It's worth reviewing why Trump lies. It's not to persuade anyone to believe his lies. Trump lies to assert dominance. Trump lies, and then Republicans have to just stand there and take it. But that doesn't go far enough. Trump lies, and then Republicans have to repeat the lie, over and over again, with vigor and enthusiasm. Everyone knows it is a lie, and everyone knows the people repeating the lie know it is a lie. But, without any doubt, the person repeating the lie is acknowledging their subservience and fealty to Trump. This is the whole point of the lie.
This is also the main reason for Trump's tariffs. Why would he place tariffs on every country in the world, whether or not we have a trade deficit, and whether or not there are more penguins than people in the country? It is not simply, or even mostly, that Trump is ignorant about economics. Trump uses tariffs to show other countries that we are the biggest bully on the block, and they better do what we tell them to do. Like the lies, Trump's tariffs are about dominance.
Why do you think Trump nominated people like RFK jr and Pete Hegseth to cabinet posts? By nominating obviously unqualified people, he forces Bill Cassidy and Joni Ernst to vote for them. They know the nominees are unqualified, and we know that they know. It is all about Trump asserting his dominance over the senators. Trump cares more about dominance than he cares about running the country.
It is not hard to figure out Trump's motives for doing shit once you realize absolutely everything is about dominance.
I have long wondered why people are confused by or shocked at the narratives coming from the WH. DJT isn't lying (I mean of course he is but hear me out) in the conventional way. He isn't coming up with a clever story to hide the truth. Instead, he is making a darker assertion: there is no truth. Or rather truth is whatever he says it is.
It's why he named his social media platform Truth Social - the basic assertion is that every post on there is a "truth" - because he says it is. He owns "truth". He bends reality to his will.
I'm a committed Christian and I've never understood why so many of my fellow believers seem to be OK with this. Especially after all of our theoretically heartfelt denunciations of Clinton's lies and character flaws in the wake of his scandals.
I've quit trying to understand. But we cannot give up the fight for real, objective, truth. It is precious. If our only "truth" is Donald Trump, we're doomed.
In the same way I can't imagine having been a strong Republican (like Tim, Sara, Bill, etc.) and then having to face the reality of almost everyone in your party supporting this utter scumbag, I can't imagine being a true Christian and seeing so many others who claim to be Christians support someone who is literally the antithesis of Jesus.
A reporter asked in an interview of a prominent Southern Baptist minister how he could support Trump who obviously lied, stole, cheated and molested women. The minister laughed, "we know he is an imperfect messenger of God's will." In other words, he hates the people we hate and will punish them. I guess if a serial killer who only murdered non Christians ran, then they would vote for the killer as well.
"I'm a committed Christian and I've never understood why so many of my fellow believers seem to be OK with this."
Ends, may I introduce you to Means? Don't worry, it's covered as it's all got the mark of Caesar on it.
This is sort of thing is probably the biggest reason I was never able to participate in the church, despite being raised as a Christian. I just didn't have the ability to deal with it. Mistakes are mistakes, the consequence of being fallible humans, but all too often people make knowing mistakes (lies/manipulation) and are fine with it. You don't need to look to far to see various Christian denominations riddled with it (ie various church child rape scandals).
I mentioned elsewhere that I suspect that the core of MAGA just assume is doing what politicians have always done. The difference is Trump makes this bare and they know it, thus are in it with him.
I've come to the conclusion that for a LOT of our fellow Americans, a large percentage of whom claim to be Christians, their most fundamental principle is bigotry. They hate brown people, queer people, uppity women, (most) foreigners, academics, and so on. They can tolerate a lot of Trumpian ruin and malfeasance--incoherent tariff policies, reduced access to healthcare, murder at sea, masked government agents snatching people off the streets, blatant corruption, demolishing the East Wing of the White House, using the DoJ to harass political enemies, you name it--as long as he stands foursquare with their bigotry. For these folks, Trump's increasingly overt racism probably inflates their acceptance (or even celebration) of the mayhem he creates in other areas.
I truly believe the mass majority of voters; democrats and non-maga republicans are really done. Even hearing that thousands of tech bros are signing a manifesto to do right is just an indication that it just takes so much energy to be greedy and non-caring of fellow humans. They believe the manifesto is just a slight beginning, but reading about it and seeing republicans pushing back on certain issues and working bi-partisan quietly on bills - people really like doing right and having integrity. We had to see how bad it could get. We will come full circle.
It explains him knocking down the east wing and plastering fake gold curlicues all over the White House. He's a dog marking territory. When he's carried out of there the new occupant will be confronted with "Trump was here" every time they turn around.
Donnie's territory marking and sniffing other's buttholes are the only traits he shares with dogs. If he were an actual dog, we wouldn't be in this mess.
My favorite sign from October 18th: “Make Lying Wrong Again”
Sad to know that even if the sign were to read, “Make Bearing False Witness a Sin Again”, the faux Christians leading our government would merely shrug.
When Andrew writes, “ it’s getting difficult to keep track of all the lies, distortions, and whiplash-inducing story revisions” - in Trump/MAGA domain, that really doesn’t matter. Just keep the firehouse pumping whatever and flood the zone. Overwhelm all attempts at rational discourse on a topic. Cuz rationality is so over
Yup, and he hates Republicans more than Democrats because the Republicans roll over for him like dogs every time. We know Trump hates dogs. (She says while she sobs hysterically in "how the hell could we elect a person who hated dogs?")
I see your point that Trump doesn't respect those Republicans who immediately say "yes sir" to anything he says. However, what Trump hates the most are the Republicans who won't roll over for him. To Trump and his followers being a Republican means rubber stamping everything Trump says or does. They HATE Republicans who won't sell out their soul to follow Trump.
Paul - just as we saw today, with Trump on his low-grade social media platform naming the Indiana Republican state senators who "need encouragement to make the right decision" about redistricting... maybe send 'em another pizza, make another swatting call, whatever it takes? He brings a menacing new meaning to the term "majority whip."
Today I have chosen to view the glass as half full! There have been a few signs that some are not defending the lies. Maybe a few have pulled their heads out of Trump’s butt.
Your observations about all of this being dominance games on Trump's part hits the nail on the head. It isn't about policy or governing, because trump does not know either one of those things. He does not think in those terms.
As a narcissist EVERYTHING is about him, for him, against him. The more blatant the lie of behavior that he can force you into, the better, as far as he is concerned.
The whole UKR "negotiations" is about dominance--not of Putin, who I think even Trump has figured out he cannot dominate, but of Zelinsky.
Because Trump's pattern is that, if he cannot dominate you, he becomes (for lack of a better term) submissive. He will actually kiss your ass in order to get you to like him, so that he can be your buddy/pal/hanger on.
He kisses up to Putin, he kisses up to Xi--because he sees them as people to be emulated, as people whose approval he wants, as people who he wants to recognize him as being powerful people like them.
The thing is that they didn't actually vote for the dominance thing. They voted in the belief that Trump would do things for them. The things they wanted were maybe bad things, but they still expected actual policy and governance.
Because they did not really understand what Trump is and why he does what he does. Some of that aligns serendipitously with what they wanted in governance, but that is just luck?
If you tried to do what these people wanted (as bad as some of it is) WITHOUT the blatant dominance games (and associated corruption), you would actually get away with it or most of it--especially with the current SCotUS. A lot of the kickback arises out of the how, not the what.
You could have picked actual qualified and competent people who followed (or properly changed) procedures and were careful.Not done the whole revenge thing.
Ooops.
Trump's narcissism and dominance games may be what saves us (in this particular iteration) from authoritariansim, because of the resistance it engenders that would otherwise not have happened.
...I hope to be among those of us wearily lifting our heads from the smoking wreckage after the 2026 election... or 2028... Been practicing my Charlton Heston: "You maniacs. You blew it up... god damn you all to hell!"
We should be thankful that Trump is in charge in this instance (as bad as THAT is) rather than someone competent, actually sane, smart, and actually dedicated to authoritarianism.
Trump has never actually glommed on to the fact that HE is his own worst enemy. But he is actually incapable of seeing that because of his narcissism.
The firehose of bs is not just a dominance ploy to keep GOP lickspittles in line. It is, as other Substacker says "epistemic warfare", an attack on reality. The point of the MAGA faithful repeating the lie is 'to make the libs cry', because what brinks us to tears is the madness of reducing every utterance to signalling in a partisan game of mere dominance. Trump and his minions give his supporters the tools to perform dominance of US, by judt obstinately refusing to engage in sincere discourse, honest truth claims, evidence and reasoning.
One of the things we need to understand is that this is a social/subcultural project. It's a _collective_ form of trolling, or more accurately _gaslighting_.
If we're still living in some vestigal democracy (a big if bigly) the question becomes how the supposedly all powerful swing voters navigate seeing and moving in the discharge from the hose. Bill days No Kings put the lie to Republican rhetoric about “hate America” and “‘pro-terrorist” gatherings. Well, what MAGA claim HASN'T had the lie put to it by material reality? Are the many folks focused on their quotidian concerns even trying to parse the spray for lies, or just hunkering down hoping not to be violently knocked back by the stream.
I don’t believe it’s that complicated. He says the first thing that comes to mind. More often than not a lie or distortion. He does it to get get himself off the hook AT THAT MOMENT. Then when it comes back to bite him he doubles down on the lies. Everything for him is transactional. ‘Just get me out of this.”
It resembles when a prisoner of war is forced by his captors to lie, and his humiliation is filmed. No one believes the lies, but they fully understand the humiliation and the power of those forcing him to lie.
The sorry truth: Trump, who pardons drug traffickers and murders the shipwrecked, is the world’s most dangerous narco-terrorist, and every American who continues to support him is complicit in his crimes.
The worst thing, other than the orders themselves, is that the Navy is perfectly capable of indicating these boats. They can stop, board, and inspect. If drugs are found, the boat, and contents can be confiscated. The crew can be arrested and rendered for prosecution. Bombing and murder are neither legal nor necessary.
As a matter of reducing drug flow, these strikes are nothing but a pin prick. A serious effort would involve arrest and interrogation so the structure of the drug producing enterprise can be understood and the kingpins can be identified and dealt with. But wait. The kingpins get pardons!
But why are we doing this in the first place? The drugs these boats are allegedly running don’t come to the US — most of our drugs come via Mexico. Early on there was talk of the US targeting the cartels and possibly sending troops to Mexico which for very good reason hasn’t happened. Are these attacks on Venezuela merely Trump’s redirection away from attacking Mexico, but giving him drug targets to brag about that the administration believes come at very little cost? I am not sure there is a grand strategy here other than Trump needed to demonstrate winning on the narcotics front which due to incompetence and poor planning has now all gone South.
Oh, don't throw logic at this administration, Keith. They just want to watch things go boom, and do it from a distance where they can pound their chests without being challenged.
And now SCOTUS seems nearer than every to allowing Trump to fire whoever he wants, regardless of the guardrails that have been put in place to protect members of independent agencies. Democrats must take the house, the senate, and the presidency and do something about this partisan court.
Yes, I especially fear for the addicted and the mentally ill. ICE has no discretion or skills at de-escalation. If confronted by either, both who may act hostile or like they are untethered from reality, ICE may just shoot them and say they were under attack. They have gotten away with horrible crimes and property destruction with complete impunity. Murder of citizens seems like the completely logical next step for Trump.
He is like a child playing with army men and tanks, helicopters and battle cruisers. It makes him happy to wreak havoc around the world. If he gets stymied in one effort, he just moves on to another. I imagine he feels incredibly small inside; this is just one way to try and fill the emptiness and make himself feel big.
Back before America recovered its present greatness, when law was more than the will and whim of Donald J. Trump, we went to the trouble to interdict boats, board them and confiscate the drugs. This is now seen as a time-wasting formality, so they just cut to the chase and kill on sight. It’s a wonder ICE hasn’t received orders to do the same to suspected “illegal aliens”,
I'm willing to bet that the amount of taxpayer dollars spent to bomb these small boats far exceeds the money spent to interdict, confiscate and interrogate the occupants of those same small boats.
His base is as happy if not happier, to have their tax dollars go to blowing up those boats as I was to have mine to help people in need through USAID.
You are forgetting that Trump and Hegseth enjoy the spectacle of killing people. If he could, Trump would bring gladiators into the Rotunda. That's why he wants a fight on the White House lawn to celebrate our 250th. He enjoys violence. He is a sadist, pure and simple.
That first boat Trump and Hegseth blew up, on September 2nd, had 11 people on board. 11 people. If you were running drugs on a small boat, would you pack the boat with 11 people? No, you’d pack the boat with drugs. That boat was moving people not drugs. And those people were murdered by the President of the United States. Put that in your pipe and smoke it—if you dare.
I would like to clarify something. I don’t know who the 11 people were on that boat, or what they were doing or not doing. And even if my speculation is correct and they were not smuggling drugs, for all I know, all 11 passengers could still have been narco-terrorists—you know, on their way to a narco-terrorism convention in Miami Beach or some such. Or maybe all 11 were on their way to the States because they were each in contention for FIFA’s first annual Narco-Terrorist of the Year Prize. I don’t think so, but because we are living in TrumpWorld, I thought I should acknowledge that anything is possible.
…and I’ve always seen Shield as on of The Bulwark’s least fiery, in terms of language used. To me, kinda bears out how bad this military madness really is.
Sadly, I am afraid that one day historians will examine the complicity of Americans today as they do with the Germans in the 1930s and 1940s. No, the crimes of this administration are nowhere near the horrors perpetrated by the Third Reich, but they significant nonetheless, especially in the end of USAID, the ruthless deportation of immigrants, the increasing destruction of the American health care system (flawed as it already is) and the use of lethal force off the coast of Venezula without any legal justification or evidence.
This Trump (Miller/Vought) regime is just getting started! It also seems to me as though we have lost sight of the horrors that are probably happening in the immigrant concentration camps. The right stopped bragging about the inhumane treatment and conditions of their detention facilities, but I can’t imagine that the cruelty has been discontinued.
Thanks for the link...as someone who lived thru adolescence - I'd argue that we are experiencing the very worst of female adolescent behaviour as well...and trust me it was nasty.... I see it being acted out by every woman in the current admin X 10. 'Original comment Slightly edited for clarity and low caffeine levels'
I went to an all-male Catholic High School, so I may have missed out on the worst aspects of female adolescent behavior. The most disturbing thing to me about all this is how acceptable the administration's behavior is to so many Americans, even when it harms them.
Some folks will do anything to be part of the perceived 'in crowd' unfortunately. Self hatred, racism and purposeful ignorance are a deadly combination and we're gonna be lucky to get through this relatively intact.
Northern neighbor- Yes, and it’s kinda pathetic how that ache to be one of the cool kids frequently fails… cuz the lessers usually aren’t really accepted by the elites they sacrifice their inner/best interests in hopes of joining
I work in a profession that's predominantly male. I've found that, more often than not, the women in the profession feel the need to amplify typical "male" attitudes/behavior to compensate for not being male. So, when I see the women in the administration doing the same, it is not a huge surprise.
"“Maybe they were signaling to other airplanes or drug cartel boats. . . " Signalling ... TO OTHER AIRPLANES? WATER CRAFT? You've got a carrier group in the vicinity and no one working the radar? WTF? No. Oh, Thor's toenails, just NO.
Those are the kinds of questions I would ask ADM Bradley. Once the first strike had taken place, where were the other Narco-Terrorist Assets? We must have known. We've got a carrier battle group in the area now. Everything that flies or floats is being tracked. So how far away were they?
What signals came from the boat after the strike? Again, a carrier battle group with the most sophisticated ESM technology in the world. They're listening to everything. What did they hear?
Since there is a carrier battle group in the area, where was the closest US Coast Guard cutter? It's their job to intercept these boats. Were they called in? And if it was just a Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachment embarked on a US Navy ship, then where was that ship? Was that ship called in to assist?
What was the need for urgency here? If the idea was that these people were going to right their boat, stow their cargo and proceed, then why not wait for that to happen and then hit them again? Or wait for the other Narco-Terrorist boat to show up and then hit that one too? Why did the strike have to happen right then? If the drone was running out of fuel, send another one to relieve the first one. We've got plenty of those things.
None of this makes any sense unless you see the need for Special Forces to do this instead of regular USN or USCG surface and air assets, which are always in the Caribbean anyway.
And I still want to know what meeting Pete Hegseth ran off to. What was more important than this strike?
And Ol' Pete's pretty fond of crapping on the press for making judgements "from air-conditioned offices." Okay, Pete, how many people who were involved in this strike WEREN'T in an air-conditioned office? Even the guys piloting the drones were in the air-conditioning. Every senior person there had access to their staffs. They had all the time in the world to make a decision and not one of them was at any personal, physical risk.
Nobody has said anything about where the location actually was. Or has given a long range picture. Was it an isolated boat in the middle of an empty sea? Were there other boats around, any planes?
This was a natural question that should have been asked in the closed door session the minute anyone said the survivors were hailing another drug boat/plane/vehicle
Well ... from Wiki (I haven't gone verifying it): "The first major increase came with the deployment of the USS Iwo Jima and its Amphibious Ready Group in August ..." So, maybe not a *carrier* group yet -- good point. But an amphibious assault ship? I imagine they'd likely have various counter measure assessment assets like ... radar ... AWACs planes ... etc ... And IJ is a helicopter carrier. No chopper surveillance out that day? Snort ...
“The task now is straightforward: It’s to maintain momentum. It’s to keep the pressure on. It’s to make the next couple weeks as bad for the Trump administration and the Republican party as the past couple months have been.”
Keep up the resistance and defiance, good people! Every action matters.
As always - a superbly written newsletter and a decent antidote to the daily dose of horrific news coming out of the administration of lunatics. As a Canadian who feels powerless, it is encouraging to read Bill's take on the wins, and I always get a good chuckle out of Andrew's descriptions - "whiplash inducing story revisions ".
It's really easy to tell a story about something 99.9% of the population hasn't seen and spin it however you like. Nameless and faceless "narco terrorists" can develop superpowers, flip burning speedboats with their bare hands, and pose imminent threats that strike fear in the boots of defenseless Arkansas senators -- threats that justify (if not demand) lobbing another missile straight down their throats.
When the full video of September 2's second boat strike is released and the world gets to view it for the first time, Tom Cotton needs to walk us all through the finer points of how clinging to unseaworthy wreckage equates to "getting back in the fight." Frame by frame and through its fiery, bloody conclusion, commenting as it plays.
Andrew describes a post-truth world. The Cuellar pardon story shows us a post-justice world. And Donald, God has not been happy with you a single day since you filled your first diaper.
Cuellar has the full support of Hakeem Jeffries and the House Democratic leadership. Once he wins the primary, which he will, he'll get all the resources he needs from the DCCC to win the general.
Not thrilled about that, as you're right. From what I'm reading, apparently the D position is that it was a "thin ice" indictment. May be true, but I don't like it.
Then again, TX has a history of not minding if their reps have accusations against them. Glad I don't live there.
The first part (about receiving full support from Jeffries) has been publicly reported. Jeffries publicly praised the pardon and said Trump did the right thing.
The part about the DCCC supporting his re-election is an educated guess. He didn't need their help in previous elections, but his district is one of the five that Texas redrew to benefit Republicans and is now R+10.
Political liberalism proposes the reign of Reason. We are witnessing the total abandonment of that project, substituting the Will of one man as the only thing that matters.
As someone who doesn’t believe in predestination, I will give you that god probably looked at baby Donald snd thought the environment that birthed him wasn’t great, but I would struggle with a god being unhappy with a newborn infant.
Some people in this country still believe in credibility and honesty. We were raised that way. It meant something real to be an American and a patriot, not what Trump espouses every few days. He wants total loyalty, not to our country, but to him. It makes me sad (and furious as hell).
"...kill everybody aboard—because all 11 people on the boat were on an internal list of military targets previously compiled by the Pentagon." The assertion that the Pentagon actually knew who all these people were (and presumably were actually drug smugglers) is not something anyone should take at face value. I hope Congress finds out who they were.
Even the term "double tap" is a distortion. Reading the very fine "Inside Delta Force," about the creation of the unit, written by one of the original operators, I learned that double tap meant two shots in quick succession, to be sure. The approach and the term arose in the context of assaults into hostage situations--aircraft or rooms. The thought was that leaving a terrorist merely wounded in a space containing hostages, terrorists and fellow Delta force could mean catastrophe. There is *no way* a strike on a boat, then another strike 40 minutes later, is a double tap. They are two separate attacks.
Absolutely right on. And it's sickening to me that they keep using the same tired approach and righteous indignation, trying to yell down truth tellers and to impugn them with personal attacks and more lies. And for Republican members of congress to say "I don't know anything about it" when asked about the hypocrisy of murdering people in small boats who may or may not be carrying drugs, at the same time having Trump pardon Juan Orlando Hernandez who was convicted of a druG scheme to flood the US with over 400 tons of cocaine makes me so angry.
The "2nd tap" was very likely a war crime. But so was the 1st tap. All of them. The campaign against so-called drug runners is unauthorized and illegal. We used to rely on law enforcement and criminal prosecution to deal with such problems. Trump has decided that simple murder is much easier.
It does. His base feels a great sense of satisfaction, especially at the second strike where we went back to kill the survivors. They have absorbed his character, which is why Megyn Kelly now sounds like a bloodthirsty ghoul.
It's worth reviewing why Trump lies. It's not to persuade anyone to believe his lies. Trump lies to assert dominance. Trump lies, and then Republicans have to just stand there and take it. But that doesn't go far enough. Trump lies, and then Republicans have to repeat the lie, over and over again, with vigor and enthusiasm. Everyone knows it is a lie, and everyone knows the people repeating the lie know it is a lie. But, without any doubt, the person repeating the lie is acknowledging their subservience and fealty to Trump. This is the whole point of the lie.
This is also the main reason for Trump's tariffs. Why would he place tariffs on every country in the world, whether or not we have a trade deficit, and whether or not there are more penguins than people in the country? It is not simply, or even mostly, that Trump is ignorant about economics. Trump uses tariffs to show other countries that we are the biggest bully on the block, and they better do what we tell them to do. Like the lies, Trump's tariffs are about dominance.
Why do you think Trump nominated people like RFK jr and Pete Hegseth to cabinet posts? By nominating obviously unqualified people, he forces Bill Cassidy and Joni Ernst to vote for them. They know the nominees are unqualified, and we know that they know. It is all about Trump asserting his dominance over the senators. Trump cares more about dominance than he cares about running the country.
It is not hard to figure out Trump's motives for doing shit once you realize absolutely everything is about dominance.
Well said. You nailed it
I have long wondered why people are confused by or shocked at the narratives coming from the WH. DJT isn't lying (I mean of course he is but hear me out) in the conventional way. He isn't coming up with a clever story to hide the truth. Instead, he is making a darker assertion: there is no truth. Or rather truth is whatever he says it is.
It's why he named his social media platform Truth Social - the basic assertion is that every post on there is a "truth" - because he says it is. He owns "truth". He bends reality to his will.
I'm a committed Christian and I've never understood why so many of my fellow believers seem to be OK with this. Especially after all of our theoretically heartfelt denunciations of Clinton's lies and character flaws in the wake of his scandals.
I've quit trying to understand. But we cannot give up the fight for real, objective, truth. It is precious. If our only "truth" is Donald Trump, we're doomed.
In the same way I can't imagine having been a strong Republican (like Tim, Sara, Bill, etc.) and then having to face the reality of almost everyone in your party supporting this utter scumbag, I can't imagine being a true Christian and seeing so many others who claim to be Christians support someone who is literally the antithesis of Jesus.
Blessings to you.
This should give one pause and consider whether they should be associated with a church that accepts such behavior. If there is a devil it is T.
And so many churches don't just *accept* it, they actively and openly promote it.
Time for the classic quote:
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
A reporter asked in an interview of a prominent Southern Baptist minister how he could support Trump who obviously lied, stole, cheated and molested women. The minister laughed, "we know he is an imperfect messenger of God's will." In other words, he hates the people we hate and will punish them. I guess if a serial killer who only murdered non Christians ran, then they would vote for the killer as well.
"I'm a committed Christian and I've never understood why so many of my fellow believers seem to be OK with this."
Ends, may I introduce you to Means? Don't worry, it's covered as it's all got the mark of Caesar on it.
This is sort of thing is probably the biggest reason I was never able to participate in the church, despite being raised as a Christian. I just didn't have the ability to deal with it. Mistakes are mistakes, the consequence of being fallible humans, but all too often people make knowing mistakes (lies/manipulation) and are fine with it. You don't need to look to far to see various Christian denominations riddled with it (ie various church child rape scandals).
I mentioned elsewhere that I suspect that the core of MAGA just assume is doing what politicians have always done. The difference is Trump makes this bare and they know it, thus are in it with him.
I've come to the conclusion that for a LOT of our fellow Americans, a large percentage of whom claim to be Christians, their most fundamental principle is bigotry. They hate brown people, queer people, uppity women, (most) foreigners, academics, and so on. They can tolerate a lot of Trumpian ruin and malfeasance--incoherent tariff policies, reduced access to healthcare, murder at sea, masked government agents snatching people off the streets, blatant corruption, demolishing the East Wing of the White House, using the DoJ to harass political enemies, you name it--as long as he stands foursquare with their bigotry. For these folks, Trump's increasingly overt racism probably inflates their acceptance (or even celebration) of the mayhem he creates in other areas.
This is a good article about MAGA Christians:
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/08/why-evangelicals-couldnt-care-less-about-trumps-epstein-scandal/
Why are so many ok with this? So much depends on the team jersey one wears.
His cult firmly believes our only truth is Donald Trump. "Trump was right about everything" is one of their mantras and they put it on their red hats.
Shocking isn't it. But he was a game show host and conviced millions of people he was a smart businessman.
I truly believe the mass majority of voters; democrats and non-maga republicans are really done. Even hearing that thousands of tech bros are signing a manifesto to do right is just an indication that it just takes so much energy to be greedy and non-caring of fellow humans. They believe the manifesto is just a slight beginning, but reading about it and seeing republicans pushing back on certain issues and working bi-partisan quietly on bills - people really like doing right and having integrity. We had to see how bad it could get. We will come full circle.
Yep, “Truth” Social is like Pravda.
It explains him knocking down the east wing and plastering fake gold curlicues all over the White House. He's a dog marking territory. When he's carried out of there the new occupant will be confronted with "Trump was here" every time they turn around.
Jenn - “ a dog marking territory”
I’m awarding you the NoBell Prize for Comment of the Day 🙂
I like that spelling.
Where is Kristi Noem when we need her to deal with canine misbehavior?
Couldn't he just lift his leg like a dog?
Cankles too heavy.
Donnie's territory marking and sniffing other's buttholes are the only traits he shares with dogs. If he were an actual dog, we wouldn't be in this mess.
My favorite sign from October 18th: “Make Lying Wrong Again”
Sad to know that even if the sign were to read, “Make Bearing False Witness a Sin Again”, the faux Christians leading our government would merely shrug.
I've attempted that conversation. Shrug is right.
James - [mashing Like button].
This is the crux right here.
When Andrew writes, “ it’s getting difficult to keep track of all the lies, distortions, and whiplash-inducing story revisions” - in Trump/MAGA domain, that really doesn’t matter. Just keep the firehouse pumping whatever and flood the zone. Overwhelm all attempts at rational discourse on a topic. Cuz rationality is so over
Yup, and he hates Republicans more than Democrats because the Republicans roll over for him like dogs every time. We know Trump hates dogs. (She says while she sobs hysterically in "how the hell could we elect a person who hated dogs?")
I see your point that Trump doesn't respect those Republicans who immediately say "yes sir" to anything he says. However, what Trump hates the most are the Republicans who won't roll over for him. To Trump and his followers being a Republican means rubber stamping everything Trump says or does. They HATE Republicans who won't sell out their soul to follow Trump.
Maybe he hates those who stand up, while despising the spineless. Not sure which is worse.
Paul - just as we saw today, with Trump on his low-grade social media platform naming the Indiana Republican state senators who "need encouragement to make the right decision" about redistricting... maybe send 'em another pizza, make another swatting call, whatever it takes? He brings a menacing new meaning to the term "majority whip."
Sounds like he's not sure Mike Braun has it sewn up for him even after the guv got to attend the White House Christmas party https://www.politico.com/news/2025/12/08/trump-indiana-senate-republicans-redistricting-00680141
I think he lies out of force of habit. He’s done it all his life so it’s not second nature, it’s first.
And he believes it.
Truth is a last resort.
Well said. Trump is that simple. The solution? Fight back. It's that simple.
Today I have chosen to view the glass as half full! There have been a few signs that some are not defending the lies. Maybe a few have pulled their heads out of Trump’s butt.
Your observations about all of this being dominance games on Trump's part hits the nail on the head. It isn't about policy or governing, because trump does not know either one of those things. He does not think in those terms.
As a narcissist EVERYTHING is about him, for him, against him. The more blatant the lie of behavior that he can force you into, the better, as far as he is concerned.
The whole UKR "negotiations" is about dominance--not of Putin, who I think even Trump has figured out he cannot dominate, but of Zelinsky.
Because Trump's pattern is that, if he cannot dominate you, he becomes (for lack of a better term) submissive. He will actually kiss your ass in order to get you to like him, so that he can be your buddy/pal/hanger on.
He kisses up to Putin, he kisses up to Xi--because he sees them as people to be emulated, as people whose approval he wants, as people who he wants to recognize him as being powerful people like them.
So true. Its disgusting that Americans could vote for that.
The thing is that they didn't actually vote for the dominance thing. They voted in the belief that Trump would do things for them. The things they wanted were maybe bad things, but they still expected actual policy and governance.
Because they did not really understand what Trump is and why he does what he does. Some of that aligns serendipitously with what they wanted in governance, but that is just luck?
If you tried to do what these people wanted (as bad as some of it is) WITHOUT the blatant dominance games (and associated corruption), you would actually get away with it or most of it--especially with the current SCotUS. A lot of the kickback arises out of the how, not the what.
You could have picked actual qualified and competent people who followed (or properly changed) procedures and were careful.Not done the whole revenge thing.
Ooops.
Trump's narcissism and dominance games may be what saves us (in this particular iteration) from authoritariansim, because of the resistance it engenders that would otherwise not have happened.
You might enjoy Daniel Barkhuff's thoughts along these lines today -https://substack.com/home/post/p-179045421
...I hope to be among those of us wearily lifting our heads from the smoking wreckage after the 2026 election... or 2028... Been practicing my Charlton Heston: "You maniacs. You blew it up... god damn you all to hell!"
And then we get to work cleaning up the mess
That makes a lot if sense and if they went through proper channels so it appeared legal.
We should be thankful that Trump is in charge in this instance (as bad as THAT is) rather than someone competent, actually sane, smart, and actually dedicated to authoritarianism.
Trump has never actually glommed on to the fact that HE is his own worst enemy. But he is actually incapable of seeing that because of his narcissism.
I’ve always believed we are sort of lucky. Could you imagine if the guy was actually competent and not a Lunatic ?
The lies also demonstrate that he is not very concerned with elections, going forward.
Trump’s M.O. is similar to domestic violence; dominance is both the means and the end goal.
And yet he loses it when someone fights back.
Which is also similar.
The firehose of bs is not just a dominance ploy to keep GOP lickspittles in line. It is, as other Substacker says "epistemic warfare", an attack on reality. The point of the MAGA faithful repeating the lie is 'to make the libs cry', because what brinks us to tears is the madness of reducing every utterance to signalling in a partisan game of mere dominance. Trump and his minions give his supporters the tools to perform dominance of US, by judt obstinately refusing to engage in sincere discourse, honest truth claims, evidence and reasoning.
One of the things we need to understand is that this is a social/subcultural project. It's a _collective_ form of trolling, or more accurately _gaslighting_.
If we're still living in some vestigal democracy (a big if bigly) the question becomes how the supposedly all powerful swing voters navigate seeing and moving in the discharge from the hose. Bill days No Kings put the lie to Republican rhetoric about “hate America” and “‘pro-terrorist” gatherings. Well, what MAGA claim HASN'T had the lie put to it by material reality? Are the many folks focused on their quotidian concerns even trying to parse the spray for lies, or just hunkering down hoping not to be violently knocked back by the stream.
I don’t believe it’s that complicated. He says the first thing that comes to mind. More often than not a lie or distortion. He does it to get get himself off the hook AT THAT MOMENT. Then when it comes back to bite him he doubles down on the lies. Everything for him is transactional. ‘Just get me out of this.”
Brilliant insight! This really explains Ts behavior in the simplest way.
F—k’in Amen!
It resembles when a prisoner of war is forced by his captors to lie, and his humiliation is filmed. No one believes the lies, but they fully understand the humiliation and the power of those forcing him to lie.
Bingo!
The sorry truth: Trump, who pardons drug traffickers and murders the shipwrecked, is the world’s most dangerous narco-terrorist, and every American who continues to support him is complicit in his crimes.
"What the Trump administration has done . . . . is turn the United States Navy into a death squad."
-Eliot Cohen on Shield of the Republic
The worst thing, other than the orders themselves, is that the Navy is perfectly capable of indicating these boats. They can stop, board, and inspect. If drugs are found, the boat, and contents can be confiscated. The crew can be arrested and rendered for prosecution. Bombing and murder are neither legal nor necessary.
As a matter of reducing drug flow, these strikes are nothing but a pin prick. A serious effort would involve arrest and interrogation so the structure of the drug producing enterprise can be understood and the kingpins can be identified and dealt with. But wait. The kingpins get pardons!
The Coast Guard does this routinely.
Absolutely right!
With great effect.
Just a thought but I don't think the coast patrols the waters just off Venezuela and Columbia.
But why are we doing this in the first place? The drugs these boats are allegedly running don’t come to the US — most of our drugs come via Mexico. Early on there was talk of the US targeting the cartels and possibly sending troops to Mexico which for very good reason hasn’t happened. Are these attacks on Venezuela merely Trump’s redirection away from attacking Mexico, but giving him drug targets to brag about that the administration believes come at very little cost? I am not sure there is a grand strategy here other than Trump needed to demonstrate winning on the narcotics front which due to incompetence and poor planning has now all gone South.
Oh, don't throw logic at this administration, Keith. They just want to watch things go boom, and do it from a distance where they can pound their chests without being challenged.
Sometimes I just can’t help myself and recycle the ingredients that went into the morning’s tea.
We're at war with Venezuela seems to be the answer, I think?
That’s still Schrödinger’s cat territory — depends on the day and Donald’s mood.
It is a hell of a lot easier than moving against Mexico or China.
We are doing this because (1) a corrupt SCOTUS gave Trump immunity and (2)Trump likes killing.
And now SCOTUS seems nearer than every to allowing Trump to fire whoever he wants, regardless of the guardrails that have been put in place to protect members of independent agencies. Democrats must take the house, the senate, and the presidency and do something about this partisan court.
Perhaps impeaching the six quislings for their failure to uphold their oaths to the constitution.
Reform to end lifetime appointments for ALL federal judges.
Why? It is a prelude to Duterte-style extra-judicial killings (i.e., murder) in CONUS.
A) Federal forces roam our public streets. DHS "disappears" folks because they threaten the blood and virtue of real Americans.
B) Military kills alleged "narco-terrorists" at sea, because drugs are evil.
C) Para-military squads get a green-light to kill/disappear anyone the regime dislikes, because "they must be on drugs to annoy Trump so."
Yes, I especially fear for the addicted and the mentally ill. ICE has no discretion or skills at de-escalation. If confronted by either, both who may act hostile or like they are untethered from reality, ICE may just shoot them and say they were under attack. They have gotten away with horrible crimes and property destruction with complete impunity. Murder of citizens seems like the completely logical next step for Trump.
My question would be is there a broader goal, or are we just doing this until Trump gets board and moves on.
I’m waiting for Trump get board for good
Venezuela and these speed boats are easy targets. China and Mexico are not.
What Keith said! I have been thinking about this for a while.
He is like a child playing with army men and tanks, helicopters and battle cruisers. It makes him happy to wreak havoc around the world. If he gets stymied in one effort, he just moves on to another. I imagine he feels incredibly small inside; this is just one way to try and fill the emptiness and make himself feel big.
I just posted this link elsewhere: https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/coast-guard-cocaine-drug-bust-port-everglades-fort-lauderdale-pacific-ocean/ And it comes in through Florida. Nice, juicy, red Florida. I say we declare martial law in Florida and put it on lockdown against all those narco-terrorists!
Back before America recovered its present greatness, when law was more than the will and whim of Donald J. Trump, we went to the trouble to interdict boats, board them and confiscate the drugs. This is now seen as a time-wasting formality, so they just cut to the chase and kill on sight. It’s a wonder ICE hasn’t received orders to do the same to suspected “illegal aliens”,
I'm willing to bet that the amount of taxpayer dollars spent to bomb these small boats far exceeds the money spent to interdict, confiscate and interrogate the occupants of those same small boats.
His base is as happy if not happier, to have their tax dollars go to blowing up those boats as I was to have mine to help people in need through USAID.
Somebody needs to tell Trump he could seize the drugs and then sell them himself
You are forgetting that Trump and Hegseth enjoy the spectacle of killing people. If he could, Trump would bring gladiators into the Rotunda. That's why he wants a fight on the White House lawn to celebrate our 250th. He enjoys violence. He is a sadist, pure and simple.
I did not forget. I am in complete agreement!
That first boat Trump and Hegseth blew up, on September 2nd, had 11 people on board. 11 people. If you were running drugs on a small boat, would you pack the boat with 11 people? No, you’d pack the boat with drugs. That boat was moving people not drugs. And those people were murdered by the President of the United States. Put that in your pipe and smoke it—if you dare.
Almost certainly. Look at this "op" from mid-November: https://www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/coast-guard-cocaine-drug-bust-port-everglades-fort-lauderdale-pacific-ocean/ Notice that we did NOT just shoot up a boat to make this fabulous arrest! "Several government officials were in attendance as the USCG offloaded more than 49,000 pounds of cocaine, at an estimated $362 million. " THAT'S how drugs get into the US. Not on tiny boats.
I would like to clarify something. I don’t know who the 11 people were on that boat, or what they were doing or not doing. And even if my speculation is correct and they were not smuggling drugs, for all I know, all 11 passengers could still have been narco-terrorists—you know, on their way to a narco-terrorism convention in Miami Beach or some such. Or maybe all 11 were on their way to the States because they were each in contention for FIFA’s first annual Narco-Terrorist of the Year Prize. I don’t think so, but because we are living in TrumpWorld, I thought I should acknowledge that anything is possible.
I’m wondering about that too.
…and I’ve always seen Shield as on of The Bulwark’s least fiery, in terms of language used. To me, kinda bears out how bad this military madness really is.
Like Duterte in the Philippines.
Sadly, I am afraid that one day historians will examine the complicity of Americans today as they do with the Germans in the 1930s and 1940s. No, the crimes of this administration are nowhere near the horrors perpetrated by the Third Reich, but they significant nonetheless, especially in the end of USAID, the ruthless deportation of immigrants, the increasing destruction of the American health care system (flawed as it already is) and the use of lethal force off the coast of Venezula without any legal justification or evidence.
This Trump (Miller/Vought) regime is just getting started! It also seems to me as though we have lost sight of the horrors that are probably happening in the immigrant concentration camps. The right stopped bragging about the inhumane treatment and conditions of their detention facilities, but I can’t imagine that the cruelty has been discontinued.
Bingo!
I cannot even express how disgusted I am by the juvenile "updating" of the name on Levine's portrait. Way to own the libs, HHS!
One of the hallmark characteristics of this administration is that it reflects the very worst of male adolescent behavior. Jill Filipovic wrote a great article on this topic last February in The Atlantic, "The Adolescent Style in American Politics". Hopefully this gift link will work for anyone interested in reading the article: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/02/trump-masculinity/681828/?gift=L7D2AM-N8oP1JiKZgQo0RvKHvWdFeJkmlWjx_ZP-uQQ&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share
Somewhere in there is also adolescent, short- attention-span online culture.
TomD - yes. And “somewhere” is sorta everywhere, no?
Ha! I left "in" out.
I've been beating this drum for a while now. Big Advertising is trying its hardest to infantilize us. We are all being treated like children.
Thanks for the link...as someone who lived thru adolescence - I'd argue that we are experiencing the very worst of female adolescent behaviour as well...and trust me it was nasty.... I see it being acted out by every woman in the current admin X 10. 'Original comment Slightly edited for clarity and low caffeine levels'
I went to an all-male Catholic High School, so I may have missed out on the worst aspects of female adolescent behavior. The most disturbing thing to me about all this is how acceptable the administration's behavior is to so many Americans, even when it harms them.
Some folks will do anything to be part of the perceived 'in crowd' unfortunately. Self hatred, racism and purposeful ignorance are a deadly combination and we're gonna be lucky to get through this relatively intact.
Northern neighbor- Yes, and it’s kinda pathetic how that ache to be one of the cool kids frequently fails… cuz the lessers usually aren’t really accepted by the elites they sacrifice their inner/best interests in hopes of joining
Girls (speaking specifically of adolescent females) are MEAN!
MAGA women are every bit as bad as the men.
I work in a profession that's predominantly male. I've found that, more often than not, the women in the profession feel the need to amplify typical "male" attitudes/behavior to compensate for not being male. So, when I see the women in the administration doing the same, it is not a huge surprise.
Thank you for the link (I have a subscription but I hadn’t read that.
You are more than welcome! Every time I see your name I think of when I was stationed in West Germany back in the late 1970s.
"Merry Christmas!" - Cheerful greeting coming from somewhere inside the flaming wreckage of America
We are the Yule log.
"“Maybe they were signaling to other airplanes or drug cartel boats. . . " Signalling ... TO OTHER AIRPLANES? WATER CRAFT? You've got a carrier group in the vicinity and no one working the radar? WTF? No. Oh, Thor's toenails, just NO.
Those are the kinds of questions I would ask ADM Bradley. Once the first strike had taken place, where were the other Narco-Terrorist Assets? We must have known. We've got a carrier battle group in the area now. Everything that flies or floats is being tracked. So how far away were they?
What signals came from the boat after the strike? Again, a carrier battle group with the most sophisticated ESM technology in the world. They're listening to everything. What did they hear?
Since there is a carrier battle group in the area, where was the closest US Coast Guard cutter? It's their job to intercept these boats. Were they called in? And if it was just a Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachment embarked on a US Navy ship, then where was that ship? Was that ship called in to assist?
What was the need for urgency here? If the idea was that these people were going to right their boat, stow their cargo and proceed, then why not wait for that to happen and then hit them again? Or wait for the other Narco-Terrorist boat to show up and then hit that one too? Why did the strike have to happen right then? If the drone was running out of fuel, send another one to relieve the first one. We've got plenty of those things.
None of this makes any sense unless you see the need for Special Forces to do this instead of regular USN or USCG surface and air assets, which are always in the Caribbean anyway.
And I still want to know what meeting Pete Hegseth ran off to. What was more important than this strike?
And Ol' Pete's pretty fond of crapping on the press for making judgements "from air-conditioned offices." Okay, Pete, how many people who were involved in this strike WEREN'T in an air-conditioned office? Even the guys piloting the drones were in the air-conditioning. Every senior person there had access to their staffs. They had all the time in the world to make a decision and not one of them was at any personal, physical risk.
Nobody has said anything about where the location actually was. Or has given a long range picture. Was it an isolated boat in the middle of an empty sea? Were there other boats around, any planes?
This was a natural question that should have been asked in the closed door session the minute anyone said the survivors were hailing another drug boat/plane/vehicle
Not to defend the Navy's actions, but I think that strike happened about two months before the U.S.S. Ford departed from the Mediterranean.
Well ... from Wiki (I haven't gone verifying it): "The first major increase came with the deployment of the USS Iwo Jima and its Amphibious Ready Group in August ..." So, maybe not a *carrier* group yet -- good point. But an amphibious assault ship? I imagine they'd likely have various counter measure assessment assets like ... radar ... AWACs planes ... etc ... And IJ is a helicopter carrier. No chopper surveillance out that day? Snort ...
Yeah, I think it's a safe bet that the Navy had total control of that area. The "fog of war" excuse is BS.
Re The Cheap Shots: My real biological name is AGCGAAAGCCTATACGCGAGATACACTGCC...
I can't remember your genome but your face is familiar.
Brilliant! But watch out for the autocorrect. I think there's a 6th finger encoded there.
I think we might be related!
A ‘lovely’. LOL!!!! (-:
“The task now is straightforward: It’s to maintain momentum. It’s to keep the pressure on. It’s to make the next couple weeks as bad for the Trump administration and the Republican party as the past couple months have been.”
Keep up the resistance and defiance, good people! Every action matters.
They need to apply the Bannon tactic: flood the zone
As always - a superbly written newsletter and a decent antidote to the daily dose of horrific news coming out of the administration of lunatics. As a Canadian who feels powerless, it is encouraging to read Bill's take on the wins, and I always get a good chuckle out of Andrew's descriptions - "whiplash inducing story revisions ".
Thanks goodness for the Bulwark.
No Bulwark without the readers! Thank you for reading!
It's really easy to tell a story about something 99.9% of the population hasn't seen and spin it however you like. Nameless and faceless "narco terrorists" can develop superpowers, flip burning speedboats with their bare hands, and pose imminent threats that strike fear in the boots of defenseless Arkansas senators -- threats that justify (if not demand) lobbing another missile straight down their throats.
When the full video of September 2's second boat strike is released and the world gets to view it for the first time, Tom Cotton needs to walk us all through the finer points of how clinging to unseaworthy wreckage equates to "getting back in the fight." Frame by frame and through its fiery, bloody conclusion, commenting as it plays.
Andrew describes a post-truth world. The Cuellar pardon story shows us a post-justice world. And Donald, God has not been happy with you a single day since you filled your first diaper.
Does Cuellar really think the Ds will go anywhere near him? If he does, he's as delusional as his pardoner.
Cuellar has the full support of Hakeem Jeffries and the House Democratic leadership. Once he wins the primary, which he will, he'll get all the resources he needs from the DCCC to win the general.
Not thrilled about that, as you're right. From what I'm reading, apparently the D position is that it was a "thin ice" indictment. May be true, but I don't like it.
Then again, TX has a history of not minding if their reps have accusations against them. Glad I don't live there.
Are you sure about that?
The first part (about receiving full support from Jeffries) has been publicly reported. Jeffries publicly praised the pardon and said Trump did the right thing.
The part about the DCCC supporting his re-election is an educated guess. He didn't need their help in previous elections, but his district is one of the five that Texas redrew to benefit Republicans and is now R+10.
Only in Texas! They keep electing an AG who has been investigated for fraud for 10 years.
I think at bottom it's post-meaning--nihilism.
Political liberalism proposes the reign of Reason. We are witnessing the total abandonment of that project, substituting the Will of one man as the only thing that matters.
Like they say about Russia, nothing is true and everything is possible. MAGA is really the Sovietization of America.
As someone who doesn’t believe in predestination, I will give you that god probably looked at baby Donald snd thought the environment that birthed him wasn’t great, but I would struggle with a god being unhappy with a newborn infant.
I didn't intend to be taken too literally . . . .
Coming from you I didn’t take it too seriously.
Some people in this country still believe in credibility and honesty. We were raised that way. It meant something real to be an American and a patriot, not what Trump espouses every few days. He wants total loyalty, not to our country, but to him. It makes me sad (and furious as hell).
"...kill everybody aboard—because all 11 people on the boat were on an internal list of military targets previously compiled by the Pentagon." The assertion that the Pentagon actually knew who all these people were (and presumably were actually drug smugglers) is not something anyone should take at face value. I hope Congress finds out who they were.
They're "names" are probably listed as DS1 thru DS11...
(DS = Drug Smuggler)
Let’s see those names!
Even the term "double tap" is a distortion. Reading the very fine "Inside Delta Force," about the creation of the unit, written by one of the original operators, I learned that double tap meant two shots in quick succession, to be sure. The approach and the term arose in the context of assaults into hostage situations--aircraft or rooms. The thought was that leaving a terrorist merely wounded in a space containing hostages, terrorists and fellow Delta force could mean catastrophe. There is *no way* a strike on a boat, then another strike 40 minutes later, is a double tap. They are two separate attacks.
Thinking about it, I seem to recall that the introduction to "Inside Delta Force" was by David Mamet.
Absolutely right on. And it's sickening to me that they keep using the same tired approach and righteous indignation, trying to yell down truth tellers and to impugn them with personal attacks and more lies. And for Republican members of congress to say "I don't know anything about it" when asked about the hypocrisy of murdering people in small boats who may or may not be carrying drugs, at the same time having Trump pardon Juan Orlando Hernandez who was convicted of a druG scheme to flood the US with over 400 tons of cocaine makes me so angry.
The "2nd tap" was very likely a war crime. But so was the 1st tap. All of them. The campaign against so-called drug runners is unauthorized and illegal. We used to rely on law enforcement and criminal prosecution to deal with such problems. Trump has decided that simple murder is much easier.
Trump also thinks producing snuff films helps him politically.
It does. His base feels a great sense of satisfaction, especially at the second strike where we went back to kill the survivors. They have absorbed his character, which is why Megyn Kelly now sounds like a bloodthirsty ghoul.
And it does help him. That’s the core of MAGA.
Thank you for this outstanding newsletter.