Posts Tagged ‘BLOOMBERG’
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 22, 2026 at 12:49 am
For the administration of Adolf Hitler, the Number One enemy was the Jews. Enforcement of antisemitic laws was entrusted to the local police and Hitler’s paramilitary police forces, the S.A. (“Brownshirts”) and SS (“Schutzstaffel”).
To facilitate this all-out war on Jewry, the Reich operated 23 main concentration camps with over 1,000 satellite camps, along with a massive network of at least 44,000 total sites, including forced-labor camps, transit camps, ghettos, and extermination camps.
The result: An estimated slaughter of six million Jews, mostly throughout Eastern Europe and Russia.
For the administration of Donald Trump, the Number One enemy is Hispanics. Trump made attacking illegal immigration the centerpiece of his 2024 campaign.
And since taking office a second time, Trump has turned Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) into his private army. Its size and budget dwarf those of every other federal law enforcement agency.
By July 21, 2026, according to ICE:
- The total number of deportations this fiscal year is 356,389.
- ICE currently holds 65,765 people in detention facilities.
- By June, ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had arrested just over 43,000 people.
- That amounts to 1,438 arrests per day in June.
ICE operates roughly 212 to 225 active primary detention centers in the United States. Immigrants’ rights groups estimate a network of over 270 to 400 total facilities.
The United States has deported more than 25,000 people under secretive agreements with 35 countries to take migrants whose nation of origin refuse to take them.
In Nazi Germany, joking about Hitler or other high-ranking Nazis could result in arrest and imprisonment.
A merchant named Erich Kaiser found himself in “protective custody” for telling a joke: “Back in the day we used to have a Kaiser sent from heaven above. Today we have some arsehole from Berchtesgaden [Hitler’s mountain retreat].”
In Trump’s America, comedians who displease the President find themselves viciously attacked, even fired.
Brendan Carr, Trump’s chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), pressured ABC to fire late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel. This followed on-air comments Kimmel had made after the September 10, 2025 shooting of Right-wing propagandist Charlie Kirk.
Carr accused Kimmel of speaking disparagingly about Kirk. In fact, Kimmel had criticized Trump for showing more concern about building a White House ballroom than the loss of his alleged friend, Kirk.
Jimmy Kimmel
Kimmel’s show was briefly suspended, but a mass protest by viewers led the network to quickly reinstate him.
After Kirk’s death, Trump and his Republican allies threatened retribution (“consequences”) for people who spoke unflatteringly about him.
On September 15—five days after Kirk’s death—Vice President J.D. Vance hosted Kirk’s podcast: “So, when you see someone celebrating Charlie’s murder, call them out and, hell, call their employer. We don’t believe in political violence, but we do believe in civility.”
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller vowed to use law enforcement to target Americans who mocked Kirk’s death, calling that domestic terrorism:
“We will not live in fear, but you will live in exile, because the power of law enforcement under President Trump’s leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you have broken the law to take away your freedom.”
Stephen Colbert had hosted CBS’ The Late Show With Stephen Colbert since 2015. Since then, he had humorously mocked Trump’s outlandish and often illegal behavior.
On July 14, 2025, he made this joke:
“While I was on vacation, my parent corporation, Paramount, paid Donald Trump a $16 million settlement over his ‘60 Minutes’ lawsuit.
“I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles—it’s big fat bribe.”
Stephen Colbert
Meanwhile, Paramount, the owner of CBS, was in the midst of an $8 billion sale to the Hollywood studio Skydance Media. For this, it needed the regulatory permission of the FCC of the Trump administration.
Trump had long made clear his desire to see Colbert removed from the airways. After CBS cancelled The Late Show, the merger between Paramount Global and Skydance Media was quickly approved by the FCC.
In 1938, using threats of overwhelming force, Adolf Hitler successfully annexed Austria and Czechoslovakia.
Similarly, Donald Trump began making threats against Canada, Mexico and Greenland even before his second inauguration.
He threatened to impose a 25% tax on all products entering the United States from Canada and Mexico unless they stopped the flow of drugs (which Americans crave) and illegal aliens (which employers crave).
And he continued to assault Canada with a seemingly endless series of tariffs. To which Canadians retaliated with counter-tariffs of 15% to 50% on $27.6 billion worth of U.S. goods.
Flag of Canada
Worse, he began insulting Canada’s leaders and making threats of using military force to make Canada—a staunch American ally for over 200 years—America’s “51st state.”
Next, he targeted Greenland—which is strategically significant to the United States for two reasons:
- It’s home to America’s Pituffik Space Base. This “detects and reports attack assessments of sea-launched and intercontinental ballistic missile threats in support of strategic missile warning and missile defense,” according to the base’s website; and
- It sits between Russia and the eastern coast of the United States, and is the fastest way from Europe to New York.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on September 21, 2026 at 12:08 am
Every four years, Republican voters search for a Presidential candidate who promises to humiliate and destroy those they hate among their fellow Americans. These include:
- Blacks
- Hispanics
- “Uppity” women
- Liberals
- Atheists
- Non-Christians
- The highly educated
- Asians
- Muslims
- The legitimate news media
In 2016, Donald Trump was unquestionably the candidate who got—and kept—their blood-lust running. His campaign took off early in the polls and never lost momentum—or high ratings.
This was especially true among rural, evangelical voters—for whom sex-drenched issues such as abortion and birth control are an obsession.
And they have continued to enthusiastically support him during his second term in office.
Donald Trump
On August 30, 2017, an article in Salon examined why Donald Trump’s base supports him so fanatically: “Most Americans Strongly Dislike Trump, But the Angry Minority That Adores Him Controls Our Politics.”
From the article:
“They like Trump’s coarse personality, and approve of the fact that he treats women like his personal playthings. They enjoy it when he expresses sympathy for neo-Nazis and neo-Confederate white supremacists.
“They cheer when he declares his love for torture, tells the police to rough up suspects and vows to mandate the death penalty for certain crimes. (Which of course the president cannot do.)
“…This cohort of the Republican party didn’t vote for Trump because of his supposed policies on trade or his threat to withdraw from NATO. They voted for him because he said out loud what they were thinking. A petty, sophomoric, crude bully is apparently what they want as a leader.”
Supporters giving the Nazi “Sieg Heil” salute to Trump
Georgia’s 14th district offers a vivid example of the mentality of hardcore Trump supporters. From 2021 until her resignation in 2026, it was represented by Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Among the highlights of her career:
- Slandering Democrats as Nazis.
- Attacking masking and social distancing—then the only safety measures against COVID-19—to the persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany.
- Attacking Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, for daring to contradict Trump’s ignorance- and lie-riddled statements.
- Supporting Trump’s efforts to illegally overturn the 2020 Presidential election, claiming it had been “stolen” from him.
The residents of that district feel left behind by years of change. As the U.S. becomes more urban, secular, and diverse, they feel “culturally oppressed.”
“They see themselves as great Americans, proud Americans, Christian Americans, and that doesn’t fit the American model anymore as they see it,” said Jan Pourquoi, owner of Global Works LLC.
Their top priority: Stick it to those who are urban, secular and non-white.
Georgia’s Congressional districts
Lisa Adams, a fervent supporter of Greene, called her: “Our stand-up person. Look at her stance on transgenderism. That’s a big one.”
Suppressing the rights of others has long been a hallmark of Republican politics. Republicans have accused transgender men of posing a menace to women. But according to a new study by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law:
- Transgender people are over four times more likely than cisgender people to experience violent victimization, including rape, sexual assault, and aggravated or simple assault.
- Transgender women and men had higher rates of violent victimization (86.1 and 107.5 per 1,000 people, respectively) than cisgender women and men (23.7 and 19.8 per 1,000 people, respectively).
In late 2025, the U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation aimed at criminalizing gender-affirming care for minors.
And then there’s abortion. To quote Lisa Adams: “That’s a big one.”
Republicans sought to re-criminalize abortion since the Supreme Court legalized it in 1973. On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court eliminated the federal constitutional right to abortion and returned regulatory authority to individual states.
This has led Right-wing states to prosecute women who obtain abortions even in cases of rape, incest or when their lives are endangered by pregnancy. Thirteen states have a total abortion ban; 28 states have abortion bans based on gestational duration.
Thus, so long as Greene supported attacking those groups her constituents hated—such as transgenders and abortion-seekers—her constituents loved her.
“The biggest thing that Marjorie contributed wasn’t even in legislation,” said Gavin Swafford, who worked on Greene’s initial campaign. He didn’t care that she had failed to cut bipartisan deals and bring federal money back home.
“She was unwavering in ‘America First,'” said Swafford, referring to cultural issues she championed.
Nor did her supporters care that her lies about COVID-19 had led untold numbers of men and women to forego wearing masks and social distancing in 2020 when no vaccines were available. Or to forego getting vaccinated once vaccines became available in 2021.
Those lies—along with those told by Donald Trump—cost the lives of 400,000 Americans during 2020, his last year in office.
COVID-19
Like Greene, her base is equally motivated by hatred—of the same persons and organizations whom Trump regularly attacks. During the 2016 campaign, countless such voters told interviewers: “He says what I’ve long been thinking!”
Which speaks volumes about the mentality of Stormtrumpers.
The Beatles’ 1969 album, Abby Road, ends with: “And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.”
For the vast majority of Republican voters, that lyric could be rewritten: “The hate you live is equal to the votes you give.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 10, 2026 at 1:37 am
Upon his return to the Presidency in 2025, Donald Trump turned his “artistic” gifts on the White House.
On June 9, 2025, contractors began paving over the grass of the White House Rose Garden with stone tiles to create a patio.
This had been a special project of then-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. In 1962 she and designer Rachel Lambert “Bunny” Mellon created a classic, symmetrical space for official state functions and press events.
They installed a central open lawn surrounded by formal flower beds, seasonal plantings, and flowering crabapple trees.
The destruction of the rose garden ignited a firestorm of criticism. But Trump insisted that the paving go on anyway.
Like Adolf Hitler, Trump believes that “bigger is better” in architecture.
On July 31, 2025, the Trump administration announced that a 90,000 square feet addition would be made to the White House to incorporate a 650-person capacity ballroom.
In October, 2025, Trump ordered the demolition of the White House’s historic East Wing to clear space for it. It’s the most expensive project in Trump’s roster, with an $800 million estimated price tag, according to New York.
American taxpayers are expected to foot more than half the bill, despite Trump’s repeated denials of this. In March, 2026, he told reporters that construction on the ballroom “is taxpayer-free. We have no taxpayer putting up 10 cents.”
Demolition of the East Wing of the White House
Trump intends this to be a monument to himself: By October, 2025, senior officials within the Trump administration were using the title, “The President Donald J. Trump Ballroom.”
On August 31, the Supreme Court—packed with six Right-wing Justices—granted Trump approval to continue construction on his ballroom. This had been halted after a lower court issued a temporary block on the project earlier that month.
After the ruling, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “We are living in the Golden Age of America, and this Building will be one of the Greatest ever constructed in Washington, D.C. When completed in the Summer of 2028, the magnificent Ballroom and Military Complex will be something that the entire Country is very proud of.”
In a rare burst of candor, Trump told New York Magazine that his construction projects are essentially monuments to himself: “Nobody will do it once I’m gone. When I leave here, nobody will.”
For Trump, there can’t be too many monuments to his memory. Among these:
- Like a Roman emperor, Trump has put his face on a new commemorative gold-finished $1 coin issued by the U.S. Mint—allegedly to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary.
- He has mused about changing the name of the Strait of Hormuz to “Trump Strait.” How he would get the Iranians to accept that name remains unclear.
- In May, 2005, the US Department of Agriculture was decorated with a banner featuring Trump’s face. Since then, the Department of Justice, the Department of the Interior, and the Department of Labor have sported similar banners.
Achieving immortality—at least in how people remember them long after they’ve passed on—has long been a desire of tyrants. But once they’re dead, they no longer have control over the lives of their once-subject peoples.
So the way they’re remembered can prove vastly different from how they wanted to be regarded.
Alexander the Great thirsted be remembered as the world’s greatest conqueror, bringing Greek civilization to the nations he ravished.
Alexander the Great
Modern historians view him as a brilliant military leader—but also as a ruthless and megalomanic tyrant who slaughtered whole peoples and caused widespread destruction. Moreover, his empire collapsed quickly after his death.
Leon Trotsky—the Russian revolutionary and bitter foe of Joseph Stalin—wrote: “Nero, too, was a product of his epoch. Yet after he perished his statues were smashed and his name was scraped off everything.
“The vengeance of history is more terrible than the vengeance of the most powerful General Secretary. I venture to think that this is consoling.”
By the time he died in 1953, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin had an estimated 6,000 statues of himself erected across the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, holding the world record for the most statues raised to a living person.
After his death and the start of de-Stalinization under Nikita Khrushchev, the vast majority of these statues were quietly removed, demolished, or melted down.
Finally, there is this classic poetic commentary on the uncertainty of immortality, courtesy of Percy Bysshe Shelley:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 9, 2026 at 12:10 am
With his popularity rating hovering at 33% to 39%, President Donald Trump desperately fears a third impeachment action against him if Democrats retake the House of Representatives in the fast-approaching midterm elections scheduled for November 3.
Thus, his almost crazed lust to be remembered forever. And for all his slim grasp of history, he knows that presidents and kings (of which he thinks himself the latter) are remembered for the wars they’ve won and the monuments they’ve left behind.
Easily won wars, of course, are the best. And on January 3, 2026, Trump got just that.
American forces bombed military facilities and infrastructure in the capital city of Caracas and across northern Venezuela. And they captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. Both were flown to New York City to face federal drug trafficking and narco-terrorism charges.
Flag of Venezuela
Savoring that triumph, Trump conspired with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to overturn the leadership of Israel’s mortal enemy and America’s longtime antagonist: Iran.
Trump predicted several times that the war would be over in four to six weeks—the same timetable Adolf Hitler gave for the completion of his victory over the Soviet Union in 1941.
And just as “Operation Barbarossa” proved a fatal mistake, so Trump’s latest stab at playing Generalissimo has proven a total disaster. Six months into his war, he still has no plan for winning it or withdrawing from it without losing face.
Then there is his mania for monuments.
Upon his return to the Presidency in 2025, he turned his “artistic” gifts on the White House. On June 9, 2025, contractors began paving over the grass of the White House Rose Garden to create a patio.
This had been a special project of then-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. In 1962 she and designer Rachel Lambert “Bunny” Mellon created a classic, symmetrical space for official state functions and press events.
They installed a central open lawn surrounded by formal flower beds, seasonal plantings, and flowering crabapple trees.
By September, 2026 his administration had altered over 100 structures in Washington, D.C., alone, according to New York, which reported that the projects have collectively cost over a billion dollars.
On December 18, 2025, The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts became The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
Not, of course, by an act of Congress. That happened in January, 1964, two months after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
Congress passed and President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law legislation renaming the Center as a “living memorial” in his honor: The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
In Trump’s case, getting his name added to the Center was much simpler. First, he fired the longstanding board that had overseen the Center, and put his own handpicked board members on it.
Then his chosen thralls declared: “We’re adding Trump’s name to this building.”
No doubt to his amazement, there were serious objections to this—and lawsuits backing up those objections.
On May 29, 2026, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington, D.C., ruled that Trump’s name was illegally added to the Center:
“The Kennedy Center’s organic statute makes crystal clear that the Center is to be named for President Kennedy, and it cannot bear any other formal name or public memorial based on the Board’s unilateral say-so. Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.”
And he ordered that Trump’s name be removed from the building within two weeks—by June 12, two days before Trump’s 80th birthday.
Trump has, predictably, appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court.
He thus joined the ranks of arts-obsessed tyrants like Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. For 12 years, Hitler served as the arbiter of culture in Nazi Germany. Stalin held that role for almost 30.
Hitler considered himself an unappreciated artist. At 18, he had applied for admission to the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, but was rejected twice. If he had a friend, it was the architect Albert Speer, with whom he felt an artistic kinship.
Even as the Third Reich collapsed, he found time to pore over architectural models he intended to turn into gigantic buildings.
In Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics, author Frederic Spotts argues that Hitler saw the world corrupted by “evils” he must first destroy so he could re-create it to conform to his artistic ideals.
Like Hitler, Trump sees himself as an unrecognized artist through his erection of buildings. And, again like Hitler, he believes that he has a mission to replace ugliness with beauty.
But he’s clearly more focused on the demolition process than on the creation of beauty.
On October 20, 2025, demolitions crews—on his orders—gutted the East Wing of the White House to create a massive, 90,000 square feet, 650-person capacity ballroom.
And he has threatened to demolish the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts if his name is not added to it.
Meanwhile, he intends to close the Center for two years, to hide the embarrassing truth that artists and audiences no longer want to go there while he runs it.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 8, 2026 at 12:10 am
All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.
–T.E. Lawrence
Donald Trump’s first love has always been himself. And for all of his adult life he’s tried to promote himself as the smartest, the handsomest, the richest, the most popular man in the United States—if not the world.
Trump’s egomania is literally stamped on his properties. Of the estimated 515 entities he owns, 268 of them—52%—bear his last name. He often refers to his properties as “the swankiest,” “the most beautiful.”
Among the references he’s made to himself:
- “My fingers are long and beautiful, as, it has been well documented, are various other parts of my body.”
- “I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I’m more honest and my women are more beautiful.”
- “My IQ is one of the highest––and you all know it.”
- “I did a lot of great deals and I did them early and young, and now I’m building all over the world….”
- “So I have a total net worth, and now with the increase, it’ll be well-over $10 billion.”
On October 7, 2016, Trump unknowingly—on a hot mike—outlined his approach to women he found attractive:
“You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful—I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.”
Even when he did not score with a woman of his desires, he left no doubt that—at least in his own mind—he could have. Just months after Princess Diana’s death in August 1997, radio host Howard Stern asked Trump if he could have “nailed” her.
Trump replied, “I think I could have.”
Donald Trump
But now Trump is an 80-year-old, easily distracted man who repeatedly falls asleep in public events—such as during White House meetings or a World Cup game. During press conferences and on his website, Truth Social, he often explodes in angry, insulting tirades against a legion of perceived enemies—particularly female journalists.
He avoids exercise—except for golf—believing that a human is born with only a finite amount of energy, which is depleted by physical activity. His diet is famously heavy on fast food, sweets and Diet Coke.
A well-known order from McDonald’s includes two Big Macs, two Filet-O-Fish sandwiches, and a chocolate shake or malted.
As a result, his diet poses several medical risks. Meals centered on cheeseburgers, well-done steaks, and French fries are dense in saturated fats and sodium.
Over time, excessive sodium and trans fats elevate “bad” LDL cholesterol, damage blood vessels, and spike blood pressure, significantly accelerating the risk of heart attacks, stroke, and chronic hypertension.
Moving from the personal to the political: He’s launched a losing war on Iran, repeatedly predicted it would be over in four to six weeks, and has seen it spiral into six months with no end in sight.
Instead of taking responsibility for his decision to provoke a needless war, he repeatedly blames others for his failure to win it. On September 4, he posted on Truth Social:
“The Radical Left Lunatics, Dumocrats, and Communists would rather have us LOSE the War in Iran, than have President Donald J. Trump WIN the War for America, In other words, they’d rather have us LOSE than have us WIN!”
Meanwhile, Iran continues to control the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 million barrels of oil used to pass each day. That flow has been reduced to between two million and six million barrels each day.
Strait of Hormuz
This has created a worldwide spiral in oil prices—and fueled inflation in the United States and other nations. But as prices for housing, energy and food soar in the United States, Trump claims that “affordability” is a “Democratic hoax.”
Like Adolf Hitler contemplating architectural models while Nazi Germany neared destruction, Trump focuses on vanity projects like a 90,000 square foot White House ballroom and a towering “Victory Arch” literally overshadowing Arlington Cemetery.
When Trump—a five-time Vietnam war draft dodger—was asked in 2025 who the 250-foot arch was for, he replied, “Me.”
As much as he fears and loathes to admit it, he has to realize he can’t live forever—and that he’ll be lucky to live another 10 years, if not a far shorter span.
And with his popularity rating hovering at 33% to 39%, he desperately fears a third impeachment action against him if Democrats retake the House of Representatives in the fast-approaching midterm elections scheduled for November 3.
Thus, his almost crazed lust to be remembered forever. And for all his slim grasp of history, he knows that presidents and kings (of which he thinks himself the latter) are remembered for the wars they’ve won and the monuments they’ve left behind.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 2, 2026 at 12:10 am
President Donald Trump is haunted by the fear of a third impeachment action against him if Democrats retake the House of Representatives in the fast-approaching midterm elections scheduled for November 3.
Speaking at a rally in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, to support Senate candidate Darline Graham, sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, Trump warned: “If we lose the midterms, I am going to be impeached. They are going to impeach me. They have no idea why!”
On the contrary: Democrats know well why they want to remove him from office. Among their reasons:
- Starting an unprovoked war with Iran.
- Attacking longtime American allies like Canada, England and Greenland.
- Cozying up to Communist dictators such as Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-Un.
- Ordering the Justice Department to indict his critics such as New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey.
- Flooding Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, with 3,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who terrorized (and murdered) both American citizens and illegal aliens.
Donald Trump
Trump’s Republican accomplices in Congress fully understand the threat he faces—and what it poses for them. Thanks to his unprovoked war on Iran, oil shipments have been constrained worldwide—and Americans are furious at soaring prices for gas, food and housing.
Meanwhile, Trump arrogantly claims that “affordability” is a “Democratic hoax.” And, like Adolf Hitler contemplating architectural models while Nazi Germany neared destruction, he focuses on vanity projects like a 90,000 square foot White House ballroom and a towering “Victory Arch” overlooking Arlington Cemetery.
As a result, Trump’s current national approval rating hovers between 33% and 38%. And Republicans fear that his unpopularity will spell doom for their own re-election prospects.
On June 26, Mike Johnson (R-LA), Speaker of the House of Representatives, warned his colleagues:
“If we were to lose the midterms, heaven forbid, these Democrats, y’all, impeachment’s not even the biggest concern. They will turn every committee of Congress into an investigative body, and they’ll go after the president’s family, the Cabinet, his donors and friends—half of you in this room will be targeted.”
Mike Johnson
Frederick Wellman, the Democratic congressional candidate for Missouri’s 2nd District, was quick to agree:
“You’re damn right we will investigate crimes and corruption. Who moved $180 million in oil futures 15 minutes before Iran announcements? Who has gotten sole source contracts because of their connections to the Trump family?
“Where did our Social Security data go when DOGE downloaded it into portable hard drives? Where are the rest of the Epstein files? On and on this Congress has chosen covering up crimes instead of stopping them. That ends in November.”
Donald Trump is notorious for being thin-skinned. He has never displayed a sense of humor—nor an ability to laugh at himself. And he cannot abide listening to news that contradicts whatever he wants to do or believe.
The role that Natalie Harp plays in his life cannot be fully understood unless one accepts this fundamental truth: Trump, like Adolf Hitler, believes that if he just thinks positively, reality will bend to meet his wishes.
For this, he needs—and devours—a constant supply of “happy news” that confirms what he wants to believe. “News” that Harp is thrilled to constantly supply.
Thus, six months after launching a war he expected to be over in four to six weeks, Trump could say: “Right now, the situation is so good.”
Trump said this after leading reporters on a tour of the White House’s South Lawn to show off his latest renovations.
Presidents—and tyrants—who substitute “happy news” for hard truth usually come to a bad end. Hitler fired generals like Heinz Guderian—the architect of his sweeping victory over France in 1940—when they told him an offensive could not be continued or that their soldiers were needlessly dying for lack of supplies.
It did not win Hitler his war.
As Donald Trump lurches from one self-manufactured crisis to another, two warnings from Niccolo Machiavelli, the Florentine statesman and father of modern political science, take on special meaning:
“I must not omit an important subject, and mention of a mistake which princes can with difficulty avoid, if they are not very prudent, or if they do not make a good choice. And this is with regard to flatterers, of which courts are full, because men take pleasure in their own things and deceive themselves about them that they can with difficulty guard against this plague.”
And:
“It is an infallible rule that a prince who is not wise himself cannot be well advised, unless by chance he leaves himself entirely in the hands of one man who rules him in everything, and happens to be a very prudent man. In this case, he may doubtless be well governed, but it would not last long, for the governor would in a short time deprive him of the state.”
Noted historian Barbara Tuchman put it even more directly: “A great empire and little minds go ill together.”
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 1, 2026 at 12:10 am
Michael Wolff, a longtime biographer of Donald Trump, recently published letters from White House aide Natalie Harp to the President in The Daily Beast.
Among their revelations:
“If there is anything else I have done to cause you trouble, please forgive me. I want things to always be right between us. I also know I’ve been distracted all week (forgetting to eat throughout the days, and even forgetting to sleep, and only catching a couple hours at a time).”
And
“I never want to bring you anything but joy. I’m sorry I lost my focus. You are all that matters to me. I don’t want to ever let you down. Thank you for being my Guardian and Protector in this life.”
On August 16, Georgia’s Democratic United States Senator, Jon Ossoff, said at a campaign rally in Atlanta:
“He golfs and trades stocks. See, he doesn’t want to do the job. He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the Emir of Qatar.”
A clip of this remark was widely shared on social media.
Jon Ossoff
Ossoff didn’t accuse Trump and Harp of tripping the light fantastic, but the White House immediately and viciously reacted as if he had:
- White House Communications Director Steven Cheung: “Jon Jackoff has to be the biggest cuck loser in politics. Instead of denigrating hard working people serving their country, Jon should look deep into his soul and ask himself why he’s a miserable person who hates this country. It’s because he’s a radical, extremist Dumocrat.” [“Denigrating” actually means “insulting.” The word Cheung meant was “praising.”]
- Trump spokesman Davis Ingle: “A cringeworthy, feminine theatre kid cosplaying as Barack Obama.”
- Right-wing CNN pundit Scott Jennings: “A garbage human.”
- When a CNN reporter asked Trump about Ossoff’s remarks, a White House-run X account attacked her as “a disgraceful, humiliating embarrassment to her alleged profession.”
Even some Democrats feel that Ossoff went too far. One of these was David Axelrod, former advisor to President Barack Obama.
“No one has been more consistently eloquent or incisive in exposing @realDonaldTrump than @Ossoff. The paragraph from his weekend speech that has gotten so much attention was a brutal takedown. But two words in it, ‘with Natalie’ seemed gratuitous and unnecessary,” Axelrod wrote on X.
David Axelrod
This despite the fact that Trump has built his political career on countless brutal insults to both Republicans and Democrats.
The attacks on him haven’t fazed Ossoff: “It’s been amazing to watch this White House melt down over this all week,” he told MS NOW. “These White House staffers are adults, public officials paid by the taxpayer with immense power in positions of public trust.”
Even if there is no affair between the President and his adoring aide, their relationship underscores a fundamental Trumpian dilemma:
On one hand, he craves not simply loyalty but constant adoration. He must be repeatedly told he’s the most handsome, brilliant, powerful, beloved man on the planet.
On the other hand, his flagrant greed, egotism and constant attacks on a seemingly endless number of people—politicians, journalists, celebrities, ordinary Americans—ensure that the hatred he spews is returned in kind. And this makes him all the more desperate to feel adored.
Thus, enter Natalie Harp.
Ossoff’s comment has clearly touched a White House nerve. And it couldn’t have happened at a worse time for Trump.
He’s an 80-year-old, easily distracted man who repeatedly falls asleep in public events—such as during White House meetings or a World Cup game. He launched a losing war on Iran, predicted it would be over in four to six weeks, and has seen it spiral into six months with no end in sight.
Meanwhile, Iran continues to control the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 million barrels of oil used to pass each day. That flow has been reduced to between two million and six million barrels each day.
Strait of Hormuz
This has created a worldwide spiral in oil prices—and fueled inflation in the United States and other nations. But as prices for housing, energy and food soar in the United States, Trump claims that “affordability” is a “Democratic hoax.”
Like Adolf Hitler contemplating architectural models while Nazi Germany neared destruction, Trump focuses on vanity projects like a 90,000 square foot White House ballroom and a towering “Victory Arch” overlooking Arlington Cemetery.
Trump is haunted by the fear of a third impeachment action against him if Democrats retake the House of Representatives in the fast-approaching midterm elections scheduled for November 3.
Speaking at a rally in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, to support Senate candidate Darline Graham, sister of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, Trump warned: “If we lose the midterms, I am going to be impeached. They are going to impeach me. They have no idea why!”
His Republican accomplices in Congress fully understand this as well. Most of them now hold their positions to his support—or by not daring to cross him in any way.
And they fear that his current unpopularity—at 33% to 39%—will upend their own chances for re-election.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 31, 2026 at 12:10 am
Letter #1: “I never want to bring you anything but joy. I’m sorry I lost my focus. You are all that matters to me. I don’t want to ever let you down. Thank you for being my Guardian and Protector in this Life.”
Letter #2: “I miss the days when you used to call, during my talkshow days, and we’d talk about everything and nothing. I want to get back to that synergy. We shouldn’t have to talk about work all the time! !
“And please, when I fail, will you tell me? You have the absolute right to cuss me out, if need be, when I deserve it, because no one knows or cares about me more.”
These weren’t the gushings of a starry-eyed high school girl toward a beloved object of affection.
They were the gushings of 35-year-old Natalie Harp, special assistant and executive assistant to the President of the United States since 2025. And the object of her affection is an 80-year-old married man with a notorious history of adultery.
Natalie Harp was born in 1991 and raised in California. She graduated from Point Loma Nazarene University in 2012, and from Liberty University in 2015 with an MBA.
By 2017, Harp began suffering from chronic pain and complications incurred by a medical error involving intravenous therapy for stage II bone cancer.
In 2019, Harp praised then-President Trump for signing a federal right-to-try law which allowed her to access experimental treatments which she credited with saving her life.
Trump invited Harp to speak at the 2020 Republican National Convention She compared Trump to the sympathetic character, George Bailey, of It’s a Wonderful Life.
Trump also asked her to serve as a member of the advisory board for his 2020 Presidential campaign. Harp worked for the Right-wing television channel One America News Network from 2020 to 2022.
She later became an aide to Trump for his 2024 Presidential campaign as a key figure in his communications efforts.
In January 2025, Trump appointed Harp to the position of special assistant to the President and executive assistant to the President, with a government salary of $150,000.
Natalie Harp
She worked intimately with Trump and other national security figures for more than one year minus a security clearance. One national security official warned that this position gave her access to more sensitive information than any other Trump associate.
One White House staff member said that she “plays into the less productive and more troublesome parts of his nature, putting things in front of him that aren’t vetted.”
Dan Scavino, a political advisor and former golf club manager who had handled Trump’s social media accounts, largely gave control of Trump’s Truth Social account to Harp.
She used it to post a racist video depicting former President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama as apes. She also posted an AI-generated image of Trump as Jesus.
Among her duties: Posting remarks Trump dictates to Truth Social, texting on his behalf, and sporting a portable printer to feed him documents, praise and upbeat news articles. This last task has earned her the nickname: “The human printer.”
No doubt to Trump’s humiliation, Harp has also been dubbed as his “diaper nurse.” Some former associates and critics have claimed or joked that he uses adult diapers due to age or health. But there is no evidence that Harp serves in any nursing, medical or caregiving role.
Still, the rumors persist.
Donald Trump
And Trump appears flattered by her devotion. He calls her “sweetie” and “my Natalie.” And he’s told other aides that “Harp is the only one who loves him as much as his wife and children,” the New York Times reports.
Only recently has her role as Trump’s groupie-turned-government employee become widely known. And the man responsible is Georgia United States Senator Jon Ossoff.
At a campaign rally in Atlanta on August 16, Ossoff, a Democrat, said of Trump: “While the sailors on the [USS Abraham] Lincoln fight his war, while he fruitlessly drains our munitions and oil reserves, the president sleeps through his meetings.
“He golfs and trades stocks. See, he doesn’t want to do the job. He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the Emir of Qatar.”
A clip of this remark was widely shared on social media.
Jon Ossoff
The week before the rally, Harp was among a small group of aides who joined Trump when he switched airplanes in Turkey to thwart a possible Iranian missile attack.
Those who were not allowed to board the decoy plane included:
- Secretary of State Marco Rubio;
- Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent;
- White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller;
- White House Communications Director Steven Cheung.
Ossoff’s comment immediately brought Harp—and Trump—a burst of thoroughly unwelcome publicity.
Maggie Haberman, a New York Times reporter and the author of Regime Change, a scathing profile of the Trump administration, called her Trump’s “binky…a comfort blanket.”
Natalie’s estranged brother, Preston, laughed on CNN when he learned that his sister had jumped into the trunk of a Trump motorcade SUV when there wasn’t room for her to sit during a trip to court in 2023.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on August 28, 2026 at 12:07 am
During 2020—the last year of the first Trump administration and the worst year of COVID—President Donald Trump offered 11 different steps for defeating COVID-19.
Nine of those steps have been revealed. Here are the last two:
11. Learn to Live With It: According to a July 3 story by NBC News: “Eager to move forward and reopen the economy amid a recession and a looming presidential election, the White House is now pushing acceptance. ‘The virus is with us, but we need to live with it.’”
12. Victory Over Coronavirus:“ “Advisor to the President” and First Daughter Ivanka Trump wrote: “Over the past four years, President Trump’s policies and investments in science and technology ensure that America stands ready to solve America’s most pressing problems and that our workforce is prepared for tomorrow’s innovations.”
Ivanka Trump has absolutely no scientific or technology background.
And Trump’s fellow Republicans proved just as anti-science and anti-education as himself.
Donald Trump
In March, 2020, as COVID-19 raged unchecked throughout the country, an NBC News poll found that that only 30% of Republicans said they would actually listen to the advice of doctors to stay away from large, crowded areas to avoid Coronavirus.
By 2026, 23% of Republicans expressed confidence in higher education, while 50% of Democrats did.
Peter Baker. the chief White House correspondent for the New York Times, appeared on the July 31 episode of Washington Week. Offering his own commentary on Republicans’ attempt to shame and destroy Anthony Fauci, he said:
“I think they’re making an awful lot out of, you know, what would be pretty normal in those early days when we did not know a lot, right? Scientists were of multiple opinions about the origin of it, they were of multiple opinions about how it was transmitted, and there were multiple opinions about what the best course of action was….
Anthony Fauci speaking to the White House press corps
“It’s not just that he was wrong, it’s that he is evil, and that he….should go to jail. I mean, he’s literally compared to Hitler and Mengele. This isn’t a scientist who just got things wrong, and maybe he did get something wrong. This, in this case, in Rand Paul’s world, it’s good and evil.”
* * * * * * * * * *
On July 26, 1946, Chief United States Counsel Robert H. Jackson delivered his closing remarks against the major Nazi defendants for war crimes at Nuremberg. He might as well have been speaking about Donald Trump and his cheerleading—and misleading—chorus on Coronavirus:
“Lying has always been a highly approved Nazi technique. [Adolf] Hitler, in Mein Kampf, advocated mendacity as a policy. {Foreign Minister Joachim] Von Ribbentrop admits the use of the ‘diplomatic lie.’
“….Nor is the lie direct the only means of falsehood. They all speak with a Nazi double talk with which to deceive the unwary….’Final solution’ of the Jewish problem was a phrase which meant extermination. ‘Special treatment’ of prisoners of war meant killing. ‘Protective custody’ meant concentration camp.
Robert H. Jackson
“Besides outright false statements and double talk, there are also other circumventions of truth in the nature of fantastic explanations and absurd professions.
“[Rabid anti-Semite Julius] Streicher has solemnly maintained that…his reason for destroying synagogues…was only because they were architecturally offensive….
“This was the philosophy of the National Socialists. When for years they have deceived the world, and masked falsehood with plausibilities, can anyone be surprised that they continue their habits of a lifetime in this dock?
“It is against such a background that these defendants now ask this Tribunal to say that they are not guilty of planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long list of crimes and wrongs.”
Citing William Shakespeare’s play about the murderous Richard 111, Jackson concluded:
“They stand before the record of this trial as bloodstained Gloucester stood by the body of his slain king. He begged of the widow, as they beg of you: ‘Say I slew them not.’ And the Queen replied, ‘Then say they were not slain. But dead they are…’
“If you were to say of these men that they are not guilty, it would be as true to say that there has been no war, there are no slain, there has been no crime.”
If Americans find Donald Trump blameless for refusing to take decisive action against the Coronavirus threat, they might as well say there was no plague, there were no thousands of dead Americans, there was no dereliction of Presidential responsibility.
It remains the mission of Right-wing Republicans like Senator Rand Paul to ignore Donald Trump’s unforgivable responsibility for the deaths of more than 400,000 Americans. Even worse, they seek to blame heroes like Anthony Fauci, who, fighting an unprecedented enemy, sought to save lives.
The advent of COVID-19 was the 21st century’s version of the Black Death. No one could agree on its origins, how it was transmitted, or the best ways to prevent or cure it. But at least there were doctors who desperately tried to find answers to these questions.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on August 27, 2026 at 12:12 am
Imagine this:
For two and a half years—1929 to late 1931—Elliot Ness and his special unit known as “The Untouchables” conduct Intensive operations, surveillance and brewery raids against the criminal empire of Al “Scarface” Capone.
Six years later, a Senate subcommittee subpoenas Ness and brutally grills him on how his unit carried out those raids:
“Why did you target Al Capone—did you have something personal against him?”
“You never did convict him, did you? That was done by the IRS for tax evasion.”
“Capone was just a businessman. He never hurt anybody.”
“Your unit is famous for not taking bribes. Wasn’t Capone offering enough?”
“There’s no such thing as a Mafia.”
Imagine, also, how such a brutal attack on a celebrated lawman would have damaged the morale of countless other lawmen—and would-be lawmen.
Elliot Ness
So it’s easy to imagine how Republicans’ brutal attack on Anthony Fauci affects current members of the medical profession—and would-be members of it.
Fauci is an American physician-scientist and immunologist who served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infections Diseases (NIAID) from 1984 to 2022 and as Chief Medical Advisor to the President–—Joseph Biden––from 2021 to 2022.
So what did this man—who has dedicated his entire adult life to protecting Americans against infectious diseases—do to ignite such hatred?
He had merely spoken the hard medical truth about Coronavirus. In doing so, he had at times contradicted then-President Donald Trump’s ignorance- and lie-riddled statements.
For example: Trump had loudly touted hydroxychloroquine, used for treating malaria, as a miracle cure for the Coronavirus.
Yet Fauci dared to point out there had been no scientific trials of the drug for its effectiveness against Coronavirus. Moreover, given the medical condition of some patients, it could even prove fatal.
Statements like this infuriated Trump’s base of—at best—half-educated fans.
Donald Trump
On July 31, Susan Glasser, a journalist who writes a column for The New Yorker, appeared on Washington Week, a PBS public affairs television program.
Commenting on the “death match” between Fauci and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), Glasser said: “Yes. I mean, look, the historical analogy that leaps to mind is not a reasonable bipartisan commission to look at lessons learned from a national tragedy. It’s a witch hunt. It’s McCarthyism.
“You know, we do, unfortunately, have a long history of that as well. And to see an 85-year-old public servant who spent 50 years of his life combating terrible diseases in this country and around the world, you know, it was a painful sight.
“You know, especially to see a bunch of senators accuse Fauci of the best they could come up with, you know, was a diary in which he was dazzled, you know, to meet celebrities and, you know, admitted that he butt-dialed Barbra Streisand….
“The person who was accountable ultimately for America’s failed initial handling of the pandemic in 2020 was someone named Donald Trump.”
Susan Glasser
During 2020—the last year of the first Trump administration and the worst year of COVID—Trump offered 11 different steps for defeating COVID-19:
- Denial: COVID entered the United States on January 19. By January 27, Trump didn’t think the virus had spread widely throughout the United States.
- Lies: On January 22, Trump said “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China.” By March 10, he was saying: “It will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away.”
- Republican subservience to Trump’s denial and lies: During the vital months of January and February, Republicans refused to challenge Trump’s unwillingness to take the virus seriously—before it gained a foothold in the United States.
- Chaos: Like Adolf Hitler, Trump likes to pit individuals and organizations against each other. This creates needless duplication of efforts and wastes resources. But it ensures that Trump—like Hitler—remains the final voice of authority, since so many others are competing for his favor and direction.
- Extortion: Trump and Republicans used a deadly plague as a weapon against those Americans they hate. This included seizing medical supplies slated for Democratic states and sending them to Republican ones.
- Propaganda Disguised as News: Since Easter weekend, President Donald Trump held almost 50 daily press briefings at the White House. Their purpose: To serve as a substitute for Trump’s hate-filled political rallies, which had been canceled and have been likened to those staged by Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, at Nuremberg.
- Quackery as Medicine: On April 23, Trump raised the possibility of preventing or curing the Coronavirus by use of ultraviolet light—or even injection of disinfectant.
- “Reopen the Country”: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urged Americans to wear masks and keep at least six feet from their fellows. And most of the nation’s governors issued stay-at-home orders that banned large gatherings—including visits to parks and beaches. Yet Trump openly encouraged defiance of those orders.
- Ignore the Danger: Although health experts expressed fears about large gatherings during the Coronavirus pandemic, Trump and his Republican allies—such as South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem—held tightly-packed, mask-free political rallies.
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NAZI PAST IS AMERICA’S PRESENT: PART FOUR (OF FIVE)
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 22, 2026 at 12:49 amFor the administration of Adolf Hitler, the Number One enemy was the Jews. Enforcement of antisemitic laws was entrusted to the local police and Hitler’s paramilitary police forces, the S.A. (“Brownshirts”) and SS (“Schutzstaffel”).
To facilitate this all-out war on Jewry, the Reich operated 23 main concentration camps with over 1,000 satellite camps, along with a massive network of at least 44,000 total sites, including forced-labor camps, transit camps, ghettos, and extermination camps.
The result: An estimated slaughter of six million Jews, mostly throughout Eastern Europe and Russia.
For the administration of Donald Trump, the Number One enemy is Hispanics. Trump made attacking illegal immigration the centerpiece of his 2024 campaign.
And since taking office a second time, Trump has turned Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) into his private army. Its size and budget dwarf those of every other federal law enforcement agency.
By July 21, 2026, according to ICE:
ICE operates roughly 212 to 225 active primary detention centers in the United States. Immigrants’ rights groups estimate a network of over 270 to 400 total facilities.
The United States has deported more than 25,000 people under secretive agreements with 35 countries to take migrants whose nation of origin refuse to take them.
In Nazi Germany, joking about Hitler or other high-ranking Nazis could result in arrest and imprisonment.
A merchant named Erich Kaiser found himself in “protective custody” for telling a joke: “Back in the day we used to have a Kaiser sent from heaven above. Today we have some arsehole from Berchtesgaden [Hitler’s mountain retreat].”
In Trump’s America, comedians who displease the President find themselves viciously attacked, even fired.
Brendan Carr, Trump’s chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), pressured ABC to fire late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel. This followed on-air comments Kimmel had made after the September 10, 2025 shooting of Right-wing propagandist Charlie Kirk.
Carr accused Kimmel of speaking disparagingly about Kirk. In fact, Kimmel had criticized Trump for showing more concern about building a White House ballroom than the loss of his alleged friend, Kirk.
Jimmy Kimmel
Kimmel’s show was briefly suspended, but a mass protest by viewers led the network to quickly reinstate him.
After Kirk’s death, Trump and his Republican allies threatened retribution (“consequences”) for people who spoke unflatteringly about him.
On September 15—five days after Kirk’s death—Vice President J.D. Vance hosted Kirk’s podcast: “So, when you see someone celebrating Charlie’s murder, call them out and, hell, call their employer. We don’t believe in political violence, but we do believe in civility.”
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller vowed to use law enforcement to target Americans who mocked Kirk’s death, calling that domestic terrorism:
“We will not live in fear, but you will live in exile, because the power of law enforcement under President Trump’s leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you have broken the law to take away your freedom.”
Stephen Colbert had hosted CBS’ The Late Show With Stephen Colbert since 2015. Since then, he had humorously mocked Trump’s outlandish and often illegal behavior.
On July 14, 2025, he made this joke:
“While I was on vacation, my parent corporation, Paramount, paid Donald Trump a $16 million settlement over his ‘60 Minutes’ lawsuit.
“I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles—it’s big fat bribe.”
Stephen Colbert
Meanwhile, Paramount, the owner of CBS, was in the midst of an $8 billion sale to the Hollywood studio Skydance Media. For this, it needed the regulatory permission of the FCC of the Trump administration.
Trump had long made clear his desire to see Colbert removed from the airways. After CBS cancelled The Late Show, the merger between Paramount Global and Skydance Media was quickly approved by the FCC.
In 1938, using threats of overwhelming force, Adolf Hitler successfully annexed Austria and Czechoslovakia.
Similarly, Donald Trump began making threats against Canada, Mexico and Greenland even before his second inauguration.
He threatened to impose a 25% tax on all products entering the United States from Canada and Mexico unless they stopped the flow of drugs (which Americans crave) and illegal aliens (which employers crave).
And he continued to assault Canada with a seemingly endless series of tariffs. To which Canadians retaliated with counter-tariffs of 15% to 50% on $27.6 billion worth of U.S. goods.
Flag of Canada
Worse, he began insulting Canada’s leaders and making threats of using military force to make Canada—a staunch American ally for over 200 years—America’s “51st state.”
Next, he targeted Greenland—which is strategically significant to the United States for two reasons:
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