judge temporarily blocks kristi noem’s ethnic cleansing internship
Kristi Noem, bravely declaring South Sudan safe from behind a podium in Washington, where the closest thing to a war zone is a CNN green room.
The Trump administration’s Homeland Security chief Kristi Noem tried to celebrate the new year by shoving a few hundred South Sudanese migrants onto a plane back to an active crisis zone, but a federal judge in Boston rudely interrupted the deportation party. Judge Angel Kelley granted an emergency request to stop DHS from letting Temporary Protected Status for South Sudan expire on 5 January, because apparently you’re not supposed to use federal immigration policy as a live-action Risk board.
DHS had insisted that thanks to “renewed peace” and “safe reintegration,” South Sudan was totally fine now – which is an interesting take on a country the US State Department still tells Americans not to travel to. The lawsuit, filed by four South Sudanese TPS holders and African Communities Together, notes the actual reality: ongoing conflict, humanitarian disaster, and a government that is not magically prepared to absorb deportees just because Kristi Noem wants a Fox News hit about getting “tough” on brown people.
TPS has protected South Sudanese nationals since 2011, giving about 232 people work authorization and a reprieve from being shipped back into chaos, with another 73 applications pending. Noem decided that was a bridge too humane, moving not just to end protections for South Sudan but also for immigrants from Syria, Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba, and Nicaragua – a list that, by pure cosmic coincidence, is overwhelmingly non-white. The lawsuit says the move violates the TPS statute, ignores the on-the-ground humanitarian nightmare, and is driven by racial discrimination in violation of the Fifth Amendment.
In other words, the administration tried to quietly downgrade “temporary protected status” to “temporary until Kristi Noem feels racist enough,” and the courts once again had to step in and explain that immigration policy is not supposed to be a whites-only fantasy league. But sure, tell us again how this is all about the rule of law.
#anti-immigration#racism#killing-democracy
trump’s maximum pressure, minimum brain iran strategy
Donald Trump staring at a map of Iran upside down, convinced this time the sanctions will definitely work.
The Iranian foreign minister just published what is basically a polite open letter to Donald Trump explaining, very slowly and with small words, that you can’t bomb your way to a peace deal. Israel’s Netanyahu finally got his wish and pulled the US into a direct war with Iran, and in return Israel got to discover what happens when you poke the regional power that’s ten times your size and not especially amused. The myth of Israel’s military invincibility? Shattered. But sure, tell us again how this was all about "security".
Araghchi walks through how Trump’s first-term tantrum—tearing up the 2015 nuclear deal in favor of "maximum pressure"—was built on Tel Aviv fan fiction: Iran on the brink of collapse, sanctions as a magic regime-change wand, and the JCPOA as some kind of lifeline instead of the only thing keeping a lid on the nuclear file. Reality check: Trump got "maximum resistance" instead, plus a region-wide war, a dead Abraham Accords project, and US allies quietly realizing that writing Israel blank checks is a great way to light their own countries on fire.
Now, with the US bogged down in yet another Middle East mess, Iran is basically saying: look, you’re not going to defeat us militarily, but if you’d like to stop faceplanting, we can talk like adults. The conditions? Treat Iran as a sovereign state, stop demanding surrender disguised as "negotiations", and actually lift sanctions in a verifiable way. In other words, do the opposite of everything the Trump brain trust has done so far. Because nothing says "art of the deal" like blowing up the working deal you already had, starting a regional war, and then being invited—again—to just try basic diplomacy.
#imperialism#killing-democracy
trump turns naturalization ceremonies into deportation pregame show
USCIS officers at the ‘cradle of liberty’ carefully separating the ‘right’ kind of Americans from the ones who followed all the rules but had the wrong birthplace.
At Boston’s Faneuil Hall – the so‑called “cradle of liberty” – USCIS staff walked down the line of would‑be new Americans and asked a simple question: where were you born? If your answer matched one of Trump’s 19 banned countries, congratulations, you got pulled out of line and sent home instead of getting sworn in. Years of vetting, thousands of dollars, and a legal right to citizenship? Too bad, the Dear Leader changed his mind.
This isn’t a one‑off screw‑up; it’s policy. A 5 December USCIS memo ordered a freeze on immigration proceedings – green cards, naturalization interviews, and oath ceremonies – for nationals of those 19 countries, allegedly because an Afghan man, previously granted asylum by the same government now freaking out, shot two National Guard members. In response, the agency blasted out emails saying oath ceremonies were canceled due to “unforeseen circumstances,” as if this was a surprise rainstorm and not a deliberate act of state discrimination.
The human fallout is exactly what the administration ordered. A Haitian nursing assistant who has lived in the US for nearly 25 years, a Libyan doctor developing AI tools to fight lung cancer, Afghans who risked their lives working with the US military – all suddenly told that the finish line doesn’t count because of their passport. Advocates report mass cancellations in at least 16 cities, while terrified applicants refuse to speak publicly, afraid ICE will turn their shattered American dream into a removal order.
And in case it wasn’t obvious, this is the plan. As one advocate notes, Trump started by demonizing undocumented immigrants and is now moving on to people with legal status and even those on the brink of citizenship. In other words, the message from Trump’s America is clear: you can serve the US, work here for a decade, follow every rule, and still get treated like a security threat because of your birthplace. But sure, tell us again how this is about “security” and not a slow, bureaucratic purge of the wrong kinds of future voters.
#anti-immigration#killing-democracy
congress speedruns oligarchy in one fiscal year
The Republican Congress, seen here proudly autographing a trillion-dollar Pentagon budget and a mass deportation fund, pauses briefly to insist this is all about freedom and fiscal discipline.
The Republican Congress celebrated Trump’s second term by doing what it does best: shoveling money to the rich, militarizing everything that moves, and rewriting the rules to make sure nobody can stop them next time. Trump’s “big, beautiful” tax bill is now permanent, because nothing says fiscal responsibility like locking in a $4.5 trillion tax cut that disproportionately benefits the highest earners while everyone else gets the patriotic honor of paying for it later.
But wait, there’s more: the bill rockets the Pentagon over the $1 trillion mark and tosses in $170 billion to supercharge ICE raids and mass deportations, turning immigration policy into a federally funded terror campaign. To help pay for this, they took a chainsaw to Medicaid and clean energy funding—because if there’s one thing Republicans hate more than poor people getting health care, it’s the planet not being on fire.
Meanwhile, Congress went on a deregulation bender, using the Congressional Review Act like a legislative wood chipper to shred 22 Biden-era rules on everything from consumer protection to cybersecurity. Then Senate Republicans decided minority rights were cute but inconvenient, nuking rules to ram through Trump nominees in giant en-bloc batches and creatively redefining what 51 votes can do. In other words, they’re not just passing laws—they’re rebuilding the system so the next round of looting and authoritarian cosplay is even easier.
#killing-democracy#oligarchy#forever-grifting
zelensky says relationship with trump has 'evolved,' translation: shouting to politely pretending putin is nice
Zelensky stands next to Trump at a press conference, trying to sell "peace" while mentally speed-running contingencies for when the guy next to him decides Putin just wants everyone to succeed and maybe own eastern Ukraine forever.
Volodymyr Zelensky politely confirmed that his relationship with Donald Trump has "evolved" – which is a very diplomatic way of saying it went from a shouting match in the Oval Office with Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance to a forced-smiles photo op at Mar-a-Lago. Because nothing says "stable American foreign policy" like screaming at an ally one month and then insisting you're best friends the next, live from the Florida chandelier bunker.
On Fox News, Zelensky joked "Who can convince him?" when asked whether he was trying to sway Trump on a peace plan – a line that doubles as the unofficial motto of every NATO capital these days. Trump, meanwhile, is out there claiming "Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed" and will help rebuild it, which is a fascinating take given that Zelensky, the guy whose country is actually being invaded, says Putin "doesn’t want success for Ukraine" and just wants to avoid more U.S. sanctions. In other words, Trump is once again confidently repeating the vibe Putin apparently gives him on the phone, while the actual victim of the war stands next to him looking "briefly puzzled" on camera.
So we now have the U.S. president publicly selling a fantasy where Russia is eager to help rebuild the country it’s been bombing, while Zelensky is stuck doing diplomatic hostage theater, thanking Trump on X for "support" and "vision" even as he has to gently contradict him on basic reality. It’s a perfect snapshot of Trump-era foreign policy: allies forced to smile and nod while the president ad-libs global security strategy based on whatever an autocrat told him last, but sure, tell us more about how American leadership is "back."
#killing-democracy#national-security
mar-a-lago peace summit: disarm or 'hell to pay,' occupation optional
Vigil for Ran Gvili’s remains, which Netanyahu is now treating as a human shield for indefinite occupation while Trump nods along from the dessert course at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump hosted Benjamin Netanyahu at Mar-a-Lago for what was billed as a Gaza peace check-in and quickly turned it into a joint press conference on why international law is for other people. Trump warned Hamas there would be “hell to pay” if it didn’t disarm on schedule, while carefully describing Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza as a “separate subject” they’d maybe talk about later. Because nothing says good-faith ceasefire like turning one side’s obligations into divine commandment and the other side’s into a vague calendar suggestion.
Netanyahu, in turn, announced that Trump will receive the Israel Prize, the country’s highest civilian honor, which has literally never gone to a non-Israeli before. So the man who’s “not concerned about anything that Israel is doing” while it sits on 53% of Gaza is being given a lifetime achievement award in looking the other way. Trump’s own officials are reportedly exasperated that Netanyahu keeps undermining the ceasefire and stalling the second phase of the plan, but Trump went with: Israel has lived up to the plan “100%” and he’s “not concerned about anything” they do. In other words: the State Department has a peace process, and the president has vibes.
The supposed next phase includes a technocratic Palestinian authority and an international stabilization force, both of which Netanyahu opposes, so he’s now hanging the entire process on the return of one last hostage’s remains – a very real family tragedy being repurposed as an extremely convenient delay tactic. Analysts openly say he has no intention of pulling out or allowing any force that might stop Israeli military action, but sure, the problem is Hamas’ timetable for handing over rifles. Meanwhile, Trump is on-camera falsely claiming that “just about” every hostage was released because of him and that none came out under Biden, a lie so lazy even Snopes had to get involved.
So the “peace” plan currently looks like this: Trump threatens that if Hamas doesn’t meet its end of the deal, other countries will “go in and wipe out Hamas,” while he shrugs at indefinite Israeli control of more than half of Gaza and hands Netanyahu a domestic political prize wrapped in a Mar-a-Lago photo op. It’s less a ceasefire framework and more an infomercial for permanent occupation, but with better catering and worse fact-checking.
#killing-democracy#imperialism
stable genius wants to sue the fed for hurting his feelings
Trump explains monetary policy to Jerome Powell by threatening to fire him and bragging about his $400 million inauguration ballroom.
Donald Trump, standing next to Benjamin Netanyahu like it’s an Axis of Impunity reunion tour, used a press conference to call Fed chair Jerome Powell a “fool” and muse about firing him and suing him for “gross incompetence” – because nothing says independent central bank like the president threatening to can the guy who won’t juice the economy hard enough for your re‑election party. He again lied about the cost of the Federal Reserve’s building renovation, nearly doubling the real $2.5bn figure to $4.1bn, then declared it “the highest price in the history of construction,” which is an interesting take from a man whose own businesses have specialized in overbilling, underdelivering, and occasionally not existing.
Trump also forgot to mention the tiny detail that he was the one who first appointed Powell in 2018, instead blaming Biden for reappointing “a fool” – a convenient bout of amnesia from the self-proclaimed hiring genius whose administration was basically a revolving door of future defendants. He then contrasted the Fed project with his own “magnificent, big, beautiful ballroom” replacing the demolished East Wing, bragging that it’s “under budget and ahead of schedule” before immediately admitting the cost has jumped from $200m to $400m. In other words: Powell is incompetent because his numbers are real; Trump is a visionary because his numbers are made up on the fly.
Having now decided the new ballroom will host the inauguration, Trump blamed the doubled price on “all bullet-proof glass” and a “drone-free roof,” as if the Fed’s problem is not inflation but insufficient gold plating. Meanwhile, he keeps dangling the idea that he “might still” fire Powell and is openly salivating over picking the next Fed chair in January – presumably someone willing to run monetary policy off a Truth Social poll. But sure, tell us more about how the real threat to democracy is technocrats quietly trying to keep the economy from turning into a meme stock.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
foreign policy live from the mar-a-lago buffet line
Trump, live from the world’s tackiest command center, explains that Iran ‘may be behaving badly’—unlike the U.S., which only tears up treaties and threatens wars for sport.
Trump popped up on NBC to announce that "Iran may be behaving badly," which is a bold statement from a guy whose own foreign policy record is a highlight reel of shredded treaties and impulsive drone strikes. From the comfort of Mar-a-Lago — America’s least secure Situation Room and most expensive members-only food court — he warned Iran against building up weapons, as if the entire world hasn’t watched him spend years nuking U.S. credibility on arms control and diplomacy.
In other words, the man who unilaterally torched the Iran nuclear deal is now back on TV warning that Iran might be doing exactly what experts said they’d do after he torched the Iran nuclear deal. Because nothing says ‘serious statesman’ like blowing up the one agreement actually constraining a nuclear program and then acting shocked that the guardrails are gone. But sure, let’s all pretend this is a coherent strategy and not just another episode of ‘Grievance Theater’ filmed live at his golf resort.
Meanwhile, the whole performance fits neatly into the ongoing project of running U.S. foreign policy as a personal branding exercise: tough talk for the cameras, zero consistency, and maximum chaos for everyone who has to clean up after him. America’s institutions burned their credibility to enable this once, and here we are again, watching him freelance nuclear-adjacent threats between meetings with Netanyahu at the cabana bar.
#national-security#killing-democracy#full-stupid
trump cuts $11bn from aid, tosses $2bn back and calls it reform
A family in a makeshift Gaza tent, thoughtfully excluded from Trump’s new, more ‘efficient’ model of who deserves to eat.
The US just announced a shiny new $2bn humanitarian package through a "new model" with the UN, which sounds very impressive until you notice the fine print: Washington's total UN humanitarian contributions crashed from $17.2bn in 2022 to about $3.38bn in 2025. In other words, Trump took a sledgehammer to global aid, then showed up with a roll of duct tape and a press release about efficiency and accountability.
Under the new setup, the UN's humanitarian office gets to manage the money, but the US gets to decide which countries are "priority" enough to be saved this year. Yemen, Afghanistan, and Gaza — all places with catastrophic humanitarian crises — are not on that priority list. But don’t worry, says UN aid chief Tom Fletcher, they'll go around with a begging bowl to other donors for those inconvenient wars and blockades.
State Department under secretary Jeremy Lewin cheerfully explains that these are just the places "where our interests overlap" and that more countries might get help later, if more money magically appears. Gaza, where people are literally living in tents and aid agencies are screaming about shortages, is being kicked to a "separate track" with a vague promise of phase-two funding and "additional donors" that may or may not exist. Because nothing says neutral and impartial humanitarian action like Washington carving the world into politically acceptable and unacceptable famines.
And just to round it out, the administration proudly notes it is cutting climate-related and other non-priority projects, while the UN slashes its global appeal from $47bn to $23bn because donor governments — led by the US and friends — decided tanks and missiles are a better investment than keeping millions of people alive. But sure, "millions of lives will be saved across 17 countries" — after Trump personally helped turn off the tap for everyone else.
#killing-democracy#imperialism
trump announces mystery strike on mystery target in mystery war
US warships enforcing a totally-not-a-blockade "quarantine" on Venezuela, bravely protecting America from the mortal threat of discounted oil and brown people with sovereignty.
Donald Trump told Republican donor and supermarket magnate John Catsimatidis that the US "knocked out" a "big plant, or a big facility, where the ships come from" in Venezuela — but didn’t say what it was, where it was, or why he’s announcing possible acts of war on a radio chat instead of, you know, Congress. The White House has offered zero details, because nothing says responsible use of military force like your commander-in-chief vaguely bragging about blowing something up he can’t quite identify.
If confirmed, it would be the first acknowledged land strike on Venezuela since Trump ordered a massive military buildup in the Caribbean, originally sold as a noble effort to stop drug trafficking allegedly directed by Nicolás Maduro. That mission has now "evolved" into a maritime "quarantine" that just happens to target Venezuela’s oil exports — except for Chevron, the one US-approved company still allowed to make money there. In other words, it’s less "war on drugs" and more "war on anyone not cutting checks through the right lobbyists."
The administration is carefully avoiding the word "blockade" while stationing about 15,000 personnel, a carrier strike group, F‑35s and Coast Guard cutters in the region to choke off Venezuelan oil. Trump has been openly threatening to expand strikes inside Venezuela — a move that would, in a functioning republic, require congressional authorization. Instead, we get anonymous officials telling CNN he meant a "drug facility" and grainy online video of an explosion in an industrial zone that no one has independently verified. But sure, let’s just trust the guy who can’t remember if it was a "plant" or a "big facility" as he casually escalates an undeclared war over the radio.
#imperialism#killing-democracy
state tv auditions go badly, trump sues anyway
Trump glares at a bank of TV screens while billionaires fight over the remote, and somewhere in the corner a lone Guardian reporter is holding up a tip jar labeled “actual journalism.”
US media in the Trump era is apparently a group project between angry billionaires and a vengeful president, and somehow the only ones not invited are readers and the truth. While Murdochs, Bezos, Soon‑Shiong, and the very Trump‑friendly Ellison clan play Monopoly with newsrooms, they helpfully “guide” coverage so it aligns with their pet projects, personal feuds, and investment portfolios. Because nothing says “independent press” like your boss’s hobbyhorse turning into the editorial line.
On the other side, Trump is running his own quality-control department, where “quality” means “does it flatter me.” He’s using frivolous defamation suits and weaponized regulatory agencies to squeeze outlets that offend his delicate feelings: a giant settlement out of CBS over a banal Kamala Harris edit, a lawsuit against the New York Times for being mean in print, and an FCC chair threatening ABC’s broadcast license over a comedian’s joke. In other words, it’s not censorship if you just bankrupt or de-license everyone who laughs at you.
Under pressure from both their billionaire owners and Trump’s retribution machine, big outlets are dialing everything down to legally vetted mush—soft-pedaled coverage, hedged language, and opinion sections that read like hostage notes to shareholders and the White House. The result: worse journalism at the exact moment the country needs better. But don’t worry, The Guardian would like you to know that they don’t have a billionaire owner, they’re not pulling punches, and they answer to readers instead of oligarchs or the guy threatening broadcast licenses. Also, please click the big donate button to help fund this rare, non-captured corner of the press.
#killing-democracy#oligarchy#fascism
leopards ate my face, says woman who campaigned for leopards
Marjorie Taylor Greene, freshly trampled by the Trump train she helped drive, explaining she was 'naive' to think the guy screaming about revenge and loyalty oaths wasn’t in it for himself and his Epstein-adjacent friends.
Marjorie Taylor Greene has discovered, very late in the series finale, that Donald Trump is not actually a humble servant of the working class but a raging narcissist who openly declares, "I hate my opponent, and I don’t want the best for them." In other words, the quiet part has been on a bullhorn for ten years and she’s just now hearing it.
Greene says she had her big come-to-Jesus moment watching Charlie Kirk’s widow publicly forgive her husband’s killer, only for Trump to stomp onstage and announce that forgiveness is for suckers. That, she says, showed he has no faith. Not the attempted coup, not the family-separation policy, not the pandemic death cult, not the endless grift—the line was mean words at a memorial service. But sure, that’s the bright red line.
The real fireworks come when she describes her final break with the White House over the vote to release the Jeffrey Epstein investigative files. After meeting victims and deciding maybe the sex-trafficking blackmail ring of America’s ruling class should see daylight, Greene says Trump called her and yelled that "my friends will get hurt" if those files come out. Because nothing says "man of the people" like trying to bury evidence to protect your billionaire pals from consequences.
Now Greene, who once screamed that Democrats were traitors and cheered on the MAGA purge, is shocked to find herself "radioactive" and exiled from both parties. She insists she hasn’t changed her views, she’s just "matured" and discovered that Washington is broken and run for the benefit of rich, powerful elites doing horrible things and getting away with it. Which, awkwardly, is exactly the thing she helped build, defended, and voted for—until the machine finally turned on her too. The leopards-ate-my-face caucus claims another alumni speaker.
#corruption#leopards-ate-my-face
trump launches a trade war, then hides the body (and the data)
Donald Trump triumphantly announcing record tariffs while his staff frantically tapes over the economic dashboard with "DO NOT RESUME UNTIL AFTER ELECTION" signs.
Trump cranked average US tariffs from 2% to 18% – the highest since the 1930s – blowing past his first-term trade war and even Smoot-Hawley, because nothing says "America First" like reenacting the pre–Great Depression policy playbook. He did it while violating international trade agreements and torching the GOP’s 40-year cosplay as a "free trade" party, but sure, tell us more about conservative principles.
Economists braced for inflation, layoffs, and a real-income beating. Instead, the headline numbers look... not catastrophic. Why? For starters, the federal government literally stopped measuring reality: Trump’s shutdown kneecapped the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the BEA, so the CPI and GDP data are full of holes and heroic assumptions. In other words, the economy hasn’t held up so much as the scoreboard’s been unplugged.
On top of that, the "tough" tariffs aren’t even fully in effect. Trump keeps delaying some, rolling others back when voters notice grocery prices going vertical, and handing out massive exemptions to Canada and Mexico after briefly slapping them with a 25% auto tariff for 48 hours of performative chest-thumping. Business and markets now operate under the rule of TACO – "Trump Always Chickens Out" – where the president does nuclear-threat cosplay, then quietly retreats once donors scream.
Meanwhile, companies spent a year panic-buying imports ahead of the tariffs, stockpiling everything from Swiss gold to Irish weight-loss drugs and dodging billions in duties. So the real hit is delayed to 2026, when the inventories run out and the exemptions run thin. But for now, Trump gets to claim victory in his imaginary trade war: he broke international rules, sabotaged data collection, destabilized supply chains, and called it winning – because if you can’t see the damage, it must not exist.
#trade-war#killing-democracy#full-stupid
historic comeback mostly happening to other people
Trump explains the ‘historic comeback’ to people whose bank accounts appear to be participating in a completely different economy.
Nearly half of Americans now say their financial security is getting worse, and the other half are presumably just waiting for the next layoff email. A new Harris poll finds 45% of people feel less secure than before, while only 20% say things are improving—but the White House insists we’re living through a "historic comeback" and that prices are "coming down fast." Because nothing says ‘comeback’ like mass government layoffs, chaotic tariffs, and a crackdown on immigrant labor that breaks supply chains.
The economy on paper is doing fine—strong GDP growth, no technical recession—yet 57% of Americans say we’re in a recession anyway. That’s what happens when your "booming" economy is a K-shaped funhouse where the stock market is high, the rich are richer, and everyone under $50,000 a year is watching their finances go through the floor. Fifty-nine percent of those making under $50k say their security is getting worse, compared with 37% of those over $100k. In other words: Trump’s "comeback" is mostly a vibes-based recovery for people who own multiple ETFs.
The partisan breakdown is a chef’s-kiss of dysfunction. Democrats and independents are increasingly blaming the government for rising prices—76% and 72% respectively—while Republicans are heroically trying to pin it on "corporate practices" instead, as if Trump’s tariffs and mass firings are just a weird coincidence. Women, Black, and Hispanic voters—whom Trump bragged about winning over in 2024—are now far more likely to say their finances are deteriorating and that we’re in a recession. But sure, keep rolling out the teleprompter speeches about how everything is totally fixed and the only problem is people’s "perceptions." If only people could pay rent in White House talking points.
#forever-grifting#killing-democracy
president shithole reboots the culture war
Donald Trump, fresh off signing another executive order to erase someone’s rights, explains that the real victims in America are white guys who say ‘shithole countries’ into microphones.
Donald Trump spent year one of Term Two proving that when he said he’d end ‘woke’, he meant ‘civil rights’. Within weeks, he signed executive orders to kill diversity, equity and inclusion and affirmative action across government, detonating thousands of DEI-related jobs in both the public and private sectors and helping purge journalists of color from newsrooms. Because nothing says ‘merit-based opportunity’ like making sure the only people left to cover the White House look like the country club directory.
He followed that up by banning gender-affirming care for anyone under 19, sending families of trans kids into a nationwide panic as they scrambled to preserve basic medical treatment. Then, in case it wasn’t clear that this is a white grievance administration, he ordered JD Vance to block federal spending on Smithsonian programs about race and tried to erase Indigenous history again by renaming Denali back to Mount McKinley. Add in mass deportation raids that are literally tearing families apart, and you’ve got the full ‘America First, everyone else last, or deported’ package.
On the mic, Trump dropped the quiet parts into a bullhorn. He mused about turning Gaza into a ‘demolition site’ and relocating Palestinians elsewhere, because ethnic cleansing is apparently just a real estate problem. He ranted that the FAA was ‘too white’ until DEI allegedly ruined it, smeared Somalia as a place where people ‘run around killing each other’, and called Rep. Ilhan Omar ‘garbage’ who should be ‘thrown the hell out’ of the country. At rallies, he dusted off his ‘shithole countries’ routine, demanded more Norwegians, and bragged about a ‘permanent pause on third world migration’ while crowing on Truth Social that he ‘loves the smell of deportations in the morning’—in other words, the Ellis Island reboot is Apocalypse Now.
And because he never met a bigotry buffet he didn’t want to hit twice, Trump tossed in some casual antisemitism for dessert: declaring Chuck Schumer ‘used to be Jewish’ but is now ‘a Palestinian’, and referring to ‘shylocks and bad people’ while bragging about his estate tax cuts. Women, of course, get the usual treatment—dismissed as nasty, boring, or not smart enough whenever they dare mix faith, politics, or criticism of Dear Leader. The Guardian calls it ‘Trump in his own words.’ The rest of us call it what it is: racism and misogyny as official U.S. policy, narrated live by the guy holding the nuclear codes.
#racism#trumps-america#killing-democracy
shutdowns for fun, hunger for leverage
Nothing says 'greatest country on Earth' like seniors in Ohio waiting in the cold for heating aid because the president needed a talking point on cable news.
Nothing says "America is back" like making poor people line up in the freezing rain because the president wanted a hostage for his latest stunt. In Logan, Ohio, people like Scott Skinner and Lisa Murphy are standing outside a food pantry before dawn, not because there’s a natural disaster, but because the Trump administration decided that shutting down the government and suspending SNAP and heating aid was a perfectly acceptable negotiating tactic.
SNAP benefits are delayed, heating assistance is frozen, and local charities like "The Market" are left trying to patch the holes blown in the safety net by people in Washington who have never had to choose between groceries and the gas bill. Weeks of suspended food aid mean months of fallout as families play catch-up on rent, utilities, and basic survival, while Republicans on TV brag about "fiscal responsibility" and "draining the swamp" by draining people’s pantries.
In other words, 2025 will be remembered by anti-poverty workers as the year the federal safety net turned into a political ransom note: pay Trump’s demands or watch seniors and disabled people freeze in the dark. But sure, tell us more about how the real crisis is people "dependent on government."
#trumps-america#killing-democracy
the ryder coup: turning golf into a trump loyalty pageant
Donald Trump fist-bumps Bryson DeChambeau at the Ryder Cup, celebrating their shared achievement of turning golf into a traveling MAGA personality cult with snipers, misogyny merch, and Secret Service apple warnings.
At Bethpage Black, Europe won the Ryder Cup, but the real star was the weird little authoritarian theme park that sprang up around Donald Trump’s presence. You had a woman shrieking at Bryson DeChambeau about how much she loves him "for everything you’ve done for the Donald", like a QAnon Hallmark card come to life. Fans wore shirts bragging "It’s Official – Trump Beats Women" and "Alex Jones did nothing wrong", because nothing says family sporting event like open celebration of misogyny and conspiracy cranks.
New York’s Democratic governor Kathy Hochul got drowned out by a furious Trumpist crowd, police hassled credentialed press for ID anyway, and yard signs proudly declared: "We are all Charlie Kirk now"—a threat if there ever was one. On the train, a white guy literally sat on a young Black woman’s belongings while screaming "This is the Long Island Rail Road, bitch" as bystanders argued over whether basic decency is "everything that’s wrong with this country". In other words: MAGA culture war, now with 30% more Bud Light and golf polos.
Security turned the course into a low-budget police state: snipers on the clubhouse roof, "airport-style" checkpoints, and a Secret Service agent informing a fan that yes, he could keep his apple, but if he threw it at the president he was going to jail. Because nothing screams robust democracy like threatening prison over hypothetical fruit. The golf was dramatic, Europe won in style, and yet the lasting memory is that under Trump, even a Ryder Cup becomes a stress test for how much petty authoritarianism and public cruelty people will tolerate between tee shots.
#killing-democracy#trumps-america#full-stupid
dems discover the internet, ten years after the coup
Democrats, circa 2025, staring at a TikTok ring light like it’s the Ark of the Covenant while the right’s propaganda Death Star orbits overhead.
Democrats, having just been steamrolled in 2024 and graciously handed Donald Trump his second shot at wrecking the republic, have finally identified the real problem: they forgot the internet existed. After decades of the right building a lavish, billionaire-subsidized outrage machine — Fox, Daily Wire, Breitbart, Blaze, PragerU, Turning Point USA, the whole "what if propaganda but as a lifestyle brand" universe — party strategists have realized that maybe, just maybe, buying more TV ads for MSNBC viewers wasn’t going to cut it.
Kyle Tharp, who launched his aptly named newsletter Chaotic Era just before Trump’s second inauguration, has been chronicling the scramble as Democrats rush onto TikTok, podcasts, and YouTube like it’s 2012 and not the part of the timeline where democracy is on fire. Suddenly, members of Congress and presidential hopefuls are flooding podcasts, begging liberal donors to fund a left-leaning media ecosystem, and discovering the radical concept of "creator marketing" — i.e., paying people who actually know how to talk to normal humans.
On the plus side, there’s now a "whole new bench" of progressive creators and partisan outlets trying to counter the MAGA content mill. On the minus side, the right has a 10–20 year head start, a massive influencer bench, and a propaganda infrastructure that’s been softening the ground for authoritarianism since the Obama years. But sure, a few more podcast appearances and TikTok collabs will definitely fix the part where Trump is back in the White House threatening the rule of law on live TV.
#killing-democracy#forever-grifting
history confirms: trump is more coffee stain than renaissance masterpiece
Trump gazes into the distance, presumably searching for the historic legacy that keeps stubbornly refusing to exist.
Donald Trump has spent a decade insisting he’s Alexander, Washington, Napoleon and Gandhi in a single spray-tanned package, but history seems poised to file him under "miscellaneous stains". Simon Tisdall notes that for all the fascist cosplay and "civilisation war" manifestos, Trump’s grand legacy is shaping up less like a world-historic realignment and more like a four-year Prohibition for populists: loud, destructive, and ultimately remembered as a national bender everyone would rather forget.
The piece skewers Trump’s self-mythology against the reality: a flailing "authoritarian, anti-European" national security strategy that trashes alliances, an economy wobbling under his tariff brainwaves, and a MAGA coalition already cracking as his approval sinks. In other words, he’s not the epoch-defining strongman he imagines so much as an unsightly smear on the canvas of history – the guy who tried to turn the US into Hungary with nukes and mostly managed to vandalize the institutions rather than fully replace them.
Yet even as Trump and his far-right pals push "civilisational erasure" nonsense and nationalist-populist snake oil, the article argues that the deeper continuity is democracy itself: still the preferred system, still outliving its would-be gravediggers. The cold war ended, then sort of didn’t; the Arab Spring rose and fell; 9/11 rewrote the rulebook mostly by shredding it. Trump slots neatly into that pattern as another overhyped "turning point" who will be remembered less as a transformative leader and more as the cautionary footnote: this is what happens when you let a reality TV landlord play at autocrat.
#killing-democracy#fascism#full-stupid
trump discovers prices exist, declares it a campaign platform
Trump, moments after learning that groceries cost money, announces a bold new strategy: complain about ‘pricing’ on television.
Trump is now floating "pricing" as a key midterm issue after previously blasting "affordability," which is a long way of saying: he’s discovered that everything is expensive and decided the real problem is the words people are using. Because nothing says serious economic leadership like rebranding your own inflation as a messaging challenge.
In other words, instead of admitting that corporate price-gouging, deregulation, and tax cuts for the rich might have something to do with people not being able to afford rent, groceries, or health care, the plan is to yell about "pricing" on TV and hope voters forget who’s been in charge while their bills exploded. Policy remains MIA, but the buzzwords are having a fantastic quarter.
So the White House response to families getting crushed is: don’t worry about your empty bank account, we’re workshopping the slogan. It’s the perfect encapsulation of Trump-era governance — all branding, no fixing — but sure, tell us more about how just saying "pricing" a lot is going to magically make eggs cost less.
#full-stupid#money
