Smart people don't like me

Yep. That would be because they’re smart.

Leadership

If ever there was a time for the president to step up and calm down the simmering violence and hate plaguing the USA, it’s right now.

He has it in his grasp to call people to heal the divisions and dial down the temperature. In other words ... show leadership!

Will he?

Toning down the rhetoric

To Trump, and all the hysterical right-wing pundits automatically blaming the “radical left” for Charlie Kirk’s shooting ...

(Setting aside the fact that the shooter came from a conservative, deeply religious family)

... look to your own behavior since 2015: insults, memes, tweets, lies, false blaming, name-calling, calls to violence, targeted retribution, pardoning violent criminals ...

All norms of decent behavior have been upended by Trump. This is the country you’ve become.

Apocalypse Now

“I love the smell of deportations in the morning,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

Just remind me, this is the guy who wants people to donate money and pray for him to get into Heaven?

I should have realized ...

After posting about Trump’s whining yesterday, I belatedly realized why he’s having a hissy fit at three national leaders getting together.

Xi, Putin, and Kim, three dictators that he so admires, are having a party ... and he wasn’t invited!

Words matter

Trump knows this. Not on any intellectual level, but on an animal reptilian-brain instinctive basis. This is why his attacks on anyone not 100% devoted to him tend to hit home on a gut level with no appeal to higher mental reasoning.

Apparently, the leaders of China, Russia, and North Korea are “conspiring” against the US.

No, Donald. “Conspiring” implies planning something unlawful. These are sovereign nations on a legal par with the US talking amongst themselves. They may be forming an alliance against the US but that is not a conspiracy. It’s within their right, and not especially surprising given the hostility the US is showing to pretty much everyone else in the world.

I look extremely good in shorts

The world of Trump’s imagination is even more bizarre than any of us suspected.

History at the museum

I guess if you were a rich, white slave-owner, slavery wasn’t all that bad.

After all, that’s the perspective Trump identifies with.

Not fair

During the Ukraine press briefing, Trump took an irrelevant tangent to one of his favorite rants – mail-in voting. Apparently this is a glaring source of fraud, despite this being how Trump himself usually chooses to vote. Seems a matter of “Do as I say, not as I do.” Typical Republican hypocrisy.

There is no material voter fraud in the US, despite Republicans looking under every conceivable rock for years searching for it. The conclusion is clear. Trump is still trying to discredit the election process and pave the way for massive and selective voter suppression.

Add in the overt gerrymandering in Texas and other red states, this is a tacit admission that Republicans are scared stiff of free and open elections because they know they can only win by cheating.

Summary of the summit

Key takeaways from the Trump/Putin talks:

Trump has caved in to Putin on the question of a ceasefire.

He’s now going straight for a peace deal, putting pressure on Ukraine to accept impossible terms akin to unconditional surrender to the aggressor.

But pushing for peace at any cost makes Trump look good, because Ukraine becomes the scapegoat if nothing can be agreed.

And he’s already begging for a Nobel Peace Prize, because Obama has one and he hasn’t and that grinds his gears, and he doesn’t care about strife-torn invaded people, only about personal accolades.

Spot the difference

Trump: Do as I say, or else ...

Politician/judge/state/university/sovereign country/law firm/private business: No

Trump: Right, I will cut off your funding/sue you/end your career/tariff you/revoke your security clearance/harass you/cancel government contracts/interfere with your business negotiations/deport you/send vigilantes to your house/fire you/send in the National Guard/call you nasty names ...

Trump: Release the Epstein files

Judge: No

Trump: *shrugs* It’s out of my hands folks, nothing I can do

Partners in crime

I find it ironic beyond belief that Trump is cracking down on a non-existent crime wave in Washington DC, to solve a non-existent crisis.

This hard-on-crime hero is the convicted felon who pardons other convicted criminals, including those who attacked police in their line of duty.

Unbelievable!

Dividing the spoils

So Trump is talking to buddy Putin about ending the war in Ukraine.

He’s talking about ceding Ukrainian land to Putin as part of the deal.

When the FUCKING HELL did that become his to negotiate away?

This does not sound like a negotiation to end the war. It’s a talk between two dictators with someone else’s land as a bargaining chip. The question is – what’s Trump getting out of the deal in return for shafting a European ally? Because you can bet your life there will be something in it for him.

Fit for purpose

Apparently, Mexicans are “made” for laboring in the fields.

How many centuries did America just regress?

The MAGA variations

Make America Grate Again – pretty much any time Trump speaks.

Make America Greedy Again – actually, there’s no “again” about this one. America never does anything simply because it’s the right thing to do. There is always the “what’s in it for us?” Sometimes subtle, sometimes blatant like Trump’s lust for other countries’ natural resources.

Make America Godless Again – on two levels, first whatever happened to the separation of church and state that was enshrined in the Founding Fathers’ thinking when they drafted the constitution? Secondly, the current behavior of supposed Christians in the country, including Trump and his followers, is nothing any Christian concept of God would recognize.

Morons Are Governing America – self explanatory.

Millionaire Asshole Golfing Again

Making Allies Grow Angry

Make America Go Away – now that I can get behind.