Saturday Report 7/26/25 — CBS is installing a monitor to look out for “leftwing bias.” You know, like facts?

The Best of the Rest of the News

Image by Tung Lam from Pixabay

ICE is flagrantly violating the Constitution — and, thus, the law — all over the country, and apparently agents are getting a $30,000 bonus if they drag enough immigrants into their concentration camps. Most recently, a phone-video recorded by an 18-year-old American citizen who was traveling with an undocumented friend shows ICE officers brutally attacking the car full of teenagers. They bragged that, “You’ve got no rights here!” while making fun of their captives and discussing with each other whether they’d hit the threshold to get the $30,000. You can watch the video here. The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution is unambiguous: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” Increasingly, it appears that Trump is creating his own secret police force, with a network of beyond-the-law concentration camps (they’ve started deportation flights from “Alligator Auschwitz” without any apparent legal sanction), much as Hitler did in the early 1930s and Putin did about a decade ago. Some Democratic politicians are starting to wake up, but the party as a whole is way behind in reacting to the threat this represents.

Get ready for Social Security cuts: If you’re on Social Security and Medicare, get ready: Republicans just screwed you in a huge way with their Big Ugly Bill, and starting in a mere 7 years you’ll see an average $18,000/year cut in Social Security for the average married, retired couple and an 11% reduction in Medicare payments to providers. If enough Americans learn about this and are outraged by it, it’s barely possible enough Democrats could win election in 2026 and/or 2028 to correct the situation, but already — because Trump and Musk cut over 7,000 employees from the Social Security Administration — seniors aging into the system (10,000 a day) are finding painful, frustrating delays in filing for benefits. Republicans have been trying to repeal the New Deal and Great Society ever since both were passed, calling them “socialism” and are outraged because morbidly rich people are expected to pay their taxes to help fund them. Instead, the GOP workaround has been to let the average billionaire pay less than 3% in income taxes while putting the bill for their tax avoidance on the nation’s debt tab that will be paid by our children and grandchildren. Fiscal conservatism was always a joke; it’s amazing they can continue to use the phrase without falling down laughing at the suckers who keep electing them to office.

CBS is installing a monitor to look out for “leftwing bias.” You know, like facts? Reality has a well-known leftwing bias because much of the rightwing ideology out there is based, simply, in lies. Trickle-down economics benefits working class people. Immigrants are more likely to be criminals. Women love getting abortions, particularly late term. Unions steal from their workers to make “union bosses” rich. Global warming is a hoax. The fossil fuel and chemical industry aren’t poisoning us and our environment. Green energy is more expensive than gas, oil, or coal. People on Medicaid and food stamps are lazy. Unemployment insurance discourages work. Raising the minimum wage increases unemployment. People only value a college education if they go into debt to get it. Healthcare for all Americans is too complicated for any government to create and administer. America was created as a Christian nation. Every single one of those statements is a demonstrable lie, but when they pop up on CBS News going forward don’t expect any push-back. As part of Skydance’s deal with Trump and the FCC, they not only gave the president a personal $16 million bribe (and apparently also offered a similar amount in free advertising) but also agreed to install in the CBS operations a “monitor” to catch and kill any semblance of “leftwing bias.” This is the sort of thing that routinely happens when nations lose their democracy, and is a flashing red sign that we’re in the actual process of losing ours.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin is destroying the agency and it’s getting no coverage at all in the media. Last week, Zeldin announced he was shutting down entirely the branch of EPA that does scientific research on environmental dangers and toxins in our air, water, and food. Now he’s sucking up to the fossil fuel industry again by reversing a rule from 2009 that prevents gasoline from leaking into our atmosphere. And claiming that he’s “driving a dagger” through the heart of what he calls the “climate change religion.” Can you imagine being Zeldin, taking money and power from the fossil fuel industry to screw your own children and future generations? How do men like him sleep at night?

Trump’s racist goons are trying to erase the history of slavery in America. Calling the true stories of slavery here “a corrosive ideology” that makes white people feel bad, Trump’s folks at the Department of Interior — which manages our national parks and monuments — are removing books and displays detailing that history. They say it’s to “end DEI” but it’s really just Lost Cause mythology reinvented. From George Washington’s Mount Vernon home to the gift shops of Smithsonian museums to the displays in national parks, the Great Whitewash is underway just as aggressively as the Lost Causers were installing statues of Confederate generals all across America in the first three decades of the 20th century. Next, Trump has said in the past, will come a reclamation and re-installation of those monuments to the brutality of slavery. The Confederate states, as I lay out in detail in The Hidden History of American Oligarchy, had completely ended democracy in the South by as early as 1850 and then reached out to declare war on the rest of us. Seven hundred thousand Americans died to protect our democracy, but this time they think they can end our democracy and turn us into the Old South without a shot fired. Will they succeed?

The Scottish people are welcoming Trump. He’s letting us taxpayers pay to fly him to one of his seedy golf motels in that country, so, of course, the nation’s largest newspaper felt it necessary to tell Scots that the American president was about to grace their land with a visit. The front page speaks for itself:

Does the Constitution allow cops to conceal their identities? Reps Summer Lee and Robert Garcia are of the opinion that it doesn’t, and trying to do something about ICE’s new norm of masking their agents, hiding their agency affiliation, and not seeking warrants before depriving people of their liberty. They wrote, in a blistering letter to Homeland Secretary and notorious puppy killer Kristi “Botox” Noem: “Federal agencies have an obligation to uphold the Constitution in carrying out their duties. For every person within the United States, the Fourth Amendment guarantees protection from unreasonable searches and seizures and the Fifth Amendment guarantees a right to due process under the law. In direct violation of these principles, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has allowed its agents—primarily from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—to conceal their identities and use unmarked vehicles while conducting immigration enforcement activities. This causes a dangerous erosion of public trust, due process, and transparency in law enforcement. It also makes it nearly impossible for individuals to determine whether they are being detained by legitimate law enforcement agents or unlawfully abducted. … On June 8, 2025, in Philadelphia’s Mayfair neighborhood, a man wearing a tactical vest labeled “Security Enforcement Agent” and a mock badge, and armed with a handgun, entered an auto repair shop, restrained a female employee with zip ties, and stole about $1,000. Prosecutors later identified this as directly exploiting the ambiguity of masked ICE-style operations. In Houston, just weeks ago, a 37-year-old man blocked another driver using his vehicle, claimed to be an ICE agent, flashed a badge, and forcibly took $1,800 along with the victim’s Guatemalan ID. Similarly, in Florida this April, a woman wore an “ICE” t-shirt, flashed a sheriff’s business card, and used a handheld radio to kidnap her ex-boyfriend’s wife, threatening her until she managed to escape. And in Anaheim, California, two teenagers in a blue SUV impersonating ICE agents approached Hispanic victims, presented fake badges, and robbed them—just one example of a wider series of such crimes targeting immigrant communities.” This ICE practice is not only unconstitutional and illegal, it’s causing real risk to every brown-skinned person in America. Will Republicans in Congress do anything about it? Maybe, if enough of us call them at 202-224-3121 and raise hell.

Is a federal judge preparing to go after one of Trump‘s most problematic, disgusting nominees? According to a whistleblower who was extensively interviewed by The New York Times, Trump’s former criminal defense attorney Emil Bove — who he’s now trying to elevate to a lifelong federal judgeship in a circuit that positions him for the next open seat on the Supreme Court — told federal prosecutors that they should tell federal judges who rule against them, “Fuck you.” The whistleblower is backing it up with memos and text messages, but Republicans in the Senate (specifically, Chuck Grassley) refused to allow the whistleblower to testify. Hearing about this, Judge James Boasberg, one of the judges whose orders they apparently defied under Bove’s orders, is moving forward with steps that appear to be preparation to hold Bove in contempt of court or worse. Meanwhile, Bove’s nomination is heading for the floor of the Senate: will Republicans succeed in preventing the whistleblower testimony when the case comes before the full Senate, which could be any day now (only the House is in recess)? Will they get Bove installed in his lifelong position before Judge Boasberg can move? Stay tuned…

Other countries are starting to think twice about using Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service. Reuters just completed a deep-dive investigation into the story that Elon Musk had, after talking with Putin on the phone, ordered Starlink service cut off to Ukrainian soldiers. Their report explains what happened next: “Upon Musk’s order, Ukrainian troops suddenly faced a communications blackout, according to a Ukrainian military official, an advisor to the armed forces, and two others who experienced Starlink failure near the front lines. Soldiers panicked, drones surveilling Russian forces went dark, and long-range artillery units, reliant on Starlink to aim their fire, struggled to hit targets.” Reuters notes that, “As recently as March, in a post on X, his social media site, Musk wrote: ‘We would never do such a thing.’” But, it appears, that’s exactly what they did. Now, as a result of the Reuters’ investigation and confirmation of the story, multiple other nations that are using Starlink are having second thoughts. But whatever business he’s lost might be made up for by South Africa adopting Starlink after their president was bullied in the Oval Office, and the White House and multiple federal agencies are also now using Starlink. Under Trump’s decision to end net neutrality, any data that passes through Starlink can be observed, captured, and even sold by Musk’s company. What could possibly go wrong?

My newest book, The Last American President: A Broken Man, a Corrupt Party, and a World on the Brink comes out soon and is now available for pre-order.
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