#the democrats has had all the chances to protect people

[trumpamerica]

America’s Future Depends on DOGE

Wall Street Journal

If Trump and Musk don’t succeed in showing the bureaucracy who’s boss, it’s likely no one ever will.

Critics view the Department of Government Efficiency’s emails asking federal employees for evidence of productivity as chaotic, arbitrary and even cruel measures to impose on a devoted civil service. But Elon Musk is simply bringing normal private-sector standards to a government that desperately needs them. Since the Pendleton Act of 1883 introduced merit-based selection and civil-service job protections for federal workers, the administrative state has proliferated without sufficient checks and balances from the president or Congress.

The federal bureaucracy has ballooned from a few agencies to more than 400, many of which are “independent” of the president. Americans often view the president as responsible for the actions those agencies take. The system nudges new presidents to give up and go along. And that’s exactly what they’ve done. No president—not Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Richard Nixon or Ronald Reagan—has cracked this nut. Most reforms have made the administrative state larger, not smaller.

As we’re seeing now, substantial opposition awaits anyone who challenges the bureaucracy. Unions are powerful. Intimidation from those with institutional knowledge can be overwhelming. Fear of the media has also been a deterrent to action. Every president has been at least somewhat fearful of the intelligence agencies. Industry leaders who have captured the agencies, including many campaign donors, have been too powerful to unseat or control.

Countless cabinet secretaries come and go with the intention of changing the system. They get big offices, a nice portrait and social status, but the bureaucrats know that the political appointees are temporary and easily can be ignored. Frustrated by institutional inertia, the appointees often leave outwitted, outgunned and demoralized.

Meanwhile, the American people feel increasingly oppressed, taxed, regulated, spied on, browbeaten, hectored and harassed. Voting never made a difference because the politicians no longer controlled the system. The bureaucracies rule all. We’ve come to know this in our gut, which is why voters’ trust in the system has eroded as agencies’ power has built up.

The Biden years underscored this point. We didn’t even need a conscious or active president, only a figurehead. Behind the scenes, institutions ran everything.

How can the U.S. deal with this problem? President Trump alone figured it out in his last term: He simply took charge of agencies in a limited way with selective firings, which he believed he had the legal authority to do. This unleashed howls of horror and whispers of plots from his critics, including in the media. Entrenched administrators hatched clever schemes to thwart his plans and show him who was boss—not the democratically elected president but the bureaucracy.

The message from today’s civic elites is that the president’s job is to pretend to be in charge while doing nothing meaningful. Shut up. Don’t disturb the administrative state. Let it keep doing its thing without oversight or disruption, and you’ll get your library and bestselling memoir.

Mr. Trump refuses this deal. In his second term, he’s determined to slay the bureaucratic beast he knows all too well from his first term and the Biden years. DOGE’s efforts are epic, breaking more than a century of acquiescence to the deep state. The Trump team is courageously confronting the problem head-on, come what may. Mr. Trump’s allies know that they must act quickly and with some degree of ferocity, even recklessness, lest we default back to the status quo of leaders who pretend to be in charge while the embedded “men of the system”—to adapt a phrase from Adam Smith—run things behind closed doors.

It’s critical that this bureaucracy-gutting effort succeeds. There might never be another chance.

[theladyvalkyrieskyeart]

*TAPS AGGRESSIVELY* this is why guys.

I mean..... "vote blue no matter who" and this is the best they got.

This is an excellent response

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Hello! I'm sorry if you've been flooded with this question lately, but my friend and mutual had recommended your blog to me. I would like to know what the chances of a queer American person of color being granted asylum in Canada are and if it would even be safe and worth it to try? Would my chances diminish if I bring my pet?

About 20% of Americans who applied for refugee status in 2024 were denied. That's all I can really say about chances.

The Canadian government said this in 2016 during the last Trump presidency (Bold for emphasis):

VICE: Could we see certain groups of people in the US claim refugee status in Canada due to the Trump presidency? Last year we saw a case where a black American man said he was fleeing police brutality in the United States, which was ultimately denied.

Raj Sharma: I suppose so. We saw some refugee claims from Iraq War military deserters. There was the Jeremy Hinzman case a few years ago, and Randy Quaid. I used to be a refugee protection officer, and I know what’s an acceptable refugee claim by an American. The problem is this for a refugee claim: You need a personalized risk. It’s got to be persecution, which is a significant interference with a core human right. Disagreement with Trump or being the victim of police brutality or profiling, that really comes more under the lines of discrimination and harassment, which is not covered by refugee definitions.

There’s two other hurdles. One would be internal flight alternative—if there’s a problem in one part of the country, could you be safe in another part? That problem has to be everywhere in that country. If you can [move to another area], you don’t get international protection. Then you have state protection: Can you go the police? There’s various levels of protection in democratic countries like the US and Canada.

-- Canada has also been moving in a more xenophobic direction by decreasing the number of immigrants we accept due to right wing politicians, so I don't think that'll help either.

If you feel its an option, feel free to go for it, but a lot of things recently hasn't given me a lot of hope that Canada will step up and help Americans.

[wilwheaton]

The conservative justices had an opportunity to rally to the defense of democracy, to gird the system against further attack, to righteously defend the rule of law, and to protect its own prerogatives and powers against a wannabe tyrant who is counting on them to be his supplicants. They could have drawn a sharp line. They could have summoned indignation and outrage. They could have overlooked their partisan priors in favor of principle – or more cravenly in favor of self-preservation. With the possible and limited exception of Justice Amy Coney Barrett, they did none of that. They failed in the worst possible way at the most crucial time.

Rogue SCOTUS Abandons Democracy In Her Hour Of Greatest Need

Say this with me: This SCOTUS majority is not an impartial arbiter of law. This SCOTUS majority has no respect for precedent, the will of the people, or its fundamental role in government.

This SCOTUS majority is doing through force what the other members of their movement could not achieve through elections: change laws to take equality and freedoms away from as many people as possible, to completely remake America into something we don’t recognize.

Donald Trump and his cult are the greatest threat America has ever faced in its history, with this corrupt, venal, activist group of unelected liars (and at least two rapists) enabling him.

Democrats absolutely have to expand the court and begin an impeachment inquiry into Thomas and Kavanaugh the instant they have congressional majorities. 

I don’t think it’s too late, but it’s about five seconds away from being too late. If Congress doesn’t act hard and fast, these seven people will turn America over to corporations and megachurches.

We have to stop this, and the only way we have any chance at all is to turn out in massive numbers this November to overwhelmingly defeat the people who will put Project 2025 into action.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dean Obeidallah at The Dean's Report:

“Dear Democratic leaders: We need you to take the FIGHT to Donald Trump and the oligarchy he is ushering in to power. Stop being silent--or worse--looking for "common ground" with a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist who attempted a coup and incited the Jan. 6 terrorist attack. If you can’t do that, then step aside because we need fighters, not doormats for the MAGA agenda.” The above is my best effort to sum up the growing anger and frustration I have heard from fellow Democrats since the election—especially now that we are just days from Trump being sworn in. It’s also exactly how I feel.

When Presidents Obama and Biden were about to be sworn in, we didn’t hear Republican leaders declare a desire to find common ground with them. Instead with Biden, GOP leaders of Congress joined with Trump to literally attempt to overturn the 2020 election—and even after the Jan. 6 attack, nearly 150 voted against certifying the results. And with Obama, we heard people like then GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell infamously pledge, “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

Making the Democrats silence now even more jarring is that leading up to the 2024 election, Democratic leaders literally called Trump a “fascist” and warned he was a “threat to our freedoms and democracy.” So where are the Democratic leaders now about how they will protect our freedoms and democracy from this fascist? Where is the passionate message about the Democratic strategy to stand up to Trump in his second term?! We are not alone in sensing something is deeply wrong with the Democratic leadership. We are seeing a growing number of articles calling out the Democrats silence. Rolling Stone recently featured an article titled, “Democrats are already rolling over Trump,” noting that, “The resistance is over” as many “Democrats signal a new era of enhanced Democratic subservience.”

In Axios, the co-founders of the publication penned an column focusing on, “Trump's ever-expansive power,” noting that “Democratic opposition is weak and largely powerless.” And just a few days ago, former Republican Mona Charen wrote an article for The Bulwark slamming Democratic leaders that began with these two words in all caps: “ENOUGH CAPITULATION!” She continued that Democrats have “responded to the election with acquiescence bordering on servility.”

Yes, there are some Democratic fighters in Congress but what is lacking is a unified strategy! We, Democrats are so desperate for someone to resist that we are overjoyed that Michelle Obama announced this week she refuses to attend Trump’s inauguration. Democrats in Congress shockingly appear to be acting like Trump actually “won in a landslide” and has a “mandate” –a lie Trump and his allies keep peddling. In reality, Trump won less than 50% of the vote (33% of all registered voters to be accurate.) And instead of the GOP gaining seats in the House—which happens in real landslide elections--they had a net loss of one seat meaning they have a three seat margin, which is the smallest majority in nearly 100 years.

One of the worst Democrats in this regard is Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman who over the weekend travelled down to Mar-A-Lago to kiss Trump’s ring. It’s one thing for a Senator to meet with Trump in Washington, D.C, but Fetterman made a spectacle of visiting Trump because it helps him politically. (I wish Trump would put Fetterman in his administration, enabling Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro-who is a fighter--to appoint a real Democrat to this Senate seat.) Some of these “let’s give MAGA a chance” Democrats are supporting Trump—or the MAGA agenda on issues like immigration—because they believe it helps them politically. They have put their re-election efforts over protecting us. Please never forget who they are.

[...] But right now, we can each play a role in taking the fight to Trump from getting more involved in grassroots organizations, volunteering on campaigns and even running for office. And for those who want to do something this Saturday, there is the People’s March in Washington, D.C. and in locations across the nation sponsored by a host of groups from The Women’s March to Planned Parenthood to The Sierra Club. Will we see any national Democratic officials speak at these events?! Keith Ellison said something else in our interview that stayed with me about the next few years under Trump: “We're all gonna get tested a little bit.” He’s right. The question is how do each of us respond?! The answer must be: We stand up and fight!

Dean Obeidallah is saying what needs to be said: Democratic leaders and politicians should fight, not coddle, Trump and Trumpism.

[ceilidhtransing]

I see people saying “a vote for a third party isn't a vote for Trump, no matter how much you try to tell me it is” and while this statement makes sense from one perspective, it also sadly just misunderstands the material reality of politics.

If we're talking about voting purely as something that affects the moral tally of your individual heart, then yes, a vote for the Greens or whatever isn't morally equivalent to a vote for Trump. If the way you think about this is in terms of getting to the pearly gates and being asked “and did you always vote for the purest and most morally clean person?” then yes, a Green vote is not the same as having to say “actually I voted for Trump”.

But down here in the real world where voting isn't about maintaining your own personal sense of having a Morally Untarnished Heart but about, you know, real material consequences, a vote for a third party is functionally, if not morally, equivalent to a vote for Trump. You might not be voting for Trump but you are voting in a way that only makes it harder for the only candidate that has an actual chance in hell of beating Trump to win. There is no world in which that does not simply help Trump. You are splitting the anti-Trump vote and making it easier for him to win because that is how this voting system unfortunately works. Frankly, you may as well be voting for Trump.

“But my vote isn't an endorsement of Trump! It's an endorsement of the exact opposite values of Trump!” Yes, but again, this terrible first-past-the-post voting system does not produce “the average of all the values that people voted for”. Any votes that don't go towards the winner are wasted votes. And the winner, especially if that winner is Trump, will not care that you voted Green. They will govern just the same, and your voice will carry no weight at all electorally.

“Stop blaming people who vote third party for all the terrible things Republicans decide to do! Those things aren't my fault; I didn't vote for them.” There is a certain value to the argument “it's not my fault for voting third party; it's the Democrats' fault for not putting up a candidate I could vote for”. But this slightly falls apart when it comes to the people who have already decided they will always vote third party, regardless of how perfect a candidate the Democrats run, so this whole “it's the Democrats' job to convince me” is purely theoretical. And I too hate the way our society often defaults to blaming leftists for whatever the right does, as if leftists are the only ones with political agency and the right can never be held accountable for anything. But when leftists had an opportunity to prevent the right from doing something evil and they chose their own moral purity over an imperfect choice that would nevertheless have prevented some harm, then no, I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to place some of the blame on those people.

US presidential elections hang on relatively tiny numbers of people in only a few crucial swing states. And because 132,476 people in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin decided to vote Green rather than Democrat in 2016, abortion is illegal in 13 states. That's less than 0.04% of the US population. Even margins that small matter. And no, those people didn't vote “against abortion”, but their failure to tactically unite behind the candidate who would have protected reproductive rights and who had a chance of actually winning directly led to the victory of the anti-abortion candidate. I'm sure all the people who now can't access abortion (ironically, none of whom lives in MI, PA or WI) are really glad that those people voted with their hearts rather than strategically. Votes have consequences, and things do change (for the worse, as well as for the better), much as some people like to harp on about how “nothing ever changes” and “your vote doesn't matter”.

“But why are you blaming those people? What about the people who actually voted Republican? Or the people who didn't vote at all?” Well, first off, this post is about third-party voting, not Republican voters or non-voters. But I do feel there is more ground to be gained by talking about the consequences of third-party voting than by discussing the others. Many Republican voters are essentially unreachable; they're not remotely progressive, so trying to convince them that they should be voting Democrat is mostly like talking to a brick wall. And non-voters are the people who didn't show up anyway; arguably they should have shown up, but they didn't. But third-party voters got involved, made sure they were registered to vote, got all the way to the voting booth, and then decided to vote not in the way that would defend at least some progressive values, but in the way that would only make it harder to beat the ultra-regressive candidate. There's an understanding that a lot of third-party voters are on the right side, they're just not making the right strategic decision, which is why so much more progressive energy gets put towards trying to convince e.g. Green voters than towards trying to convince people who aren't even remotely on our side to begin with.

“But both major candidates are agents of capital who will ultimately work for the continuation of the American empire. I'm voting for the benefit of the world, not just for the benefit of a few people in the US.” I'm not going to argue with you over that first sentence, because yes, you are correct. Both Democrats and Republicans ultimately support capitalism and both Democratic and Republican presidents have been responsible for some absolutely heinous crimes of US foreign and military policy. But as a non-American, the idea that voting in a way that makes it easier for Trump to win rather than uniting behind the person who might actually beat him - who is still flawed, but orders of magnitude better than him - is in some way liberatory to the rest of the world is just... what??? Do you not hear the people who are screaming “please stop the guy who's basically in favour of Putin annihilating Ukraine and endangering the rest of Central and Eastern Europe”? The people who are screaming “please stop the guy who seems like he just can't wait to drop nukes somewhere”? The people who are screaming “please stop the guy whose victory will only embolden the far right in our own countries and make it harder for us to beat them here”? Non-Americans are, by and large, not saying “ah yes, we are grateful that you chose moral purity rather than supporting one of the two capitalist candidates who will continue US imperialism”; we are screaming “PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T LET TRUMP GET ELECTED; THIS WILL MAKE EVERYTHING WORSE FOR ALL OF US”. Your Green vote does not help the world right now. Please get behind the person who isn't a massive, immediate, almost unprecedented threat to everything we hold dear, and then we can fight for a better world together.

[mariacallous]

Evidence is mounting that Europe’s far right will score better than ever before in the upcoming European Parliament elections on June 6 to June 9—and that the continent’s young voters will fuel its ascent. The young adults now gravitating to far right aren’t Nazis or xenophobic racists, but they may have a hand in an outcome that will, at the very least, shift the European Union’s priorities and accents to the right. A particularly solid right-wing finish—and cooperation across the hard-right spectrum—could rattle EU unity and throw a wrench into the bloc’s workings at a time when it is confronting acute crises on several fronts, not least the war in Ukraine.

Since new laws mean that even people under 18 will be eligible to vote in some countries—16-year-olds in Austria, Germany, Malta, and Belgium, and 17-year-olds in Greece—there had been hope that these new voters would put a brake on the populist surge engulfing Europe. The idea behind giving 16- and 17-year-olds the vote was partly based on their long-term investment in politics. The policies designed today will affect them for many decades, in contrast to their grandparents.

And in the 2019 European Parliament election, young voters showed great promise by turning out in record numbers, a hopeful sign that reflected their enthusiasm for the common European project. With the climate movement rocking the streets, their votes went disproportionately to green parties that championed strong climate protection and deeper EU integration—two sets of long-term interests. This landed green representatives from Portugal to Latvia in the Brussels parliament and prompted the EU administration to approve the European Green Deal in 2020.

But the democratic exuberance of voters in their late teens, 20s, and early 30s could boost a very different trend this June, as growing numbers of younger voters are siding with far-right populist parties—the very ones that want to scupper the Green Deal and rein in the EU. In recent national votes conducted in Portugal, Sweden, the Netherlands, Italy, Finland, and France, young people voted in unprecedented numbers for extreme nationalist and euroskeptic parties. (Though some observers have argued that reporting about these trends is incomplete or oversimplified.) And surveys in Germany show the youth vote becoming ever more sympathetic to the Alternative for Germany (AfD), a far-right party that has undergone a radicalization that makes it among Europe’s fiercest, hard-right electoral parties.

“There’s no doubt that these parties have been making inroads to younger voters,” said Catherine de Vries, a Dutch political scientist. “The parties don’t look so extreme anymore, as they’ve been around for a while now. And young people think that the mainstream parties have had their chance. The system still doesn’t work for them, so let the other guys have a try.”

A German study published this year by a team led by youth researcher Simon Schnetzer showed that a full 22 percent of the young people (in this case, ages 14 through 29) surveyed would vote for the AfD if German elections were held today—twice as many as just two years ago. The tally for the Green Party fell by a third during that time frame. A full quarter of those asked said they weren’t sure who’d they vote for—another all-time high result.

The grounds for the pronounced shift are vague: Researchers tend to cite a general unhappiness with the post-pandemic economic and political conditions. “It seems as if the coronavirus pandemic left [young people] irritated about our ability to cope with the future, which is reflected in deep insecurity,” wrote the study’s authors. The issues described by participants that most impact this insecurity included their personal finances, professional opportunities, the health sector, and social recognition. They expressed less concern about the climate crisis and more about inflation, the economy, and old-age poverty.

“We can speak of a clear shift to the right in the young population,” said Klaus Hurrelmann, one of the study’s authors and a professor at the Hertie School in Berlin. The AfD’s foremost campaign priority of stopping immigration and refugee relief plainly struck a chord: Compared to a separate study conducted five years ago, about half as many (26 percent) of the young participants (26 percent) in the 2024 study said they were not in favor of taking in refugees. But just as important as the content of immigration policies, the authors underlined, was the idea that young people feel unheard or involved in the political process.

The change in sympathy in many young Germans reflects survey results, elections, and the statements of other young people across Europe. In the Netherlands’ elections last year, the most popular party among people under 35 (at 17 percent) was the Party for Freedom, led by Geert Wilders, a far-right populist with a long record of EU-trashing.

The explanation provided by many Dutch experts: It’s all about bestaanszekerheid, a Dutch word translated as “livelihood security.” This refers to having a decent and regular income, a comfortable home, access to education and health care, and a buffer against unexpected problems, de Vries told the Guardian. Young peoples’ leading concerns in the Netherlands are housing, overcrowded classes, and struggling hospitals, she said, which Wilders addressed in his campaign.

In Portugal’s March legislative elections, the far-right Chega party, which prioritized courting young people, raked in more of their votes than any other party. The meaning of chega, which can be translated as “that’s enough,” accurately describes many young voters’ motive for supporting it. Their gripes: “a very low average wage and an economy that cannot absorb educated young people,” according to political scientist António Costa Pinto in an interview with Euronews

“In the past, right-wing sympathizers accused immigrants of taking their jobs,” said Eberhard Seidel, the managing director of a Berlin-based nongovernmental organization called Schools Without Racism. “Now there are enough jobs but not enough housing for people who work. They still have to live with their parents.”

Observers say that the far right has excelled at grabbing the youth’s attention, not least with the social media platform TikTok. The recent German study found that 57 percent of young people imbibe their news and politics through social media. More than 90 percent use messaging service WhatsApp, followed by Instagram (80 percent) and YouTube (77 percent). TikTok stands at 51 percent; more than half of all 14- to 29-year-olds now use the app regularly, compared to 44 percent last year. The epiphany prompted an immediate response from German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach, who on declared in his first video on the platform, posted on March 19: “Revolution on TikTok: It starts today.”

Other opinion surveys show that young voters are diverse, divided, and undecided. A YouGov poll conducted in August 2023 showed that young Europeans are overwhelmingly concerned about the climate crisis and its likely effects, and more willing than older people to change behavior to mitigate those effects. Another poll, conducted in Germany, showed human rights violations at the top of younger people’s lists, followed by climate change, sexual harassment, and child abuse.

Younger voters still aren’t the drivers of xenophobia in the way that their parents’ generation was, Seidel said. A vote for the AfD doesn’t necessarily mean that they favor expelling immigrants from Germany or exiting the EU. “They take the basics of democracy and the social system for granted,” he said. “And they’re not fully aware of the implications of a rightward lurch in their political systems.”

Neither were Brexit’s voters, Seidel noted. And they found out the hard way.

[quaranmine]

im not american and i just saw your recent posts about all the firings. what is going on, what do they gain from this??

What's going on? Basically a hostile takeover of the American government.

What do they gain from this? Money. Control. Privatization. More money into the hands of billionaires. It's not a coincidence that the richest man in the world is leading the charge.

They're breaking the govenment intentionally, and then when nothing works and everything is suffering, they'll privatize all the services. They'll cut government workers under the claim of saving money, and then hire contractors to work in the same positions for more money. I'm sure it's no coincidence that Elon Musk himself has had $18 billion in government contracts. Or that the State Department was going to buy $400 million in armored Tesla cars.

When the National Parks can't function under a skeleton staff and no limits on entry numbers, they'll sell the federal land to a corporation to run, and then they'll sell it again for mining and drilling. They'll deregulate all the environmental laws and worker protection laws to make sure that corporations can maximise the profit completely. It's easier to make money if you can just dump your toxic waste anywhere! Nothing being done right now makes any sense to help anybody but the richest people in the country.

Why are they going against the federal workforce? Well, the Republicans have been aiming to attack civil service as part of their platform. They say it is full of inefficiency and fraud, but make no mistake--Washington D.C., voted overwhelmingly blue, and that's part of their rage. They're literally putting federal employees--mostly black people!--on watchlists and doxxing them, for reasons that include donating to the Democratic party. (Federal employees are subject to the Hatch Act, which prevents them from campaigning on behalf of any political party or doing political activity at work, but as private citizens on their own time and property they may vote and donate how they choose.)

So, Elon Musk donates massive amounts of money to Trump's campaign during the election. He hosted giveaways of a $1 million dollars a day for swing state voters who would vote for Trump and somehow this was deemed legal. Trump wins, and in return for his service, Elon Musk is given a special government position and access to everything. It's called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and they've installed people in major agencies to monitor employees, they've accessed the US Treasury, they've locked government employees out of IT systems that include the personal information of all federal employees, they've accesses sensitive government data, leaked classified information, and they're just getting started. They have access to the payment systems of Social Security and Medicaid, and Medicare. None of these people are elected, many are younger than me, and none have had background checks or clearance. One of them was fired from an internship for leaking company secrets so.....I don't really have confidence he won't leak national security secrets either.

The main thing DOGE is doing right now, other than possibly feeding all our data into AI and stealing it, is slashing the federal workforce. Shortly after Trump took office, DOGE via the Office of Personnel Management (OPM, a key player in this story) sent all 2.6 million federal employees a deferred resignation ("buyout") offer titled Fork in the Road. It's worth mentioning that "Fork in the Road" is the exact same email that Elon Musk sent to all the Twitter employees shortly before laying everyone off....and then he failed to pay them the promised severance. If federal employees accepted the offer, they'd be place on paid leave through September and have a chance to look for another job. Nevermind that much of what was promised wasn't legal. Nevermind that the probationary employees who took the offer found out yesterday that they never qualified in the first place and got fired anyway. Meanwhile, the daily Fork emails continued to use insulting language like that "the way to American prosperity" was for federal employees to "leave their low productivity public sector jobs and take a high productivity private sector job." The White House press secretary said that employees who didn't resign were ripping off the American people. Fox news says they should "get real jobs." Note that the demonization is intentional:

Russel Vought, one of the architects of Project 2025 (the rulebook they're following exactly), who is now the leader of the Office of Management and Budget, literally said the goal was to traumatize federal employees so they'd no longer want to go to work and the American people would hate them. Also, people have been able to use metadata to see that these Project 2025 people have been the ones writing various OPM government memos (some are not even government employees!)

The claim: federal employees are wasting taxpayer money with their....pesky jobs in public health, food inspections, veterans healthcare, wildfire support jobs. Note that federal employees are only 4% of the entire budget, and that there's roughly the same amount of them as there were in the 1960s, despite the population of the country rising since then. The job of DOGE: get rid of as many as possible.

So. Day one of the Trump presidency, he issued an executive order demanding the end of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in government programs. Make no mistake that DEI is the new slur for POC and LGBT people right now (remember the watchlist earlier with mostly black people on it? Now look at claims that agencies are taking down posters of minority scientists.) And make no mistake they aren't also coming for the A that normally goes on the end of DEIA, for accessibility (disabled people.) Using this executive order they placed many government employees administrative leave pending termination. They've also interpreted this to include environmental justice. Trump also blamed the recent plane crash over the Potomac on people with disabilites, and DEI. Washington Post reports that the next step for DOGE is to start identifying "DEI-focused" positions that aren't explicitly about implementing DEI....so we can all guess what "type" of employees will be targeted.

Then, step two. Probationary employees. Government employees in the United States have civil service protections. This is because the government used to operate on a spoils system where each election, the new president would fire everyone and hire loyalists to him. Turns out that kind of shakeup every 4 years is bad, and it's better if you can get subject matter experts to stick around across administrations. So federal employees have legal protections against firing them at random. Trump is trying to eliminate that, by the way, by insitituting a broad recategorization of federal employees who are in "policy influencing positions" to be able to fire them at-will. (The definition of "policy influencing" here is intentionally so broad that it will affect most employees in the government regardless of whether they have any influence on policy or not.) Oh! And remember the Fork email? Yeah, there's language in those emails about employees who don't resign needing to be "loyal." Will they be required to be loyal to Trump?

But in the meantime while he waits to fire everyone else, they're going after probationary employees first. This is because for the first 1-2 years of service as a government employees, you can be removed easier (they still must justify bad performance though.) It's not just new employees--the probation can reset when you take a new position, so experienced people with many years of service were also let go simply because they changed jobs within the last year. Around 200k~ probationary employees are in the federal workforce, and thousands got fired in the last two days and thousands more will be fired by Tuesday. This includes brilliant scientists in the middle of projects, with some people saying there's no staff left to feed living animals that were under their care. They're firing CDC epidemiologists. Wildfire support personnel in the Forest Service. People who are doing emergency response work right now in LA for the cleanup are being fired during this, despite the fact they're working 7 days a week, 12+ hours a day (sooooo lazy though, right?) The Trump admin also accidentally fired a bunch of people in charge of nuclear weapons since they didn't know what their jobs actually were, and had to scramble to undo that. It's tax season in the US, and the IRS may layoff thousands of workers.

It shoud be noted that a lot of these firings were illegal, because probationary employees can be fired in the case of bad performance, but it's stupid to claim that 200,000 people are all bad performers. Many of these people have paperwork documenting a glowing performance review. They'll be sued. But Trump and Elon are moving fast and trying to break enough things that the courts won't be able to stop all of it in time.

Nobody else is safe either, of course. On Tuesday Trump passed an executive order demanding agencies to conduct large scale reductions in force (RIFs). There's no knowledge yet on just how many more people this will target in the future. I can't give you an estimate how many people will be fired in the next few months, but nobody is safe.

Why does this matter for the average person? Well, this will affect everyone in the US. It'll affect highway safety. It'll affect product recalls. It'll affect food inspections and food recalls. It'll affect clean water systems and air pollution reduction. It'll affect enforcement action against polluters. It'll affect public health. It'll affect research. It'll affect fair housing. It'll effect the economy and consumer protections. It'll affect banking. It'll affect farmers. It'll affect people who rely on food stamps, childcare services, etc. It'll mean that the public will have less recourse to get things fixed, less of a chance of getting help for issues. It will affect the private sector when contractors get fired. It will affect local and state government when the grants that fund their programs get pulled. It will affect nonprofit employees. It will affect universities. It will affect government funded programs like Poison Control. So much of government work is functionally invisible to the average citizen, and things will start breaking in the next year. This concentrated attack to dismantle the government is the first step to dismantling everything else.

[posttexasstressdisorder]

GOP has gone rancid—and it isn't fair decent people have to keep cleaning up after them

D. Earl Stephens

April 23, 2024 5:27AM ET

People await the arrival of former U.S. President Donald Trump at a rally for Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) at the Miami-Dade Country Fair and Exposition on November 6, 2022 in Miami, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

This article was paid for by Raw Story subscribers. Not a subscriber? Try us and go ad-free for $1. Prefer to give a one-time tip? Click here.

I’ve heard more than enough from people identifying as Republicans to last for whatever is left of my life.

By words and actions, Republicans have proven they are not serious people, and most definitely do not love or care for our country. We have learned without any doubt during the past decade that there is no line they won’t cross, rule they won’t break, or lie they won’t tell to further their dirty causes, which have absolutely nothing to do with making America great.

They are incapable of good governance, and have settled into mob rule. The Republican-led House of Representatives is a complete and nasty joke, where members literally elbow and hiss at each other, and that is both true and terribly, terribly sad.

With help from our inept Justice Department and a bought-off Conservative Supreme Court, Republicans are making a mockery of the notion that our nation is protected by the rule of law. They know better than anybody, that this simply is not true.

They have exploited a system they have learned to eagerly spit on by refusing to allow nominations for Supreme Court Justices in some cases, while rocketing other Conservative nominees through the Senate in record time.

READ: Breaking our democracy is all part of the GOP plan

They call violent terrorists who attack our country hostages, and expect the press to keep swallowing it whole, because that’s what they do.

Cheating and underhandedness is in their DNA.

They are long past the point of no return, and will either pay for their felonious behavior, or will somehow be rewarded for it at the polls this November, in which case we are done with our Democratic experiment after 248 years.

It is now up to Democrats to once again save this nation from the sick arsonists eagerly trying to burn it to the ground, and that is helluva lot to ask, and isn’t remotely fair.

Here’s a damn truth we don’t hear near enough about: If the Democratic candidate for president was facing 91 felony counts, had been convicted of fraud, was a serial abuser of women, told a documented 30,573 lies in four years, spread a big, toxic lie about an election he lost, and praised dictators, the party and the people who support it, would drop him/her like a rock.

He or she wouldn’t stand a chance. They’d be banished to the nearest dumpster. No decent person would want to be associated with such obvious scum.

The people who vote on the Left and the Right in this country are not remotely the same, and I am way past sick and tired of hearing that they are.

Something as despicable and odious as Donald J. Trump could NEVER happen in the Democratic Party. We simply would not allow it.

That right there is an ironclad fact.

Democrats and left-leaning people are not perfect, because no person is, but we still believe in truth, decency and manners. ALL children are important in our world, which is why we believe feeding them and getting them the healthcare and the childcare they need is vital, and far more important than paying the taxes of filthy-rich, bloated billionaires. We still believe that how the United States projects itself to rest of the world and our children means something.

We love our country, warts and all.

We still believe that when we’ve made mistakes, or said stupid, hurtful things we should apologize for them, not recklessly double down like ill-bred maniacs.

We have not, and will not, surrender to the lowest form of life like Trump. It is simply not in us.

As of this writing, I am officially DONE listening to the unmitigated gall that “both sides do it” or “both parties are the same” because that’s a complete load of bullshit. It is brutally insulting to the tens of millions of people in this country who play by the rules, believe all people are created equal, and still know a damn lie, or attack on our country when they hear it and see it.

The people who populate the Left and Right in our country are wired differently, and it’s time this was said out loud, and repeatedly. It is also long past time our media reported this. Especially because they know it to be true.

In the newsrooms where I used to work, if something so obviously bad and as evil as Trump and his enablers had burst on the scene, we would have been sounding alarms and reporting on it 24/7. The man means us and our country harm. We know this because he is SHOWING US AND TELLING US THIS.

There is seldom a day that goes by without him saying or doing something revolting and egregious. The media doesn’t even bother asking his Republican followers in Congress to account for his larceny anymore. They just accept it as somehow normal when it most certainly is not and never can be.

There are two sides to the story that should be told in America right now. One is called, good, the other is called, evil.

The only reason our national press does not report on this legitimately and accurately is simply because they are pathetic cowards, plain and simple. They know they are failing, but are carrying on despicably, anyway.

I’ll always have ammo to burn addressing their egregious behavior these days, but for now, I want to continue unwinding this thread of how the Left and Right are completely different and how unfair it is that we have to deal with the never-ending recklessness on the Right.

Back in 2015, when Trump laughably announced he’d be seeking the Republican nomination for president, many prominent Republicans rightfully scoffed at the possibility. You’ll get no better example than Lindsey Graham’s evergreen tweet: “If we nominate Trump we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it.” Graham went on to call Trump, “a jackass.”

The Bushes, Rubios, and other red-blooded Republicans all saw Trump for what he was: completely disgusting and ridiculous. That was before the big-mouth, lifetime loser started blasting them off the debate stage by imitating a slobbering, belligerent drunk at the end of the bar.

Instead of bouncing him from the party, they allowed him to play to the delight of the silent minority in America, who had watched him bravely fire people on his TV show, and lick his toilet seat by degrading President Obama with his putrid, racist, noxious birther blather.

These were the fine people whose tongues bled from self-censoring the bile that flowed from their broken brains, into their big, fat mouths, and had taken centuries to finally go out of taste in this country. It killed them that there were actually awful, hurtful things they could not say out loud anymore.

Now they were free to be themselves again, and let the sludge flow freely from their chapped lips.

Their freedoms had nothing to do with breaking free from any chains, or breaking glass ceilings. No, their freedoms meant having the permission from the very top to be just as disgusting and appalling as they wanted to be. It meant belittling the disabled, and dragging women into the gutter. It meant coddling Nazis and calling cities that terrified them with their sophistication, “s--t holes.”

Before we knew it Nazis and white suprematists were coming out of their caves everywhere and lighting their tiki torches. They were finally on the march to the point of no return, where their disgusting leader was waiting to tell them that he loved them.

Once you have coddled a racist, a traitor, a two-timer, a friend of our enemies, an environmental terrorist, a serial liar, and a sociopath, you are completely lost and broken. Done.

Now the mob rules the Republican Party, which makes it fitting they are represented by this two-bit thug, who is currently sitting in a court room for hiding campaign money he paid to an adult movie star he slept with named Stormy, while his wife was at home caring for a newborn.

Yeah, that’s good and wholesome and normal right there.

A few have broken free of the madman’s grip in the Republican Party, while others have tried, and have crumpled into a heap and back into the mud and slime.

In February, Trump’s very own attorney general, the morally corrupt, Bill Barr, stumbled into bravery and truth when he said that voting for Trump would be “playing Russian roulette with the country.”

By this past Wednesday he had once again devolved and said, but “I’ll support the Republican ticket” if Trump leads it.

Also in February, New Hampshire Republican Governor Chris Sununu said of Trump: “A--holes come and go. But America is here to stay.”

On Sunday, he admitted he had changed his tune and said: “Look, nobody should be shocked that the Republican governor is supporting the Republican president.”

That’s exactly right, governor: A--holes come and go, and apparently you will do everything you can to hang around for a while. You are a revolting person, sport.

Nobody should be surprised by these things anymore, because the Republican Party is irredeemable and incapable of surprises. They can ALWAYS go lower, and prove it literally every day.

This is what happens when you are morally busted and are not bound by any rules or self-control that guides the rest of us.

This is what happens when you surrender to depravity.

This is what happens when you rubber stamp abuse of women, lies, insurrection and support for dictators as anything in the vicinity of normal.

So what happens when standing by the truth and playing by the rules gets you nowhere as a political party and as a country? What happens when millions discover there is no justice and a depraved mad man once again has the keys to the kingdom?

Thanks to the Barrs and the Sununus, and the tens of millions of below-average, broken-down Republicans littering our country, we are terrifyingly close to finding out.

It is up to the Left to take out the garbage once again in America, because the Right has lost its damn mind, as well as its sense of taste and smell.

At what point can all this FINALLY be delivered as fact and shouted on Page 1?

At what point can we quit pretending that both sides are even remotely the same?

NOW READ: What most assuredly happens when Trump sits down with the New York Times

D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. Follow @EarlofEnough and on his website.

[the-real-sasuke-uchiha]

Thoughts on Hashirama's past with trauma? Frankly I think it's an excuse that he didn't stand up against Tobirama because their father abused him. He was the Hokage.. Also I'm not sure who to ask this but you seem knowledgeable Sas so can you refresh my memory about what happened with Madara, Hashi, and Tobirama? It's been a while since I read the manga/watched the anime. If you have time/effort. Just a quick explanation is all I'm looking for. :)

Anyone who disagrees please don't get angry and attack, and take it up with me if you do.

Hi there! How are you?

Don't worry at all, people can keep scrolling or block a tag if they are unable to deal with a character being criticised. This will be anti Hashirama and anti Tobirama, of course. Those who know me even a tiny bit know that they are constantly receiving hate in this blog, so, no surprise.

If you don't mind, I will start by the end. Hashirama had proposed the hokage position to Madara, but Tobirama was against that and requested a democratic election. Immediately after, Tobirama also fed his racist bullshit to Hashirama, and Hashirama barely answered with one of his typical small scoldings. This was overheard by Madara, who obviously was not happy. Hashirama gets elected, and Madara realises that the Senju are hoarding the power in the village. This, together with the fact that Tobirama could not let go of his prejudice and hatred towards the Uchiha, makes him correctly foresee that the Uchiha face a fate of exclusion and doom in the village they co-founded. He tries to warn his clan, but nobody trusts him, so he leaves mortified because he was unable to protect his family once again. And later attacked the village and Hashirama killed him. More or less that, in summary.

Now, about Hashirama, I can totally understand that he was traumatized by his abusive father, by his siblings being killed, by a childhood of war and suffering, and by all you want. But I can't by any means justify his terrible job as a hokage with any of that. He had the responsibility to lead the village fairly and, if he was unable to do that, he should have passed the position to someone else. You can't take such a job willingly and then justify your very concious and obvious negligence on trauma or faked incompetence.

Tobirama likely had many reasons to hate the Uchiha, as the Uchiha had many reasons to hate the Senju. Nobody is asking Hashirama to get rid of his brother, but he should have found someone impartial as an advisor. He knew perfectly that his brother was racist, and still, he not only listened to him and let him influence state matters, he also appointed him as a successor. He let Tobirama desecrate Madara's body for his experiments, and he knowingly let him kill and experiment with people to develop the Edo Tensei. One can understand that he loved his brother unconditionally, as he was the only family he had left. But he had a duty as a leader to put limits to his brother's crimes and rampant bigotry. Or, if he was unable to stop him, at least keep him far from any position of power.

You know, if the Uchiha were to do something remotely similar to what Hashirama did, everyone would be questioning their loyalty, saying that they put their clan before the village, curse of hatred and whatever bullshit.

Another thing I can't stand of Hashirama is that he plays innocent and dumb. And I just can't believe this comedy. Because in his political actions he was never dumb. He was entertaining Madara with empty promises and nice words but, first chance he has, he leaves him out of the leadership of the village they both founded. Why didn't he, don't know, appoint Madara or any other Uchiha as his advisor instead of his biased brother? Collecting tailed beasts is also not the behaviour of a fool, he very much intended to hoard power to stablish Konoha's supremacy (and his own). He distributed the tailed beasts but was clever enough to keep the most powerful one to himself. And for a man who reached to power with the excuse of democracy, see how quick he forgot about it nominating someone from his family without taking anyone's opinion into consideration. Should I believe he established an oligarchy by accident because he was naïve, and that he didn't know what would happen once his racist brother got to power?

Anyway, sorry, this was probably too long. But I start hating on Hashirama and I get carried away...

Take care!

[simply-ivanka]

America’s Future Depends on DOGE

Wall Street Journal

If Trump and Musk don’t succeed in showing the bureaucracy who’s boss, it’s likely no one ever will.

Critics view the Department of Government Efficiency’s emails asking federal employees for evidence of productivity as chaotic, arbitrary and even cruel measures to impose on a devoted civil service. But Elon Musk is simply bringing normal private-sector standards to a government that desperately needs them. Since the Pendleton Act of 1883 introduced merit-based selection and civil-service job protections for federal workers, the administrative state has proliferated without sufficient checks and balances from the president or Congress.

The federal bureaucracy has ballooned from a few agencies to more than 400, many of which are “independent” of the president. Americans often view the president as responsible for the actions those agencies take. The system nudges new presidents to give up and go along. And that’s exactly what they’ve done. No president—not Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Richard Nixon or Ronald Reagan—has cracked this nut. Most reforms have made the administrative state larger, not smaller.

As we’re seeing now, substantial opposition awaits anyone who challenges the bureaucracy. Unions are powerful. Intimidation from those with institutional knowledge can be overwhelming. Fear of the media has also been a deterrent to action. Every president has been at least somewhat fearful of the intelligence agencies. Industry leaders who have captured the agencies, including many campaign donors, have been too powerful to unseat or control.

Countless cabinet secretaries come and go with the intention of changing the system. They get big offices, a nice portrait and social status, but the bureaucrats know that the political appointees are temporary and easily can be ignored. Frustrated by institutional inertia, the appointees often leave outwitted, outgunned and demoralized.

Meanwhile, the American people feel increasingly oppressed, taxed, regulated, spied on, browbeaten, hectored and harassed. Voting never made a difference because the politicians no longer controlled the system. The bureaucracies rule all. We’ve come to know this in our gut, which is why voters’ trust in the system has eroded as agencies’ power has built up.

The Biden years underscored this point. We didn’t even need a conscious or active president, only a figurehead. Behind the scenes, institutions ran everything.

How can the U.S. deal with this problem? President Trump alone figured it out in his last term: He simply took charge of agencies in a limited way with selective firings, which he believed he had the legal authority to do. This unleashed howls of horror and whispers of plots from his critics, including in the media. Entrenched administrators hatched clever schemes to thwart his plans and show him who was boss—not the democratically elected president but the bureaucracy.

The message from today’s civic elites is that the president’s job is to pretend to be in charge while doing nothing meaningful. Shut up. Don’t disturb the administrative state. Let it keep doing its thing without oversight or disruption, and you’ll get your library and bestselling memoir.

Mr. Trump refuses this deal. In his second term, he’s determined to slay the bureaucratic beast he knows all too well from his first term and the Biden years. DOGE’s efforts are epic, breaking more than a century of acquiescence to the deep state. The Trump team is courageously confronting the problem head-on, come what may. Mr. Trump’s allies know that they must act quickly and with some degree of ferocity, even recklessness, lest we default back to the status quo of leaders who pretend to be in charge while the embedded “men of the system”—to adapt a phrase from Adam Smith—run things behind closed doors.

It’s critical that this bureaucracy-gutting effort succeeds. There might never be another chance.

[uboat53]

Genuine question: What would be a bridge too far? Is there anything Democratic politicians could do that would make you break with them?

Hey, great question! I'm happy to answer this one. In fact, it's a question I'd encourage anyone to ask about groups they support!

To me there's actually two fairly clear cases where I would break with the Democratic Party.

First, if Democrats ever become a party that actively attacks the rights of minorities and vulnerable people, I'll abandon them in a heartbeat. Depending on the specific politician, Democrats can be steadfast in their support or lackluster and anywhere in between, but at the moment I'm not aware of any Democrat who is actively trying to roll back the rights of racial minorities, women, LGBTQ folks, or any other marginalized or vulnerable people.

Note that not attacking them is very different from not accepting losses. Unfortunately, Republicans are still way more popular than they should be given their outright racist and sexist agenda which means that they have the power to force changes to the law that attack disadvantaged people and Democrats will not always have the power to stop them. Even worse, sometimes they will be forced to choose which of two (or more) different disadvantaged groups they can protect or whether to accept a lower level of attack in order to prevent even worse from occurring.

Triage sucks and it can be tempting to blame Democrats for those tough decisions. This, however, misses the point that, if Democrats had enough power, none of those attacks would occur in the first place. The fact that Democrats are in the position of having to make these decisions at all is entirely the fault of the Republicans who are launching the attacks in the first place.

If that changes, if vulnerable people are deliberately targeted by Democrats, then I'm out.

Secondly, if a viable third party arises that better promotes the rights of poor, minority, vulnerable, and other disadvantaged people, I'll happily switch over and vote for them instead. That said, there's a key word in there that probably deserve a bit more detail.

"Viable" is always a key word, isn't it? It gets thrown about a lot, but it's worth looking at it in some detail. "Viable" to me means that this party has a chance of winning. If a third party exists but all it's doing is making it so that liberal voters such as myself are split between two candidates, letting the conservative candidate win, that's not something I can get behind because, ultimately, that only hurts the causes I care about. And yeah, that is a tall order.

Unfortunately, we have a first-past-the-post electoral system. In this system it doesn't matter how many votes an idea gets, it only matters which candidate gets more votes than all the others, even if that number is a small number of the total. The reason we have a two-party system is because this electoral system necessitates it. I'd rather have the most milquetoast, weak-kneed liberal candidate win than see the left split its votes between them and a powerful liberal candidate only get a conservative elected. Ultimately, the person in office will get to make decisions that affect all of our lives and I want to make sure that the person in that office leans as far toward my position as possible, even if that means giving up on someone who would technically be better from my point of view.

And, yes, that does mean that I'm prioritizing the short term over the long term. Perhaps voting for a small third party might help them grow to the point where a party that does 90% of what I want might start winning elections in a few decades, but doing that also makes it more likely that a party that does 80% of what I want RIGHT NOW doesn't take power and a party that does 80% of what I absolutely DON'T WANT will. Two decades is a long time, the whole project could fail, and a lot of damage can be done in that time, and I'm old enough to remember that Democrats (including myself!) hemmed and hawed about gay marriage twenty years ago and have now evolved into a party where just about everyone strongly supports it.

(I'd also note that the key moment in that transition was when our current president, then vice-president and today loudly decried by many on the left as a weak-kneed centrist or even an outright traitor to liberal causes, went off-script to do what he thought was right and dragged the whole party with him.)

At this point there has only been one successful third party in the entire history of American politics. Just one, and, let's face it, its success precipitated the Civil War. Pushing the evolution of the major parties has been THE major way that change has happened in American history and, as long as there's one that works for me for the most part it seems reasonable to keep plugging away at it.

That said, I don't see a third party I'd be willing to support at the moment over Democrats even if they had a chance of winning. The Libertarians have basically decided that gun rights and low taxes are more important than abortion and civil rights, the Green Party is basically now the pro-dictator party under Jill Stein, the Constitution Party makes the MAGA movement look liberal, and No Labels seems dedicated to pretending that Democrats promoting the rights of trans people too aggressively is as deadly a sin as Republicans demonizing them.

And that's pretty much it, a new party that more closely represents what I want to see in government AND has a chance of winning an election could get me to abandon Democrats and vote for them, but I'm not seeing that at the moment.

So, for the moment, I'm a solid Democrat. I'm very happy that the party is moving more and more in the direction of increasing the scope of rights we're willing to protect and I'm happy with the direction of economic policy, moving in favor of a greater role for government both in regulating the private sector and in providing certain goods and services. I certainly have some quibbles and I definitely identify more with some factions of the party than others, but I'm reasonably happy with it overall.

[ultimatebottom69]

Trump won

now. I see some kind of campaign to recount the votes and frankly yeah go sign that shit but hum.

This is about me for a second. Yes the filthy European. Well. As I said last night before passing out drunk. Palestine is fucked. Keep giving donations and all but you must know too right.

Abortions rights ? Well i hope you didn't like women.

Trans rights ? Doll there was already barely any. He gonna snuff that shit out.

The economy ? Oh baby 2016 eletric bungaloo remix. But you all knew that.

Suicide hotlines ? Over crowded as all learn the info as usual.

Immigrants rights ? Basically snuffed.

Police brutality ? Oh you thought George Floyd would be the worse they ever done it ? Think again.

My respect for this country ? None. I respect only the people I talked to.

My hope for this country ? Doll. The whole world watched with bated breath, we sent our whitest blond woman journalist to do the fucking job and you voted...For Nazi Orange. Again. No words.

You know when I was 12 and Obama was still the president. I remember loving the USA. Grand houses, cool movies, the music culture as I always liked pop, the diverse community how all you were so much more detached and free then me in my little France.

I remember at 13 to learn English because I wanted to go to the USA. I wanted to be able to talk to my idols. In 2017. I got called a racial slur in Orlando. It was also my first time being cat-called while my dad was right there, I mean I always got stares but bro was whistling and shit while my whole family was there. I loved Disneyland, loved the whole thing except for this two very weird encounters. I mean I am very light skinned and didn't know such word existed and my step mom who is a black woman didn't tell me what it meant when I asked her. And it was to me who it was said by the way because it was a little blond girl who said it while staring into my soul.

I learned that day that I was a black woman. That my light colored skin contrary to any had thought had offered me no protection whatsoever.

Which is funny because I am the lightest in my group and I got called a white woman a lot by them only it's our little rascist jokes between us.

But in the USA I get treated like the "Bad Hombre" as Trump called them. I get called a "Niggay" by the white folks.

And funnily enough this experiences although very defining did not stop me from making it big in the USA I thought I just had to not go to orlando and i'l be fine...

And then George Floyd happened. I then watched real life documentaries about victims of police brutality. BLM happened.

I saw people that looked like my grandma and uncle getting shot at as if they were just fucking cattle.

When Biden got elected I thought "Maybe if the democrats win again...I can forgive them., I can go there and see their world and drive for an awful 8 hours when I barely wanna drive for 30 minutes hahaha."

And...Well...Trump won. He did. By a large margin I am CERTAIN there were tampering in the election as usual.

But...The fact is. He fucking won. Despite the whole world watching. All of us were quietly hoping for you all to show us. Progress what the USA stands for.

Diversity

Freedom

Dreams

And you vote for the man. Who extinguished the most dreams I have ever seen. You vote for the man who made me re-think every respect I ever had.

You had the chance to make a woman president. After the first black man president in the western world you could have had the first woman president.

You could have gained all the respect you had ever lost back. To the people who voted at all, bravo for trying. To the people who didn't vote PER CHOICE...I have nothing to tell you except you could have done something.

I won't even dwell on the dumb fucks who voted third party. Just vote for Trump at that point it's the same the whole world has been telling you this for 8 years now.

But back to this. The American dream is dead. I dream of nothing more but for the USA to stop being everyone's burden. I don't want to go to your country. I don't want to know anything right now.

Are we a joke to you ? Because USA you are the ehole circus right now.

I am gonna go focus on something else since clearly the hatred was stronger then the Hope. This isn't even a joke the USA has a true problem and if I need to spell it out well too bad.

I hope Drag queens will keep existing and that is that.

Have a pleaseant day tbh. I have no words. I won't try to tell you that there is hope or whatever. There is none. Your fate has been sealed. In fact many fates right now have been sealed. I can see in real tiime how many lives are about get snuffed because Harris didn't win. I am not here to tell you to have hope. I can however tell you Good luck and get the fuck out.

You have like 3-5 months before it really starts to be a shitshow so if you wanna move out or had plans. Move to Europe as a whole.

I am not even angry. I am throughly disapointed. In about 8 month France will feel the wave. Gaza ? Pfft. I'm going to keep donating and reblogging.

To the mutuals who voted. Thank you for trying. I hope you stay safe and are white looking enough for the upcoming times.

[ginnyrules27]

I'm hearing all this hand-wringing about Joe Biden and 'oh, what are we going to do? Should we nominate a new candidate?'

So I figured I should drop some history here.

When LBJ was convinced not to run for re-election, who did we have next? Nixon.

Jimmy Carter was almost replaced as the nominee due to a brokered convention. There's a good chance he could have been re-elected and we wouldn't have had Reagan had the Democratic party been united.

In 2016, Bernie Sanders failed to bring his people to the table and unite the party under Hilary (the same job she had to do in '08 even though she actually had her Michigan and Florida delegates taken from her but that's a story for a different time) and who did we end up with? Trump.

History has shown that a split party means victory for the other side. And with democracy hanging in the balance, this is not a time for the Dems to be handwringing.

Joe Biden is our incumbent. He is the winner of the Democratic primaries (and don't come on here claiming there weren't primaries, cause I voted in my state's primary and I voted for Biden). He is the one we need to rally behind.

If you really hate the idea of voting for Biden, then on Election Day ask yourself this. Do you want more 40-50-year-old Federalist Society SCOTUS justices serving a lifetime spot or do you want justices who'll actually protect our country and all of its citizens, not just the straight, white, able-bodied Christian men?

[jewishbarbies]

https://www.tumblr.com/jewishbarbies/768080310343778304/gotta-admit-bernie-sanders-is-getting-ridiculously?source=share

Bernie been pissing me off too but I ain’t wanna say it coz people get real protective of that old ass man nowadays, as if he’s their lord and saviour. Did the Dems do him wrong in 2016/20? Yeah, sure whatever. But Bernie has NEVER BEEN POPULAR BECAUSE HE IS RADICAL. The demographics that vote the most are old people and middle aged people and Bernie ain’t never been popular to those demographics. Maybe now, in the age of radicalism, but not in ‘16 and definitely not in ‘20. He keep acting like he would be the saving grace of America, but he forgets that he failed to capture the support from southerners, especially southern black folk. And it ain’t coz he Jewish, it’s because he has no fucking charisma at all and came off as a stuck up northerner and talking down on people. They’re gonna tell you it’s because black voters are more conservative, but it’s more complicated than that. The Clintons put in the work over the last thirty years and were actual active members of the Democratic Party. Bernie was not an active Democrat for most of his career and served a constituency of mostly white people in Vermont. Add on top of that the endorsements of Clinton by local black leaders, and Bernie Sanders never stood a chance. Also, black voters aren’t afraid of social spending, but Bernie’s specific type of social spending is more appealing to middle income to affluent college students. He had the wrong message and the wrong institutional bonafides. But people gon say it’s coz “black democrats are more conservative than white democrats” THAT AINT THE TRUTH AND YOU KNOW IT. BERNIE JUST FAILED.

But in terms of him talking shit bout the Dems and Kamala nowadays, he been pissing me off because he truly doesn’t get the real problem here. He doesn’t get that he himself aided towards the Dems losing the election.

One thing I will say is that the republicans won because they vote red no matter WHAT. No matter how outlandish their politics are, they vote as a united front, which dem voters didn’t. And radicalism aided towards that. One issue voters aided towards that. All of that shit is shit that Bernie himself largely contributed towards. And now he wanna act all high and mighty, get your old ass outta politics and go play golf. And take McConnell with you.

He keeps pushing radicalism and he doesn’t seem to get that radicalism on either side is what’s destroying this fucking country. Radical right wingers are everybody, but so is radical leftism. Does he not see how radical leftism is harming black and Jewish folk? The two demographics that vote Dem overwhelmingly because we know what’s at stake if we don’t? Maybe he sees it and doesn’t care, idk. “They’re not radical enough” WE DONT NEED RADICALISM.

The way he be talking about Kamala and the Dems on the podcasts and shit, it’s like he wanted them to lose to “prove a point”. And that shit pisses me off. Because at the end of the day, Bernie’s an old, rich, white (or white passing Jewish) guy. Project 2025 and all ain’t gonna affect him like the way it’ll affect us. He’s old as shit. He won’t be here much longer. And he rich too. He ain’t gonna suffer from the tariffs and shit like we will. So for him to act like this knowing how much pull he got… idk man. Shit pisses me off.

Sorry for the rant. I’ve just been thinking this for weeks. Bernie been unpopular with voters for a long time and his bitter ass won’t get over losing.

well said.

Bernie did a lot for activism in his life but he’s doing actual harm to the people he claims to be an activist for now. he should just go back to local politics or get out of the game altogether imo.

[mariacallous]

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration warned that it could restrict weapons transfers to Israel if the flow of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip does not increase. 

A letter sent Sunday by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin accused Israel of sharply reducing humanitarian assistance to Gaza Palestinians. The letter also referred to a memorandum President Joe Biden issued in February linking military aid to how the receiving country administers humanitarian relief. 

Israel was not named in the February memo but was widely seen as its target, at a time when the two governments were growing increasingly at odds over Israel’s conduct of the war.

“The amount of assistance entering Gaza in September was the lowest of any month during the past year,” the letter said, noting that the delivery of relief had improved considerably in the weeks immediately following Biden’s warning before decreasing again.

Giving Israel a 30-day deadline, the letter called for allowing in at least 350 trucks of relief a day, up from 69 per day in August, according to aid agencies. The letter also called for allowing people crowded in the coastal zone to move inward and for the removal of restrictions impeding the delivery of aid. The possible consequences outlined in the letter are broad, ranging from a second warning to suspending deliveries of weapons. 

“Failure to demonstrate a sustained commitment to implementing and maintaining these measures may have implications for U.S. policy,” it said, referring to Biden’s national security memo. “Remediation could include actions from refreshing the assurances to suspending any further transfers of defense articles or, as appropriate, defense services.”

Democratic officials have consistently called on Israel to let more aid into Gaza. The letter was sent the same day that Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, tweeted her concern at the slowdown in aid delivery.

“The U.N. reports that no food has entered northern Gaza in nearly 2 weeks,” Harris wrote. “Israel must urgently do more to facilitate the flow of aid to those in need. Civilians must be protected and must have access to food, water, and medicine. International humanitarian law must be respected.”

When weighing in on Israel and Gaza, Harris has sought to straddle competing Democratic constituencies that are both crucial to her election chances: Jewish and pro-Israel voters seeking assurances that she would continue Biden’s overall robust backing for the country in its multi-front war, and progressives and Arab and Muslim Americans and pro-Palestinian activists appalled at Israel’s conduct. She has been campaigning hard in Michigan, a swing state with what is believed to be the country’s largest Arab American population as well as a large Jewish voter base.

The letter outlined a number of obstacles currently impeding humanitarian assistance, including strict customs rules. And it said the vast majority of Gaza’s 2 million residents had been pushed into a small strip stretching from near the border with Egypt to less than halfway into the enclave, which posed additional risks. 

“Extreme overcrowding has put these civilians at high risk of lethal contagion,” it said. “Humanitarian implementers report they are unable to meet essential survival needs of aid-dependent civilians.”

John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said in a press call that the letter “follows a relatively recent decrease in humanitarian assistance reaching the people of Gaza, which is obviously something we’ve been very, very concerned about since the beginning of the conflict,” 

The letter, he said, was spurred by “the sense of urgency that we all have here about the desperate need of the people of Gaza for this humanitarian assistance.” International health officials have long said that Gaza is in a famine or close to it.

Kirby would not predict what the breadth of the consequences would be should Israel be deemed non-compliant, but he reiterated the Biden administration’s commitment to assisting Israel in defending itself from Iran, noting the pending deployment of missile batteries and U.S. troops to Israel. 

The deployment is “very much in keeping with the President’s strong desire that from an air defense perspective, our ally has what they need to defend themselves against, clearly, a very real, present, viable threat by Iran and its proxies,” he said.

An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue, indicated to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that Israel would change its policies in response to the letter.

“The letter has been received and is being thoroughly reviewed by Israeli security officials,” the official said. “Israel takes this matter seriously and intends to address the concerns raised in this letter with our American counterparts.”

But Israel has also consistently denied that it is hindering aid delivery. On Monday, a day after the letter was sent but a day before it was leaked to the press, COGAT, the Israeli agency coordinating the delivery of goods into Gaza, tweeted video of what it said was 30 trucks entering the strip.

“Israel is not preventing the entry of humanitarian aid, with an emphasis on food, into Gaza,” it said.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the premier pro-Israel lobby, said on X that the letter was dangerous.

‘Threatening to cut off American support for Israel as it confronts Iran and its proxies on seven fronts weakens our ally, undermines American interests, and sends a dangerous message to our common enemies about U.S. support for our democratic allies,” AIPAC said in an unusually sharp rebuke to a president.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to crush Hamas in Gaza, even as the military is increasingly focused on fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon. On Monday, the Associated Press reported that Netanyahu was considering a proposal to give Palestinian civilians a week to leave northern Gaza before aid would be cut off entirely. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant reportedly told Austin that the proposal would not be implemented.

“In the last two weeks, the IDF has been conducting a ground operation in northern Gaza to destroy Hamas terrorist infrastructure, which just this week launched rockets from northern Gaza towards civilian populations in Israel,” COGAT said. “Israel will continue to allow the entry of humanitarian aid to the residents of Gaza, while simultaneously destroying Hamas’ military and governance infrastructures.”