Tuesday, October 14, 2025

The Snapshot

Tuesday, October 14, 2025.  Protests this Saturday across the country, CBS gets into bed with Bari Weiss let's hope they deloused her first, Barack Obama points to warning signs, and much more.




Millions of people will take to the streets again this Saturday to protest the autocratic regime of President Donald Trump, his government shutdown, and his demolition of Medicare, Medicaid, and other public programs in service of tax cuts for billionaires. The protests, under the brand No Kings, have the potential to be the largest ever in the United States.

As of last Friday, 2,500 events were planned across every state, Europe, and Canada, No Kings organizers said. They expect that number to grow. Multiple cities will host anchor events, including Bozeman, Montana, a college town that rarely makes national news. Other No Kings anchor protests will be in Atlanta, Boston, Kansas City, New Orleans, San Francisco, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. The latter two have been burdened by a persistent federal law enforcement presence over the past several weeks. 

“If you are cynical, you might not understand the utility of simply standing together and showing the massive agreement in this moment around our disdain for a president who believes he is a king,” said Lisa Gilbert, co-president of the nonprofit Public Citizen and one of the rally’s organizers.


At THE NEW REPUBLIC, Greg Sargent uses his DAILY BLAST podcast to explain how the attacks by Donald Chump and Chump's love slaves did not work out the way that they had hoped.  Excerpt:

Greg Sargent: This is the Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.

It has become very clear that President Donald Trump is really, really worried about the No Kings protests that are scheduled for October 18. Suddenly, multiple Republicans are all using the same disgusting talking point about the protests, referring to them as agitators and terrorists. It sure looks coordinated. They’re all using the same vile language. This really displays extraordinary contempt for our whole political system. Yet we think it’ll backfire. It’ll only prompt the protests to get larger, and there’s nothing Trump hates more than seeing big crowds arrayed against him. Today we’re talking about all this with writer Jill Lawrence, who has a new piece for The Bulwark on Trump’s hatred of our system and of democratic voters. Jill, thanks for coming on.

Jill Lawrence: Thanks for having me, Greg.

Sargent: So the No Kings protests are set for next Saturday. Let’s listen to what House speaker Mike Johnson had to say about this.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (voiceover): This Hate America rally that they have coming up for October 18th. The Antifa crowd and the Pro-Hamas crowd and the Marxist, they’re all gonna gather on the mall. We got some House Democrats selling t-shirts for this event. It is an outrageous gathering for outrageous purposes.

Sargent: So there you heard Johnson talk about Antifa, pro-Hamas, Marxists, Jill. These are American citizens, millions of them exercising their right to peacefully protest. Your response to what you heard there from Johnson?

Lawrence: Well, I’m not surprised. And this is traditional, this is constitutional, this is a right, and they’re trying to turn it into something really evil. But that’s because they’re scared of it, and they know that it turns public opinion.

The problem here is that people like Johnson and the Republicans in Congress aren’t doing their jobs. They’re not putting any checks and balances on the president, and they’re not upholding American values or even American constitutional rights.

So this is where we are. The people have to protest, and I don’t really see this working out the way they hope.

Sargent: Well, they clearly hope for some sort of violence, which either will allow them to respond with violence of their own—state violence—or to demonize the protests as terrorism and extremism. You know, the funny thing about this is, as you alluded to, the more people show up, the more other people feel supported, and it really is a sort of snowballing effect that can take place in these situations. And I think that’s what really worries them.

Lawrence: I think they should be worried, because nothing they’re doing is popular. And people who may support them generally on issues like crime and immigration are seeing how they carry out these policies. And he’s down on his best issues in polls, and the midterms—if they go ahead fairly and freely—will put a check on Trump, at least through the House. So that’s the problem. And the more momentum they gather, and the more peaceful they are, and the more it’s obvious that there are troops hanging around with nothing to do except maybe provoke people, then, you know, the worse it’s gonna get for them. 



Last night on MSNBC, Rachel Maddow explained that a huge turnout is expected at the protests.
 


The protests matter.  They put us on record that we do not consent to the destruction of democracy, we do not join Chump in his efforts to burn the Constitution, we say the US stands for something and we will not let Chump degrade and destroy our country.

Speaking with Marc Maron, former President Barack Obama about the state of dismay.  





Former President Barack Obama has weighed in on President Donald Trump’s latest escalation — sharply condemning the president’s call to jail Chicago’s mayor and Illinois’ governor for opposing his deployment of National Guard troops to the city.

Speaking on Marc Maron’s “WTF” podcast released Monday, Obama accused Trump of “politicizing the military” and warned that the deployment of troops to U.S. cities is “inherently corrupting” when used against civilians.




He called Trump’s federalization of National Guard troops “a deliberate end run around” of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, which prevents the use of the nation’s military for domestic law enforcement.

The law says “don’t use our military on domestic soil unless there is an extraordinary emergency of some sort,” Obama said. “When you see an administration suggest that ordinary street crime is an insurrection, or—”

“A terrorist act,” Maron added.

“A terrorist act,” Obama replied. “That is a genuine effort to weaken how we have understood democracy.”

He suggested that if he had sent troops to Republican strongholds,

“Man, it’s almost too easy of a thought experiment,” Obama said. “If I had just sent the National Guard into Texas, and just said, You know what? Lot of problems in Dallas. Lot of crime there. I don’t care what [Governor Greg Abbott] thinks. I’m gonna kind of take over law enforcement

“It is mind boggling to me how Fox News would have responded,” he said.




Obama said that instead of caving to the administration, universities should say, “This will hurt if we lose some grant money in the federal government, but that’s what endowments are for. Let’s see if we can ride this out, because what we’re not going to do is compromise our basic academic independence.”

Firms should also take a stand against the administration’s pressure campaign to turn away from hiring minorities and women, Obama said.

“We think it’s important, because of what this country is, to hire people from different backgrounds,” Obama said of what businesses should stand for during the second Trump administration. 

Universities, law firms and other businesses have all reached agreements with the White House and changed policies to end investigations or avoid being targeted.



As I noted last week, people like Chump can't learn.  They can't alter course.  It's the ego and the stupidity combined.  Republicans try to help him out and he blows them off because he's not a Republican.  That is reality.  He's distorted what that party was about.  His cult gets smaller each day and, in about a decade, you'll find that the Republican Party tries to foist him off on us, tries to say he was a Democrat.  And he was a member of the Democratic Party once upon a time.  But he's no Democrat.  He's nothing but a fascist.  I'll be glad when Republicans wipe their hands of him but not so glad that I'll let them lie that, while in office, he was a Democrat.  Karl Rove becomes the latest GOP insider to try to offer him advice that we all know Chump will blow off. Frank Yemi (INQUISITR) reports:

Karl Rove has a warning for President Donald Trump, troops on American streets may juice a few tough-on-crime headlines, but it is likely to backfire where it counts, with voters. On Fox News’ Journal Editorial Report, the GOP strategist walked through fresh polling and concluded that President Donald Trump’s push to deploy National Guard units into Democratic-led cities, even over governors’ objections, is “going to end up being a loser.”
A new Reuters/Ipsos survey finds 58 percent of U.S. adults say the president should deploy troops only in response to external threats, not to police domestic unrest. That posture commands 72 percent support among Democrats and a narrow majority among Republicans, 51 percent. Just 37 percent of respondents say presidents should be able to send troops into a state “even if its governor objects,” a view driven largely by Republicans, while independents lean against it. In other words, the bigger the standoff with blue-state leaders, the worse the politics get with the middle.

“If a governor objects, though, the partisanship starts to be felt,” Rove said, noting that independents tend to side with Democrats on the question. He allowed that some crime-concerned voters might credit Trump for “taking action,” but still judged the overall play as negative. “This ultimately, I think, will tend to be a loser,” he said, sketching out the same risk Republicans faced in 2020 when federal force became the story rather than the solution.
Judges in multiple jurisdictions have slowed or stalled deployments, and in the Chicago area, the legal fight collided with optics when several Texas Guardsmen were quietly sent home and replaced after a viral backlash over fitness standards. The administration insists the Guard is there to protect federal facilities and Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel, but the courtroom calendar, not the cable-chyrons, now dictates the tempo.

Axios’ roundup of public surveys mirrors the Reuters/Ipsos findings, with broad discomfort over domestic military missions and a strong consensus that the armed forces should remain politically neutral. Task & Purpose, summarizing the same poll, underscores that sentiment, noting overwhelming support, 83 percent, for keeping the military out of politics. That neutral-ground instinct is exactly what Rove is tapping, the idea that voters may tolerate a “surge” for a true emergency, but will punish a president who makes troop deployments feel routine.


Rove is standing in the middle of the road, waiving his hands desperately at Chump who is blindly barreling down the road ignoring all the signs alerting everyone to the construction up ahead.  Chump doesn't know how to hit the brakes, how to save himself. 



Rove's warning about how conservatives will see the fascistic move Chump is making comes as James Bickerton (NEWSWEEK) notes four quicksand traps for Chump in the latest polling, "On immigration, Trump has a net rating of -4.7 percentage points, for the economy it was -15.3, for trade it was -16 and -27.7 was recorded for inflation."  People are tired of it -- all of it.  They're especially tired of inflation and Chump's non-stop lies about inflation.  Christopher Rugaber (LOS ANGELES TIMES) explains:


Inflation has risen in three of the last four months and is slightly higher than it was a year ago, when it helped sink then-Vice President Kamala Harris' presidential campaign. Yet you wouldn't know it from listening to President Donald Trump or even some of the inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve.
Trump told the United Nations General Assembly late last month: “Grocery prices are down, mortgage rates are down, and inflation has been defeated.”

And at a high-profile speech in August, just before the Fed cut its key interest rate for the first time this year, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said: “Inflation, though still somewhat elevated, has come down a great deal from its post-pandemic highs. Upside risks to inflation have diminished.”

Yet dismissing or even downplaying inflation while it is still above the Fed's target of 2% poses big risks for the White House and the Federal Reserve. For the Trump administration, it could find itself on the wrong side of a potent issue: Surveys show that many Americans still see high prices as a major burden on their finances.


As you read through Rugaber's report you see bad news over and over -- one example?  Artificial trees are expected to rise in cost by 10% since Christmas season last year.  And it doesn't help Chump's image that the "American-Firster" actually puts America last over and over.  Steve H. Hanke (FORBES) reports:


The world’s biggest deadbeat has passed the begging bowl again. This time, Argentina is asking for $20 billion. That’s the size of the swap line that U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has promised to pony up in order to bail out Argentina and its floundering president, Javier Milei.
Where will that kind of money come from? Secretary Bessent will dip into the seldom-used Exchange Stabilization Fund at the U.S. Treasury. He will do so without Congressional approval. Why? Because President Trump has bet on President Milei. Trump sees Milei as Uncle Sam’s man in Latin America—the man who will lead the charge against the “pink tide” of leftist Latin American governments and counter the commercial and geopolitical inroads made by China in the region.

But maybe President Trump has bet on a dead horse. After all, Argentina has never been a good bet. Since independence, it has faced one economic crisis after another. In the last two generations alone, there have been one hyperinflation (1989–90); six banking crises (1980, 1982, 1995, 2001, 2008, and 2019); five balance-of-payments crises (1958, 1962, 1981–82, 1989, and 2018–19); four external debt defaults (1982, 1989, 2001, and 2020); three local public debt defaults (1989, 2007–09, and 2019); numerous currency devaluations; and a near-constant, punishing inflation.



He's got money for Argentia (our tax dollars) but Special Ed in this country is now at risk?  Zachary Schermele (USA TODAY) reports:

Families and educators across the country were plunged into a state of uncertainty over the weekend after the federal Education Department laid off practically every staffer in the government's special education division.

Nearly the entire Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, including the Office of Special Education Programs, was let go, according to agency workers and their union.

Employees in the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights, many of whom work to protect students with disabilities from discrimination, were also laid off, the union said. The impacted divisions included offices in the District of Columbia, Seattle and Atlanta.


 



He's got serious problems, problems of his own making.  No one to blame but himself.  Did someone say Epstein and Maxwell?  Yes, the two pedophiles continue to cause problems for their former pal Chump -- even with Jeffrey Epstein dead and gone and even with Ghislaine Maxwell locked away in prison, they continue to cause problems for Chump. 




The decision to move disgraced socialite Ghislaine Maxwell to a minimum-security female prison has been irritating her fellow inmates - who are angry at the move.

Reports from the US said the prisoners were even once placed on lockdown so her visitors could be properly accommodated. Maxwell, 63, was transferred to the Federal Prison Camp Bryan in Texas in August after three and a half years in a federal prison after her conviction for aiding Jeffrey Epstein in his abuse of under-age girls.
[. . .]
According to The Wall Street Journal, inmates were confined to their dormitories after breakfast on one occasion in August as Maxwell held meetings in the camp's chapel.

Some prisoners claimed they had been told the lockdown had been necessary because of the importance of her visitors.


Covering the same story, Isabel Keane (INDEPENDENT) notes:

It was not known whom Maxwell met with in the chapel that day, though some of her fellow inmates heard rumors that the lockdown was meant to accommodate important visitors, according to the report.

Later that day, one inmate said they saw Maxwell return to her dormitory with a smile on her face. When asked about her mysterious meeting, Maxwell said it went well, but didn’t share any other information, according to the report.

Meanwhile, less than a week later, the Department of Justice released a transcript of an interview Maxwell had had with senior official Todd Blanche weeks earlier in July.

During the interview with Blanche, Maxwell said she had never seen President Donald Trump doing anything inappropriate or illegal with Epstein when they were friends. Soon after, she was transferred to Federal Prison Camp Bryan.


 


Nothing is rotting more today than Chump's skin except for craven and collapsing media.  We addressed the freak show possibly joining CBS at the start of last month with "As ugly as she is stupid," "Barely Bari can't wait to destroy CBS NEWS," "An idiot named Bari Weiss," "Crazy Karens named Bari Weiss," "What Bari Weiss wants to (mis)teach the world" and "THIS JUST IN! BARI WEISS GROWLS NEXT TO HER FOOD BOWL!"


FUGLY CRACKPOT FREAK BARI WEISS IS SAID TO BE TRYING TO SQUEEZE INTO THE ROLE OF OMBUDSPERSON AT CBS NEWS -- IF SHE CAN LOSE FORTY OR FIFTY POUNDS AND SOMEONE CAN CUT THE POOP OUT OF HER ASS HAIR.  THE WALKING DISASTER HAS NEVER PLAYED WELL WITH OTHERS AND IS KNOWN TO BITE ANY CANINE  WHO COMES NEAR HER BOWL OF PURINA PRO PLAN SENIOR DOG FOOD.  

BUT WHEN THESE REPORTERS MET WITH HER FOR A SCHEDULED Q.&A., WEISS WAS SURPRSINGLY CHIPPER HAVING JUST TAKEN A DUMP ON A NEWSPAPER BESIDE HER DESK.

Q: DONALD CHUMP BASICALLY CREATED THIS JOB FOR YOU -- DOES THAT MEAN YOU'RE ON WELFARE?

BW: I'M A HAPPY CAMPER BECAUSE, DESPITE MY FACE, I MAY GET ON TV.  I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO DO TV BUT NEVER HAD ENOUGH MONEY FOR PLASTIC SURGERY.  THE RISE OF CHUMP MEANS ALL THE UGLY PEOPLE FINALLY GET A SHOT AT HIGH PROFILE MEDIOCRITY.  

Q: AND WHAT WILL YOU BRING TO CBS?

BW: DIVERSITY.  DIVERSITY'S REALLY IMPORTANT.

Q: BUT CHUMP GOT CBS TO AGREE TO KILL ALL DIVERSITY INITIATIVES.

BW: NO, NO AND NO.  WHAT WE DON'T WANT IS EQUALITY.  DIVERSITY -- AS WE DEFINE IT -- MEANS DIVERSITY OF OPINION.  FOR TOO LONG, MAINSTREAM MEDIA HAS STRESSED CONFORMITY WITH NO REAL DIVERSITY.  THANKS TO ME, CBS WILL NOW BE ABLE TO DEMONSTRATE TRUE DIVERSITY.  FOR EXAMPLE, THERE ARE A LOT OF MURDERS IN THIS COUNTRY.  MAINSTREAM MEDIA COVERAGE ALWAYS TREATS THIS AS A BAD THING.  DIVERSITY OF OPINION MEANS I CAN GO ON TV AND TALK ABOUT THE MANY GOOD PARTS OF MURDER.  OR ELDERLY ABUSE!  I WON'T BE PART OF THE ECHO CHAMBER CONDEMING IT.  I'LL POINT OUT THAT SOME ELDERLY PEOPLE DON'T HAVE MUCH TO DO AND ELDERLY ABUSE ACTUALLY BRINGS SOME EXCITEMENT INTO THEIR LIVES.  IT'S ABOUT PRETENDING YOU HAVE A BRAIN AND PRETENDING YOU'RE USING IT.  I'VE DONE THAT FOR MANY YEARS NOW.  LIKE WHO SAYS RACISM IS WRONG?  I NEVER HAVE!  DIVERSITY OF OPINION IS SO VERY IMPORTANT TO ME.  UNLESS WE'RE TALKING HIRING PEOPLE OF COLOR.  THEN YOU CAN FORGET ABOUT DIVERSITY.  DIVERSITY IS MY RIGHT TO ARGUE THAT THE EARTH IS FLAT WITHOUT BEING CANCELLED!  YES, I KNOW WHAT IT MEANS TO BE CANCELLED!  YES, I DO!


IN OTHER NEWS, OLD YELLOW TEETH RONNIE JACKSON HAS HAD HIS 2022 DEMOTION OVERTURNED.  REACHED FOR COMMENT BY THESE REPORTERS, JACKSON RESPONDED, "CAN'T TALK NOW, I'M OFF TO CVS FOR CREST WHITE STRIPS!"



In an early taste of CBS News’s editorial direction under its newly anointed editor in chief, the anti-woke pundit Bari Weiss, the storied outlet elevated a hit piece on Zohran Mamdani, the progressive New York City Democratic mayoral nominee.

CBS News on Friday published a segment featuring Olivia Reingold—a reporter for the Weiss-founded Free Press, which is now owned by the same parent company as CBS. Reingold, whose previous work for Weiss includes a much-criticized August story that attempted to downplay the Israel-induced famine in Gaza, shared her reporting on Mamdani on a CBS morning program.

“Some NYPD officers worry about Mamdani becoming the NYC mayor, The Free Press reports,” reads the title of the segment posted on CBSNews.com. (Until Monday, “Mamdani” had been misspelled “Mandani.”)

Reingold reported that officers in the New York Police Department are worried about Mamdani, with some “considering retiring.” The evidence? In total, her Free Press article contains quotes from four of the at least 33,000 uniformed officers serving in the NYPD. None of them are named.

 

 Shoddy reporting which is no surprise.  Weiss is not a reporter.  She was a (bad) opinion writer as John Oliver explained on Sunday.  

 

 

Let's wind down with Lawrence O'Donnell last night on MSNBC analyzing how Miss Sassy JD Vance lied over and over on Sunday trying to pretend Tom Homan didn't take a $50,000 bribe.


 



The following sites updated:






Trump Returns to BAD NEWS as Country ERUPTS

Historic turnout expected for nationwide 'No Kings' protests against Tru...

Top Dem: GOP 'wants to slash healthcare' but doesn’t ‘want to govern'

FAFO Season Follows Magas to Russia

My Conversation with Marc Maron | WTF Podcast - Barack Obama

Trump BLINDLY Sends HIS DOJ into DEVASTATING TRAP

'What has happened to the United States?' Ex-CIA Director slams Trump's ...

Martin Sheen eviscerates Trump's Cabinet: 'Smells of ego and fear and fa...

Trump dealt BRUTAL NEWS as Dems deploy secret weapon | Another Day

Trump picks a bad time to set vivid example of authoritarian self-dealing

Monday, October 13, 2025

MAGA Mike LOOKS AWFUL as his ENITRE WORLD is COLLAPSING

Federal Judges Sound Alarms About Supreme Court Justices Ruling In Favor...

Lawrence: Did Trump 'czar' Tom Homan take $50,000 from the FBI? JD Vance...

Rambling Trump accidentally reopens questions about an election payoff

What I Learned After RFK Jr. Sold Me Drugs: Author | The Daily Beast Pod...

Trump DOJ PANICS as Comey prepares BOMBSHELL FILINGS

Red alert! ‘Enemies list’ in action as DOJ bows to Trump demands to targ...

Remembering Diane Keaton | The View

Trump gets RUDE AWAKENING as Dems EXPOSE DARK PAST

Masked ICE agents struggling to find violent criminals in spite of terro...

🚨 Obama FINALLY deals CRUSHING BLOW to Trump

ICE ICE LAMELY (FULL EPISODE) | Titus Podcast/Armageddon Update

YIKES! DOJ BUSTED in Epstein COVER-UP as GOP STALLS RELEASE

Experts WARN of Trump PLAN for MIDDLE EAST

Trump LOSES IT after FOX host CALLS him OUT over MILITARY ATTACKS

DONALD TRUMP IS CHOOSING TO HURT SPECIAL NEEDS KIDS!

The Texas State Fair Is EMPTY As The Economy COLLAPSES

Maxwell Granted SECRET MEETING during PRISON LOCKDOWN

Is Trump Planning an Insurrection? w/ Rick Wilson

Trump LOSES CONTROL and Leaves Country as PLANS BLOW UP

TRUMP LOSES IT IN MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT TWEET!

Maga Blames OBAMA As Shutdown Wrecks Them

Trump gets RUDE AWAKENING in Arizona as IT FLIPS ON HIM QUICK

Bari Weiss: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

Trump’s SUFFERS BAD AT HOME during Monday MIDDLE EAST Trip

Congressman Exposes Epstein Cover-Up Secrets | Rep. Jake Auchincloss

Trump’s Rapid HEALTH DECLINE on DISPLAY as he STRUGGLES ON TRIP

The Snapshot

 Monday, October 13, 2025.  We do not have time for the craven or the cowardly.  If you're an elected Democrat and you think this is the time to flatter and praise Donald Chump, get your ass of TV, you're not helping anyone (not even, surprise,yourself). 


THE NEW REPUBLIC's latest RIGHT NOW WITH PERRY BACON podcast is up


In the latest episode of Right Now With Perry Bacon, Democratic strategist Arkadi Gerney argues that the United States is in the midst of a “cold civil war.” For liberals to win it, they must use “hardball” tactics, including borrowing from the Republicans’ playbook. Gerney says that Republican governors and attorneys general smartly coordinated during Joe Biden’s presidency to thwart him. He praised Democratic attorneys general for taking a similar tack, constantly filing and at times winning lawsuits against the Trump administration. He also lauded California Governor Gavin Newsom for immediately responding to Texas’s redistricting scheme with a proposal for California to redraw its district lines in ways favorable to Democrats. Newsom and Illinois Governor JB Pritzker’s threat to leave the bipartisan National Governors Association unless it condemns Trump’s National Guard deployments was also a savvy move, he says. A big and unresolved challenge for Democrats, according to Gerney, is dealing with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and the guard deployments from Trump that target Democratic-leaning cities in blue states. You can read the transcript here.


From the podcast:

Bacon: You used the words hardball and deterrence a few minutes ago. So I think part of this is—and even when we’ve talked a few times—every time you talk, I’m sort of like, “Do I really want California to be using their pension to, like, force…” But the answer to these questions has got to be yes—part of what you’re saying is, things that make me queasy in sort of a liberal way, are gonna [happen]. We’re in a fight over power, and that requires hardball. Is that the subtext here, or the actual text?


Gerney: I think that’s right. For example, in the last 24 hours, Governor Pritzker and Governor Newsom sent letters to the National Governors Association, which is the bipartisan coalition of all 50 governors—and they said, “Hey, if you’re not going to say something about National Guard troops coming into our states without our request, we’re going to drop out of this organization.” And I think that’s a healthy response to something that’s not working anymore.


I think we have to be able to look squarely at what we have. At the end of the day, yes, we want to have a national bipartisan governors association where they talk about ideas across party lines. But if the red-state governors are not going to say something about something that is an across-the-board violation of the Constitution and of the role of states, what’s the point of being in something like this? 

 And look, I’ve talked about some of the challenges that blue states have around affordability and this sort of net migration toward red states. But blue states have a lot to be proud of too. If you look at educational outcomes, if you look at life expectancy—there’s a big difference. If you look at crime in cities—Republicans talk a lot about crime in Chicago and cities like that, but if you look at crime across states and control for urbanization, there’s more crime in red states. There are a lot of reasons for that, but I think there’s a lot that’s going reasonably well in blue states, and part of what you want to do is tell that story.


We are helped by strength and when we don't show it we embarrass ourselves.  Senator Mark Kelly was a damn fool yesterday on CNN's STATE OF THE UNION -- see Ava and my "Media: Can Dems stop caving, can the media stop whoring?"  Was his goal to have Republicans think, "Oh, he's the reasonable one."  There are people you can pull off from Chump.  Mark Kelly's bowing and scaping -- the same thing that Senator John Fetterman does -- is not going to help us or our country.  

CNN reports this morning that the last Israeli hostages from the October 7th assault have been released this morning.  That's good.  That doesn't mean peace.   It was 20 people.  About what Joe Biden got out of each negotiated pause.  It doesn't mean peace.  You're an idiot if you can't grasp that.  It didn't mean peace in the past as Ava and I noted:


This could very well be yet another pause masked as a cease-fire.  

A true peace plan probably wouldn't result in what took place September 29th -- that's when Chump announced it . . . with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his side  -- with only Netanyahu at his side.

The willful stupidity on the part of the press and the part of elected officials when it comes to this fact speaks to a very anti-Muslim point of view.  We get that, right?  When Chump pretends to have talks of peace re: Ukraine, the press and politicians notice if a Ukrainian representative is not present.  

But leave, for example, Izz al-Din al-Haddad out of the announcement and it doesn't matter?

It matters and it's very significant.   

There is no peace plan -- certainly not one that's going to benefit the Palestinian people.  

How do you miss that?  If it's not assuming that Palestinians are less human -- the anti-Muslim point of view we noted above -- then it's just exhaustion over this conflict that didn't begin in October 2003.  But even that exhaustion goes to anti-Muslim bias.  Because you're ready to embrace anything just to see it 'ended' -- you're willing to ignore the Palestinian needs.


In terms of the US, in terms of Mark Kelly, the bigger problem is he shot off his stupid and uninformed mouth.

Chump is putting US boots on the ground.  Are we going to discuss that?  They have no clear goals.  This is, as Elaine notes in "Stupid Donald Chump works to create a quagmire," how you get a quagmire.  And Idiot Mark Kelly, if that happens, you damn well better believe that your remarks will be remembered to insist the quagmire was built with bipartisan support.  Why do you have to be so damn stupid?



At THE NEW REPUBLIC, Michael Tomasky puts it very concisely:

 David Axelrod is far better known these days for occasionally wagging his finger at his fellow Democrats than for breathing partisan fire, so it caught my eye when he posted this on X Wednesday: “So far, the ICE gang has shot & killed an unarmed man & lied about the circumstances; shot a woman 5 times for obstructing their vehicle; roughed up elderly women and zip-tied small children; shot a clergyman in the face with a pepper ball; marched through downtown Chicago, masked and armed. And they’re not going after the ‘worst of the worse,’ [sic] as promised. Most of the people they’re snagging have clean records. Some are citizens. To be clear: This is NOT making Chicago safer. It’s state-sponsored mayhem; dangerous political theater calculated to provoke.”

Historians sometimes say that when societies are descending into fascism, it can be hard for the people to notice it in real time. Well, historians of the future, I’m here to tell you: We are noticing. Millions of us are noticing. And we are horrified and enraged. We are well aware: We once lived in a country that, for all its frequent imperfections, was a place where the rule of law was a broadly shared value and where leaders acted with democratic restraint. We now live in a country where there is no rule of law; where leaders, especially the president but also others who support him, spit on the idea not only of democratic restraint but of democracy itself; and where the timorous first reflex of nearly every member of one of our two political parties is, at virtually all times, to do precisely what the leader wants.

That’s fascism. It may be—for now—a comparatively mild form of fascism. Political opponents aren’t being jailed or shot, opposition media outlets aren’t being shuttered, and books aren’t being burned. But a lot of things are happening that are terrifying. And last year, we lived in a country where the three scenarios I just listed were barely conceivable. Today, we live in a country where they are more likely only a matter of time.

Let’s go back to Axelrod, and specifically, his use of the phrase “state-sponsored mayhem.” That is exactly what President Trump is imposing upon Chicago. To take just one of the incidents Axelrod cites: Pastor David Black of the First Presbyterian Church was with a small gaggle of protesters outside a Chicago ICE facility. Three agents stood on the roof of the two-story building as Black and the others stood on the sidewalk maybe 15 feet away from the building. Black raised his arms to the sky, as if in prayer. Someone who appears to be a fellow protester approached Black to confer with him. Next thing you see in this video is a considerable puff of smoke explode from Black’s forehead as he falls to the ground. That’s a clergyman. Exercising his First Amendment right (he’s fine, and he’s suing). Black later told CNN: “We could hear them laughing.”


He's right.  David Axelrod is right.  But there's Democratic Senator Mark Kelly on CNN praising and normalizing Convicted Felon Donald Chump.  Some one needs to whip these lazy and self-serving Democratic politicians into shape because we don't have time right now for their efforts to get praised as 'reasonable' by FOX "NEWS."

Dems in Congress need to be demanding answers not offering cover for the administration.  Fortunately, some are demanding answers.


 

Fortunately, former President Barack Obama is showing leadership.

 

Former Vice President Kamala Harris is speaking out.

 


The American  people are speaking out -- which scares the hell out of Chump.

 

 


US House Rep Jim Jordan insists ICE is doing God's work.  Was Jim doing God's work when he watched the college boys locker room?  Was he doing God's business when he looked the other way as the team doctor was in the showers and walking around the locker room with an erection?  Was Jim doing God's work when he mocked young men who complained about how the team doctor was always touching their cocks and balls?   In what world are we supposed to believe that Jim can do anything but bear false witness?

In the same world where an increasingly diminishing number of Americans will insist that ICE is not harming anyone.  The Chump administration thinks they can get away with this.  But they also think they can pose -- with crosses around their necks -- as good Christians and that's not working either.  Good Christians don't cover up for Jeffrey Epstein Good Christians don't let a man work directly under Kristi Noem when the media has reported for years on the two's alleged affair -- both are married. Good Christians don't take $50,000 bribes and other good Christians don't cover up for them.  Good Christians don't try to bully US senators in a committee hearing.  We can down the list all day but no one serving in Chump's corrupt and illegal administration qualifies as a good Christian.


Pope Leo?  He qualifies.  VATICAN NEWS reported this week:

Pope Leo XIV encouraged leaders and volunteers of the Catholic Charities USA network to persevere in their work pointing out that they follow the Gospel mandate to recognise Christ in the poor, the hungry, the homeless, and all those in need.

His words of gratitude came in a message to the network is gathered in San Juan, Puerto Rico or its 115th Annual Meeting.

Agents of Hope

Quoting Pope Francis’ definition of hope as “the desire and expectation of good things to come, despite our not knowing what the future may bring,” Pope Leo underlined the importance of Catholic Charities’ work across its 168 diocesan agencies.

He described them as “agents of hope” for millions of people in the United States, especially the most vulnerable, the migrants, refugees, and those unable to rely on their own resources.

“Through providing food, shelter, medical care, legal assistance, and many other gestures of kindness,” he wrote, “Catholic Charities affiliates across the United States show what Pope Francis often referred to as God’s ‘style’ of closeness, compassion, and tenderness.”

Witnesses of Hope

The Pope said that while poverty and forced migration bring immense challenges, migrants and refugees also serve as “witnesses to hope,” both by their resilience and through the faith they bring to the communities that welcome them, to find their new homes in your country.

He described them as “missionaries of hope,” strengthening parishes and building bridges across nations and cultures.


Chump never had a chance at heaven.  He's going to hell and he'll spend eternity there.  And if that is anyway different from what you think, you need to stop and reflect because one of three things has happened: You're deeply stupid, you're incredibly caring and overly optimistic or you are you confused and probably headed to hell yourself.

The faith community isn't confused.  Illinois' SHAW LOCAL MEDIA notes:

Wesley United Methodist Church will offer an “Immigration 101: Welcoming the Stranger” workshop for community members to learn about current immigration issues.

The free workshop will be held from 12:30 to 3 p.m. Oct. 12 at the church, 14 N. May St., Aurora.

“Wesley UMC and our UMC Northern Illinois Conference advocacy partner present a workshop to help us understand the current issues facing our immigrant neighbors – and give us some ideas of how we can support and help provide for neighbors in need!” Wesley United Methodist Church’s lead pastor, the Rev. Tammy Scott, said in a news release.



Some 50 peacemakers, including members of the Pax Christi USA National Council held a prayer service and vigil in support of immigrants outside of the headquarters of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency in Washington, DC on Friday, 3 October. The service was sponsored by Pax Christi USA, Pax Christi Metro DC - Baltimore, the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker, Franciscan Action Network, Congregation Action Network, Sisters of Mercy, the Quixote Center and other groups.

The service began with a welcome from Pax Christi USA Executive Director Charlene Howard. Sherry Simon, outgoing chair of the National Council, then read this message from Pax Christi USA Bishop President John Stowe, OFM Conv:

"I wish I could be there in person with Pax Christi USA and others for this witness on this eve of the Feast of Saint Francis. I hope that the words of Cardinal McElroy from the march on the World Day of Migrants and Refugees are still resounding in DC and beyond. He called out the assault on the most vulnerable that is taking place in DC and many places throughout the country.

"It is so vital that we who call ourselves Christians remind ourselves of the most fundamental Christian values, love of God and love of neighbour. As you bear witness in the nation's capital you are affirming the importance of human dignity, which is God-given and is more basic than our nationality or citizenship. You are also striving to uphold the common good, recognizing that we are one community in the US, brought together from all over the world and our immigrants have made us stronger and better and will continue to do so. Let us remember the biblical imperative that we welcome the stranger, and recognize that it is Christ himself whom we welcome. Let us insist on the respect for human dignity and the rights of all, for law-enforcement personnel to clearly identify themselves and their authority, and continue to work for the comprehensive immigration reform that can allow millions of our immigrant sisters and brothers to leave among us without fear."

The participants then sang Sweet Honey in the Rock's song, 'We who believe in freedom shall not rest,' which was followed by this reflection from Pax Christi USA 2016 Teacher of Peace Art Laffin:

 


The attacks attacks on faith and religious people started by Chump continue.  Clergy is being attacked by ICE non-stop.  For example, last week,  Tom Schuba, Cindy Hernandez, Selena Kuznikov, Michael Puente, Mary Norkol and Kade Heather (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES) reported:


Rabbi Michael Ben Yosef, a frequent attendee at protests, was among those detained. Video shows a few state troopers pinning him to the ground and detaining him about 7:30 p.m. near Lexington and 25th. He was charged with misdemeanor resisting arrest.

Yosef said he was holding a microphone and leading chants on a sidewalk when an ISP trooper started pushing protesters out of the way and approached Yosef.

“It was like I had no time to react, and next thing I know I was grabbed, they locked my arms and the other [troopers] came with him and threw me to the ground, pinned me down,” Yosef said about two hours later after he was released.

“All I saw was just the ground, and I saw sideways. I couldn’t see nothing. It was like I was literally trapped,” he said, adding that he was on his stomach as three troopers knelt on his back.

“I couldn’t resist. I was like crushed,” he said.


And MSNBC did the following video report Saturday.


We're all under attack.  No one is safe.  That's the reality of Chump's war on immigrants and it is why ICE needs to be out of US cities that don't want them in it, why the kidnapping needs to stop, why the attacks on citizens needs to stop, why ICE needs real oversight and why the masks need to come off.


The following sites updated: