Hi Bill. I’m going to quote JVL in response to you:
“For our semiquincentennial I want Donald Trump on stage ranting like a lunatic. We squandered our inheritance. We should be confronted with our choices.
I too want Trump on stage ranting like a lunatic. I want his "crowd" to consist of his sycophantic regime members, hundred to two hundred total. No member of Congress should show up at this travesty. Seriously, who needs to have the 250th anniversary of this country ruined by the ravings of this moron? You can listen to it the other 364 days.
The entire SCOTUS should be required to wear their lovely black robes & also be required to sit in the full sun through the whole 137 minutes of Trump in full throat.
I see a clear Eighth Amendment problem, since that certainly sounds cruel and unusual. I think scheduling a lunch with Trump is more than enough to show SCOTUS the error of its ways.
I really wish that specific Triad was free for everyone. I wanted to link to it so many times yesterday, whenever conversation turned to the Dome of Electric Death and the desecration of the White House lawn. Not to mention Trump desecrating our national anniversary.
“This fund was open to anybody who was so weaponized [sic], targeted, or persecuted, whether they were Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent, or otherwise,”
This had to be in a written statement because nobody could keep a straight face while saying this into a camera.
Disagree. There's a ream of video evidence refuting your claim. Carve out a few hours, google "Trump speech," put on those Clockwork Orange eyelid clamps, and strap yourself in because it's going to be a long ride.
Bill, I do appreciate your effort to help me allow myself to celebrate the 4th this 250th year. I was a young teen for the 200th. But it’s not only the orange one that tamps down my celebratory spirit. It’s his cult and what they represent about our country. I have been defiant towards my maga neighbors in recent years and decorated with flags all over the place. This year it is just different.
I will keep trying to change my attitude. Not sure I have the energy.
Yes, Stacy, I agree with you about this. I would be afraid that MAGA cult folks would shanghai at least part of my town's fun Independence Day celebration. I am imagining myself cheering the high school marching band and then having to watch a group marching with MAGA hats and signs. Would I be the only one booing? Would I look around me and see my neighbors cheering and so wimp out and be silent? Would I then be ashamed of myself for being like the Germans who didn't say anything after watching the Brown Shirts and CrystalNaccht? Or closer to home, like the Republican Congress people who disagree with Trump in private but are too cowardly to do it in public?
So we stick it to Trump by treating the 250th like any other Independence Day? I suppose, but that simply robs a special milestone of its significance.
In 2024, I was keenly aware that whoever became president would be president for the 250th birthday, and I dreaded the thought that Trump might be that president, because I knew it would become an embarrassing and fetid spectacle very much like what he is endeavoring to make it now. But I've come around to embracing this whole disgrace.
We voted for Trump, and we are getting the sorts of things you get when Trump is president; this is what Trump would do, and we deserve nothing less than what we voted for. Will I watch a cage fight on the White House lawn? No. Will I watch any of the performers desperate and washed-up enough to participate in this debacle? No. Will I watch a Trump rally that compensates for the vacuum created by all the artists who dropped out because it suddenly occurred to them this was not a celebration of America, but of Trump? No. But let's have this parade of Various Disgraces proceed undiluted and in full technicolor, a tribute to everything the Founders and Revolutionaries fought against. I'm all for it. As JVL said yesterday, what we need and what we deserve is a mirror.
The problem is: those most in need of the epiphany that *should* result from being confronted with the fruits of their choice are those least disposed to experience it.
Yes. And I’m tired of being told “we” deserve it. Trump won the election by lies and Republican gerrymandering. Half this country didn’t vote for him: 48.34% Dems for Harris and 1.85% Other = 50.19%; 49.81% for Trump. Yet the Electoral vote was 58% Trump, 42% Harris, 0% Other. And it’s supplicating, brown-lipped Republicans in Congress who have enabled and encouraged him to do his worst, including Mitch McConnell who ensured in 2020 that Trump wouldn’t be impeached. So “we” don’t deserve this. But they and the MAGATs and enablers do.
Yeah, that's generally how things go. Who most badly needs to watch MSNOW? Fox News viewers. Who actually watches MSNOW? Nothing but Democrats. Everybody preaches to their choir these days.
But, history will take note, and so will the world.
My husband and I intend to anti-celebrate trump's birthday by attending our local No Kings protest and praying DC gets hit with a series of thunderstorms (see yesterday's Triad). And yes, July 4th belongs to the people, not trump and his band of mindless sycophants. We'll be ignoring whatever goes on in DC in favor of hanging out with family and friends.
Important to recognize that the slush fund is specifically $1.776 Billion, to make the rubes believe that it is a patriotic request to "right wrongs" as did our founders. And DonnieFelon said only "for now" in backing off; not down. He will only back down if the Senate passes legislation banning his demand. Republicans will have to stand and be counted. Interesting times!
Exactly - I think the report just said the White House will "stop working on the fund". Better to make sure it's canceled and cannot come back, otherwise Trump may well just resume once he gets the votes in Congress.
There’s a lot of focus on the $1.776 fund in the news but I haven’t seen anything new about the part of the “settlement” guaranteeing immunity for crimes and civil wrongs to the Trump family. I’m hoping the judge reopening the case will address this. Can any lawyers in the group confirm?
On the slush fund - I agree as far as it goes, but the exemption from tax audits for Trump. his family,, and his businesses seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle, although I think I remember reading somewhere that he is trying to hang on to that. That should be a massive scandal too, and needs to be ended.
Those exemptions are the main reason Trump wanted it; giving the peons what is chump change to him would keep them happy with him and have them insisting on its passage. Like tariffs, I imagine he’ll try to find some other way to squeeze it in.
“And hawks in the American media are beside themselves over the whole thing: “THE LEAK IN AXIOS WAS A VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW AND PROVIDED SUPPORT TO THE IRANIAN REGIME AND ITS HEZBOLLAH PROXY,” conservative radio host Marc Levin fumed.”
The true definition of irony: These clowns complaining that the leaks provided support for Iranian regimen and Hezbollah, when they were crying foul and couldn’t criticize Obama enough when he negotiated the JCPOA—even calling Obama a Muslim terrorist and traitor!
Therefore, the only reason one could posit that this is administration looks weak and is actively aiding and abetting a terrorist nation is because this administration is WEAK (the cats out of the bag) and we are aiding and abetting a terrorist nation: Russia! IMHO…:)
Their accusations and outrage might be more credible if Axios hadn’t become a favored source of stenography for what the administration wants in the media. Time for those big boy pants Donald. You got the job; now comes the responsibility part.
Well said, and the reason Netanyahu is on the menu. Even Rubio teed it off by claiming it was Netanyahu who got us into the war—only after Iran closed the Straight of course.
Before then the sagacious adage hold true:
“Victory has a thousand fathers—defeat is an orphan!”…:)
It was Netanyahu who got us in this war--or the interests of Israel. A case could have been made that our ally Israel has been beset by terror attacks by organizations sponsored by Iran, and that it was time to go the root of the problem, but that would have undercut Trump's need for an imminent threat to the US to justify by-passing Congress.
Notice that these hawks in the American media weren't beside themselves because the "liberal" media lied about what Trump said, just that the truth was leaked and wasn't hidden. My family Zoom group recently watched and discussed "All the Presidents' Men", about how the two Washington Post journalists uncovered the Watergate coverup. I continue to think that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are the most important of the Bill of Rights.
Well said, and 100% agree about the free press and Bill of Rights; unfortunately, most of the MSM and Social media are controlled by billionaires aligned with Trump’s interests—onside of some independent media, our voices are being drowned out by the noise; so to speak..:)
I have a tough time believing Trump was actually ranting at Bibi. Bibi has the Israeli version of the Epstein files and they go back to Epstein's beginning years.
You know it's bad when Trump's own cowardly lions of the Senate start pushing back on Trump's corruption.
To be fair, how many of those senators have any motivation or feeling for the beneficiaries of the super duper slush fund? I suspect zero to none and mostly antipathy. Those MAGA fever dreams of sudden wealth can die a quick death and they can move on to the next grift. It really has been a bad few weeks for Trump personally on the legal front. He has lost with keeping his name on the Kennedy Center which caused him sour grapes. He has issues moving forward with the former East Wing and now senate antipathy combined with increased legal scrutiny are killing off the slush fund. Trump may be an innovator in corruption, but not all innovations work out. Too many of his innovations have, but as we head towards the 250 4th of July it looks like the late spring and early summer may be a time of great personal humiliation for our Orange Julius. The humiliations alone is a reason to celebrate 250 years of the Republic and that the reason and principles it was founded on can endure a tinpot dictator like Trump.
My plan is to celebrate with my neighbors in our majority minority small town. Everyone needs to shun Donald and stay home to celebrate. It is also less expensive. I live about a half mile from downtown. I'll walk. No parking problem. 8647
Hi Bill. I’m going to quote JVL in response to you:
“For our semiquincentennial I want Donald Trump on stage ranting like a lunatic. We squandered our inheritance. We should be confronted with our choices.
America doesn’t need a celebratory retrospective.
We need a mirror.”
I too want Trump on stage ranting like a lunatic. I want his "crowd" to consist of his sycophantic regime members, hundred to two hundred total. No member of Congress should show up at this travesty. Seriously, who needs to have the 250th anniversary of this country ruined by the ravings of this moron? You can listen to it the other 364 days.
I just want the Supreme Court justices to have to sit through it. It's only fair.
I want Trump to loudly and publicly thank his "boy" Chief Justice Roberts.
Attendance for Moscow Mitch should be mandatory.
I want to see Trump instigate an insurrection at the Supreme Court. I wonder which judge they would want to hang first.
The uppity black woman, of course!
The entire SCOTUS should be required to wear their lovely black robes & also be required to sit in the full sun through the whole 137 minutes of Trump in full throat.
Alito and Thomas will probably be enjoying too much and I will spare Sotomayor, Brown Jackson and Kagan.
I see a clear Eighth Amendment problem, since that certainly sounds cruel and unusual. I think scheduling a lunch with Trump is more than enough to show SCOTUS the error of its ways.
I thought it was now called the Unsupreme Court. :)
I think it's been renamed the Supine Court.
For shame. What did Kagan ever do to you? Don't you put that evil on her, Ricky Bobby.
And if there's a Good, there will be an enormous lightning bolt the second his stubby little fingers touch the mic.
I really wish that specific Triad was free for everyone. I wanted to link to it so many times yesterday, whenever conversation turned to the Dome of Electric Death and the desecration of the White House lawn. Not to mention Trump desecrating our national anniversary.
"Dome of Electric Death" 👍
Someone needs to tell Trump that if he feels a tingle in the air to grab hold of the cage ...
Trumpster Fyre Festival
I hope this happens too, and I can't wait to not watch it while I'm doing useful, productive and fun things with family and friends.
“This fund was open to anybody who was so weaponized [sic], targeted, or persecuted, whether they were Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent, or otherwise,”
This had to be in a written statement because nobody could keep a straight face while saying this into a camera.
Disagree. There's a ream of video evidence refuting your claim. Carve out a few hours, google "Trump speech," put on those Clockwork Orange eyelid clamps, and strap yourself in because it's going to be a long ride.
Bill, I do appreciate your effort to help me allow myself to celebrate the 4th this 250th year. I was a young teen for the 200th. But it’s not only the orange one that tamps down my celebratory spirit. It’s his cult and what they represent about our country. I have been defiant towards my maga neighbors in recent years and decorated with flags all over the place. This year it is just different.
I will keep trying to change my attitude. Not sure I have the energy.
Yes, Stacy, I agree with you about this. I would be afraid that MAGA cult folks would shanghai at least part of my town's fun Independence Day celebration. I am imagining myself cheering the high school marching band and then having to watch a group marching with MAGA hats and signs. Would I be the only one booing? Would I look around me and see my neighbors cheering and so wimp out and be silent? Would I then be ashamed of myself for being like the Germans who didn't say anything after watching the Brown Shirts and CrystalNaccht? Or closer to home, like the Republican Congress people who disagree with Trump in private but are too cowardly to do it in public?
You could wear a rude or oppositional t-shirt and say it all without saying a thing.
Good idea!
Exactly!
KEEP your defiance! Festoon your roof with flags if you choose, it’s our country, too, and they need to be reminded of that, now more than ever.
Outstanding! I've been looking for a reason to go festooning! Boy, everything is really coming up Pseu!
So we stick it to Trump by treating the 250th like any other Independence Day? I suppose, but that simply robs a special milestone of its significance.
In 2024, I was keenly aware that whoever became president would be president for the 250th birthday, and I dreaded the thought that Trump might be that president, because I knew it would become an embarrassing and fetid spectacle very much like what he is endeavoring to make it now. But I've come around to embracing this whole disgrace.
We voted for Trump, and we are getting the sorts of things you get when Trump is president; this is what Trump would do, and we deserve nothing less than what we voted for. Will I watch a cage fight on the White House lawn? No. Will I watch any of the performers desperate and washed-up enough to participate in this debacle? No. Will I watch a Trump rally that compensates for the vacuum created by all the artists who dropped out because it suddenly occurred to them this was not a celebration of America, but of Trump? No. But let's have this parade of Various Disgraces proceed undiluted and in full technicolor, a tribute to everything the Founders and Revolutionaries fought against. I'm all for it. As JVL said yesterday, what we need and what we deserve is a mirror.
The problem is: those most in need of the epiphany that *should* result from being confronted with the fruits of their choice are those least disposed to experience it.
Yes. And I’m tired of being told “we” deserve it. Trump won the election by lies and Republican gerrymandering. Half this country didn’t vote for him: 48.34% Dems for Harris and 1.85% Other = 50.19%; 49.81% for Trump. Yet the Electoral vote was 58% Trump, 42% Harris, 0% Other. And it’s supplicating, brown-lipped Republicans in Congress who have enabled and encouraged him to do his worst, including Mitch McConnell who ensured in 2020 that Trump wouldn’t be impeached. So “we” don’t deserve this. But they and the MAGATs and enablers do.
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/elections/2024
Yeah, that's generally how things go. Who most badly needs to watch MSNOW? Fox News viewers. Who actually watches MSNOW? Nothing but Democrats. Everybody preaches to their choir these days.
But, history will take note, and so will the world.
To paraphrase Obama, I'm not going to stick it to Trump. *You* stick it to Trump.
My husband and I intend to anti-celebrate trump's birthday by attending our local No Kings protest and praying DC gets hit with a series of thunderstorms (see yesterday's Triad). And yes, July 4th belongs to the people, not trump and his band of mindless sycophants. We'll be ignoring whatever goes on in DC in favor of hanging out with family and friends.
Important to recognize that the slush fund is specifically $1.776 Billion, to make the rubes believe that it is a patriotic request to "right wrongs" as did our founders. And DonnieFelon said only "for now" in backing off; not down. He will only back down if the Senate passes legislation banning his demand. Republicans will have to stand and be counted. Interesting times!
Exactly - I think the report just said the White House will "stop working on the fund". Better to make sure it's canceled and cannot come back, otherwise Trump may well just resume once he gets the votes in Congress.
There’s a lot of focus on the $1.776 fund in the news but I haven’t seen anything new about the part of the “settlement” guaranteeing immunity for crimes and civil wrongs to the Trump family. I’m hoping the judge reopening the case will address this. Can any lawyers in the group confirm?
Sun Tzu left out the most important part. Make sure your troops can do the most push-ups! /s
And are of a an appropriate height and weight... .
And gender. And ethnicity.
For the troops who do the fighting they don’t seem too concerned about ethnicity, but the browns can’t possibly qualify to lead.
"No fatties!" -Sun Tzu
Don't I feel silly for just making the same joke.
And no fatties!
And can pay their own way.
On the slush fund - I agree as far as it goes, but the exemption from tax audits for Trump. his family,, and his businesses seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle, although I think I remember reading somewhere that he is trying to hang on to that. That should be a massive scandal too, and needs to be ended.
Those exemptions are the main reason Trump wanted it; giving the peons what is chump change to him would keep them happy with him and have them insisting on its passage. Like tariffs, I imagine he’ll try to find some other way to squeeze it in.
"that indignation only grew stronger during the congressional recess"
I suspect that constituents howling with rage in an election year may have had something to do with that.
“And hawks in the American media are beside themselves over the whole thing: “THE LEAK IN AXIOS WAS A VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW AND PROVIDED SUPPORT TO THE IRANIAN REGIME AND ITS HEZBOLLAH PROXY,” conservative radio host Marc Levin fumed.”
The true definition of irony: These clowns complaining that the leaks provided support for Iranian regimen and Hezbollah, when they were crying foul and couldn’t criticize Obama enough when he negotiated the JCPOA—even calling Obama a Muslim terrorist and traitor!
Therefore, the only reason one could posit that this is administration looks weak and is actively aiding and abetting a terrorist nation is because this administration is WEAK (the cats out of the bag) and we are aiding and abetting a terrorist nation: Russia! IMHO…:)
Their accusations and outrage might be more credible if Axios hadn’t become a favored source of stenography for what the administration wants in the media. Time for those big boy pants Donald. You got the job; now comes the responsibility part.
Agreed, but the thing about Trump that stands out the most—No Accountability!
He’s built a turn key operation for perennial grifters and scapegoats—one more corrupt and incompetent than the next.
The likes of which the world has never seen before!…:)
"No Accountability" is a Cardinal Virtue from the Narcissism Handbook. Under no circumstances is the narcissist to be blamed for anything.
Well said, and the reason Netanyahu is on the menu. Even Rubio teed it off by claiming it was Netanyahu who got us into the war—only after Iran closed the Straight of course.
Before then the sagacious adage hold true:
“Victory has a thousand fathers—defeat is an orphan!”…:)
It was Netanyahu who got us in this war--or the interests of Israel. A case could have been made that our ally Israel has been beset by terror attacks by organizations sponsored by Iran, and that it was time to go the root of the problem, but that would have undercut Trump's need for an imminent threat to the US to justify by-passing Congress.
Totally agree, although the neocons in the administration were also gung-ho, and didn’t need much persuasion.
But my point was how quickly they all turn on each other when the plan goes south—it’s these people’s only actual skill set…:)
Notice that these hawks in the American media weren't beside themselves because the "liberal" media lied about what Trump said, just that the truth was leaked and wasn't hidden. My family Zoom group recently watched and discussed "All the Presidents' Men", about how the two Washington Post journalists uncovered the Watergate coverup. I continue to think that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are the most important of the Bill of Rights.
Well said, and 100% agree about the free press and Bill of Rights; unfortunately, most of the MSM and Social media are controlled by billionaires aligned with Trump’s interests—onside of some independent media, our voices are being drowned out by the noise; so to speak..:)
Poor Marc Levin. I'd never heard of him a month ago, and now when I see his name all I can think is, "oh, the micropenis guy!"
🤣
I have a tough time believing Trump was actually ranting at Bibi. Bibi has the Israeli version of the Epstein files and they go back to Epstein's beginning years.
You know it's bad when Trump's own cowardly lions of the Senate start pushing back on Trump's corruption.
Well, I think Trump is pissed at Bibi, bkz Bibi promised he'd have a Nobel Peace Prize in two weeks.
A July 4th tradition for me is watching Pop Goes the Fourth featuring the Boston Pops Orchestra.
The 1812 Overture! (A Capitol Fourth is on the third this year, to kick off the weekend.)
To be fair, how many of those senators have any motivation or feeling for the beneficiaries of the super duper slush fund? I suspect zero to none and mostly antipathy. Those MAGA fever dreams of sudden wealth can die a quick death and they can move on to the next grift. It really has been a bad few weeks for Trump personally on the legal front. He has lost with keeping his name on the Kennedy Center which caused him sour grapes. He has issues moving forward with the former East Wing and now senate antipathy combined with increased legal scrutiny are killing off the slush fund. Trump may be an innovator in corruption, but not all innovations work out. Too many of his innovations have, but as we head towards the 250 4th of July it looks like the late spring and early summer may be a time of great personal humiliation for our Orange Julius. The humiliations alone is a reason to celebrate 250 years of the Republic and that the reason and principles it was founded on can endure a tinpot dictator like Trump.
Celebrate our July the 4th. Do nothing else. Have a blast.
Pay no attention to the man child behind the curtain.
My plan is to celebrate with my neighbors in our majority minority small town. Everyone needs to shun Donald and stay home to celebrate. It is also less expensive. I live about a half mile from downtown. I'll walk. No parking problem. 8647