"Ten years ago, on June 23, 2016, the people of Great Britain voted in a referendum to leave the European Union."
At the time, I thought this might prove to be the dumbest vote any country would make in the 21st century. But then November came around. And then it came around again in 2024. A quarter of the way through the century, American voters currently hold first AND second place on the list. Go USA!!!
I have a small amount of grace for those who were duped to elect him the first time. Also, in terms of pure self-imposed economic ruin, Brexit is still a humdinger. We may get there in time, but it's not even close for now.
When Trump says "most people" don't know something, what he means is "until five minutes ago, I didn't know something." No one is real, except for him.
My kid was in Europe shortly after the Brexit vote and before the 2016 election. He was a student and met several British students who all said that the Brexit vote was an anti-immigrant vote mostly.
Second thought on Brexit, I suspect it was the result of a fair amount of Russian influence via social media as was the result of the 2016 election. "Got my information on Facebook..."
It should have been an amazing celebration July 4 this year, especially since will fall during a long weekend. Instead, I will avoid seeing images out of DC and just catch some local fireworks and otherwise laying low.
What bugs me is the major news outlets will cover his "speech" and most likely sanewash it at the same time. I wish for once they would ignore him. It would drive him nuts. Attention of any kind is his oxygen.
They have to cover his speech because, crazy or not he is still the President. I myself wish non-right wing journalists would stop asking him questions. A rare instance of his telling the truth was when he said if the Moo went over well he’d take the credit, and if not, he’d blame Vance (Whenever he tells the truth and knows it’s bad, he says he’s joking.). I cab’t stand to hear his speeches.
I used to think that, like him or not, he’s still not just THE President, but MY President, but his last bleat asking his fans to vote on whether they preferred “DUMocrats” with or without a”b”, he convinced me. He’s NOT My President, so I’ll carry on for the 4th the way I would if an actual sane person were President.
I was wondering what rides and games will be on the Midway for the Great American State Fair (that is not being held in a state). Has the fascist “leader” of our country even been to a state fair? Is anyone bringing their livestock—there must be livestock shows—right?
Someone made the following comment to an article about the reflecting pool in The Atlantic yesterday; does anyone know if it's accurate?
"The product chosen was never designed to used in this open enviroment that has it exposed to sunlight nor was it ever designed for installation by a "swimming pool contractor".
It is an industrial coating intended to be used to reline the inside of steel piping systems for industrial uses that are carrying water or waster water lines or holding tanks. It does not have a warranty for the way that it was used. America has been scammed by Trump again.
I don't know anything definitive to confirm or deny. I know it seems like rushing to put any coating on old concrete that has been recently drained of water, in a humid environment, in a swampy area and then immediately refilling it with water feels like a recipe for failure. No coating is going to bond well to moist concrete. I read that so many corners were cut on this job that it's a circle. And from a biology prof. that if he were to design a large facility for growing algea, it would basically resemble the reflecting pool.
I made a comment. Here is the link related to your question, while not really addressing your primary question about product choices. Maybe your answer is contained within the comments on the post?
An actual coatings person with a considerate opinion on what is going on in the Reflecting Pool paint adhesion:
Very informative, thank you. He specifically said, "Ultimately, the issue isn’t the coating or anything done to the reflecting pool after installation," so don't know which one of them is correct? But one thing's for sure: this super-duper fantastic job that was going to "last 100 years" according to T is a big fat failure - just like him.
If you dig further, and as a prior pool treatment professional, I was interested in how paint works in the best of conditions, that being a properly prepped residential pool. (Well treated, no significant externalities, etc). I did not see many painted pools in my time in the industry. Maybe there was a reason. .Pool surface paint coatings do not last as long as usually stated, a couple of years before requiring reapplication. Fading, peeling, and general customer dissatisfaction are also common observations. 100 years? Uh.
I heard a reporter say the same thing on Friday...must have done the same research. The fact that it peeled off as it did, not chip off, makes me think it was completely wrong for its intended use.
I wondered about this, DD. I bet there are a whole lot of Trumpy guys out there who know a lot about repairs, sealants, etc. who could have given Trump immediate advice about what to do and not do here. I would love to ask them to comment. My guess is they are keeping quiet but may be knitting their brows about how such a smart, capable businessman like Trump could have done something so obviously wrong.
Yes, I love JVL, but as another cradle Catholic out here in Phoenix who has sung in choirs in several different churches for the last few decades, I take issue with his recent pronouncement about the horribleness of contemporary religious music. This was on one of the recent gabfests with Sarah and Tim. Last weekend, we sang a 2019 song called "Tremble" that is one of my favorites. Visitors often come over to us after Mass to tell us how inspired they were by the music.
Apparently the valley outside of Jerusalem, called Gehenna, where people threw offal and corpses, is the actual hell. Gehenna translates as 'the place of divine punishment.'
“These villains, it seems, were so cunning, so devastatingly dastardly, that they managed to pull off this shocking act of national blasphemy without once being visible on the cameras embedded in the Washington Monument that transmit a 24/7 public livestream of the Reflecting Pool. Plainly, we are looking at some serious criminals here. But rest assured that Trump is on the case: Many people, he claimed, have already been arrested.”
As a patriotic American, I share the president’s concern; I personally witnessed on cable news—several park rangers dumping chlorine into the big, blue beautiful water after it turned PUKE 🤮 Green!
Therefore, I’d like to make a citizens arrest and make sure these environmental terrorists get exactly what’s coming to them!🤪
Re: "...non-Iranian ships immediately stopped transiting again, while Iranian ships, against which America is no longer enforcing its blockade, kept sailing through.)"
I had an (unpleasant) exchange with my brother over the weekend. His summation of Trump: "He's a narcissistic asshole, but he's the best. It was him or Socialism."
I said, "He just lost a war."
"To Iran? Are you nuts?" He was so angry, I thought he might have a health event.
His is a diet rich in Fox News and other right wing nuttery. (He accuses me, without evidence, of thinking as I do because I listen to left wing media.) He's not alone. Not by a long shot. Half the country feeds on this kind of swill. These are people who will see Iranian ships passing through the Straits of Hormuz, moving their cargoes to their customers, generating revenue while non-Iranian ships remain bottled up, losing money for their owners every day and say America won.
I don't get it. I don't know the answer. I don't know what can be done. But something's gotta because there are 77 million people out there like my brother who will vote for Trump or the closest thing to him for as long as those options exist for them.
I am convinced the individual confrontation and analysis of said resultant behavior(s) involving confirmation bias, cognitive dissonance, and sunk cost fallacy would require some form of electroshock therapy to stick. Wish me luck I am heading into a similar breach next month.
Wow, that must have been horrible for you--your brother! I think you put your finger on it when you said that his only source of info is Fox and "other right wing nuttery" and that there are millions of Americans like him. I also don't know the answer to this.
I don't generally follow British politics closely, but I wish Bill had gone more deeply into the machinations that lead to Kier Starmer's resignation. It's fascinating and involves something that is generally foreign to politics...self-sacrifice. My apologies in advance if I get anything wrong.
Last month, a relatively unknown Labour Party MP named Josh Simons resigned his seat for the sole purpose of forcing a special election that would allow the very popular mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, to replace him. Why?
Because the Labour Party recognized that Burnham was their best chance at staving off the far-right Reform Party. But to be elected Prime Minister, you must first be a member Member of Parliament. And the plan worked! Despite Kier Starmer pledging to fight to the bitter end, he resigned three days after Burnham won his special election, clearing the path for Burnham to be Britain's next Prime Minister.
As for Burnham staving off the far right TBD. He will first have to govern and prove himself in office. Keir Starmer and the revolving door of British prime ministers around the inability to determine what Britain should be post-Brexit and how government can produce results that meet the populaces needs.
Yeah, Burnham's part of the story not yet written. But at present moment, the hero of the story seems to be Josh Simons, the MP who gave up his seat, setting into motion the Rube Goldberg machine that lead to Starmer's resignation.
True, and I hope he is not "rewarded" with a nice post in the new government, if one is created by Burnham, if he wins, unless it is truly on merit and not patronage.
The populace seems to be on message to REJOIN. That is a result of many factors, not the least of which are demographic. Mostly older Britons thought that they were better off alone, perhaps re-writing WWII, and many of them have gone the way of old Britons, or old people everywhere for that matter. And, at the other end of the demographic scale, many of the teenaged Britons who would have voted to stay if they could have, now can. A group of young Britons, most in their 20s I believe, just completed a fourteen day, 25 miles a day march from the Manchester/Liverpool area in the NW of England, to Brussels (OK, they took the ferry) to deliver a petition to the EU asking that Britain be allowed back in.
That may be, but the impression I get is that most British politicians don’t want to reopen the question at the moment. Most British probably believe they would be allowed back in with the same privileges and op-outs they had before, but that won’t happen.
"Not allowed back in with same opt-outs" has certainly been the assumption. But just last week Michael Barnier (who was the EU's negotiator for the leave deal, and wants to run for French President) suggested that maybe the Euro and Schengen opt-outs could be kept; only the rebate may be an issue. So perhaps there's a deal to be done? Getting Britain back would be a big win for the EU, and any rejoining would require winning a referendum, so could not be a punitive deal.
However, it's true that most politicians don't want to reopen Brexit now. For Labour, this is mostly because they won their majority with a manifesto promise not to rejoin, mainly because many of its supporters being pro-Brexit, so they have been afraid to risk these voters. Meanwhile, the Conservatives delivered Brexit so they can't easily turn around and say "our bad, let's rejoin now" even if they wanted to. Meanwhile Reform's position is "real Brexit has never been tried", like communists of old.
In the meantime, there are other problems with or without Brexit, such as struggles to deliver large construction projects and military spending on budget. These need to be solved with or without an EU reset.
Andy Burnham will have his work cut out for him...
Barnier is completely irrelevant when it comes the UK joining the EU and accession negotiations.
It'd be very telling if the british politicians painted the requirement to join the eurozone and Schengen as a punishment. The problem with the UK always was attempting to be just inside it but never really committed to it.
British euroscepticism has a long history and they don't really see themselves as a part of the entity called "Europe"
Not sure if "most" British politicians are on that wave length. It has not been anyone's priority, so no one in the political class is talking about it. Farage and his Hard Right crowd want isolation, and that is the current focus of the discussion, as I see it from across the channel.
It was also a bit of reputation laundering by Simons. He’d been forced to resign from the his position as Cabinet Minister in February following a scandal in which he’d tried to sic the UK security services on journalists who’d been investigating £730,000 of potentially illegal political donations connected to a think tank he previously headed. He accused them of being Kremlin backed.
His career had been derailed and the resignation to let Burnham run was likely as much an attempt to get back at Starmer for forcing him out (he wasn’t sacked as such but credible rumours are that he was told he would be if he didn’t go voluntarily). Now he probably hopes he’ll be remembered as the man who gave up his seat to allow Burnham back into Parliament and perhaps get himself a place in the House of Lords in as recompense assuming Burnham does become the next PM (it’s not yet clear if his leadership bid will be opposed). Whether that works out for him will depend on how well Burnham does.
Whether or not Burnham will prove to be the panacea Britain needs only time will tell. I’m not optimistic (but when am I ever?). The country has basically been ungovernable since the Brexit vote. It has caused untold damage. There would never have been a good time for it but we decided to do it just before the first election of Trump and the end of the post WW2 international order. We stormed out of the world’s biggest free trade area at a time when the world, especially the US, was trending anti-free trade.
No one has been willing to do what needs to be done to fix, or at least mitigate, the harm as that would involve closer relations with the EU. First because we had a series of Tory PMs who had all supported Brexit (except May, at least in public, but she made up for that by going for the hardest and most damaging form of Brexit possible) and were clinging to their absurd fantasies of ‘Singapore on Thames’ and Empire 2.0 (Johnson’s term). They couldn’t admit that Brexit had caused problems; never mind address them and certainly not allow that the solution involved some level of reconciliation with the EU.
Then we had Starmer winning the largest Labour Parliamentary majority since Blair in his prime but terrified to use it to do anything radical like agree to some level of reintegration with the EU or trying to join the EEA because the right wing press would start screaming about betrayal even though, if polls are to be believed, a large majority of the public have come round to the view that Brexit was a terrible mistake.
Then there are all the other problems. Decrepit infrastructure, an aging population making increased demands on the NHS and social care services (to the extent the latter exist), resurgent security threats now we can no longer rely on the US alliance and no money to address any of them as GDP is estimated to be anywhere between 2.5 and 10% less than it would have been in 2026 had we stayed in the EU.
The plot thickens! Josh Simons: hero or anti-hero?
Richard, you clearly know more about what's going on across the pond than any of us Yanks. You should write something up and submit it to The Bulwark as a guest piece.
“It is extraordinarily unlikely that David Hearn or anyone else will actually face legal repercussions for touching the failing pool bottom. But that’s no thanks to Trump, who would absolutely give a few wrong-place, wrong-time bystanders “years of jail” to pass the blame if he actually had the sweeping authoritarian powers he claims and craves.”
Given that ICE essentially executed two Americans in Minneapolis (Renée Nicole Good and Alex Jeffrey Pretti) for exercising their constitutional rights, while labeling them domestic terrorists, as well as allowing many immigrants to be killed and denied life saving healthcare, while being incarcerated in modern day internment camps—I’d say any semblance of justice is relative at this point, and the depravity—off the charts! IMHO…:)
This specific dynamic feels like McConnell's "Party of No" superimposed onto the justice system. Rather than Mitch's version of obstructing most legislation which product a broken legislature Trump's DOJ refuses to prosecute slam dunk cases. Meanwhile they bringing charges it can barely get past a grand jury if they're lucky, leading to a broken justice system.
What's amazing about Trump is to see--after decades of myth-making, especially that by Mark Burnett and Jeff Zucker during the NBC years, although Rupert Murdoch's Fox was no piker--what a shabby, ineffective little man he is in reality; and what a shabby little party the GOP has become under his leadership.
His puling over the Reflecting Pool, his insane conspiracy theories about Antifa hordes sneaking in to scar and pollute it (their Invisibility Cloaks concealing them from the security cameras), and his boasts of mass arrests of imaginary saboteurs, may still play well with the Magas; but most Americans see all this for what it is.
It's not that a shabby, ineffective little man can't do a great deal of harm, mind you: not when some of the most powerful men on earth have seen fit to give him imperial power including access to the nuclear codes and the ability to transform DOJ officials into button men.
But the silliness of Trumpism is so vast, it's beginning to overwhelm the sense of horror. I hope his fatuity inspires more and more Americans to take the risk of standing up against him. Start by laughing at the little SOB.
I think the hardest part to accept is that there were people who thought Reagan and Thatcher were wrong at the time.Turns out those people realized what many others didn't.
I like the new version of Bill Kristol, but I wish the younger version had been a bit more aware and introspective about what "animal spirits" were being created in the right wing.
It doesn't take a genius to see what frighteningly insecure, ego driven, political hacks (Newt Gingrich, Tom Delay, Dick Armey, and on and on and on) will usher in to serve their own slefish desires. The current crop of horrid Republicans are far worse than many of the asshats that preceded them.
I wish I had Bill's optimistic view but I fear much worse is on the way.
I also wish Bill and company would have paid more attention to what Paul Weyrich and Leonard Leo were up to because the combination of abortion and the politization of the Evangelicals have been the corner stone of the culture wars.
One thousand percent!! I am glad the Never Trumpers have seen the light (as it were) but pretending that this stuff wasn't knowable or predictable is challenging for me sometimes.
There were rumors back in the day that Reagan believed in what was then called Armageddon, which today is known as the Rapture in these circles. At the time, I thought that was nuts and extreme even for him. But now I have to wonder...
Andrew wrote: "Trump posted on Saturday night. 'These are very serious crimes having to do with the destruction of National Monuments. Years in jail!'” You mean like the East Wing of the White House?
Oh, if Iranian hackers have obtained a complete and redacted copy of the Epstein Files it would explain a lot about Trump's complete capitulation in his illegal war.
There is nothing more Lilliputian than Trump’s obsession with the reflecting pool. Yes, not other president would have cared or bothered because none have the same vanity or smallness of mind. But now mother nature and one celled algae are still beating the very stable genius. Unlike Iran for which Trump has been looking for an offramp since the beginning, here he is doubling down for the long haul — once more the smallness of it all. But where’a the navy when you need them? Hopefully they can at least protect the reflecting pool even if they couldn’t clear the strait of Hormuz.
There is an edit function hidden behind the ... in the upper right corner of what you wrote that only the author can access. Typo correction, in my experience, has not caused loss of likes.
Starmer resigns, as he probably should have, but we in the US have a bat shit crazy demented idiot getting more and more bat shit crazy and demented by the day, and no one even tries to do anything about it? I used to think J6 was the epitome of GOP Trump cowardice, but what we have now is existential for this country. Trump belongs in an institution, not the White House. Is there ever going to be a point of enough's enough?
When the GOP and the right-wing commentariat decreed that it was wrong to hold Trump to conventional standards of ethics and morality, they also decreed that he should never be judged by normal standards of intelligence and wisdom. There is no standard higher than Trump himself.
Just as there is no bottom to what they will excuse morally, there appears to be no bottom to the mental deterioration they will accept - because it's just Trump being Trump.
"Ten years ago, on June 23, 2016, the people of Great Britain voted in a referendum to leave the European Union."
At the time, I thought this might prove to be the dumbest vote any country would make in the 21st century. But then November came around. And then it came around again in 2024. A quarter of the way through the century, American voters currently hold first AND second place on the list. Go USA!!!
I'm not so sure about that. I'd probably go:
1. Trump 47
2. Brexit
3. Trump 45
I have a small amount of grace for those who were duped to elect him the first time. Also, in terms of pure self-imposed economic ruin, Brexit is still a humdinger. We may get there in time, but it's not even close for now.
maybe men, women should know better, even then.
Dumb and dumber. "Did you know that most people don't realize Dumb has a b on the end" ? *DJT
Perhaps he only just learned there's a 'b' at the end and like the child he is, has to show off his new knowledge.
When Trump says "most people" don't know something, what he means is "until five minutes ago, I didn't know something." No one is real, except for him.
My kid was in Europe shortly after the Brexit vote and before the 2016 election. He was a student and met several British students who all said that the Brexit vote was an anti-immigrant vote mostly.
Second thought on Brexit, I suspect it was the result of a fair amount of Russian influence via social media as was the result of the 2016 election. "Got my information on Facebook..."
That’s what I recall too: anti-immigrant. But migrants are still coming.
Definitely Russia supported Brexit.
☹️
It should have been an amazing celebration July 4 this year, especially since will fall during a long weekend. Instead, I will avoid seeing images out of DC and just catch some local fireworks and otherwise laying low.
so almost 15 mill, he could've used door dash and sent us all a pack of brats and some mustard
Tai, You mean you aren't going to catch the Trump rally? "Will be wild"! :)
What bugs me is the major news outlets will cover his "speech" and most likely sanewash it at the same time. I wish for once they would ignore him. It would drive him nuts. Attention of any kind is his oxygen.
They have to cover his speech because, crazy or not he is still the President. I myself wish non-right wing journalists would stop asking him questions. A rare instance of his telling the truth was when he said if the Moo went over well he’d take the credit, and if not, he’d blame Vance (Whenever he tells the truth and knows it’s bad, he says he’s joking.). I cab’t stand to hear his speeches.
I used to think that, like him or not, he’s still not just THE President, but MY President, but his last bleat asking his fans to vote on whether they preferred “DUMocrats” with or without a”b”, he convinced me. He’s NOT My President, so I’ll carry on for the 4th the way I would if an actual sane person were President.
I need to keep my sanity in check.
Wouldn’t want to miss a Trump rally! /s
I was wondering what rides and games will be on the Midway for the Great American State Fair (that is not being held in a state). Has the fascist “leader” of our country even been to a state fair? Is anyone bringing their livestock—there must be livestock shows—right?
Someone made the following comment to an article about the reflecting pool in The Atlantic yesterday; does anyone know if it's accurate?
"The product chosen was never designed to used in this open enviroment that has it exposed to sunlight nor was it ever designed for installation by a "swimming pool contractor".
It is an industrial coating intended to be used to reline the inside of steel piping systems for industrial uses that are carrying water or waster water lines or holding tanks. It does not have a warranty for the way that it was used. America has been scammed by Trump again.
PipeLiner 5000
https://www.uscoatingspec.com/pipeliner/
https://www.uscoatingspec.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Pipeliner_5000_11-70PW_TDS.pdf"
I don't know anything definitive to confirm or deny. I know it seems like rushing to put any coating on old concrete that has been recently drained of water, in a humid environment, in a swampy area and then immediately refilling it with water feels like a recipe for failure. No coating is going to bond well to moist concrete. I read that so many corners were cut on this job that it's a circle. And from a biology prof. that if he were to design a large facility for growing algea, it would basically resemble the reflecting pool.
You and your fancy science. Next you're gonna tell us that horse dewormers don't cure coronavirus infections.
What! It doesn't?
If you still get sick from respiratory viruses at least you've got excellent protection from parasites!
Science? It mostly read of common sense to me.
Nathan, of course it was a recipe for failure. The Felon knows no other kind and would never hire anyone who knew what he was doing, see Cabinet.
YAHTZEE!
All I know is painting the pool a dark color is going to heat it up nicely. Wear a black shirt outdoors when it’s in the 90’s out.
The company that did the painting, on their website claim their expertise is in lining sewer and wastewater piping....
...and in getting contracts from the government through contacts with the Felon?
I made a comment. Here is the link related to your question, while not really addressing your primary question about product choices. Maybe your answer is contained within the comments on the post?
An actual coatings person with a considerate opinion on what is going on in the Reflecting Pool paint adhesion:
https://www.reddit.com/r/washingtondc/comments/1ua9ed2/reflecting_pool_insight_from_a_coating_expert/
Very informative, thank you. He specifically said, "Ultimately, the issue isn’t the coating or anything done to the reflecting pool after installation," so don't know which one of them is correct? But one thing's for sure: this super-duper fantastic job that was going to "last 100 years" according to T is a big fat failure - just like him.
If you dig further, and as a prior pool treatment professional, I was interested in how paint works in the best of conditions, that being a properly prepped residential pool. (Well treated, no significant externalities, etc). I did not see many painted pools in my time in the industry. Maybe there was a reason. .Pool surface paint coatings do not last as long as usually stated, a couple of years before requiring reapplication. Fading, peeling, and general customer dissatisfaction are also common observations. 100 years? Uh.
I heard a reporter say the same thing on Friday...must have done the same research. The fact that it peeled off as it did, not chip off, makes me think it was completely wrong for its intended use.
The reflecting pool fiasco sure sounds like this was entirely DJT's idea. And who is going to tell him no?
I wondered about this, DD. I bet there are a whole lot of Trumpy guys out there who know a lot about repairs, sealants, etc. who could have given Trump immediate advice about what to do and not do here. I would love to ask them to comment. My guess is they are keeping quiet but may be knitting their brows about how such a smart, capable businessman like Trump could have done something so obviously wrong.
Bill, it was Pope John Paul II, not John XXIII. Needs a quick edit.
We've made a correction. Thanks for point this out!
And I appreciate The Bulwark does corrections instead of denying or doubting down on mistakes. Refreshing.
Like DJT!
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Ben, You've got to get up pretty early in the morning to fool us Bulwarkers!
I get up pretty early in the morning to help get this newsletter out the door, so . . . same difference ;)
Can't fool us Bulwarkers!
It would have been more Presidential to just say that everyone disputing the original article was "stupid." 😀
Going forward, it'd probably a good idea to have JVL take a look at any Bulwark piece that mentions the papacy.
Who knows more about Catholics than JVL!
Well,… As a life long and cradle Catholic, I can assure you that JVL says more than he knows about Catholicism, but his heart is in the right place.
My wife is Catholic. And I know the Pope is. That is my knowledge of Catholicism!
Yes, I love JVL, but as another cradle Catholic out here in Phoenix who has sung in choirs in several different churches for the last few decades, I take issue with his recent pronouncement about the horribleness of contemporary religious music. This was on one of the recent gabfests with Sarah and Tim. Last weekend, we sang a 2019 song called "Tremble" that is one of my favorites. Visitors often come over to us after Mass to tell us how inspired they were by the music.
JD Vance would like a word...
Indeed. I don't know if the famously liberal John XXIII would have been as much an inspiration to Bill and the Reaganites.
Wasn't it Pope John Paul II who declared that hell, as an actual "place", did not exist?
He became one of my life's heroes.
Apparently the valley outside of Jerusalem, called Gehenna, where people threw offal and corpses, is the actual hell. Gehenna translates as 'the place of divine punishment.'
That non Italian - Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli.
This Country's greatness is better reflected (ha! 😀) by burgers and dogs followed by fireworks at the local high school than a Presidential pep rally.
The good people of this country will rightfully enjoy their day without the President.
How about a firecracker in DJT's shoes. That would be entertaining.
in his pants, Dave
I can hear a "Sir Story" starting. 😀
“These villains, it seems, were so cunning, so devastatingly dastardly, that they managed to pull off this shocking act of national blasphemy without once being visible on the cameras embedded in the Washington Monument that transmit a 24/7 public livestream of the Reflecting Pool. Plainly, we are looking at some serious criminals here. But rest assured that Trump is on the case: Many people, he claimed, have already been arrested.”
As a patriotic American, I share the president’s concern; I personally witnessed on cable news—several park rangers dumping chlorine into the big, blue beautiful water after it turned PUKE 🤮 Green!
Therefore, I’d like to make a citizens arrest and make sure these environmental terrorists get exactly what’s coming to them!🤪
Go Robert! But it was not PUKE Green, since Green (as in backs) is the Felon's second favorite color, after GOLD.
Fair enough, and excellent point. Perhaps I just wanted to PUKE after seeing the results of Trump’s $14 million monstrosity…:)
On to DJT next mistake; draining it and trying something else he can think up.
True, perhaps we should start taking bets on the next fall guy or expendable cabinet member—when his next best laid plans run amok!..:)
Re: "...non-Iranian ships immediately stopped transiting again, while Iranian ships, against which America is no longer enforcing its blockade, kept sailing through.)"
I had an (unpleasant) exchange with my brother over the weekend. His summation of Trump: "He's a narcissistic asshole, but he's the best. It was him or Socialism."
I said, "He just lost a war."
"To Iran? Are you nuts?" He was so angry, I thought he might have a health event.
His is a diet rich in Fox News and other right wing nuttery. (He accuses me, without evidence, of thinking as I do because I listen to left wing media.) He's not alone. Not by a long shot. Half the country feeds on this kind of swill. These are people who will see Iranian ships passing through the Straits of Hormuz, moving their cargoes to their customers, generating revenue while non-Iranian ships remain bottled up, losing money for their owners every day and say America won.
I don't get it. I don't know the answer. I don't know what can be done. But something's gotta because there are 77 million people out there like my brother who will vote for Trump or the closest thing to him for as long as those options exist for them.
I am convinced the individual confrontation and analysis of said resultant behavior(s) involving confirmation bias, cognitive dissonance, and sunk cost fallacy would require some form of electroshock therapy to stick. Wish me luck I am heading into a similar breach next month.
Good luck. May you at least not be outnumbered.
Wow, that must have been horrible for you--your brother! I think you put your finger on it when you said that his only source of info is Fox and "other right wing nuttery" and that there are millions of Americans like him. I also don't know the answer to this.
I don't generally follow British politics closely, but I wish Bill had gone more deeply into the machinations that lead to Kier Starmer's resignation. It's fascinating and involves something that is generally foreign to politics...self-sacrifice. My apologies in advance if I get anything wrong.
Last month, a relatively unknown Labour Party MP named Josh Simons resigned his seat for the sole purpose of forcing a special election that would allow the very popular mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, to replace him. Why?
Because the Labour Party recognized that Burnham was their best chance at staving off the far-right Reform Party. But to be elected Prime Minister, you must first be a member Member of Parliament. And the plan worked! Despite Kier Starmer pledging to fight to the bitter end, he resigned three days after Burnham won his special election, clearing the path for Burnham to be Britain's next Prime Minister.
As for Burnham staving off the far right TBD. He will first have to govern and prove himself in office. Keir Starmer and the revolving door of British prime ministers around the inability to determine what Britain should be post-Brexit and how government can produce results that meet the populaces needs.
Yeah, Burnham's part of the story not yet written. But at present moment, the hero of the story seems to be Josh Simons, the MP who gave up his seat, setting into motion the Rube Goldberg machine that lead to Starmer's resignation.
No such self sacrifice could happen here.
he's good at communicating on social medai
True, and I hope he is not "rewarded" with a nice post in the new government, if one is created by Burnham, if he wins, unless it is truly on merit and not patronage.
The populace seems to be on message to REJOIN. That is a result of many factors, not the least of which are demographic. Mostly older Britons thought that they were better off alone, perhaps re-writing WWII, and many of them have gone the way of old Britons, or old people everywhere for that matter. And, at the other end of the demographic scale, many of the teenaged Britons who would have voted to stay if they could have, now can. A group of young Britons, most in their 20s I believe, just completed a fourteen day, 25 miles a day march from the Manchester/Liverpool area in the NW of England, to Brussels (OK, they took the ferry) to deliver a petition to the EU asking that Britain be allowed back in.
That may be, but the impression I get is that most British politicians don’t want to reopen the question at the moment. Most British probably believe they would be allowed back in with the same privileges and op-outs they had before, but that won’t happen.
"Not allowed back in with same opt-outs" has certainly been the assumption. But just last week Michael Barnier (who was the EU's negotiator for the leave deal, and wants to run for French President) suggested that maybe the Euro and Schengen opt-outs could be kept; only the rebate may be an issue. So perhaps there's a deal to be done? Getting Britain back would be a big win for the EU, and any rejoining would require winning a referendum, so could not be a punitive deal.
However, it's true that most politicians don't want to reopen Brexit now. For Labour, this is mostly because they won their majority with a manifesto promise not to rejoin, mainly because many of its supporters being pro-Brexit, so they have been afraid to risk these voters. Meanwhile, the Conservatives delivered Brexit so they can't easily turn around and say "our bad, let's rejoin now" even if they wanted to. Meanwhile Reform's position is "real Brexit has never been tried", like communists of old.
In the meantime, there are other problems with or without Brexit, such as struggles to deliver large construction projects and military spending on budget. These need to be solved with or without an EU reset.
Andy Burnham will have his work cut out for him...
Barnier is completely irrelevant when it comes the UK joining the EU and accession negotiations.
It'd be very telling if the british politicians painted the requirement to join the eurozone and Schengen as a punishment. The problem with the UK always was attempting to be just inside it but never really committed to it.
British euroscepticism has a long history and they don't really see themselves as a part of the entity called "Europe"
Not sure if "most" British politicians are on that wave length. It has not been anyone's priority, so no one in the political class is talking about it. Farage and his Hard Right crowd want isolation, and that is the current focus of the discussion, as I see it from across the channel.
GB once had its clown in Boris Johnson. We still have our clown with a flamethrower for 2 1/2 more years.
It was also a bit of reputation laundering by Simons. He’d been forced to resign from the his position as Cabinet Minister in February following a scandal in which he’d tried to sic the UK security services on journalists who’d been investigating £730,000 of potentially illegal political donations connected to a think tank he previously headed. He accused them of being Kremlin backed.
He also lied about commissioning a PR agency, at a cost of £36,000, to ‘investigate’ those journalists and spread innuendo to discredit them and support his claims (see: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/feb/28/minister-josh-simons-resigns-labour-together).
His career had been derailed and the resignation to let Burnham run was likely as much an attempt to get back at Starmer for forcing him out (he wasn’t sacked as such but credible rumours are that he was told he would be if he didn’t go voluntarily). Now he probably hopes he’ll be remembered as the man who gave up his seat to allow Burnham back into Parliament and perhaps get himself a place in the House of Lords in as recompense assuming Burnham does become the next PM (it’s not yet clear if his leadership bid will be opposed). Whether that works out for him will depend on how well Burnham does.
Whether or not Burnham will prove to be the panacea Britain needs only time will tell. I’m not optimistic (but when am I ever?). The country has basically been ungovernable since the Brexit vote. It has caused untold damage. There would never have been a good time for it but we decided to do it just before the first election of Trump and the end of the post WW2 international order. We stormed out of the world’s biggest free trade area at a time when the world, especially the US, was trending anti-free trade.
No one has been willing to do what needs to be done to fix, or at least mitigate, the harm as that would involve closer relations with the EU. First because we had a series of Tory PMs who had all supported Brexit (except May, at least in public, but she made up for that by going for the hardest and most damaging form of Brexit possible) and were clinging to their absurd fantasies of ‘Singapore on Thames’ and Empire 2.0 (Johnson’s term). They couldn’t admit that Brexit had caused problems; never mind address them and certainly not allow that the solution involved some level of reconciliation with the EU.
Then we had Starmer winning the largest Labour Parliamentary majority since Blair in his prime but terrified to use it to do anything radical like agree to some level of reintegration with the EU or trying to join the EEA because the right wing press would start screaming about betrayal even though, if polls are to be believed, a large majority of the public have come round to the view that Brexit was a terrible mistake.
Then there are all the other problems. Decrepit infrastructure, an aging population making increased demands on the NHS and social care services (to the extent the latter exist), resurgent security threats now we can no longer rely on the US alliance and no money to address any of them as GDP is estimated to be anywhere between 2.5 and 10% less than it would have been in 2026 had we stayed in the EU.
Edit: A couple of missing words
The plot thickens! Josh Simons: hero or anti-hero?
Richard, you clearly know more about what's going on across the pond than any of us Yanks. You should write something up and submit it to The Bulwark as a guest piece.
Yep, that was the plan and it worked. Imagine someone in the US sacrificing their elected seat to help their party and (hopefully) their nation.
“It is extraordinarily unlikely that David Hearn or anyone else will actually face legal repercussions for touching the failing pool bottom. But that’s no thanks to Trump, who would absolutely give a few wrong-place, wrong-time bystanders “years of jail” to pass the blame if he actually had the sweeping authoritarian powers he claims and craves.”
Given that ICE essentially executed two Americans in Minneapolis (Renée Nicole Good and Alex Jeffrey Pretti) for exercising their constitutional rights, while labeling them domestic terrorists, as well as allowing many immigrants to be killed and denied life saving healthcare, while being incarcerated in modern day internment camps—I’d say any semblance of justice is relative at this point, and the depravity—off the charts! IMHO…:)
This specific dynamic feels like McConnell's "Party of No" superimposed onto the justice system. Rather than Mitch's version of obstructing most legislation which product a broken legislature Trump's DOJ refuses to prosecute slam dunk cases. Meanwhile they bringing charges it can barely get past a grand jury if they're lucky, leading to a broken justice system.
100% 👍
With Starmer stepping down, I have to think it would be nice if we could get rid of political leaders as easily as they seem to across the pond.
The problem across the pond, however, has been the replacement quality which to be kind has been low.
We seem to have that problem, too.
Amen!
What's amazing about Trump is to see--after decades of myth-making, especially that by Mark Burnett and Jeff Zucker during the NBC years, although Rupert Murdoch's Fox was no piker--what a shabby, ineffective little man he is in reality; and what a shabby little party the GOP has become under his leadership.
His puling over the Reflecting Pool, his insane conspiracy theories about Antifa hordes sneaking in to scar and pollute it (their Invisibility Cloaks concealing them from the security cameras), and his boasts of mass arrests of imaginary saboteurs, may still play well with the Magas; but most Americans see all this for what it is.
It's not that a shabby, ineffective little man can't do a great deal of harm, mind you: not when some of the most powerful men on earth have seen fit to give him imperial power including access to the nuclear codes and the ability to transform DOJ officials into button men.
But the silliness of Trumpism is so vast, it's beginning to overwhelm the sense of horror. I hope his fatuity inspires more and more Americans to take the risk of standing up against him. Start by laughing at the little SOB.
I think the hardest part to accept is that there were people who thought Reagan and Thatcher were wrong at the time.Turns out those people realized what many others didn't.
I like the new version of Bill Kristol, but I wish the younger version had been a bit more aware and introspective about what "animal spirits" were being created in the right wing.
It doesn't take a genius to see what frighteningly insecure, ego driven, political hacks (Newt Gingrich, Tom Delay, Dick Armey, and on and on and on) will usher in to serve their own slefish desires. The current crop of horrid Republicans are far worse than many of the asshats that preceded them.
I wish I had Bill's optimistic view but I fear much worse is on the way.
I also wish Bill and company would have paid more attention to what Paul Weyrich and Leonard Leo were up to because the combination of abortion and the politization of the Evangelicals have been the corner stone of the culture wars.
One thousand percent!! I am glad the Never Trumpers have seen the light (as it were) but pretending that this stuff wasn't knowable or predictable is challenging for me sometimes.
The failure to see was because they were blinded by the light of confirming a majority conservative Scotus.
Yes, and now who gets to bask in that light? Trump and Trump alone.
There were rumors back in the day that Reagan believed in what was then called Armageddon, which today is known as the Rapture in these circles. At the time, I thought that was nuts and extreme even for him. But now I have to wonder...
Andrew wrote: "Trump posted on Saturday night. 'These are very serious crimes having to do with the destruction of National Monuments. Years in jail!'” You mean like the East Wing of the White House?
Oh, if Iranian hackers have obtained a complete and redacted copy of the Epstein Files it would explain a lot about Trump's complete capitulation in his illegal war.
There is nothing more Lilliputian than Trump’s obsession with the reflecting pool. Yes, not other president would have cared or bothered because none have the same vanity or smallness of mind. But now mother nature and one celled algae are still beating the very stable genius. Unlike Iran for which Trump has been looking for an offramp since the beginning, here he is doubling down for the long haul — once more the smallness of it all. But where’a the navy when you need them? Hopefully they can at least protect the reflecting pool even if they couldn’t clear the strait of Hormuz.
"The strawberries! Where are my strawberries?!"
Sorry, wrong story. But I keep picturing the man in his diapers wading in the green pool, ranting about vandals. Hey, it might kill the algae.
"bearing" not "beating"?
Yes, should be beating.
There is an edit function hidden behind the ... in the upper right corner of what you wrote that only the author can access. Typo correction, in my experience, has not caused loss of likes.
We live in the dumbest timeline.
Or a simulation and the gamer is bored and YOLOing things now.
Starmer resigns, as he probably should have, but we in the US have a bat shit crazy demented idiot getting more and more bat shit crazy and demented by the day, and no one even tries to do anything about it? I used to think J6 was the epitome of GOP Trump cowardice, but what we have now is existential for this country. Trump belongs in an institution, not the White House. Is there ever going to be a point of enough's enough?
When the GOP and the right-wing commentariat decreed that it was wrong to hold Trump to conventional standards of ethics and morality, they also decreed that he should never be judged by normal standards of intelligence and wisdom. There is no standard higher than Trump himself.
Just as there is no bottom to what they will excuse morally, there appears to be no bottom to the mental deterioration they will accept - because it's just Trump being Trump.