My newest #Substack on #Trump's expected, yet dangerous turn towards more lawlessness and the #GOP mooks attacking our judiciary/enabling him
https://www.blueamp.co/p/trump-defies-judge-iilegally-dangerously #news #usa #press #media #politics #tech #ai #elonmusk #donaldtrump #musk #socialmedia #russia #ukraine #china #canada #eu #europe #us #amrerica #tariffs #war
The Navajo Code Talkers are the latest to be erased from official military history by the Republicans' racist "DEI" purge.
The article give a remarkable list of people tossed in the memory hole: many black veterans and units, even the regiment from "Glory"
DOGE Cuts Reach Key Nuclear Scientists, Bomb Engineers & Safety Experts
Firings & buyouts hit the top-secret National Nuclear Safety Admn amid a major effort to upgrade America’s #nuclear arsenal. Critics say it shows the consequences of heedlessly cutting the federal work force.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/17/us/politics/federal-job-cuts-nuclear-bomb-engineers-scientists.html
"Officials had initially expected that the nuclear agency’s #NationalSecurity mission would protect it from layoffs."
DOGE Is Making It Harder to Track Extreme Weather. What Could Go Wrong?
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/17/opinion/weather-service-doge-cuts.html
"These cuts threaten your budget, too. #Insurance companies rely heavily on #data gathered by #NOAA and the #US Geological Survey to assess wildfire, flood, wind and other risks. Some firms are warning that any interruption in data availability could drive insurance premiums for customers even higher."
Elon Musk Shared, Then Removed a Post Absolving Dictators for Genocide
The post falsely claimed that Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Mao Zedong were not responsible for the murders of millions of people, but rather public sector workers were.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/14/technology/elon-musk-x-post-hitler-stalin-mao.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4E4.RW-P.VV-Qk7n8s5HK&smid=bs-share
"Musk shared the post without any other comment. He removed it soon after users on X criticized the post, saying it was #antisemitic and dismissive of #genocide."
Who DOGE Hurts: Gutting NOAA
https://joycevance.substack.com/p/who-doge-hurts-gutting-noaa
"the #NOAA was preparing to lay off more than 1,000 workers...
People who live in #hurricane & #tornado country keep their “NOAA #weather radios” handy...
In theory, it sounds like one more bad thing to worry about. In practice, it’s much worse. We’ve just had a demonstration of precisely how effective NOAA is & what we stand to lose without it."
"I find it odious when the world’s richest man cackles about #America shoving programs for needy children “into the wood chipper.”
When you meet those dying #children and look into their eyes and hold their hands and feel faint heartbeats flutter, you can’t bear the gleeful laughter. You see children just like your own and hang your head in shame."
#GiftArticle #GiftLink
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/15/opinion/foreign-aid-cuts-impact.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4E4.H8Lx.GD39rucUfloD&smid=url-share
"Where are the White countries?"
Draft List of Trump's Proposed Travel Ban Countries — An internal Trump regime proposal lists the following countries whose citizens could face restrictions on entering the U.S. Some countries may change in any final order
#AureFreePress #News #press #headline #GOP #Politics #uspolitics #uspol
The People Trump and DOGE Hurt
https://joycevance.substack.com/p/the-people-trump-and-doge-hurt
"when fair #housing groups lose... funding, a lot of people suffer as a result...
This isn’t about making #government more effective. It’s about #cruelty. That’s the point... leaving families without a #safety net and putting countless lives and futures at risk. The freeze would have devastating consequences for millions of #Americans, regardless of political affiliation."
USPS Makes Alarming Deal With Elon Musk’s DOGE
US Postmaster General #LouisDeJoy is welcoming DOGE with open arms.
https://newrepublic.com/post/192777/usps-deal-elon-musk-doge-cuts
"DeJoy said... #DOGE was “an effort aligned” with... shrinking the USPS,
#Musk also believes that the #USPS should be privatized...
#Privatization... would raise prices, hurt postal workers, and negatively impact #rural communities, who are served by USPS thanks to the #Constitution and federal #law."
DOGE plans to double its staff, target safety net programs
https://www.muskwatch.com/i/159032671/doge-plans-to-double-its-staff-target-safety-net-programs
" #Musk also telegraphed DOGE’s designs on dramatically reducing social #safety net programs...
Earlier this month, he described #SocialSecurity as “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.” So far, DOGE’s work has served as a form of austerity theater, which — while destructive — has done very little to reduce federal spending."
See How Elon Musk’s Team Inflated, Deleted and Rewrote Its Savings Claims
#GiftLink
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/upshot/musk-doge-changes-deletions.html?unlocked_article_code=1.304.pJHf.DTibHql8U3db&smid=url-share
Helpful animated graphics showing Doge's mistakes and lies.
"debuted a website last month... the list has undergone dizzying changes. New contracts have been added, others deleted. Values have been altered, and altered again...
more than 2,200 contracts listed — or 40% of the total — show a savings value of $0"
TSA Says Its Credit Cards for Bomb-Sniffing Dogs Are Cut Off
https://www.404media.co/tsa-k9-bomb-sniffing-dogs-funding/
"The #TSA spokesperson didn’t clarify whether these were #Doge cuts... but Elon Musk’s dept has been busy making poorly-coded & insecure websites, dodging #FOIA, gutting national parks resources... demanding federal workers list their weeks out in bullet points, and generally sowing #chaos all over the federal #government with layoffs & budget cuts."
Making DOGE Cuts Permanent Is Easier Said Than Done
Plus: #GOP town halls are scarce these days.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/making-doge-cuts-permanent-congress-funding-shutdown
"The prospect of ending these far-reaching programs—like #PEPFAR and, on a much larger scale, the foreign aid administered by the #USAID—remains distant. Beyond that, #DOGE ’s haphazard cuts are difficult to codify because they have a weak legal foundation & are hard to explain, let alone justify (hence the repeat un-firings)."
Trump Suffers Huge Loss as Judge Overturns “Unlawful” Mass Firings
At Donald Trump’s behest, #DOGE had sought to gut the federal workforce.
https://newrepublic.com/post/192719/donald-trump-doge-judge-overturns-mass-firings
"the mass firing of federal employees was an “unlawful” directive...
ordered several agencies to “immediately” reinstate... employees... the #VA... Depts of #Defense, Energy, Interior, Treasury, & #Agriculture... the IRS, which falls under the helm of the Treasury Dept"
"Where do Elon Musk’s #business interests end & Donald Trump’s #political interests begin? Trick question—they’re one & the same.
How else do you explain the jarring sight of the #POTUS hawking #Teslas on the #WhiteHouse South Lawn?"
https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-donald-trump-doge-congress-takeover/
Here begins the 11th Elon Musk thread.
List of links to previous threads:
https://newsie.social/@ZhiZhu/113986946321010763
Cartoon source: https://contrarian.substack.com/p/fire-sale
Obviously I support pressuring the U.S. government to impeach Trump, both for the laws he's breaking and to stop the very real, and very violent fascist agenda he's conducting, but I don't think you can count on a Republican Party that has fully embraced Trump and the fascist American First movement, and is currently surrendering its own powers over things like tariffs to the President, to help anyone do that. They like most of the fascist shit he's doing, and they've seen what the MAGA base does to GOP officials who speak out against Downmarket Mussolini, at least in terms of their career prospects. Mostly then, I'm sharing this article to point out that Trump's strategy of ignoring the courts and daring someone to stop him extends far beyond an injunction to protect the right to even *have* optional diversity programs that, let's be honest, a lot of privileged white Americans really don't care about even though they should.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-impeachment
Trump Ignoring Court Orders Is New Grounds for Impeachment, Says Pro-Democracy Group
"As Free Speech for People detailed in a Wednesday statement, the new administration's recent "oversteps of the judiciary branch include: refusing to release $2 billion in foreign aid in defiance of multiple court orders; refusing to adhere to court orders that prohibit the Office of Management and Budget from implementing a freeze on all federal assistance; and refusing to adhere to a court order requiring U.S. Office of Personnel Management [acting Director] Charles Ezell to testify in person on March 13, 2025, in a lawsuit challenging Ezell and OPM's termination of thousands of employees."
Courtney Hostetler, legal director of the nonprofit, said that "the checks and balances of our three-branch government is a cornerstone of our democracy, created by our country's founders because they were rightfully afraid of how quickly, in the absence of a balanced system, our democracy might become a tyranny."
"Trump has usurped the powers of the legislature and now tramples on the authority of the judiciary," Hostetler continued. "In just one month, he has repeatedly ignored court rulings that have and must restrain his unlawful abuses of power. He, like all presidents, must abide by the rule of law—and because he has not, Congress must adhere to its own obligations to carry out an impeachment investigation."
I write a lot about what the shit Trump says actually means, or what he's *going* to do next, because as a student of Pig Empire history, political economy, and the rise of fascist movements, I know a lot of things about how Trump is operating that for-profit, corporate media seems reluctant to share with you; and I've been right far more often than wrong on this hellride so far. On this subject however, we're no longer talking about likely scenarios. We can acknowledge that Trump absolutely means to ignore any court orders designed to block his fascist agenda and considers himself above the law, because he is doing precisely that already, he's openly saying he can break the law if he wants to as President, and as I'll discuss in a minute when I have time to break out the links, SCOTUS has signaled that they agree with him.
This is it folks, a really-existing, overt fascist dictatorship is here under Downmarket Mussolini and you are watching this nazi bastard assemble his own version of the Nazi Enabling Act, piecemeal, and in real time. The vaunted American system of "checks and balances" in government isn't going to stop him, the courts aren't going to stop him, and I would bet you my whole ass the Republican Party isn't going to stop him either. If we don't want to suddenly wake up five years from now to piles of corpses so big they block out the sun, it's time to start deploying people power, fighting fascism in the streets, and shutting this shit down - or you'll soon be asking yourself why you didn't *do* anything about fascism, before the mass graves were dug.
Over the past month and a half, I've encountered a lot of Very Serious PeopleTM in my life, and on my TV, who seem to think that the best way to counteract Trump's fascist regime as it tears everything apart and starts trying to disappear political prisoners, is to "not take the bait" and wait for the courts to handle it. "We are still a nation of laws" these folks have assured me, even though I've spent the past four decades watching US presidents break the law in ways that are more acceptable to Pig Empire society than Trump does. Throughout that time, my question has always been "well what are you gonna do when he just ignores the law? I mean it's not like you can send the local sheriff to evict him from the White House, and the GOP is extremely unlikely to help their inept opposition to impeach him." To the degree that I've been able to actually ask that question in person, I have yet to receive a reasonable reply; which is unfortunate, because completely ignoring the courts appears to be precisely what Downmarket Mussolini and his merry gang of shitposting nazi freaks are doing:
Trump Officials Are Pretending A Judge Didn't Bar His Anti-Diversity Orders
"In at least one case, the senior executive says, a U.S. official told the international organization that they knew about the court injunction and what it meant, but that the senior ranks of the Trump administration had explicitly instructed staff to enforce Trump’s executive orders, to ignore the court’s injunction, and to pressure partner organizations if need be. This official also said that if the nonprofit’s leaders didn’t sign the new paperwork, they’d risk having their funding quickly terminated by the Trump administration, per the senior executive.
“The Trump administration is daring the courts in the United States to do something about this, and thus far, I don’t think most people in America understand that what’s at risk is the fundamental basis that there is fairness and justice and rule of law in the United States,” says the senior executive. “And whatever you think of DEI, we should all agree that running the government based on the rule of law is a requirement. The playbook that is being used in the U.S. is not new; we’ve seen it in country after country where there’s been an increase in authoritarianism. To see it in the modern United States itself is what’s new and disturbing.”
The other two sources, one of whom is a Trump appointee, tell Rolling Stone that the directive to comply with Trump’s DEI orders, despite what the judge said, has gone out to an array of nonprofit organizations and partners around the world."
This is kind of a messy article that spends a lot of words going over the timeline of the Trump administration's attempts to play dumb about what the judge's injunction actually blocks in terms of Trump's anti-diversity executive orders, but the key takeaway isn't that complex. Trump has knowingly, and directly ordered his administration to ignore the injunction and continue enforcing his anti-diversity orders both inside the government and towards outside contractors and partners. This is not speculative, several sources *inside* the Trump administration have confirmed that the regime knows what the injunction means, and government employees are being ordered to simply ignore the ruling. Borrowing a page from noted genocidal racist U.S. president Andrew Jackson, Trump has effectively declared "Adam Abelson has made his decision; now let him enforce it."
Should this come as a surprise to anyone in the American establishment "opposition?" Well, probably not, because as the article notes Trump and his minions have more or less been actively broadcasting their intentions to ignore court orders designed to block their fascist agenda:
"The episode is part of a broader pattern in which the second Trump administration has operated under the impression that judges’ orders and rulings don’t much matter. Vice President J.D. Vance has publicly argued that Trump can ignore judges’ orders, asserting: “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.” Trump, for his part, has threatened to “look at” judges who rule against Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Over Presidents Day weekend, Trump admitted he thinks he can break any law he wants to — so long as he can loosely define doing so as part of his mission to “save” the country."
Folks, like I've been telling you for a while, the cavalry ain't coming. If a GOP-controlled government won't impeach him, and the regime won't obey court orders, nothing short of an uprising is stopping these nazis anytime soon; no matter HOW much that scares an "opposition" establishment that hates people power.
What the #GOP added into the Continuing Resolution was worse than shutting the #government down.
