‘How is it… that kids can get into such trouble for their behavior, accept responsibility and make amends, but the president of the United States does not and will not?’ Via @jackiecalmes.bsky.social www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: After Trump's racist post about the Obamas, a daughter called: How does he get away with behavior that kids in school get punished for? Or adults in any job? Good question. Daily he offends. If only Congress or the Supreme Court would be his H.R. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: To all who're daily distressed by some Trump outrage, you're not alone. “Every day there’s something insane happening,” said a Texas independent in the red district that just elected a Democrat. Misery has company. And company's coming in November. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Enough with laying blame on Noem, Miller and Bovino for the feds' deadly, terroristic tactics in Minneapolis and elsewhere. This is Trump’s paramilitary. These are his advisers. These are his policies. Don't let him pass the buck this time. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: All of Trump's gilt defiling the White House, his name on the Kennedy Center--those can be easily undone. The same can’t be said for the damage he's done in just a year to the US character and rule of law at home, or its alliances and reputation globally. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Robert Yates, Essay No. 15, Mar 20, 1788 “The president, with his immense powers, may easily become the tyrant of America." onedominoaway.com/broken-shack... An Old Whig, Open Letter Oct 27, 1787 “The president of the United States… will be in reality more like a monarch than any king in Europe.”

‘It’s Americans’ bad fortune that such a man as Trump, a wannabe king, is the presider in chief for the yearlong commemorations of the rebellion that ultimately threw off a real king who’d met protesters with force and retribution.’ Via @jackiecalmes.bsky.social www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump's conflicting takes on protest in Iran and the US is especially gross in the 250th year of the Declaration of Independence. Its indictments of King George have parallels today. Like, he “sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people.” www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Who knew that by “America First,” President Trump meant all of the Americas? With the Donroe Doctrine--Might makes right--the wannabe king turns out to be a wannabe emperor of an entire hemisphere. While exacerbating, not fixing, problems at home. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump's most potent '24 campaign ad delivered a punch line with real punch: “Kamala Harris is for they/them. President Trump is for you.” In 2025, the self-aggrandizing president only lived by the first-person pronouns: me, myself and I. A review. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: A man told a Salvation Army bell-ringer at the grocery, “Because you said ‘Merry Christmas’ and not ‘Happy Holidays,’ I’m giving you money. America’s back!” It's a mindset Trump stokes. Such kind wishes aren't political--unless you want them to be. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: There is a Santa Claus, and light in the dark. Susie Wiles' candor on Trump 2.0 in Vanity Fair is a Christmas-Hanukkah gift. Along with Trump's sliming of Rob Reiner, voters got the clearest mirror yet to the ugliness that is Trump. Happy 2026. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Even as the Supreme Court this week signaled it will end regulatory agencies' independence, Trump's interference in the fight over Warner Bros. Discovery showed what the future holds: Presidents picking winners and losers, politics over expertise. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: First Trump fired the lawyers, Months on, the storylines around him are tangled in a knotty mess of lawlessness, hypocrisy & war crimes: killings at sea of supposed drug-runners, retribution for critics, yet a pardon for an ex-narco-state leader. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Today family comes first, but give thanks too for an independent judiciary, for the many federal judges, including Trump picks, who've withstood harassment and death threats to hold the wannabe king and his toadying turkeys to account. Examples: www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Presidents of both parties have abused the pardon power but Trump's corruption and perversion of the rule of law surpasses them, making reform a national imperative: Amend the Constitution to repeal the unchecked power or give Congress a veto. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: A defensive Trump has been flailing, pinballing dumb ideas--$2,000 rebates and debt payoffs with nonexistent "trillions" from tariffs, 50-year mortgages, ending Obamacare. Policy ignorance has been a defining trait, but this knee-jerk junk is nuts. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: A gilded White House, Gatsbyesque parties, crypto-grift. Trump won two elections on his appeal to working class voters, but he seems utterly out of touch, enjoying his personal Golden Age as voters struggle with costs he vowed to contain. They've noticed. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Only next to the inept radicals and flatterers in Trump's Cabinet does Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stand out as a “normie.” But his Argentina bailout at rural America's expense is just the latest sign that he's normal only by Trump standards. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: As sickening as Trump's East Wing teardown is, it's small stuff compared to killing noncombatant civilians from nations with which the US isn't at war. Yet together the actions reflect the spectrum of his utter sense of impunity. No kings indeed. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Democrats are right to demand continued healthcare subsidies before they vote to reopen the government. But the shutdown is at least as valuable for drawing attention to the de facto Trump shutdown of government that he's been executing all year. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

The following is REAL footage from Portland, 2025. Viewer discretion is advised.

Column: George Washington warned about the likes of Trump. But 200+ years later the checks and balances the founders wrote into the Constitution to guard against a wannabe king with a standing army are proving inadequate to the charge when Congress bows. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

America First? Trump cuts money funded by law to blue states & cities amid the govt shutdown while his Treasury extends a $20 BILLION bailout package to Argentina that's only domestic benefit is to rich US holders of Argentinian bonds.

Column: Not since the pro-slavery Taney court before the Civil War has a Supreme Court been so wrong for its moment in history as the Roberts court. Lower courts have stepped up to Trump's anticonstitutional threats, but SCOTUS trumps them. Pun intended. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump lately obsesses about getting into heaven. Hint: Stop wishing that so many fellow citizens go to hell. The disconnect between Trump's dreams of heaven and his earthly avenging was never plainer than in his hateful message at Charlie Kirk's memorial. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Each day since the Trump-Putin summit shows that worse than nothing came from that failed bro-fest. Putin arrived to a red carpet even as Russian kept bombing Ukraine and left with license for Russians “to do whatever the hell they want,” as Trump once put it. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Democrats’ leverage on spending bills is pointless if senators don’t use it. They were right in March not to force a shutdown but they can no longer help fund a government that's become a plaything for Trump's power lust, enrichment and retribution. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Troops patrol the National Mall--"America's Front Yard"--as Trump normalizes a police state in DC. If he sends masked feds & more red-state troops to other blue cities, protests will grow. That's good but probably just what he wants: an excuse for more troops. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

“I am not a crook,” Nixon said in 1973. “I’m not a dictator,” Trump insisted on Monday. And with that, another famously false presidential proclamation entered the annals of memorable statements no president should ever feel compelled to make. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: It's time to quit tuning out Trump's Big Lie that he won the 2020 election (validated by Putin!). It's his pretext, along with trying to ban mail ballots & militarize Democratic cities, to disrupt the '26 midterm elections lest he lose control of Congress. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump's showy obsession with redoing the Oval Office & Rose Garden, his plane & even golf cart (!), and adding a White House ballroom reflects something much bigger--his unchecked makeover of the nation's government & institutions, all in service of his power. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

'The president’s rigging goes beyond elections, to all aspects of governance, if his cruel, chaotic maladministration can be called that.' @jackiecalmes.bsky.social on the rigger in chief www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: After retribution, Trump's guiding principle is projection: Falsely projecting his sins onto enemies. Everything is "rigged" against him, he vents--even as he works to rig the '26 midterms, jobs data, tariff law, DA appointments & more. Even golf! www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Israel's heinous policies in Gaza are taking their toll on Israel's own: Haaretz reports today the 7th death by suicide THIS MONTH of an Israeli soldier. The soldier, 24, had just ended a stint in Gaza. Because he died at home, the IDF won't consider him a fallen soldier. Shame.

Column: By starving Gaza, Netanyahu is hastening a break in bipartisan US backing for Israel that endured for the entire lives of most Americans--until he arrived, denying Palestinians’ humanity and overtly courting US Republicans. It's not only shameful, it's stupid. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

‘In pre-Trump times, Bove’s nomination would be an easy call: No. And if ever there was a time for the Senate to use its power to send a president that message, it’s now.’ Via @jackiecalmes.bsky.social @latimes.com www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

. @jackiecalmes.bsky.social: ‘For a president… to falsely allege a former president is a traitor, and to suggest that his lickspittles at the Justice Department and FBI should act against that former president, is a distraction that must command Americans’ attention.’ www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump now has completely sullied the office of president & I'm not referring to the Oval's gilt excess. His latest outrage--lying that a former president is a traitor--is one distraction from his Epstein mess that demands attention, and condemnation. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: It’s bad enough that Senate Republicans shirked their advice-&-consent power to confirm Trump’s Cabinet of crackpots, saying he should get to pick his posse. But now they seem poised to okay one of the worst nominees ever for a lifetime court seat: Emil Bove. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: It's no blame game over the Texas tragedy: Trump's sacking of the government, not least agencies for weather warnings & disaster aid, means he's accountable for each tragedy that might've been averted or mitigated by fed action. He can't say HE wasn't warned. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

A conservative Arizona Supreme Court justice is warning that the Trump administration is "doing violence" to the Constitution and publicly expressing his concerns about the emerging risk of "authoritarianism." www.azcentral.com/story/news/l...

Column: The juxtaposition was apt: one big ugly bill in DC & one big garish wedding in Venice. What Trump's bill has in common with Bezos' nuptials: The excess of a new gilded age. More tax cuts, debt, income inequality & preventable deaths among the newly uninsured. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Federal judges, including Trump picks, have been a bulwark against his lawless reign. They've repeatedly stood up for the law & Constitution to constrain him, at demonstrable danger to themselves. You’d think the Supreme Court would have their backs. But no. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: After a lifetime reading about antidemocratic countries abroad—despots, masked agents, disappearances, troops in streets, arrests of opposition figures, military parades, political killings--this month I was abroad & that country was my own. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: The Trump Doctrine in foreign policy is less "America First" than "Me, Myself & I." He's making deals alright, but not the ones he's promised in the Mideast, Ukraine & China. There, he's getting played. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: Trump began the week with yet another attack on federal judges ("scum," "monsters")--just after a WSJ report that fearful judges talk of forming a security unit & before an NYT story on a spike in threats against judges since Trump took office. He's a danger. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: We’ve seen false advertising in naming bills before; take Dems' 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Yet none was so misbranded as the GOP's "One Big Beautiful Bill," named by the branding aficionado himself, Trump. It's a debt bomb that indeed F's w/Medicaid. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: The real value of Trump’s grift, er, gift, of a Qatari jet could be what it reveals to Americans about the brazenness of his global grab for wealth & its trappings. Crypto & foreign deals are eye-glazing; he's made it easy to fathom his corruption. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

Column: I figured Trump, after claiming Biden 'destroyed' the economy, would take credit for fixing what wasn't broken. Instead he broke it & blames Biden. It won't work: the mess is too ID'd with his tariffs. And next: The GOP's fiscal follies over taxes & Medicaid. www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...