#just another trump scam

[qqueenofhades]

i registered to vote for the first time ( i feel old) now that im an adult but my state has closed primary elections which i was wondering if you have an opinion about. my initial thought was that its bad because i had to register democrat (rather than my states green party which represents my beliefs more) just so i could vote between democrat candidates, which feels like being pressured into supporting the weird pseudo two party system we have. but then i looked it up and apparently a reason for this is so that people from opposing parties wont purposefully mess up the votes just so that their preferred candidates have an easier time winning, and i think that makes sense too. but is that actually the reason theyve closed it or is it just to force us dem/republican?? cause it feels strange

Okay, look. I respect the fact that you're a young person, and I appreciate that you have not only registered to vote, but plan to vote in the primaries, so I don't want to lecture you too much. That said: I am taking you out for coffee, I am sitting you down, I am looking into your eyes, and I am urgently telling you the following:

The Green Party is a scam. It is a scam. It has existed for decades in American politics as an empty shell corporation weaponizing the good intentions of young people like yourself, because all it theoretically stands for "it's good to save the planet maybe." Which is not something that any non-insane person seriously disagrees with, but there is no world in which that cause is actually furthered by registering/voting Green (you mentioned that you did vote for Democrats, which -- good, but listen to me here, youngun, okay?) It ran Jill Stein in 2016 to siphon more votes from HRC, and this election it plans to run Cornel West, a pro-Russian tankie who positively equated Bernie and Trump, as another spoiler candidate. It does not stand for "protecting the planet" or America in any real way. It has never elected a single senator or congressman, let alone a president. It stands for empty performance/grievance political theater by those people who feel too morally superior to vote for/affiliate with Democrats, often because the internet has told them that it's not Cool or Hip or Progressive enough.

If your main priority is climate/the environment, you're doing the right thing by registering as a Democrat and voting for Democrats. (Also: the adjectival form is Democratic. It is the Democratic party and Democratic candidates, otherwise you sound like the Fox News host who wrote a book literally entitled "The Democrat Party Hates America.") They are the only major party who has in fact passed major climate legislation and have made environmental justice a central tenet of their platform. As opposed to the Republicans, whose Project 2025, along with the rest of its nightmare fascist prescriptions, openly pledges to completely wreck existing climate protections and forbid any new ones, just because we weren't all dying fast enough under their death-cult rule already. That's the main logical fallacy I don't get among both the Online Leftists and the American electorate in general: "the Democrats aren't doing quite enough as I'd like, so I'll enable the active wrecking ball insane lunatics to get in power and ruin even the progress we HAVE managed to make!" Like. How does that even make sense?

On a federal level, the Greens have contributed nothing whatsoever of tangible value to American or international climate policy/legislation, environmental justice, or anything else, because as noted, they don't have any elected candidates and mostly focus on drawing voters away from Democrats. There might be plenty of good candidates on the local or city level, which -- great! Vote away for Greens if they're available, or the only other option is a Republican! But on the federal/primary level, please understand: once again, they are a scam. There is no point in affiliating yourself with them. You're welcome to register Green and vote Democratic, if that makes you feel better or if you prefer having another label next to your name, but once again, I'm telling you in my position as a salty Tumblr elder that they have done nothing but harm to the causes they claim to care about, because "environment" is such a nebulous priority and has demonstrably been hijacked to stop the American government entity, i.e. the Democrats, that is actually working to improve on it.

As for your question: nobody is "forcing" or "pressuring" you to vote in primaries. By your own admission, you made a conscious choice to register as a Democrat in order to vote for Democratic candidates. If you were just a regular registered voter of whatever party affiliation, you would vote in the general election for whatever candidate the primary process produced. But if you are sufficiently vested and committed to that process that you would like to have a say in who is running under that party label, it is not unreasonable that you would register as a member of that party. Nobody has twisted your arm behind your back and made you do so; you are taking a considerable level of initiative on your own. Likewise, open primaries can be both a good and bad thing. This falls under the "the political system we have is flawed, but we can't magically pretend it doesn't exist and act according to our own fantasyland versions of reality" thing that I keep saying over and over. So yes, if you want a role in shaping the Democratic candidates who emerge from a Democratic primary process, you will usually register as a Democrat, and nobody has forced you to do that. It's that simple.

Likewise as a general programming note: I'm trying to cut back on politics a bit right now, because I don't have the spoons/bandwidth/mental health to deal with it. I apologize. So if you've sent me a politics-related ask recently and haven't received a response, I'm not deliberately or maliciously ignoring you; I just am not able to handle it as much as usual and will have to put it on pause. However, I feel as if this is important enough to be worth saying, so, yeah.

[robertreich]

Trump’s Tax Scam: Why Nothing Trickled Down 

The Trump tax cuts were a YUGE scam.

But this November we have a chance to end this trickle-down hoax once and for all.

Donald Trump’s biggest legislative achievement (if you want to even call it that) was the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

The law permanently slashed corporate taxes and temporarily cut income tax rates mostly for rich individuals through the year 2025. The results were worse than I could have imagined.

Trump and his officials claimed the tax cuts would lead to corporations hiring more workers and would “very conservatively” lead to a $4,000 boost in household incomes.

What actually happened in the years since?

In AT&T’s case, the company saw its overall federal tax bill drop by 81%. It spent 31 times more on dividends and stock buybacks to enrich wealthy shareholders than it paid it in taxes. Meanwhile, it slashed over 40,000 jobs.

That was par for the course with Trump’s tax cuts.

Like AT&T, America’s biggest corporations didn’t use their tax savings to increase productivity or reward workers. Instead, they increased their stock buybacks and dividends.

Many of them, including AT&T, even ended up paying their executives more in some years than what they paid Uncle Sam.    

Those executives (along with other high earners) then got to keep more of their earnings because Trump’s tax cuts for individuals were heavily skewed toward the rich. The lowest earners? They got squat.

And many middle-income families saw their taxes go up.

And those supposed $4,000 raises, did you get one?

The bottom line is that Trump’s tax law fueled a massive transfer of wealth into the hands of the rich and powerful. Corporate profits have skyrocketed. U.S. billionaire wealth has more than DOUBLED since 2018.

The tax cuts have also added $2 trillion to the national debt so far, but that hasn’t stopped Trump and the so-called “party of fiscal responsibility” from doubling down on renewing them.

If Trump is reelected and Republicans take control of Congress, they’re planning to renew the expiring tax cuts for individuals that primarily benefited the rich. This would cost $4.6 trillion over the next decade, more than double the cost of the original tax cuts.

Trump has also threatened to lower the corporate tax rate even further from 21% to 15% — which would cost another $1 trillion.

It’s trickle-down economics on steroids.

All of this would cause the federal deficit and debt to soar — which Republicans will then use as an excuse to cut spending on government programs the rest of us rely on.

But the Democrats have their own tax plan. We can make it a reality this November. What would it do? Just the opposite of Trump’s tax plan.

ONE: It would increase taxes on wealthy individuals with incomes in excess of $400,000 a year, while cutting taxes for lower-income Americans.

TWO: It would make billionaires pay at least 25 percent of their incomes in taxes, still leaving them with plenty left over.

THREE: It would raise the corporate income tax to 28 percent, which is about what it was in 1990.

LASTLY, it would quadruple the tax on stock buybacks to get corporations to invest more of their earnings in workers’ wages and productivity instead of windfalls for investors.

So the real choice is between the Republicans’ plan to make the rich much richer, and the Democrats’ plan to make the rich pay their fair share and provide what Americans need.

Which do you want?

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

The confidence game doesn’t begin with a lie. It begins with a story—one so emotionally resonant it feels like truth. It offers meaning, identifies villains, flatters the audience, and—when fully deployed—quietly opens the vault.

Donald Trump’s political rise is not just a break from convention. It’s a textbook long con. Not in the casual sense of dishonesty, but in the classic structure: the Big Lie, the emotional hook, the moving target, the victim narrative, and finally, the identity trap—where the mark can no longer afford to walk away because belief has become inseparable from self.

The script is familiar. Whether in a Ponzi scheme, a shell company, or a populist campaign, the pattern is the same. The conman begins not with evidence but with a narrative. Trump’s version is always some variation on a central myth: America has been betrayed, the system is rigged, and only he can fix it. The villains rotate—immigrants, globalists, bureaucrats, journalists—but the goal is constant: create clarity through division, and turn grievance into identity.

The genius of this narrative lies not in its truth, but in its simplicity. It sells not just an outcome, but a self-image. You’re not just supporting a candidate. You’re seeing through the lies. You’re part of the resistance. To believe is to belong. To doubt is to defect.

This is the first move of the long con: the Big Lie. Not just a falsehood, but a worldview. “The election was stolen.” “The deep state is after me because I’m fighting for you.” These aren’t claims to debate. They’re loyalty tests. And the price of failing them is exile from the story you’ve been promised.

And the mark? The mark is not foolish. The mark is angry, disillusioned, and tired of being told to trust institutions that no longer deliver. Trump didn’t invent that despair—he capitalized on it. He gave it direction. He gave it enemies. And he offered himself as both weapon and refuge.

Once belief takes hold, facts become noise. The con fuses politics with identity, and identity with moral survival. Doubting Trump means doubting yourself. And so the mark invests more, not less.

But a con doesn’t pay off. So the grifter keeps moving the goalposts. The wall? Still coming. The swamp? Still draining. The deep state? Still lurking. Every failure becomes proof of sabotage. Every delay, evidence of how powerful the enemy must be. The promise is always just out of reach—and that’s the point.

And when reality intervenes—when courts reject his claims, when fraud is exposed, when indictments land—Trump doesn’t retreat. He adapts. Exposure becomes persecution. Accountability becomes martyrdom. The scam becomes sacred.

This is the fatal turn in the long con: when truth no longer matters. When reality is no longer shared. What remains is not democracy but spectacle—a theater of grievance, rage, and blind loyalty.

We’ve seen this before.

Mussolini cast himself as a savior while dismantling Italy’s institutions. Berlusconi blurred corruption with charisma, laundering scandal through media control. Ferdinand Marcos used crisis to seize power and enrich allies. Joseph McCarthy waved blank papers and claimed they named traitors. Each man sold lies as loyalty, and each hollowed out public trust from within.

And there may be another layer to this performance: a financial con wrapped inside the political one. The chaos isn’t incidental. It may be the plan.

In times of upheaval, those closest to power often find ways to turn disruption into wealth. Trump’s erratic tariff wars, billed as economic nationalism, upended markets, collapsed sectors, and triggered retaliatory shocks. But while farmers went bankrupt and consumers paid more, the market opened space for those with foresight—or insider access—to buy low and consolidate.

Geographer David Harvey calls this accumulation by dispossession: crisis used not to correct the system, but to extract from it. Devalue public assets. Destabilize protections. Create just enough chaos to buy cheap what others are forced to abandon. It’s not just policy failure—it’s extraction dressed as populism.

The con isn’t just psychological. It’s material. It’s not just about being lied to—it’s about being looted.

And that’s what makes this moment different—and more dangerous. The scam isn’t happening outside the system. It’s running through it. Congress, the courts, and the press are not just targets. They’re props. The goal isn’t to fix government. It’s to turn it into a shell—one that can still collect taxes, enforce laws, and declare wars, but no longer serve the people who fund it.

The stakes are no longer just political. They’re existential. Can we still agree on what happened? On what’s real?

Because here’s the brutal truth about every confidence game: it doesn’t end when the lie is exposed. It ends only when the mark walks away. And that is the hardest part—because it requires admitting not just that you were lied to, but that you believed it. That what felt like belonging was, in fact, betrayal.

But if that reckoning doesn’t come—if the spell isn’t broken—the damage won’t stop at the believer’s door. This isn’t just a private illusion. This is a public unraveling. A national hollowing-out of trust, truth, and democracy itself.

And so we must hope—urgently and without illusion—that those caught in the story come to see what it is. That they see the man behind the curtain, the sleight of hand, the fantasy sold as fate.

Because if they don’t, this story won’t end with the emperor having no clothes.

It will end with all of us—every institution, every safeguard, every principle—stripped bare. Not just humiliated, but exposed. Not just misled, but fleeced.

If the con holds, we don’t just lose our shirts.

We lose the republic.

https://substack.com/@jamesbgreenberg

[12thbiologist]

Introduction by N. K. Jemisin, from 10th anniversary Authority reprint

"To my own shame, I've become a jaded reader in recent years. By this, I mean that my enthusiasm and curiosity, my drive to experience new worlds, have all been damaged by a persistent disjunct between reality and the speculative fiction I most enjoy.

"Is it any wonder? Given the horrors of Trump's first regime, the looming threat of another, a global plague allowed to run rampant, and a billionaire backed culture war on the rest of us. I'm more jaded about everything now. Escapism at this juncture feels like a way to temporarily pretend that everything is fine. And while there's value in taking a break from Hell, it also feels dangerous. Like drinking to drown my sorrows. Nothing wrong with alcohol now and again, but nobody needs a steady diet of oblivion.

"What I've found myself seeking instead are philosophies of entropy and survival. That is, fiction that addresses multifaceted decay and the psychology needed to survive it. At this point, to mangle Audre Lorde, the master has handed his tools out freely after designing them to break at first usage, buying out the only shop that could fix them and the only newspaper that tried to report on the scam, and charging all customers a subscription fee. And these days, it's no longer just us marginalized folks who need our media to acknowledge the slow motion apocalypse we're all trapped in.

"Enter, The Southern Reach books. When I first read Annihilation during the run-up to the 2016 election, it was a welcome breath of fungal, fetid air. Other fiction of the time seemed determined to suggest there was no need for alarm. Things couldn't be so bad. Anything broken could be fixed.

"Could it though? As I watched my country embrace a stupid, incompetent, and blatantly criminal fascist while insisting his spiteful, privileged sycophants somehow had a point—Well, when you're already queasy, sweet smells make the feeling worse. It helped to read instead about the smells and sights and horrors and haunting beauty of Area X. It helped me to imagine that creeping transformative infection warping body and mind and environment and institution. Because that was the world I was living in. It helped to meet the 12th expedition's nameless women who were simultaneously individuals, with selfish motivations, and archetypes, trapped in their roles. The biologist, driven by the loss of her mate and the need to integrate into a new ecosystem. The psychologist, a human subjects ethics violation in human flesh. We are dropped into danger with these women, immediately forced to confront an existential threat with courage and perseverance. And this? This was what I needed from my fiction.

"The second book, Authority, was even more what I needed. As we watch Control slowly realize he's never been in control, and that things are a lot worse than his complacency allowed him to see—it just resonated so powerfully. His over reliance on procedure and the assumed wisdom of his predecessor. His dogged refusal to see the undying plant in his office as a sign of something wrong. There was nothing of 2014's politics overtly visible in the book. And yet, they were all over it like mold.

"I've read and written reviews of these books and it seems to me that there's a common misreading that applies. Namely, that they are "climate fiction," or "cli-fi." This clunky label fits superficially, in that climate change occurs during the course of the book.

"However, Area X, with it's inexplicable reality warping power, is a poor metaphor for human caused destruction. Or even for the surreality of climate denial- talk about reality warping. I think a better analytic is to view the books as postcolonial fiction. Per Caribbean Canadian writer Nalo Hopkinson, postcolonial stories take the adventurous repertoire of science fiction—such as traveling to a distant realm and taming the exotic flora, fauna, and people who live there—and from the experience of the colonizee, critique it, pervert it, fuck with it. The characters of The Southern Reach books are only obliquely marginalized. Their races, ethnicities, class distinctions, and other markers of identity are deliberately downplayed, down to the lack of personal names. But they are all women, which is atypical of pretty much any US government agency. Two of them, the Asian biologist and the half-Indigenous psychologist, are racialized. Biology and psychology and anthropology are often dismissed as "soft sciences," in large part because too many women thrive in them. Or because they've done too good a job of reconsidering racial/cultural/ethnic equity and updating practices and personnel to suit.

"As the 12th expedition proceeds into Area X, on the surface it seems they are reenacting a thousand science fiction novels: going forth as intrepid strangers into a strange land. But for any reader who's familiar with those classic narratives, Annihilation's version feels like a setup. Our marginalized protagonists lacking the privileges and power of stalwart square-jawed white men seem doomed from pretty much the moment they enter Area X.

"So, they are the colonizees in this situation and Area X is definitely fucking with them. But as the story proceeds, it becomes clear that they are themselves fucking with that classic adventure dynamic. The psychologist has wholly focused her skills on taming her fellow adventurers, and perhaps herself. The biologist is trying to solve a mystery of identity: something unquantifiable and scientifically immeasurable, more felt than known, and deeply personal. The anthropologist has no one to study, save her fellow expedition members, and only the surveyor seems wholly focused on Area X at all. Perhaps this is why she later tries to kill the biologist. We see the irony of this setup most clearly with Control in Authority. He is the stalwart square jawed man that traditional science fiction has primed us to expect, even hope for, because he'll have the power to solve the situation, right? But Control becomes the proof that no colonizee can ever tame Area X. At best, they might manage to tame themselves.

"By the end of book one, the 12th expedition becomes the first successful one by a colonizer's rubric, in that they manage to share new understandings of Area X with those outside it and in that at least one member of the team survives with her mind and form somewhat intact. The beginning of book two seems to confirm this, as the story shifts to explore the Kafkaesque bureaucracy of the Southern Reach itself. But the expedition members' choices have become the choices of the colonized. Survive or not? Internalize or not? Assimilate or not? They bring these choices to Control, who adds his own familiar, horrifying existential questions. When change seems inevitable and irreversible, can it be controlled to some degree? Can the self remain intact after the mind and body have been "Ship of Theseus"-ed into something unrecognizable?

"This is not to say that climate focused readings are irrelevant to The Southern Reach series. I mean that climate issues are also colonization issues. In that, the worst effects of climate change fall hardest upon the most marginalized. We observe the breakdown of the 12th expedition, an invasive species to this new biome, even as we observe the breakdown of recognizable life within Area X. New configurations of life emerge from this collapse of old structures. Hybridizations, commensalisms, wholesale assimilations. Even our bureaucracies, as evidenced in Authority, form a kind of natural order that can be deconstructed and readapated. Control fails to contain Area X because of another key understanding that the colonized eventually develop: you cannot fight that with which you have become complicit. The best you can do is realize what's happening and hope its not too late by the time you do. Never fear, Area X reassures. Colonization and its associated harms, terrifying and painful as they might be, are not the end—however much traditional science fiction stories might suggest otherwise. Survival is possible if one is lucky, brave, and clever, but it might require a transformation far more nuanced and complex than mere death. And this is a reassurance. Speculative fiction has historically framed colonization as a contest with winners and losers, but its never been that simple. Human beings are syncretic, some element of who and what we were will always remain in what we become. Entropy cannot be stopped but new energy can be added to the system. And those who are caught up in the transformation can claim a degree of that power for themselves. And, ultimately, syncretism means that we are carried forwards regardless, if only in part. Still better than nothing.

"As I write these words, multiple genocides are in progress. I feel no certainty for the future. Half my nation is so enthralled to it's own bigoted fantasies that I neither expect nor particularly want the United States to survive. I do not fear the singularity, sentient AI, or any technological boogeyman. I fear the confluence of greed and shortsightedness and spite that human rights and human consciouses cannot survive intact.

"But new systems emerge, inevitably. After a climate extinction or a natural disaster, ecologies adapt, new entities eventually fill old empty niches, power changes hands, and stories can be deconstructed. Even when the situation is most terrifying, least stable, there will always be those who embrace the change, and perhaps gain new strength from it. It's a bittersweet understanding, but the change is upon us. We're all in Area X, now. If we are lucky, clever, and courageous, we might still recognize ourselves when its all said and done."

-N. K. Jemisin, Authority

[th3-c0ll3ct3r]

Docm77 as well as MANY other have fallen face first into this media-related ragebait and I'm here to explain why you shouldn't be mad at Doc/be upset but not "wish ill things on your child" upset, which yes. I did see. Shame on you person. Shame.

Ahem.

So upon waking up in the UK/Europe, we didn't necessarily have the build up to the presidential election due to timezone conflictions, so for many people (myself include) 6am to 9am we woke up to Trumps victory speech on the trending tab. I'm not joking, that's how people going out and how I found out

There have been a mixed bag of reaction but Doc is getting hate for saying, and I quote "Lol... Really USA? This is what I wake up to?"

Alot of people say this was insensitive, and excuse my language and I don't mean to upset, it's because they're Americans and (again apologies) Americans have been socialised into to being quite emotional about politics and read into everything that happens regarding it. Which is something that the rest of the world kinda looks down on America for, because it makes you look like 'cultist' (this isn't my viewpoint however we do discuss this alot in certain class and this is how other people see you)

Doc's reaction is not trying being insensitive, because to literally anyone else it's a reaction of speechlessness and confusion. Which the majority of people saw it as.

Because we all woke up to that.

Doc isn't trying to be insensitive, but I do understand why people think he's being insensitive, his confusion and speechlessness is being written off as dismissive.

People are saying the word 'lol' is worth cursing at his family over

1. That's not tolerated here. Don't be sending threats or harassing him.

2. Lol, has cultural differences in meaning.

In the US countries, it means 'haha funny!' or it can be a dismissive reply (in text format)

But in other countries, lol, is also used as a 'your joking right?' or 'pretty funny joke'. An example being 'lol what?' (funny joke, but what does it mean)

Many people think the lol is dismissive but it's not. He, along with many other actually didn't believe Trump had won yet and learnt about it in the worst way possible

Secondily he made a comment about dealing with "another 4 years of insanity" which people also thought was rude.

But sadly, it's actually true to alot of people outside the US. We only see the "funny" or mildly annoying bits of your media (because of filters and blockers) and sadly, I'll admit we don't know the full picture other than the Americans insanity over politics

It's literally what your known for in the UK.

So the '4 years of insanity' is definitely an exaggeration but is definitely true in some way. We get the bud of all the "Americans drama" and it's mostly the insane stuff, heck that's how flordia man and ohio became memes. So it's not unrealistic for us to see the next year's as insanity because it is. Just very dramatised

Also quick point, people are saying that because of this he doesn't support the LGBTQIA+ and to that I say; Rendog + his entire fanbase respectfully

Now the big boy issue. Doc said he won't talk about politics and Palestine yet talked about politics now? Why?

Why didn't Doc talk about Palestine?

And for similar reasons as to why alot of other people didn't talk about it, including myself. Not out of fear or something. It's because of the scams.

Being "late" to new media is frustrating especially when it comes to supporting people, and genuinely by the time I heard about Palestine I saw the scams first.

Doc HAS a younger audience demographic, who are more likely to get scammed because they do look very realistic and they even have fake followers and everything.

Why not get one from a reliable source? Well what is a reliable source? Because if something goes wrong people will blame you because you endorsed them.

Why not go to charities? Sadly their are now currently many scummy charities that do take alot of the donation percentage. (including some gofundme pages)

So to address this, Doc just didn't address it. And YES he admittedly should have explained why, instead of leaving it up to people to infer because as we can see, some people took it the wrong way. And I can see how they took it the wrong way, he didn't communicate it very well.

But to me and many others, the intentions were clear and that's why their were no comments made. However I do believe he shouldn't have used the excuse about not wanting to talk about politics, because that does have consequences long-term. And that why I'm here today

And this brings me to my final point.

People are forcing opinions out of other people and when their opinions don't aline they get mad about it. So to avoid this people either refuse to comment or have their own methods of tackling it or simply blurt it out because of pressure.

A modern example of this would be Kim. K and her son (ik shocking). Her son talked about supporting Trump and she got mad about it, told him to take down the videos and allegedly made him sign a contract saying to never make a video about politics.

Kim. K is actively avoiding being pressured into speaking by not responding and keeping it in.

However, another example of this would be Vivziepop. Due to recent events regarding her shows being leaked and the recent elections that damaged the integrity of women's rights and healthcare, she broke down on twitter.

Letting some of her frustrations spill out. This was encouraged by people personal targeting her, and basically harassing her to the point of breaking down.

These same types of people are trying to do the same to people like Aismey, Doc and even Jimmy Solidaritygaming because of thier social media presence, and when they have a reaction but then change their opinion it's suddenly a "well you didn't say that before!"

So to be clear, the circumstances of Docm77 is brought upon by miscommunication and ragebaiting. Dont go and threaten his family, voice your concerns respectfully in this troubling time (even if you're frustrated, you should project that onto someone else)

IF YOU SEE ANYONE RAGEBAITING REPORT IT

And have a good night ya'll

[deadpresidents]

"Sometimes lost amid all the shouting of a high-octane campaign heading into its final couple of weeks is that simple if mind-bending fact. America for the first time in its history may send a criminal to the Oval Office and entrust him with the nuclear codes. What would once have been automatically disqualifying barely seems to slow Mr. Trump down in his comeback for a second term that he says will be devoted to "retribution."

In all the different ways that Mr. Trump has upended the traditional rules of American politics, that may be one of the most striking. He has survived more scandals than any major party Presidential candidate, much less President, in the life of the republic. Not only survived but thrived. He has turned them on their head, making allegations against him into an argument for him by casting himself as a serial victim rather than a serial violator.

His persecution defense, the notion that he gets in so much trouble only because everyone is out to get him, resonates at his rallies where he says "they're not coming after me, they're coming after you, and I'm just standing in the way." But that of course belies a record of scandal stretching across his 78 years starting long before politics. Whether in his personal life or his public life, he has been accused of so many acts of wrongdoing, investigated by so many prosecutors and agencies, sued by so many plaintiffs and claimants that it requires a scorecard just to remember them all.

His businesses went bankrupt repeatedly and multiple others failed. He was taken to court for stiffing his vendors, stiffing his bankers and even stiffing his own family. He avoided the draft during the Vietnam War and avoiding paying any income taxes for years. He was forced to shell out tens of millions of dollars to students who accused him of scamming them, found liable for wide-scale business fraud and had his real estate firm convicted in criminal court of tax crimes.

He has boasted of grabbing women by their private parts, been reported to have cheated on all three of his wives and been accused of sexual misconduct by more than two dozen women, including one whose account was validated by a jury that found him liable for sexual abuse after a civil trial.

He is the only President in American history impeached twice for high crimes and misdemeanors, the only President ever indicted on criminal charges and the only President to be convicted of a felony (34, in fact). He used the authority of his office to punish his adversaries and tried to hold onto power on the basis of a brazen lie.

Mr. Trump beat some of the investigations and lawsuits against him and some proved unfounded, but the sheer volume is remarkable. Any one of those scandals by itself would typically have been enough to derail another politician...Not Mr. Trump. He has moved from one furor to the next without any of them sinking into the body politic enough to end his career. The unrelenting pace of scandals may in its own way help him by keeping any single one of them from dominating the national conversation and eroding his standing with his base of supporters...And victory next month may yet help him escape the biggest threat of all -- potentially prison."

-- Peter Baker, laying out very plainly how insane it is that America could very well elect Donald Trump as President once again, in the New York Times. I really hope you'll take the time to read the whole article, which I am sharing gift links to in order to bypass the paywall, and remember just what is on the line on November 5th.

(Please feel free to copy and share this gift link to anyone and everyone that you think needs to read this immensely important article in the next two weeks.)

[ellevandersneed]

People really hate the idea of unemployment benefits, and constantly obsess over who "deserves" to have access to food, housing, and medical services. There are people who know, deep down in their hearts, that their job is horrible and that life would be better if they could do whatever they wanted, and since its too hard to imagine a future where everyone is free, they spend their time conjuring with their minds all sorts of scam artists and lazy "degenerates" who don't work, and steal unemployment benefit from "deserving" unemployed. Maybe all of those bad, underserving people who don't work will one day die out. Maybe the government should implement a program so that we can finally exterminate this undesirable element of society so that everyone who wants to work can stay working. I've met people who think this. They vote in US elections. They are your boss and your "progressive" friend and your parent. There are thousands of people who wake up every day and think like this. The idea of who does and does not "deserve" unemployment does not end at one type of person. The perpetually unemployed: the autistic individual, the physically disabled friend, etc, are all dead weights on society in the eyes of your petite bourgeoisie cousin or uncle or neighbor. "Why should I have to share my earnings with these dead-weights?" they think. But they ignore the fact that, in order for their bosses to make a profit with their business, they are being paid only a fraction of what their labor-power is worth. Business owners have been doing this for centuries and human beings have been coerced in one way or another to accept it as normal and healthy. It's, unfortunately, communist to think about that sort of thing. Better to flip the blame downwards. It's those dead-weight leftists and disableds that are really keeping me from having all the wealth I deserve. We just need to build a society around killing off anyone who doesn't fit into this model. Anyone who isn't physically fit goes into the furnace! I have had a close family member tell me how good COVID was because it "killed off" a lot of the physically disabled. That mentality flourishes in places like the US, where freedom and democracy are just words you say in order to show that you love the United States and all it represents. US Uber Alles! Pitchforks not for my boss, but for my disabled neighbor, nephew, and childhood friend! There's a reason why US politicians and businessmen don't work that hard to keep quasi-fascists like Trump out of the White House.

[voidsentprinces]

Look the US Election is right around the corner and I don't like to get into or talk about politics at all. Cause I am trying to cater my mutuals to shitposting and laughter to make each day a little easier. But, I keep hearing the same phrase over and over.

And let me iterate on that, the phrase is:

"Can't wait for Trump to be gone, then we can get back to normal politics."

Which is a nice sentiment but it sounds like

"Can't wait for Reagan to be gone."

And its like, hate to break it to you but like...its not going to be done. Reagan is in his grave but we're seeing his policies damaging everything over 30 years later. And Trump can be in his grave but his policies will continue to damage a lot going forward. And I say this because to me, the next Trump/Reagan is already here. Follow me here:

Logan Paul is right there. There's just another conartist who is only 20 years from entering politics to stroke his own ego. He's already doing it with boxing while he is young and fit and heading for his 30s, he's starting to work with others to scam children. Helping James Donaldson sell molding lunchable rip offs to children after last year when he was done selling children highly caffienated energy drinks. What is he going to be doing in his 40s? 50s? 60s? Trump too was an "entrepreneur" and failed upward with business. The future's worst nightmare is here now. His off shore untaxable house in Puerto Rico, his filming of the deceased in Japan. It is only a matter of time before someone offers him enough money to also take a crack at this. And all it will take is the following generations to laugh him off like they did Reagan's "just being an actor" or Trump's "being a failed businessman" for yet another issue to arise. And say it isn't Paul getting into politics. He could be an Epstein in motion, a Bezos. Someone who clearly does not care for his fellow man only for the money in his pocket. Say he doesn't get into politics. Could be his brother, could be Donaldson, could be someone in their circle.

The world is labourosly horrible and stamping out Trumpism is ideal but please consider and look at long term for the "up and coming stars" and their capacity to be the next one. And Republicans have shown they are more than willing to sup on that teet when given a chance. The only way to stamp out this fascist bout for power is to remain vigilant as to who could possibly be the next mad man.

Its going to be a long life, hopefully those who follow us are as just as if even more vigilant than we are. But, I only ask that no one consider this done and buried when there are many other amoral individuals clearly and publicly being brought up in a similar manner. And already going off the rails as a result.

Alright, that's my peace on that for the moment. Back to...shitposts I guess.

[skull-pun]

Helping Ukraine is simply not in Trump's best interest and people need to wake up to this fact.

Why settle for some when you can have it all?

Why help Ukraine when you can just make a backdoor deal with Russia that ensures the USA won't interfere as long as it gets a cut of everything when all this is over?

Any talk of peace is all smoke and mirrors from Trump and the thing people also need to realise is that yes, Putin may be all the way in Ukraine now, but I can assure you he will not be stopping there.

He will invade the rest of the EU, the UK, and eventually the USA.

It may not happen now, or in a year, or even a decade, but it will happen if we continue down this path of appeasement.

At the end of the day the way I see it is that the money sent to Ukraine is an investment in the future of democracy, and surely it's smarter to invest in that than another Trump and dump crypto scam, right?

[justinspoliticalcorner]

J. Dylan Sandifer at TNR:

Two egos like Elon Musk’s and Donald Trump’s could never share the spotlight if it weren’t for the unifying force of grifter solidarity—two oligarchs teaming up to further tip the scales against everyone else. Just as Trump’s P.R. campaign as a canny dealmaker hid his multiple bankruptcies, Musk’s rogue genius performance serves as cover for the fact that he’s just another billionaire buying up others’ ideas and playing the system with enough of a safety net to repeatedly fail. His whole shtick is built on the idea that he’s a bold, self-made innovator who defies the odds, shuns government handouts, and stands for the unbridled power of the free market. In reality, his empire, built originally on an apartheid emerald mine, has been propped up by public money for years. One of its most consistent sources of income has been Tesla’s exploitation of the carbon credit market.

Tesla, the supposed future of clean energy, isn’t just making money by selling electric cars—it’s making a fortune off a regulatory loophole. In the first nine months of 2024, 43 percent of Tesla’s net income came from selling credits to other automakers that hadn’t met emissions standards. It’s not innovation that’s keeping Tesla’s finances afloat; it’s a rigged system that Musk is milking for everything it’s worth. And all the while, he’s using his newfound power as Trump’s unelected co-president to gut the very government programs that provide working people with a fraction of the support that he’s quietly pocketing. Musk loves to sneer at working-class people who rely on food stamps or unemployment benefits, claiming they’re lazy or entitled. But what’s more entitled than using regulatory credits to boost your company’s stock price and then leveraging that stock for loans to keep your cash flow steady? The hypocrisy gets even more grotesque when you look at Musk’s role in the so-called Department of Government Efficiency—the dystopian fever dream where he’s now helping Trump dismantle social programs under the guise of “cutting waste.” While he’s ensuring billionaires like himself keep their tax breaks and loopholes, he’s working to slash food assistance, disability benefits, and Social Security. The plan is clear: If you’re rich, the government will help you get richer. If you’re poor, you’re on your own. Meanwhile, Musk has strategically positioned himself to undermine public infrastructure alternatives to his products. Musk has started targeting public transit and infrastructure projects, claiming they are bloated and inefficient—while his own half-baked ideas, like the Las Vegas “Loop” (a glorified tunnel for Teslas), receive public subsidies and fizzle out into tech-world vaporware. He is claiming that government spending on social good is a waste, while positioning himself as the one true visionary who should receive those taxpayer dollars instead. Here’s how Tesla’s legalized scam works: Under California’s Zero Emission Vehicle, or ZEV, mandate and the federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, standards, carmakers are required to meet emissions targets. If they don’t, they have to buy carbon credits from companies that produce cleaner vehicles. Tesla, which only sells electric cars, racks up a surplus of these credits and sells them to gas-guzzling automakers that don’t want to invest in real change. In other words, Tesla isn’t making money because it’s selling cars efficiently—it’s making money because Ford and GM still rely on gasoline. Musk has figured out how to turn regulatory inaction into a billion-dollar side hustle. If Tesla’s carbon credit well ever runs dry—if regulatory standards change or if automakers finally catch up—Tesla’s bottom line takes a hit. That’s when the whole house of cards Musk has built starts to wobble.

Musk’s entire empire hinges on one thing: Tesla’s sky-high stock price. He’s leveraged Tesla shares to take out massive loans, using them as collateral to fund his lifestyle and side projects. This means that keeping Tesla’s valuation high is a matter of personal financial survival. Those carbon credits—essentially free money from the government—make Tesla’s earnings look better than they actually are, which in turn props up its stock price. But this strategy is starting to fall apart. Tesla’s stock is plummeting—down nearly 40 percent this year—due to increased competition, battery technology falling behind, and Musk’s erratic behavior scaring off investors. When a company is built on smoke and mirrors, it doesn’t take much for the illusion to shatter.

A big chunk of Elon Musk’s Tesla income comes from their regulatory credits scheme.

[nezoriy]

List of "normal" things that always baffled me as a person on the aro/ace spectrum:

Disclaimer: A lot of this is based on the feelings and perception of my teenage self when I started to feel people around me were weird but didn't have the language or concept yet to understand what was wrong. So, give me a break if it sounds edgy sometimes. I don’t have the energy to sugarcoat every statement so it doesn’t offend anyone. If you're part of the mainstream and feel attacked by a random dude on the internet questioning things you find "normal," maybe ask yourself why you’re upset instead of coming for me.

1. "Love at first sight."

Even as a kid, this felt like a scam. I get friendship, and I can imagine love developing out of it. But for that, you need to know the person. You can't know someone instantly. So how on earth is this supposed to work? (The answer is, most ppl can feel sexual attraction instantaneously and it gets sold as love for the kids.)

2. Finding someone "attractive" = you’d like to fuck them.

I honestly was like 20something when I realized that actually yes, when ppl talk about someone, even celebs, being "attractive," they do mean they’d like to have sex with them and not just compliment them on their looks.

Like, I can honestly say that many of my friends, Cate Blanchett, and Hugh Jackman are "attractive." But to me, that’s like talking about a painting. Like, sure, Singer Sargent's Madame X is "attractive," but no one's trying to, uh, get it on with the painting… right?

3. The whole concept of dating (to find a romantic partner.)

So, you’re telling me people meet up specifically to see if they might develop feelings for each other when they don't have those feelings yet? 

Like, what even makes you say yes to a date if you don't know a person at all? (The answer is: once again, sexual attraction, obviously.) 

On the other hand, if you’re already friends with someone and just wanna see where it goes, why bring the flowers and fancy dinners into the equation?

4. Why people (especially women) would even risk sex back when it could have had major consequences for them

The list includes (but isn’t limited to):

Women before reliable contraception in societies where an unplanned pregnancy could be socially catastrophic;

Brothel visitors once STDs were known;

(Here’s the tricky one bc I myself kinda feel guilty for not being empathetic enough) gay people, especially men, in times and places where they could literally be imprisoned or executed for having sex

I need to be very clear here, this isn’t about moral superiority as I'm not feeling any, it’s about survival. Like, if sex could legit mess up your life, why not just… not do it? 

Yeah it's basically rip to “fallen” women but I’m different.

5. The culture of one-night stands, cruising, club hookups, etc.

This is still a bit uncomfortable in my head because this is a very prominent part of gay culture specifically, and I’ve always felt incredibly disconnected from it. But I can't edit it out.

Okay, so someone’s hot. I can maybe get that there’s a spark. But if you don’t know them… what if they open their mouth mid-action and reveal they voted for trump? Instant deal-breaker, my genitals are shriveling in terror.

6. The need to have a partner / actively searching for one.

I give it to you, if you vibe with someone, getting into a relationship may make sense. But actually, putting in effort to find one? For what? There’s so much other cool stuff in life!

7. "I haven’t had sex in five minutes/a month/half a year 😱😭" / jokes about dry spells.

Do you actually keep track of the timelines? So what if you haven’t? I get it, orgasm is great and all, but your hand still works, right? Why do you need another person for that? 

8. Imagining yourself in place of a person/character in sex scenes.

This mostly applies to fanfics but also “regular” porn. Even if the scene is hot, I don’t picture myself as any of the characters involved. Even if I'm aroused, I like it precisely for the characters in a specific scenario, I would only be a third wheel there. 

9. Sexual fantasies with yourself as a participant.

I really don't want to imagine myself in any sexual scenarios, neither with fictional characters nor with real people, even if I might have a crush on them. 

10. Cheating in relationships/marriage.

I’m not even talking about the moral aspect of breaking trust/violating the negotiated agreements; it’s the fact that someone "just couldn’t help themselves," “accidentally” had sex. Like, you’re willing to break an agreement, feel all the guilt, and go all secret agent-level to hide the thing because you… what, couldn’t keep it in your pants?

11. Extreme jealousy over sex.

Alongside the last point, I don’t really get why people make such a big deal about someone sleeping with someone else. Sure, it’s not cool to break agreements, and it’s a valid reason to re-evaluate the relationship. But just because they hooked up with someone else? Why is it such a dramatic deal?

(Spoiler alert: I’ve grown up to be poly now, who’s surprised xD)

12. The sexualization of women in media, ads, and the outrage from cishet guys about female characters wearing realistic armor instead of metal bikinis in their games now.

What do you mean, people actually like this and it works on them? Do people actually appreciate having half-naked women in their media? Seriously?

13. The priority of romantic relationships over friendships and every other kind of relationship.

From "got a partner, disappeared for two months from their friend group" to the whole idea that romance is inherently more "serious" or "important" than friendship. Why? Who made that a rule?

Okay, that’s it off the top of my head. Might add something later. 

[nightpool]

In 2013, Weinstein pleaded guilty to running a $200 million real estate Ponzi scheme. In 2012 and 2013, while he was out on bail for that Ponzi scheme, he did another financial scam involving “purported sales of pre-IPO Facebook shares and Florida real estate”; he pleaded guilty to that one in 2014. He was sentenced to a total of 24 years in prison for all of this, but in January 2021 President Donald Trump commuted his sentence and let him out of prison. I don’t know why Trump let him out, but possibly he admired Weinstein’s moxie and sense of humor and wanted to see what else he’d get up to.

That faith in him was richly rewarded yesterday, when Weinstein was charged by the US Securities and Exchange Commission and federal prosecutors in New Jersey with doing a new Ponzi scheme in the two years since he left prison. Pre-IPO Facebook shares were very much the current thing in 2012, before Facebook went public, but in 2021 through 2023 the things were apparently:

» “In or around late 2021, Optimus [one of Weinstein’s companies] started raising money directly from a small number of investors to finance purported transactions related to COVID-19 medical supplies.”

» “In or around May 2022, WEINSTEIN (posing as Mike Konig) asked CC-1 and CC-2 [two unnamed alleged co-conspirators] to raise money from investors to finance the purchase and delivery of three million first-aid kits (‘FAKs’) to USAID to be distributed to the people of Ukraine during the Russia-Ukraine war (the ‘FAK deal’).”

» “In or around May 2022, WEINSTEIN (posing as Mike Konig), asked CC-1 and CC-2 to raise additional money to finance Company-1’s purchase of 100 million N95 masks (the ‘N95 Mask deal’).”

» “Similarly, in or around early August 2022, WEINSTEIN (posing as Mike Konig) asked CC-1 and CC-2 to raise money to finance the purchase of approximately 29 shipping containers of baby formula from [alleged co-conspirator Alaa Mohamed] HATTAB’s company, Hattab Global, in order to capitalize on supply chain issues which had created a shortage in baby formula (the ‘Formula deal’).”

Just pick a thing in the news, and he was allegedly pretending to supply it. Of course prosecutors say he was not actually doing any of these things and was instead stealing the money

– Baby-Formula Ponzi Schemer Does This a Lot, Money Stuff

[theweirdwideweb]

I deleted my gofundme scam post because 1) being mad on the internet isn't helpful to me and 2) this is my first day sober in a long time and I'm irritable as fuck. It feels like my life has completely fallen apart and I'm really struggling. I quit my job for a better life but now I can't find another one and I'm running out of money. I thought my emergency fund would last me for 4-6 months but it's going to be 2.5 months instead. I don't borrow money as a rule but I'll have to on January 1. The staffing agency keeps suggesting me for these amazing jobs and nothing is coming to fruition. I'm doing the absolute best that I can but I can't productivity my way out of rent and health insurance. I miss my old bougie life. I used to pay a lady $200 just to cuddle with me for a few hours and I wish I could see her now. My therapist quit her job. Trump won the election and everyone is saying that prices are just going to get higher. I feel like I'm drowning.

[see-arcane]

gahh I completely relate to everything you said in the tags of that post about the election and everything. I can't believe my parents can't just open their eyes and admit they're wrong

Depressing ramble under the cut

I genuinely can't get my head around it. I know, the most rancid part of Trump and co's supporters are the ones who are legitimately brimming with bigotry and violence. The kind of people to unironically tweet about the bishop being a serpent who ambushed Trump with her plea to show mercy and go on to call empathy a sin.

But it feels like there's a large amount of Trump voters who not only just slid down a rabbit hole full of online media ranting about how All Your Problems are Because of Woke and Pronouns and No-Fault Divorce and Bodily Autonomy and Vaccines and Brown People Coming to Take Your Jobs and Do Crimes!!1!, but had the key ingredient of being utterly incapable of accepting when they are in the wrong about a topic.

It doesn't matter what science you put in front of them. It doesn't matter what actual lived experiences and testimonies you have them sit through. It doesn't matter how their view and actions are proven to hurt and endanger completely innocent people. Nothing matters if it dares to Make Them Wrong About Something.

It's why so many of them foam at the mouth about marriage

(It's only between men and women! Ever! Everything else is just a courthouse union! No I will not acknowledge any dictionary definition or the fact that marriage rites have existed outside the Christian norm for millennia, fuck you.)

and genderqueer people, trans or otherwise

(Only men and women are real! Nothing else! Biology as I learned it in 4th grade is all that matters! Gender is sex and girls are pink and boys are blue and no one can change their name or take the Wrong Hormones because that automatically turns them into sexual deviants who wear dresses while having dicks so they can invade the Target bathroom and rape little girls! Being gay or transified is a LEARNED and INFLUENCED state, nothing to do with nature! No I will not acknowledge any of the extensive statistics and science and actual human history that disputes that, fuck you.)

These are people who encounter a Thing, form Their Opinion, and said Opinion is hammered in as law in their mind. Any time someone offers evidence or arguments that contradict that opinion and dares to point out how harmful it is gets taken as a direct attack on themselves and they immediately turn defensive.

Which utterly baffles me coming from my parents who are, respectively, a multidisciplinary artist and one of the hardest working and most intelligent men I know, both of whom came from large poor families who experienced shitty upbringing while destitute. They have been under the boot before.

And yet, here they are. Still on the Trump Reich's side. Because surely they can't have been wrong about him!

(My dad told me and reassured me and laughed me off. "Trump doesn't know anything about Project 2025! He said so himself!")

((This is the same man who has an eagle eye for con artist phone calls and scam flyers. This is the same man who only isn't watching TikTok sprees of men complaining about women when he's watching another World War II biopic.))

What do I do with that?

What does anyone do with people they love and who they know to have such a sharp mind in so many other ways, but are also...like this?

A day is going to come when we see Trump on TV, red capped and arm banded, giving the same salute Musk did. And my parents will say to me, dead serious, that it was just a fluke. A mistaken gesture. A satire. Stop worrying so much.

Because to say or believe anything else would mean admitting they'd made a huge and awful mistake.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

The streets are alive again. Banners wave, voices roar, and the air stinks of overpriced street food and righteous fury. America is throwing itself another full-scale political tantrum, and honestly, it feels like home. The Donald has barely been back in office for two weeks, and already the country is cracking open like a cheap piñata, spilling outrage, chaos, and enough executive orders to turn the Constitution into a bar napkin with “NO WOKE STUFF” scribbled in Sharpie.

The man is signing orders like he’s trying to speedrun fascism. His latest masterpiece? The aggressively named “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” executive order, which is not at all a subtle title and makes it sound like he’s personally tackling trans athletes at the starting line. It rewrites Title IX into a conservative fever dream and threatens schools with legal Armageddon if they let a trans girl onto the field hockey team. Somewhere in the White House, Stephen Miller is probably jerking off to the printed document.

And then there’s Elon Musk. Because of course, there’s Elon Musk. Just when we thought this country couldn’t possibly be any more of a dystopian hellscape, Trump handed him the reins to something called the Department of Government Efficiency—which sounds like something straight out of a rejected 1984 fanfic. Now, the man who ruined Twitter has read-only access to Treasury data, which, according to the government, is totally fine and not at all a reason to panic. Never mind that the guy can’t run a website without accidentally locking himself out of his own account—now he’s poking around the U.S. financial system like a bored raccoon in a dumpster.

The result? Protests in every goddamn state. This isn’t 2017, with its polite pink-hat marches and Hamilton cast speeches. No, this is something darker, louder, and more unhinged, like the entire country just realized it’s trapped in a Black Mirror episode and no one knows where the pause button is.

In Columbus, Ohio, a woman summed up the mood perfectly: “I’m appalled by democracy’s changes in the last, well, specifically two weeks—but it started a long time ago.” Translation: The wheels have been falling off this clown car for years, but now the engine’s on fire and the driver is a 78-year-old man who thinks windmills cause cancer.

Austin, Texas, saw massive demonstrations, because of course it did. Protesters swarmed the Capitol, trying to drown out the Moms for Liberty crowd, who, if left unchecked, will eventually push for mandatory daily prayers to Ronald Reagan. Meanwhile, in Atlanta, marchers made their way from Centennial Olympic Park, probably reminiscing about the good old days when the biggest political controversy in town was the Falcons choking in the Super Bowl.

But the gold medal for protest slogans goes to Phoenix, where activists decided to cut through the noise with the brutally efficient “DEPORT ELON.” Say what you want about modern discourse, but that? That’s art.

Over in Jefferson City, Missouri, protest signs went after Musk’s government infiltration with the blunt “DOGE IS NOT LEGIT.” We are officially at a point where American democracy is being debated using the same terminology as a Reddit crypto scam. Perfect.

Meanwhile, in freezing Lansing, Michigan, hundreds braved the cold to scream into the void. One woman held up a Democratic campaign sign she had altered to read “Harris Walz Were Right”, which is the saddest I told you so in political history.

And what does Trump think of all this? He loves it. He lives for this. If there’s one thing Trump enjoys more than a well-done steak drowned in ketchup, it’s chaos. Every angry protester, every screaming headline, every panicked liberal on MSNBC is a gift to him. He is the internet troll who made it to the Oval Office, a human YouTube comment section with nuclear codes, and he feeds on this kind of outrage.

But this time, the resistance isn’t rolling over. Not after Roe. Not after J6. Not after four years of watching democracy dangle off a cliff while half the country cheered for gravity. So here we are, two weeks into 2025, and it already feels like we’re speeding toward some kind of grand national breakdown, with Trump setting fire to the rulebook, Musk fumbling around government systems like an overcaffeinated IT guy, and the streets filling up with people who have had just about enough.

How does this all end? Nobody knows. But if history has taught us anything, it’s that America doesn’t go down quietly.

[Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail]

[radical-revolution]

Bowing to Reality

When I was young, I tried to escape the madness of my world by imagining a better future. Now that I'm old, I seek that refuge in nostalgic memories of the past. It still doesn't work. I can dwell in the present for hours on end while practicing meditation, but when I turn on the evening news I just want to cry. How pathetic we are... how laughable... we sing about the angels, but we are programmed with the law of the jungle.

I wonder how many of us would be content to just earn a decent living, raise a family, and give our kids a good education? Most of us, I think... but throughout all of history we have been cursed with a ruling class that is never content... never satisfied! No matter how much we give them, it is never enough.

In colonial America, we fought a revolution to escape that sort of tyranny... but then we turned around and stole an entire continent from its native inhabitants. It seems to me our revolution was a fraud... we merely replaced a royal aristocracy with a corporate aristocracy based on tobacco, alcohol, cotton, and slave labor. We threw the King's tea into Boston Harbor, and then picked a president who used slaves to brew Rye Whiskey. Our founding fathers were so proud of their drug trade that they decorated the Capitol Dome with tobacco leaves.

Somehow our Christian forbears convinced themselves that their genocidal transgressions were God's gift of 'Manifest Destiny'. Not even Donald Trump could have imagined such a scam! We signed treaties with the Cherokee, Choctaw, and Seminoles, and then marched them off to die on the Trail of Tears. Some of us took asylum in Texas and then stole it from Mexico. We pretended to fight a Civil War to emancipate the slaves, but only gave free black men a fifth of a vote! Then we allowed Jim Crow slavery to flourish for centuries. Our wives didn't even get a fifth of a vote until 1917.

We created puppet dictators in Central America to enslave the native 'Indios' so our corporations could grow cheap bananas, sugar cane, and pineapple. Those illegal Indios are still harvesting our fruits and vegetables in the Imperial Valley even as Trump plans to deport them. And what has all that hypocrisy accomplished for us? Unsurprisingly, we have all become the economic slaves of a few elite families holding 90% of all the wealth in the world. And yet we go on telling ourselves that we live in a democracy where all men are created equal!

And how many American boys and girls have been sacrificed on that altar of false freedom? In 1917, we killed 116,000 of them in a war between Queen Victoria's relatives because one of Kaiser Wilhelm's submarines sank one of George V's ocean liners that had some Americans on board. In 1941, Roosevelt got the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor so he could declare war on Germany over the objections of America's isolationist majority. That war killed over 400,000 Americans, including my dad. In the 1970s, we killed fifty thousand more American boys while losing a war with Vietnam, and fifteen years later our corporations were making bluejeans and computer chips on those very same killing fields. In 1992, we gave Saddam Hussein chemical weapons to kill his Iranian enemies, and in 2006 we killed him over weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist. That Iraqi meddling cost us a trillion dollars and thousands of lives over a period of twenty-five years.

So many misadventures... there were the Philippines, and Israel, and Samoa, and Diego Garcia, and Afghanistan, and Lebanon, and Panama, and Cuba, and Sudan, and Yemen, and The Congo, and Nigeria, and Nicaragua, and Cambodia, and Korea. Oh, don't forget Korea... 36,000 dead Americans there, and another 24,000 guarding that no man's land to this day. And remember the Marshall Islands? No? Well, we claimed that territory after WWII without bothering to consult the native islanders. And how did we treat them? Well we removed the entire populations of Bikini and Enewetok so that we could test our atomic bombs on their Polynesian paradise. That's American democracy for you.

And despite all that death and destruction, America has not actually won a war since 1945. Only America's corporations can be said to win wars. They profit even when we surrender. Today, you and I are paying withering taxes so that America can maintain over 600 military bases around the world, and the military industrial complex pockets it all: $895 Billion more scheduled for 2025. Think what America would look like if we spent that on education!

And what is the corporatocracy planning for us now? They are being subsidized by our taxes yet again to build giant computer centers that will house an Artificial Intelligence Network so superior to our human networks that we will have absolutely no ability to resist our enslavement. Elon Musk predicts that our streets will be full of self-driving cars within two years, and shortly afterward our homes will be full of R2-D2 and C-3PO style humanoid robots. He predicts that these robots will become the defining product of our time, with each human owning several, and industry employing billions. And with so many robots building our world and doing our work, we won't need to earn money anymore. So much wealth will be generated that every human will have a universal basic income, and humanity's standard of living will surge beyond our wildest dreams. Well... certainly Elon's wealth will surge, but I'm not so sure about the homeless folks sleeping in the streets!

And because the robots will be smarter, faster, and stronger than us, Elon foresees humanity living in 'retirement'. Any activities we take up at that point will be in the nature of hobbies. We won't need to work anymore because it will be so much easier to tell the robots to do it. And you won't even need to speak your commands aloud. You won't even need a remote control. Musk is working on Neuralink Technology to connect those computer devices directly into your brain. Three human test subjects are already connected. So... if you really want to match wits with the robots, you will just need to use Elon's Neuralink so that your brain cells can tap into the robot's super-intelligence. Won't that be fun?

And there is yet more... Musk expects to send the first robot-crewed spacecraft to Mars in two years, with human-crewed ships to follow soon after. His goal is to build a self-sustaining colony on Mars, so that if some catastrophe wipes out humanity on Earth, our species will still survive. Of course, this begs the question; if robots are so superior, why bother to save a human? In fact, the most likely catastrophe on Earth will be the Armageddon brought on by robotic warfare. Every military on Earth is even now building AI and robotics into their weapons of war.

Back in 1942, Isaac Asimov published his famous 'Three Laws of Robotics'.

First Law: A robot cannot injure a human or allow a human to come to harm.

Second Law: A robot must obey human orders, unless those orders conflict with the First Law.

Third Law: A robot must protect itself, unless that protection conflicts with the First or Second Law.

One wonders how Asimov ever came up with such a ludicrous scenario. In a world ruled by Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Ali Khamenei, Benjamin Netanyahu, Kim Jong Un, Elon Musk, and Donald Trump, our robots will never be programmed with compassion. Like their makers, our robots will be programmed with the unvarnished law of the jungle. As I said... when I turn on the evening news, I just want to cry.

Not all who wander are lost,

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