed there a long time, but the Egyptian army is not far behind them.

Try this adaptation of Deuteronomy 1:6-7:*

You have stayed long enough in this place, God said.

Time to go forward.

Turn your face to the future.

Believe that you can cross this sea and survive.

Inside you is a Moses; within you Miriam dances, unafraid.

Lift up your voice and sing a new song.

If today “this place” is where you’ve stayed as an observer, then it’s time to go forward, to turn your face to the future. It’s time to believe that you can do what seems impossible, because it is not impossible.

It is possible because of what is inside you.

Lift up your voice and sing a new song.

Sing it loud.

Sing it so everyone can see the future that you see.

Sing it with your integrity and your imperfect voice.

That’s how the light gets in!

____________________________________________

* from Mishkan Hanefesh, Machzor (prayer book) for the Days of Awe, Rosh Hashanah, page 33.

  • Mid-Term Election
    Goes fast, doesn’t it?
    .

  • Did someone forward this post to you? Welcome! Please subscribe at no charge – use the simple form above on the right. And pass this along to three others, encouraging them to subscribe, too, because 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 or intentionally cruel. If you must post something cruel, stop reading these posts immediately and instead invest your time with a good therapist.
    7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally and unavoidably mine.

    Click me

    JA


Copyright 2026 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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