Seven million people say no to kings

I attended the No Kings protest in Livonia, MI on Saturday. I saw very little of it and had no sense of the size of the crowd because I was at a table encouraging people to sign petitions for a ballot proposal to remove corporate money from Michigan politics. This work is to get the proposal on the 2026 ballot. I’m sure we pulled in over 200 signatures and our table was usually quite busy. I did watch a lot of people pass my table. I also heard a great deal of honking from cars showing solidarity with those on the sidewalk – the afternoon was a noisy one. Some of the attendees had cute signs, though I couldn’t pay a lot of attention to them. There were several signs saying they reject the nasty guy for free, refuting the claim that we were all paid to be there. I did note a shirt that said, “Aunt Tifa” and heard about another that said, “Gran Tifa.” I wasn’t able to get a photo of one that I liked. A friend was able to share her photo of it.

A new form of protest is inflatable animal costumes. That began when a person in a frog costume danced in front of ICE agents. Of course, the idea quickly spread. I saw several inflatable costumes of several animals. Kaili Joy Grey of Daily Kos posted photos of No Kings events around the country and invited people to share their photos in the comments. My favorite signs from those photos: A takeoff on The Cat in The Hat

I do not like your lying ways I do not like your hate for gays I do not like you grabbing rump I do not like you Mr. Trump

If Kamala was president we would all be at brunch. Peaceful resistance NOW is easier than hiding a family in your attic LATER. My Sunday movie was Egoist, a Japanese film based on a novel by Makoto Takayama. The story is about Kosuke who has a job in fashion (scenes of him actually working are few) and does quite well but he wears designer clothes as armor and to say he’s no longer from his birth village. His mother died when he was 14. His gay friends suggest Kosuke is getting out of shape and should get a personal trainer. They recommend one. That trainer is Ryuta and getting in bed with Kosuke takes very little time. Ryuta’s father left the family when he was a teen. He dropped out of high school to support his mother and continues to have a several jobs. So there is a rich man, poor man dynamic. Ryuta is reluctant to accept Kosuke’s generous gifts. Even so feelings develop. Ryuta takes Kosuke to meet his mother and she recognizes they care for each other very much. Kosuke begins to have the mother he lost. When the film description includes the words, “When tragedy strikes...” one keeps waiting for that to happen. I don’t want to say more. I’ll only say that Kosuke, though he doesn’t give up his designer duds, he no longer uses it as armor. This one is good enough to recommend. I have one mild complaint of the movie. In most scenes instead of a camera on each of the participants in a discussion there is a single camera that swivels back and forth among them. That’s a lot of camera movement. Back to the No Kings rally. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Monday Cheers and Jeers column for Kos included several photos of the event in his home city. One that I like is a guy wearing suit of armor holding a sign, “If we’re going back to the Dark Ages, better suit up.” In my reading I followed a link to an article in the Durango Hearald written by Christian Burney with story and photos of the protest there. My favorite line is from the sign of a woman in a frog costume, “United we ribbit, divided we croak.” In Monday’s pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin quoted Elliott Morris of Strength in Numbers who worked with The Xylom to estimate the turnout for all of the 2,700 No Kings rallies:

Our median estimate is that 5.5 million people participated in a No Kings Day demonstration somewhere in the country on Saturday, with an upper bound of 8.7 million people. We provide an “estimate” and not a “count” because we are making predictions of turnout in protest sites where official records are still missing. Our estimate is based on reports from local officials, local organizers, and attendees, and suggests the count from organizers — who report 7 million participants nationwide — may be a bit optimistic (but is not impossible). Still, regardless of whether the precise number is 5, 6, 7, or 8 million, Saturday’s events are very likely the biggest single-day protest event since 1970, surpassing even the 2017 Women’s March demonstrations against Trump.

Aaron Blake of CNN:

President Donald Trump and his allies have spent weeks painstakingly trying to manufacture an image of an irredeemably violent American left. ... The Trump team and its allies suggested that the rallies, which are likely to draw millions of people, will essentially be chock full of antifa, terrorist sympathizers and even terrorists themselves. It’s baseless and ugly, yes. But it’s also highly suspect strategically. The GOP rhetoric surrounding this and the Democratic base more broadly has grown remarkably pitched.

But no violence by the No Kings participants was recorded. The little violence reported was traced to those protesting the No Kings events. In the comments is a cartoon by Guy Richards Smit of an ICE agent handcuffing a small girl. The agent says, “It might be comforting for you to know that, on the inside, I’m also a terrified little child.” A meme posted by exlrrp shows what the nasty guy thought of No Kings.

In a late night Saturday post, Trump shared his official response to the historic “No Kings” protests by posting an AI video depicting himself as a King literally dumping his own shit on protesters heads.

The reaction is embarrassment that our president would post such a video. Of course, there are a lot of cartoons about it. Another meme posted by exlrrp is about the White House press secretary:

Karoline Leavitt officially announced the launch of a large-scale investigation to find the person behind “No Kings.”

To which exlrrp added, “time for everyone to stand up and say I am George Soros!” Or, as another suggests, the person behind No Kings is the nasty guy. Without him there would be no need to protest. Emily Singer of Kos reported on the reactions to the day by the nasty guy and others. He described the event as very small and very ineffective. No, it was not small. And since he was rattled by the size, it was effective enough. Republicans tried to defend their comments that the event would be violent. Or – the fun one – they claimed the participants were on a day trip from nursing homes. Seems that shortly after the nasty guy’s poop video came out there appeared photos of work on the White House Ballroom. In particular, photos of demolishing part of the East Wing. On Monday DRo of the Kos community has photos and tweets in reaction. This demolition comes after the nasty guy said the work would not “interfere” with the existing building, “near it but not touching it.” A sample of the reaction. Form Joseph Fink: “taking an actual wrecking ball to the White House is a little on the nose as far as metaphors go” Kevin Kruse:

"Yes, yes, it *is* sad that you lost the family farm, but have you heard about the big beautiful ballroom that President Trump is building at the White House? It's going cost a quarter of a billion dollars! Yes, billion, with a b. ... What? ... No, you can't come see it. What a stupid question."

There is a reminder that the destruction is breaking the law. Not that the nasty guy worries about such things. On Monday there was still debate about how much of the East Wing was being demolished. This morning host A Martínez of NPR spoke with White House reporter Tamara Keith, who said:

A White House official not permitted to speak on the record tells me the East Wing is being brought down, modernized and rebuilt as part of the ballroom project. President Trump has wanted to build a ballroom at the White House for more than a decade. But this demolition is taking a lot of people by surprise because when the project was announced in July, President Trump downplayed the impacts.

See the nasty guy’s comments above. The The National Capital Planning Commission is supposed to have a role in this but the nasty guy appointed chair Will Scharf. He conveniently said the commission doesn’t have jurisdiction over demolition. Besides, the commission is shut down with the rest of the government. Keith said that the construction is being paid by corporate donations is “a giant ethical red flag.” Today DRo reported that the White House is saying the entire East Wing is to be torn down, with demolition completed by this weekend. DRo included a tweet by Jon Cryer:

If this had happened during a Democratic presidency Fox News would be 24 hours of nonstop “AMERICA DESECRATED!” headlines.

And Republicans in Congress would have started impeachment proceedings. Comments of the ballroom architecture and its architect were supplied by davidkc of the Kos community. The architect is James McCrery, who specializes in religious buildings and describes modernist buildings as “ungodly.” Peter Eisenman, McCrery’s former mentor, described the ballroom plan as “bonkers.” And Christopher Hawthorne says the plan suggests...

not so much a bloated classicism or an effort to turn Washington into Mar-a-Lago north, although it is both of those things, as a blueprint for making concrete the notion that the White House has turned in some fundamental sense into a retail outlet, a place where access and influence are nakedly bought and sold.

Are we going to need to tear down that ballroom after the nasty guy vacates the place and we work to restore the country and government? Added to all of this yogipohaku of the Kos community wrote that since the East Wing was built in the 1940s it is full of asbestos. Is proper asbestos remediation being followed? Who will pay when the mesothelioma lawsuits go to court? Why isn’t Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, wearing a mask? And scott3460 of the Kos community wrote:

Putin’s tentacles are almost certainly in the construction of this new Ballroom. God only knows what sorts of technology will be embedded in to the White House after this construction in done. It must all be razed to the ground the afternoon of the next Inauguration. Tin foil hat conspiracy? Maybe, maybe not.

In Tuesday’s Cheers and Jeers column, Bill in Portland, Maine posted new lyrics to a famous Gilbert and Sullivan song. The first verse:

I am the very model of a modern fascist potentate, I gin up fear across the land and viciousness I advocate, I tweet my fingers to the bone and cable news I dominate To tear you down and smear your name and fill your world with spite and hate My propaganda is the very best that I can propagate I love Vlad Putin like a son, for he's my greatest surrogate When I slam 2020 you will hear me bellow "cover-up!" And whip my crowds into a froth by leading chants of "Lock them up!"

Save your soul and quit your job

Alix Breeden of Daily Kos discussed the New York State Young Republican group chat that had a lot of “extremely homophobic, racist, sexist, and antisemitic remarks.” One member even said if the chat was leaked “we would be cooked.” It was leaked. They were cooked. Some had job offers that were rescinded.

However shocking this might be, this kind of language—once thought to be culturally on its way out—is swinging back into the mainstream. But why?

The answer is simple. The nasty guy, and other far right people before him, use those kinds of words and other demeaning language, making their use by others more acceptable, and desensitizing the rest of us to their use.

Ultimately, this is a massive jump backward in a decades-long effort to denormalize hate speech, with the right feeling emboldened to make jokes and comments at the expense of people’s races, genders, and religions. And instead of pushing back, young people are also feeling pressured to let it slide—or even to laugh along. So where is this train going? And, more pressingly, will it slow down before impending impact?

A few months ago I wrote about Elon Musk’s Boring Company and his effort to put tunnels under Las Vegas to ease traffic topside. In that earlier story Musk said he would rather pay penalties than wait for environmental approvals. I noted that if his company causes environmental damage paying a penalty does nothing for the damage that probably can’t be repaired. Anjeanette Damon for ProPublica and Dayvid Figler for City Cast Las Vegas in an article posted on Kos reported on another reason why Musk would favor paying penalties.

Nevada state regulators have accused Elon Musk’s Boring Co. of violating environmental regulations nearly 800 times in the last two years as it digs a sprawling tunnel network beneath Las Vegas for its Tesla-powered “people mover.” The company’s alleged violations include starting to dig without approval, releasing untreated water onto city streets and spilling muck from its trucks, according to a new document obtained by City Cast Las Vegas and ProPublica. ... The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection could have fined the company more than $3 million under the 2022 agreement, which allowed for daily penalties to be assessed. But regulators knocked down the total penalty to $242,800. ... “Given the extraordinary number of violations, NDEP has decided to exercise its discretion to reduce the penalty to two $5,000 violations per permit, which it believes offers a reasonable penalty that will still serve to deter future non-compliance conduct,” regulators wrote in the letter.

A fine that small, compared to Musk’s wealth and the money he doesn’t have to spend on protecting the environment, will not “deter future non-compliance conduct.” I doubt the top level $3 million would act as a deterrence. Musk prefers paying penalties instead of doing proper environmental reviews because agencies and courts could look at a penalty and say it’s too big when it isn’t big enough. Emily Singer of Kos reported the nasty guy went to the Middle East on Monday to bask in the praise of Israel’s far right leaders and various Arab leaders. They lamented the nasty guy didn’t get the Nobel Peace Prize, awarded the previous Friday. The prize went to María Corina Machado, a Venezuelan woman who stood against Maduro’s vote rigging. The Nobel Committee wrote, in explaining their choice:

When authoritarians seize power, it is crucial to recognise courageous defenders of freedom who rise and resist. Democracy depends on people who refuse to stay silent, who dare to step forward despite grave risk, and who remind us that freedom must never be taken for granted, but must always be defended—with words, with courage, and with determination.

Which sounds like they are explaining why the nasty guy will never win it. Alex Samuels of Kos reported that Middle East leaders were not the only ones lamenting that the Nobel Committee passed on the nasty guy. Congressional Republicans, lead by Mike Johnson also joined the praise for the Israel-Hamas peace deal. He announced that he and the Speaker of the Israeli Knesset would urge other world leaders to jointly nominate the nasty guy to receive the Peace Prize next year. Samuels wrote:

According to a September Ipsos poll for The Washington Post, 76% of Americans believe Trump does not deserve the Nobel Peace Prize, while just 22% think he does. Even Republicans are split down the middle, while independents and Democrats are overwhelmingly opposed.

Samuels concluded that this campaign for the award is a convenient distraction from the government that has been shut down for more than two weeks. A tweet by paulpro shows a frame of the old Peanuts cartoon in which Lucy is holding a football to be kicked. The text has been changed to: “Come on Democrats. Pass our Budget. We promise this time we’ll definitely work on funding the ACA afterwards.” I think that is the clearest explanation of what the shutdown is all about. Singer reported on the next step in Republican efforts to gerrymander their way to protecting their House Majority in next year’s election. In North Carolina the state Senate leader, a Republican, will call the Republican controlled legislature back into session to pass a new map that could steal another seat from Democrats. North Carolina’s maps are already highly skewed. The nasty guy carried the state by just 3%, yet they hold 10 of the 14 seats the state holds in the House. The new maps need only a majority to pass and the governor can’t veto. Texas, Missouri, and Utah have already passed new maps. Ohio Republicans are expected to pass a new map by the end of November. Starting their effort are Republicans in Kansas, Indiana, Florida, and Nebraska. Dennis Goris tweeted a cartoon he created showing two young kids playing baseball looking at another with a big trophy. One says, “That’s Gerry Mander. He’s a loser who’s figured out how to get a trophy.” In today’s pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin quoted Patricia Lopez of Bloomberg on what ICE in Chicago is really about:

President Donald Trump's actions in Chicago, including militarizing Immigration and Customs Enforcement and attempting to federalize National Guard troops, are seen as an exercise of raw power rather than an effort to improve public safety.

John Seidel tweeted, “From the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on deployment of National Guard: ‘Political opposition is not rebellion.’” Seidel highlighted a section of the ruling:

The spirited, sustained, and occasionally violent actions of demonstrators in protest of the federal government’s immigration policies and actions, without more, does not give rise to a danger of rebellion against the government’s authority.

In the comments LJ Slater posted 10 reminders for tomorrow’s No King’s rallies. I plan to take part and will have more in a future post. Some of the reminders:

Lead with love, not anger. Focus your energy on what you stand for, not what you stand against. Anger fades; compassion lasts. Smile and greet others. Say hello, wave, or share a word of encouragement. Small acts of friendliness build community trust and lower tension. Look out for one another. Offer water, a smile, or friendly chat to someone nearby. Check on families, elders, and people with mobility needs. Make your sign speak peace. Choose messages that uplift – creative, clever, values-based signs draw attention without aggression or profanity. Carry joy beyond the rally. After the event, share stories, photos, and reflections that highlight unity and courage – show the world what peaceful power looks like.

Pat Begley posted a meme titled The Paradox of Tolerance by Philosopher Karl Popper from The Open Society and Its Enemies.

Should a tolerant society tolerate intolerance? The answer is no. When we extend tolerance to those who are openly intolerant the tolerant ones end up being destroyed and tolerance with them. Any movement that preaches intolerance and persecution must be outside of the law. As paradoxical as it may seem, defending tolerance requires to not tolerate the intolerant.

LEastsound posted a cartoon of two men discussing a poster of a man with a bulging chest and tight pants.

First man: We asked 100 extremely online straight men what makes a man attractive. Second man: How many w– First man: Zero. We asked zero women.

And Bill Amend posted a cartoon of his Foxtrot characters celebrating Pumpkin Pi season. In last Friday’s roundup Dworkin quoted John Harwood of Zeteo:

Over four decades as a journalist, I’ve covered seven presidents, 20 Congresses, and thousands of staffers. I’ve never encountered one as sinister as Stephen Miller. I see it in the darkness of his eyes, the venom of his words, the malevolence of his affect. And also by the deliberate brutality of his campaign from the White House to deport immigrants and crush dissenters. That Miller serves as the president’s top domestic policy adviser demonstrates the unique depravity of Donald Trump’s second presidency. So does the fact that Kash Patel commands the FBI, Kristi Noem directs the Department of Homeland Security, Pete Hegseth peacocks around the Pentagon, Pam Bondi stains the office of attorney general, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. runs the Department of Health and Human Services.

Jack Jenkins of Religion News Service reported that religious leaders have been part of the protests at the ICE detention center in Broadview, Illinois, about 12 miles from downtown Chicago.

Despite the danger, religious leaders and faith activists have been a visible presence at the protests, some waving signs with slogans such as “Love thy neighbor” and “Who would Jesus deport?” Many argue they are compelled by their religious beliefs to advocate for immigrants, but as officers continue to respond with violence, some claim their religious freedom is increasingly at risk — even, they say, as the pray for the souls of ICE agents. “One of the chants that has become ubiquitous at these protests at Broadview is, ‘Love your neighbor, love your God, save your soul and quit your job,’” said Black, who pastors at the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago. “Everybody chants that.”

A tweet by Scott Horton says:

Kash Patel spends most of his time on Fox News today smearing and attacking the city and people of Chicago, a large number of which are thugs and criminals. But the available evidence shows that a much higher percentage of people inside the White House are felons than in Chicago.

Wayno posted a cartoon showing two ancient Romans, one with a bowl of greens and croutons. The other announces, “Hail Caesar’s salad.” The caption says, “Holy Romaine Empire.” In Saturday’s roundup Dworkin quoted a pair of tweets. First by Eleanor Mueller:

On this press call with the House Freedom Caucus, Johnson tells reporters: "We worked on rescissions, and there'll be more of that, we expect, in the days ahead."

And a response by Eric Michael Garcia:

This is why the Democrats are voting "No" on the CR. It's not just health care. What's the point of doing a bipartisan appropriations process if the Republicans do a partisan rescissions package?

See Lucy and the football above. Brian Beutler of Off Message talked about the standard ways to stand up to the nasty guy. Then he added:

But my sense is that what costs people like us sleep at night isn’t that we aren’t doing enough. It’s that we’ve lost confidence in the people who are in positions to do more. It’s become fashionable to repeat cliches like “nobody is coming to save us,” and “we’re going to have to save each other.” We surely do need stamina and self-sufficiency, but mantras like these let people in power—people who sought power, and people who have power by dint of wealth—off the hook too easily. They should know what we expect of them.

Mike Nellis tweeted:

A reporter asked the chair of the Nobel Peace Prize committee why Trump didn’t win, and the guy basically said it’s because he has no courage or integrity. Absolutely brutal.

There’s also that the deadline for nominations for the 2025 prize was about the time the nasty guy was inaugurated. So all the things he did this year to get the prize would only apply to next year’s award. In the comments are a lot of cartoons about the nasty guy and the Peace Prize. Walter Einenkel of Kos posted part of a transcript of Obama’s interview on “WTF with Marc Maron.”

The question has always been, can we pull off this experiment in which people are showing up from all over the place? They're not tied together by blood. They don't necessarily worship God in the same way—or worship God at all. They speak different languages. They have all these weird foods. They show up with these odd customs. And some of them were dragged here in chains and some of them had their land taken from them and their culture destroyed. And out of all that, can we create a shared creed that allows us to live peacefully together and get stuff done? There's always been this fight over what is the true story of America. And I believe deeply in this story—that if we can pull this off, if we can actually treat everybody with decency and respect, and compromise, and make democracy work—it shines a light for the entire world.

Must I say something positive?

I finished the book Everything I learned, I learned in a Chinese Restaurant, a Memoir, by Curtis Chin. The author is American with Chinese ancestry and his parents owned a Chinese restaurant in Detroit’s Chinatown. This is his story from birth in 1968 to graduation from college in 1990. I’ve lived in the Detroit area since 1979. I did not know Detroit had a Chinatown. The original Chinatown was west of Downtown and was demolished in the 1950s to make way for a freeway, in the same way Black Bottom, on the east side of Downtown was demolished for a freeway. The new Chinatown was created in the Cass Corridor, the area between Downtown and New Center, which soon had the reputation as the worst of Detroit. Much of the Corridor has been revitalized and renamed Midtown, though Google Street View still shows the area around the restaurant as rather empty. There is a red roofed building at the corner of Cass and Peterboro that might be the restaurant building, though it has been renovated and looks like a showroom. The first school Chin attended on the other side of Cass is still there, but it isn’t a school anymore. After looking around the school through Street View a bit more I realized I had been inside – it was the first home of Cinema Detroit (which now appears to hold events in other movie theaters or in Planet Ant). And I now see in Street View a kiosk with Chinese characters marking Chinatown. Chin was at that school only a year or so when the declining conditions prompted the family to move their home out to Troy, one of the whiter suburbs. The restaurant stayed where it was. To fit in, he became an ardent adherent of the Republican Party, though he was barely a teenager. Also about that time he figured out he is gay, and was terrified of being outed. I wondered what, if anything, would prompt him to leave Republicanism behind. Surely, now a proud gay man in his 50s would he stick with them? He was in the restaurant pretty much all the time he wasn’t in school. There was a room in the back where he studied with his siblings, and when he wasn’t studying he was working either in the kitchen or in the dining room. He learned about what it meant to be a family, what it meant to be part of a team, and how to meet and get along with people from across the economic and racial spectrum. His early encounters with being gay were at the restaurant, from asking the super cute cook to teach him (an excuse just to be close) to the gay couple, one in drag, who used a racial slur but still showed a gay adulthood was possible. So, yeah, he also learned about racism. Chin is a fine writer with a compelling story to tell. I enjoyed the book and recommend it. My Sunday movie was Ennio, a documentary about film composer Ennio Morricone, released in 2021 after his death, though that is not mentioned. I streamed this through Kanopy and was surprised it didn’t come with subtitles. I had to explicitly turn subtitles on. Yes, Morricone is Italian, so his words and most of the commentary was in that language. His father demanded he learn to play the trumpet as Dad did. When the boy was a teen in WWII he played in clubs to get enough to eat, sometimes substituting for his father. But he felt humiliated to play for food and tired of it. His playing was good enough to get into music school. While there he studied composition with a well known composer. A lot of that music was experimental. To pay the bills he arranged songs for singers. He wanted to do more than provide the chords, so every arrangement had something different about it. That led him to arrange, then compose, for films. He thought it was degrading, a thought a lot of film composers have, a thought pushed by composers able to write exclusively for the concert hall. His name got around and soon film director Sergio Leone wanted his talents. They realized they had been classmates. Leone is known for his spaghetti Westerns – Italian films set in the American West, such as A Fistful of Dollars. The quite unusual scores Morricone wrote for those movies set his reputation. Morricone could write fast and appears to have been able to do it at a desk, not at a piano. When a director wanted a change he could come up with something quickly. In 1969 he wrote for 23 films. Sometimes he could start developing his musical ideas as the script was being written. The actors could get a sense of what the director wanted by listening to music already written. Morricone’s fame grew with the score for The Mission in 1986 and The Untouchables in 1987. He was nominated for an Oscar for both and won neither. Several people thought his score was much better and his loss an injustice. After being nominated for and losing a few more Oscars the Academy gave him a lifetime achievement Oscar – and then he won outright the following year for The Hateful Eight. Morricone also wrote concert music, though those pieces aren’t well known, party because many of them are avant-garde. But starting about 2000 concerts of his film music became cultural events, filling arenas. He also saw that many of his tunes were so good they were pulled into the music of other composers. He pretty much redefined what film music could be. I found it all quite enjoyable and fascinating, but then I compose and I very much enjoy listening to film music. I have a CD of The Mission, which I listen to every so often. I once streamed one of his arena concerts (likely at his death). While I recommend this film I know it isn’t for everyone. While I spent evenings watching an orchestra concert, a movie (above), was a part of two rehearsals, and went to supper with my friend and debate partner (emphasis definitely on friend this time), there was a peace deal between Israel and Gaza. Hostages were released! Prisoners returned! After two years and significant destruction and death is the war over? Will I have to say something positive about the nasty guy? Last Friday morning Leila Fadel of NPR spoke to Gershon Baskin, described as a “veteran hostage negotiator,” an Israeli peace activist, and “was involved in back-channel discussions over this deal.” Baskin said:

I've been in regular communication with Steve Witkoff, the presidential envoy to the Middle East and his No. 1 confidant. And from that point, I was communicating with him. Mostly a one-way communication on the importance of the U.S. understanding that the only way that the war in Gaza would end is if President Trump decides that it has to end because Prime Minister Netanyahu had no interest in ending the war whatsoever. He was willing to continue it forever because it keeps him in power.

He also had contacts within Hamas. He told Fadel:

Every time they said, Israel won't accept this, Israel won't accept that, I kept telling Hamas, Israel won't accept anything. You have to imagine that you're sitting in a room across the table from Donald Trump, not from Netanyahu. The person you need to convince is Trump. Trump will impose a deal on Israel when the time is right, when he believes that you are serious about ending this war, returning the hostages, no longer controlling Gaza.

Then about how much credit the nasty guy gets:

A hundred percent. There's no question about it. Without Trump, this would not have happened.

Why doesn’t Biden get any credit?

Biden's relationship with Israel was problematic from the Israeli side. Let's face it, Benjamin Netanyahu and Ron Dermer, his main ally in the Israeli government, are Republicans. They support the American Republican Party, not the Democratic Party. They were hostile to Barack Obama. They were hostile to Joe Biden, and they're very supportive of Donald Trump. So that was one thing. Biden never had the leverage over Netanyahu that Trump has. I couldn't get Biden's people to look at the deal that I negotiated with Hamas in September 2024.

I was pleased that Friday evening NPR broadcast a rebuttal to Baskin. Host Scott Detrow talked to Jake Sullivan, National Security Adviser to former President Biden. I’ll summarize his main points: When Biden left office there was a ceasefire in place with a plan for the end of the war (so Biden must have looked at something). Israel walked away. In the six months since then Hamas’ position has been very badly weakened and is a shadow of its former self. That allowed the nasty guy to apply some pressure.

So to me, the key thing here is that Israel had no more military objectives to achieve in Gaza, and Hamas had lost a huge amount of its capacity to continue to resist militarily. And when you put those two things together, this situation was ripe to be resolved.

Sullivan says there are still big issues: Will Israel withdraw out of Gaza? When? How willing are Hamas fighters to keep fighting? Who will govern Gaza? I’ve heard since there are still lots of ways the deal could fall apart. For example, the deal calls for other Arab countries providing a peace-keeping force. But why would they want to? Why would they want to put their own troops into a very dangerous situation? So because the nasty guy has done and continues to do so much harm, and because the peace in Gaza is far from a sure thing I won’t credit him for doing something good. Some examples, though mild, of the nasty guy continuing to be vile... Last week Alex Samuels of Daily Kos reported that as part of the nation’s 250th anniversary next year the nasty guy wants to hold an Ultimate Fighting Championship bout on the White House grounds. This will also be around his 80th birthday. I read that and thought he thinks the best way to celebrate our history is with violence. A reminder that the purpose of violence is to enforce the social hierarchy. Also last week Alix Breeden of Kos reported the nasty guy revealed plans for America’s own triumphal arch. I don’t know how it will compare to the Arch de Triomphe in Paris. The map on the nasty guy’s desk showed the arch would be placed across from the Lincoln Memorial where there is a traffic circle, currently just grass. Breeden noted it is another way the nasty guy insists on leaving his fingerprints on the capital. I note an arch of triumph implies destroying an opponent, not learning to live together. Oliver Willis of Kos discussed the nasty guy’s tendency to turn Fox News reporting into governmental policy. The nasty guy doesn’t read and he is an avid watcher of the network. That appears to be his major source of information. And he’s quite susceptible to suggestion. Couple that with Fox News’ reason to exist being the pumping out of conservative propaganda. The network showed one image of a migrant scaling the border. The nasty guy starts pushing a migrant invasion. The network shows old isolated images of violence in Portland and the nasty guy claims the city is “war ravaged.” His North Korea policy is based on what he watched on Fox News.

In his first term, the Trump-Fox feedback loop—as Media Matters for America senior fellow Matt Gertz has termed it—came to life. Trump watched the network religiously and built his presidency around its obsessions.

And the network’s influence has only gotten stronger during the second term. Alan Austin of the Kos community listed 40 ways the nasty guy and the MAGA movement are violating the Bible. He lists their actions with links to articles and the Bible verse that contradicts the actions. Here is a selection:

2. Greed for personal wealth. Proverbs 29:4 affirms that rulers intent on justice build strong nations but those obsessed with money ruin them. 3. Skewing the economy in favor of the rich. Jeremiah 22:16 refers to the righteous King Josiah who won God’s approval by defended the poor first and foremost. 6. MAGA leaders refuse foreigners equal rights as the native-born. Leviticus 19:33-34 demands equality: “Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” 7. Trump and other MAGA leaders routinely call for violence against perceived political enemies. Philippians 4:5-7 urges believers to be peaceful and gentle towards everyone. 18. Multiple court cases and bankruptcy hearings have confirmed Trump has defrauded thousands of employees of their wages. Jeremiah 22:13 vehemently condemns the employer “who makes his people work for nothing and does not pay their wages.” 29. Changes to tax and other laws have shifted wealth and income from the poor to the rich. Proverbs 22:16 warns that this eventually impoverishes a nation.

Make resistance the safer bet

I finished the book Whistle-Stop Politics; Campaign Trains and the Reporters Who Covered Them by Edward Segal. The book is small scenes of when a politician climbs onto a train to take his message to the small towns across the country. Segal was the press secretary for an Oklahoman Congressman in 1984 and thought to use a campaign train to introduce his candidate to more of the state. He wanted to find a book or other resource about campaign trains and came up empty. So he started collecting stories, then did serious research, and 40 years later produced this book. Overall, it’s a lightweight book. He covers the campaigns from the late 1800s to Biden’s train in 2020, though the first train campaign was in 1836. Th coverage isn’t of the type of saying in 1896 this candidate was on the rails for this number of days, covered so many miles, gave this number of speeches, had these incidents along the way, and the trip had this consequence for the candidate or the future of campaign trains. Instead, the book is organized by topic. These campaigns had this type of incident. These had that type of incident. Each incident is described in a few paragraphs, up to a page or two. Campaigns can appear under several topics, but there isn’t a complete campaign narrative. Some of the topics: A description of the campaign train (the candidate’s car was always the last one and out its back door was the campaign platform). Who was on it (candidate, staff, reporters, regular train staff). Whether the candidate gave the same speech at every stop or how he pulled in local details. What local politicians were introduced. How the logistics of the trip were set up. What the Secret Service did to make the route safe. What happened when a doctor was needed. How the candidate dealt with hecklers or protesters. How the press managed enroute (no showers, no laundry, no direct communication while on the train). As to the last topic, occasionally the train stopped and everyone stayed at a hotel. Sometimes they stopped only during the day, so the hotel would get a request for six rooms and 150 towels. Segal also described some campaign imitators. In 1940 Gracie Allen of the comedy team Burns and Allen did a train tour as the candidate for the Surprise Party. Winnie the Pooh did one in 1972 with advisors Tigger and Eeyore. Mickey Mouse did one in 1978 to celebrate his 50th birthday. The top candidates that logged the most miles on a train were Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman, far more than any of the others. There is a description of the rail car built for Roosevelt to keep him comfortable and safe. The reason for campaigning by train was simple: There was a train depots downtown in practically every small city. Everyone knew where it was. The airport, if there was one, was a ways outside of town and few people knew about it. A train allowed the candidate get close to the people. I enjoyed the book, but glad it was just over 200 pages (plus 778 endnotes to list the sources that I could skip) and I could finish it in just a few days. As I said, these were short amusing stories without a comprehensive narrative. Oliver Willis of Daily Kos reported on Monday the nasty guy’s invasion of Chicago has begun. It’s over the objection of Gov. JB Pritzker and the city’s mayor. The justification for sending in the troops is, of course, lies. Also on Monday Lisa Needham of Kos reported on the state of the invasion of Portland. U.S. District Court Judge Karin Immergut ruled on Saturday that the nasty guy could not federalize the Oregon National Guard to protect federal agents in Portland. On Sunday the judge ruled that the nasty guy could not use California’s national guard protect federal agents in Portland. That ruling was at the request of both California and Oregon because neither wanted one state to invade the other. While she was at it the judge ruled the nasty guy couldn’t use the national guard from any other state either, even if Texas was offering. The case was appealed and I’m still behind in my reading. A week ago Needham reported that the nasty guy has a new effort to get colleges and universities to bend to his will. He came up with a ten point plan titled “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.” Schools that agree to it will get preferential access to federal funds. Needham wrote about the points in the plan. Here’s some of them.

So a vibrant marketplace of ideas, but one where schools put their thumb on the scale for conservatives, who basically can’t compete in the marketplace of ideas in higher education. ...And, of course, there are demands that there be no race-or sex-based preferences in hiring and that transgender women be barred from women’s locker rooms and sports.

And they need to hire an independent auditor to ensure compliance.

So all that schools need to do to get “multiple positive benefits,” including “substantial and meaningful federal grants,” is to totally alter their curriculum, departments, admissions, hiring, and sports teams to conform to whatever racist, transphobic, or xenophobic thought that skitters across Trump’s gray matter at any given time. Just some minor tweaks, really.

Nine schools have received the “invitation.” One, the University of Texas at Austin, appears all in. On Monday Dalbert of the Kos community reported that Gov. Gavin Newsom of California has a response. Refuse the nasty guy’s offer a school could lose federal funding. But if a state school accepts the nasty guy’s offer they lose state funding, including grants to California students.

People cave to bullies when there’s no cost to giving in. Newsom’s changing that dynamic. The article urges other blue-state governors to follow suit: cut off state resources to institutions and officials who comply with Trump’s demands. Make resistance the safer bet.

Alix Breeden of Kos wrote that a few top level comedians have gotten themselves into a mess. The royal family of Saudi Arabia funded the Riyadh Comedy Festival. The royal money means they paid big bucks to the comedians, like $375K and upwards. They are working hard to burnish their image. With this royal family we know there is a catch – the entertainers signed contracts specifying they would say nothing bad about the country, the royals, the legal system, or the religion. But giving up free speech for a paycheck, especially a big one, means they are losing credibility in America, especially after Jimmy Kimmel was pulled off the air because of free speech. Fellow comedians are saying their hypocrisy is showing. In the comments of Monday’s pundit roundup for Kos paulpro posted a cartoon by Angel Boligan showing the nasty guy beating furiously at a huge drum set while the two speakers are aimed at earth. John Sipher posted a cartoon by Kal showing a big beefy American army man ready to fight foreign foes while a small Pete Hegseth tugs at his ankle and points to a cat named “Wokeness” and saying “You’re under attack!” In Tuesday’s roundup Chitown Kev quoted Paul Krugman writing for his Substack on why the nasty guy’s second term seems to have gotten so extreme so fast.

One reason things have gotten so extreme, so fast may be that Trump, Miller and company are in a race against time. Foreign autocrats like Orban or Vladimir Putin could afford to chip away gradually at the foundations of democracy because they were, at least initially, quite popular. Trump — although he won’t admit it — has very low approval, and the public opposes him on every major issue. Yet he and his minions control much of the machinery of government, and are trying to use it to intimidate — you might say terrorize — their opponents before public anger catches up with them.

In the comments exlrrp posted a meme showing, I think, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. Whoever it is the text is fun. It says, “She’s going through the normal 5 stages of grief: pyrotechnics, merch, podcasting, grifting, and acceptance.” In the comments of Wednesday’s roundup is a cartoon posted by LJ Slater and created by Smit. It shows ICE agents standing around and one says, “I gotta leave early today, guys. We deported my kid’s babysitter.” A comment posted by paulpro shows a calm Chicago scene and two ICE agents are talking:

First: You see any Chicago Antifa rioters yet? Second: No, but there was a dress sale at the Water Tower my wife would kill for.

LJ Slater posted a cartoon by David Cohen. It shows a peace prize on the floor and the nasty guy reaching for it. To the side one guy tells another. “It’s an old bar trick. I glued it to the floor. Let’s see how long it takes him to get it.” In the comments of today’s roundup Fiona Webster posted a cartoon by Jesse Duquette showing a policeman cuffing a young black child (I’ve seen mentions that this is a thing). The policeman says, “Stop crying. America’s great now.” Webster also posted a cartoon by Lalo Alcaraz that has a caption, “Meanwhile, at the border... The president ordered that the border wall be painted black because it makes the wall hotter when migrants climb it. Also, it’s lunchtime.” The image shows the bottom of three beams of the wall bent up and being used as a grill attended by a Mexican man. Beside him is a sign, “Hot border tacos.” While checking one set of stats for this blog – the excitement of setting big viewing records in September – I forgot to keep track of other stats. I’ve passed mentioning the nasty guy in 700 posts, this one is 701. There are only two topics with more posts. One is “GOP” which is now at 1114 posts. The other is “Gay Marriage” and “Marriage Equality” (I switched tags) at 711.

A majority of book challenges come from organized movements

My Sunday movie was Lover of Men: The Untold History of Abraham Lincoln. Several years ago I saw stories in the press about Lincoln perhaps being gay. This is a documentary exploring that possibility in more detail. The movie shows many letters by Lincoln and others that are evidence of his relations with other men. The letters are authentic. The movie uses actors to portray scenes. We see emotions (mostly tender glances) but hear no words. Where possible the scenes are enacted in the location where the original happened. From what I heard before Lincoln shared a bed with four men at various times, the most famous was Joshua Speed. This movie says Lincoln shared a bed with Speed for four years, declining housing where he would have a room and bed of his own. The two men were seen as great friends. Speed was instrumental in turning Lincoln from a country bumpkin into a man ready for national politics. This was at a time when mattresses were rare and men sharing a bed, especially in a tavern, was common. It was also a time that was homosocial – men and women socialized separately and all of one’s friends were of the same sex. Photos with fingers intertwined and with hands on thighs were not seen as strange. Letters mentioned Lincoln as being uncomfortable around women, perhaps having an aversion to them. But to get anywhere in politics one needed a wife. Speed introduced Lincoln to Mary Todd and they became engaged. But since that caused a rift with Speed Lincoln broke the engagement. Speed soon inherited the family plantation in Kentucky. Lincoln went to visit, which is where he saw the Speed family wealth and the human cost of slavery. Back in Illinois Lincoln resumed courting Todd and married her. There was another man, Billy Greene, who shared a cot (even smaller than a bed) with Lincoln for 18 months. They really had to want to share it. There was Elmer Ellsworth when Lincoln campaigned for and became president. And there was David Derickson who was Lincoln’s personal bodyguard and shared his bed at what became the “Lincoln Cottage” when Mary was away. The history of Derickson’s regiment mentions that Derickson was seen wearing Lincoln’s nightshirt and the mention includes no shame. Towards the end of the 19th century science replaced religion as the source of morality (well, to some extent). But science institutions were led be white men. And we get eugenics, the effort to “prove” scientifically that black people were inferior. Also a part of that effort was to show sexual difference also meant inferiority. Science supported hierarchy. Sigmund Freud said that doing a certain type of thing showed that you were a certain type of person. Have sex with men and you were a homosexual, which according to their “research” claimed homosexuality was not natural and homosexuals were inferior to heterosexuals. So sexuality became performative. One had to act in a way that removed all doubt one was straight. That’s why images of the American West of the time were filled with rugged men. Since homosexuality was said to be not natural it became punishable. There were brutal and abusive treatments in hopes of turning men straight. Lincoln is easily seen as the best president our country has had. He was the most invested in the country and in democracy. He is the closest we have to a national saint. How could one be so masculine as to win a war and also be queer? One of the historians is tired of that question because it implies stereotypes. Was Lincoln gay? There is strong evidence and no proof. Also, there was no concept of sexual orientation at the time. I quite enjoyed this movie and recommend it. There is, of course, a lot more information than I can include in my discussion of it. I finished the book The Wings Upon Her Back by Samantha Mills. This is a good science fiction novel that mirrors our current political climate. The story is about Zemolai, nicknamed Zenya. She lives where there is a domain of five gods. Arthur C. Clarke’s phrase “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” might be useful here or maybe, “... indistinguishable from divine intervention.” The gods are in charge of creation (engineering), scholarship, workers, farming, and security (mecha). Those that follow the mecha god, if they’re good enough, can earn mechanical wings to help with their security duties. The story begins with an incident 26 years after earning her wings that causes Zemolai to lose them. The rest of the novel has alternate chapters on how she earns her wings and what she does after she loses them. With this alternating format the two parts of the story highlight and parallel each other. When Zenya is young she is captivated with the idea of flying. When old enough she leaves her father and brother to begin training. She becomes a student of Vodaya, the top teacher who seems to be in direct contact with the mecha god. Vodaya drives Zenya to excel, and she does, and also becomes a tender mother to her. The five parts of the society are supposed to be an interrelated community. But rivalries develop. The scholars want to know all about the gods, even if the knowledge can upset current understanding. The mecha don’t want to disrupt the current stability, though the rivalries do exactly that. And the mecha shift from protectors against external threats to enforcers of internal doctrine. Spoiler alert: After Zemolai loses her wings she is cared for by rebels while her body recovers from the withdrawal of drugs that made control of the wings possible. As she maintains her devotion to Vodaya there is a long process to understand how abusive Vodaya had been to her and the rest of the community. Zemolai had earlier interpreted that abuse as just a tactic to make her stronger and more fit to receive the wings. She also begins to realize the abuse she doled out to stay in Vodaya’s favor and stay within the theology Vodaya upheld. Zemolai’s desire for the wings blinded her to the abuse. I enjoyed and recommend this book. I saw similarities to the nasty guy supporters. They also want something desperately – a restoration of the middle class and the hierarchy that places straight white Christian men at the top. They see the nasty guy getting it for them, certainly he’s blaming and hurting the people they want blamed. But their lives are being made worse as the nasty guy’s policies are implemented. They may need a long time to see he is abusive and has always been abusive. I found a page of Arthur C. Clarke quotes. A few:

The goal of the future is full unemployment, so we can play. That's why we have to destroy the present politico-economic system. Before you become too entranced with gorgeous gadgets and mesmerizing video displays, let me remind you that information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, and wisdom is not foresight. Each grows out of the other, and we need them all. In my life I have found two things of priceless worth - learning and loving. Nothing else - not fame, not power, not achievement for its own sake - can possible have the same lasting value. For when your life is over, if you can say 'I have learned' and 'I have loved,' you will also be able to say 'I have been happy.’

While I’m discussing a book... The American Library Association is marking Banned Books Week by releasing the list of the top ten most challenged books of 2024. From their top ten page:

The 2024 data reported to ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) shows that the majority of book censorship attempts are now originating from organized movements. Pressure groups and government entities that include elected officials, board members and administrators initiated 72% of demands to censor books in school and public libraries. Parents only accounted for 16% of demands to censor books, while 5% of challenges were brought by individual library users. The 120 titles most frequently targeted for censorship during 2024 are all identified on partisan book rating sites which provide tools for activists to demand the censorship of library books. The most common justifications for censorship provided by complainants were false claims of illegal obscenity for minors; inclusion of LGBTQIA+ characters or themes; and covering topics of race, racism, equity, and social justice.

There were 821 attempts to ban books, down from 2023, but up from 2021. Those 821 attempts included 2,452 unique titles. That’s significantly up from 2001-2020. The LGBTQ books in the list. 1. All Boys Aren’t Blue by George Johnson. This had 39 challenges. 2. Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe. 3. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. 10. Flamer by Mike Curato. All of them on the list, including those above, were challenged for a claim to be sexually explicit. Also related to literature is the end of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. I realized that I hadn’t heard about this year’s winners, which had usually been announced around Labor Day, so I looked for the website. That’s where I learned Scott Rice, the guy who created and ran the contest since 1983 announced his and the contest’s retirement back in March (sheesh he’s older than Biden). The archive of winners will be maintained. In August Deena Prichep of NPR talked to Rice about the contest and retirement. He explained the contest (which I’ve mentioned several times over the years) is to create the worst possible opening sentence for a novel. The rest of the novel is irrelevant. Last year Rice got 6,000 entries. The contest is named for Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, a 19th century author who wrote best sellers, but is remembered for the bad opening sentence of his novel Paul Clifford, “It was a dark and stormy night.” An example of a contest winner included in Prichep’s report:

For the first month of Ricardo and Felicity's affair, they greeted one another at every stolen rendezvous with a kiss - a lengthy, ravenous kiss, Ricardo lapping and sucking at Felicity's mouth as if she were a giant cage-mounted water bottle and he were the world's thirstiest gerbil.

I never submitted to the contest, though thought the worst first sentence would be one where there was no possible second sentence.

I could tell you about my life but thought it’s none of your damn business.

I searched previous blog posts for contest winners. I found these:

This dishonorable mention in the Fantasy category from the 2009 winners is by Shannon Gray of Wichita, KS. Detective Pierson mentally reviewed the group of suspects milling around the recent crime scene – two young siblings eating gingerbread, a young girl in a red hoodie, a beautiful girl with narcolepsy, and seven little people with the profession of miners – then gave his statement of "It's a grim tale" to the press. A winner in the Vile Puns category for 2015 is by Matthew Pfeifer of Beaman, Iowa: Old Man Dracula forgot to put his teeth in one night, and so had to come home hungry, with a sort of “nothing dentured, nothing veined” look on his face.

From 2018:

In preparation for visits by African dignitaries, we had redecorated the West Wing of the White House in an African motif with numerous artificial plants and animals, but the President asked that we remove the papier-mache wildebeests, saying he was "tired of fake gnus." Wm. "Buddy" Ocheltree, Snellville, GA

From 2023 and working with the inspiration for the contest:

It was a dark and stormy night at the harbors of Sydney, where wind whipped the seawater across the docks and the torrents of rain soaked everything that the waves could not reach, but luckily for James Tyche this story begins at a beach in Southern France, where it was currently day and James was gradually developing a healthy tan and less healthy sunburn. Robin Alberts, Ludenscheid, Germany

And from last year’s contest:

Stepping outside just after dawn, Chef Billingsworth was pleased to discover that for once the morning fog was not as thick as pea soup—or even lobster bisque for that matter—but was more a chicken velouté, or perhaps a beef remouillage. Mark Meiches, Dallas, TX

I’ll miss this fun. A while back I wrote about Kat Abughazaleh, who is Gen Z and running for Congress in a district that’s a long strip in Chicago’s northern suburbs. Alix Breeden of Daily Kos interviewed her. She’s a person I’d very much want to see in Congress right now, willing to take on the fascists (she’s been taking on ICE) as well as the stodgy Democratic leadership.

The people rose up and took power back for themselves

Thom Hartmann of the Daily Kos community and independent pundit posed a thought experiment. If you were hired by Putin or billionaires and your job was make the country vulnerable to takeover, what steps would you take? I’ve heard a variation of that question: Would you do anything different from what the nasty guy is doing now? Hartmann gives a twelve step program to accomplish that task (quite different from the programs to treat addiction). I’ll list some of them and let you read his article for the rest. The whole list is painfully familiar – we’re living through the takeover. 1. Turn America from “Out of Many, One” into warring factions. 2. Create a huge pool of mostly white men who are mad because they feel locked out of the American Dream. Destroy unions. Gut the social safety net. Ship manufacturing overseas. Demonize “the other.” Ban books on diversity. 3. Destroy people’s faith in the news. Loudly proclaim “leftwing bias.” 4. Shatter faith in reality. Challenge science. Spread conspiracy theories. 6. Shatter faith in elected officials by legalizing the buying of legislators. 11. Seize control of legislative and judicial branches so a tyrant’s corruption and election rigging is never held to account.

All of these twelve simple steps have been used by every despot in history, from the ancient Roman Empire through the kings of the Dark Ages to the fascists of early 20th century Europe to today’s strongmen including Orbán, Putin, Erdoğon, El-Sisi, Maduro, Netanyahu, and Modi. ... The good news is that multiple countries have elected men to leadership who tried to run through this list and were stopped before they could finish the job. Instead of letting their leaders turn their nations into permanent autocracies, the people rose up and took the power back for themselves and their democracies. They include Ukraine, the Philippines, Brazil, Poland, Zambia, Sri Lanka, Guatemala, Peru, South Korea, Romania, North Macedonia, Slovakia, Gambia, Malawi, Moldova, and South Africa.

We can look away or we can act. Lisa Needham of Kos reported that even though the government is shut down the construction of the ballroom for the White House continues. The reason is it isn’t funded by the government, but by private donations (also known as bribes). Critics, such as California Gov. Gavin Newsom, see this as a bad public relations blunder, cutting support for the poor while building a playground for the rich. Newsom tweeted an image of the nasty guy as Marie Antoinette with the words, “NO HEALTH CARE FOR YOU PEASANTS, BUT A BALLROOM FOR THE QUEEN!” Kos of Kos noted this government shutdown is because Republicans need Democrats to vote for it – they need 60 votes to overcome a filibuster. Then Kos lists several recent cases in which the filibuster was, for a specific situation, eliminated. Both parties did it. Republicans aren’t talking about doing it now. If the filibuster was gone they would have enough votes. That means Republicans want the shutdown. Alex Samuels of Kos reported that the nasty guy is threatening Republican governors who don’t redraw Congressional districts to give Republicans more seats. The threat is he will back primary challengers when they’re next up for reelection. Those threatened include governors of New Hampshire, Indiana, North Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky, and Florida. Missouri is already somewhere in the process. Some Republicans fear the backlash from independents isn’t worth the potential gain of new seats. They cite polls in Texas showing a majority of independents oppose the redrawn maps there. Adelita Grijalva, Democrat, won a special election to fill a Congressional seat for Arizona. Needham reports that Speaker Johnson is delaying her swearing in, giving reasons that didn’t apply when Republicans won special elections. The reason appears to be simple. Hers would be the last signature needed on a petition to force a vote on releasing the Epstein files. I had written about younger Democrats challenging the party elite. Here’s another story like that. Alix Breeden of Kos wrote about Saikat Chakrabarti. He had been chief of staff for Alexandria Ocsaio-Cortez among other important jobs. The person he is challenging is a big one – Nancy Pelosi. Chakrabarti sees Democrats who are “doing stuff” and others “doing nothing.” That second group appears to find security in doing as little as possible and with plans to win off the backlash against the nasty guy and Republicans. He sees Pelosi in the “doing nothing” category. Chakrabarti recognizes that if Democrats don’t offer a compelling vision many people won’t vote at all. He wanted to explore why Democrats lost in 2024, what they did wrong, and how could they change. Helplessness can’t be the message. And that is a challenge to the “do nothing” camp. Pelosi was first elected to Congress when Chakrabarti was a year old. He’s 39 now. His parents were extremely poor. He grew up middle class. He got a job in Silicon Valley and says he got rich because the company he worked for did extremely well. He says it is like winning the lottery. Business Insider did an article on him and he says that exposed him as a class traitor. He knows teachers and firefighters work harder than he ever did without making the money he has. They can’t afford a home in San Francisco and won’t have a secure retirement. He sees the system is rigged against them. Breeden did a lengthy interview with Chakrabarti. He sounds like a fine candidate. And it sounds like Pelosi, who has done many fine things in her decades in Congress, has reached the end of her time. Jen Fifield and Carter Walker, in an article for Votebeat posted on Kos discussed the debate over clean voter rolls. The voter rolls of a city need to be updated because citizens move and die. The question is “how to ensure that only eligible voters are registered without endangering voting rights.” The article was prompted because the Department of Justice has sent letters to states asking for their voter lists and how they maintain them. The DoJ wants to enforce the parts of the federal law the nasty guy wants to prioritize. We can guess what his priorities are. States are pushing back. This is the core of the matter:

House Republicans claimed dirty voter rolls enable fraud, and said ensuring that only eligible voters are on the list increases election security and voter confidence. They dismissed the idea that their efforts are meant to purge certain types of eligible voters from the rolls, such as people of color.

Though the policies they propose very much show they intend to purge certain types of eligible voters.

House Democrats made it clear that they, too, don’t want ineligible voters, such as dead people or noncitizens, on the list. But they questioned why Republicans would want to take any actions that could potentially disenfranchise eligible people, citing recent incidents of state list maintenance actions that led to eligible voters being removed.

Maintaining rolls is difficult because our voting is decentralized. It’s run by states, townships, and cities. There is no national database, though states have databases. Cities must rely on official notices of death. But moves to another state are difficult to track. Even if rolls are poorly maintained, fraud is still quite rare. The effort to purify the voter rolls has come to Michigan. Back in 2000 we passed a voter bill of rights, allowing vote by mail, early voting, and registering through election day. Naturally, Republicans are outraged that voting was made easier. There is an effort right now to gather signatures to put a proposal on the ballot that would do such things as require a birth certificate when registering to vote. Of course, the ballot summary is misleading. If you’re in Michigan, please decline to sign that one (but please do sign the proposal to get money out of politics). Mike Luckovich posted a cartoon on Kos titled Fighting for Democracy. It shows unafraid Dems, cartoonists, late night hosts, never Trump Republicans, uncowed journalists, and everyday Americans. Randy Bish posted a cartoon showing a military general with a chest full of insignia. He says, “Am I insulted? A drunk and a draft dodger just told me that I need to do better.”

Demanding they abandon ethics and commit war crimes

Yesterday I mentioned that the nasty guy and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth required generals and admirals come from around the world to Virginia to be lectured by these two guys. Emily Singer of Daily Kos had excerpts of Hegseth’s speech. My summary of some of the things he said: The military is to use “punishing violence on the enemy.” No more “politically correct” rules of engagement. No more inspector general process. Those that complain about abusive colleagues and superiors will have nowhere to turn. Basic-training drill sergeants may beat up recruits. No “toxic ideological garbage” as in nothing remotely related to DEI or anything Hegseth might consider “woke.” I read through that and thought again he’s acting like a supremacist and wants to turn his military into supremacists. Yeah, that he is a supremacist was apparent as soon as he appeared on the scene. One major part of supremacy is that it is maintained by violence. Put another way, all violence is in support of supremacy and the social hierarchy. And Hegseth is demanding his military be as violent as possible. Not just the usual military violence to subdue the opponent, but violence to crush and eliminate the opponent. As part of that he is demanding the hierarchy of the military be maintained not just by rank, but also by violence. Singer said that the way Hegseth is demanding his military fight is demanding they abandon ethics and commit war crimes. Singer also reported on the nasty guy’s speech, which came after Hegseth’s. He wasn’t going to let an underling get all the glory. I hear he talked for more than an hour and other observers said his dementia was showing. What Singer reported is the nasty guy wants to use the military against American citizens. Not a surprise the generals were silent. About ten days ago the nasty guy, with Robert Kennedy Jr. as backdrop, attacked the use of Tylenol, claiming its use during pregnancy caused autism. Yeah, that has long been debunked. As part of his rant the nasty guy said “There’s no downside” to avoiding Tylenol while pregnant. Madison Czopek of PolitiFact, in an article for KFF Health News posted on Kos, wrote yes there is a downside, a big one. Tylenol is the only available treatment for fever when pregnant and untreated fever can cause significant damage to both parent and child. An Associated Press article posted on Kos a week ago reports on the indictment of James Comey for making false statements to the Senate and obstruction. This appears to have happened because the nasty guy demanded his Attorney General file charges against Comey even though Department of Justice lawyers said the case was flimsy. The nasty guy hates Comey because he is connected to the investigation of Russia interfering in the 2016 election, which the nasty guy declares didn’t happen and lots of evidence shows that it did. The nasty guy had demanded chief prosecutor Erik Siebert of the Eastern District of Virginia file the charges. He refused and was fired. So the nasty guy said he would nominate Lindsey Halligan, a White House aide, to take Siebert’s job, though she has no prosecution experience. She rushed a basic case so that it would be filed before the statue of limitations expired on September 30. Since the accusation is lying to the Senate Steve Inskeep of NPR spoke to Sen. Tim Kaine. Kaine said he doesn’t think Comey lied to him during that testimony. This is a distraction from all the things the nasty guy said he would do and has done the opposite. Inskeep noted this indictment includes no evidence. Kaine expanded that:

Pam Bondi put out a press statement that was highly unusual when this indictment was announced. And the last line in the press statement was, we will follow the facts in this case. You follow the facts before you indict somebody. You understand the facts before you indict them. You don't indict them on a two-page lack of details and then say you're going to follow the facts. This is a political hatchet job. I think the concerns about selective prosecution are significant. I think Lindsey Halligan, she's not a prosecutor. She's never had any experience in Virginia. I think even the circumstances of her appointment raise legal questions.

The discussion turned to Bondi’s confirmation hearing in which she said of her decisions as AG, “Politics will not play a part.” Kaine says he feels misled by that and knew at the time she wasn’t sincere. He thought everyone knew that. Inskeep then brought in a recording of an interview with Peter Navarro, who said the investigation into Comey needed to finish before the 2026 election because if Democrats regain the House they will open investigations into himself. Kaine responded by saying that shows the Comey case is political prosecution. I add this sounds like another case of a Republican accusation that is really a confession. Navarro is only afraid of Democrats holding political investigations of himself because he and other Republicans are currently doing that to Democrats and he’s afraid of payback. In last Saturday’s pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin included a tweet from Kyle Cheney:

Trump’s inability to stop live commentary on Comey’s case could actually doom it. This isn’t just a broad “no one is above the law,” he’s doing legal analysis that Comey’s team will plug right into their selective prosecution motion to dismiss the indictment.

S.V. Date of HuffPost:

“No one from the White House should be saying anything about Comey or the indictment,” said Ty Cobb, a lawyer in the White House Counsel’s office during Trump’s first term and once a federal prosecutor. “But there are no guardrails there in this administration, no adults.” Prosecutors, who represent the state, are supposed to refrain from commenting publicly about criminal cases and present their accusations and evidence in court. In this case, Trump’s numerous previous attacks on Comey, his many campaign vows to seek retribution against those who investigated or prosecuted him and his social media post demanding that Attorney General Pam Bondi charge Comey and others already laid the foundation that Comey was charged only because of pressure from Trump.

In the comments there was link to a meme, now broken, that said if the case goes ahead Comey and his team can demand the nasty guy give depositions under oath. The nasty guy clearly hasn’t thought this through. In last Sunday’s roundup Chitown Kev quoted Amanda Marcotte of Salon:

This dynamic, where a talented female leader inherits a collapsing situation, is so common in the business world that experts have a name for it: The glass cliff. The phrase is a play on the “glass ceiling,” an older metaphor that describes how structural sexism keeps women from reaching the highest levels of leadership. In glass cliff scenarios, however, women do get to the top — but only after male leaders have screwed things up so badly that the situation may be unsalvageable. As Jordyn Holman of the New York Times described it in 2024, it’s “a phenomenon in which a company in crisis appoints a woman to turn things around, often setting them up for failure.” ... Williams laid out a number of reasons institutions turn to female leaders in times of crisis. The ugliest is plain old scapegoating. If the male leadership messed things up beyond all repair, they often find it’s easier to pass it off to a woman right before the final collapse, so they can blame her instead of themselves. Biden did this aggressively to Harris, even going on TV after her loss and insisting, preposterously, that he would have won. There’s also an expectation, Williams explained, that women have more soft skills, like empathy and morale-building, which people hope will save them in a crisis. We saw this play out with the “Momala” meme, when pundits and influencers openly hoped that Harris was maternal enough to unite a party that had been torn apart by Biden’s mismanagement.

Marcotte included several examples. One of them is Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors. She’s been there 11 years and some in the automotive press think she’s doing an outstanding job. Barra may have been given the job so leaders could blame the failure of GM on her, but GM didn’t fail. In the comments is a tweet by Acyn with a quote from Rep. Crow discussing the government shutdown.

There’s no consistency to any of it because there’s actually no ideology. Donald Trump doesn’t believe in fiscal conservatism. He doesn’t believe in conservative philosophy. He actually doesn’t believe in anything other than his own personal grievances—who he likes or dislikes on any given day—and his power. That’s what he believes in.

In today’s roundup Greg Dworkin quoted Paul Waldman writing for his The Cross-Section Substack. I’m leaving out the nasty guy’s quote and going straight to Waldman’s analysis.

In other words, Democrats say that they’re trying to keep Trump from cutting medical benefits, to which Trump basically responded: Yep, I’m going to cut medical benefits. When other politicians hand their opponents such a perfect talking point on a silver platter that way, it’s usually the occasion for a vigorous round of mockery and contempt, as both enemies and allies marvel at how only a spectacular idiot with no political skills would say such a thing.

NBC News reported that when the shutdown began Education Department employees set up their emails with out-of-office messages. Five of them told NBC News that their messages were changed without their permission to blame Democrats for the shutdown.

One person reported changing the out-of-office message back to the nonpartisan version, only to have it revert to the partisan wording later. “None of us consented to this. And it’s written in the first person, as if I’m the one conveying this message, and I’m not. I don’t agree with it. I don’t think it’s ethical or legal. I think it violates the Hatch Act,” this person said, referring to the law that limit federal employees’ political activity. “I took the statement that they sent us earlier in the week to use. And I pasted it on top of that — basically has a standard out-of-office,” another one of the Education Department employees said. “They went in and manipulated my out-of-office reply. I guess they’re now making us all guilty of violating the Hatch Act.”

Dworkin also had an excerpt from a post and I thought to share the whole thing. The nasty guy has said he needs to send troops to “war ravaged” Portland, Oregon. So Cliff Schecter of BlueAmp created a letter supposedly from a man caught in the war of Portland to his wife back at home. Do be wary of the video at the top showing a Portland street scene that seems to insist it must play with the sound on. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos, quoted late night commentary. A sampling.

"Republicans would like you to believe that Democrats shut the government down. But the bill they wanted Democrats to sign would knock out about 15 million Americans from health insurance. It's like going out to dinner and the waiter says, 'You must order lasagna. The chef made it today, and a bunch of you are going to get food poisoning from it. But if you don’t eat it, you've ruined the meal.' That's the Garfield version of what's going on right now." —Jimmy Kimmel "President Trump on Saturday ordered the Defense Department to deploy troops to Portland, Oregon to 'secure the city.' From what? Farmer's markets? The only crime in Portland is the price of locally-sourced honey." —Seth Meyers "Portland??? Did I miss Vancouver attacking Portland in a fierce battle of mellow artisans? 'Don't shoot until you see the whites of their cold-foam, half-caf latte art!' " —Jon Stewart

Damaging to real American people, but an opportunity for cuts

Sheesh, where to begin? Start talking about the new mess or finish talking about the previous mess? I guess I had better finish off the old mess first. Way back on September 18 (so it can be seen as old news) when the Jimmy Kimmel mess was still hot Alex Samuels of Daily Kos reported that Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr hinted that Kimmel won’t be his last target. He said, “We’re not done yet.” Sinclair and Nexstar are the two large TV station owners that objected to Kimmel’s comments, prompting his show to be suspended. On September 23 Oliver Willis of Kos reported that they said when Kimmel’s show is brought back (which was that evening) their stations would not air the show. On Friday, September 26 Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos had some late night commentary, including on Kimmel’s return to air. Bill started with the start of Kimmel’s opening monologue:

I’m happy to be here tonight with you. I’m not sure who had a weirder 48 hours, me or the CEO of Tylenol.

And later in the monologue:

[Trump] did his best to cancel me. Instead, he forced millions of people to watch the show. That backfired bigly. He might have to release the Epstein files to distract us from this now.

Willis posted that opening monologue. I watched it. The whole segment is 30 minutes. The first 15 minutes was rather serious and a full support of strong American ideals, especially free speech. I think it’s worth watching. The rest of it was jokes and a skit on the “new rules” Kimmel would have to follow. In all a great return. On September 26, three days after Kimmel’s return Samuels reported that Sinclair and Nexstar had changed their position and would air Kimmel’s show. On to the other big news, the federal government shutdown. Leila Fadel of NPR spoke with Rep. Rosa DeLauro, Democrat of Connecticut. She wanted to offer a bill to keep the government funded and open for another month so that Congress, and not the Office of Management and Budget head Russel Vought. But the House was gaveled into adjournment before she could. DeLauro reminded us the reason for the shutdown, for the budget impasse, is Democrats want to reverse the cuts to Medicaid that would throw fifteen million people off. They also want to reverse the cuts to Affordable Care Act subsidies, which would cause premiums to be too expensive for millions of people. At the moment Democrats do not trust Republicans. DeLauro said:

In the midst of these negotiations, Russ Vought, who is the mastermind of this, of this effort, and who wants a shutdown - and he said - his words are very clear - there should be less bipartisanship. The president of the United States said it's a waste of time to negotiate with Jeffries and Schumer. And Republicans rally around, jam this Republican continuing revolution down the Democrats' throat. Now, you tell me if that acts in good faith. And Mr. Vought introduced a bill that would continue to steal the money appropriated by Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate, as we're into these negotiations.

As for the nasty guy’s threat of turning mass furloughs into mass layoffs, DeLauro said there have already been mass layoffs. Scott Simon of NPR talked to Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin about his proposal to end shutdowns. He calls it the Eliminate Shutdowns Act. If a budget isn’t enacted this bill would establish 14-day rolling funding at last year’s levels for the parts of the government not yet funded.

And by the way, that's the well-honed process by the uniparty to put pressure on the process to just pass anything, which has then resulted in [the national debt] going from $14 trillion to $37 trillion. It's designed to increase spending. Everybody has to get together and compromise to spend more on everybody's programs. Again, we can't afford this. So again, let's end the dysfunction.

I like his idea, but puzzled. Why have a bill that funds the government in two week chunks that automatically renew every two weeks? Why not just say the government is funded at the previous level until the new budget is passed? News Corpse of the Kos community wrote Speaker Mike Johnson gave the game away. While talking to Maria Bartiromo of Fox News about turning the furloughs into job cuts, Johnson said:

Yes, the president and I talked about this at great length. While, a shutdown is very damaging for real American people who depend upon government services, it can provide an opportunity to downsize the scope and the scale of government, which is something that we’ve all always wanted to do.

This would allow the nasty guy do some things that would otherwise not be possible because Democrats would never vote for them. Johnson also said of Vought:

He gets to decide now what services are essential, what programs and policies should be continued, and which would not be a priority for taxpayers.

So Vought gets to decide – and not Congress? And that “priority for taxpayers” nonsense... This is all about the priorities of the nasty gay and Republicans, which are far different than the priorities of taxpayers. News Corpse wrote that the nasty guy says the shutdown will allow him to do things that are bad for Democrats. News Corpse corrects that thought. The cuts will be bad for the American people. The nasty guy and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth called about 800 of America’s generals and admirals to one place in Quantico, Virginia. They ignored the cost of transporting them from around the world and the big security breach of having all the top brass in one place. Then Hegseth laid out his definition of a warrior ethos (from a guy who had never been a warrior) and the nasty guy insulted them. In today’s pundit roundup for Kos Chitown Kev quoted Robert Hubbell of his Today’s Edition Newsletter on Substack:

They sat in silence as Trump claimed that the military would use U.S. cities as “training grounds” for waging war against American civilians. They sat in silence as Trump said he would ask the military to fight “the enemy from within.” They sat in silence as Hegseth said the generals were free to ignore the law of war and international treaties that separate the US military from barbarians and war criminals. [...] In his final insult, Trump told the generals they looked like they came out of “central casting.” In doing so, he trivialized and demeaned their accomplishments and professionalism, telling them they were nothing more than props for infantile speeches by men who hold the military in contempt. And so, the generals sat in silence, depriving Trump of the thing he values most--obsequious adulation. The silence of the generals spoke volumes.

In the comments are several cartoons and memes about that military gathering. A cartoon by Sophie Labelle has a lot of text. Here’s part of it. It start with saying Vought is a key architect of Project 2025. Then:

What Vought aimed to do was create the conditions in which he could strip bare what he calls the “unelected fourth branch of government.” Back in February, he instructed agencies to prepare for mass layoffs in Sept. 30. This shutdown will give Trump the power to bypass Congressional oversight: Trump can just declare which areas are considered essential services, and ignore the 1974 law that prevents presidents from withholding federal dollars. The shutdown was the goal all along.

Laugh About It cartoons posted one by David Crampton. It shows two women in conical hats with a crystal ball between them. In the ball is an image of a guillotine. One woman says to the other:

Once upon a time, there was a similar concentration of gold and power in a palace. It didn’t work out too well for the leaders.

Last night my friend and debate partner asked what is really lost when the government is shut down. I could only list a few things from memory. So now I turn to a list I made back in 2017 when the nasty guy threatened or caused a shutdown. Here are the departments of the federal government listed in the order of their creation, though some were created under a different name. State

coordinates foreign affairs, foreign policy advisor

Treasury

regulates & stabilizes money, pays government bills IRS – collects taxes and investigates tax cheats

Defense

armed forces, national security

Interior

federal lands & national parks programs for natives

Justice

enforcement of law & administer justice ATF, DEA, anti trust, civil rights, criminal, environment, tax

Agriculture

support the farmer support the forests food safety, promote nutrition, SNAP, WIC

Commerce

promote economic growth & tech competitiveness Census NOAA – Weather Service Patents & trademarks

Labor

improve working conditions, assure worker rights

Health and Human Services

CDC, Food & Drug, Institute for Health, Medicare & Medicaid agency for toxic substances Indian Health Service Head Start & senior home delivered meals services to prevent child abuse and domestic violence

Housing and Urban Development

strong, sustainable, inclusive communities affordable and safe housing Office of Fair Housing Community block grants, Section 8 housing, Federal Housing Admin

Transportation

Aviation safety, highway safety, pipeline safety Fed highway, fed railroad

Energy

Safe handling of nuclear material system of national labs Promote energy production, research, conservation.

Education

Watches over the ed system money for grants and loans money for special ed programs

Veterans Affairs, Veterans Health,

Veterans Benefits: home loans, vocation rehab, education

Homeland Security

antiterrorism, cybersecurity Customs FEMA

Small Business Administration Social Security NASA Environment Protection Agency Ambassador to United Nations National Endowment for the Humanities Corporation for Public Broadcasting

Am I famous now?

Wow! The number of views for this humble blog for September is 163,988. This is more than three times the previous monthly record of 48,646 set back in July. The views started picking up at the start of the month, averaging roughly 4K views a day. On September 20 the average jumped to roughly 9K a day. In the last 30 days over 100K (61%) views were from the US, over 30K (18%) from Singapore, 23K (14%) from Hong Kong, nearly 6.9K (4%) from Mexico, and over 1.2K (less than 1%) from Britain. There were views from at least 15 other countries. Since I asked Blogger to keep track of statistics in July of 2010 this blog has now passed 1 million views, currently at 1,058,937. More than 15% of recorded views are in the last month. Until 2023 most months had fewer than 4K views and 12K or 15K views in a month were a big deal to me. The current rise in views started in May 2023. I mentioned these numbers to my friend and debate partner over supper together. He asked if I knew what triggered this sudden rise, such as a big site mentioning this one. I don’t see anything in the stats Blogger shows me that would explain this jump. This big jump in views did not change another aspect of this blog. There have been all of three comments since 2020 and only 235 comments in the nearly 18 year history of this blog – that’s excepting spam comments, which I promptly delete. I do appreciate comments and may respond in a following post. In the nearly 18 years of this blog – I’ll mark that anniversary in about six weeks – this is post 5,528. The main page of this blog has a “Best of the Nest” list, what I consider the most important posts. Those posts are getting a lot of views right now. Nine of the top ten posts with the highest views are from this list with view counts from 63 to 53 in the last week and 294 to 262 in the last month. My Sunday movie was Diciannove, which means “nineteen” in Italian. I saw it at the Detroit Film Theater. Leonardo is the nineteen year old of the title. At the start of the film he is leaving home, which is Palermo, to go to college. He first goes to London, where his sister is and where he is to study business. But after a night of clubbing he decided he’d rather study Italian literature in Siena. In Siena he really gets into the books, but thinks the professor is boring and clueless (I’d agree to the boring part). He pushes away attempts to be his friends. Then what is he supposed to do? He’s at the age where he feels he’s no longer a teenager but not quite an adult. He tries hookups, but doesn’t get very far. He admires young men he sees on the street (is he gay?) and goes to parties with women (is he straight?). At the end of the year he hasn’t figured out much, which is typical for someone who is nineteen. DFT offers a sheet with an introduction to its movies. This one says don’t expect the usual story arc of encountering a difficulty and conquering or at least learning from it. Yeah, Leonardo does learn a few things in the year (such as some vegetables rot if not eaten quickly), but in that year he hasn’t done much in the process of coming of age. Again, typical. Actual discussion of news will have to wait for another post.