No. Trump and his press secretary set off the conspiracy theories. Trump's own videographer triggered the safety mechanism.

World Power Humiliates Itself; Sends Crackpot to Address U.N. www.nytimes.com/live/2025/09...

So many scandals, so little time. This alone would have ended any presidential administration before now: 1. Official is caught on video taking a $50,000 cash bribe in a bags. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/20/u...

While no one pays attention, Putin has launched a low-grade war of micro-aggressions and attrition against Europe: drones, fighter-jet incursions, cyberattacks. He knows Trump has given him a green light, weakening NATO and (literally) rolling out the red carpet.

The main television news programs are already compliant. It's more urgent for the regime to silence the late-night talk shows.

It's a strange fact of American life that the most eloquent, hard-hitting, and effective critics of the Trump regime have been the comedians hosting late-night talk shows.

There was no “ideology,” leftist or otherwise. What if he was just a kid in love, who saw a man spreading hatred that endangered the person he loved. And he broke.

And now: The biggest straight-up bribe in American history. Two billion dollars from a foreign ruler into the pockets of Trump, his family, and his cronies. In exchange, an AI chip sale that compromises national security. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/u...

This is what we've come to. Inciting hatred of Blacks, Jews, and gays is, according to the New York Times, merely “brash right-wing spin.” Did they think about this at all? Is it a considered policy choice?

There is no conceivable reason to lower flags to half staff in honor of Charlie Kirk, a rabble rouser and “media personality" who never served his country in any capacity.

English mavens: How did "dated" become the euphemism?

When Trump promised to end Putin's war with Ukraine on his first day in office, did he mention that Putin would take the war to Poland? I forget.

American journalism today.

Surely the lead story in every newspaper right now should be the President declaring war on a major American city—the White House posting violent imagery of the Chicago skyline in flames. Here's a historian with news judgment. open.substack.com/pub/heatherc...

Full credit to the NY Times—Dave Phillipps and Matthew Cole—for this blockbuster story. (Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/u...) Let me suggest a clearer lede, however:

There’s no doubt left: American fascism has begun. “Everything else from here on out is just a matter of degree and wondering how bad it will get and how far it will go? Do we end up ‘merely’ like Hungary or do we go all the way toward an American Reich?” www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/america-ti...

Epstein Victims Begged Republicans to Stop Protecting the Child Sex Traffickers and Their Clients as Pete Hegseth Said, “Look! Over Here! We Blew Up a Boat!” www.nytimes.com/live/2025/09...

Jesus. Regiments from Illinois fought in Texas in 1865. Regiments from Texas do not belong anywhere in Illinois.

Here we have Trump, his minions and flunkies, and his real estate cronies planning in writing a historic war crime. For profit. wapo.st/4g2eATo

Remember when millions of people were dying from Covid-19, and life came to a halt, and everyone was locked into their houses, and every day was terrifying? Because there was no vaccine! Of course you do. Republicans have empowered a madman to bring that back. talkingpointsmemo.com/morning-memo...

What a tiny little man. www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

These petty, vindictive, feckless apparatchiks. Unable to admit error, flouting the law and traducing justice. Will no one stop them. www.nytimes.com/live/2025/08...

“It is wild to see Republicans cheering on a president who publicly threatened a CEO and stated openly that he shook the man down for a major share in his company." open.substack.com/pub/heatherc...

Ghislaine Maxwell, convicted sex trafficker and perjurer, who for years pimped underage girls to wealthy old men such as Donald Trump, cooperated with Trump's personal defense lawyer (and now deputy attorney general) by giving this warm testimonial:

Imagine—teenagers actually wanting to stay healthy. www.scientificamerican.com/article/more...

Zelensky: How is this real life? Russia is murdering and kidnapping our children. Macron: He'll die one of these years.

Needed: thought bubbles for Zelensky and Macron.

Does the U.S. government have any comment on Putin’s forces flying the American and Russian flags as they attack Ukrainians following Trump’s show of obeisance?

How badly did Putin humiliate “the eager puppy-like supplicant” Trump in Anchorage? This badly: open.substack.com/pub/fallows/...

Who could have guessed that Trump would 1) Use his meeting with Putin to complain about how US elections are rigged. 2) Tell a series of absurd lies about his meeting with Putin.

The Turing test is done. We’ve proven that we can be fooled. around.com/the-lie-of-ai/

"The Congress shall have Power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises." In the U.S. Constitution, this is bedrock.

Let’s play “Imagine if …” Imagine if a Democratic president extorted extra-legal payments (taxes, but unauthorized by Congress) from individual business leaders, according to his whims, in exchange for government approvals. Republicans? Anything to say? www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/t...

the thing everyone is going to have to accept is that the post-trump period, whenever it comes, will not and cannot be a project of national unity, it must be a project of partisan project of renewal, in the same way that reconstruction and the new deal were partisan projects of renewal.

holy shit this is a helluva ad from the Democrat running against Joni Ernst in Iowa. worth every second

Your taxpayer dollars at work: New Zealand woman living and working LEGALLY in Washington state, snatched up with her 6-year-old son, transported to Texas, and imprisoned there. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

Consider this weaselly framing by the New York Times. The reality: Trump is telling a blatant lie about violent crime in DC in order to militarize its streets. He is inventing a nonexistent crime wave. So what’s this extra clause? Some “youth crime” still exists? It hasn’t been totally eradicated?

First Ukraine, now Alaska. Putin’s team, triumphant, asks Alaskans to “respectfully remember their Russian past and their Orthodox present.” wapo.st/46PwvtP

You know how sometimes you read that a celebrity has died and it’s a surprise because you actually thought they had died long ago? help.aol.com/articles/dia...

Bringing back pandemics to own the libs. www.msn.com/en-in/news/w...

The Vice President, the White House chief of staff, the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General, and the FBI Director convene for a dramatic evening meeting at the Vice President's residence. What urgent matter of national security can it be, to require such top-level attention?

Elon Musk is a symbol of American collapse in many ways, but one of the big ones is how for years he has constantly engaged in multi-billion-dollar securities and consumer fraud, and the "consequence" has been him making billions more, including from the federal government paying him directly.

3/ If there were a Public Editor, she/he would dig into this story— and see who is telling the truth. Lacking a Public Editor, NYT really needs its leaders, many of whom are former student journalists, to say more about provenance of this very damaging "Harvard bending the knee" report.

Sorry, the correct link is www.nytimes.com/2025/08/02/u...

Shorter NYT: The entire Trump administration is a nonstop bribery operation. Get in line. smidnytimes.com/2025/08/02/u...

Sex offender? What sex offender?

The debate around Musk and the Royal Society is just so frustrating. If those who think it is right to retain him as an FRS were to say "Here, despite his having been a direct accomplice to the dismantling of scientific institutions, destruction of scientific data, spreading of...

All these universities and museums tripping over themselves to appease our tinpot Stalin. Have they no self-respect? wapo.st/3HhfyxU

NEW visual investigation: ICE agents are smashing car windows & grabbing the people inside There's footage of sobbing kids, pregnant women, & bloodied faces We found ~50 cases but no civilians w/ sig criminal records Insiders told us this used to be rare projects.propublica.org/trump-ice-sm...

I don’t think “Epstein stole my 16-year-old sex worker" is a winning defense for Trump. www.pbs.org/newshour/pol...