M. Scott Peck warned decades ago that social systems built on lies eventually lose the capacity to distinguish reality from fantasy, loyalty from morality, or raw power from truth...
Every time I read about Republicans' reliance on falsehoods, I return to the Fairness Doctrine, and what we've lost with its absence. If we don't return to requiring truth, accuracy, and equal time in the news, by whatever mechanism, 38% of the US population will continue to endorse fascism. Our deep division correlates EXACTLY with the % of US adults who get their news from Fox and Sinclair- all propaganda, all the time. The sooner we understand this, the sooner we'll fix it. If the UK can regulate accuracy in the news, so can we.
As I sat in my hairstylist’s chair, I was both surprised and pleased to hear the owner, employees and customers make fun of Trump. One had expressed worries about the upcoming heating bill, having heard from others that the bill showed a large increase. The chorus behind him starting laughing: “Don’t worry, gas prices are waaay down. Everything is coming down!!”.
This occurred in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, hardly a bastion of liberal views. No, its home to “just us city folks”, trying to succeed, take care of family, give our children a better future, enjoy life a bit. Home owners, passed through generations, small business owners, store keepers, civil servants, teachers, firemen, police officers. You know, the “ordinary people” often referred to in the media – though we aren’t as respected as middle America, the perceived backbone of real Americans – we’re the home of the “elite”.
My corner of the world is built of people with common sense and common cause. My father-in-law, small garment business owner (bathing suit “knock-offs”) born on the lower east side, moving to the then “suburbs” Brooklyn, was a staunch Republican (voted for Goldwater). His take on politicians? “Everyone has their finger in the pie – just don’t get caught”. But he didn’t always vote the party line: “Its time to give the other guys a chance”.
My Dad, a postal worker – sent by his family after the depression to get a good, secure job – and union member -- was a Democrat. “I don’t know what everyone has against the Democrats – they gave us Social Security.”
Hearing the sarcasm, from those who I assume voted for Trump, as I remember conversations before the election, gave me a ray of hope. Perhaps support for the administration is cracking, if not crumbling.
Then I spoke to a close friend, fellow teacher and retiree, who is a devout Catholic. I don’t know that she voted for Trump, either time, but I know that she repeats, and worse, believes everything that is said on the Fox Channel. That apparently is her, only source of information. We usually veer into politics only briefly, agree to disagree and move on. Only when I find something truly egregious do I extend an “argument”, before we move on to the connection before we move on to the connections that make us friends.
On my last visit, the tv screen in the restaurant was covering the Greenland story.
I lost my cool – and all arguments. “The people of Greenland neither asked for this, or want it”. She hadn’t heard that”. “But You can’t buy a people!” “Why not, they can keep their culture.” “This is like saying, we need to buy Italy!! Well, why not, if they wanted it.” It ended with a smirk, and “things can change” (?!).
Through the looking glass? I still haven’t been able to digest this, let alone understand it. My world has been forever changed. And as dangerous as the Supreme Court and its rulings are and has been; the new Nazi GOP party; the military invasion of our cities by masked goons, we have to place the propaganda machine of FOX at the top of the list, if we ever hope to get back what we have lost.
Condolences. The loss of respect for those we love is very hard to deal with. Keep talking it out, and you'll figure out what to do with all of that in your head and in your heart.
Citizens United is a stage 4 cancer on our democracy. The only cure is legislative. But let us not overlook that while Republicans engineered it with luxuriating Supreme Court Justices, the Democratic Party has done nothing to overturn it. Obama had control of both houses for a while, but did not even put Citizens United in his sights. Democrats lie too. What? Joe Biden was having dementia issues, and the WH staff just covered them up and re-ran him for president? That is a whopper. It cost Democrats the WH.
My point is that regardless of party, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." If having a demented egomaniacal pathological liar in the WH cannot motivate killing Citizens United, then fascism will be our future. I do not want a world defined by greedy computer software engineers who know little to nothing about governing and care only about their unbridled greed and wacky worldviews. They just want to create a Pink Floyd future for mankind as depicted in "The Wall," where humans are being groomed in school to be components in the techbros Machine.
If you watched much news in 2023/4, you would see that his brainfreeze in the Trump debate was not a one-off. There have been articles in which WH staff described typical minor dementia incidents most people experience to some extent once past age 75 (lax impulse control, memory recall failures, situational confusion, emotional outbursts).
POTUS is very high-stress emotionally, cognitively, and physically. Re-electing somebody with known cognitive-emotional symptoms is like pushing a non-swimmer into the deep end of the pool. Just look at DJT. He is looney as a coot after just 1 year back in the saddle.
Watched a fitness expert describe turning 75 as "falling off a cliff".
We need age limits for POTUS, SCOTUS, and Congress. We have limits for pilots. Have the old folks work as advisors and experts.
There's a time and place for everyone to a be a help or a hindrance. If Joe had left when he said he would, we would remember his last State of the Union where he was on-fire, fighting for us. He'd have been the hero that got us through covid.
I watched religiously. If you know anything about dementia, you would also know that brain freeze is not necessary an indicator of dementia. It is an indicator that he had too much on his mind. It was an indicator that he was nervous. Again, you bought the cool aid from people that didn't want him to run, because he was too old. You must be thrilled with his replacement.
When President Biden took office, the country was in the midst of the worst pandemic in more than a century and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. On President Biden's first day in office, he released a National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response to vaccinate the nation and stood up the largest free vaccination program in the country's history.
Politico:
"President Biden's American Rescue Plan changed the country's economic trajectory through targeted relief to meet the urgent needs of American communities, leading to the strongest jobs recovery on record and a world-leading economic performance. The American Rescue Plan:
Invested about $160 billion to provide the supplies, emergency response, testing, and public health workforce to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Provided critical relief to more than 15,000 school districts to reopen safely and support student well-being and academic recovery.
Delivered immediate support for families hard-hit by the pandemic, including extending enhanced unemployment insurance benefits and eligibility for millions of Americans temporarily out of the workforce, lowering taxes for working Americans by increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit for 17 million workers, and providing $1,400 per-person checks for most Americans.
Delivered assistance to help over eight million hard-pressed renters stay in their homes and kept eviction filings below historic averages in the aftermath of the pandemic. Hundreds of thousands of homeowners at risk of losing their homes also received assistance through the American Rescue Plan's Homeowner Assistance Fund to help prevent mortgage delinquencies and defaults, foreclosures, and losses of utilities and home energy services.
Provided a historic expansion of the Child Tax Credit, leading to the lowest child poverty rate in American history in 2021.
Created the first-ever summer nutrition benefit, helping the families of 30 million children nationwide who rely on free and reduced-price school meals afford food over the summer.
Delivered historic investments to help over 225,000 child care programs remain open, lowering costs for millions of families and helping speed the return to work of hundreds of thousands of mothers.
Provided direct fiscal relief to every state and territory and 30,000 cities and towns, enabling critical investments in housing, workforce, public safety, and water and high-speed internet infrastructure.
Lowered or eliminated health insurance premiums for millions of lower- and middle-income families enrolled in health insurance marketplaces, leading to record-breaking health insurance coverage nationwide.
Delivered more than $28 billion in emergency relief to help keep 100,000 restaurants and other food and beverage businesses open during the pandemic.
Powered a small business recovery and boom, including through a historic investment in the State Small Business Credit Initiative to catalyze tens of billions of dollars in private investment, and new small business financing and support, for up to 100,000 small businesses over the next decade."
President Biden invested in our future. In his low key manner and stutterer since childhood, he gave the impression that he was not quite with it. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Age discrimination is not becoming.
The facts that would still be at the forefront, if he had bowed and left the stage.
What a damn shame he didn't follow his FIRST instinct to have one term. Age is a consideration for many jobs.
Thank you for defending him, Sofia. He's a good man. Obama picked him to get us through the tragedy in case he died or was incapacitated. He knew he was excellent for advice on a whole host of things.
Turned out covid was the tragedy he got us through.
TRump showed the world what we were seeing everyday here, that he is one of the sickest human beings on the planet. He will gather the worst of all humans to strangle democracy wherever it is still breathing.
We finally got to see Jack Smith at his bravest and best. Representative Swalwell told the truth about Republican cowards. The committee Democrats told everyone the truth is on the videos and no amount of gas-lighting will change it. Juries saw it too and that's why the insurrectionists were convicted.
Sadistic liars. Psychopathic liars. Pathetic liars. The Republicans have become TRump. Sane people unite! See you in the streets.
All of the republicans interrogating Jack Smith acted like defense attorneys for Trump. Each one grasped at a fictitious thread trying to trying to unravel the whole cloth of his testimony - and failed. “If the facts are against you, argue the law. If the law is against you, argue the facts. If the law and the facts are against you, pound the table and yell like hell”. Carl Sandburg.
The biggest question is how do we undo the greed, the lies, the corruption? How do we undo Citizens United, the corrupt Supreme Court? How do we undo the willful ignorance so many Americans embrace?
"Donald Trump is back in Washington, D.C., and he is clearly losing control. At the same time, a historic moment is taking shape across the United States. A general strike that began in Minnesota is now spreading to other parts of the country, with workers, nurses, and pro-democracy activists coordinating actions that we have not seen at this scale in roughly seventy years. The goal, shared openly by organizers, is to make this the largest general strike in modern U.S. history."
To paraphrase Henry II, "Whose going to rid us of this troublesome pest" By pest I mean MAGA, Trump is the symptom, MAGA is the disease.
Elections aren't going to do it, MAGA has already gamed the system. It will take unified, collective anti MAGA action, real action, not marching and waving placards. Voting? Imagine playing a game, when the rules and referees all favor one side.
Real resistance, boycotting, witthholding labor, surround ICE in force, wearing masks, gas masks, shields resisting their violence, stop playing victim. Be Iranians.
The Iranian revolution shut down this week, because the mullahs cut communications. We need analog methods of communication. Radio shack Walkie Talkies will do
If Trump invokes the Insurrection act and martial law and our troops turn their guns on their own family, neighbors and friends, then it is time for guerilla warfare, do not play victim and lay down to be drug to a concentration camp.
On that score, maybe the reason that he hasn't invoked martial law yet, is because they are still building and acquiring concentration camps (err detention centers)
Rounding up immigrants is only practice.
The following is from AI overview, The fact is that "detention centers" are double down, crowded, filthy, inmates are ill fed, ill clothed, insufficient toilets, showers,and plumbing. and to date 32 have died, at least one strangled to death by guards.
Even our prisons, built to handle X inmates incarcerate 2X, 3X even 6X
Based on reports from late 2025 and early 2026, the Trump administration is planning a massive expansion of immigration detention, with plans to build seven large-scale "mega" detention centers and 16 smaller processing facilities.
These facilities are designed to support a, at times, stated goal of holding up to 80,000 to over 100,000 detainees to accelerate deportations.
Key Details of the Expansion Plan
Large-Scale Facilities (7): These are intended to be "large detention centers," including converted warehouses and tent-based, soft-sided facilities. They are planned to hold 5,000 to 10,000 detainees each.
Locations: Large facilities are planned for Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Missouri, Texas, and Virginia.
Smaller Facilities (16): These "processing sites" are planned for Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Utah, with capacities up to 1,500 people each.
Strategic Approach: The plan aims to create a "staged pipeline" or "feeder system" for faster removals.
Military Involvement: The Navy has been involved in planning, with some facilities potentially located on military bases.
Capacity Goal: As of early 2026, reports indicate the administration aims to have capacity for nearly 108,000 detention beds.
As of late 2025, detainee populations had already reached record levels, with roughly 66,000 people held by early December 2025.
Gloria, that was a serious question asked about the Nazis. After all, dictatorships often find it convenient to have threats to their citizens as a way of justifying their hold on power. If you are surrounded by enemies then you must be strong and remove them.
The easiest thing is to invent them. Stalin did it very well by calling anyone who he thought opposed him (and by extension the glorious socialist future) a Trotskyite, a wrecker, a social parasite, a bourgeois nationalist, a Kulak, or just more generally an "enemy of the people".
I can imagine the GOP digging up more immigrants (say legal citizens whose parents slipped in before having them here) as people to be rooted out, ditto any "questionable" naturalized citizens, and if they can get away with it going as far as they want under NSPM-7 (domestic terrorists=Unchristian enemies of the people). Trump's gang lives by hate, so the well of those they fear is bottomless.
We MUST get corporate money out of politics—period.
We need to be aware of politicians who take their money and from PACs or have strings attached to contributions for political favors. This is one of the only ways to truly know who you’re voting for and what they really stand for, regardless of what they say or promise is follow the money. Who are they beholden to?
If so much of our population is indoctrinated by media such as FOX and right-wing social media, then I fear there’s little hope to combat such stupidity.
Demonstrations aren’t being covered nationwide or accurately. So called Blue cities are being disregarded as trouble makers and lies are being told about them being harbingers of illegal aliens and crime ridden.
The general population just doesn’t know what’s happening outside of their little conservative communities, especially in the middle states and South. Those are the ones who need to see the danger that will soon touch everyone.
With honest elections we have a prayer for turning this around. And the administration and their bakers are fully aware that honest elections are the last hope for any semblance of honesty in government. That’s what we need to be on top of.
How do we monitor elections to keep them from turning into nothing more than an exercise and the joke they are in countries like Russia, Iran, and other fascist nations?
I've noticed that THE facts have been replaced by YOUR facts.
Not only are there no fact-checks -- if I hear one more time how Trump has stopped 8 wars, and only in his deluded and deranged mind, without commentary, I will scream -- but there is no contradiction, let alone context. explanation or refute.
It is not simply that voters are gullible -- starting with the inability to call Trump a racist, continuing through to today when lies are sanitized by calling them misinformation or falsehoods, the media has determined the language we are allowed to use and therefore distorts reality, if not obliterates it completely.
I recall in a class about the cognition of language and perception that we learned that the indigenous people of Alaska have many words to describe/identify snow. The lesson: environment shapes language, language shapes the environment and perception as well. We may be aware of the power of advertising and even propaganda's ability to change opinion. This insidious creep to rewriting the meaning of words, casually implemented and unchallenged is the most dangerous tool in the political arena.
There are voters who share Trump's warped worldview. They view any challenges to Trump's bullshit assertions as disrespecting his amazing achievements out of political malice. Their very poor reasoning skills are likely related to their assertions that the world has treated white MAGAs unfairly - why they are not wealthier and more powerful. The libtards are giving away their tax dollars to lazy minority welfare cheaters at the expense of working-class people like themselves.
One of the Republican Questioners noted that 104 Republican members of the House voted that the 2020 election results were unacceptable. In effect, she admitted that 104 Republican members of Congress were co-conspirators with Trump in his seditious attempts to change the results of the election. I would campaign to remove the current Republican members of the Supreme Court. Roberts has been a major factor in corrupting constitutional government in the U.S.
There are two things that enable the system of lies to succeed. The first is racism. Give a maggot reason to hate brown and black people and he will gladly give you his school lunch money and support the lies. Number two is just as important-education. Without a population capable of critical thinking they will always believe the first thing spoon fed to them.
Unfortunately fixing these two things will take years if not decades but we need to start now. Young children are not inherently racist, it is taught to them. They just need the tools to tell truth from lies.
M. Scott Peck also labeled those people as “evil” and added to their description, “evil not just as immoral acts, but as a specific, destructive personality disorder rooted in intense narcissism, self-deception, and the refusal to acknowledge one's own faults.” Sound familiar?
Every time I read about Republicans' reliance on falsehoods, I return to the Fairness Doctrine, and what we've lost with its absence. If we don't return to requiring truth, accuracy, and equal time in the news, by whatever mechanism, 38% of the US population will continue to endorse fascism. Our deep division correlates EXACTLY with the % of US adults who get their news from Fox and Sinclair- all propaganda, all the time. The sooner we understand this, the sooner we'll fix it. If the UK can regulate accuracy in the news, so can we.
As I sat in my hairstylist’s chair, I was both surprised and pleased to hear the owner, employees and customers make fun of Trump. One had expressed worries about the upcoming heating bill, having heard from others that the bill showed a large increase. The chorus behind him starting laughing: “Don’t worry, gas prices are waaay down. Everything is coming down!!”.
This occurred in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, hardly a bastion of liberal views. No, its home to “just us city folks”, trying to succeed, take care of family, give our children a better future, enjoy life a bit. Home owners, passed through generations, small business owners, store keepers, civil servants, teachers, firemen, police officers. You know, the “ordinary people” often referred to in the media – though we aren’t as respected as middle America, the perceived backbone of real Americans – we’re the home of the “elite”.
My corner of the world is built of people with common sense and common cause. My father-in-law, small garment business owner (bathing suit “knock-offs”) born on the lower east side, moving to the then “suburbs” Brooklyn, was a staunch Republican (voted for Goldwater). His take on politicians? “Everyone has their finger in the pie – just don’t get caught”. But he didn’t always vote the party line: “Its time to give the other guys a chance”.
My Dad, a postal worker – sent by his family after the depression to get a good, secure job – and union member -- was a Democrat. “I don’t know what everyone has against the Democrats – they gave us Social Security.”
Hearing the sarcasm, from those who I assume voted for Trump, as I remember conversations before the election, gave me a ray of hope. Perhaps support for the administration is cracking, if not crumbling.
Then I spoke to a close friend, fellow teacher and retiree, who is a devout Catholic. I don’t know that she voted for Trump, either time, but I know that she repeats, and worse, believes everything that is said on the Fox Channel. That apparently is her, only source of information. We usually veer into politics only briefly, agree to disagree and move on. Only when I find something truly egregious do I extend an “argument”, before we move on to the connection before we move on to the connections that make us friends.
On my last visit, the tv screen in the restaurant was covering the Greenland story.
I lost my cool – and all arguments. “The people of Greenland neither asked for this, or want it”. She hadn’t heard that”. “But You can’t buy a people!” “Why not, they can keep their culture.” “This is like saying, we need to buy Italy!! Well, why not, if they wanted it.” It ended with a smirk, and “things can change” (?!).
Through the looking glass? I still haven’t been able to digest this, let alone understand it. My world has been forever changed. And as dangerous as the Supreme Court and its rulings are and has been; the new Nazi GOP party; the military invasion of our cities by masked goons, we have to place the propaganda machine of FOX at the top of the list, if we ever hope to get back what we have lost.
Yes. Killing the Fox is key to saving our democracy.
Sad story---very well written, J.
Condolences. The loss of respect for those we love is very hard to deal with. Keep talking it out, and you'll figure out what to do with all of that in your head and in your heart.
Individual voir dire?
Where the bread is buttered is usually far more important than ideology.
Fox News is evil. If I can find my rant about this, I’ll send it to your profile. Others agree.
You write for Alternet.org, don’t you? Raw Story? Intercept? The Atlantic? You’re always on the money!!
Wow, Tom Hartmann, you have said it very succinctly and clearly.
Thanks for reminding us of Scott Peck's insight and how it applies directly to today's "Republican" party.
Citizens United is a stage 4 cancer on our democracy. The only cure is legislative. But let us not overlook that while Republicans engineered it with luxuriating Supreme Court Justices, the Democratic Party has done nothing to overturn it. Obama had control of both houses for a while, but did not even put Citizens United in his sights. Democrats lie too. What? Joe Biden was having dementia issues, and the WH staff just covered them up and re-ran him for president? That is a whopper. It cost Democrats the WH.
My point is that regardless of party, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." If having a demented egomaniacal pathological liar in the WH cannot motivate killing Citizens United, then fascism will be our future. I do not want a world defined by greedy computer software engineers who know little to nothing about governing and care only about their unbridled greed and wacky worldviews. They just want to create a Pink Floyd future for mankind as depicted in "The Wall," where humans are being groomed in school to be components in the techbros Machine.
How do you know Biden was having dementia issues? Show me your evidence i.e. physician records, hospital records etc.
If you watched much news in 2023/4, you would see that his brainfreeze in the Trump debate was not a one-off. There have been articles in which WH staff described typical minor dementia incidents most people experience to some extent once past age 75 (lax impulse control, memory recall failures, situational confusion, emotional outbursts).
POTUS is very high-stress emotionally, cognitively, and physically. Re-electing somebody with known cognitive-emotional symptoms is like pushing a non-swimmer into the deep end of the pool. Just look at DJT. He is looney as a coot after just 1 year back in the saddle.
Watched a fitness expert describe turning 75 as "falling off a cliff".
We need age limits for POTUS, SCOTUS, and Congress. We have limits for pilots. Have the old folks work as advisors and experts.
There's a time and place for everyone to a be a help or a hindrance. If Joe had left when he said he would, we would remember his last State of the Union where he was on-fire, fighting for us. He'd have been the hero that got us through covid.
Tim your opinion is for me an undeniable though hard to swallow truth.
I watched religiously. If you know anything about dementia, you would also know that brain freeze is not necessary an indicator of dementia. It is an indicator that he had too much on his mind. It was an indicator that he was nervous. Again, you bought the cool aid from people that didn't want him to run, because he was too old. You must be thrilled with his replacement.
When President Biden took office, the country was in the midst of the worst pandemic in more than a century and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. On President Biden's first day in office, he released a National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response to vaccinate the nation and stood up the largest free vaccination program in the country's history.
Politico:
"President Biden's American Rescue Plan changed the country's economic trajectory through targeted relief to meet the urgent needs of American communities, leading to the strongest jobs recovery on record and a world-leading economic performance. The American Rescue Plan:
Invested about $160 billion to provide the supplies, emergency response, testing, and public health workforce to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Provided critical relief to more than 15,000 school districts to reopen safely and support student well-being and academic recovery.
Delivered immediate support for families hard-hit by the pandemic, including extending enhanced unemployment insurance benefits and eligibility for millions of Americans temporarily out of the workforce, lowering taxes for working Americans by increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit for 17 million workers, and providing $1,400 per-person checks for most Americans.
Delivered assistance to help over eight million hard-pressed renters stay in their homes and kept eviction filings below historic averages in the aftermath of the pandemic. Hundreds of thousands of homeowners at risk of losing their homes also received assistance through the American Rescue Plan's Homeowner Assistance Fund to help prevent mortgage delinquencies and defaults, foreclosures, and losses of utilities and home energy services.
Provided a historic expansion of the Child Tax Credit, leading to the lowest child poverty rate in American history in 2021.
Created the first-ever summer nutrition benefit, helping the families of 30 million children nationwide who rely on free and reduced-price school meals afford food over the summer.
Delivered historic investments to help over 225,000 child care programs remain open, lowering costs for millions of families and helping speed the return to work of hundreds of thousands of mothers.
Provided direct fiscal relief to every state and territory and 30,000 cities and towns, enabling critical investments in housing, workforce, public safety, and water and high-speed internet infrastructure.
Lowered or eliminated health insurance premiums for millions of lower- and middle-income families enrolled in health insurance marketplaces, leading to record-breaking health insurance coverage nationwide.
Delivered more than $28 billion in emergency relief to help keep 100,000 restaurants and other food and beverage businesses open during the pandemic.
Powered a small business recovery and boom, including through a historic investment in the State Small Business Credit Initiative to catalyze tens of billions of dollars in private investment, and new small business financing and support, for up to 100,000 small businesses over the next decade."
President Biden invested in our future. In his low key manner and stutterer since childhood, he gave the impression that he was not quite with it. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Age discrimination is not becoming.
The facts that would still be at the forefront, if he had bowed and left the stage.
What a damn shame he didn't follow his FIRST instinct to have one term. Age is a consideration for many jobs.
Thank you for defending him, Sofia. He's a good man. Obama picked him to get us through the tragedy in case he died or was incapacitated. He knew he was excellent for advice on a whole host of things.
Turned out covid was the tragedy he got us through.
Are you talking to me or Sofia?
The Republicans had a very bad no good week.....
TRump showed the world what we were seeing everyday here, that he is one of the sickest human beings on the planet. He will gather the worst of all humans to strangle democracy wherever it is still breathing.
We finally got to see Jack Smith at his bravest and best. Representative Swalwell told the truth about Republican cowards. The committee Democrats told everyone the truth is on the videos and no amount of gas-lighting will change it. Juries saw it too and that's why the insurrectionists were convicted.
Sadistic liars. Psychopathic liars. Pathetic liars. The Republicans have become TRump. Sane people unite! See you in the streets.
Ah, now you’re just being kind.
All of the republicans interrogating Jack Smith acted like defense attorneys for Trump. Each one grasped at a fictitious thread trying to trying to unravel the whole cloth of his testimony - and failed. “If the facts are against you, argue the law. If the law is against you, argue the facts. If the law and the facts are against you, pound the table and yell like hell”. Carl Sandburg.
The biggest question is how do we undo the greed, the lies, the corruption? How do we undo Citizens United, the corrupt Supreme Court? How do we undo the willful ignorance so many Americans embrace?
Ans: To get started: https://contrarian.substack.com/p/contrarian-calls-to-action-a14?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3719374&post_id=185441018&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=zc69i&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Excellent action items, Daniel---I like the Tactical Frivolity section.
Meidas 2 pm.
"Donald Trump is back in Washington, D.C., and he is clearly losing control. At the same time, a historic moment is taking shape across the United States. A general strike that began in Minnesota is now spreading to other parts of the country, with workers, nurses, and pro-democracy activists coordinating actions that we have not seen at this scale in roughly seventy years. The goal, shared openly by organizers, is to make this the largest general strike in modern U.S. history."
Works in France.
They've been listing corporations making money off of and aiding our Gestapo. Target, Home Depot, car rentals, hotels, airlines.
Wakey wakey all you consumers and lazy voters. That's why we are in the streets.
To be effective, picket Congressional Republicans, Fox outlets, ertc.
The other day, I published some stats on the numbers of businesses that are losers....
One of your best editorials…your comments are spot on.
Thank you for making that connection and observation to such a helpful thinker.
The fake GOP is a trick. An illusion.
The real GOP? It's dead as disco.
Votes are this [in-name-only] GOP's crack. Don the-Doofus Gotti is their pusher.
Of course, they lie. They are counterfeit, hence bullsh-t artists.
And the GOP's electorate?
Idiots, suckers, and losers. Each of 'em.
VOTE, because 2+2 does NOT equal 5.
The real GOP is not dead, it’s a virus, neither alive nor dead, somewhat like Dracula.
Latent, then. Shingles-like.
Seems good to me.
To paraphrase Henry II, "Whose going to rid us of this troublesome pest" By pest I mean MAGA, Trump is the symptom, MAGA is the disease.
Elections aren't going to do it, MAGA has already gamed the system. It will take unified, collective anti MAGA action, real action, not marching and waving placards. Voting? Imagine playing a game, when the rules and referees all favor one side.
Real resistance, boycotting, witthholding labor, surround ICE in force, wearing masks, gas masks, shields resisting their violence, stop playing victim. Be Iranians.
The Iranian revolution shut down this week, because the mullahs cut communications. We need analog methods of communication. Radio shack Walkie Talkies will do
If Trump invokes the Insurrection act and martial law and our troops turn their guns on their own family, neighbors and friends, then it is time for guerilla warfare, do not play victim and lay down to be drug to a concentration camp.
On that score, maybe the reason that he hasn't invoked martial law yet, is because they are still building and acquiring concentration camps (err detention centers)
Rounding up immigrants is only practice.
The following is from AI overview, The fact is that "detention centers" are double down, crowded, filthy, inmates are ill fed, ill clothed, insufficient toilets, showers,and plumbing. and to date 32 have died, at least one strangled to death by guards.
Even our prisons, built to handle X inmates incarcerate 2X, 3X even 6X
Based on reports from late 2025 and early 2026, the Trump administration is planning a massive expansion of immigration detention, with plans to build seven large-scale "mega" detention centers and 16 smaller processing facilities.
These facilities are designed to support a, at times, stated goal of holding up to 80,000 to over 100,000 detainees to accelerate deportations.
Key Details of the Expansion Plan
Large-Scale Facilities (7): These are intended to be "large detention centers," including converted warehouses and tent-based, soft-sided facilities. They are planned to hold 5,000 to 10,000 detainees each.
Locations: Large facilities are planned for Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Missouri, Texas, and Virginia.
Smaller Facilities (16): These "processing sites" are planned for Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Utah, with capacities up to 1,500 people each.
Strategic Approach: The plan aims to create a "staged pipeline" or "feeder system" for faster removals.
Military Involvement: The Navy has been involved in planning, with some facilities potentially located on military bases.
Capacity Goal: As of early 2026, reports indicate the administration aims to have capacity for nearly 108,000 detention beds.
As of late 2025, detainee populations had already reached record levels, with roughly 66,000 people held by early December 2025.
Don't be fooled by the 108,000 capacity
What will they do when they run out of illegals to fill the for-profit concentrate camps?
Gloria, that was a serious question asked about the Nazis. After all, dictatorships often find it convenient to have threats to their citizens as a way of justifying their hold on power. If you are surrounded by enemies then you must be strong and remove them.
The easiest thing is to invent them. Stalin did it very well by calling anyone who he thought opposed him (and by extension the glorious socialist future) a Trotskyite, a wrecker, a social parasite, a bourgeois nationalist, a Kulak, or just more generally an "enemy of the people".
I can imagine the GOP digging up more immigrants (say legal citizens whose parents slipped in before having them here) as people to be rooted out, ditto any "questionable" naturalized citizens, and if they can get away with it going as far as they want under NSPM-7 (domestic terrorists=Unchristian enemies of the people). Trump's gang lives by hate, so the well of those they fear is bottomless.
Trump's enemies are next, the real reason for the concentration camps ,Willkommen im Vierten Reich, Liberale sind die neuen Juden
Lies lose - it takes time, but it is a surity
I think about when young i was always amazed how my parents always understood that those little lies were not true...
The Felon's lies are so pathetically obvious - always accusing people of something he does himself...
We MUST get corporate money out of politics—period.
We need to be aware of politicians who take their money and from PACs or have strings attached to contributions for political favors. This is one of the only ways to truly know who you’re voting for and what they really stand for, regardless of what they say or promise is follow the money. Who are they beholden to?
If so much of our population is indoctrinated by media such as FOX and right-wing social media, then I fear there’s little hope to combat such stupidity.
Demonstrations aren’t being covered nationwide or accurately. So called Blue cities are being disregarded as trouble makers and lies are being told about them being harbingers of illegal aliens and crime ridden.
The general population just doesn’t know what’s happening outside of their little conservative communities, especially in the middle states and South. Those are the ones who need to see the danger that will soon touch everyone.
With honest elections we have a prayer for turning this around. And the administration and their bakers are fully aware that honest elections are the last hope for any semblance of honesty in government. That’s what we need to be on top of.
How do we monitor elections to keep them from turning into nothing more than an exercise and the joke they are in countries like Russia, Iran, and other fascist nations?
I've noticed that THE facts have been replaced by YOUR facts.
Not only are there no fact-checks -- if I hear one more time how Trump has stopped 8 wars, and only in his deluded and deranged mind, without commentary, I will scream -- but there is no contradiction, let alone context. explanation or refute.
It is not simply that voters are gullible -- starting with the inability to call Trump a racist, continuing through to today when lies are sanitized by calling them misinformation or falsehoods, the media has determined the language we are allowed to use and therefore distorts reality, if not obliterates it completely.
I recall in a class about the cognition of language and perception that we learned that the indigenous people of Alaska have many words to describe/identify snow. The lesson: environment shapes language, language shapes the environment and perception as well. We may be aware of the power of advertising and even propaganda's ability to change opinion. This insidious creep to rewriting the meaning of words, casually implemented and unchallenged is the most dangerous tool in the political arena.
There are voters who share Trump's warped worldview. They view any challenges to Trump's bullshit assertions as disrespecting his amazing achievements out of political malice. Their very poor reasoning skills are likely related to their assertions that the world has treated white MAGAs unfairly - why they are not wealthier and more powerful. The libtards are giving away their tax dollars to lazy minority welfare cheaters at the expense of working-class people like themselves.
One of the Republican Questioners noted that 104 Republican members of the House voted that the 2020 election results were unacceptable. In effect, she admitted that 104 Republican members of Congress were co-conspirators with Trump in his seditious attempts to change the results of the election. I would campaign to remove the current Republican members of the Supreme Court. Roberts has been a major factor in corrupting constitutional government in the U.S.
There are two things that enable the system of lies to succeed. The first is racism. Give a maggot reason to hate brown and black people and he will gladly give you his school lunch money and support the lies. Number two is just as important-education. Without a population capable of critical thinking they will always believe the first thing spoon fed to them.
Unfortunately fixing these two things will take years if not decades but we need to start now. Young children are not inherently racist, it is taught to them. They just need the tools to tell truth from lies.
M. Scott Peck also labeled those people as “evil” and added to their description, “evil not just as immoral acts, but as a specific, destructive personality disorder rooted in intense narcissism, self-deception, and the refusal to acknowledge one's own faults.” Sound familiar?