UH-OH: Even Fox News Calls Out the Unelected Billionaire ‘Calling the Shots’ in Place of Trump

After weeks of tense negotiations, Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives agreed on a bipartisan bill to fund the government and avoid a devastating shutdown that would cause severe harm to millions of Americans. So naturally, that effort was sabotaged by the two most divisive and destructive dimwits in American politics, Donald Trump and Elon Musk.

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The torpedoing of the Continuing Resolution was aided and abetted by the spine-deprived GOP Speaker of the House, MAGA Mike Johnson, who obediently nixed his own bill at the behest of his puppet masters. As a result, he will maintain his record of having presided over the most unproductive Congress in modern times.

SEE THIS: DO-NOTHING CONGRESS? The Republican House of Representatives is the Least Productive Ever

The spectacle of a couple of billionaires bullying Congress into abandoning its obligation to the Constitution and the people is a nauseating devolution of the great expectations for American democracy. It most resembles the melodramatic inanities of reality TV wherein pathetic contestants vie for supremacy by playing idiotic games. And in this season it appears that the Celebrity Apprentice will be Trump, who is now noticeably subservient to his financial benefactor, Musk.

This swapping of roles is not something that has been observed only by Democrats and other Trump critics. On Thursday morning Stuart Varney of Fox News delivered a commentary that could have been composed by Bernie Sanders. He said in part…

“Think about this: Nobody voted for Elon Musk. But with the support of Donald Trump he called the shots on shutting down the government, and he’s calling the shots on trimming the fat in government. In fact, he has influence on just about every aspect of policy, including who should take which job in the Cabinet.

“We have never seen anything like this before. No previous administration has allowed an unelected outsider this degree of power. Of course it’s all a function of Musk’s relationship with the president-elect. They’ve been inseparable for months. He practically lives at Mar-a-Lago. And they seem to be in agreement on everything. It doesn’t hurt that he’s the richest man in the world, and threw over $200 million into Trump’s campaign.”

What Varney is describing is the undermining of democracy by an unelected, foreign-born, oligarch with the resources to buy a weak narcissist who is desperately trying to stay out of prison and retain some measure of perceived power. Musk is not constitutionally able to be president, so he’s settling for the next best thing: controlling the president. That relationship, however, could make things complicated for Trump’s former significant other. And that isn’t Melania…

What was once the Republican Party is now fully indoctrinated into the Musk/Trump Cult. Some GOP members of Congress are even suggesting that Musk be elected Speaker of the House. So if the GOP is not satisfied with the level of idiocy that is presently in place, they have options. A competent Speaker must be someone with extensive knowledge of how the House operates. Musk doesn’t have a clue. So while Johnson has proven to be a disaster, Musk would be even worse.

While the rules of the House do not require the Speaker to be an elected member, there are other concerns that are being neglected. For instance, the Speaker is second in the presidential line of succession, after the vice-president. But the Constitution would not permit Musk to be promoted to the presidency. So the job would fall to the president pro tempore of the Senate. And if Democrats were to regain the majority in 2026, that would be Democratic Sen. Patty Murray. If not, it would be 91 year old Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley.

In the meantime, the nation is being run by billionaires who couldn’t care less about the government shutting down because it won’t affect them in the slightest. And what they do care about – getting richer, lowering their own taxes, and eliminating pesky regulations that protect the environment, workers, and America’s middle and lower income families – would be theirs for the taking. Congratulations MAGA. This is what you voted for. I hope you like being subservient to the oligarchs.

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GOP Oversight Chair Excuses Trump’s Corruption Unless Bank Records Prove It – Well, Guess What?

As Donald Trump prepares to reoccupy the White House, every American that hasn’t been indoctrinated into the MAGA cult is aware that he is setting new precedents as the first president to be a convicted felon and an adjudicated rapist, who has advocated terminating the Constitution, and incarcerating his political foes.

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That’s not exactly a record that would instill pride in either the officeholder or the people he purports to represent. To the contrary, it’s a resume of shame that would, and does, produce nausea in patriotic citizens. It would also spur responsible public officials to keep a tight rein on a leader who is as disposed to criminality as Trump has been.

SEE THIS: Trump’s Refusal to Sign the Required Ethics Agreement is His Virtual Promise to Violate It

On Wednesday morning the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, James Comer, was interviewed by Pamela Brown on CNN. Comer is the prime antagonist in the long-running persecution of President Biden and his family. After years of sensationalized probes that failed to produce a shred of evidence of any wrongdoing, Comer is now dismissing any inquiry into Dear Leader Trump’s blatantly unlawful enterprises, as he affirms in the following exchange..

Brown: Do you have any concern if [Trump] doesn’t divest about present future President Trump using public office to enrich himself and his family? I mean, if he doesn’t divest, would that concern you?
Comer: I think the most important thing is transparency. And with respect to tax records, I come from a banking background. Tax records don’t mean anything. If you want to know whether someone’s doing something corrupt or not, get their bank records because bank records don’t lie. People cheat on their taxes all the time. Most important thing is the bank records. And I think as long as President Trump is transparent, I think the American people will give him a pass on honest business activity. But if it ever comes out that they’ve got secret deals or whatever, then that that could potentially be a problem, obviously.”

It’s interesting that Comer warns against using Trump’s tax records because “People cheat on their taxes all the time.” Is he implying that Trump cheats and, therefore, his tax records should be ignored?

More to the point, Comer asserts that nothing Trump does should be investigated because he’s such a pure paragon of transparency, and that his bank records would confirm that. However, in 2020 the New York Times reported that Trump had a secret bank account in China that he failed to reveal in his official financial disclosure forms. The Times discovered the account in his tax returns that they got from an undisclosed source because Trump repeatedly refused to make them public like every other president in modern times…

“President Donald Trump’s tax records show he has pursued expansive business projects in China for years and even maintains a Chinese bank account, The New York Times reported […] An analysis of Trump’s tax records by the Times shows that the President holds a previously unreported bank account in China that was not included on his public financial disclosures.”

So according to the criteria specified by Comer, there should be immediate hearings into Trump’s finances by Comer’s Oversight Committee. Trump has obviously not been as transparent as Comer implied. And that’s been the case for many years. Here are a couple other examples of Trump’s deceit with regard to his finances…

NOPE! Eric Trump Lies that Daddy Gave All Foreign Money Made at His Hotels to the Treasury
As reported by NPR last year… “Documents released by the House Oversight and Reform Committee show extravagant spending from foreign leaders at former President Donald Trump’s luxury hotel in Washington, D.C., which the committee says could have violated his oath of office by distorting U.S. foreign policy for personal financial gain.

“Government officials from Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and the People’s Republic of China collectively spent over $750,000 at the Trump International Hotel during his presidency.”

[And…]

Trump earned as much as $160 million dollars from foreign sources while president. A more expansive investigation by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) found that… “Throughout his time in office, President Trump, his family and his Republican allies repeatedly assured the public that his refusal to divest from his businesses wouldn’t lead to any conflicts of interest […] When it came to foreign conflicts of interest, Trump and his company pledged to pause foreign business. They did not.”

Not surprisingly, the most frequent contributors to Trump’s coffers were from the Middle East and China.

Lest anyone think that Trump’s fiscal malfeasance is all in the past, take a look at his latest vehicle for enriching himself via shady self-dealing…

The Grifter-In-Chief: Will Donald Trump Divest From His Bribery Platform, Truth Social?
“Surely he is not planning to divest from any of the businesses that he didn’t divest from last time. […] Trump’s Truth Social, via its parent corporation, Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG), is listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange. It is therefore available for any crooked scheme-ster to shovel shiploads of cash into, enriching the other shareholders, of which Trump is the biggest.

No one should expect Trump to change his nefarious ways now. And Comer’s hypocrisy amounts to the willful wearing of blinders in the hopes of avoiding observing Trump’s illegal activities. But he knows. And so does everyone else whose eyes – and minds – are not glued shut. The only question that remains is whether others in Congress or the press will seek to bring him to justice.

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Trump FREAKS OUT Over Judicial Ruling Against Immunity For His Felony Hush Money Convictions

For the better part of Donald Trump’s public life, the one skill that he has shown any aptitude for is squirming out of legal troubles via delays, distractions, and deceit. It’s a skill that has served him well considering the frequency of his civil and criminal misconduct.

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This year, Trump’s luck appeared to run out when one of his criminal cases actually went to trial and he was convicted on all 34 counts brought against him for falsifying financial records. The case centered on his payment of $130,000 to adult film star Stormy Daniels to buy her silence regarding a sexual encounter that he was worried would harm his electoral prospects during the 2016 presidential race. In other words, election interference.

SEE THIS: What’s Roasting Trump’s Nuts? Jurors Believed Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen, But Not Him

However, the story doesn’t end there. Trump’s conviction and sentencing were paused after the Supreme Court issued a preposterous ruling that presidents have immunity for crimes committed as part of their official duties. That ruling led to Trump’s attorneys filing a motion to have the convictions rescinded and the case dismissed.

On Tuesday morning Judge Juan Merchan issued his ruling that “the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision does not apply” because “the evidence in Trump’s hush money case related ‘entirely to unofficial conduct’ [and] ‘poses no danger of intrusion on the authority and function of the Executive Branch.'” Furthermore, the criminal acts all took place prior to Trump’s presidency, and any evidence presented at trial that came from White House personnel was immaterial and didn’t impact the “overwhelming evidence of guilt.”

Not surprisingly, this ruling triggered a massive meltdown by Trump. He posted an extended rant on his failing Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, that did little more than provide further confirmation of his psychological infirmity. He raged in part that…

“In a completely illegal, psychotic order, the deeply conflicted, corrupt, biased, and incompetent Acting Justice Juan Merchan has completely disrespected the United States Supreme Court, and its Historic Decision on Immunity. But even without Immunity, this illegitimate case is nothing but a Rigged Hoax.”

Trump went on to make wild and utterly false assertions that the ruling “goes against our Constitution [and] would be the end of the Presidency as we know it.” He also took a gratuitous swipe at the special prosecutor in his federal cases, who he calls “Deranged Jack Smith,” and reprised his “Witch Hunt” whine.

Trump closed his harangue by implying that Judge Merchan is conflicted by family relations, and issued an impotent demand that “This has to stop!” Missing from this outburst was any rational legal argument to support his claims that the ruling was unlawful or in any way improper. It was just another pathetic excretion of angst-ridden inanity that served no purpose other flushing his mental colon.

If anyone thought that the next four years were going to be any different than the toxic chaos that ensued during Trump’s previous occupation of the White House, this sad episode should put that naïve notion to rest. He is who he is, and he isn’t going to change. Which makes it all the more imperative that the rest of us be prepared to defend democracy and American principles once again. LFG!

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Trump Hurls Hate and Fear at All of the Media He’s Suing Following the ABC News Capitulation

The forecasts of doom that have proliferated since Donald Trump managed to squeak by to win a second term occupying the White House are coming true even before he’s been inaugurated. And the reality is proving to be even worse than the predictions. He is promising to rule in the model of his totalitarian heroes, and his proposed Cabinet is a House of Horrors.

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Last week ABC News agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by Trump against the network for $15 million. The suit alleged that “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos had defamed Trump by asserting that he had been found liable for rape by the jury in the defamation case filed by writer E. Jean Carroll. However, it was the judge who, after the fact, said that Trump’s assault amounted to rape, as the term is generally understood. The jury only found that Trump was liable for sexual abuse. And Trump seems to regard being a confirmed sexual abuser as a victory.

SEE THIS: TRUMP WINS? ABC News Settles His Lawsuit Confirming that He Was Found Liable for Sexual Abuse

Following the ABC News settlement, Trump is already talking excitedly about his efforts to punish other media with vengeance-fueled lawsuits. It is his way of terrorizing the free press that he refers to in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.” So in an impromptu press conference Monday morning, Trump lashed out at the media in his typically hostile manner.

Trump began his rant about suing the media (at 30:33 in the video below) with an inane threat to sue the Des Moines Register over a poll that showed him losing the election, which he called “fraud” and “election interference.” Then he went to discuss his lawsuit against CBS News saying that…

“We’re filing one on 60 Minutes, where they took Kamala’s answer, which was a crazy answer, a horrible answer. And they took the whole answer out and they replaced it with something else she said later on in the interview. […] And that was fraud. and election interference by their news magazine, a big part of CBS News.

Of course, none of what he said is remotely true. 60 Minutes did nothing more than to make routine edits for time and clarity. Nothing they did impacted the content or context of the interview. But that didn’t stop Trump from demanding that the license for CBS – and ALL broadcast networks – be revoked. [Note: The federal government does not license networks, only individual stations]. And he was just getting started. He continued…

“We’re involved in one, which has been going on for a while very successfully, against Bob Woodward, where he didn’t quote me properly from the tapes. And then on top of everything else, he sold the tapes. Which he wasn’t allowed to do.”

Once again, Trump is lying. Woodward taped his conversations with Trump for the book, RAGE!, and used them for that purpose. Furthermore, he quoted Trump verbatim, and has the tapes to back that up. In the book Woodward documented how Trump lied and downplayed COVID when he knew just how deadly it was. But he still wasn’t finished. He went on…

“And we have one very interestingly on Pulitzer, because reporters at the New York Times, Washington Post got Pulitzer prizes for their wonderful, accurate, and highly professional reporting on the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax. Well, it turned out to be a hoax, and they were exactly wrong.”

This may be the most absurd lawsuit of them all. Trump isn’t suing the New York Times or the Washington Post. He’s suing the Pulitzer committee at Columbia University, who are entirely within their rights to award prizes as they see fit. What’s more, Trump claims that the articles documenting his unsavory associations with Russia “turned out to be a hoax,” that “now everybody admits.” Which could not be farther from the truth. Even the Republican led Senate Intelligence Committee report affirmed the Trump/Russia connections.

SEE ALSO: GEEZ! Trump is STILL Obsessed With the ‘Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax’ that is NOT a Hoax

Trump also spent some time flattering his Ministry of Propaganda, Fox News. He babbled that…

“Sean Hannity got it right. Many people got it right. Tucker [Carlson] got it right. Jesse [Watters] got it right. Laura [Ingraham] got it right. Jeanine [Pirro] got it right. A lot of people got it right. They didn’t get anything. They gave it to reporters that got it absolutely wrong. And now everybody admits it was a hoax. And I want them to take back the Pulitzer prizes and pay damages. […]

I feel I have to do this. I shouldn’t really be the one to do it. It should have been the Justice Department, or somebody else. But I have to do it. It costs a lot of money to do it. But we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt, almost as corrupt as our elections.”

The only things that any of them got right, at least from Trump’s perverse perspective, was their unwavering adoration of Trump and conformity to his worldview. And any deviation from that will result in punitive measures that will be carried out by his administration, overseen by his nominee for FBI Director, Kash Patel, who has sworn to “come after the people in the media.”

Will the media allow this unconstitutional persecution of the free press to proceed? Hopefully the surrender by ABC News isn’t the consensus answer to that question.

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TRUMP WINS? ABC News Settles His Lawsuit Confirming that He Was Found Liable for Sexual Abuse

Congratulations Donald Trump! ABC News has announced that they are settling a lawsuit filed against them by Trump that alleges that the network defamed him during an interview of ultra-MAGA Rep. Nancy Mace by “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos. However, this may not be the victory that Trump and his lesions of glassy-eyed cult followers think it is.

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Donald Trump, Pervert

Trump’s lawsuit took issue with remarks made by Stephanopoulos wherein he asked Mace, a rape victim herself, how she could justify supporting Trump after he was found liable for sexual abusing writer E. Jean Carroll. That finding resulted in Trump being ordered to pay Carrol more than $88 million dollars for defamation. Mace tried to spin Stephanopoulos’ question into some sort of attempt to shame her as a victim, which was patently absurd and grossly exploitative of her own victimhood. Stephanopoulos was only asking about her support for Trump, which she was unable to directly justify.

SEE THIS: Trump Sues ABC and Stephanopoulos for Accurately Reporting a Judicial Opinion that He’s a Rapist

Which brings us to the news of the settlement by ABC. According to reporting by CNN

“ABC News will pay $15 million to a ‘presidential foundation and museum’ in a settlement reached with President-elect Donald Trump in his defamation suit against the network and anchor George Stephanopoulos. […]

“ABC News will issue the following statement as an editor’s note on the online article at the center of the suit: ‘ABC News and George Stephanopoulos regret statements regarding President Donald J. Trump made during an interview by George Stephanopoulos with Rep. Nancy Mace on ABC’s This Week on March 10, 2024.'”

The decision by ABC to settle is both understandable and unfortunate. It’s unfortunate because Trump will use it to dishonestly to absolve himself of his sexual abuse that was, in fact, affirmed by the jury. However, it’s understandable because the case would have been difficult to defend given the language used by Stephanopoulos. In the interview he prefaced his question to Mace saying that…

“Judges and two separate juries have found him liable for rape and for defaming the victim of that rape. How do you square your endorsement of Donald Trump with the testimony we just saw?”

The problem is that the jury only found Trump liable for sexual abuse, not rape. The rape designation was made by the judge after the jury delivered their decision. CNN’s report elaborated that…

“A judge concluded in August 2023, when dismissing Trump’s countersuit against Carroll, that the claim Trump raped Carroll was ‘substantially true.’ The judge wrote that Trump ‘raped’ her in the broader sense of that word, as people generally understand it, though not as it is narrowly defined by New York state law.”

So what the Trump team is celebrating today is that he was only found civilly liable for sexual abuse. How proud he must be of that. He’s just a sexual abuser who defames his victims. Hooray! And he was still adjudicated to be a rapist, in the common usage of the term, by the judge who tried the case.

It’s also notable that none of the $15 million in the settlement will go directly to Trump, but to the funding for his eventual presidential library, if there ever is one. It would not be unreasonable to presume that Trump will never bother to build a library, given his aversion to reading and books. If he does build one it will likely contain only picture books, or books slavishly praising him, or books written – or more accurately, ghost written – by/for him. And if he can swing it, it will be housed at Mar-a-Lago so that he can pocket much of the donated funding.

The settlement by ABC News is a stain on the profession of journalism. It is a capitulation to a bully and aspiring dictator. It will produce a chilling effect on other reporters who will have to deal with future threats such as those coming from Trump’s nominee for FBI Director, Kash Patel, who has sworn to “come after the people in the media.”

However, this settlement is also a virtual concession that Trump is guilty of sexual abuse, and he’s happy that he has a legal affirmation of it. Now, along with his being the first president to have been impeached twice, the first to have been convicted of felonies, and the first to have staged a violent coupe to undermine democracy, he is also the first president to have been found to be a sexual abuser. Is that what he means when he says “make America great again”?

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Some Democrats are Planning to Boycott the Inauguration of Trump. Here’s a Better Idea!

In a little more than a month, Donald Trump will stand on the steps of the Capital that he sent his StormTrumpers to assault about four years ago in an attempt to undermine democracy. While there he will lie that he swears to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” That’s the same Constitution that he has said that he wants to terminate.

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Six weeks after Election Day and it’s still hard to comprehend how even a razor-thin slice of American voters could have chosen to allow Trump to reoccupy the White House. Those who voted for Trump managed to set aside that he is a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist who tried to overthrow the government. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The list of Trump’s malfeasance and immorality is long and loathsome.

SEE THIS: What Is America? Who Votes For This?

There are now reports that some Democratic members of Congress are planning to boycott Trump’s inauguration. It is totally understandable why they would consider passing up what, under normal circumstances, would be a celebration of democracy and the peaceful transfer of power. But there will be nothing to celebrate next month when an unambiguously anti-American huckster assumes the leadership of the country. As Axios reports

“More than a dozen congressional Democrats plan to sit out President-elect Trump’s inauguration, and many more are anxiously grappling with whether to attend, Axios has learned. […] For many Democrats, the scars of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol remain fresh in the mind, marking Trump as a threat to democracy.”

However, as justifiable as it would be to snub Trump’s swearing in, there is another option that might make more sense. Turn it in to a “swearing at.” Democrats, and other patriots, could attend the inauguration and transform it into a protest. They could carry signs reminding the American people that Trump is an ethical nightmare and a criminal. They can even cause a peaceful disruption when he attempts to lie about preserving and protecting the Constitution.

What’s more, they could follow up the inaugural ceremony by remaining at the Capital after Trump leaves to pay tribute to the law enforcement officers who were injured or died as a result of the January 6th insurrection that Trump incited. And they could even incorporate a memorial to Martin Luther King Jr., whose holiday just happens to coincide with Inauguration Day.

We need to find creative ways to respond to the horror of having to endure another four years of Trumpism. We need to find reasons to be positive and productive as we resist his aspirations for a dystopian dictatorship. And that can all begin on day one of Trump 2.0, right on the Capital steps. Trump’s inauguration would be a great place to demonstrate to the nation and the world that he’s a loathsome cretin who most Americans despise. LFG!

NOTICE: There is another event being planned for January 18, 2025, two days before Trump’s inauguration: The People’s March, sponsored by a collection of progressive organization in order to “demand and defend our freedoms against fascism.”

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Brave Sir Hegseth, Trump’s Pick to Run the Pentagon, Runs Away From His Own Hateful Opinions

The reasons to oppose Donald Trump’s nomination of Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense are impossible to refute by any rational standard. Which may be why neither Trump, nor any of those purporting to support him, have offered any coherent argument for confirming him. All they can muster is their blindly obedient opinion that it is what Dear Leader Trump wants.

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Fox News, Pete Hegseth, Cleared

First and foremost, Hegseth has absolutely zero experience relevant to running the biggest bureaucracy in the United States federal government. His past work record contains nothing that would demonstrate the management, financial, legal, personnel, or international diplomacy skills required of a defense secretary. In addition to Hegseth’s lack of work experience, he is also lacking the moral and ethical character to perform at the high standards necessary for a top national security post.

SEE THIS: Pete Hegseth’s Mommy Steps Up to Shield Him From His Life of Alcoholic and Sexual Debauchery

As Hegseth strolls the halls of Congress to meet with the Senators who must confirm him, he has been questioned by the press about his fitness for the job. In one such incident he engaged in the following exchange with a reporter seeking his response to recent revelations about his objection to gay soldiers…

Reporter: Do you believe that gay people should be allowed to serve in the military?
Hegseth: Yes.
Reporter: Can you just respond to the CNN report this morning highlighting some of you previous comments?
Hegseth: I don’t feel the need to respond to CNN.

That brief exchange revealed two glaring examples of Hegseth’s cowardice. First of all, his response that he believes that gays should be allowed to serve contradicts his previous comments on that subject. He is clearly afraid to be honest about his opinions. And it isn’t the first time that he’s reversed himself due to his fear of public backlash. He has also tried to walk back his statement that “we should not have women in combat roles.”

Secondly, his dismissal of the follow up question that sought his clarification of his past remarks exhibits his fear of CNN, or any other media that he disapproves of.

To be clear, contrary to Hegseth’s flippant dismissal, the question wasn’t asking him to respond to CNN. It was asking him to respond to himself, and what he said in the past. CNN’s reporting was not their opinion. It was about what Hegseth wrote concerning gays in the military. According to the CNN report

“In his 2024 book ‘The War on Warriors’ and in subsequent media promotions this year, Hegseth described both the original ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ (DADT) policy and its repeal in 2011 as a ‘gateway’ and a ‘camouflage’ for broader cultural changes that he claims have undermined military cohesion and effectiveness.”

What’s more, the prospect of a Cabinet member refusing to address a serious matter by asserting that he doesn’t “feel the need to respond” to a particular news network is a flashing red light alarm. He’s saying that he doesn’t feel that he has any obligation to be accountable to the citizens he is supposed to be serving. That is not acceptable behavior in a democratic society. Which, of course, is something that Trump hopes to dispense with.

Hegseth’s nomination has been in trouble from the start. And comments like these aren’t going to help him gain favor with the senators whose votes he needs. And it surely doesn’t help that he is also unpopular with the public

“A new survey from the Associated Press and National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago suggests that Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Defense, has almost no popular support. According to the poll, only 17% of those surveyed said that they approved of Hegseth’s nomination.” […]

“In general, just 27% of the public is confident in Trump’s “ability to appoint well-qualified individuals to his cabinet and other high-level positions,” while 55% say they are not confident.”

As a side issue, the video above was posted by Will Cain, a co-host of the Fox News morning program, “Fox and Friends Weekend.” Which is the same program that Hegseth co-hosted prior to his nomination. Cain’s comment with the video is especially ironic. He apparently doesn’t see that it is his own network that has gone “from biased…to agenda…to propaganda…to embarrassment.”

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Trump’s Press Secretary Lies on Fox News that Reporters are ‘Excited that Trump Will Be Back’

As Donald Trump assembles his team for the reprise of his occupation of the White House, he is making it crystal clear that there is only one unnegotiable prerequisite for service in his administration: Unflinching fealty to Trump. Above and beyond everything else, the malignant Narcissist-in-Chief demands absolute adoration at all times.

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Donald Trump TV Set

Other job criteria, such as a total lack of relevant experience, and a commitment to dismantling whatever department you’re assigned to manage, are important, but have room for a small measure of flexibility. The result is that Trump’s Cabinet is going to be populated by incompetent know-nothings, who worship Dear Leader, and advance the interests of right-wing extremists and elitists.

SEE THIS: Trump’s Nominees Are Largely Fox News Alum, Mar-a-Lago Patrons, and Billionaires

An outstanding demonstration of this perverse tilt of the political landscape occurred Thursday on Fox News. Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, visited the MAGA Ministry of Propaganda where she offered a uniquely demented opinion about the state of the media…

“If you talk to reporters off the record they will tell you they are excited that Trump will be back in the Oval Office because they know how much access they had to him and his press secretaries in his first term.”

WHUT? First of all, the likelihood that Leavitt got off the record expressions of “excitement” from reporters gushing over the prospect of Trump’s return is about as realistic as Trump’s hysterical claims that “big, strong. men with tears in their eyes” are constantly flocking to him to express their undying gratitude and devotion.

Furthermore, Leavitt’s assertion that reporters recalled Trump’s previous playacting as president as a time when they had extraordinary access to him and his press office is laughable. In fact, Trump had virtually discontinued the routine daily press briefings that were held by the press secretaries of all other modern day presidents. There times when Trump’s White House didn’t have a press briefing for months on end. And when he addressed reporters it was often impromptu gaggles next to a waiting helicopter, where he hurled lies and insults without actually answering any questions.

MORE HERE: Trump’s Press Secretary Has Replaced ‘Daily’ Press Briefings with Softball Interviews on Fox News

What’s more, there are some disturbing reasons why reporters are actually worried about the next Trump term. Throughout his campaign this year he has made overt threats aimed at the media that he regularly refers to in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.” He has proposed replacing credible journalists in the White House Press Room with screwballs, conspiracy crackpots, and fawning sycophants and MAGA trolls, like Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson.

Even worse, Trump’s nominee to be Director of the FBI, Kash Patel, recently threatened the press, saying that “We’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections. We’re going to come after you.”

You really have to wonder who the reporters are that Leavitt says “are excited that Trump will be back in the Oval Office”? The only plausible people who would say that are folks like Steve Bannon, or Megyn Kelly, or maybe the alleged drug-addled sex trafficker, Matt Gaetz, who was recently dumped as Trump’s nominee to be Attorney General, but who is now scheduled to host a primetime show on the piddling, Trump-fluffing, One America News.

So it doesn’t seem like the press corps is really all that excited by Trump’s return. More likely, they are nervous and preparing for a hostile relationship with the White House for the next four years. However, if nothing else, Leavitt is doing precisely the sort of job that Trump wants her to do. And she is proving her bona fides as Trump-worthy disseminator of dishonesty and lies.

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Antifa Mitch McConnell Warns that Trump 2.0 and ‘America First’ are Like the Third Reich

The authoritarian aspirations of Donald Trump have been unmistakably apparent for years. Anyone who has a functioning cerebral cortex will have noticed the maniacally tyrannical rhetoric that he openly excretes whenever he has an opportunity to express his rancid thoughts.

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Donald Trump

In the recent past Trump has advocated for “terminating” parts of the Constitution, herding migrants into concentration camps, accepting monetary contributions to enact legislation favorable to the contributor, suppressing the free press, and incarcerating his political opponents.

SEE THIS: Trump Madness on Meet the Press: Jail the January 6th Committee and Pardon January 6th Rioters

Trump’s admiration for brutal dictators such as Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong Un, is well known. He can’t stop lavishing them with praise, while simultaneously castigating America’s leaders, institutions, and citizens, as “vermin” who “poison the blood” of the country. Much of his bombast is closely aligned with the fascism of another one of his heroes, Adolf Hitler, whose book of speeches he kept at his bedside, according to his ex-wife Ivana.

Consequently, it is surprising to hear the Republican leader of the Senate, Mitch McConnell, deliver some harsh criticisms of Trump, whose hide he saved during two attempts to impeachment him. But now that McConnell is on his way out, he might be leaning a bit more toward some candid assessments of Trump. The Financial Times is reporting that…

“With [Trump] preparing to return to the White House next month, [McConnell] issues a warning from America’s past. ‘We’re in a very, very dangerous world right now, reminiscent of before world war two,’ he says. ‘Even the slogan is the same. ‘America First.’ That was what they said in the ’30s.'”

McConnell is right. Trump’s words and deeds are frighteningly similar to those of the Nazi regime prior to World War II. And the “America First” slogan was originally used by Nazi sympathizers in the U.S. and the American Nazi Party in the the 1930’s.

None of this information is new. What’s new is that a staunchly conservative Republican icon like McConnell is the saying it this time. And that’s not all, He also told his biographer, Michael Tackett, that McConnell has called Trump “stupid” and a “despicable human being.” And, once again, that isn’t new information either to rational, thinking Americans.

McConnell’s opinion of Trump, while accurate, is coming out too late to have any positive impact on the state of current political affairs. But it is not too late for the nation to prepare for a massive campaign of resistance to Trump’s totalitarian intentions.

Trump is endeavoring to populate his administration with overtly anti-American sycophants whose loyalty is only to Trump. And he is using his gift for lying to claim a mandate that his margin of victory (1.5%) doesn’t support. He is also trying to convince the nation (and perhaps himself) that he is popular. Part of the argument will rest on his being named Time’s “Person of the Year.” However, like almost everything else, Trump doesn’t understand what that means…

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Matt Gaetz is Taking His Moral Decrepitude to One America News Network

Donald Trump is finding out that putting together a Cabinet of notoriously incompetent, unqualified, dishonest, hate-mongering, sexual perverts, and pathetically sycophantic toadies is harder than he thought. His nominees to top administration posts are undergoing scrutiny of their professional and personal lives that is revealing how desperately unfit they are for public service.

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Matt Gaetz

Leading the pack of failed nominees was Trump’s first choice for Attorney General, former representative Matt Gaetz. He withdrew himself from consideration after it is was clear that he could not get enough votes from his fellow MAGA Republicans to be confirmed. Even that crowd briefly exhibited a measure of integrity when they were faced with approving someone who was credibly accused of sex trafficking a minor and indulging in illicit drug use. And he isn’t the only one with such a repulsive resume…

SEE THIS: One Down: The Demise of Matt Gaetz’ AG Aspirations Spells Trouble for Pete Hegseth at Defense

After bombing out as a potential AG, Gaetz promised that he was “still gonna be in the fight, but its gonna be from a new perch.” And as it turns out, he is indeed going to be out on a limb next year with the premiere of his new primetime TV program on the Trump-fluffing One America News (OAN) network. CNN made the announcement of Gaetz’s new hosting gig Tuesday morning. OAN confirmed it shortly after saying that…

“One America News Network, (‘OAN’) announced today that powerhouse Matt Gaetz will be joining OAN’s prime-time lineup in January. […] Matt is a remarkable talent and a principled leader. His insider access to America’s top policymakers and unwavering dedication to America-first values will bring unparalleled insight and exclusive content to OAN viewers.”

That’s an especially PR-heavy press release. Gaetz can hardly be described as a “powerhouse,” a “talent,” or a “principled leader,” by anyone who is able to actually define those words. And his alleged “access to America’s top policymakers” is notably suspect since almost all of his former congressional colleagues openly hate his guts.

Landing at OAN has to be something of a disappointment for Gaetz. He was obviously rejected by Fox News and Newsmax, both of which he has previously lobbied for a job. Consequently, this should raise the profile of OAN as the network that employs sex traffickers who committed statutory rape and bragged about using illegal drugs. And that profile boost will only be enhanced if the House Ethics Committee’s probe into the allegations against Gaetz are ever officially released or leaked.

OAN’s reputation as a Trump propaganda disseminator has been affirmed by their settlement of a defamation lawsuit brought by election workers and Smartmatic Voting Systems following the network’s deliberately dishonest 2020 election coverage.

Furthermore, there has been an incestuous relationship between the network and Trump World. For instance, Natalie Harp, a current starstruck Trump flunky, is a former OAN host who was known for writing fawning letters to Trump, saying such adoring thinks as “You are all that matters to me.” And Christina Bobb is a former OAN correspondent and an attorney who worked Trump. She was the member of Trump’s legal team who signed off on the confirmation to the FBI that Trump had returned all of the classified documents that he had stolen and stored at Mar-a-Lago. Which, of course, was not true.

For his part, Gaetz is bursting with pride for his new job. Or at least that’s what he says. But it’s hard to believe that he’s all that excited about being hired by D-List network with a miniscule audience after he resigned his seat in congress and was trashed as the AG nominee by his BFF Trump.

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