- Two big topics today: how Trump is aligning with dictators, breaking 75 years of America as leader of the free world;
- With items from NYT’s Fred Kaplan, Atlantic’s Tom Nichols, and Robert Reich.
- Some reflections from two books I’ve just read;
- And the second topic: conservatives as bigots and simpletons, with many examples;
- And Trump’s hypocrisy about playing golf, and his projection that that’s what government workers are doing.
The earlier homepage title, about how Trump has abandoned 75 years of America as leader of the fee world, is there in the fourth paragraph.
NY Times, Fred Kaplan, 25 Feb 2025: Trump’s Foreign Policy Has Completely Departed From Reality, subtitled “And the geopolitical stakes are high.”
Now President Trump has gone too far.
Last week, he committed more foreign policy heresies than any U.S. leader ever has, slamming Ukraine’s popular president, Volodymyr Zelensky, as a dictator; bypassing Ukraine and the rest of Europe in seeking a separate peace with Russia; and all but endorsing a neo-Nazi party in Germany’s elections, thus casting doubt on America’s commitment to Western security and values.
On Monday, he went a step beyond what even many of his critics had imagined possible: He took Russia’s side in its war with Ukraine; he fully accepted Russian President Vladimir Putin’s view on what the war is all about.
His drastic departure from 75 years of U.S. foreign policy took the shape of a triple whammy.
\\
A few days earlier:
The Atlantic, Tom Nichols, 19 Feb 2025: A Terrible Milestone in the American Presidency, subtitled “Trump switches sides in the war for freedom.”
This week, Donald Trump falsely accused Ukraine of starting a war against a much larger neighbor, inviting invasion and mass death. At this point, Trump—who has a history of trusting Russian President Vladimir Putin more than he trusts the Americans who are sworn to defend the United States—may even believe it. Casting Ukraine as the aggressor (and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as a “dictator,” which Trump did today) makes political sense for Trump, who is innately deferential to Putin, and likely views the conflict as a distraction from his own personal and political agendas. The U.S. president has now chosen to throw America to Putin’s side and is more than willing to see this war end on Russian terms.
Repeating lies, however, does not make them true.
\\\
Why is he doing all this?
Robert Reich, 25 Feb 2025:
What is occurring now in the United States has very little to do with making the government more “efficient,” or rooting out “incompetence,” or “depoliticizing” parts of government that should be nonpartisan.
Nor is it motivated chiefly by Trump’s desire get rid of “D.E.I.” and “woke,” or “weaponize” law enforcement, or establish white Christian nationalism, or wreak vengeance on his enemies.
The real story is this.
In every part of the government that involves the use of force — the military, the investigation and prosecution of crimes, the authority to arrest, the capacity to hold individuals in jail — Trump is putting into power people who are more loyal to him than they are to the United States.
He has purged (or is in the process of purging) at the highest levels of the Department of Defense, the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the Inspectors General, and the FBI, anyone who is not personally loyal to him.
Trump is rapidly gaining a personal monopoly on the use of force. This is his most fundamental goal. This is the essence of tyranny.
With a discussion of firings (senior leaders with experience) and hirings (more Fox News lackeys).
He concludes,
We — the vast majority of people in the United States — do not want to live in a dictatorship. Yet we now have a president and a regime bent on an authoritarian takeover of America and on joining the other major authoritarians of the world.
As he tries to consolidate power, we must protect the institutions in our society still able to oppose Trump’s tyranny — independent centers of power that can stop or at least slow him. Not this Congress, tragically, but federal courts and judges. Many of our state governors and attorneys general, state legislatures, and state courts. Perhaps even our state and local police. Hopefully, our communities.
Ultimately this will come down to our own courage and resolve: To engage in peaceful civil disobedience. To organize and mobilize others. To fight against hate and bigotry. To fight for justice and democracy.
Remember this: Tyranny cannot prevail over people who refuse to succumb to it.
\\
A few days before Reich had an optimistic take:
Robert Reich, 21 Feb 2025: Ten reasons for modest optimism
They are: boycotts are taking hold; international resistance is rising; independent and alternative media are growing; Musk’s popularity is plunging; Musk’s Doge is losing credibility; the federal courts are hitting back; demonstrations are on the rise; stock and bond markets are trembling; Trump is overreaching — pretending to be a “king” and abandoning Ukraine for Putin; and, The Trump-Vace-Musk “shock and awe” plan is faltering.
And concludes confidently:
The current coup is less than five weeks old, and resistance has only begun. The Trump-Vance-Musk regime will fail. Even so, the Democracy Movement now emerging will require at least a decade, if not a generation, to rebuild and strengthen what has been destroyed, and to fix the raging inequalities, injustices, and corruption that led so many to vote for Trump for a second time.
Those of you who want the leaders of the Democratic Party to step up and be heard are right, of course. But political parties do not lead. The anti-war movement and the Civil Rights Movement didn’t depend on the Democratic Party for their successes. They depended on a mass mobilization of all of us who accepted the responsibilities of being American.
We will prevail because we are relearning the basic truth — that we are the leaders we’ve been waiting for.
\\\
Still, most people seem remarkably complacent, many indifferent, to everything that’s going on, with some die-hard MAGA fans even approving, cheering Trump and Musk on, which proves to me that they, like Trump and Musk, have no idea of what they’re actually doing. They are simpletons tearing down the complex state because they do not understand it. It’s easier to destroy than to build.
I’ve just read two books with somewhat overlapping themes, called THE MISINFORMATION AGE and THE KNOWLEDGE ILLUSION, each by two coauthors I’ve otherwise never heard of, and they support what may be a new provisional conclusion of mine. Or perhaps support for a couple I already have. To wit: most people don’t know much; they rely on their communities for what they know; and most of what they “know” is wrong. With results like the present: vast, world-changing events going on beyond their attention, because, e.g., they’re more concerned about the price of eggs. Historical events that are later noted by historians go largely unnoticed by most people at the time. Historians like to think that they *should* have noticed — e.g. the “good Germans” — but it seems not to actually happen that way.
\\\
And, it’s difficult to be polite about this, but many conservatives are simpletons, and bigots. How else to explain it? Examples:
JMG, 24 Feb 2025: Kirk: “Federal Workers Operate As Worthless Parasites”
How does he know? Why should it be so? “They don’t do anything of value”??
\
JMG, 25 Feb 2025: Ingraham: Federal Workers “Need To Get Real Jobs”
You mean, federal workers who keep the government of (what she would surely claim) is the greatest nation in history don’t have real jobs? How does she know? Evidence please.
\
And this guy.
Slate, Molly Olmstead, 24 Feb 2025: Elon Musk Is Grabbing Headlines, but This Man May Be Even More Dangerous, subtitled “OMB director Russell Vought isn’t as flashy as Musk. But it’s his vision of destroying the federal government that’s being put into effect.”
It’s the religious certainty of his thought, and his ambition to destroy the US government, that makes him evil.
Like Musk and Trump, Vought believes in breaking the system. Unlike them, he believes in doing so from an extremist religious position. It’s unclear whether his Christian nationalist worldview will take hold in the larger political machinations of the anti-bureaucracy movement. But regardless, it indicates that one of the architects of this moment feels not dispassionate pragmatism, but a kind of divine righteousness in inflicting a great “trauma” on our entire country.
\
Again, the presumption of these people, driven by religious zeal.
JMG, 24 Feb 2025: GOP House Rep Tells Furious Constituents That “God Has Plan And Purpose” For Them Getting Fired [VIDEO]
You can justify *anything* by claiming “God has a plan.” Said the murderer: “Don’t worry, God has a plan for me to strangle you to death. Now hold still!” And history.
\\
We’ve heard about this before.
Washington Post, Catherine Rampell, 25 Feb 2025: Cuts for thee, but not for me: Republicans beg for DOGE exemptions, subtitled “Have GOP lawmakers forgotten that they control spending?”
Here:
Washington Post, 19 Feb 2025: After ceding power of the purse, GOP lawmakers beg Trump team for funds, subtitled “Republican senators are asking Cabinet secretaries and other Trump officials to let money flow back into their states.”
and
Slate, Jim Newell, 20 Feb 2025: One Senator Accidentally Captured Trump’s Corruption of Congress in a Nutshell, subtitled “Republicans are begging for funding back. Trump has them right where he wants them.”
\
JMG, 21 Feb 2025: HHS Scours Govt Websites For LGBTQ-Related Content
“The bigotry is astounding.”
\\
Meanwhile,
Salon, Brian Karem, 20 Feb 2025: Trump’s vision for America is a throne, subtitled “One month in, Trump declares himself a king”
Note the comment about golf outings at Mar-a-Lago (“nine on 31 days by last account”).
\
Washington Post, Philip Bump, 20 Feb 2025: Half of Trump’s first month in office saw him visiting Trump properties, subtitled “On one-third of the first 31 days of his second term, Trump played golf.”
Trump, of course, accused Obama of playing too much golf. (Why do presidents play so much golf? I don’t know. I’ve never golfed.)
\
And here again is the projection of a simple-minded person who knows only what he knows, and nothing else.
RawStory, Matthew Chapman, 19 Feb 2025: Trump golfs 5 days straight as he accuses teleworkers of hitting the links on the clock
“There’s a whole big, oh, you can work from home,” said Trump when signing the executive order mandating a return to office. “Nobody’s going to work from a home. They’re going to be going out. They’re going to play tennis. They’re going to play golf. They’re going to do a lot of things. They’re not working.”
