Not satisfied with making enemies of our neighbors to the north and south, not to mention Europe, Trump stunned even his own staff* with a proposal he’s been thinking about for a month or two that has now alienated him from even his Saudi pals. He proposed that the Palestinians be relocated to Egypt and Jordan while the United States seized control of Gaza.

Mr. Trump’s announcement that he intends to seize control of Gaza, displace the Palestinian population and turn the coastal enclave into “the Riviera of the Middle East” was the kind of thing he might have said to get a rise on “The Howard Stern Show” a decade or two ago. Provocative, intriguing, outlandish, outrageous — and not at all presidential. Continue reading →

It was said so often as to lose any seriousness, as Trump accused his myriad enemies of having committed some unstated crime and should be punished, the punishment ranging from prison to death. In other news, randos on twitter constantly claim some act, whether innocuous or constitutionally protected, is a crime, throwing in acronyms like RICO or the dreaded HIPPA (yes, it’s HIPAA, but that’s part of the joke. Get it?).

But yesterday, the shadow president raised the stakes after Wired posted an article naming six of Musk’s best and brightest.

Engineers between 19 and 24, most linked to Musk’s companies, are playing a key role as he seizes control of federal infrastructure.

Continue reading →

It was bad enough when Trump, without prior warning, decided to let the Russian foreign minister and ambassador into the Oval Office, where he gave them highly classified information because it seemed like a good idea to him at the time. And then there were the classified documents he showed off at Mar-a-lago, because what ex-president doesn’t want to be the cool kid to randos?

So, Trumpy excuses aside, it might be said that Trump doesn’t take state secrets seriously, and if it doesn’t seem to be a problem to him, given his deep and broad grasp of government functioning and in-depth understanding the threats facing the nation from countries with adverse interests, why should anyone be concerned that he’s handing over national and personal confidential information without any consideration of who gets to see it? Continue reading →

During the confirmation hearing of K$H Patel, Louisiana Senator John Kennedy questioned whether Patel would be party to Trump’s “retribution” tour.

During Mr. Patel’s testimony on Thursday, Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana, told Mr. Patel that lawmakers would hold him accountable if he tried to exact revenge at the F.B.I., saying two wrongs did not make a right.

“And there have been and may still be some bad people there, and you’ve got to find out who the bad people are and get rid of them, in accordance with due process and the rule of law,” Mr. Kennedy said. “And then you’ve got to lift up the good people. Don’t go over there and burn that place down. Go over there and make it better.”

Continue reading →

ABC settled its defamation suit with Trump for $15 million. Meta settled its suit with Trump for its post-January 6th suspension of his accounts for $25 million. The New York Times is reporting that Paramount, owner of 60 Minutes, is in settlement talks with Trump for editing the interview with Kamala Harris. What all three of these cases have in common is that enterprises that would normally fight to the death over challenges ranging from far-fetched to utterly frivolous have chosen instead to pay. And pay pretty big money.

Bribes? Some would say so, although the word bribe implies they are getting a quid pro quo, something concrete in exchange for their cash. There is no evidence that there is any quo for their quid. Continue reading →

The first I heard of it was from Chris Halkides in a succinct comment to yesterday’s post about Trump’s ignorance of law, governance and presidential authority.

The Vaeth memo freezing spending makes the firing look like small potatoes by comparison.

And indeed, it does. Putting aside the question of whether the executive has any authority to “usurp” the power of the purse, a prerogative reserved by the Constitution for Congress, the memo from the acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, Matthew J. Vaeth, is a stunning display of ass-backwards incoherence that created a depth of chaos and instability that undermined any sense of reliability in the federal government. To call it a bludgeon where a scalpel was needed is far too kind. Continue reading →

After Trump’s firing of inspector generals with neither the specific explanation nor 30 day notice required by the Inspector General Act of 1978, an obvious question arose. What happens when Trump shamelessly breaks the law? It may not be the biggest deal law ever, but it’s still a law. You may not like the law, or believe the law is constitutional, but it’s still the law. And Trump just, well, broke it.

Josh Blackman tried his very hardest to muster some rational explanation for Trump’s actions, but, despite his best efforts, came up empty. In response, David Post made the obvious observation that Josh tried so hard to avoid. Continue reading →

There has been harsh criticism of Trump for having pardoned or commuted the sentences of violent criminals in his grandiose, yet shallow, display of pandering to his MAGA base that saw them as patriots and hostages. To those who believe in faeries, he was a hero, kind of keeping his campaign promise and bringing home the well intended, if none too bright, patriots he told to storm the Congress to save the nation.

To others, he was his usual simplistic fool, doing pretty much what one would expect of any simplistic fool, uninterested in distinguishing between unworthy defendants and unwilling to put in the effort when the only purpose of his act was to pander to sycophants who similarly wouldn’t care either way. It was a cheap way for Trump to buy himself some adoration and, if necessary, useful idiots to take to the streets again if he needed some very fine people to do his dirty work. Continue reading →

No, Trump didn’t get a “mandate.” He didn’t get a majority of the popular vote and had the smallest winning percentage of any president in generations. No, “woke” isn’t just being courteous, and DEI isn’t just being against discrimination. And no, yours isn’t the side of good and theirs isn’t the side of evil, and everyone who fails to live up to your purity test isn’t part of the evil tribe.

I blame myself for trying to be as accommodating of differing views as possible. It had been my hope that commenters here would police themselves and each other, would exercise some modicum of self-control so as not to spew their tribe’s lies and delusions, as if to challenge me and others here to disprove them. Continue reading →

No one has ever accused Donald Trump of being deep, nuanced and petty subtle. But then, no rational person believes that the avalanche of Executive Orders marked with a sharpie come from the mushy-minded Trump. The “tell” is that they aren’t in all caps, use big words spelled correctly and are generally coherent. Someone came up with all these ideas, save the silliness of renaming the Gulf of Mexico and Denali, and Trump is channeling his best Governor William J. Le Petomane.

Among the proclamations are two Executive Orders seeking to eradicate, overnight, the dreaded Diversity, Equity and Inclusion machinery that have properly come under fire for their infusion of race and sex discrimination under the woke guise of remediating past discrimination by exploiting current discrimination. The Supreme Court says no. Americans say no. Even those it was putatively supposed to help say no. So what’s not to like? Continue reading →