Portrait of America in the world, 2026

There are 138 days to the mid terms.

Democrats just outvoted Republicans in Georgia for the first time since 2006 last night, and with the help of the DC Press Corpse, most Americans have no idea it happened. For the first time since 2006, Democratic turnout beat Republican turnout in a Georgia primary - in a state Trump carried, in the heart of the South. And it wasn’t close. Compared to the last midterm primary, Democratic turnout surged 53% while GOP ballots dropped 13%. That’s not a poll or a prediction. That’s people voting - the only number that matters.

At around 4 a.m. EDT, Trump posted on Lies Anti-Social that he was “cancelling” the Senate confirmation hearing for Jay Clayton, whom he tapped to become the next DNI. He appeared to walk that back, however, after announcing that his initial pick - Bill Pulte - would remain as the acting DNI for the foreseeable future, and in the process, derailed the Senate GOP’s agenda. So long as Pulte keeps that, there is Zero Chance FISA 702 gets renewed.

As he continued the early morning shitposting from France, Trump tested out a childish new nickname for rising Democratic star being hailed as the “next Obama.” He lashed out at Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia as “Os(jerk!)off” in a Truth Social post at 8:50 a.m. EDT. Trump unveiled the nickname after his endorsed candidate, Rep. Mike Collins, defeated Derek Dooley in Tuesday’s Republican Senate runoff, setting up a showdown with Ossoff in November’s midterm election. “So happy for highly respected Congressman Mike Collins. He will win his Senate Race in Georgia against a pathetic failed Dumocrat Senator, Os(jerk!)off, who is a joke in D.C. Nobody even knows who he is!!!” Trump wrote, channeling his inner schoolyard bully. “I’ll be doing Big TRUMP Rallies for Mike in Georgia! President DJT.” I’m sure Ossof’s team is hoping he’ll do several.

Immediately after he finished a meeting with Egyptian president al-Sissi, Sundowning Grampa went to a press conference to take care of the Really Important Business, firing off a foul-mouthed attack on former President Obama as he desperately defended his proposed peace deal with Iran. After making the extraordinary admission that his long-touted peace deal with Iran, expected to be signed Friday, is not final, Trump blasted his longtime nemesis and the JCPOA nuclear deal, which was signed by Tehran in 2015 during the Obama administration. “It’s a memorandum of understanding, and if I don’t like it, we’ll go back to shooting at them, dropping bombs on their head. We’ll go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head, because they misbehaved for 47 years.” (FACT CHECK: this is a LIE.) He went on: “Nobody could have made this deal. I mean, the JCPOA, done by Obama. He gave them $1.7 billion in cash, green cash from banks, into a Boeing 757 and flew it into Iran. They tried to bribe their way out of it, and you know what the Iranians did? They laughed at Obama, and they said he’s a stupid son of a bitch.” He then abruptly ended the press conference. He is suuuuch a fucking embarrassment. The living embodiment of everything the rest of the world doesn’t like about the average Ammurrikin. “The Ugly American” indeed.

Sundowning Grampa’s bloodlust birthday party just about “finished things.” With no tickets to sell onsite, the UFC walked in expecting to eat a $30 million loss. Even Dana White, who built the whole thing and counts Trump as a friend, was done by the end. “I can’t afford it,” he said, adding that he’d never do it at the White House again. The giant cage came down soon after. One night, and his monument to himself was gone.

Trump Mobile finally shipped the T1 - a $499 gold-colored phone they’d been promising for nearly a year. They called it an “American-made” answer to Apple and Samsung. The repair experts at iFixIt took one apart to see if that was true. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t. Inside was a two-year-old phone built in China - the same one already sitting on store shelves, just painted gold. The marketing claims were fake too. The company bragged about 600,000 orders. The real number, exposed in a data breach, was around 30,000. I’m soooooo surprised!

A far-right group went to court to stop Wisconsin from sharing voter data with ERIC. It’s the nationwide system that keeps voter rolls accurate—flagging duplicate registrations and people who’ve moved or died. Their argument: Wisconsin quit that system back in 2016, so sharing data with it was illegal. There was just one problem. Wisconsin didn’t quit ERIC in 2016 - it joined then. The entire lawsuit was built on a claim that was flatly false. US District Judge William Conley didn’t just throw the case out. He sanctioned the lawyers who filed it - writing that either they never checked the facts or they just didn’t care. These groups file junk lawsuits like this constantly, betting that no one’s paying attention. This time, they weren’t so lucky. Further proof one has to have a lobotomy to qualify for membership with these people, which explains everything about MAGA.

Dilbert and his second-in-command, Couchfuck McGee, can’t seem to get their story straight, or do basic math. Monday, Dilbert shared a post on Lies Anti-Social about his peace deal with Iran that directly conflicts with what Couchfuck said about the agreement’s terms earlier in the day.

“Iran has agreed to never have a Nuclear Weapon! Also, the story that the U.S. is paying Iran 300 million Dollars is Fake News, put out by the Dumocrats!!!” the president wrote. (FACT CHECK: This is a LIE.) Dilbert was seemingly referring to reports that the MOU electronically signed by both him and his veep contained a clause requiring the U.S. to pay Iran $300 billion—not $300 million—for reconstruction efforts. Couchfuck confirmed that term of the deal when pressed about it in an interview with CBS News’s Ed O’Keefe Monday morning, who asked whether it was “true or false” that the Iranians would have access to a $300 billion reconstruction fund. Couchfuck answered: “Well, Ed, that’s the sort of thing they could have access to, funded by the Gulf Coast Coalition, so long as they honor their end of the obligation. I think that one of the things you’re going to see, Ed - and people have to be skeptical of this - is that the hardliners in the Iranian system will overemphasize the benefits that Iran gets, while underemphasizing all the things that they have to concede, and all the things they have to provide, in order to get these benefits.” The full text of the peace agreement has not yet been released; you know if it had been anything close to what Dilbert claims it is, he’d have handed out copies to the press at the White House personally.

Trump’s controversial Iran deal may already be about to hit a brick wall - and it’s all thanks to rules Trump and his own congressional allies put in place. According to Punchbowl News, Trump’s State Department “triggered a provision in the 2024 Ukraine-Israel supplemental funding bill that prevents the president from removing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO).” This could be a huge problem for the specific aspect of the memorandum of understanding with Iran that requires the U.S. to give sanctions relief, Andrew Desiderio noted on X. Senators “slipped a provision into the 2024 Ukraine supplemental that requires State to tell Congress every 180 days” if the IRGC made drone attacks against Americans, and if so, “the IRGC can’t be removed from the Foreign Terrorist Organization list for four years.” The IRGC being delisted “would almost certainly be required to implement the broad sanctions relief the admin has outlined.” The problem is, “Last April, the State Dept formally told Congress that the IRGC had indeed attacked Americans w/ drones, adding that this is ‘sufficient to meet the statutory criteria’ to bar removal of IRGC from FTO list for 4 years,” Desiderio wrote. Trump theoretically has the power to waive this rule if it’s deemed “vital” to national security, Desiderio added - but that would be a “tough sell” for Republicans, who near-universally backed Trump’s original decision to declare the IRGC a foreign terrorist organization in the first place.

Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky were heard on a live microphone discussing Dilbert on the sidelines of the G7 Leaders’ summit in Evian-les-Bains. “Yesterday, we had a difficult discussion in front of the camera,” Macron said of the G7 meeting with Dilbert regarding the war in Ukraine at which Dilbert tried his usual pro-Putin sabotage - which didn’t work now that Ukraine as Putin on the run. Macron is also heard urging Zelensky to stay longer at the summit. The Ukrainian responds that he is scheduled to visit Brussels the next day to speak with leaders in the European Union.

After Dilbert met with Zelensky at the macron-arranged meeting, he said that Russia should make a deal with Ukraine to end its four-year invasion of its neighbor to the west. “Russia should make a deal. Russia’s lost tremendous amounts of people, and so has Ukraine.”

Tuesday, House Judiciary Democrats posted on X: “Judiciary Democrats have uncovered that FBI Director Kash Patel directed over $1 MILLION in unlawful taxpayer-funded bonuses to a small group of MAGA agents and members of Patel’s personal security detail.” Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin has written to Patel: “We have been receiving troubling reports that you may be using part of the budget of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as a personal slush fund to make tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in unlawful ‘bonus’ payments to loyalist MAGA henchmen who have engaged in misconduct.” The letter informs Patel that Judiciary Democrats know the money went to special agents serving on his Director’s Advisory Team, which is described in Raskin’s letter as “a curated group of agents who are willing to carry out your unlawful partisan and personal orders.” The letter states also that funds also went to agents on Patel’s security detail, “circumventing the mandatory maximum pay caps established by statute.” The letter continues: “By issuing these side payments, your office may be knowingly breaking federal law. In some cases, nearly $8,000 payments have been made to multiple individuals every two-week pay period despite many of the beneficiaries of your selective generosity already maxing out on a federal employee’s salary.” What Raskin’s letter describes is the FBI Director having a personal force within the Bureau to carry out illegal orders for him, and this personal force is being illegally compensated through a slush fund paid for by taxpayers. So much for all those reforms of Fools & Buffoons Inc. over the past 50 years from the Bad Old Days of J. Edgar Fruitfly and his “Black Bag Unit.” Patel didn’t go out and recruit these “bad apples” - they were already in place.

See? It’s just that we’re much better than they are: While Dilbert and any Republican has trouble getting A-List musical talent in any genre - outside of C&W - to perform for any of their events for fear of the reputational damage that comes from so doing, Cool Daddy Obama has no problems whatsoever. The upcoming grand opening ceremony for former President Obama’s presidential center will feature a lineup of award-winning performers. The Obama Foundation’s chief executive, Valerie Jarrett, said that the Thursday event “will be unlike any other - filled with music, performances, and hope.” “The Grand Opening Ceremony will reflect a spirit of inspiration and joy, with a big boost from the performers who are sharing their talent with us. We hope to inspire people everywhere to believe in their power to bring change home.” The celebration will include performances from Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, Christina Aguilera, John Legend, The Roots, Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam, Common, Jennifer Hudson, Marc Anthony, Tems and U2’s Bono and The Edge. Actress and producer Marsai Martin, who starred in ABC’s sitcom “Black-ish,” will also participate, and the Illinois National Guard’s Color Guard will perform in the opening ceremony. The ceremony will be livestreamed starting at 11 a.m. local time, and noon EDT, Thursday June 18 on The Obama Foundation’s social media accounts. Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama will give speeches at the dedication event, ahead of the library’s public opening on June 19.

Maladministration II is quietly relaxing standards for how immigration detainees can be treated in lockup - and one of those changes may run afoul of the 13th Amendment’s prohibition on “slavery or involuntary servitude.” Geo Group, a private prison contractor in charge of many of the DHS detention facilities, “has faced lawsuits in three states alleging it violates minimum-wage laws by paying some immigrant detainees $1 a day to work. The company maintains that the work is voluntary and that it operates the program at the direction of the government.” Now, in a new change of policy, Geo requested ICE “remove lines saying contractors needed to follow state and local laws around the treatment of detainees and that ICE amend language to support its legal position in these cases,” per the report. Under the new policy, detainees are not considered employees “and are not entitled to wages or benefits under applicable wage laws or labor regulations.” Now, in a new change of policy, Geo requested Immigration and Customs Enforcement “remove lines saying contractors needed to follow state and local laws around the treatment of detainees and that ICE amend language to support its legal position in these cases,” per the report. Under the new policy, detainees are not considered employees “and are not entitled to wages or benefits under applicable wage laws or labor regulations.” The 13th Amendment’s prohibition against slavery and involuntary servitude carves out an exception when imposed “as punishment for a crime,” and prisons in some states have for years been allowed to institute compulsory labor for extremely low pay or no pay at all. However, immigrant detainees in most cases have not been convicted of any crime.

Great Britain’s new social media ban for kids under 16 is threatening to escalate longtime tensions with the Trump administration over internet and social media policy. Prime Minister Keir Starmer revealed this week the UK is moving forward with the ban, less than a week after the White House urged Downing Street against it, citing concerns over free speech and burdensome hurdles for American tech companies. Starmer’s move suggests Britain is committed to its digital regulatory agenda, even if it risks another fight with Maladministration II. The prime minister largely brushed off disagreement with Trump on the issue, just hours before meeting with the president at the G7 summit in France. “I honestly think that across world leaders, there’s always been a recognition that leaders have to take steps to protect children,” Starmer told reporters. “I don’t think that’s controversial, but there’ll always be arguments as to exactly what the limits of that are and what rules should be in place, but I don’t see that as a problem.”

MAGA Rep. Mike Collins (R) was declared the winner over former college football coach Derek Dooley in the Senate Republican runoff to take on Sen. Jon Ossoff (D) in Georgia this fall. Collins’s victory is a major win for Trump, who issued a last-minute endorsement for the staunch ally over the weeekend. Most Republicans saw Collins as the favorite even before Trump put his thumb on the scale Sunday.He gained national attention for his work on the Laken Riley Act, immigration legislation that allows federal officials to detain certain undocumented immigrants if they’re accused or convicted of certain crimes like burglary and theft. Collins has a problem with hiring staffers who turn out to have problems with their right arm wanting to snap into a Nazi salute. Collins will face an uphill battle against Ossoff, who has proven to be a formidable candidate with a hefty war chest of over $32 million, according to his last federal campaign filing.

Trump’s “Freedom250” UFC match on the White House lawn was a massive display of weakness, Salon’s Amanda Marcotte argued in an analysis published today - and it reveals the true insecurity of the MAGA psyche. The whole movement, she said, is “run by men obsessed with looking tough, but who are, in actuality, weak and incompetent. The more they fail, the more they grasp for these theatrical but ineffectual displays of masculine preening, hoping that the public mistakes loud and violent displays for strength.” It gets eaten up by the MAGA faithful, she said, but the rest of America can easily see it for what it is. On one hand, “the guys in the cage can punch really hard and knock each other out,” but on the other hand, they “live in what appears to be daily terror that the slightest misstep - getting caught cooing over a kitten or shaking their hips to a Beyoncé tune - will emasculate them.”

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

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“This is great, I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

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There are 140 days to the mid terms.

Today is primary election day in Georgia, where two varieties of Jaw-ja Republicans will be up for voter’s choice as the candidate to face off with Democrat Jon Ossoff in November for the U.S. Senate seat. One of these is what passes for a “more traditional” Southern Conservative, who’s endorsed by Governor Kemp. The other has made headlines repeatedly for... hiring a chief of staff accused of various violent acts... replacing said staffer with someone caught in a white nationalist group chat... making light of the January 6th insurrection attempt, calling it a “self-guided, albeit unauthorized,” tour of the Capitol... promoting the sick conspiracy theory that former President Biden ordered an attempted assassination of Trump... On Sunday night, Trump posted to Lies Anti Social an endorsement of the latter guy - Mike Collins - saying, “Mike is strongly supported by the most Highly Respected MAGA Patriots in Georgia and beyond.” Of course, there’s no possibility that the fact the other guy said in 2020 and Trump did lose Georgia had anything to do with it, right? Ah - we have a correction from the control room: Trump made clear in the post that Dooley’s refusal to promote conspiracy theories about the 2020 election was a disqualifier, complaining that Dooley “said that I lost Georgia in 2020 when, in actuality, the facts have now proven that I won by a lot!”.

Tol’ ya so: Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday the Senate will attempt to pass an extension of FISA 702 without the SAVE America Act attached, rebuffing Trump’s demand to link the two bills. Thune, who has repeatedly warned that letting FISA 702 expire poses a risk to national security, said he would try to move an extension of the controversial surveillance law as a stand-alone measure. “We will try and move 702 as soon as we feel like we have the votes to do it,” Thune told reporters. He told Punchbowl News on his way into the Capitol earlier Monday that it would be “unrealistic” to get the SAVE America Act passed simply by attaching it to an extension of FISA authorities.

I’m sooooo surprised: The TrumpDOJ gave the green light last week to a controversial mega-acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, which includes CNN, by Paramount Skydance, a media giant with a Trump-friendly CEO. But reports suggest they may have rushed the process and ignored the opinions of career officials. According to the Wall Street Journal, “A team of career lawyers who had spent months scrutinizing the deal was leaning toward recommending a lawsuit challenging it on the grounds that the combination of the two movie studios would be anticompetitive and violate antitrust law, the people said.” However, ultimately the TrumpDOJ told this team they were closing the investigation before they had formally made a decision, and announced publicly it was their opinion the merger wouldn’t pose a threat to competition. Senior leaders at the TrumpDOJ, according to the report, “believed that Paramount Chief Executive Officer David Ellison, son of Oracle co-founder and Trump ally Larry Ellison, persuasively addressed many of the staff’s questions,” including “how the combined company could meet its commitment to make 30 theatrical releases a year, given its increased debt load.” The TrumpDOJ statement reads: “The Antitrust Division conducted a thorough investigation to assess whether the proposed transaction would harm competition. The investigatory record indicated that the transaction will increase competition across the media and entertainment ecosystem, benefiting American consumers and workers.” Did you know cows can too jump over the moon and it really is made of green cheese?

Some people familiar with the matter believe the TrumpDOPJ approval of the Ellisons’ takeover of WBD Discovery was deliberately crafted to make it harder for state attorneys general to ask courts to stop it. But California AG Rob Bonta is reportedly about to do exactly that. The California suit against the merger is expected to drop anytime between now and t he end of the month. The takeover is expected to close as soon as the end of July, but California’s lawsuit could put things in the deep freeze while the issue is resolved if a California judge declares the issues raised are significant. We can trust they’ll qualify as such. The deal is also under antitrust review in Europe which would also put a freeze on finalization. Paramount’s failure to consume the deal by September 1 would result in the company paying multi-million dollar weekly penalties until they do - or walk away. We’re seeing the plain evidence the fix was in the whole time. The only question remaining is whether states can get the courts to step in. (FWIW, Yours Truly is one of over 10,000 Hollywood creatives who signed on to the complaint against the merger - it turns out I do have a dog in the fight. I dislike Putzes ever winning anything.)

Sundowning Grampa called for the impeachment of Democratic Sen. Jack Reed, after the lawmaker criticized his decision to pull out of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in his first term, during his Saturday night Adderall Overdose. “Senator Jack Reed, a Dumocrat from R.I., lied when stating the the Deal we just made is not as good as the Obama disaster known as the JCPOA. Reed is either an outright fraud, or incompeten. The Obuma Deal was a road to a Nuclear weapon for Iran, cash and all, one of the worst and dumbest (hence Dumocrats!) Deals ever made by the U.S. Our Deal is a WALL against Iran ever having a Nuclear weapon, the complete opposite of Obuma. Impeach Jack Reed!”

Speaking of the Trump Surrender Documents, Trump and Corporal Couchfuck McGee electronically signed the MOU with Iran on Sunday, while Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, speaker of the Iranian Parliament, signed for Iran. The details of the memorandum will be released Tuesday or Wednesday, the officials said. The agreement is only the first step, one said, and then “real technical discussions” will begin later this week and will be led by Corporal Couchfuck, god help us all. “We’ll be releasing the text this week, and what everybody will see is that Iran doesn’t get a dime of money unless they perform their obligations, and the money that we’re talking about is fundamentally sanctions relief,” he said in an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Monday. Trump echoed those sentiments while meeting with French President Emmanual Macron in France for the G7 later Monday, saying the full agreement would be released “sometime after Friday.” This is the agreement t o agree to sit down and develop a plan of action to agree on further meetings to agree on other meetings to agree on something perhaps happening on November 4, 2026.

Barack Obama has taken a swipe at Trump’s emerging agreement with Iran, suggesting the president is trying to bully his way back to a deal that may end up looking remarkably similar to the one Trump spent years attacking.In an interview with ABC News, the former president said it was “doubtful” that any agreement negotiated by Trump would prove to be “significantly different” or a “significant improvement” on the 2015 nuclear accord brokered by his own administration. “It’s a reminder that on a lot of different foreign policy problems, the notion we can just bully our way or bomb our way to a solution may sometimes seem appealing,” Obama said, adding that it was better to create a diplomatic solution to avoid war. “You’d think we would’ve learned that lesson by now, but it seems like every so often we have to learn that lesson again.”

In The Atlantic, Tom Nichols wrote that - even without the details - “it is clear that Trump has failed to achieve every one of the goals he put forward for this war of choice, and now he is determined to sign, seal, and deliver America’s capitulation as quickly as possible.” His article concludes, concludes: “The war leaves Iran battered, but more powerful and with more cash at its disposal, while it leaves America weaker, with important stocks of weapons depleted, and with its consumers paying the price for the war at the gas pump.” That is how one defines what the answer is to the question, “Who won?” The answer - no matter how the facts get arranged - is: “Not the United States.” Trump is now the American president who created the greatest decline in power and influence of the United States in the nation’s 250-year history.

Phillips O’Brien says of the agreement: “So, Trump signed a deal with the Iranians but is refusing to release its terms for days. Best bet is that he knows they are a massive defeat and is trying to set a completely false narrative by flooding the airwaves with misinformation for as long as possible.” I’m sure the DC Press Corpse will be busy this weekend slobbering all over Dear Leader’s “widdle mushwoom” to let us all know how magificently amazingly wonderful Dilbert’s Victorious Conclusion to HisWar truly is.

Uh-hmmm - tell us another one, maybe we’ll laugh: Grammy-winning and Emmy-nominated comedian Nate Bargatze only went to Donald Trump’s birthday cage match—and posed for a photo with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cheryl Hines - because UFC is his “favorite sport,” a source close to the comedian claimed (why is it dweeby guys who have spent their lives staying as far away as posible from the Jason Hokits hae such blood lust?) According to the source, the appearance was “not political.” The comic, currently America’s top-selling stand-up for his clean, profanity-free material, was spotted at the unprecedented cage-fighting spectacle on the White House’s South Lawn on Sunday, to the surprise of some of his anti-Trump fans. Bargatze, a devout Christian who grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, has remained mostly coy about his personal politics in interviews. (Sorry, you just spelled out your “politics” in detail with those facts. In 2024, Bargatze told The Washington Post that he isn’t apathetic about politics but is intentional about keeping it out of his comedy. “I actually enjoy politics,” he said at the time, “I don’t talk about them, but I enjoy them. I don’t think it’s what people are coming to me for.” In February, he posed with Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn, an ally of Trump’s who strives to “fight wokeness” by dismantling DEI initiatives, limiting abortion care, and introducing legislation that prevents the “ideological indoctrination” of students by penalizing teachers for “pushing far-left ideology,” according to her website. Bargatze was meeting with Blackburn to discuss his proposed Nateland theme park, which he plans to open in his hometown of Nashville. A Redditor posted: “I sometimes wonder if some celebs have no idea about the amount of damage their reputation takes once they are in close proximity of Trump. It might not be immediate, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he loses audiences in some places. As one posyer put it: “There is no quicker way to torpedo your standing than sucking up to this administration.”

Here’s another smack, Dilbert: Trump’s plans to build a “National Garden of American Heroes” are being challenged in court, in a new legal bid to stop his MAGA-fication of Washington D.C.

Trump, 80, has bragged about building the statue garden in West Potomac Park, a space near the National Mall that already includes the Korean War Veterans Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, and the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. Monday, a coalition of organizations, including the D.C. Preservation League, National Mall Coalition, National Parks Conservation Association, and The Cultural Landscape Foundation, sued to prevent the proposed statue garden in West Potomac Park from proceeding without congressional authorization. “The National Register-designated West Potomac Park is not available open space; it is part of the National Mall, which is one of the world’s finest achievements in civic landscape architecture, architecture, city planning, and art,” said Charles Birnbaum, TCLF’s president and CEO. The coalition filed its 44-page lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Monday against the Department of the Interior, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, the National Park Service and its acting director Jessica Bowron. “The West Potomac Plan is unlawful. Congress has made clear that the National Mall is a “substantially completed work of civic art”—not a personal sandbox for each President to renovate however he likes,” the lawsuit reads.

And that doesn’t include the Arc d’Dilbert, which is its own can of worms for any Trumper who gets caught in that tar baby. In a letter sent Monday to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and two National Park Service officials, Independent Senator Angus King of Maine and Democratic congressman Jared Huffman of California outlined at least three federal laws the administration would be breaking if construction moves ahead. One is the Commemorative Works Act, which governs monuments on federal land in the capital. A 1912 law that flatly says structures “shall not be erected” on federal land in Washington without express congressional authority. The Height of Buildings Act also generally caps building heights in D.C. at 160 feet, while Trump’s arch would be 250 feet high if built. The letter warns that officials who use unauthorized funds on the project could face “suspension without pay, removal from office and, for knowing and willful violations, criminal fines and imprisonment.” Senator King, who’s been a practicing attorney for more than 50 years, called the project “stone-cold illegal,” adding it was “one of the clearest legal cases I’ve seen.”

Newly-released internal contractor estimates reveal that Trump’s Dance Hall project carries a price tag far exceeding what he has told the public, with taxpayers footing most of the bill. The Washington Post obtained a project summary prepared for the White House by contractor Clark Construction in early March that estimated the total construction cost at $600 million - $200 million more than the maximum figure Trump has ever cited publicly. The documents also show that roughly $307 million of that total was projected to come from federal agencies funded by taxpayers, including the Secret Service and the White House Military Office, while only $293 million was expected to come from private sources. “This is taxpayer-free,” Trump said on March 31. “We have no taxpayer putting up 10 cents.” By that date, the Post reported, federal agencies had already approved more than a dozen payments to Clark Construction totaling tens of millions of dollars in public funds. Contracting and procurement experts who reviewed the documents for the Post said some government spending on security features falls within normal bounds: $155 million from the Secret Service; $149 million from the White House Military Office; $3 million from the Executive Residence. Congress has not authorized the project or allocated monies for it. The Secret Service and White House Military Office routinely fund security infrastructure at the White House complex. But they drew a clear line at what the documents appear to show: taxpayer money flowing into the ballroom structure itself. Stan Soloway, a former Pentagon acquisition official, said: “You can’t disentangle the entertainment space from all of the other parts that are in here. It’s one structure.” A former GSA official was more blunt about the use of Secret Service funds for demolition of the original East Wing, telling the Post: “That is a stretch. How is that something Secret Service should do and fund?”

For those wondering what in the actual fuck happened to the Reflecting Pool, a tale: when Dilbert announced he was painting it “American Flag Blue,” numerous experts warned that painting the bottom of the pool a dark color was effectively “painting it black,” and that the sun would warm the water sufficiently to cause vastly-increased algae growth resulting in massive algae booms filling the pool. Also that it would take less than a week in summer for the result to become obvious. As it did. Add the Reflecting Pool to the rest of Dilbert’s lifetime of failures as further proof that Everything Trump Touches, Dies.

The graft, corruption and criming metastasizes: HCR explained something interesting in her post last night about how Trump even scammed his own birthday party/barbarian contest/desecration:

“... at 9:30 Friday night, as Aram Roston and Joseph Gedeon of The Guardian reported, the UFC issued a press release saying that the cryptocurrency venture World Liberty Financial, which emerged on Wednesday as an official sponsor of the event, would be the “Presenting Partner of a new $250,000 Performance of the Night bonus pool.” (For those keeping score at home, World Liberty Financial is the Trump family’s cryptocurrency company, overseen by Zach Witkoff, the son of billionaire Steve Witkoff. The elder Witkoff is Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East and for peace missions, including to Russia’s president Vladimir Putin.) Here’s the scam: “In addition to connecting World Liberty Financial directly to the White House, UFC is giving cash to World Liberty Financial. World Liberty Financial gives its crypto to the fighters. World Liberty Financial then invests the cash in U.S. Treasury bonds and keeps the interest.”

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

We geese don’t care about your steenking political crises!

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. We can bring down Trump, with your support. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters There are several readers who visit every day - is what you get here worth 21 cents? It’s only a little, but its result is huge. Thank you for your support.

“This is great, I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid swubscriber on April 28)

Comments are for paid subscribers.

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There are 141 days to the mid terms.

Dr. Phillips O’Brien post good news about Ukraine’s battle success against Russia over the weekend:

Up until this point in the war the Ukrainians had actually worked hard to isolate Crimea from the air and the sea. They had forced the Russians to abandon the Sevastopol naval base, meaning getting shipping in and out of the peninsula except in the far east, is very difficult. The Ukrainians have also waged a continuous campaign against Russian air defense, which means that the Russians flying supplies in and out of Crimea would be far too risky. So all that is left is the road and rail bridges. Until this last week. Since June 6, Ukraine has launched a comprehensive and well thought out series of mid-range UAV attacks against the road and rail network into Crimea. They were focused on cutting off the peninsula from the north.

On June 7, the Chonhar Road Bridge, a primary artery carrying the R-280 highway from Rostov-on-Don into Crimea, was conducted using the newly debuted “Behemoth” mid-range strike drone, equipped with a dual high-explosive and thermobaric warhead. One of the advantages of the mid-range campaign is the shorter distances involved means that mid-range systems need less fuel and can carry heavier warheads such as this.Satellite imagery confirmed dark impact craters on the central span, forcing Russian occupation authorities to halt traffic and deploy an adjacent pontoon bridge. Two days later, a second wave of long-range UAVs hit the Chonhar crossing. Simultaneously, Ukrainian forces launched an attack near the bridge linking Henichesk to the Arabat Spit. The Chonhar road crossing was officially declared inoperable, with military bloggers noting repairs could take up to a month. The Henichesk detour was also suspended, forcing Russian military logistics to entirely shift westward toward the Perekop Isthmus.

With all road traffic being sent through Armiansk, the Ukrainians moved to attack there. Four distinct bridges along the northwestern corridor over the North Crimean Canal were hit on June 11. Catching Russian supply lines exactly where they had been diverted, a massive overnight drone and missile barrage struck the main Perekop–Armiansk Road Bridge, the road bridge near the village of Stavky, and bridges crossing the canal near Preobrazhenka and Myrne. The strike on the Armiansk bridge directly hit a dense convoy of roughly 50 Russian military cargo trucks loaded with fuel and ammunition intended for the Zaporizhzhia front. The Da Vinci 1st Separate Assault Regiment confirmed the route was “completely paralyzed,” leaving Russia with heavily restricted, convoluted dirt and secondary detours through the region. Follow-up attacks targeted the pontoon infrastructure built by Russian engineers to bypass the crippled main road bridge. At least one active pontoon crossing near Chonhar was verified as damaged or sunk during the overnight strikes. Satellite imagery from June 12 confirmed that vast queues of military and cargo trucks had stalled on the approaches, with north-south transit effectively paralyzed.

Ukraine now has the mass and technical capabilities to wage a methodical and practically daily campaign against Russian logistics linking Crimea to the mainland to the north. If maintained, that will have major implications for the Russian army in Ukraine and the occupying forces in Crimea. That means Russian forces at the front will have no chance of getting supplies sent through Crimea up to them. For Crimea, that means nothing will get in from the north. And as shipping and air supply is practically impossible, that means vital commodities such as fuel and even water (Crimea is rather dry) can only come from the Kerch side. That is a big problem for the Russians too. Damage to the Kerch bridge over the last few years means the Russians have been severely restricting the amount of fuel and other hazardous cargo they are willing to send over that bridge (they do not want the Ukrainians to turn fuel trucks and trains into bombs—as they did earlier in the war. And this Spring Ukraine has attacked the ferries that are operating on the Kerch side as well, reportedly doing great damage.

So, if the Northern route remains closed and Russian cannot find a way to significantly increase traffic from the Kerch end, Crimea is for all intents and purposes cut off. That turns the peninsula from a strategic asset to a major strategic and political headache. The Russians will have to move heaven and earth to try and get supplies in to their military and population there. Already there are reports of long lines to get gas. The Ukrainians will have to keep the road and rail network shut for a considerable period to fully cut off Crimea, but this is not the situation the Putin traitors in the White House expected - and neither did Putin. He has no way to counter this on the battlefield, since Okrainian UAVs now dominate ground fighting in eastern Ukraine.

Back to the news in DilbertWorld:

New York Times correspondents, Trump-whisperer Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, report in their upcoming book that Permanent High School Freshman Dumbassed Dweeb, er I mean Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, proposed suspending habeas corpus to speed up mass deportations, and both he and Vice President JD Vance pushed the president to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota. Come next January, look for this to be top of the congressional investigations we will launch against these putzes. (For those who don’t know the term, a Putz is “a penis that thinks it’s a person.”

Miller also launched into a tirade Sunday over wind turbines, which he described as “monstrous” and a “visual assault on God’s creation.” A social media user on X published a photograph Saturday that showed several wind turbines off the coast of Virginia Beach. The image apparently upset Miller, who responded tohe post, voicing preference for fossil fuels as an energy source. “These monstrous wind farms - very one of which exists solely based on federal subsidy - are a visual assault on God’s creation that weaken the grid, disrupt marine ecosystems, and force reliance on foreign fuel when we have near-limitless reserves of our own. Miller’s claims have been refuted by Maladministration II’s own Energy Department, which still has a page on its official government website dedicated to the “advantages of wind power.” On the page, the Energy Department states that wind power is “cost-effective” and bolsters energy reserves.

By now, everyone has heard what professional lunkhead Josh Hoskit had to say about a woman with more class and accomplishment in her little toe than the class lout we always avoided back in school. However, there’s some interesting reporting about the audience of one the mentally-challenged turd was giving a “shout-out” to after shouting out his “Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.” (Hoskit seems to me to be a “six days spreading wild oats and one day praying for crop failure” kind of bible-banger - like the song said: “The odds against goin’ to heaven - six to one”) Anyway, CNN reported that Trump, who was seated in the front row during the match, “appeared to show a half-smile” seconds after Hokit’s outrageous remark. Why am I completely unsurprised? He is, after all, the Biggest Piece of Shit on Planet Earth. Let’s recall that, back in February, Trump faced rare bipartisan outrage after posting a video on his social media platform Truth Social that briefly depicted former President Barack Obama and the first lady as primates in the jungle. The blowback was so fierce that Trump - who denied being aware that the segment of the video he posted included the racist depiction - ultimately deleted the post. Saturday wasn’t Hokit’s first white supremacist rodeo. At a UFC event in January, he referenced legendary women’s basketball player and 10-time WNBA All-Star Brittney Griner at the end of his victory speech, saying to Joe Rogan, “And P.S., Brittney Griner is a man,” Rogan said, “Brittney Griner catching strays.” I’ve always been a big believer in “what’s ten dead dumbfuckingjocks? A good start.” And they keep living down to my expectations.

Following his Desecration of America last night, Sundowning Gramps seemed to stay up all night, with his thumbs going crazy on his Samsung. Around 0300, he launched a Lies Anti-Social tirade to declare he will not support renewing FISA 702 unless his so-called SAVE America Act is passed. On one level, it’s interesting to realize that in the middle of what for other people would be a nice high from a happy birthday party, what’s bugging Grampa is that

Congress rejected a short-term extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and he’s grabbing it for another desperate attempt to get his SAVE Act, his last-gasp plan to suppress enough votes to keep a Republican majority in November and keep his ass out of jail. Yes, he knows in his heart what a criming scumbag he is and always has been. “I’m against FISA if it doesn’t come with The Save America Act (Full version!) firmly attached to it. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” This would require the Senate GOP to kill the filibuster in order to deliver, and once again - they are not going to slit their own throats for the likes of Trump. The House of Representatives voted 218-198 on Thursday against extending FISA until July 2, with 19 Republicans joining nearly all Democrats in opposing the measure.The Senate then went into break anbd left town. Dilbert’s ginormous posterior is getting closer and closer to the whirling blades of the baloney-slicer.

“When Johnny comes marching home again, Hurrah! Hurrah! We’ll give him a hearty welcome then. Hurrah! Hurrah! Oh, the men will cheer and the boys will shout. The ladies they will all turn out. And we’ll all feel gay when Johnny comes marching home.” I don’t think Donald John Trump is going to even get the cheers Johnny Reb got when he marched home, when Donald John Trump returns victorious next week after signing the most craven surrender document never signed before by an American president and starts his tour to convince us all that shit sandwiches are really tasty and good for what ails you. David Rothkopf has the whole sordid mess covered with this: “Donald Trump deserves exactly as much credit for the “deal” with Iran that he has announced as a spouse abuser does for announcing he will stop beating his wife.”

Professor Robert Pape says of this “agreement”: “Despite the headlines, this deal remains highly uncertain.” “According to Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister – the most senior to comment on the Friday signing after Trump’s announcement -- Tehran expects three conditions before any long-term process begins: immediate release of $12 billion in frozen assets, an immediate and complete end to Israeli military operations in Lebanon, and significant movement toward reducing the American military presence in the Gulf. He also said Iran begins charging fees in 60 days. Those demands tell us something important. Negotiations are no longer occurring because Iran fears defeat. They are occurring because Tehran believes time increasingly favors Iran. Iran is no longer negotiating to stop losing. It is negotiating to win more.” “For Trump, no question he is under enormous pressure to end the war at virtually any price. When he started it, he promised to destroy Iran’s missiles and proxies, and “to the great proud people of Iran…take over your government.” None of these goals will be achieved. Even in Trump’s interpretation of the deal, Iran’s regime remains and retains missiles, drones, proxies and no limits on expanding these tools of regional influence.The critical source of Iran’s advantage hinges on what’s changing for the world’s economy, not on the battlefield per se. The world’s economic cushions are running out and are smaller than many assume.” “The US Strategic Petroleum Reserve began the war with just under 400 million barrels. Today it stands near 348 million. Energy specialists increasingly argue that the operational floor lies closer to 270 to 300 million barrels, the operational minimum after which the salt walls in the storage caverns start to physically collapse. At current draw rates, that leaves only six to eight weeks before Washington faces harder choices.” “For months, the administration successfully reduced immediate pressure by talking down oil prices. Politically, that strategy bought time. Economically, however, it postponed adjustment. High prices normally encourage conservation and substitution. Suppressed prices delay those responses. Delayed adjustments frequently become abrupt adjustments. If inventories continue shrinking, Iran’s leverage will likely be significantly greater in August than it is today.”

His final point: “History will ultimately judge this war by a single question: did the war—and the agreement designed to end it - actually prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear weapons state? Ironically, the very dynamics that have strengthened Iran’s bargaining position may also strengthen Tehran’s incentives to seek the one form of leverage that cannot be blockaded, sanctioned, or negotiated away. The regime survived. The leadership survived. Oil leverage worked. And if growing leverage now creates pressure for American military withdrawal and regional accommodation, Iranian leaders may reasonably conclude that an eventual nuclear deterrent would lock those gains into place permanently.”

Here’s how desperate the commercial world is for this deal to stick: Crude prices slid about 5% following the news and hit their lowest level since March: Brent crude futures fell $4.38, or 5.02%, to $82.95 a barrel by 10:54 a.m. EDT and U.S. West Texas Intermediate was at $80.28, down $4.60, or 5.42%. Both contracts fell to their lowest levels since March 10 after tumbling more than 3% on Friday. WTI futures fell as much as $5 during the session. This aided shares of energy-sensitive airline and cruise stocks and hurt energy shares. United Airlines rose 6.4%, while Delta Air Lines and American Airlines added 4.1% and 5.2%, respectively. Norwegian Cruise and Carnival Corp advanced 5.2% each. Shares of oil majors Exxon Mobil and Chevron fell about 5% each. The S&P 500 energy index was down 3.9%. Iran’s semi-official Mehr news agency said the draft deal called for reopening the Strait of Hormuz within 30 days under Iranian arrangements. What all this means is Trump is constrained because he is desperate to get the market up with gas down, and can’t do anything that affects that “wrong.” This leaves the U.S. with little to any negotiation room and no ability to walk away from a deal. The Iranians have Trumpty-Dumpty by the short hairs and are squeezing the family jewels - that’s why he squeals like a piggie.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Tigger the gentle giant

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There are 142 days to the mid terms.

Do not do anythingf today that indicates in any way that you submit to this desecration of America and all its values that is being done today by this tasteless, tacky, vulgar, garish, gaudy, kitschy, crass, crude, coarse, gross, tawdry, trashy, meretricious, distasteful, weak, boorish, lumpish, oaf, this worthless, ignorant and proud of his ignorance, this barbarian, can stand there with his nose pressed to the glass door that is the entrance to civilized society, and he knows in his heart that there is not one thing - nothing - he can do to change the fact that no matter how many undeserved honors he steals for himself, not the cheers of lessers so degraded they perceive him as something great, that will ever change the fact that that door will never be opened to him. He will die there, on his knees, crying “Oh please, please, please!” To no response. Trump is THE MOST pathetic, most cowardly, weakest, thinnest-skinned baby-man ever born.

Goddamn him to Hell.

Trump is offering free admission to the National Parks on his birthday. It’s not a gift. It’s not. It is the latest installment in a systematic effort to literally remake this country in one man’s image. It’s a brand extension. Let’s not forget that Maladministration II removed Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth from the free admission calendar. They’re gone. In their place is Dear Leader’s birthday, which the Interior Department has rebranded as one of its new “patriotic fee-free days.” Maladministration II has been systematically rewriting what our public lands and public institutions are allowed to say about who we are. Don’t go. Ken Burns is right; our national parks are America’s greatest idea. Do not knuckle your brow to him and his cabal of –- incompetent fascist scum in any way whatsoever. As said elsewhere, “he’s playing 3-dementia chess.”

According to a forecast from The Weather Channel, UFC Freedom 250 is walking into a near-biblical mess tonight.on Sunday. Forecasters put the chance of thunderstorms at 60%, with heavy downpours and wind gusts reaching up to 34 mph that could delay the outdoor bouts entirely. The storms are only the start. The Weather Channel warned that brutal Washington humidity is shoving the heat index into triple digits, the kind of swampy misery the capital is famous for in mid-June. And then come the bugs. Forecasters said fighters will have to battle “massive swarms of mosquitos and gnats” inside the cage, turning the octagon into an open-air buffet. If the rain, heat and insects sound like a checklist of ancient plagues, the lightning rules supply the final twist. The Weather Channel noted that the event’s 92-foot overhang, the towering structure organizers have dubbed “the Claw,” should at least keep the octagon dry. But a single lightning strike within eight miles will trigger an automatic 30-minute freeze on the whole event, meaning the fights could stall again and again as storms roll through. For a president who loves to control the cameras, the sight of fighters swatting gnats through a rain delay is probably not the spectacle he had in mind.

This forecast makes me almost believe there is a God. There’s even the possibility of a tornado.

Cabinet officials, and some 4,000 spectators are expected to attend the mixed martial arts event, for which a massive structure nicknamed “The Claw” has been erected on the White House lawn. But there aren’t many other fans. Harry Enten, CNN’s resident pollster, delivered a stunning blow to the bash on Sunday: “Let’s just say this much: Americans do not like it.” Enten calculated that just 16% of those polled found the fighting event to be appropriate at the White House. Notably, even members of the TrumpParty expressed reservations, with just 31 percent of Republicans approving. “I think this is the big problem here….Americans just don’t think that Donald Trump and this White House is in touch with them, because they put on stuff like that that Americans don’t really care about.” According to CNN polling, 60% of Americans view the White House as out of touch with the country.

UPDATE: Fu Manchu, er, I mean Steven Cheung, who operates the Rapid Response 47 account posted on X: This event is about celebrating America’s unmatched greatness after 250 years — which apparently doesn’t sit well with the friendless loser who wrote this bullshit clickbait headline. Rain or shine, we’re celebrating our great country no matter what. GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Meanwhile, everything else keeps reminding us what a Master of the Universe Dear Leader is:

Trump spent valuable time Saturday posting self-promoting Lies Anti-Social messages about what a capable, fearless, adventurous fellow he is. Despite the Iran war, skyrocketing gas prices, an inflation jump, depressed wages and mounting grocery costs, the president spent time on Saturday golfing, and revealing what he imagines are his multiple victories. One post featured a younger Trump, in a suit, hands clasped, sitting wistfully alongside Central Park’s Wollman skating rink. “Years ago after saving the Wollman Skating Rink in Central Park – Long before I fixed The Reflecting Pool, and everything else in Washington, D.C. including, most importantly, CRIME!” Trump wrote. (As for his $14 million “fix” of the Reflecting Pool, it’s already marred by algae just days after its TrumpRenovation.) He also posted a photo of himself on a 1986 cover of Fortune magazine beneath the headline: “Real Estate Upheaval.” Trump was so busy posting message after message about his heroic self last week that he completely forgot to mention D-Day heroes who risked their lives by storming the beaches at Normandy.

Further proof that, with a “friend” like Israel, you need no enemy: This morning, Trump warned Israel and Iran to “not blow” the finalization of an emerging peace deal amid strikes in Lebanon.

He wrote on Lies Anti-social: “We are very close to a Deal that will bring peace to the region, including to Lebanon, and all sides should stand down,” after he said Saturday that a ceasefire could be signed Sunday. “There should be no more attacks by Israel anywhere in Lebanon, but there should also be no more attacks by any other party, including Hezbollah, against Israel. This could be the beginning of a long and beautiful peace - Let’s not blow it!” Earlier, the IDF struck Beirut after Hezbollah fired three projectiles into northern Israel. Trump wrote that Israel’s “attack on Beirut should not have happened, particularly on a special day when we are so close to a Peace Deal with Iran.” He called the attack that Israel responded to “small and meaningless,” adding that “nobody was hurt, injured, or killed, and should not disrupt this important process.” Israel’s strikes on Lebanon “are creating issues” with finalizing the peace agreement with the U.S. and Iran. Israel is not a party to the emerging peace deal, though Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office stated on Thursday that he supports Trump’s “commitment” to a deal. Iranian officials and state media have largely contradicted U.S. claims that a peace deal would be signed Sunday.

I think there may be bigger news later this evening.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Ginger

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. We can bring down Trump, with your support. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters There are several readers who visit every day - is what you get here worth 21 cents? It’s only a little, but its result is huge. Thank you for your support.

As of this morning, in the past 10 days TAFM has lost 12 paid subscribers. This path is not sustainable. I have this question for the free subscribers who regularly read my work: do you think this work has value?

“This is great. I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

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There’s143 days to the mid terms.

Finally, maybe, possibly? Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif revealed this morning that a peace deal between the United States and Iran was imminent, and that mediators were already preparing to electronically certify the agreement between the two nations. “We are closer to a peace deal than ever before,” Sharif said in a statement published on social media. “With finalisation likely expected in the next 24 hours, Pakistan is preparing for the electronic signing of the peace deal immediately after, followed by technical level talks next week.” Of course, Dilbert couldn’t leave well enough alone. This morning he shitposted on Lies Anti-Social, “Hopefully, this process will all work out quickly, easily, and smoothly. If it doesn’t, we have the ultimate alternative, hopefully never to be used again!” This certainly sounds like he’s bringing up nuclear weapons again. Citing sources within Maladministration II, veteran journalist Seymour Hersh claimed this week Trump had previously “raised the issue of using low-yield nuclear weapons” against Iran out of desperation amid his deeply unpopular war that had failed to achieve any of its objectives.

Both chambers of Congress on Thursday failed to pass bills to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) through July 2 amid outrage from Democrats about Bill Pulte being tapped to lead the intelligence community. The unprecedented expiration of the nation’s warrantless spy powers has plunged the country into legal uncertainty over the extent to which it can surveil foreigners located abroad. Each then left town, allowing the spy powers to lapse after they expired at midnight. Democrats refused to reauthorize Section 702 over objections to Pulte being tapped to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), noting his history of using his role leading the Federal Housing Finance Agency to make criminal referrals of alleged mortgage fraud for four Trump foes. Trump somewhat backed away from the pick, nominating U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton to lead the office. Pulte, however, is still slated to serve as acting director of intelligence on June 19, and Democrats have said they won’t give him even one day’s access to 702.

After much hooing and hawing and huffing and puffing and pissing and moaning, Trump’s name is noi longer on the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. While it took a mere few hours, using scissor lifts, the his name to go on the build back in December, this time it took ten hours to erect scaffolding, while a festive crowd gathered and remained - happy and peacful, celebrating the first blow against our would-be dick-tater. Minutes befpre tjhe midnight deadline to see the name removed, the TrumpDOJ requested 12 hours, citing weather delays and safety concerns. The pathetic excuse got asll the respect it deserved when the judge denied the request; then the Appeals Court denied the emergency request. Trumpty-Dumpty was about to have his great fall. Then the real plan came into view. The scaffolding hasd not been put up to help workers remove the name; it was a framework for the tarps that were hung across the facade to keep all those in attendance from seeing the removal. The event became a perfect metaphor for Trump: compliance behind a curtain. The court was obeyed; the letters came down. But no one was allowed to see the biggest blow to Dilbert’s tiny, fragile ego since he lost the 2020 election. The name was gone by 0400. Jim Acosta posted on-scene video showing him walking close to the façade and looking into the narrow gap between tarp and wall, confirming what was later treated as fact: behind the tarp, Trump was gone. It’s still a victory for Us and a big loss to the psychologically-destroyed 5 years old the moron portion of the electorate placed in an office he has no business being near, let alone in. When we get the veto-proof majority next year, we’ll confine him to his room till December 2028, then impeach and remove him. Letting his body slowly twist in the wind is nothing he doesn’t deserve.

U.S. District Judge Angel Kelley in Massachusetts scorched Trump’s Interior Department on Friday for orders to remove all exhibits pertaining to race, sexuality, and climate from national parks, and issued an order to reverse all of it. She went into painstaking detail about the significance of the exhibits being torn down under the so-called “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History” order by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, wrting: “The National Park system ... serves as a cornerstone of public learning, providing rich and informative signs, exhibits, and interpretive waysides on topics ranging from civil rights to environmentalism, citing “the echoes of abolition in John Brown’s Fort in Harpers Ferry ... the genesis of the modern LGBTQ+ civil rights movement at the Stonewall National Monument ... [and] the retreating ice of Glacier National Park.” The park system, she continued, is sometimes called “America’s largest classroom,” and to that end, “the Government’s stewardship of these park sites ... carries a responsibility to present history in full rather than in favored fragments.” Unfortunately, she continued, “Under the guise of promoting American dignity, this Administration seeks to share a limited history by ordering the removal of all signs, displays, and interpretive exhibits at National Parks that do not align with its preferred narrative, thereby telling half-truths.” All of these removals, Kelley wrote in her opinion, add up to “government-sanctioned erasure and rejection of their histories. It strips the sites of the context that gives them meaning. It degrades the public’s trust in the government, as the Executive Order ignores congressional directives and carelessly razes decades of efforts in the pursuit of its unilateral agenda. These harms are, in all senses of the word, irreparable.”

David Ellison, CEO of Paramount Skydance, promised to give “60 Minutes” more editorial independence during a call, Lesley Stahl told the NYT. Along with Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim, Stahl is one of the last journalists sticking with the iconic “60 Minutes” despite recent firings and a Trump-friendly takeover.

The TrumpDOJ sure got a lot of whackin’ applied to its ginormous posterior by federal judges this past week: The judicial branch’s response to the Trump rampage has been slow but there are signs that it’s gathering steam. The more judges that dispense with the government’s presumption of regularity, the wider the door opens to investigating irregularities. The pace is halting and often hard to visualize because it comes in so many different flavors across so many different courts. Thursday and Friday saw a flurry of examples of judicial pushback against Maladministration II that offers a good snapshot of the emerging moment: In Florida: U.S. District Judge Kyle Dudek of Ft. Myers, a Trump appointee, issued an apoplectic order in a habeas case after the Trump administration failed to abide by his order to give an ICE detainee a bond hearing. The TrumpDOJ originally conceded that the detainee was entitled to a bond hearing in front of an immigration judge. “What happened next borders on the surreal,” Dudek wrote in an order. The immigration judge refused to hold a bond hearing, the administration went along with it, waiving its right to appeal, and then came back to Dudek saying its original concession “was in error.” Dudek was not having any of it: “The Government was right the first time. And its request for a do-over here is not just legally unsupportable, it is a masterclass in litigation cynicism. A federal court is not a testing lab where the Executive branch can pilot a concession to get a case closed, stand by silently while its own administrative process flouts the resulting mandate, and then stroll back in demanding a clean slate. Give me a break.” Rather than just re-order a bond hearing, he ordered the detainee released within 48 hours “because the Government has shown a complete inability to follow judicial directions.”

In Rhode Island: Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr. popped the Trump administration for not immediately complying with his order to resume making asylum decisions and restart immigration processing. “It should almost go without saying—but the Court will say it anyway for the sake of ‘clarify[ing]’ the Government’s ‘current obligations’ — that court orders vacating and setting aside agency policies have immediate effect once they are issued,” McConnell wrote.

McConnell gave the administration 24 hours to file a status report on the “specific steps” it’s taken to comply with his order: “There is no excuse this time; the Government has an obligation to immediately comply with this Order.”

In Illinois: After a federal judge ordered an evidentiary hearing into possible grand jury improprieties in an unrelated fraud case by the same prosecutor implicated in grand jury misconduct in the Broadview Six case, the TrumpDOJ folded. It moved to dismiss charges against two defendants in the rather serious fraud case rather than see its prosecutors, including potentially Chicago U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros, hauled to the stand to give sworn testimony about the grand jury proceedings.

In D.C.: Chief Judge James Boasberg rejected a revisionist move by the TrumpDOJ to vacate his earlier order quashing grand jury subpoenas in the politicized investigation of the Federal Reserve and its then-chairman Jay Powell. In revisiting his earlier ruling, Boasberg colorfully summarized it thusly: “This Court found that the subpoenas were meant to harass Powell and to pressure him to truckle to the President’s policy preferences.” It also concluded that the Government had no good-faith basis to believe that Powell was guilty of any crime other than displeasing the President and that the Government’s justifications were mere pretexts.” As he rejected the latest move, Boasberg dryly called it “a creative way to clear its loss from the books.” “This Court found that the subpoenas were meant to harass Powell and to pressure him to truckle to the President’s policy preferences. It also concluded the Government had no good- faith basis to believe that Powell was guilty of any crime other than displeasing the President and that the Government’s justifications were mere pretexts. As he rejected the latest move, Boasberg dryly called it “a creative way to clear its loss from the books.”

Elmos net worth surged past $1 trillion on Friday as SpaceX presented its Pump-and-Dumb fraud, er, I mean IPO, prompting global revulsion and calls for an aggressive wealth tax to rein in out-of-control inequality. Igor Volsky, director of the Tax the Greedy Billionaires Campaign, said: “Musk became the world’s first trillionaire because our tax system shields the wealth of the ultra-wealthy from taxation while requiring working to people pay taxes on every paycheck. Today’s milestone should serve as a wake-up call to us all.” He went on: “Unless we plan to cede control and agency over our future to a handful of ultra-wealthy individuals, lawmakers must pursue bold tax policies that actually meet this moment- not just slowing the accumulation of extreme wealth, but reversing it. That means passing taxes on billionaire wealth ambitious enough to make the ultra-wealthy less wealthy, reduce the stranglehold they have over our economy and democracy, and restore the ideal that no one in America gets to buy their way to unchecked power.”

Friday, the TrumpDOJ approved the Paramount-WBD merger; Paramount Skydance now has a clearer path to acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery for $110 billion. Maladministration II had leverage over Paramount Skydance CEO and MAGA ally David Ellison, who sought to clear the deal through the DOJ. While the deal dangled in uncertainty, Paramount’s networks like CBS and CBS News made controversial moves to end The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and fire “60 Minutes” correspondents like Sharyn Alfonsi and Scott Pelley.

Behind the scenes, TrumpDOJ and other Maladministration II officials have quietly assured allies that plans for some form of payout to the J6 Seditionists remain on track. TPM’s David Kurtz reports: “I spoke with eight people familiar with the so-called Anti-Weaponization Fund—including current and former Justice Department officials, current and former members of Congress, a defense attorney, and political operatives close to the administration. All said that Justice Department officials and people close to the White House have indicated that the payout idea has not actually been scrapped. Rather, they say, officials are exploring whether elements of the fund can be reactivated while also examining alternative arrangements to make sure loyalists get compensated.”

Thursday morning and Friday morning Trump called for Rep. Jamie Raskin to be expelled from Congress because the “bum” wants to launch impeachment proceedings against him. In a now-standard-issue Midnifght meldown, sundowning Gramps a 195-word tirade against Raskin while sharing an X post from Fox News host Mark Levin demanding Republicans “move to expel” Raskin from the House. It is unclear what exactly set Levin and Trump off on their rants against Raskin. The longtime nemesis of the president has frequently hinted that Democrats will launch impeachment proceedings against Trump should Democrats retake control of the House in the midterms, as they are widely expected to do. Dilbert wrote: “Jamie Raskin, a Loser in Life, who worked endlessly during my First Term to impeach me, and failed miserably, wasting the Country’s money, time, and effort, will guaranteed be trying to do it again, despite one of the most successful Presidencies in History.” He also desperately suggested Friday morning that Raskin would “be in jail right now” if former President Joe Biden hadn’t issued sweeping preemptive pardons just before leaving office. “Something should be done about people like this who do bad things, but always come up on the short end because of their illegal or unscrupulous behavior, and hurt our Country in the process,” Trump continued. (Yes indeed, something should be done to you, Dilbert.) “I agree with Mark Levin when he says to, EXPEL THE BUM. Congress can never be great with people like this, who suffer massively from Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS), casting their vote of HATE!” In an interview on All In with Chris Hayes, Raskin responded to Trump’s Lies Anti-Social post by suggesting the president is “having nightmare flashbacks about impeachment.”

A commercial airline pilot received a baffling response from the FAA after Trump’s UFC lights blinded them while landing Friday night. The pilot spoke anonymously about how powerful lights from the UFC octagon on the White House South Lawn filled the cockpit during a landing at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. It was “10 times worse than any laser illumination event.” FAA personnel told the pilot to contact the White House about the safety concerns. The pilot’s reports “raise questions” about how well the fight’s organizers coordinated with aviation authorities, considering the illuminated UFC setup’s proximity to the “busiest flight corridors.” The FAA recently recommended blinking red lights for Trump’s triumphal arch because of how close it is to busy D.C. flight corridors.

Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman explained in his Friday morning nesletter, and later on Ari Melber’s show, why the SpaceX IPO valuation that just made tech tycoon Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire stinks to high heaven, calling deal deal a Ponzi Scjheme and Musk’s whole career a Ponzi Scheme. After all his other cons like The Boring Company, Mission to Mars, self-driving Teslas, and everything else have failed, Space-S is what he has left. “What’s left? What is SpaceX? It’s a medium-sized satellite launch company? That’s an okay business, but it’s not a huge business, attached to a really bad AI model. Grok is, by all accounts, terrible ... and that in turn is bolted to what’s left of Twitter, which has been turned into a, you know, a right-wing, Nazi-infested wasteland.” It defies belief, Krugman continued, to imagine that company is “worth almost as much as Microsoft, you know, which is are supplying the software that, you know, like it or not, the world runs on. So this is crazy, the valuation. There’s no conceivable way.” Ultimately, he said, “this is all it really is a Ponzi scheme,” but unlike most Ponzi schemes where all the suckers have to choose to opt into it, “People are being forced effectively to buy into SpaceX because the indexes are including it, even though by the normal rules they should not,” and there are now even “universities that have 10 or 15 percent of their endowment invested in SpaceX.” The bottom line, Krugman concluded, is that “this is a rigged system ... this is genuine rigging. Clearly the the system has all been tilted into producing this absurd valuation that makes the world’s first trillionaire.”

It does seem, after more than two months of lies and deceptions that the USA and Iran are closer to a deal than they ever have been before. Not just Trump is saying it (he has lied about this repeatedly) but the Iranians and other states in the region are claiming that a deal actually is close. The Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi went on television to say that an agreement is in the works. As for the terms of the agreement we must still wait and see. However the first signs are not at all positive for the USA securing anything of value and indeed point to a humiliating result for what was, until recently, the world’s only superpower. Credible reports are coming out that not only has the US already supported the return of $3 billion to Iran, but that a total of $20 billion might soon be on its way through the UAE. VP JD Vance tacitly endorsed this scenario by saying that the USA would not be sending money to Iran now (using the present tense, a sure giveaway that what happens in the future might be different) and furthermore talking up the prospect of the USA actually supporting the long-term legitimacy of the Iranian regime. Iran seems determined to maintain the principle that it can still charge tolls for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and when it comes to any Iranian nuclear deal, it seems the terms on offer are probably worse than those agreed by the Obama administration under the JCPOA of 2015.

Losing wars tends to be unpopular for Americans, and Trump will have done so obviously - with the mid-term elections looming. Politically the timing could not be better. I agree with Phillips O’Brien, who wrote last night: “If this happens, we are staring at a pretty comprehensive US strategic defeat. The US would have used up a large percentage of its most advanced weaponry, would have bombarded Iran at will for more than a month and would be in a worse position than when the war started. More worryingly, countries in the region and around the world have now had a first hand opportunity to see what the US has become, a blowhard of a power with no real partners, which regularly betrays those who thought they were its allies. The USA has revealed that it is strategically illiterate, with a decaying military and a decrepit political system. Add it up, and this war should weaken the US markedly in the region and internationally while highlighting the reality of American decline. A defeat would be good for this country. It will clear the air. It can make Americans realize just how the US military has declined and is deteriorating. This performance of the US military has been poor militarily and ethically in this war. The US has not adjusted its military to meet modern war-fighting conditions, still relying too much on expensive, exquisite systems, and the US officer corps has clearly been purged of much of its talent and intellectual ability. The US military will need total rebuilding after this and losing a war so quickly and decisively can lead to such a rebuild. Now, nothing can actually be done on this while Trump is commander in chief and the DOD is led by someone as completely unfit as Pete Hegseth, but it does mean that going forward, the whole Pentagon structure will need to be cleansed.

“The implications of the destruction of the US foreign policy making structure is now undeniable. This has not received nearly the attention that it deserves in the US, but America’s ability to conduct foreign policy, let alone influence other states, has been crippled by the gutting of the US diplomatic corps. The US has not only driven away vast number of its best diplomats, it is not even filling most of its ambassador positions around the world. Basically the country is led by a crook/con-man and a handful of incompetent sycophants. They have lost this war and hopefully people will see that killing expertise is not some game or a way to “own the libs” but is actually a development that is weakening the country.

“For decades the US has achieved nothing in the region except making things worse for itself and those who live there, and at monstrous, eye watering cost. It is time for the people of the Middle East to take responsibility for their own destiny without the US playing this hyper-militarized role. Yes, there will be a much more developed piece on this once/if any deal is signed. However if losing this war leads to a US drawdown in the region, I will be standing in the cheering section.”

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Tim the turtle

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Wow - there are 144 days to the midterms. Boy, I tell ya - getting the hit in daily does is sustainable, but coming across all the fuckwittery, shitheadness, malfeasance, malevolence., ignorance, incompetence, and other crap from this collection of malevolent ignoramuses... that’s not so easy.

Fortunately, I awakened from 24 hours of sleeping for an hour, peeing, sleeping for an hou... until around 11pm last night, when I only got up to pee twice by 0700. I had enough energy to douse my face in cold water, ditto the top of my head and comb out all the rats up there, shave for the first time in five days (ouch!), go in the kichen and make make a pot of coffee. Boy, that first jolt was welcome. I’m currently working on #2 and each sip feels better than the one before.

So, off into the big bad world of Reality we go.

A federal lawsuit was filed Monday, trying to stop Trump from hosting a UFC fight on the White House lawn Sunday. The lawsuit, filed by the Public Integrity Project on behalf of two Virginia residents, argues Trump is handing White and the UFC something no private company has ever had: the White House and the Lincoln Memorial as a promotional platform for a for-profit sporting event. The lawsuit further notes that Trump disclosed owning between $15,000 and $50,000 in stock in the UFC’s parent company while actively promoting the event. Lawyer Brendan Ballou called the fight “a profoundly corrupt scheme to enrich the President and his friends.” He added that America’s national monuments “will become little more than branding opportunities for the rich and well-connected” if the fight is allowed to move forward. Winning in court will be a tough lift. The National Park Service answers to the president, which means the administration can change whatever rules get in the way. A federal judge did ask both sides Monday to propose a hearing schedule, so there’s a legal process moving. But the cage is already being built. Democrats are tying this to a broader pattern of the president treating public spaces as his personal property. There’s a legal fight over the demolition of the White House East Wing to build a 90,000 square-foot ballroom. He also wants to build a 250-foot arch right next to Arlington National Cemetery. Democratic Senator Adam Schiff laid it all out in blunt terms, saying: “Trump is building a golden ballroom, and for his birthday arranging a UFC fight on the White House grounds, while you’re fighting to pay this month’s bills.”

Thursday, after claiming the United States was going to seize control of Iran’s oriduction ficility on Kharg Isdlabnd Dilbert was soon trumpeting to the world that the Iran deal had been “settled at the highest level,” ande ws soon to end, which was why he called off his announced “major attack.” Today was a different day ending in “y”. Today, “The terms that Iran leaked out to the Fake News have NOTHING to do with the terms that were agreed to, in writing. What they said, including their weak and pathetic statement on having a deal, bears no relation to the truth. He went on to blast the Iranians as “very dishonorable people to deal with” and wrote, “With them, there is no such thing as dealing in good faith. AMAZING!” He ended with a comment that an attempted drone strike by Iran against Indian ships leaving the Strait of Hormuz is “TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE.” A senior Maladministration II said that Iran has agreed to multiple points as part of a “performance-based” deal. The provisions include Iran agreeing to destroy and remove all nuclear material and to dismantle its nuclear program. It stipulates that none of its money will be released until it performs. It also includes Iran agreeing to no funding for terrorist groups and the Strait of Hormuz would be open. Late on Thursday, Dilbert announced that the U.S. had “ended the war with Iran today” and claimed that both sides had agreed to a “very strong memorandum of understanding” during a tele-rally. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office earlier, he called it a “great settlement.” In a Lies Anti-Social post, he revealed he was calling off the strikes after discussions with Iran and claimed that “final points have been, in both concept and great detail, approved by all parties involved,” though it was short of being “finalized.”This is what you get when you put a psychologically-destroyed 5-year old in charge.

Once again, the more-accurate news is the Iranians. The report from Iran stated it would not make any new commitments regarding nuclear capabilities and that this would be discussed during a 60-day negotiation period. The removal of all sanctions would also be addressed within that 60-day period. It also claimed $300 billion for reconstruction, the release of $24 billion in frozen funds, and indicated that the Strait of Hormuz would be regionally managed, without implying a return to its prewar status. Similar accounts of the memorandum that appeared to favor Iran were also provided by the mediator, Pakistan. But they emphasized that the text had not been finalized, according to the report.

Thursday, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Virginia agreed to indefinitely block the TrumpDOJ’s “anti-weaponization” fund after previously agreeing to temporarily block any payments. The decision from came a hearing on whether to bar any payments from the $1.776 billion fund for the duration of the case. Democracy Forward, a legal nonprofit representing the plaintiffs, confirmed Brinkema’s ruling from the bench. “This ruling is a significant victory for the Constitution, the rule of law, and people in America,” said Skye Perryman, the group’s president and CEO, in a statement. “The court recognized the serious legal concerns raised by the Trump-Vance administration’s attempt to create a secretive, taxpayer-funded compensation program operating outside the constitutional safeguards that govern public spending. Despite the administration’s shifting explanations about the future of the slush fund, the court’s order ensures that taxpayer dollars cannot be distributed through this unlawful scheme while the courts fully consider the serious constitutional issues at stake. We look forward to continuing this challenge on behalf of our clients.”

The carnage continues: Sordid new details are coming out about how Trump and his allies hijacked the bipartisan “America250” celebration approved by Congress and siphoned off its money to alternative celebration planning entities under his control. According to The Atlantic’s Michael Scherer, newly obtained documents behind the scenes of Trump taking over the event “described frayed trust and growing conflict that has become so acrimonious that the Department of Interior is refusing to honor a December agreement with America250 “to transfer $50 million in funding.” Officials claimed they will not do so because “Spending taxpayer money on frivolous, poorly attended events and D.C. consultants who are trying to get rich off America’s 250th is the exact opposite of what was intended. This administration will not light taxpayer money on fire. Full stop.” This has left lawmakers and event organizers in both parties frustrated, with one America250 commissioner telling Scherer, “This is straight out of It’s a Wonderful Life, when Henry Potter steals George Bailey’s money and tries to drive him to the brink.”

It’s not just Dilbert who’s getting kicked in his teeth: While Republicans project confidence in the race between Collins and Graham Platner , the NRSC is throwing up alarms, warning this could be a tough fight and Collins must not be caught off guard. “Maine has become more than a battleground state in this year’s fight for control of the Senate. It has become a linchpin,” stated the NRSC memo. “Because Democrats cannot win the majority without it, they have fully rallied around Graham Platner, an extremely flawed, far-left candidate who secured the nomination last night. Platner has captured his party’s financial backing, outraising Senator Collins in every quarter since entering the race. We must match both the energy and the money to retain the seat.” The memo outlined the fact that one of Platner’s best fundraising days was after the story dropped about his problematic relationships with women. Ultimately, the memo concluded, in a state as Democratic-leaning as Maine, “it is a fatal mistake to assume Platner is too damaged to win. He is currently leading. Vice President Harris won the state by 7 points, and the National Democrats view this as their only path to regaining control.” Collins, the memo said, has to be protected “with total urgency.” I caqn just see this showing up in a Platner ad, reminding people they want “a senator who can’t be bought.”

The hits continue! District Judge Richard G. Stearns in Massachusetts ruled Thursday that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton cannot move forward with a donation-vetting lawsuit against progressive fundraising platform ActBlue. He blocked Paxton from “continuing to litigate” the case, finding that ActBlue was likely to succeed in its claims that the action infringed on its First Amendment’s free-speech protections. The court sided with ActBlue’s argument that the lawsuit amounted to “retaliation” for its role in fundraising for Democratic candidates, namely Paxton’s opponent in the Texas Senate race, state Rep. James Talarico. “The lawsuit in Texas is undoubtedly an adverse action,” Stearns, an appointee of former President Clinton, wrote in a 15-page order. “And having previously found bad faith, the court agrees with ActBlue that the evidence in the record compels the conclusion that, far from protecting Texas consumers, the action was filed in retaliation for ActBlue’s fundraising on behalf of Talarico, Paxton’s current political rival for the Senate seat.” Judge Stearns also barred Paxton or his office from bringing any new claims “premised on the same conduct.”

In the third century AD, scholars began to note a fall off in general literacy among the Empire’s peoplation - a skill once held by over 90% of the population at the time of the Republic’s fall. It wascnsidered that literacy had declined by a third. Over the next 200 years, the laws that would govern society in the Dark and Middle ages - when most people were bound to the places they were born and to their “family occupation.” Things remained that way for 1,500 years in European civilization. In a new essay for The Chronicle Higher Education, university-level literature and writing instructor Tyler Jagt recalls how not a single one of his students could get through an assigned 20-page article, something that he had read “without complaint” as an undergraduate a decade ago. One student confessed that the reason they didn’t finish was that they kept losing track of what the paper was about. And there’s no doubt that they’re not alone. Jagt cites the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress reading assessment results released last year. It showed that 12th grade reading scores were at the lowest level since the assessment began in 1992. Nearly a third of those 12th graders scored below the assessment’s “basic” level in reading, meaning they likely “cannot draw general conclusions based on concepts presented explicitly in a text.” Younger children aren’t better off: a recent report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation found that 70 percent of fourth graders, or around two million kids, can’t read at a proficient level. “What I am seeing in my classroom is no longer a hunch,” Jagt writes. “There is a measurable, generational collapse in sustained reading and writing, and the academy is responding to it with improvisation and exhaustion rather than the structural overhaul it requires.” They could start with getting rid of the past 76 years of “edumacashanil reforms” Sight reading - introduced across the country in 1950 -destroyed the ability to recognize words and led to a generation of boomers who to this days still dislike reading. Get rid of Great Books - the idea that placing a student near a “great book” will lead to the information in the book transposing into the student brain. Then get rid of New Math, New Science, and every other so called educational reform spouted by some Ed.D looking for something to save their job. I was lucky, my two grandmothers, both teachers, taught me phonics at age 5 and I never had a problem learning anything.

Thursday, Trump claimed he would take over Washington, D.C. if the mayoral candidate he doesn’t want to win gets elected, according to The Washington Post. Trump made it clear for the first time that he was opposed to democratic socialist Janeese Lewis George winning the Democratic primary next week. S reporter asked, “One of the two leading candidates is running a Zohran Mamdani campaign focusing on socialist policies. How would you feel if she wins?” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that he “wouldn’t like it” if Lewis George wins. He also threatened that his administration “maybe would take back Washington, run it on the federal basis.” Lewis George, who has been leading in polls and criticized the president throughout the campaign, issued this statement: “We are not going to get ICE off our streets by fearing this president. We are not going to protect our rights or Home Rule by obeying in advance. Threatening Home Rule because you do not like how residents vote is an attack on democracy itself. The people of DC elect the mayor of DC. And they want someone who will stand up to Donald Trump.” Trump would need congressional approval to take over Washington, D.C. He has not explained why he is against the candidate. “While he has authority to seize temporary control of the city’s police department and to deploy the D.C. National Guard, as he did last year, Trump is legally barred from unilaterally revoking the city’s right to self-government, a step that would require an act of Congress,” according to The Post.

Maladministration II is quietly folding on a major policy to attack the development of renewable energy in the United States. According to Heatmap, the TrumpDOJ this week “filed a motion ... to dismiss its appeal of a federal court’s December decision vacating the order to halt offshore wind projects.” The motion still must be approved by the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, but it marks a significant win for the plaintiffs, which include 17 states and the Alliance for Clean Energy New York. The original executive order Trump signed would have suspended all offshore wind development on the outer continental shelf. Despite all of Trump's efforts to obstruct the industry, renewable energy continues to grow as a share of U.S. power generation, reaching a record 26% last year. Trump's war in Iran, which has disrupted global oil markets through the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, is sparking further renewable energy investment around the world. Wow, Dilbert killed his war on wind by starting his war on reality.

During a press conference today, the worlds Dumbestfuckingokie - ol’ Markwayne - went after New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his constituents. Mullin said of Mamdani: “He and I don’t get along. It’s shameful, and hopefully people in New York will wise up and get a true leader in there in a few years.” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, fired back, writing, “Nothing like an Oklahoman with no ties to New York City trying to tell the city what to think about its highly popular mayor.” “The leader of American Gestapo is both dumb as a rock and purely evil,” Norman Ornstein said.

The latest weather forecast has Washington, D.C. at a temperature high of 91 degrees Fahrenheit on Sunday, with “hot with intervals of clouds and sun; a thunderstorm in spots late in the afternoon.” And the famous humidity. Organizers are grappling with a problem that every Washingtonian knows all too well: summer insects descending on bright lights in the nation’s swampiest city. AccuWeather’s bug tracking may be even more concerning for Trump as he celebrates his 80th birthday watching burly men trade blows. “Warm weather and the metabolic rate of insects increases causing bugs to invade homes and gardens in search of food. With a rise in rain, notice an increase in mosquitoes, stink bugs, roaches and termites,” the site says, warning of “extreme” risk on Sunday. All this could be “somewhat unpleasant” for fighters gasping for air in an already slippery octagon splattered with sweat and blood, as well as UFC boss Dana White, who has made it clear over the years how much he dislikes outdoor fight cards because you can’t control the elements. Awwww. I’m sooooo worried and concerned!

And finally: Workers were tearing President Donald Trump’s name off the Kennedy Center on Friday as onlookers nearby chanted and cheered. Thousands tuned in on livestreams from ABC 7, WUSA9, Reuters, Fox 10, the Associated Press, Forbes, and MS NOW to watch it happen in real time. A crowd assembled outside the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as workers erected scaffolding on the façade. A judge had killed the Trump board’s last-ditch legal attempt to stop the removal just hours earlier, leaving a midnight deadline intact. Then the chanting started. “Take it down!” — 15 times in a row. The crowd exploded into applause and cheers. About a minute passed. “Take it down!” — 11 more times. More cheering. Someone hollered “Woo!” The energy didn’t drop. After another minute, there were nine more chants, more applause, more whoops, more noise — the whole thing playing out over roughly 2-1/2 minutes of pure crowd electricity. I think this can be listed politicvally with such things as tearing down Saddam’s statue and the fall of th Berlin Wall for symbology.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Bitsy and Winnie

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. We can bring down Trump, but ONLY with your financial support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty here.

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There are 146 days to the mid terms. I wonder if Sundowning Gramps will make it without blowing a fuse or two along the way?

After tossing and turning for an hour, I decided I might as well get up, at 0415. At 0545, my screenwriting partner will arrive to give me a ride over to Cedars-Sinai. At least going in early, I’ll get out before evening rush hours.

So, there was good news ( to me) when I turned on the news feed:

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Democrat Nithya Raman are projected to face off to lead Los Angeles in November. With 87% of votes in, Bass is at 34.68%, and Raman is at 27.12%; Spencer Pratt was at 26.69%.

Of course, Fatso Fatass had another overdose last night and went into a rageathon over the news. He just KNOWS there had to be voter fraud, since Republicans always win (except when they don’t). “Now way this could have happened. Rigged Election!” When he had his public rageathon yesterday on Meet The Press, Trump said of the notoriously slow voting process, “Do you know why they’re doing that? Because they’re cheating on the election!” Poor Dilbert! Everybody won’t give him the respect he knows he’s deserved since he popped out in this reality. Please go have your massive fatal myocardial infarction, you embarrasing piece of shit.

Arab-dumb-enough-to-be-a-Republican Rep. Abe Hamadeh (R-Ariz.) said in a post on the social platform X: “Watching California reenact a VERY familiar playbook by flooding the system with unverifiable mail-in ballots while deliberately staggering the count to chip away at the Republican candidate. This is a joke. Everyone sees what’s happening. When will Republicans recognize the urgency and pass legislation to fix this broken system before Americans lose faith in our elections?” Do you have to wear special glasses that keep you from seeing that you and your fellow criminals are the Lizard People, to “see what’s happening”? Katie Miller, one half of the most Lizardy of the Lizard People couple in DC, posed: “The ballot corruption is happening in California right before our eyes!” Looney Loomer posted: “The Mayoral election in Los Angeles is being stolen from @spencerpratt in real time! Where is the DOJ?” She also posted: “Here’s a crazy idea: Make it a law that all ballots must be counted on election night. It’s rocket science, I know.” And later: “How do third world countries count millions of ballots in one day, but California ‘isn’t done’ yet? Make it make sense.” Libs of TikTok MAGA operative Chaya Raichik, also expressed outrage with a racially charged question: “Can someone please explain to me how third world India counted 640 million ballots in one day while California takes a month to count 20 million ballots??” MAGA “comedian” Jamie Kennedy said, “This is a literal crime scene. There is no way this is an honest election.” Right-wing influencer Joey Mannarino also chimed in: “California’s election fraud scam right now is somehow even more blatant than 2020’s election fraud. Literally no one believes these numbers.”

Yesterday, Iran fired missiles at Israel for the first time since the ceasefire went into effect in early April, in response to escalations in Israel’s fight against Iran-linked Hezbollah in Lebanon. The IDF said it intercepted the missiles as sirens could be heard in northern Israel. Israel retaliated against Iran, despite Trump saying he told Netanyahu not to retaliate in a call Sunday to allow for more time for diplomacy (and to influence the oil futures market and Wall Street this morning). “I call all the shots. He doesn’t call the shots,” Trump told the Financial Times about Netanyahu. Showing what even his “ally” thinks of him, immediately after the “knock it off!” phone call, the IDF announced it was striking military targets in central and western Iran, with explosions heard in the cities of Tehran, Isfahan and Tabriz, among others. A U.S. defense official said the U.S. was not involved in the Israeli strikes and called them “relatively limited” in scope. That’s not how the Iranians see it. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei told reporters at a briefing: “No one believes that the Israeli regime would take any action without coordination with the United States. The United States bears responsibility for the Israeli regime’s aggression, and it will also be responsible for the consequences of any escalation in tensions.” Trump called on Israel and Iran to stop firing at each other “immediately” in a Truth Social post early Monday morning. And whattaya know? Oil prices jumped overnight Sunday on news of the resumption in direct fighting between Iran and Israel. How’s a man supposed to be able to engage in market manipulation when nobody listens to him?

As missiles flew from Israel into Iran and vice versa on this morning, Trump came up with a diplomatic masterstroke: a grammatically questionable demand-cum-plea to stop the fighting, posting on Lies Anti-Social: “Israel and Iran must immediately stop ‘shooting,’” he wrote in a post sent out at 5:36 a.m., putting the word “shooting” in speech marks for some reason. “President DONALD J. TRUMP.” An hour later, he posted: “Both sides, Israel and Iran, are looking to do an immediate CEASEFIRE!” He further claimed the talks are in the final stages. “Final negotiations on ‘Peace’ are proceeding, subject to ignorance or stupidity getting in its way. The Blockade will remain in place, and in full force and effect, until a ‘Final Deal’ is reached. Things should move quickly.” FACT CHECK: The only place these events are happening is in the rat-infested spaces between Dilbert’s ears.

Time to go finish gettinhg ready to face the day.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

The rarely-seen Chardonnay

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. We can bring down Trump, with your support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty here.

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There are 147 days to the mid terms.

Pete Hegseth flew to France to commemorate the anniversary of the D-Day landings, but the locals were not pleased to see him. The Secretary of Defense was “persona non grata” for locals of Langrune-sur-Mer, a small town in Normandy where an international ceremony was held on Saturday, according to French news station BFM TV. Sylvie Lamy Thepaut, a member of the local association Langrune en Commun, did not hold back on her distaste for Hegseth. “He has very warlike remarks, and it seems to us that he does not exactly share our values of democracy and freedom,” she told the outlet. Days before Hegseth landed in northern France, a local civic and political organization released a scathing statement calling for the cancellation of his trip. “This individual holds values contrary to democracy, human rights, and peace. This is evidenced by his numerous anti-European remarks,” the group said, recounting Hegseth’s earlier statements about “the parasitism of Europeans” and “his American supremacist remarks such as ‘the War Department.’” “The honor of Langrune, that of France, and the memory of the young allies, American, British, Canadian who died on our beaches in the name of democracy would dictate canceling the visit of this individual,” the group concluded. Chantal Richard, a member of the group, Langrune en Commun, also told BFM that they “can’t pretend it’s business as usual.” “What’s happening with the Trump administration isn’t business as usual. The fact that Pete Hegseth is challenging all the international organizations that emerged from the Second World War isn’t business as usual. The words must be spoken, he must be called out for who he is, for the values he represents: colonial, warmongering, racist, far-right values. Silence seems to us to be the worst thing we can do on these issues.” Hegseth appeared unfazed by the backlash surrounding his trip, using his D-Day anniversary speech - given at the American Cemetery where there were no demonstrators - to take veiled shots at European allies who have refused to take part in Maladministration II’s war with Iran.

Bill Essayli, the alleged “U.S. Attorney” for Central Calfornia, who has been illegally occupying that position since his 130 days ran out last summer, announced Friday that his office had “multiple election fraud investigations underway” but did not offer any specifics. He wrot on X:

“We will follow the evidence wherever it leads and prosecute any violations of federal election law to the fullest extent.” He alleged California’s election system was rife with “serious structural vulnerabilities,” criticizing the state’s policy of allowing mail-in voting and not requiring photo ID at the polls, two practices Trump often claims, without evidence, contribute to widespread voter fraud. He also said his office was “working closely” with Harmeet Dhillon, the U.S. Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, to audit the state’s voter rolls to “verify that only eligible U.S. citizens” are registered. (FACT CHECK: California has refused to turn over voter information and these two shitbirds do not have the authority to change that.) The incompetent boob - whose office has been unable to prosecute any political cases because grand juries keep disbelieving the collection of liars masquerading as AUSAs - is following the bullshit from Dear Leader’s midnight rageathons. “My office will not look the other way. We will investigate and prosecute. Every legal vote deserves to be counted. Every illegal vote cancels one out.” The Los Angeles County elections office told CNN Friday morning that a DOJ attorney had been sent to observe ballot processing. “The individual arrived this morning, was provided an overview of the public observation program, and participated in a walkthrough of the ballot processing operations,” spokesperson Mike Sanchez said in an email. In California, members of the public are free to observe various election-related activities. Advance notice is not required, according to the Los Angeles County registrar-recorder’s office. California Attorney General Rob Bonta said, “My office has a presence on the ground right now, is monitoring the situation closely, and stands ready to protect voters and ensure California’s election laws are followed.”

Democratic attorneys general are on the cusp of taking legal action against nepobooby David Ellison’s $110 billion Paramount Skydance/Warner Bros. Discovery deal. A coalition of states led by California and New York is preparing to sue to block the transaction “in the coming weeks,” according to Reuters. In addition to creating new—but, let’s be honest, surmountable—hurdles for the Ellisons, the suit underscores how state AG’s are trying to occupy the Lina Khan lane in the absence of scrutiny from the Trump administration, which has taken a far more accommodating posture—at least to the executives it likes.

Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner has endured a brutal week of reporting on his personal history and unsavory interactions with women, issues that have left the Pearl-Clutching Coalition wringing their hands over the state of the race. However, MS NOW’s Chris Hayes - who interviewed Platner Thursday night -noted that Maine voters on the street largely seem unfazed.Part of the reason, he suggested, is that there is genuine disgust with longtime GOP incumbent Susan Collins. “A lot of them ... really do not want to send Susan Collins back to the Senate,” said Hayes. For all her posturing over the years as a dealmaker and moderate, she “is really a party line Republican” and “a rubber stamp for the Trump agenda during both terms.” Because they realize she’s in trouble, he continued, the Senate Republicans organized a “sham vote” in the reconciliation bill for an amendment to formally restrict President Donald Trump’s $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization” slush fund; while the GOP voted it down, Collins and two other vulnerable Republicans were allowed to vote against it. “Everyone knew that it was doomed to fail from the beginning,” said Hayes, because Republicans would not let such a huge rebuke to Trump pass, even though his Justice Department is now claiming the fund won’t go forward anyway. “They don’t actually want to bar your money from being stolen from the government to pay off cop-beaters and seditionists. And so what they do is Collins gets to pretend to be independent when the stakes don’t actually matter.” When they do, though, Collins reliably joins the party line, most famously being “the key vote to get Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court” while falsely assuring voters he would never restrict abortion rights. Platner has been campaigning against her record, and has been leading her in polls for months. He has not lost any support in Maine while the over-educated, under-intelligent, otherwise-unemployables of the DC Perfesshunil Dimocraps have been tut-tutting and listening to a Republican operative tell lies about Platner in the same way Al Franken was shivved by the worthless Kirsten Gillibrand.

Friday, Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy of Rhode Island referred TrumpDOJ attorneys to a disciplinary committee after condemning them for misconduct so severe she said it had shaken her faith in the TrumpDOJ entirely. The judge issued the referral under the court’s Local Rule 210(b), citing both representations made by the respondents’ attorneys and the findings of her May 14 order - a 24-page takedown of DOJ conduct in a case involving a subpoena seeking the medical records of minor patients who received gender- affirming care at Rhode Island Hospital. In that order, McElroy found the TrumpDOJ had “misrepresented and withheld information” from both her court and a federal court in Texas, where she said the department had engaged in blatant forum shopping to find a friendlier venue for its demands. The judge saved some of her sharpest language for TrumpDOJ’s courtroom behavior, writing that a senior attorney “sat silently by” during a hearing while a junior colleague - who had been practicing law for approximately six months - “was forced to answer questions about DOJ’s blatant disregard for the proper course of negotiations.” McElroy found a declaration filed by a senior TrumpDOJ official in the Texas proceeding,, was “clearly misleading, if not utterly false.” She called TrumpDOJ’s “reckless disregard for the duty of candor owed” to a federal court “appalling,” and a serious breach of professional ethics. “DOJ has proven unworthy of this trust at every point in this case.” She also quashed the subpoena entirely and enjoined TrumpDOJ from seeking, receiving, or using any patient-identifying records from Rhode Island Hospital, finding the subpoena lacked a congressionally authorized purpose, was issued in bad faith, and violated children’s constitutional right to informational privacy.

Byron Allen’s replacement program “Comics Unleashed” - put in to replace the Colbert show - has hemorrhaged more than half its audience while competitors Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon capitalize on the exodus. Viewership just days after CBS pulled the plug on Colbert tells a devastating story for the network’s late-night strategy. Kimmel’s show experienced a dramatic surge, drawing 2.185 million total viewers on June 1, a 53% year-on-year increase. In the coveted 18-49 demographic, Kimmel’s show captured an eye-popping 295,000 viewers, representing a staggering 178% increase from the same night last year. Fallon’s “Tonight Show” came in with 1.301 million total viewers, a respectable 10% year-over-year increase. The program pulled in 194,000 viewers in the 18-49 demo, a 14% improvement from last year. CBS, saw Allen’s “Comics Unleashed,” which debuted a day after Colbert’s departure, draw only 628,000 total viewers , a catastrophic 65% drop compared to the same time slot last year. In the crucial 18-49 demographic, the show managed just 82,000 viewers.

Trump’s $60 million UFC cage fight on the White House South Lawn set for his birthday on June 14 has DC power players competing for seats, Vanity Fair reports. Donors, lobbyists, and members of Congress have flooded the White House with requests, with ringside seats reportedly going to those willing to pay more than $1 million in sponsorships. But MAGA Hollywood appears to be going the other way. UFC boss Dana White told Time magazine he’d invited a roster of A-listers, including Adam Sandler, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Jared Leto, Mario Lopez, and Tom Brady. According to Vanity Fair, few if any, will actually attend, as representatives for The Rock, Sandler, Leto, and Lopez all said they won’t be there.

Friday, a tense confrontation outside Newark’s Delaney Hall immigration detention facility escalated when a red sedan slowly drove into a line of protesters blocking a facility exit, pushing them backward until someone hurled an object that left two large shatter marks in the vehicle’s windshield. Video showed the car sitting for several minutes as protesters blocked the exit, then creeping forward, making contact with demonstrators and forcing them back. As the car advanced, protesters could be heard shouting, “That’s blood money! You will reap what you sow!” Protesters appeared to presume the driver was a facility employee, though that has not been confirmed. The confrontation took an uglier turn as the car pressed forward. “You’re fucking Spanish!” demonstrators screamed at the driver. “You should be ashamed of yourself!” Friday’s incident is the latest in a weeks-long standoff at Delaney Hall, a privately run facility with 1,000 beds operated by GEO Group under a $1 billion ICE contract.

Insiders are saying that Maladministration II Chief of Staff Susie Wiles will soon quit her high-level White House post. She is preparing to quit because she was “vehemently” opposed to the promotion of Bill Pulte from the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency to the role of acting Director of National Intelligence. She perceived it as an “insult” when Trump followed through on the Pulte promotion, and Trump had already been starting to “resent” her opposition. “She is getting cancer treatment and is completely drained,” a White House insider said. “Now Trump is taking more and more control of the White House.” Wiles is expected to use the midterms as an off-ramp and could leave the White House soon after the November elections.

Som who, exactly, is Lyndsey Fifield, the woman accusing Graham Platner of “inappropriate behavior_ - which he firmly denied ever happened when he was interviewed by Chris Hayes obn Thursday night? She is a longtime conservative activist who has worked on many far right campaigns and is a supporter ofr Trump. Among other things, Fifield and Inez Stepman - who at the time worked at the Independent Women’s Forum, co-founded a group called “Ladies for Kavanaugh” in support of Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination during his confirmation fight to become one of the Supreme Court Justices who is firmly in Trump’s pocket and the key vote to kill Roe v Wade after swearing up and down in his Senate hearing how much he “respected precedent” and considered Roe to be “settled law.” Fifield has been a registered Republican since at least 2012. In 2019 she married far right activist Matthew Collins. According to her online profile, she loves “motherhood, marriage, home birth, raw milk - but also Botox & Chick-fil-A,” and dislikes, “Facebook groups for moms, gentle parenting, mommy bloggers.” That’s a pretty good portrait of a far right activist (disliking “gentle parenting” is code for bing in favor of corporal punishment for children). She worked as a social media manager at theHeritage Foundation for over six years, from September 2015 to April 2022. She also served as communications director for Republican candidate Ray McKinney in Georgia. She has also worked for Senator Susan Collins. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, said Thursday that he was “not impressed” by the new allegations, saying, “Seems like a lot of nothing. I mean, the only one who had anything to say that seemed ‘unsettling’ was a woman who works for right-wing political operations.” This is another Trumpscum plot to sabotage a Democrat who is the biggest threat Collins as faced. I trust a far right Trumper like Fifield about as far as I can see her with my eyes closed.

Pardon me while I make a quick run to worship the Porcelain God: Down in Dumbfuckingokielahoma, the wife of a Republican candidate for governor issued an emotional apology for donating to Biden’s campaign. Oklahoma gubernatorial candidate Gentner Drummond has been the target of “heartbreaking” attacks, his wife, Wendy, said in her apology. She recorded her apology and posted it on social media via her husband’s accounts. “I can’t stand by silently any longer,” a choked-up Wendy Drummond said in the opening of her video, which was scored with dramatic music. “I’ve been wanting to say this for a long time. It’s just heartbreaking for me to watch the man I love be attacked for something that was my fault.” She explained that she tried to send a $1,000 donation to the 2020 Biden campaign through her Apple Pay account. She didn’t realize that the account was linked to a joint credit card she shared with her husband, however. “In 2020, I heard something that made me so emotional that I made a mistake,” Wendy Drummond said. “I attempted to make a political contribution. I never discussed it with Gentner.” In the video, Wendy asserted that the donation was canceled, and “not one penny ever went to Joe Biden.” “Now political opponents are using my mistake over and over to attack Gentner,” Wendy said in her apology. “And it hurts.” If you look at her photo, the prefrontal lobotomy is really obvious.

With an “ally” like these people, we need no enemies: Israeli intelligence has stepped up efforts to spy on top Trump officials involved in peace talks, according to new intelligence reports.

Numerous intelligence reports and experts have raised concerns about Israel in recent weeks, as their attempts to listen in on discussions between the United States and Iran ramp up, The New York Times reported Saturday. Even though Israel is an ally of the United States, and the two nations share a great deal of intelligence, recent attempts to listen in on the Iran war negotiators and find out President Donald Trump’s position have alarmed some officials, according to the report. One report, by the Defense Intelligence Agency, was drafted after American defense personnel in Israel discovered software to tap their communications had been secretly installed on their phones. According to the officials the Times spoke to, Israel’s counterintelligence threat level is now “higher than any other ally, and higher than some adversarial countries.” One unnamed senior official told the Times that Israel’s spying on U.S. officials has become “unhinged.”

Amazing: A California Republican operative went viral this week for doing something unusual in her party: publicly fact-checking a right-wing election conspiracy theory, and refusing to back down when Rasmussen Reports pushed back. Elizabeth Barcohana, who works with the Los Angeles GOP, stepped in after Rasmussen posted a claim that a single ballot drop in the LA mayor’s race had contained zero votes for Republican candidate Spencer Pratt, the reality TV personality from The Hills running for LA mayor, while every other candidate gained thousands. “Virtually every candidate received votes except for Spencer Pratt,” Rasmussen wrote. “Impossible.” Barcohana called it false. “No, it did not happen,” she posted, sharing a batch composition chart showing Pratt’s orange bar appearing consistently across every single ballot drop. “This is fake news.” She further noted that Rasmussen was recycling an NBC screenshot taken before the network’s graphics team had corrected an error - meaning the “evidence” of fraud was a screenshot of a mistake that had already been fixed. Barcohana’s response to an anonymous user cut to the heart of the problem: “THIS is why you don’t see Republicans fighting back against all of this. No one believes us no matter what we say when we push back on things that aren’t true which demoralize our voters, so they would rather just keep quiet and not hit a hornet’s nest of angry voters.” Drew Savicki, a political analyst, called it “fascinating watching a California Republican struggling to push back against the online conspiracy theories being promoted by so many in her party.” Republican strategist Mike Madrid kept it simple: “Wait...is this a Republican standing up for math, facts and evidence? What kind of sorcery is this?”

I’ll end with a recommendation that you read Heather Cox Richardson’s post at Letters From An American, posted last night. She lays out the perfidy of the Senate GOP in how they passed the reconciliation billAT 5 A.M. Saturday morning, on a strict party line vote 52-47 (The safest time for Republicans to engage in their fuckwittery is when most of us are asleep), refusing to take any action on the things the GOP senators had been complaining about during this past week: no action taken to remove the $1.776 billion for the Thug Fund; no action taken to remove the $1 billion for Trump’s dance hall; no action to restrict Trump from appointing the unqualified partisan hack Bill Pulte from taking the position of DNI. The reconciliation bill, in addition to providing funds for CBP and ICE through September 30, 2029, is a complete surrender to Trump, giving him things a majority of the American people oppose. This perversion of democracy is the most blatant Republican assault on the American Republic ever. Go read the whole thing, take in all the details, the full description of their treason to the United States. And then damn these enemies of the Republic to hell. If you needed a reason to redouble your efforts to opposed this pro-fascist criminal cabal, HCR gives it to you in spades.

ADMIN NOTICE: There won’t be a post tomorrow, inasmuch as I have to report to Cedars at 0630, with the surgery going on from 0830-1100, then the rest of the day spent recovering from the anesthesia. See you on Tuesday.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Subscribe now

The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. We can bring down Trump, with your support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty here.

“This is great. I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

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Dawn comes early in England during the summer. At 0200, June 6, 1944, the rumble of 48 Pratt and Whitney R-2800s reverberated over the quiet English countryside surrounding the former RAF base of Beaulieau Roads between Southampton and Bournemouth that was now home to the 9th Air Force’s 365th Fighter Group. On the taxiway, the big P-47s - resplendent in the black and white identification stripes hurriedly applied with mops and brooms by the ground crews two nights before - S-turned heavily under their loads of two 500-lb bombs on the wing shackles and a 110-gallon drop tank on the centerline mount, as they took their turn to fly off into the rising sun.

At the runway, the flagman checked each pair as they moved into position; the engines roared as the pilots advanced their throttles to takeoff power, then began their roll as they were waved off. In the middle of the sixteen P-47s of the 388th Fighter Squadron, Second Lieutenant Archie Maltby ran his hands over his wool pants to dry his sweating palms, then pulled on his flying gloves. The next two airplanes moved into position and took off.

The ground crew signaled Maltby and his wingman to move forward. He checked the engine instruments, worked the controls quickly in a last-minute check, and pushed the throttle forward.

Halfway down the runway, the heavy Thunderbolt’s tail came up, and then it was airborne with the main gear thumping into the wells. A right turn brought the two Thunderbolts over the Isle of Wight in a matter of moments; they joined the rest of the formation, heading east across the English Channel toward the coast of Normandy.

“I’ll never forget what it was like that day. There were so many airplanes in the sky that there was a serious risk of collision, and there were so many ships in the Channel it seemed that you could have walked from ship to ship from England to France.”

The assignment for the 365th that day was to patrol the Cotentin Peninsula, to insure the Germans were unable to reinforce their units facing the invading Americans at Omaha and Utah Beaches. After an hour, the Thunderbolts were free of their bombs and most of their ammunition.

Returning to base, the pilots told the excited ground crews what they had seen. After a quick meal, they were back in their planes for a second sweep of the beachhead. “We thought that was it for the day when we got back from the second mission, but all of a sudden there was a call that radar had picked up the Luftwaffe heading toward the beaches, and all the airplanes that had been fueled were scrambled.”

In fact, the “enemy force” was the only two members of the Luftwaffe to make an appearance over the Normandy beaches on D-Day - Oberst Josef “Pips” Priller, Geschwader Kommodore of JG 26, and his wingman, Unteroffizier Heinz Wodarczyk. “By the time we got there, Priller had already made his famous run over the beaches and gotten out of there.”

When they returned, night had fallen on England. “It really was the longest day I can ever remember.”

The 78th Fighter Group cranked engines at 0320 hours for their first D-Day mission. Rain poured and visibility was so bad pilot Richard Holly remembered that when Colonel Gray’s first section took off, “He just barely cleared the end of the runway before he was out of sight.” When his flight lined up for magneto check Holly instructed the other three pilots to set their gyros on his and follow him. “It was the only instrument takeoff I made in the war and also the only one I made with water injection all the way because we were so heavy.”

The 78th’s Thunderbolts found themselves flying in and out of rain showers across the Channel. As they flew through one storm, they encountered a formation of RAF Lancaster bombers and barely avoided disaster. Holly remembered, “I did not see anything on the ground through the clouds, but the red glow below the clouds told us it was Omaha Beach. As it got daylight the red glow went away but we knew from the smoke and haze there was still plenty going on down there.”

The 78th flew three missions over the course of the day. Using both A and B groups, planes were landing and taking off at Duxford all day long. Eight-plane attacks were made on targets inland. The 83rd Squadron bombed a railroad bridge 40 miles west of Paris, while the 84th Squadron hit the Alencon marshaling yard and blew up a nearby ammunition dump.

Armorer T/Sgt Richard Kellerstadt remembered, “All that day they were dive bombing and strafing everything that moved. When they returned from a mission, we hopped on the planes, rearmed and bombed them, and cleaned as many of the guns as we had time for before they took off again.”

Colonel Gray led the 83rd Squadron on their third mission. As the Thunderbolts approached the Mayenne rail marshaling yard, eight Fw-190s were spotted, flying low on the deck. Grey sent two flights after them. Peter Caulfield singled out one and got into a Lufbery with his opponent. He pulled 90-degrees deflection and fired; the Fw-190 snap-rolled, spun, pulled out, turned, hooked a wing on the ground and exploded on impact. Colonel Grey and his wingman Vincent Massa pursued two Fw-190s and caught up to them using water-injection. Gray opened fire on tail-end Charlie until its canopy came off and the engine quit. He overshot his opponent, and Massa pulled behind it to give the coup de grace.

The group’s final mission of “The Longest Day” was flown at 1800 hours. Thirty-two P-47s patrolled the area from Chaillone to Coulonche. Two flights from the 84th strafed a train pulling fuel tank cars that exploded so violently debris hit the attackers. Wallace Hailey had to abandon WZ-F over the Channel and was quickly rescued by ASR; two other damaged Thunderbolts managed to land safely at the RAF Coastal Command airfield at Ford.

Eighth Air Force’s Operation Pointblank had succeeded. The Allied air forces had air superiority over western Europe. The five month campaign had cost the Eighth 2,600 bombers and 980 fighters lost, with 18,400 casualties including 10,000 dead.

Back in the United States, where he heard President Roosevelt’s broadcast announcing the invasion, Ernie Russell - who had returned home at the conclusion of his tour with the 78th ten days earlier - remembered, “I was filled with a great sense of relief that I was not there for what I knew was a tough fight, and at the same time a crazy wish that I had extended my tour long enough to see it.”

That night, after flying two missions during the day, Flying Fortress pilot Bert Stiles wrote in the journal that would become “Serenade to the Big Bird”: “The only thing that matters is to win, win in a way so there is never another one.”

They’re gone now, all the young men who flew the fighters and bombers, those who leaped into a night sky over France from C-47s torn by flak, the boys who rushed out of the Higgins boats into the surf and onto the shingle beachheads ripped with machine gun fire from German bunkers.

It’s the privilege of my life that I got to meet them, become friends with them, and tell their stories.

There’s one story that mattered greatly then, and so much moreso today, when such a leader seems impossible to find. General Dwight Eisenhower, who commanded this great force, had a piece of paper in his pocket that he hoped he would not have to pull out and read to reporters:

“Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foodhold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the air and the navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.”

D-Day was such a narrow run - there was little more than a 50-50 chance it would fall victim to a weather forecast that turned out wrong, to enemy forces stronger than expected - that the most powerful American in England that day knew if failure came, it was because of his decision, and must be admitted so. Where are leaders like that today?

It was the largest amphibious operation ever mounted and carried out. When Luftwaffe pilot Pips Priller broke out of the clouds, just south the British invasion beach code-named Sword, he only had a moment to stare out to sea at the largest naval force ever assembled in history. He could see wakes of the inbound invasion barges as they approached the beaches for as far as he could see in the hazy weather, beyond them the shapes of the thousands of ships they came from.

156,000 men - Americans, British, Canadians, Poles, French, Belgian, Dutch - landed on the beaches that day.

By the end of that day, over 10,000 had been wounded or killed.

We must always remember them.

The lesson they still hold for we, their descendants, living in a time when the threat against the cause they fought for is once again raised, is one of overcoming fear and doing what is necessary in spite of that fear. Their example matters more than ever in a country that feels helpless and lost, its defenders wondering, as those men on those beaches wondered, do we have the courage to take on the fight and carry through to victory?

Those boys who became men that day did what had to be done, in spite of seasickness, in the face of fear; they carried through to create the world we grew up in, a world now once again under threat.

We can follow them and live up to their example.

We must.

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There are 149 days to the mid terms. Work hard. We can do this.

The latest Quinnipiac University poll shows 57% of respondents believe “the system of democracy in the United States” isn’t functioning; 37% said they believe it is. 21% said they believe “democracy in the United States will end” sometime in their life, while 68% disagreed. 22% said they didn’t see themselves as “a proud American,” while 73% disagreed.

The latest poll by Fox News has Sherrod Brown leading Sen. Jon Husted in Ohio by 8 points as Trump’s favorability rating craters in the state. According to the poll, 53% of respondents backBrown, while 45% back Husted. 42% said they either felt “strongly” or “somewhat” favorable toward Trump, down 5% from October 2020. 57% said they either felt “somewhat” or “strongly” unfavorable toward the president, up 5% from October 2020. The Fox News poll had Trump’s approval rating at 38.9%, while his disapproval rating was 56.8%.

Surprise, surprise: Yesterday, Sen. John Fetterman said he would vote against confirmation of Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, adding to the list of lawmakers who have criticized Trump’s potential nomination. “I would not vote for him,” Fetterman told lawmakers outside of the Capitol. “I don’t know why you would introduce that when you’re in the middle of really important questions about the Iranian war and those other things. I don’t think we need any of those kind of distractions.” Senators Tillis and Cornyn said they would likely vote against confirmation.

Senior oil industry executives have privately warned Maladministration II officials that global fuel inventories are draining at an alarming rate following the closure of the Strait of Hormuz; the White House denies those high-level talks. Four industry executives told Politico that insiders have delivered warnings in recent weeks to senior White House officials and Cabinet members that a significant price spike could arrive as soon as mid-to-late June, and data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration shows companies are increasingly drawing on storage reserves to compensate for the near-total halt in crude oil flows from the Middle East. “We’re at dangerously low levels already,” one industry executive said. “You’re hitting tank bottom.” U.S. crude stocks fell by 8 million barrels last week - the eighth consecutive weekly decline - and now sit 3% below their five-year average. Gasoline stocks are 5% below that benchmark, with diesel and jet fuel each running 3% under, and total U.S. commercial petroleum inventories have fallen by 52 million barrels since the war began. Globally, inventories have declined by approximately 500 million barrels, dropping at a rate of roughly 5.8 million barrels per day. “I’ve never seen inventory numbers fall so much so quickly,” said Jim Burkhard of S&P Global Energy. “It is stunning.” Exxon Mobil senior vice president Neil Chapman told an investor conference last week that benchmark crude prices could reach $150 to $160 a barrel if inventory levels continue their decline. An industry expert on Chris Hayes’ show last night said gas could increase nationally to $7-plus/gallon BY July if there is no resolution to Trump’s War. A Maladministration II spokesperson stated that Politico’s anonymous sources were “wrong” and that Maladministration II “does not have a supply problem.” If you beliee them, I know a bunch of bridges for sale cheap you won’t be able to resist.

In a Lies Anti-Social post Wednesday morning, Trump criticized the House vote on War Powers as “meaningless.” He wrote: “Yesterday, in a meaningless vote, the House voted, 4 bad Republicans and all of the Dumocrats, to limit my War Powers, right in the middle of my final negotiations to end the War with the Islamic Republic of Iran.” There are no negotiations to end the war, and Trump has become “bored” with the whole thing. He has told insiders he does not plan to return to bombing Iran “unless Americans get killed,” but he is just fine with leaving the situation as it is while things go from worse to worst for the rest of us. The good news here is the more he acts like this, the angrier voters will get, and the bigger the Democratic wins in November. There could be a veto-proof Democratic majority in both houses, with an immediate impeachment and removal from office for Trump next January. But only if we work our asses off to achieve this.

Senate Republicans voted Thursday morning to strike down an amendment sponsored by Chuck Schumer to prohibit the TrumpDOJ from establishing the “Weaponization Fund.” Schumer’s amendment failed 49-50, but three Republicans facing re-election in November – Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME) Jon Husted (R-OH) and Dan Sullivan (R-AK) – voted with Democrats in support of it. Sen. Bill Cassidy, who lost a GOP primary to a challenger endorsed by Trump, joined Sen. Cory Booker in submitting an amicus brief in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia opposing the $1.776 billion fund established by the Treasury Department to pay off Trump allies who claim they were targeted for prosecution by previous administrations. The challenge states: “The Anti-Weaponization Fund presents an immediate and dire threat to our constitutional order and the authority of Congress. Indeed, among other purposes, the Fund is designed to compensate the insurrectionists who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6th. The existence of the Fund strikes at the core of Congressional authority and our Constitutional order.” Let the Senate GOP own this - 84% of the public hates this robbery of the Treasury and it will only contribute to even larger GOP senate losses in November. A “Conviction majority” is coming into sight.

After the GOP lemmings defeated Shumer’s amendment, they did the same to an amendment offered by Senator Thom Tillis, voting overwhelmingly to defeat an amendment to redirect the $1.8 billion proposed for the “anti-weaponization” fund to bolster the budget for cracking down on fraud against U.S. taxpayers. “This amendment prohibits federal funds from being used to establish, administer, defend or pay claims through the so-called anti-weaponization fund,” Tillis said on the Senate floor, explaining his proposed amendment to the $70 billion budget reconciliation package. The Senate vote 15 to 84 against Tillis’ proposal.

Six Republican senators - Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Jon Husted (R-Ohio), Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) and Thom Tillis (R-N.C.). - voted with Democrats in support of a proposal sponsored by Sen. Jeff Merkley to block construction of Trump’s vanity dance hall unless Congress authorizes the project. The amendment would have given Congress sole authority to construct a new ballroom and would have barred any federal funds or private donations from being used to build the new ballroom without congressional approval. The amendment needed 60 votes to overcome a point-of-order objection. It failed by a vote of 52 to 47. Another nail in the Senate GOP 2026 coffin. The attack ads write themselves.

What’s the difference between “Republicans with a conscience” and MAGA Trumpers - not enough to matter, as yesterdays votes demonstrated. The Senate GOPleadership had the votes they needed to advance the reconciliation bill, with nothing said against Dear Leader’s slushfund, so Susan Collins, Dan Sullivan, and Jon Husted - who are each trailing serious Democratic challengers in their re-election campaigns - were allowed to vote for the Shumer amendment; when the final bill came for a vote after the defeat of the Shumer amendment, all three voted with the GOP majority, as they always do. Senator Lisa Murkowski was the only Republican to vote against the final bill. The two GOP senators who were so loudly opposed to the slush fund - Thom Tillis, who is not seeking re-election, and Bill Cassidy, who lost in the GOP primary - voted for the final bill. When questioned about his vote, Tillis said: “I’m taking the cue from my colleagues that are in cycle. Whatever suits their purposes.” Harry Truman is still right: “The only ‘good Republicans’ are pushing up daisies.”

Here’s further proof that Governor “Hot Wheels” Abbott of Texas is the nation’s worst fucking asswipe scumbag - and he likes doing what it takes to maintain that status: There are signs that he may refuse to extradite Christian Castro - the ICE agent charged with shooting an undocumented immigrant through a closed door during Operation Metro Surge, then lying about it - to Minnesota after Castro declined to waive extradition yesterday in state court in South Texas, where he is being held on $200,000 bail. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz had formally asked Abbott to extradite the agent earlier this week. In the wake of Castro’s move, Abbott’s office has refused to answer whether he will comply with Walz’s routine request.

Even Steve Bannon can figure out the future of the Senate GOP majority: In a Thursday episode of his “War Room” Bannon said he has witnessed a deflation in excitement from GOP voters ahead of the November elections “because now it has to be a showdown.” He went on: “Here’s the reason: We’re going to lose the Senate in the fall anyway. No grassroots leader, none of the grassroots phalanx, the hoplites — nobody’s excited about going door to door and doing voter engagement.” He criticized GOP leadership’s decision to rely on standard campaign strategies in these races, saying “old-school” TV advertising “does not work.” “There’s been a new day, and the Senate’s got to understand that, or we’re going to lose the Senate. There is no enthusiasm for going door to door, having voter engagements, canvassing, to actually lead to victory. Those people are out there and it can be done. Texas shows you that. Virginia shows you that.” He concluded: “We’re telling everybody to put their freaking pencils down in North Carolina, in Maine, in Ohio, all of it. Michigan, you want to play hardball? We’ll say, ‘Hey, look, it’s just as bad having Democrats in charge. So let’s just have Democrats in power.’”

CNN host Kaitlan Collins called out the weirdest part of President Trump’s latest rant against her, provoked by his apparent fury at the fact that she’s not always smiling in his presence. After going after her Tuesday, he did the same on Wednesday - this time before she said anything. He gestured to Collins and began to berate the media in general before finding his usual targets. He aid: “CNN’s crooked as hell, CNN’s a very corrupt organization, with a corrupt reporter standing right there, never smiles. She never... a young, beautiful woman never smiles. I never see a smile off her face. I see her standing there with hatred in her eyes.” He continued his attack on CNN, “Now they have new ownership maybe it’ll straighten it out, but I doubt it... it’s hard to straighten garbage out.” Collins later asked a question, in an attempt to clear up confusion over the bill which has been labeled a slush fund.“Excuse me, Mr. President, just to clarify on what you were asked earlier. Is the $1.8 billion DOJ fund dead or is it on hold?” He replied that he’d have to “ask the lawyers.” After playing that footage on The Source, Collins said, “Attacks aside, the news there is the president defending this $1.8 billion fund while pushing questions about whether or not the door is permanently shut to the attorneys in his administration. He himself never said whether or not it could potentially move forward.” For someone who started out in D.C. working for Tucker Carlson, Collins has become one of the best reporters covering the criminal conspiracy masquerading as Maladministration II.

Sundowning Grampa went on another midnight meltdown early Thursday: Shortly after 1 am, Trump pushed an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that Democrats are “cheating” in high- profile elections in California while rallying against mail-in ballots in a series of deranged takes on Lies Anti-Social, suggesting that the process of counting ballots sent by mail in the California gubernatorial primary and Los Angeles mayoral primary amounted to cheating and falsely suggesting Democrats are trying to “steal” the California elections from Republicans while promoting voter-fraud conspiracies. As of early Thursday morning, only 56 percent of the votes had been counted in the California governor all-party primary, while 62 percent had been counted in the Los Angeles mayoral election. At 1 am he posted: “The Dumocrats are at it again! They are trying to STEAL THE GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA PRIMARY, AND THE MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES, PRIMARY, AWAY FROM TWO GREAT REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of MAIL IN BALLOTS.” At 1:05 a.m.: “There’s BIG cheating by the Dumocrats in California. Votes are all tied up. May not be in for weeks. Under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles. Why the vote counting DELAY???” FACT CHECK: The U.S. Attorney is not investigating anything about voting in California. For Governor, the best Hilton will do in the General - combining his and Chad Bianco’s votes - is around 38%; Becerra - with the other Democratic votes - will overwhelm him with a 60%-plus victory. Bass will overwhelm Spencer Pratt similarly in the General Election. Governor Newsom’s press office responded to the posts: “Trump is lying about California again - time to take the phone away from grandpa and put him to sleep.”

I like news like this: Kennedy Center lawyers instructed staff to immediately begin removing Trump’s name from the facility after a federal judge blocked Maladministration II from rebranding the center to include the president’s name. In an internal memo sent Thursday, the center’s general counsel told employees that email signatures, letterhead and other documents must be changed to reflect the venue’s original name, “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts,” or “Kennedy Center.” The memo also set a June 12 deadline to replace interior and exterior signage, as well as remove its Trump-affiliated name from furniture and other materials. The directive marks the first official sign that the arts institution is complying with a federal court ruling that deemed the controversial name change unlawful.

This is important: On Monday, Kurt Olsen, the Maladministration II election security czar who aided Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election, joined the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, where the mother of all retributive investigations is being conducted into a “grand conspiracy” against Trump. While it’s not confirmed that Olsen, who has no prosecutorial experience, is on the “grand conspiracy” team, he appeared in a photo of that team posted last month by Miami U.S. Attorney Jason Reding Quinones, according to Reuters. Also, Trump ally and conservative firebrand Victoria Toensing was sworn in as a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of Florida last month. Toensing is the wife of Joseph diGenova, who is leading the “grand conspiracy” investigation. “DiGenova declined to say whether she is working on the Brennan and grand conspiracy cases, but a source with direct knowledge confirmed she is,” CBS News reported.

From Michael Sellars: At a time when American public opinion toward Israel and Nitwityahoo has turned sharply negative - with Pew reporting in April that 60% of U.S. adults now have an unfavorable view of Israel, up from 53% last year and 42% in 2022, while 59% have little or no confidence in Netanyahu to do the right thing in world affairs - a new uproar is building over a little-noticed provision in the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act. The provision is Section 224, formally titled the “United States–Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative.” It would create a formal Pentagon mechanism to expand U.S.-Israel defense technology cooperation, including in some of the most sensitive fields in modern warfare: artificial intelligence, cyber defense, quantum technology, autonomous systems, counter-drone warfare, missile defense, directed energy, electronic warfare, and data fusion. The language appears to trace back to a former piece of standalone legislation — the U.S.-Israel FUTURES Act, introduced by Senators Ted Budd and Kirsten Gillibrand and promoted by pro-Israel and hawkish national-security groups including AIPAC and FDD Action as a way to accelerate U.S.-Israel defense technology integration. The provision does not combine the two militaries under one command. But the concern behind the uproar is real: Section 224 would push the United States and Israel toward a level of defense-industrial and military-technology integration that most Americans probably do not realize is even being contemplated. The NDAA language regarding Section 224 would require the Secretary of Defense to designate a Pentagon “executive agent” to coordinate U.S.-Israel efforts to “expand and accelerate” defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation. An “executive agent” means someone inside the Pentagon would be formally responsible for synchronizing and driving this cooperation across the Department of Defense. This is not merely a statement that Israel is an ally. It is an institutional mechanism. This is not just “more aid to Israel.” It is a proposal to place U.S.-Israel defense technology cooperation more deeply inside the Pentagon’s own acquisition and development system with “Israeli-origin” technology adopted by the U.S. military. It includes many of the fields that will define future military power: drones, AI, quantum, cyber, autonomous systems, directed energy, electronic warfare, and data fusion. The provision would require the Secretary of Defense to report annually until 2030 on implementation, including descriptions of technologies transitioned into U.S. acquisition programs or fielded systems, partnerships established with U.S. and Israeli industry, and recommendations for future opportunities to promote the “long-term integration of joint capabilities” between the United States and Israel. Rep. Ro Khanna and Rep. Thomas Massie have both objected to the provision and said they would try to remove it from the defense bill.

Former perfesser of economyomics Kevin Hassett, another incompetent Trumpboob jumped up way beyond his lack of qualification to be Director of the National Economic Council, went on Fux Snooze this morning, to declare that the economy under Dear Leader is booming. Hilarity ensued. The dimbulb claimed “the Trump boom” wouldn’t be reported by “the fake news,” and that the One Big Beautiful Bill has massively helped to improve the economy, while he dismissed affordability concerns. He actually managed to pop off with “Right now, Wall Street just doesn’t understand that the Trump economy is really creating an economic golden age.” Filmmaker and producer Joel Lesko wrote on Bluesky: “It sure is, for the 1%. Not for Main Street.” He was joined by Dawn Humphrey, who wrote on Bluesky: “Trump is creating an ‘economic golden age’ for his cronies in the top 1/2 of 1%. The rest of us can go suck it.”

Finally - during oral arguments this morning before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit over Trump’s controversial $400 million White House ballroom project, Yaakov Roth, the principal deputy assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice Civil Division said Trump could demolish the Statue of Liberty before anyone could sue to stop him, and that would simply be the end of it. An amazed Judge Patricia Millett pressed Roth directly. “If the government decides very quickly to bulldoze the Statue of Liberty, the people whose ancestors - that was the first thing they saw coming to this country, but the govt moved too fast - nothing can be done?” Roth responded, “I think that’s right, yes.” Judge Millet is one of three Appeals Court judges now weighing whether to reinstate the injunction issued by U.S. District Judge Richard Leon in March , who said that “no statute comes close to giving the President” the authority to build the dance hall without congressional approval. Maladministration II has argued throughout this that no one has legal standing to challenge the project once demolition is complete. Judges Millet and Brad Garcia appeared supportive of the challenger’s arguments against Maladministration II while batshit-crazy Trumper Judge Neomi Rao kept pressing the administration’s view that no one can sue. There’s a good chance Trump may get slapped again with an order to stop the dance hall.

Here’s good news to end on: Xavier Becerra has advanced to November’s general election in the race to become California’s next governor. Trump-backed Fox News commentator Steve Hilton (R) and billionaire Tom Steyer (D) are currently battling for the second spot. Becerra holds 26.03% of the vote as of late Thursday night, while Hilton has 27.18% and Steyer has 20.18%. Becerra appears to be doing well among mail-in voters and is expected to pass Hilton at the current vote-count pace

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

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There are 150 days to the mid terms.

Just when you think you have the day’s line-up complete, Dilbert does something spectacularly stupid (even more stupid than making Bill Pulte DNI). That would be his announcement late last night that he is nominating his personal lawyer, the guy who has thoroughly fucked up the TrumpDOJ and destroyed it professionally, who flipped the bird at everyone over the Epstein Files release, and who has managed in only 16 months to get the reputation of Worst Person Ever In A Top DOJ Post. That would be the execrable Todd Blanche, nominated as Attorney General. This close to the mid terms, with four senators who have no fucks to give Dilbert any more, and others who might think a vote for the Worst Attorney General Ever might make their re-election even harder than it is already, these confirmation hearings and the senate vote will be Popcorn Time. Every time you think these fucks can’t be as bad as you know they are, they say “Hold our Diet Cokes!”

Democrats announced late yesterday that they had just secured a huge win, by forcing changes in Republicans’ partisan funding bill to drop the dance hall funding and any funding for the Thug Fund in Justice Department funding. The Senate is going to codify the ban on a weapons-funding fund and ensure that zero dollars can be used for it.

Yesterday, the House of Representatives voted 215-207, with four Republicans - Reps. Fitzpatrick, Davidson, Barrett and Massie - voting with all Democrats to pass a War Powers Resolution regarding Trump’s War. Senate lawmakers advanced a similar resolution last month on a procedural vote. There is a very strong likelihood that the Senate will now proceed to a final vote and also pass the resolution. Trump will undoubtedly veto the legislation, but having the Congress vote for a War Powers Resolution will pull the rug out from under him politically.

Trump took a second hit Wednesday when the House voted 218-204 in a procedural motion that clears the way for a vote on the Ukraine Support Act, authored by Rep. Gregory Meeks, the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. The bill, first introduced in April 2025, sat in limbo as Republicans - under Trump’s direction - halted efforts to provide additional support for Ukraine, with Trump saying U.S. support for Ukraine was a waste of money and launched a series of failed bids to get Russian President Vladimir Putin to end his war. The bill provides $8 billion in military financing loans to Ukraine, extends the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) through 2027, which allows for the U.S. to send Ukraine weapons directly from Pentagon stockpiles, and additional sanctions against Russia. Ukraine’s supporters view the vote on the Meeks bill as sending a strong signal of U.S. support for Ukraine at a time when Russia is escalating devastating strikes against the country and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has publicly pleaded for Trump to provide Patriot interceptors to guard against ballistic missiles. It also comes when the news shows that Ukraine is holding its own on the battlefield and inflicting severe losses inside Russia with long-range drone strikes.

Maladministration II is looking at a third try to impose Trump Tariffs, in the face of the Supreme Court declaring the ”emergency” tariffs illegal back in February, and with the likelihood that the Court is about to affirm a lower court striking down the second attempt using laws that are only for short-term tariffs and not “on point” for what Trump is trying to do. This third try uses a narrower provision about unfair trade practices. Earlier this year, Maladministration II began investigating whether US trading partners like Mexico, Canada, and the European Union import goods made with forced labor in their own trade. It has now concluded that 59 countries, plus the EU, do so; consequently it wants to impose tariffs between 10 percent and 12.5 percent on those countries. Under the current Maladministration II plan, these tariffs would take effect next month. Some products, such as beef, coffee, and critical minerals, would be exempted from the tariffs. or, obviously, is atrocious; preventing it is a worthwhile goal. There’s no real reason to believe this effort by Maladministration II comes out of genuine conviction; the EU already has new forced labor restrictions set to take effect late next year. The US also isn’t immune to issues with forced-labor imports, despite laws intended to prevent them. This is just the latest tool Maladministration II has landed on to do what Trump has been trying to do since he took office: Impose sweeping tariffs in service of his economically-illiterate concept of the US economy. Even as Trump tries to impose new tariffs, Maladministration II is also fighting to hold onto some of the $166 billion in revenue it earned illegally from his first round of tariffs by making the process of applying for the refunds more onerous and slow; they are additionally trying to claim they cannot obtain the remaining tariff payments for refunds.

Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he’d never seen President Trump fall asleep during meetings. (This despite the fact he sits next to Trump at those meetings) Rubio was asked by Rep. Ted Lieu whether he had ever seen Trump fall asleep during a Cabinet meeting. “That’s false. I’ve never seen him fall asleep. On the contrary, the guy doesn’t sleep, which is a big problem because he calls me at 2 in the morning. He calls me at 5 in the morning. And, you know, I like to sleep a little bit, maybe not 12 hours, but at least 6. So he works. The other day he was at the Oval Office at 12.30 p.m. - 12.30 a.m. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lieu accused Rubio of lying and then showed a clip of Trump with his eyes closed during a Cabinet meeting. Rubio said questions regarding Trump’s cognitive ability are “absurd.” “He works inhumane hours. I’ve been on foreign trips with the president that he doesn’t sleep in the whole flight. And everyone else is sleeping on the plane. You know, wandering the hallways looking for someone to wake up and talk to. So I don’t know what you’re referring to. But he has an incredible amount of energy. I’m just telling you, you may not like his policies. You may not like his policies. You may not like the decisions he’s made. But I assure you, this is not a president that sleeps or is cognitively impaired in any way, shape, or form.” Welcome to North Korea, Mr. Secretary.

Democrats in Congress have informed Republicans that if they do not “pressure Trump to withdraw his appointment of Pulte,” they’ll withdraw support for a bi-partisan deal to support an extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), a law that permits national intelligence agencies to surveil overseas communications without a warrant, including those of Americans. Punchbowl News wrote: “Democrats have leverage here. Republicans can’t pass a FISA reauthorization on their own. With a handful of GOP senators expected to oppose any FISA agreement, Thune would likely need at least a dozen Democrats to support the bill.” Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the top Senate Intelligence Committee Democrat, said Pulte’s appointment would “absolutely” make renewing FISA’s Section 702 more difficult. Democrats were already worried about how the Trump administration wields these powerful tools, and their low opinion of Pulte is making things worse. Sen. Chris Murphy said, “The very nature of our collection is now going to be put in the hands of somebody who has a history of seeking out private information for political gain.”

Following the Iowa gubernatorial Republican primary, in which Trump’s endorsed candidate lost to a candidate supported by MAHA and Turning Points Action, Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball has moved the November election - in which GOP candidate Zach Lahn will face Democrat Rob Sand from “leans Republican” to the toss up column. Sabato wrote: “If Iowa is ever going to have a Dem Governor again, it’s this year with Rob Sand.” In the open Senate race, Gold medalist Paralympian Rep. Josh Turek will face off in November against Trump-backed millionaire Rep. Ashley Hinson, whose voting record includes supporting Trump on the vastly unpopular tariffs that have wrecked Iowa’s rural economy, as well as voting against health care in a state with increasing health concerns including the most growth in cancer of any state. The Cook Political Report has shifted the race to “lean Republican,” just a step away from being considered a “toss-up.” “Even though Hinson is a strong candidate who has amassed a formidable war chest, the overall environment in the Hawkeye State is an increasingly favorable one for Democrats,” analyst Jessica Taylor wrote, highlighting Turek’s moderate approach and his past wins in red parts of the state.

MAGAt lawmakers and right-wing commentators erupted yesterday after Dr. Adam Hamawy, a progressive plastic surgeon and Army veteran, won the Democratic primary in New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District , zeroing in on his decades-old association with Omar Abdel-Rahman, the “Blind Sheikh” convicted on terrorism and seditious conspiracy charges whose followers carried out the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, while largely ignoring his military record and the endorsements of major progressive figures. Rep. Anna Paulina Lunatic called Hamawy “a national security risk” and claimed he “was a defense witness in the 1993 WTC bombing (allegedly with ties to Al-Qaeda)” erasing the roughly 30 years since those events and Hamawy’s extensive record of military service since that time. Rep. Mike Lawler who earlier Tuesday had condemned a colleague’s anti-gay social media post as “absolutely idiotic,” pivoted sharply to demand that Congress “fully investigate his ties to terrorist organizations” if Hamawy wins in November. The MAGA Meltdown glossed over that Hamawy is an Army National Guard veteran whom Sen. Tammy Duckworth has credited with saving her life after her Blackhawk helicopter was shot down in Iraq in 2004. He also worked as a first responder at Ground Zero following the 9/11 attacks. Hamawy has said on the campaign trail that he disavows Abdel-Rahman’s calls for violence and has characterized the attacks against him as “guilt-by-association attacks on Muslim and Arab candidates.” Hamawy is now the heavy favorite to win the seat in November. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by more than two-to-one in the 12th District.

The gang that can’t govern continues to fail: With only 38 scheduled legislative days remaining before Election Day, GOP lawmakers are opting to stay home rather than return to Washington for votes that MAGA Mike’s leadership cannot guarantee will succeed. Tuesday was supposed to mark the start of a productive legislative week, with House members returning from the weekend to pass a slate of bipartisan bills. Instead, the chamber sat nearly empty after Republican leaders postponed the scheduled votes. Johnson’s fractured caucus has repeatedly sabotaged his legislative agenda. Senior House Republicans and aides now openly acknowledge it’s preferable to cancel votes entirely than risk the political fallout from public defeats on the House floor.

In another desperate attempt to change the course of public comment (and take the spotlight off his many recent failures) Trump suggested late Wednesday that the UFC arena currently under construction on the White House’s South Lawn could be a permanent addition. “I’m looking at it and maybe we’ll never ever take it down,” Trump said in a video posted on his official TikTok account on Tuesday. He compared the structure to Paris’s Eiffel Tower, which was originally intended to be only a temporary addition to the city for the 1889 World’s Fair. “Well, they never took it down, and you know we’re building something in front of the White House that’s quite attractive to a lot of people,” he continued. Trump’s really flailing - he remembers when crazy-ass shit like this could dominate the news for up to a week. But no more.

Finally, here’s how you take down a TrumpBimbo: Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins was repeatedly ordered to stop talking and struggled to answer basic questions about the farm economy Thursday during a tense House Agriculture Committee hearing that devolved into a shouting match. Rep. Angie Craig (D-MN), the committee’s ranking member, came loaded with data — and used every second of her question time to expose what she called Maladministration II’s ignorance of its own record. “Reclaiming my time means you stop talking,” Craig snapped after Rollins repeatedly interrupted her. “That’s what it means in this building.” Craig opened by asking Rollins how many farms the U.S. lost last year. Rollins cited bankruptcy figures. Craig cut her off: the country lost 15,000 farms in 2025 - fourth- and fifth-generation operations wiped out, she said, “because of bad policy on the part of this administration.” When Craig asked about total farmer losses, Rollins pushed back on the math. Craig was unimpressed. “If this administration didn’t have terrible policies, we would not need all that support for family farmers,” she said, “because we would have export markets still left in China.” Craig cited $28 billion in farmer losses, a figure the American Farm Bureau Federation has used to describe net crop returns after support payments for the 2025/26 crop year. Craig then demanded to know the current national average price of farm diesel. Rollins deflected to the Biden administration. Craig fired back. “ Joe Biden is no longer the president of the United States. Mr. Trump is. Your party controls Congress. You own these numbers.” Farm diesel hit $5.41 a gallon in May — up 95% year over year, she noted, across “the entire year in which this administration was in power in the White House, the House, and the Senate.” On fertilizer, Craig asked what share of farmers can’t afford it this planting season. Rollins began breaking down fertilizer categories by region. “Oh, my God!” Craig cut in. “70% is the answer.” A Farm Bureau survey of more than 5,700 farmers confirmed that figure. Rollins shot back: “Those are not the numbers. That’s not correct.” The hearing grew most heated over SNAP. Rollins disputed the program’s official fraud rate, claiming states were self-reporting numbers the administration couldn’t verify. Craig read the USDA’s own data back to her. “USDA’s own data found 1.6%,” Craig said. “I honestly don’t think you understand the difference between error rates and fraud rates.” Rollins accused Craig of grandstanding. “You’re not asking questions for an answer. You’re asking questions to make a political statement.” (Tjhat’s what happens in Congressional hearings, you braindead bimbo)

Craig dismissed the charge and closed with a warning: “When you describe the farm economy as the ‘golden age,’ this administration needs to wake up and start understanding that family farmers are in need.”

We have entered “‘Late Kakistocracy”- the phase of democratic decline where the regime starts running out of people who will work for it, and so those who aren’t qualified for their current positions are promoted to even larger positions for which they are even more unqualified.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Satchmo

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. Remember, independent media brought down Viktor Orbán - we can bring down Trump, with your support. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. But your support helps me keep TAFM free for those on fixed incomes. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty.

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There are 151 days to the mid terms

Last night, CBS News veteran “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley a day after he confronted the show’s new executive producer at a heated staff meeting. Screenwriter/”technology journalist” turned “Executive Producer” Nick Bilton wrote Pelley: “Your antipathy to the future of the show has come through loud and clear. And I have heard you. Yesterday’s performative display of hostility - enacted in front of the staff instead of in a civil, private conversation - demonstrated that you have no interest in contributing to the future success of the show, or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress. I therefore write on behalf of CBS News, Inc. to inform you that your employment with CBS is terminated for cause effective immediately.” In a separate note to “60 Minutes” staffers, Bilton confirmed that the network had “parted ways” with Pelley: “I know how much Scott meant to many of you, and I don’t say this lightly. I made repeated attempts to have direct conversations with him over the weekend, and this afternoon I tried to find common ground. That was not the path Scott chose.” Everything I’ve heard by people who know Bilton tells me he’s another “Hollywood legend in his own mind.” I hate those scum.

Pelley replied: “Last month, 60 Minutes lost its DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on-air correspondents were cruelly fired without cause. Good people were silenced because they stood up for our audience. They stood for fairness against the forces of political bias; they stood for professionalism against chaos. For my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. I’ve been told to include assertions that are unverified. To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them. Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over 60 Minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and unprofessionalism in the new management have wreaked havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within 19 minutes of not getting on the air at all.”

A media expert warned CBS chief Bari Weiss on Tuesday night that she just set off an “underwater earthquake” at her network by firing Pelley. Brian Stelter, CNN’s chief media analyst, told Kaitlan Collins on “The Source” that Pelley’s firing likely won’t go over well within the CBS newsroom and could lead to a costly legal battle. In the termination letter, CBS Executive Producer Nick Bilton said Pelley was dismissed “for cause,” which he can challenge in court.”This is like an underwater earthquake at CBS News. It’s not going to be visible on TV right away, but this is bound to have many ripple effects and maybe a legal battle,” Stelter said.

Pelley unloaded on Bari Weiss in a statement this morning after it was reported she told staffers the network tried to mend fences with him. The NYT reported Weiss saying she met with Pelley to go over his criticism of her tenure and for pointing out that Nick Bilton was over his head and unqualified to oversee the legendary newsmagazine. He was later fired by email. This morning, she told staffers, “Despite our attempts to engage with Scott Pelley and to find a way back, unfortunately we weren’t able to do so, and so we had to part ways. We did not want that to happen, but that’s the path that he chose.” Pelley called her a liar while pointing out that mention of his firing led off the meeting with Weiss, Bilton and CBS News President Tom Cibrowski. “Bari Weiss knows what she said was not true. In the meeting on Tuesday, in which I was effectively fired, there was no effort of any kind to ‘find a way back,’ as Weiss said in the editorial meeting. Weiss and Cibrowski were openly hostile from the start. ‘Firing’ was raised by Cibrowski in the first 15 seconds. No CBS executive, at any time, suggested ‘a way back.’ To say so now is disingenuous. And they know it.” He asked Weiss multiple questions about the firings that have gutted “60 Minutes,” to which she repeatedly said ”I’m not answering that question.” Cibrowsk blew up and announced, “This conversation is over!” twice, “raising his voice and standing to show me the door.” The EllisonCBS executives keep revealing themselves as the corporate drones they are, looking worse with each new tale.

Trump suffered his first major defeat in the 2026 elections last night in Iowa. Representative Randy Feenstra, who was backed by Trump suffered a narrow primary defeat to businessman and farmer Zach Lahn, a rival backed by the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement; this was the first loss for a Trump-endorsee in the 2026 midterms election cycle. Feenstra was viewed as the establishment candidate and received the “complete and total” support of Trump. Iowa has been really hurt by Trump’s tariffs, resulting in the state having the highest number of farms repossessed and sold out of bankruptcy. So far as health is concerned, it has the highest - and growing - cancer rate of any state in the country. The bad news for Iowans may translate into good news for Democratic candidates for Governor, for Senate - the GOP candidate is another major Trump supporter - and in the House races where they can also campaign against Trumpers.

Trump has confirmed he will attend the rescheduled and rehomed White House Correspondents’ Dinner on July 24, nearly three months after a shooting forced one of Washington’s highest-profile annual events to end abruptly.Announcing the new date in a social media post Tuesday night, the president described the decision to move forward with the event as a sign of “strength and fortitude,” adding “we cannot allow Lunatics to change our way of life.” Trump also confirmed he plans to attend the dinner, which will be held at the Waldorf Astoria on Pennsylvania Avenue with enhanced security measures, after decades at the Washington Hilton. He will speak at the event, and says he might not have as “nasty” a speech as heprepared for the earlier event.

The UFC gladiatorial bloodsport being put on for the “emperor in his own mind” on June 14 is expected to host around 5,000 attendees on-site with tens of thousands more nearby. Putting on the show is reportedly costing around $60 million overall; UFC CEO Dana White has said his company will cover all costs. But as construction ramps up, attention has turned to a more unexpected question: in the short term, the section of lawn used for the event will almost certainly be heavily damaged - how will that be dealt with? White has said the promotion expects to spend around $700,000 replacing the grass after the event; the decision to use pre-grown, “ready-to-play” sod adds to the cost. crews will likely remove the damaged turf and replace it with new sod using specialized machinery.

DHS got into a public internet feud with celebrity chef and World Central Kitchen founder José Andrés, who demanded transparency about what’s really going on at Delaney Hall. Things began when the official DHS account proclaimed “there is no hunger strike” at Delaney Hall, a claim that is at odds with other reports that such a protest by detainees is underway due to the unsafe and unsanitary conditions. DHS said: “ALL detainees are provided with 3 meals a day, clean water, clothing, bedding, showers, soap, toiletries, and opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers. Aliens are also provided comprehensive healthcare. For many illegal aliens this is the BEST healthcare they have received their entire lives.” Andrés responded: “Can you invite me to see with my own eyes what the truth is? Undocumented or not people deserve our respect….and their dignity….enforcing the laws of the land is great, but always treating people with humanity.” He dared DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin to come with him so they can “go see it together.” The DHS account clapped back: “Chef, Chicken Fried Steak was on the menu for dinner last night,” providing an image of a meal rotation sheet. American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick posted: “Oh, you have a MENU? Wow, that sure disproves the dozens of personal testimonies about rotten and spoiled food being served to people. After all, there’s never any disconnect between what’s written down and what’s happening on the ground. And it’s a MENU, so it has to be true.”

Mullin repeatedly refused Tuesday to commit to following court orders from judges who rule that the Department of Homeland Security is acting illegally. In his first appearance on Capitol Hill since confirmation as secretary two months ago, the former Oklahoma Republican senator told lawmakers that DHS “will never break the Constitution, and we’re not going to break the law.” But Mullin also would not vow to abide by rulings from judges. “If we didn’t think courts were politicized, then I would probably be able to answer that,” Mullin said. “But we see courts over and over again that use their bench for their political opinion, not just the rule of law.” Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democrat on the panel that funds DHS, noted that even Republican-appointed judges have said the department has violated almost 100 court orders this year. The senator cited that noncompliance as the main factor fueling the ongoing partisan feud over DHS funding that led to the longest funding lapse in U.S. history this year. “This is a really important discussion for us to have, because this is - whether you want to believe it or not - at the root of our disagreement,” Murphy said, adding, “it is very hard for us to figure out how to fund an agency that is violating the law.”

MAGA Mike is upset with Democrats for suggesting that Trump’s appointment of Bill Pulte to be acting director of national intelligence could imperil reauthorization of the nation’s foreign spy powers that are due to expire next week. Johnson said today that it is “absolutely outrageous” Democrats are suggesting they would withhold their votes for that vote “because of an interim appointment that is the president’s choice to do.” “It is the most important intelligence tool that we have. The idea that they would try to play politics right now because they don’t like the president’s choice of an appointment is absolutely stunning to me. These are not reasonable leaders over here. Okay, they will use pain for the American people for political purposes, and this is the latest example.” Yesterday, Hakeem Jeffries called the nomination “another indication of how unserious, reckless and dangerous Donald Trump and his administration are with respect to the national security of the American people. Bill Pulte is deeply unserious, deeply dangerous and deeply unqualified. His supposed elevation as the acting Director of National Intelligence will jeopardize the effort to pass surveillance legislation that was already on life support.” The GOP will likely need Democratic support in the House and at least 7 Democrats in the Senate to advance a FISA reauthorization bill before next week’s deadline. Asked if he believes Pulte is qualified for the role, Johnson said Trump has “the prerogative and the choice on who he appoints to these positions, and this would be an interim appointment.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters “we don’t need a weaponized” director of national intelligence when asked about President Trump’s appointment of Bill Pulte, the homebuilder and director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), to serve as acting head of the nation’s intelligence services. When asked whether he has concerns that Pulte would “weaponize” the position given the role he has played during Trump’s second term in plumbing mortgage records to see whether Trump’s political adversaries have committed fraud, Thune said: “We don’t need a weaponized DNI; we need professionals there.” “Again, I just heard about it. I’ll try and get more information about the current state of their thinking about that position,” he added. “If he’s somebody they want in that position permanently, he’s got a — as you all know — a lengthy road ahead of him.”

Only the best people: Maladministration II has hired a convicted Jan. 6, 2021, rioter to work in the Pentagon’s office that oversees sensitive special operations and irregular warfare matters. Elias Irizarry, who was 19 when he participated in the attack at the U.S. Capitol, was appointed to a position within the Defense Department’s Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict office, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday. The Pentagon confirmed Irizarry’s appointment, saying he is a “qualified, patriotic young professional and we are proud to have him as a political appointee at the Department of War.” “Unlike Mr. Irizarry, the Washington Post does not care about national security given its track record of low-tier reporters publishing and soliciting classified information that could hurt our nation on a daily basis,” the acting press secretary Joel Valdez said in a statement. Irizarry works in the office’s irregular warfare and counterterrorism section, The Post reported. The office performs oversight of the employment of special operations forces in counterterrorism, counterproliferation, special reconnaissance and similar activities, along with oversight of special access programs under U.S. Special Operations Command (SoCom).

Fux Snooze host Sean Hannity ended Tuesday’s episode of his podcast, “Hang Out with Sean Hannity,” with a disclaimer that some political analysts flagged as “notable.” The 90-minute episode featured an interview with Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche that spanned several conspiracy theories about alleged Democratic conspiracies to charge President Donald Trump with crimes. The allegations became so caustic that producers felt the need to slap a disclaimer at the end of the video before it was published on YouTube. “John Brennan, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Letitia James, Alvin Bragg, Matthew Colangelo, Arthur Engoron and James Clapper have not been charged with any crimes in connection with any alleged conspiracy,’” the disclaimer reads in part. “Charges against James Comey related to alleged false statements and obstruction have been dismissed. There have been no findings that Rod Rosenstein, Tim Walz, Gavin Newsom or Jacob Frey engaged in professional misconduct.”

Talk about unlucky: The pilot of the F-15E fighter jet downed over Iran was also flying one of the jets shot down at the start of the war by Kuwaiti friendly fire. Just over 30 days after safely ejecting during the friendly fire incident, the pilot was on a mission over Iran when the jet was hit by a surface-to-air missile, prompting a daring rescue operation. The pilot’s dual shootdowns were first reported by national security reporter Sean Naylor in his Substack The High Side. In the opening days of the war, the pilot was among six aircrew members who safely ejected after three F-15E Strike Eagles were mistakenly shot down by a Kuwaiti fighter jet over Kuwait in a friendly fire incident. Remarkably, just weeks later, the pilot was again forced to eject when the F-15E he was flying was shot down by an Iranian missile on April 3. The pilot, who sustained serious injuries, was rescued after several hours, and the second crew member was rescued after nearly two days in hiding. “It is a highly unusual coincidence,” said Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. David Deptula, who was the principal planner of the air campaign for Operation Desert Storm, during the 1990-1991 Gulf War. Deptula told CBS News in a phone interview that he couldn’t think of a pilot being shot down in separate incidents during the same campaign since potentially as far back as the Vietnam War. “It’s like getting hit by lightning twice.” From my own knowledge, this guy is the ONLY U.S. pilot ever shot down twice in the same campaign. (There were several German aces in WW2 who were shot down several times, as well as RAF pilots in the Battle of Britain.)

The water crisis in the Mountain West has led to Oregon and Colorado telling fishermen to catch all the fish they want, no limit. Water managers don’t expect water supplies - or the fish that rely on them - to last in those locations, so officials have taken special administrative action to remove limits for anglers. In Oregon, the three reservoirs where fishing limits were lifted all store water from the Powder River, a tributary of the Snake River, which flows through the northeast part of the state. In Colorado, officials recently allowed a period of unlimited fishing on the Antero Reservoir on the South Platte River in the central part of the state and approved another to start Monday on the Nee Noshe Reservoir to the southeast.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Sadie

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. Remember, independent media brought down Viktor Orbán - we can bring down Trump, with your support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Currently, fewer than 10% of TAFM readers are paid subscribers. There are free subscribers who read TAFM daily according to the site stats. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive withoutn adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. I’m well aware gas and food prices are up, which can make something like a paid newsletter subscription problematic when the newsletter itself is free. But your support helps me keep TAFM free for those on fixed incomes. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty.

“This is great. I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

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There are 152 days to the mid terms. Today was supposed to be Surgery Day, but yesterday afternoon I was informed by Cedars-Sinai that my surgeon was sick and everything was rescheduled to next Monday. If you stand at Point X and want to get to Point A, and each time you take a step you move halfway to the goal, can you ever arrive?

Yes indeed, things can always get worse: Yesterday Trump nominated Bill Pulte, the 38-year-old grandson of homebuilding magnate William J. Pulte - who tried to get Lisa Cook, James Comey, Letitia James Eric Swalwell and Adam Smith sent to jail for “real estate fraud” when he was director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) - to replace the failed Tulsi Gabbard as Acting Director of National Intelligence; he will do the job part-time, remaining with FHFA simultaneously. This once again proves that Loyalty To Dilbert trumps (pun intended) Competence every time. Pulte doesn’t even have the minimal exposure to the Intelligence Community Gabbard had as a result of her time in the House. Politico described the appointment as “a surprise move that would elevate a political ally with no known background in intelligence to a key national spy post.” Calling him Completely Unqualified demonstrates the failure of language to completely describe full reality. Trump’s Lies Anti-Social announcement read: “William has deep experience managing the most sensitive matters in America, the safety and soundness of the Markets, and over 10 Trillion Dollars at Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac, a substantial increase from where it was just 12 months ago.” Politico reported, “... John Thune alluded to the controversy surrounding Pulte in his initial reaction Tuesday and said he was unsure he would ever be nominated for the permanent post.” He will never gain Senate confirmation, so this appointment can only run to January 3, 2027, when the next Congress is convened. I sense an upcoming battle over illegal occupation of office creating a tremor in The Force. Erick Erickson posted: “Bill Pulte is one of the worst members of the President’s team and has convinced Trump to do more stupid stuff than anyone else in the past year.” Stan Soloway, a former deputy undersecretary of defense, posted: “Does Trump know that building a strong intel infrastructure is not about buildings?” UPDATE: Ken Dilanian reports that there's a provision in the authorizing legislation for the office of DNI that requires that “the person holding this job has significant, substantial intelligence experience.” Trump’s appointment is open to legal challenge.

Monday, the TrumpDOJ said it will comply with a federal court order blocking its proposed “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” despite strongly disagreeing with the ruling, as backlash mounted from Republicans over the initiative. In a statement, the TrumpDOJ criticized Judge U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema of the Eastern District of Virginia for barring the fund, which it said was intended to support individuals who believed they had been unfairly targeted or persecuted, regardless of political affiliation. The TrumpDOJ said the fund aimed to address “abuse, harm, and hate” but confirmed it would abide by the court’s decision, effectively ending the effort (for now). The TrumpDOJ statement reads: “The Department of Justice disagrees strongly with the decision on the Anti-Weaponization Fund put forth by the United States District Court Judge in the Eastern District of Virginia, wherein the Court stated that, under no circumstances, may the Department of Justice proceed with the Anti-Weaponization Fund recently established in order to make up for the tremendous abuse, harm, and hate unfairly shown to so many people. This Fund was open to anybody who was so weaponized, targeted, or persecuted, whether they were Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent, or otherwise. The Department will abide by the Court’s ruling.” The words that are implied in the last sentence are “for now,” which is unstated but obvious. There was no mention of the Get-out-of-all-audits-free deal with the IRS. Remember, as with everything else from Maladministration II, 95% of what was said was a lie. As Michael Sellars points out: “There is a reason to be cautious about taking this at face value. Trump has a long history of floating, pausing, reviving, reframing, and reintroducing controversial ideas once the immediate pressure passes. In this case, the phrase “for now” does a lot of work... So the question is not only whether the fund survives. The question is whether the whole settlement survives. And more specifically: does the IRS immunity survive?” Today, the NYT reported that it is “unclear whether getting rid of the fund would affect another part of the legal settlement in the case, which provides Mr. Trump, his family and his businesses with significant immunity from audits.”

Trump claims the Iranians “never informed us” they were leaving the negotiations as was announced yesterday. He also claims that the talks are continuing “at a rapid pace.” Trump also said the end of talks “doesn’t mean we’re going to go and start dropping bombs all over there.” This is a significant backdown on his part compared to previous positions in the negotiations. In a later post, Trump said that he had a “very productive” call with Netanyahu over the operation in Lebanon, saying “There will be no Troops going to Beirut, and any Troops that are on their way, have already been turned back.” He said he also spoke with Hezbollah “through highly placed Representatives.” According to him, “They agreed that all shooting will stop - that Israel will not attack them, and they will not attack Israel.” Heather Cox Richardson had a very full and complete explanation/takedown of all this bushwa in her post last night - I highly recommend you read it.

Axios reported late yesterday that the conversation with Nitwityahoo referenced above wasn’t as polite as the report implies. In fact, Trump let Yahoo have it, according to the Axios report of the conversation. The call was curse-filled, with Trump blasting Nitwityahoo according to two U.S. officials and a third source briefed on the conversation. Trump said: “You’re fucking crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this. What the fuck are you doing?” Additionally, Trump objected to Israel demolishing entire buildings to take out a single Hezbollah commander and was disturbed by the high civilian death toll. Netanyahu said in his own readout of his call with Trump that Israel’s stance “remains unchanged” on the matter and that the Israel Defense Force will continue to operate “as planned” in southern Lebanon. “I spoke with President Trump and told him that if Hezbollah does not cease attacking our cities and citizens, Israel will attack terror targets in Beirut.” Yes, the Israelis are once again proving that with Israel for an “ally,” you don’t need an “enemy.”

Maladministration II is increasingly seen as a bad investment by the rest of the world, causing interest rates to climb in ways that are worsening affordability pressures, hampering economic growth and creating a new risk for Republicans in November’s midterm elections. The energy price spike triggered by the Iran war has seeped into the price of bonds that help fund the U.S. government. Interest rates on a 10-year U.S. Treasury note are topping 4.44%, up from 3.95% before the war started. Average mortgage rates have climbed to their highest levels in nine months, while auto sales are slumping. The challenge is global in scale; interest rates have risen for multiple countries as the world adjusts to the prospect of higher inflation, mounting questions about the sustainability of government debt and a dramatic surge in investment in artificial intelligence. Higher interest rates are giving Democratic candidates in the races to determine control of the House and Senate another line of attack at a time when voters are concerned about high costs for food and gasoline. As of now, investors continue to buy shares in U.S. companies, causing the stock market to increase in value in a sign of confidence in America’s economic potential. But the increase in interest rates also suggests that investors view the national debt as a vulnerability for the U.S.

Further proof that Republicans Are Permanent Shitheads: Minnesota Republican Party Chair Alex Plechash refused Monday to say whether he supported a moment of silence for convicted murderer Derek Chauvin held at the GOP’s state convention over the weekend. When WCCO’s Vineeta Sawkar asked Plechash point-blank if he agreed with delegates who believe Chauvin was wrongly convicted, he dodged. “I don’t think I’m going to comment on that. The court system had its verdict, and I’m not going to challenge the court.” Sawkar pressed harder: “Did you like the fact that a convicted murderer had a moment of silence at your convention?” He replied, “I don’t think I should comment on that.” When she asked why not, he finally explained his silence: “It indicates whether I do or don’t agree with something that came out of the court. So I think I’ll just let that pass.” The tribute for Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who is currently serving a 22 1/2-year federal prison sentence for murdering George Floyd, with no release until 2037, came Saturday morning at the opening of the Minnesota Republican State Convention in Duluth - just days after the sixth anniversary of Floyd’s death - when a delegate called for a moment of silence, which passed on a voice vote. Convention chair state Rep. Danny Nadeau led the roughly 10-second observance after saying he recommended against it but could not unilaterally block it. Plechash defended the tribute as coming from the delegate body rather than party leadership. “There are a lot of people, I think, that believe that Derek Chauvin was improperly convicted and not treated well. And those people wanted to have a moment of silence and recognition because they felt that way.” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who led the prosecution of Chauvin, called the moment of silence “an act of profound cruelty to the Floyd family.” He added: “The jury heard all the evidence. The appeals courts reviewed every claim. Justice was rendered according to our system of law.” Former Michigan Republican Party executive director and Lincoln Project senior advisor Jeff Timmer was equally blunt: “On brand for today’s Republican Party: Racists who despise the rule of law.” The GOP is now officially white supremacist in all ways.

Trump gets yet another political kick to his balls: Senior U.S. District Judge R. Brooke Jackson in Colorado has put a stop to Maladministration II’s plans to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, slamming the move as an effort to exact political revenge on the state. He called Maladministration II’s plans to transfer NCAR’s supercomputing facility to the University of Wyoming “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” Jackson agreed with the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), the plaintiff in the case, “that breaking off parts of NCAR, dismantling projects and potentially firing thousands of employees was intended by Trump and agency officials as direct political revenge.”

Maladministration II continues it’s upside-down-and-backwards approach to energy and climate change: The Energy Department recently issued guidance reinterpreting a program in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act that set up a rebate program for people who make high-efficiency electric purchases for their homes. The program includes heat pumps for heating and cooling, stoves, and ovens, as well as insulation. However, the new guidance, which took effect Friday, disallowed “fuel-switching,” meaning people would not be eligible for the rebates if they replace a gas-powered appliance with an electric one. Instead, the rebate will be open for people who replace appliances that are already electric with other electric appliances that are more efficient.

Trump also received an astounding rebuke from the legal community that reveals how much worse Maladministration II is compared to his first, according to two experts. Attorneys Brian Kabateck and Shant Karnikian discussed a recent survey that found 94% of judges and lawyers believe Maladministration II poses a greater threat to the rule of law than the first in a new episode of their podcast “Civil Action.” Karnikian argued that the survey results were “astounding” and showed just how much Trump has eroded faith in America’s institutions. “Here we are. It’s gotten that much worse,” Karnikian said.

There was big news yesterday about Scott Pelley’s eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with CBS News management. Pelley questioned Nick Bilton’s qualifications to head “60 Minutes,” pressed him to account for the logic behind last week’s mass firings, and accused Bari Weiss of “murdering” the storied news program. “Bari has no qualifications for her job; you have slender qualifications for this job. The changes that she’s made at the Evening News have been catastrophic. So why should we expect that any of this is going to be any better?” When Bilton said that Weiss loved CBS News and “60 Minutes,” Pelley responded, “She is murdering ‘60 Minutes.’ She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and she’s been doing exactly that.” On two occasions, Weiss drone Charles Forelle told Pelley he was being “rude.” Pelley’s reply was For The Ages: “I’m not being rude. I have some pretty - you know what was rude? Black Thursday. That was the absolute definition of rudeness. Telling Tanya Simon she had to be out of here at five o’clock. Sending Draggan Mihailovich to HR to get fired, because nobody could look him in the eye. Not talking about Tanya’s contract. Not talking about Sharyn Alfonsi’s contract. Not talking about Cecilia Vega’s contract. Just calling them up and telling they were fired. That’s rude. This is a conversation. That is rude, and you were part of that.” In the Cool Writer’s Bar in the Sky, Paddy Chayevsky pours a stiff one and says “Mmm-hmmm.” Pelley received applause from staffers immediately afterward. As someone who has had dreams of walking into a Hollywood Meeting like that, strapped with an M-60 locked and loaded with a 500-round belt of Full Metal Jacket, I can only bow to Mr. Pelley’s example of what pissed-off courage looks like.

The kind of news I love to report: TMZ reported that Chris Robinson, lead singer for The Black Crowes, hit back at a crowd booing his band during a show in Florida over the weekend. The red state crowd started chanting “U-S-A” when the band’s backing video showed the “Black Crowes character dressed as Uncle Sam,” just before the band started playing its hit song “She Talks to Angels.” Robinson told the crowd, “Thanks for the geography lesson.” When the crowd kept chanting, he quipped back, “I don’t know what you have to be so proud of right now.” People in the crowd started walking out of the venue, but Robinson didn’t let up over the heckling” “For those of you fucking booing us, some of us are not afraid. And we most assuredly are not fucking ignorant.”

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Benjamin the football fan

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. Remember, independent media brought down Viktor Orbán - we can bring down Trump, with your support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Currently, fewer than 10% of TAFM readers are paid subscribers. There are free subscribers who read TAFM daily according to the site stats. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. I’m well aware gas and food prices are up, which can make something like a paid newsletter subscription problematic when the newsletter itself is free. But your support helps me keep TAFM free for those on fixed incomes. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty.

“This is great. I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

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There are 153 days to the mid terms.

The news of Trump’s War continues to be bad for Trump: This morning, Iran announced it was suspending talks with the United States following Israeli strikes and an increased military offensive in Lebanon, which Iran had set as a condition for any ceasefire. (Israeli terrorist/now “Security Minister” Itamir Ben Gvir said Friday that Israel was doing everything it could to torpedo the peace talks with Iran - further proof that with Israel as a “friend,” we need no enemies.) Nitwityahoo ordered attacks on Hezbollah-controlled neighborhoods in southern Beirut today. Iran said it was now considering a full closure of the Strait of Hormuz just hours after Trump told critics to “sit back and relax” and let him handle the now cancelled negotiations. Iranian state media Tasnim news agency reported Iran’s negotiating team was halting “talks and exchanges of texts through mediators.” At 1:02AM, in the midst of another midnight meltdown, Trump posted to Lies Anti-Social: “Iran really wants to make a deal, and it will be a good one for the U.S.A. and those that are with us. But don’t the Dumocrats, and various seemingly unpatriotic Republicans, understand that it is MUCH tougher for me to properly do my job and negotiate, when political hacks keep negatively `chirping,’ at levels never seen before, over and over again, that I should move faster, or move slower, or go to war, or not go to war, or whatever. Just sit back and relax, it will all work out well in the end-It always does!” Minutes later, the news arrived of Iran’s withdrawal from the talks due to US and Israeli lies. Reaction to Trump’s midnight post was swift across the board: “Maybe if he hadn’t been telling us for three months that a surrender deal with Iran was imminent he wouldn’t have to post at 1:02 AM that he has no idea how to get out of this war while accomplishing anything meaningful,” said Ron Filipkowski, MeidasNews editor in chief. “Another reason to just walk away. Does America benefit at all from playing referee between Israel & Lebanon? Prior to the war, Iran couldn’t dictate terms in Lebanon, but their control of the Strait of Hormuz gives them the ability to do so. Cut our losses & just leave,” Joe Kent, ex-Trump administration insider and former director of the National Counterterrorism Center. A source told Axios that Trump had made significant changes to the proposed Memorandum of Understanding between the U.S. and Iran, with the edits based around the clauses involving removal of the enriched uranium and access to the Strait of Hormuz. The official said Trump had been informed any response from Iran would take up to three days. “They’re literally in caves and they’re not using email.” Iran’s response to Trump’s constant bad faith in everything he does came in a matter of hours, using email. This proves the Trumpmorons can’t find their ass with both hands on a clear day with a two hour advance notice.

How fucking stupid are the southern-fried MAGAts? This fucking stupid: This morning during an interview with Newsmax following reports that Iran had suspended talks with the U.S. after Israeli strikes and an increased military offensive in Lebanon, which Iran had set as a condition for any ceasefire, Rep. Sheri Biggs (R-SC) said Americans need to trust the president on what comes next with the ongoing conflict. “I think we have to trust him. The American people elected President Trump for a reason, and it’s because he has the backbone, the intelligence to get things done. We have to put America first, and as I’ve said before, if you don’t love this country, get out.” (I haven’t heard “Love it or leave it” in 55 years.)

As of last night Sundowning Grampa Fatso Fatass has gone from being pissed off that all the “Third Rate Talent” decided that entertaining him for his birthday when they thought they were celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and performing for all Americans was not what they wanted to be part of and announced they wouldn’t be performaing at his “State Fair.” He then decided to substitute himself with a big rally for all the dentally-challenged drooling hay shaker and shit kickers, but somehow reality set in and he rememberd not so many of them show up to watch him do his bad imitation of a social klutz trying to dance at Studio 54 50 years ago. So last night he announced :fuck it, there won’t be anything.” Since whatever he was going to do would have been a desecration of the celebration of 250 years of freedom from asswipes like him, that’s a goo thing. I’d rather see no celebration than a celebration of this dimwitted Russian stooge and his fellow Confederate traitors as they do their best to try and destroy the United States and all we stand.

Proving there has been no “rehabilitation” as idiot Colorado Governor Jared Polis has claimed in deciding to grant her clemency and an early release from prison for her crimes of sedition in support of the attempted January 6 coup, Tina Peters walked out of a Colorado prison this morning and headed for Steve Bannon’s War Room, where the convicted election denier told the MAGA faithful she wants a job in the Trump administration. “I would like for President Trump - I’d like to be more involved in prison reform,” Peters said on the podcast, adding she’d pursue it “if that’s the way the Lord leads me.” Peters, 70, was released Monday from La Vista Correctional Facility in Pueblo after serving less than a one-fourth of her nine-year sentence for election interference. Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis commuted her sentence to four and a half years last month following a sustained pressure campaign by President Donald Trump. Peters also made it clear she has no intention of abandoning her election-conspiracy crusade, citing recent and upcoming races - including New York City mayoral winner Zohran Mamdani and Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D) - as evidence that Democrats cannot be trusted at the ballot box. “I know that the Democrats are going to cheat,” she said, “and no one’s really addressing the problem.”

In addition to all the other bad news for Trump/Good news for America that happened in the federal courts on Friday, there is also this:

U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta of D.C. ordered the TrumpDOJ on Friday to provide a fuller justification for seeking to dismiss the indictments of Oath Keepers convicted of seditious conspiracy, including founder Stewart Rhodes. In additions to commutations and pardons of Jan. 6 defendants by the president, the TrumpDOJ has moved to wipe the historical record clean of the indictments and convictions arising from the attack on the Capitol.

Matthew Petracca, the rookie federal prosecutor who brought the “86” case against former FBI Director James Comey, has dropped off the prosecution team and withdrawn from other criminal cases he was handling in the Eastern District of North Carolina. “Petracca had contemplated leaving the Justice Department altogether, according to two people familiar with the matter, but instead remained a Justice Department employee after taking a week off.”

The TrumpDOJ’s retributive prosecution of the Southern Poverty Law Center came after an earlier IRS review of the civil rights organization’s paid informant program in 2019-20 concluded that it was legal, CBS News reports: “The tax portion of the investigation, which has not been previously reported, was initiated during President Trump’s first term as an expansion of an FBI probe into whether that same former chief financial officer may have embezzled money from the SPLC, the sources said.”

In announcing the arrest of Christian Castro, the ICE agent indicted up on state charges of shooting an undocumented immigrant through the closed door of their residence during Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis and then lying about it, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said her office has more than 30 other open investigations of ICE and CBP agents who took part in Operation Metro Surge, including the fatal shootings of American citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

The war crimes continue: A total of four U.S. strikes last week against alleged drug-smuggling boats brought the murder toll in the lawless high seas campaign to more than 200. The first strike on Tuesday killed one and left two survivors, a Wednesday attack killed two men, Friday, three men were killed, and on Saturday, three more were killed. Military expers have warned that this campaign leaves service members open to being charged with war crimes. Maladministration II has never presented any evidence that any of the boats it has sunk or people it has murdered were involved in the narcotics trade. The strikes have had no effect on cocaine smuggling to the U.S.

Hogsbreth gets kicked hard in the family jewels: This morning, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit affirmed a preliminary injunction protecting currently serving troops from the Hegseth Policy, the February 2025 Pentagon directive implementing Trump’s executive order barring anyone with a history of gender dysphoria from serving in the U.S. military. The court vacated the injunction for prospective recruits. Writing for the majority, Circuit Judge Wilkins found the policy “both arbitrary and based upon animus,” driven by what he called a “bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group.” The government, he noted, never contested that the plaintiff servicemembers - who have collectively served 130 years and earned more than 80 commendations - “served honorably” and “satisfied the rigorous standards” required of them. The majority were withering in their criticism of the government’s courtroom performance. Rather than defend the policy on its merits, the administration’s “strategy seems to be one of willful ignorance,” the court wrote, deflecting from the executive order’s explicit language targeting people who express a “false gender identity.” In the majority’s plain-language summary of what that order actually proclaims, Trump “labeled transgender persons as dishonorable, undisciplined, arrogant, selfish liars.” The government offered no evidence to back that up. The ruling echoed District Judge Ana Reyes’ original March 2025 finding that the ban is “soaked in animus and dripping with pretext” and called it an “unadulterated expression of animus.” The ruling is the latest courtroom defeat for Hogsbreth. Since taking office, federal judges have blocked his Pentagon press restrictions, enjoined his censure of Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), and blocked his blacklisting of Anthropic, with courts repeatedly finding his actions driven by retaliation rather than legitimate policy. The case, Talbott v. United States, now heads back to the district court. A class action motion that would extend protections to all affected servicemembers is scheduled for hearing on June 30.

A former Trump White House aide who once brokered a plot to seize voting machines, went on a racist Telegram rant, and built a nonprofit around publishing Biden family dirt, just struck out at the Supreme Court. Today, the justices declined without dissent to hear a petition from Garrett Ziegler, ending his bid to squeeze more protection out of California’s anti-SLAPP statute. The case traces back to a 2023 lawsuit alleging Ziegler had impersonated a Democratic fundraiser to extract information about Hunter Biden’s laptop, then published his target’s personal contact details - triggering a torrent of harassment. Ziegler responded with an anti-SLAPP motion, a legal tool designed to protect defendants from suits that target free speech activity. He lost most of it. The dispute began with a 2022 phone call. The plaintiff picked up believing he was speaking with a Democratic operative. After the call, he received an image of a squid, the phrase “NOTHING IS BEYOND OUR REACH,” and the words “Marco Polo.”

In response to news that Senate Republicans are debating restrictions on how Trump could use his $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” as part of their reconciliation package to fund immigration enforcement, Senate Democrats are mounting a coordinated campaign to eliminate the controversial fund, with Chuck Schumer vowing to use every procedural tool available to force the issue to a vote. In a letter to Democratic colleagues Monday, Schumer announced that Senate Democrats would pursue multiple legislative avenues to shut down the fund, which critics have labeled a taxpayer-funded slush fund benefiting President Donald Trump and his allies, including former January 6 defendant. Schumer wrote: “This week, Senate Democrats will launch a coordinated effort to kill the slush fund before one cent goes out the door. If Republicans return to reconciliation, we will be ready with amendments to shut the fund down. If they try to bury the issue, we will force them to the Senate floor. If they try to sneak behind appropriations, we will fight them there too.” Senators Adam Schiff, Mark Kelly and Elissa Slotkin separately introduced legislation they called the “Drain the Slush Fund Act,” which would ban payments stemming from lawsuits brought by the president or vice president, retroactive to Jan. 20, 2025. Democrats are unlikely to have the votes to kill the fund outright, but the campaign is widely seen as a political maneuver designed to put Republicans on the record ahead of the 2026 midterms, when control of both chambers could hinge on a small number of competitive seats. There are also 12 GOP senators who have stated their opposition to the fund; things could get “interesting.”

A month ago, California Democrats were worried that both candidates for Governor could be Republicans. Right now, it doesn’t look like there will be a Republican candidate forthe office on the November ballot, according to a recent poll. A new poll shows Xavier Becerra holding a 6-point lead as the frontrunner. The Emerson College Polling/Inside California Politics survey released Saturday found Becerra receiving support from 28% of voters, followed by billionaire Tom Steyer at 22%. Former Fox News commentator Steve Hilton is behind at 21%. Only 5 percent of Golden State voters are unsure who they will vote for tomorrow.

Guardian US media reporter Jeremy Barr reported that “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley confronted new executive producer Nick Bilton and another CBS executive this morning in what Barr described as a “heated meeting,” pushing back forcefully on last week’s mass firings. Pelley didn’t mince words about who he held responsible. “She’s murdering 60 Minutes,” Pelley said of CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, according to Barr. “She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it and is doing exactly that.” Producers were present and showed support for Pelley during the meeting, Barr said. The firings Pelley pushed back on included veteran correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, fellow correspondent Cecilia Vega, executive producer Tanya Simon, and executive editor Draggan Mihailovich - all ousted last Thursday as Weiss installed Bilton, a tech journalist with no experience in broadcast television, to lead the broadcast.

Remember, you are not the crazy ones, and we were made for these times. Regardless of what you may feel right now, act as if you believe that and redouble your efforts.

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.” - Abraham Lincoln

Wonka

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The current media scene is a stark reminder of the importance of independent journalism. Remember, independent media brought down Viktor Orbán - we can bring down Trump, with your support. This is the fight of our lifetimes, and the challenge of our generation. Currently, fewer than 10% of TAFM readers are paid subscribers. There are free subscribers who read TAFM daily according to the site stats. Across Substack, authors like me need your help! It’s only 21 cents a day. I hope you’ll join Stephen King - one of my favorite authors - in keeping TAFM operating. Thomas Jefferson said he’d rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers because he understood that a republic cannot survive without an adversarial press willing to challenge power. TAFM really needs some new paid supporters to offset the ones who, likely because of this economy, have let their paid subscriptions expire. I’m well aware gas and food prices are up, which can make something like a paid newsletter subscription problematic when the newsletter itself is free. But your support helps me keep TAFM free for those on fixed incomes. If ten of the daily readers among the free subscribers stepped up now, it would go a long way to solving the immediate difficulty.

“This is great. I love your blog. Keep at it.” - Stephen King (free subscriber on March 15, paid subscriber on April 28)

Comments are for paid subscribers.

Leave a comment