kennedy center rebrands as the donald j trump grievance palace
Richard Grenell, newly self-appointed guardian of patriotic jazz purity, explains why federal law, congressional intent, and artistic freedom must all yield to Donald Trump’s feelings.
In a bold new interpretation of "arts administration," Trump ally and Kennedy Center president Richard Grenell has demanded $1 million from jazz musician Chuck Redd for the high crime of…canceling his Christmas Eve concert after the White House slapped Donald Trump’s name on a building Congress explicitly dedicated to John F Kennedy. Because nothing says "non-profit arts institution" like trying to bankrupt a drummer for exercising his conscience.
Grenell’s letter accuses Redd of "classic intolerance" and calls his cancellation a "political stunt"—this from the guy whose boss just unilaterally renamed a congressionally created memorial to himself, despite a law that forbids putting anyone else’s name on the building or turning it into a memorial to another person. Legal scholars are already pointing out that this is almost certainly illegal, but sure, the real problem is the jazz guy who didn’t want to play under the neon sign for creeping authoritarian narcissism.
Trump forced out the previous Kennedy Center leadership, installed Grenell, and then had his handpicked board rubber-stamp the renaming that Congress likely has to approve. Kennedy niece Kerry Kennedy is promising to strip Trump’s name off the building once he’s gone, and historians are saying the same thing: this isn’t how any of this works. In other words, the "living memorial" to JFK has been temporarily converted into a live-action case study in how a petty, thin-skinned administration treats the law, the arts, and anyone who dares to say "no."
#killing-democracy#fascism
alligator alcatraz: america’s favorite illegal swamp gulag
Nothing says ‘land of the free’ like families begging for basic due process outside a secretive swamp prison while the government insists everything is totally normal and very legal.
The Trump–DeSantis dream project "Alligator Alcatraz" is going so well that thousands of people are spending their Sundays standing in a mosquito-infested swamp just to yell at a concrete box in the distance. The Everglades immigration jail, personally celebrated by Trump for its harsh conditions and touted by Ron DeSantis as a "model" for mass detention, is now the subject of weekly vigils where families trade legal scraps and horror stories because the government has thoughtfully replaced due process with a bus ticket to Mexico.
Inside, detainees like 54-year-old diabetic Justo Betancourt are allegedly being denied basic medical care and told they can "get it in Mexico" after being disappeared from routine check-ins. According to his daughter, people aren’t getting court dates or seeing judges; they’re just yanked from cells at night and dumped over the border regardless of where they’re actually from—because nothing says rule of law like secret nighttime deportation flights. A federal judge ordered the place closed in August, an appeals court swooped in to save the cruelty, and the administration took that as a green light to lean even harder into the human rights abuse speedrun.
So now you’ve got pastors filling buses, multi-faith crowds blasting prisoners’ voices over speakers about worms in their food and nonexistent showers, and regular Americans driving hours through the Everglades to stare at a barbed-wire monument to Trump’s deportation agenda. In other words: the government built an unconstitutional swamp prison, staffed it with bureaucrats who think Geneva is a type of cheese, and the only functioning oversight mechanism left is a weekly caravan of furious relatives and clergy with megaphones. But sure, tell us again how this is all about "border security" and not about building a shiny new authoritarian playground.
#killing-democracy#anti-immigration
trump and musk team up to deport the fact-checkers
Thierry Breton, now learning that under Trump the punishment for annoying tech oligarchs is a State Department exile order.
The Trump administration has discovered a bold new frontier in free speech: using the State Department to try to deport people who expose hate, lies, and extremism online. Imran Ahmed, head of the Center for Countering Digital Hate and a lawful DC resident with an American wife and infant daughter, was suddenly informed he faces removal from the US. His crime? Daring to hold social media and AI companies accountable, which so enraged Elon Musk that X tried—and failed—to sue his group, then apparently found a friendlier venue in Trump’s deportation machine.
Ahmed is one of five Europeans, including former EU commissioner Thierry Breton, slapped with visa bans for allegedly leading “organised efforts to coerce American platforms to censor…American viewpoints.” In other words: they pushed platforms to deal with hate speech, disinformation, and extremist content, so Trump’s people labeled that “censorship” and tried to throw them out of the country. A State Department official even bragged on X that if you “spend your career fomenting censorship of American speech, you’re unwelcome on American soil” — because nothing says robust marketplace of ideas like the government exiling critics at the request of billionaires.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked Ahmed’s detention or removal, but he spent Christmas separated from his family because, as he notes, others whose green cards were yanked in recent months have been arrested and shipped hundreds or thousands of miles away from their support networks. Meanwhile he calmly points out that this isn’t about partisan politics but about tech companies with “sociopathic greed” using their money and connections to corrupt the system so they can never be held accountable. Trump gets to cosplay as the defender of “American viewpoints,” Musk gets fewer pesky reports about rising racism and extremism on X, and anyone who documents the damage done by social media and AI learns that in Trump’s America, the algorithm doesn’t just shadowban you—it calls ICE.
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump trades 'you’re fired' for 'loyalty über alles'
Trump’s ‘fantastic’ cabinet, seen here competing to see who can praise the Dear Leader loudly enough to keep their job and their security detail.
Donald Trump has finally found a way to cut down on staff turnover: stop hiring anyone who might ever say no to him. After a first term that looked like a White House remake of Battle Royale, Trump 2.0 has settled on a new management philosophy: keep the loyalists, ignore the scandals, and pretend everything is going great. Defense secretary Pete Hegseth is under fire for misusing encrypted apps and bungling Caribbean operations, Kristi Noem is allegedly treating Homeland Security like her personal AmEx Black, Kash Patel is torching what’s left of the FBI’s credibility, and Tulsi Gabbard is filming doomsday monologues about nuclear annihilation — and Trump’s response is basically: fantastic job, everyone.
Critics point out the obvious: this isn’t a cabinet, it’s a court. The only real qualification is personal devotion to Trump. As Brookings’ Bill Galston notes, it’s now loyalty über alles — if you’re a loud enough fighter for Trump, your actual performance is a rounding error. Tara Setmayer spells it out: the sycophancy is the point. Competence is optional; obedience is mandatory. The Senate, slightly less eager to jump off the cliff with him as his approval ratings crater, has made it harder to confirm new extremists, so Trump is stuck with the ones he’s got — which conveniently means he never has to admit a mistake or give the media the satisfaction of a firing.
Meanwhile, the real ‘personnel changes’ are happening out of sight. Trump has pushed millions of federal workers to quit, cleared out advisory councils, and let the justice department fire dozens of career prosecutors, including those connected to investigations involving him. In other words, he’s stopped firing cabinet-level loyalists and started quietly purging the people who actually enforce laws and provide independent oversight. Because nothing says “great job, Mr President” like dismantling the guardrails that might hold you accountable.
#killing-democracy#fascism
mar-a-lago accords: america’s freelance foreign policy shop
Zelenskyy prepares to discuss Ukraine’s survival at the world’s most corrupt country club, where international law goes to die between the shrimp tower and the putting green.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy is apparently heading to Florida, because nothing says "serious peace negotiations" like flying to the guy’s beach club to see what deal he and his real estate buddies cooked up between golf rounds. Trump’s "peace envoy" Steve Witkoff – a property developer, naturally – has been shuttling between Russian and Ukrainian reps, joined by America’s most experienced statesman, Jared "Middle East Peace, But Make It Kush" Kushner.
Behind the scenes, Trump’s crew is floating an updated US proposal straight to Putin’s top foreign policy aide while the Kremlin demands Ukraine hand over the entire Donbas and dangles a tiny "territorial exchange" like it’s haggling over a condo floor plan. Zelenskyy is talking about withdrawing heavy forces under a US-backed "free economic zone" plan, because when you’ve been invaded and partially occupied, what you really need is a special economic district designed by Trump-world.
In other words, US foreign policy is now being run like a distressed luxury asset: talked over at Mar-a-Lago, staffed by Trump’s son-in-law and a developer, and quietly pitched to Moscow as a take‑it‑or‑leave‑it deal involving someone else’s borders. But sure, this is all about "peace" and not about a twice‑impeached Putin fanboy desperately trying to prove he can end the war by giving the Kremlin most of what it wanted in the first place.
#killing-democracy#imperialism
congress tries doing nothing and somehow manages to do less
Congress, seen here bravely guarding its constitutional powers by leaving the door unlocked and a note that says, "Do whatever, we’re on recess."
Congress started 2025 with an "ambitious agenda" and ended it by handing the car keys, the title, and the entire DMV over to Donald Trump. Twelve months, record-low number of bills, and a historic levels of "you know what, let him do it" later, the legislative branch has basically rebranded as the president’s cheering section.
Because nothing says "coequal branch of government" like ceding much of your power to an aspiring autocrat and then bragging about how you bravely did absolutely nothing. In other words, Congress looked at the Constitution, looked at Trump, and decided checks and balances were just suggestions.
So here we are: a "tumultuous year" in which the only real turbulence was the sound barrier breaking as lawmakers sprinted away from their duties. But sure, tell us more about how this is all just normal gridlock and not the legislative branch slowly strangling itself so the president doesn’t have to.
#killing-democracy#fascism#lawlessness
susie wiles discovers conscience, checks polling first
Susie Wiles gazes at Trump like a woman who just realized all her 11 taped interviews might not be enough to wash this off her résumé.
Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief of staff and newly christened "Susie Trump" (because nothing says healthy democracy like your top White House aide being absorbed into the family brand), has apparently decided that now is the perfect time to start whispering that the president has "an alcoholic’s personality" and a vindictive streak a mile wide. In a marathon 9,500-word Vanity Fair profile based on 11 on-the-record interviews, Wiles calls JD Vance a conspiracy theorist, labels Elon Musk an "odd, odd duck" while trashing his dismantling of USAID, and dishes on the rest of the regime like she’s doing exit interviews for a collapsing startup instead of an administration.
Wiles is publicly insisting she was the victim of a "hit piece" and "selective quoting", because of course the first woman White House chief of staff in this mess has to speedrun the "I enabled it, but with a raised eyebrow" defense. Meanwhile, veterans like Rick Wilson point out there is exactly "0.000 chance" that a hyper-seasoned operator did 11 taped interviews by accident. In other words, Susie is trying to negotiate a plea bargain with history: yes, she helped manage the revenge-obsessed, conspiracy-curious, USAID-dismantling White House, but she got the joke, you see, so she’s not one of the bad authoritarians.
The whole thing offers a neat little window into Trump’s court: a vengeful president, a Q-pilled vice-president, a billionaire wrecking US foreign aid for funsies, and a chief of staff who wants credit both for keeping the machine humming and for quietly recognizing that the machine is a meat grinder for democracy. But sure, she’s "not an enabler"—she just schedules the enabling, staffs the enabling, and calls reporters to make sure history understands she found the enabling a bit gauche.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
turns out yelling in the streets actually works, which is awkward for king donald
Crowds at the Women’s March proving that contrary to White House belief, ‘real Americans’ do in fact own shoes, read books, and vote you out later.
Historians and political scientists have delivered some terrible news for Donald Trump and his friends in the "presidents should be kings now" caucus: mass protests work. From emancipation to civil rights to marriage equality, people taking to the streets has repeatedly forced the US government to stop being quite so openly terrible. In Trump’s America, that started with the 2017 Women’s March – the largest single-day protest in US history – which did more than generate pink-hat selfies. It helped trigger an explosion of women running for office and a measurable shift in votes toward Democrats in the 2018 midterms. In other words, a bunch of women showed up with signs and proceeded to rearrange Congress, which is presumably not what the Access Hollywood Administration had in mind.
The research is annoyingly clear: when lots of people protest, elections move. Counties with bigger Women’s March turnouts saw higher support for Democrats and more votes for women and candidates of color; Tea Party protests did the same for Republicans in 2010, proving that public rage is a bipartisan force multiplier. One study even notes that adding one more protester does more for a cause than adding one more voter – because nothing says "functional democracy" like having to stand in the cold with a cardboard sign just to get basic rights. And looming over Trump’s second-term fantasy of hereditary rule is the famous 3.5% rule: if roughly 3.5% of the population mobilizes against a regime, it tends to fall. With the new "No Kings" protests drawing historic crowds, the message is clear: you can pack the courts, gut the agencies, and flirt with autocracy all you want – but if a few million people decide they’re done with your cosplay monarchy, the streets start doing what the institutions won’t.
#killing-democracy#fascism
veteran diplomat attempts to translate trumpese into human
Seasoned diplomat stares into the middle distance, trying to turn Trump’s foreign policy word salad into something that wouldn’t terrify allied governments.
Wendy Sherman, who has served under three presidents who could locate countries on a map, stops by NPR to perform the impossible holiday miracle: explaining Donald Trump’s second-term foreign policy like it’s a coherent strategy and not just whatever he rage-posted on Truth Social between court dates.
In the segment, Sherman analyzes how Trump is approaching the world this year—read: shredding alliances, flirting with strongmen, and treating national security like a loyalty test and a personal brand opportunity. Because nothing says serious global leadership like threatening NATO on Monday, praising authoritarians on Tuesday, and asking, "Wait, which Korea is the good one again?" by the weekend.
So NPR politely calls it an “approach,” Sherman gamely translates it into diplomat-speak, and the rest of us are left watching a second-term foreign policy that looks a lot less like statecraft and a lot more like America’s geopolitical credit score circling the drain—but sure, let’s pretend this is all just normal presidential behavior.
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump’s 'billionaire first' plan: crush unions, call it populism
Trump’s ‘Billionaire First’ jobs program: one job for you, three yachts for them.
Donald Trump has spent the year waging what AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler calls an “unrelenting attack on working people,” which in Trump World is marketed as economic genius and blue-collar outreach. His big move: executive orders nuking collective bargaining rights for more than 1 million federal workers, because nothing says “I love the working class” like kneecapping their ability to negotiate for pay and protections.
The House just passed a bill to restore those rights, but the AFL-CIO is now bracing for a Senate fight in January, right as another government shutdown looms and the White House continues to insist that concerns about affordability are a “hoax.” Out in reality, workers are drowning in record credit-card debt just to buy groceries, while Trump’s “Billionaire First” agenda showers corporations and the ultra-rich with rewards and tells everyone else to be grateful for the vibes.
Unions, somehow, are now the last major institution most people actually trust, and they’re gearing up to turn that into a 2026 midterm battering ram. With Starbucks baristas on strike for a first contract and inequality exploding alongside AI-driven consolidation of wealth, Shuler is basically spelling it out: either workers get power and guardrails, or the future of the economy belongs entirely to Trump’s favorite people — the billionaires, the corporations, and whoever can afford to pretend this is all going great.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
nothing says christmas like lying to children about coal and elections
Trump, surrounded by NORAD decorations, explains to an 8-year-old that coal is beautiful, elections he lost were actually wins, and that Santa is now a national security threat.
NORAD’s annual "track Santa" tradition is supposed to be a cute, nonpartisan moment where kids call in and chat with the president about reindeer and presents. Under Trump, it’s now a joint venture between the fossil fuel lobby and Stop the Steal. When an 8-year-old girl from Kansas City said she didn’t want coal for Christmas, Trump corrected her: it’s actually "clean, beautiful coal" — because nothing says holiday magic like marketing the dirtiest fossil fuel on Earth to children on live TV.
Trump then explained that the U.S. government is making sure Santa isn’t "infiltrated" and that we’re not getting a "bad Santa" sneaking into the country — in other words, he managed to work border paranoia into a call with a kid asking about presents. He also reminded another child that Oklahoma was "very good" to him in the election and told them not to ever leave the state, because apparently even Santa outreach has to double as a campaign stop now.
The real centerpiece, though, was Trump lying about the 2020 election to a child from Pennsylvania, claiming he won the state "actually, three times" and adding, "I bet your mom voted properly." So we’ve now reached the stage where election denial is just casual small talk with 8-year-olds. After the calls, he jumped onto Truth Social to wish a Merry Christmas to "Radical Left Scum" allegedly trying and failing to destroy the country, before bragging about how "respected" America is under him. But sure, tell me again how both sides are equally normal.
#killing-democracy#full-stupid
trump tries to defund counterterrorism to own the sanctuary cities
The Trump administration, carefully weighing national security needs against the urgent priority of punishing blue states for not doing ICE’s paperwork.
The Trump administration had a fun new idea for "homeland security": strip more than $230 million in FEMA and DHS counterterrorism and disaster-prep grants from states that won't turn their cops into unpaid ICE agents. Because nothing says "keeping Americans safe" like yanking anti-terror and emergency response money from New York, Massachusetts, and D.C. to score Fox News points.
Unfortunately for the White House, US district judge Mary McElroy — a 2018 Trump appointee, no less — read the law instead of the press releases. In a blistering 48-page decision, she called it a "wanton abuse" of their grant powers and noted that this money funds actual life-or-death programs, citing the Brown University mass shooting response as one example. In other words, Trump’s DHS tried to hold counterterrorism funding hostage over immigration politics, and the judge replied: absolutely not, and also, are you people out of your minds?
Letitia James and a coalition of 12 state AGs dragged the administration into court and walked out with their funding back and a federal ruling that this little extortion scheme was "unconscionable" and unlawful. DHS, naturally, plans to appeal, because if there’s one thing this crowd hates more than immigrants, it’s the idea that federal money isn’t a personal political slush fund.
#killing-democracy#lawlessness
america ruled by a very sleepy sun god
President Trump carefully not falling down the stairs on his way to confuse Albania with Armenia and declare victory over wind turbines.
Trump says he’s delivered “more positive change” than any administration in US history, which is certainly one way to describe a year spent nodding off in meetings, confusing Albania with Armenia, and inventing a fan-fiction backstory where his uncle mentored the Unabomber at MIT. Minor problem: the uncle was dead a decade before Kaczynski was identified and, also, Kaczynski never went to MIT. But sure, let’s hand this guy the nuclear codes and a microphone.
Across 2025, the 79‑year‑old president has treated the country to a highlight reel of deeply normal behavior: drifting off into two-minute rants about windmills driving whales “loco” and killing all the birds (scientifically: no), obsessing over how Barack Obama walks down stairs, and explaining his own foreign policy by mixing up entire countries. The White House solution? A rotating cast of flacks insisting his “mental sharpness is second to none” while former White House doc Ronny Jackson declares him the “healthiest president this nation has ever seen” — because nothing says medical credibility like pretending the guy who forgets which body part got an MRI is basically Captain America.
Meanwhile, the schedule for this supposed unstoppable dynamo of American greatness runs roughly noon to 5pm, with public events down nearly 40% from his first term. When he does surface, it’s often to call Somali immigrants “garbage” or to essentially blame Rob Reiner for his own death, all while periodically falling asleep in the Oval Office, in cabinet meetings, and at a cannabis reform presser. In other words: the substantive work of governing has been replaced by a fragile cult of personality frantically insisting that the emperor’s naps are actually 4D chess.
Democrats are reportedly planning to make his mental fitness a midterm issue, which the White House dismisses as partisan trash. But the real story here isn’t just whether Trump is mentally OK; it’s that an entire party, a tame physician, and a propaganda ecosystem are perfectly happy to let a visibly diminished man rage, doze, and ramble his way through the presidency — as long as he keeps signing the papers they put in front of him.
#killing-democracy#full-stupid
state department discovers free speech by banning critics from entering country
The State Department, bravely protecting American free speech by making sure critics of disinformation can’t physically enter the country to talk about it.
In the latest defense of "American free speech," the Trump administration has decided the best way to protect it is to… ban foreign critics from entering the country. The State Department has denied US visas to five people whose great crime is working against disinformation and online hate, including Imran Ahmed of the Centre for Countering Digital Hate and Clare Melford of the Global Disinformation Index. They’ve been officially rebranded as "radical activists" in the global "censorship-industrial complex"—because nothing says "we love open debate" like slapping dissidents with travel bans.
Also on the enemies list: former EU commissioner Thierry Breton, architect of the EU’s Digital Services Act, plus two leaders of German anti-hate group HateAid. Their sin? Supporting regulations that mildly inconvenience US tech billionaires and the right’s favorite disinformation firehoses. Macron and other European leaders are calling it "intimidation" and an attack on European digital sovereignty, while the Trump State Department insists it’s just defending American speech from the unspeakable horror of… foreign laws passed by elected parliaments.
In other words, the administration that screams about "censorship" any time a Nazi loses a blue check is now using federal power to blacklist researchers and regulators who track hate, disinfo, and platform lies. The targets call it an authoritarian attack on free speech and the rule of law, which is accurate but undersells the vibe: this is a loyalty test for US tech and a warning shot to anyone who thinks platforms should verify users or stop monetizing hate. But sure, tell us again how the real tyrants are the people asking Elon Musk to follow the law.
#killing-democracy#fascism#forever-grifting
democracy? sorry, we’re redistricting that away
A map of the United States, helpfully updated to show where voters still matter and where the legislature already picked the winners.
President Trump spent 2025 speedrunning the part of the authoritarian playbook where you don’t bother winning more voters, you just draw fewer of the wrong ones. Republican legislatures across the country spent the year furiously carving up congressional maps like a Christmas ham, hunting for every last seat they could steal by line-drawing instead of, you know, persuading people. Because nothing says “confidence in your ideas” like having to gerrymander the map into modern art just to survive the next election.
Trump is reportedly leaning on GOP states to squeeze out maximum advantage before next year’s contests, while Democrats get a few scattered chances to counter in the courts or in the handful of states they still control. In other words: Republicans are playing a coordinated, nationwide power-maximization game, and Democrats are playing whack-a-mole with a butter knife.
So 2025 becomes the year where the House of Representatives is less about representing actual people and more about representing whichever party controls the cartographers. But sure, tell us again how this is all about “election integrity” and not about pre-rigging the scoreboard before voters even show up.
#killing-democracy#oligarchy#full-stupid
supreme court temporarily rediscovers posse comitatus
Live look at Chicago, which the White House insists is in open rebellion, as federal judges squint and say, "We’re gonna need more than Fox B-roll for that."
The Trump administration went to the Supreme Court demanding permission to federalize and deploy the Illinois National Guard to "protect" immigration agents in Chicago, because nothing says "normal law enforcement" like rolling in the troops over local objections. The Court, in a rare moment of remembering what the law is, said no—at least for now—pointing out that the statute Trump invoked only kicks in when the regular military can't restore order, and that tiny inconvenience called the Posse Comitatus Act still exists.
In an unsigned order, a 5–4 majority (three conservatives plus the three liberals) noted that the government "failed to identify a source of authority" to let the military execute civilian law in Illinois. Translation: you don't get to cosplay dictatorship just because you're mad at Chicago. Illinois and Chicago had already argued that this was less about "rebellion" and more about Trump punishing political enemies, and lower courts agreed there was no credible evidence of the "lawless chaos" the administration keeps insisting is everywhere Democrats live.
Naturally, Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch were furious that the Court didn't just wave through the deployment, with Alito announcing his "serious doubts" about the majority's reasoning—because if the president wants to send troops into opposition cities over protests, who is the Constitution to say no? Meanwhile, Trump's broader campaign to impose federal control on Democratic-led cities—D.C., Los Angeles, Portland, and beyond—rolls on, backed by a string of Supreme Court wins. But in this case, even this Court decided that using the National Guard as an ICE goon squad crossed a line. For now.
#killing-democracy#fascism
trump screams ‘judicial coup,’ judges buy guns and cancel credit cards
Federal judges upgrading home security and dodging swat teams because the president can’t handle losing in court — truly the shining city on a hill the Founders envisioned.
In the latest episode of "Who Wants To Be A Fascist?", longtime Reagan-appointed Judge John Coughenour blocked Trump’s blatantly unconstitutional stunt to gut birthright citizenship — and immediately discovered what happens when you anger the guy whose fanbase thinks the Constitution is a deep-state plot. Within days, someone "swatted" the 84-year-old judge, falsely reporting that he’d murdered his wife and barricaded himself in his home, then followed up with a fake bomb threat in his mailbox. After four decades on the bench, Coughenour finally did something he’d never felt compelled to do: he took a gun home from the courthouse because the American president and his enablers had whipped up a mob against him.
He’s not alone. Judges across the country who ruled against Trump or dared defend judicial independence are now living like they’re in witness protection. They’re upgrading home security, changing driving routes, moving houses, freezing hacked credit cards, and warning their families to scrub personal info from the internet. One Trump-appointed judge received death threats after crossing Dear Leader; another judge, Stephen Bough, blocked a Trump deportation scheme and was rewarded with creepy 1 a.m. pizza deliveries to his home — and to his daughter’s house 800 miles away — because nothing says "respect for law and order" like weaponizing DoorDash. The U.S. Marshals are now treating surprise pizzas as potential intimidation ops, possibly from foreign actors, which is definitely a normal thing in a functioning democracy.
Meanwhile, the administration that lit the match is insisting it’s just telling the "truth." Stephen Miller calls adverse rulings a "judicial coup," Attorney General Pam Bondi sneers about "low-level leftist judges," and MAGA influencers daydream publicly about impeaching judges who get in the way of the agenda. Then White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson shows up to deliver the punchline: any suggestion that this relentless demonization might be fueling threats is "deeply unserious," and actually, Trump "cares deeply" about judicial safety. In other words: they slam the gas pedal on delegitimizing the courts, watch the threats spike, and then swear they’re just humble truth-tellers while the judges buy guns and move houses — but sure, tell us more about how this is all very normal and not at all how democracies die.
#killing-democracy#fascism
historic shutdown, tariff brain genius, and the vibes recession
Americans bravely simulating a thriving economy by maxing out their cards on rent, medical bills, and AI gadgets while Trump calls it the greatest boom in history.
Trump’s miracle economy update: GDP grew at a robust 4.3% in Q3, which we are only hearing about now because the historic Trump shutdown jammed up the Commerce Department so badly they couldn’t even release numbers on time. Nothing says "stable business environment" like a president who both tanks the first quarter with sweeping global tariff threats and then turns off the government’s lights so the statisticians can’t tell you how bad his ideas were.
Meanwhile, the supposed boom is powered by people spending more on hospitals, nursing homes, prescription drugs, and computer hardware to feed the AI hype machine. In other words, Americans are going broke trying not to die and training the algorithms that will replace them, but sure, "consumer spending is strong." Inflation is down to 2.7%, wages are still (barely) beating prices, and yet the cost of rent, electricity, and health insurance keeps chewing through paychecks so fast that only rich shoppers are keeping retail afloat.
Despite the topline "win," business and residential investment are falling, the job market is softening, and people tell pollsters they feel like their finances are circling the drain. Trump, naturally, insists everything is amazing; the latest NPR/PBS/Marist poll says only 36% of Americans approve of his handling of the economy, his worst score yet. So the official numbers say the economy is growing, the president says he’s a genius, and most people say they’re one surprise bill away from disaster — but remember, questioning the vibes is fake news.
#killing-democracy#full-stupid#money
trump calls press 'enemy of the people,' cops take notes
A journalist in a press vest and helmet, moments before law enforcement demonstrates what "enemy of the people" means in practice.
The Freedom of the Press Foundation just dropped a fun little data point: in 2025, US journalists have been assaulted almost as many times as in the previous three years combined. The spike comes as Trump returns to office, ramps up mass deportations, and revives his greatest hit, calling the press the "enemy of the people"—because nothing says "land of the free" like turning news-gathering into a contact sport.
Most of the 170 documented assaults this year happened at protests against the administration’s immigration crackdown, where law enforcement decided that the real threat wasn’t unconstitutional deportations without due process, but people with cameras and press badges. Reporters and photographers were batoned, shot with pepper balls and "less-lethal" rounds, and blown up with explosive devices from a safe 40 feet away, just to make sure nobody gets too clear a picture of how "Operation Midway Blitz" actually looks on the ground.
A federal judge in Chicago had to issue a restraining order literally telling ICE and DHS "don’t beat the people clearly marked as journalists unless they’re committing a crime"—a standard that used to be implied by the whole Constitution thing. The government responded by insisting the area was in a "vise hold of violence" to justify indiscriminate force, and the judge politely translated that as: "That narrative simply is untrue." In other words, they lied to defend assaulting the press, then appealed the ruling because of course they did.
But remember, we can’t prove a direct line from Trump’s years of media-bashing to cops treating reporters like enemy combatants. He only calls them liars, delegitimizes their work, brands them enemies of the people, and runs an administration whose policies and rhetoric "reflect hostility towards the press" and could be seen as condoning violence. Totally mysterious how we ended up with journalists getting shot and clubbed for doing their jobs. Must be a coincidence.
#killing-democracy#fascism#lawlessness
trump orders, whatley obeys: north carolina tries elective monarchy
Michael Whatley, proudly auditioning for the role of ‘Most Loyal Senate Intern to Dear Leader’ while North Carolina voters pretend this is still a normal election.
Michael Whatley is running for Senate in North Carolina the old-fashioned way: by waiting for Donald Trump to call and inform him that he’s already decided. According to Whatley, Trump phoned after Sen. Thom Tillis bowed out and basically said, “You’re going to run, you’re going to win, so congratulations” — because nothing says representative democracy like the president assigning Senate seats over the phone like it’s a mid-level promotion at Trump Org.
Whatley, former RNC chair and current professional Trump loyalist, has responded by Velcroing himself to Trump so hard you can practically hear the ripping sound. Onstage at a pre-Christmas rally, he declared Trump “the most transformational president in our lifetime” and pledged to be his “ally” in the Senate — not an ally to North Carolinians, mind you, but to “our great president.” In other words, it’s not a Senate race, it’s a loyalty audition.
Meanwhile, the MAGA base is deeply inspired by…someone else. Steve Bannon says Whatley’s “not MAGA,” grassroots Republicans are openly calling him “an awful candidate,” and Young Republicans at a tacky sweater party are pining for Lara Trump instead — because if you’re going to be a vassal state, you might as well get a real member of the dynasty. Lara, for her part, is using her Fox News show to boost Whatley while bragging about how they “cut the fat” at the RNC, which is a polite way of saying they turned the national party into a fully-owned Trump family asset.
So North Carolina’s “critical” Senate race boils down to this: Roy Cooper, a popular ex-governor who’s actually won statewide races against Trump’s numbers, versus a handpicked former party apparatchik whose main qualification is that he’ll never, ever distance himself from the president. If Whatley wins, Trump keeps his four-seat Senate cushion and his personal Praetorian Guard. If he loses, it’s one tiny crack in the facade of the imperial presidency. But sure, tell us more about how this is just normal politics and not a slow-motion attempt to turn the Senate into the Mar-a-Lago Board of Directors.
#killing-democracy#oligarchy
