James Marriott

“Our society has been peaceful and healthy for so long that for many people serious disaster has become inconceivable,” Marriott writes. “Americans who parade around in amateur militia groups and brandish Nazi symbols do so partly because they are unable to conceive of what life would actually be like in a fascist state.” Those who attack modern medicine cannot really comprehend a society without it. And, Marriott adds, those who are cheering the rise of autocracy in the United States “have no serious understanding of what it means to live under an autocratic government.”

(Heather Cox Richardson's substack.)

Marriott notes that five Texas counties that make up one of the least vaccinated areas in the U.S. are gripped by a measles outbreak that has infected at least 58 people and hospitalized 13. It may be, Marriot writes, that “[t]he paradise of fools is coming to an end.”

Sunday

Trump and Musk want a world where there's no government and you have to beg the oligarchy for any little crumb, and they can spend wildly on whatever they want. Suckers. 

With the states fighting against each other, state attorney generals are suing each other. Luckily some got a cease and desist order on Elon Musk. 

I am feeling a need to avoid politics lately, maybe I need a break from it all. They say it's OK to take breaks, there's a conscious overwhelming policy, that's why there's always blarney most days. If it were not so destructive and evil, I'd say it was creative.

Trump trying to erase slogans like "End Racism" and diversity, equality and inclusion programs really means they work. 

I was trying to think of Trump is more like Darth Vader or Golem, and I remember that economic man, Quentin Compson, the second section in The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner: Drowned in the fading of honeysuckle.

Been feeling anger at all the people apathetic not to vote. Germany and France resoundingly reject far right wing autocrats and wannabe Nazis and America elected one. Just so obvious to me, we've been hoodwinked and people are dying, being deported, fired without cause or legally. It's a huge mess. And why? Greed. 

People just keep posting on social media, how is this happening? In shock. 

no longer authorized to conduct informal activities using government time, resources or facilities.

Protests at City Hall NYC February 2025

There's certainly a lot going on and pretending to be comprehensive isn't going to work. The hacking into payments at the source, even if it's read only, well, we just don't know what's going on, but it's quite possibly quite damaging. Cutting off payments to nursing homes, and all sorts of vital things is going to cause mass chaos and that's what it's about. 

Now Elon is playing the game of avoiding being served for all the lawsuits he's creating with his lawlessness. Just sidestepping the courts, sidestepping the legislature, that is a coup. I don't care if he's been empowered by Trump to hijack the federal government, or that the supreme court and legislature are republican, there is a rule of law, and he's breaking it. The Felon in Chief who isn't so hot on laws either, is cheering him on.

How does it happen that clubs are banned at West Point? Does Trump call up the president, and say well if you don't cancel these diversity affirming clubs I'm going to cut funding, I have Musk on the inside and he'll do it. Or does the president just get the vibes of what's going on and do it? 

Meanwhile shitty Google's links aren't working, you have to scroll down past the sponsored links, which seem to have expanded, and find a working link. 

Headline: West Point Disbands Clubs for Women and Minorities After Trump Orders NYTimes. Why is the president closing clubs? At a military college? Should be the only place he could do such a thing but why would he even care. I certainly care that he's closing them.

The message is both, you're not welcome here, and your experience doesn't matter. Like you can stop the black engineers from gathering together. 

The soccer guys down at the park don't really care, they're all hispanic and like Trump, and prefer to identify with the oppressor, and don't want to be told how to think.

"The memo said the directive canceled all trips, meetings, events and other activities associated with the clubs, which were no longer authorized to conduct informal activities using government time, resources or facilities." NYTimes

I mean it's not to hard to rename the club rock climbing or photography and still meet, except they're being trained to follow orders, and Trump doesn't like the military because it resists being his stooge. This is a revenge tour by a petty small minded harmful president. It's offensive on so many levels, which might be his plan to offend liberal sensibilities, the freedom to be who you are. Now cower to his greed. What does he stand for? He can't say white supremacy out loud, but that's his Hitler type message ultimately. And the mixed race guys playing soccer in the park love him, even though they're less under this system. I can't tell them as a white man who to vote for, that's more oppression, they're already voting for an oppressor without my educating them, thank you. They identify more with the strong man who smashes people, hopefully they're not caught under foot. 

Pretending that racism, sexism, classism doesn't exist, that doesn't erase it. Just compounds the problems that the clubs were working to redress. 

"end diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives within the federal government and supported by federal funds"

Trumps ultimate script flipping then goes on to say, "promising to “forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based.”"

This is why lying is so vital to Trump, because doing the opposite of what he says he's doing is the key to the art of the deal. 

Meanwhile the legal system is fighting out diversity programs, as in against affirmative action (NY Times). Total shitshow. I wouldn't be surprised if colored water fountains start showing up in federal buildings. 

All the NASA website posts trumpeting women have to be taken down. (gizmodo).

This is what you jerks voted for. And that is what the cheating felon president is doing.

Many conservatives applaud his works, meanwhile it's going to be too late to stop him later when these self interested types get trampled on in some way.

The Coup

I thought it was dramatic to call it a coup, but I see it now. Musk is circumventing too many rules. Check out HCR's letter to America:

"...the Republicans control both chambers of Congress: the House of Representatives and the Senate. They also control the White House and the Supreme Court. If they wanted to get rid of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), for example, they could introduce a bill, debate it, pass it, and send it on to President Trump for his signature. And there would be very little the Democrats could do to stop that change. But they are not doing that."

"Instead, they are permitting unelected billionaire Elon Musk, whose investment of $290 million in Trump and other Republican candidates in the 2024 election apparently has bought him freedom to run the government, to override Congress and enact whatever his own policies are by rooting around in government agencies and cancelling those programs that he, personally, dislikes."

"The replacement of our constitutional system of government with the whims of an unelected private citizen is a coup. The U.S. president has no authority to cut programs created and funded by Congress, and a private citizen tapped by a president has even less standing to try anything so radical."

"...permitting a private citizen to override the will of our representatives in Congress destroys the U.S. Constitution. It also makes Congress itself superfluous. And it takes the minority rule Republicans have come to embrace to the logical end of putting government power in the hands of one man."

Nation headline: Who Will Stop Elon Musk’s Coup?

Never forget he did the Nazi salute 2 times recently.

"“What is happening now is predictable,” Die Zeit said in its editorial. “Neo-Nazis and right-wing radicals can interpret the stretched right arm as a gesture of fraternization and empowerment.” NYT

The selling price for American government is 280 million, seems cheap. Wasn't even into Trump's pocket, it was just on his campaign.

Selling fear of chaos, president creates chaos. America have never been in more danger than in this moment.

Many news outlets are calling it a hack. It's a coup. (example, 

Guardian: Progressive Democrats accuse Trump and Musk of ‘a plutocratic coup’

I am very angry! Worst threat to American democracy in my lifetime. Today I am calling my legislative representatives, Schumer (202) 224-6542, Gillibrand (202) 224-4451 and Meng (202) 225-2601, to protest the coup. Websites aren't working but I figured it out with non-governmental websites.

All I can say is anytime a conservative starts to talk about security of state secrets, I'm going to ask them if they spoke out about Trump's boxes in his bathroom, and Musk accessing social security numbers even though he was not vetted. They keep crossing off items of their agenda through lack of integrity.

Links:

Atlantic on Archive: Elon Musk’s bureaucratic coup is underway.

Nation: Signs of a New Anti-Trump Opposition Amid Elon Musk’s Coup

Heather Cox Richardson YouTube. She points out the Coup was after 5PM on Friday, avoiding the media coverage. She says people keep their pensions when they resign instead of being fired, that's why people are resigning instead of fighting things more. Musk's philosophy is break everything and then if it was really necessary, they can add it back. He says he's doing things, never really sure if they're really doing things. She says the Republicans in congress can stop this, but not for much longer. Democrats are screaming from the rooftops. Republicans stopped Nixon. Will they stop this time? Stepping past the congress and courts sets up a dictatorship. There's a blizzard of lawsuits. Normally when people are breaking the law, they try to stay within the law, it's harder to understand how to attack back when people completely disregard the law. People don't know how to respond. How do we proceed? This GOP isn't popular, and since then they stay in power by suppressing the vote, gerrymandering, and overspending from corporations, the media follows. That Trump can't really talk isn't being covered the way Biden limped after he broke his foot. We got to the place we are now because Republicans control president, legislature, and supreme court. They don't even have the notes in congress, so they're not going to do it with legislature. They're not acting to stop him. Without laws, we're in authoritarianism. 

They want to get rid of federal education. That would get rid of money for disabilities and poor schools. Nursing homes. If you shut down a nursing home, it's really bad news for the people who live there, the people who work there. It's the ultimate destruction of the liberal consensus to use tax dollars to create a structure, a safety net. That's not going to turn out well for America. This isn't a private company like Twitter, this is a country. There's going to be some real problems. The hardships are going to be extraordinary, and it takes down the whole system. They want to destroy everything and helpless, and divided. They'll sell the parts. You voted to take the car to the mechanic, and you come back and it's been stripped and sold, they kept the money and we should thank them for it. 

What to do: Musk is not elected. He threatens to fund opponents in the legislature, and he doesn't need them any more by side stepping them. The republicans need to wake up. 332 million Americans against one. The question isn't whether you're left or right, the question is how do we stop this? Gizmocrats. They can stop any payments they want to from the government. Why would you trust them? It's chaos.

How did America mobilize the people in their own interest without the constitution (which they're sidestepping). Government needs popular buy in. He keeps saying he had a landslide, had a huge inauguration and sidestepped that last time. In this moment our voice needs to be heard.

The switchboards went down in Washington yesterday, so many people were calling.

The democrats are doing the best they can but they're not in power. People yell at the democrats, even Heather Cox Richardson doesn't do anything. Yell at the arsonists setting things on fire, not the firemen. 

You can even go to your bank and ask how you're protecting their information, the treasury has been breached. 

No violence, that always changes the narrative.

Putting money into programs that undercut ISIS, for less than 1% of the budget, is acting in our own best interest. 

Help people see how white people or their tribe is being hurt. They point out one tiny piece of this obscure grant. They're trying to cut nursing homes. Transportation. It's endless, you're about to see what happens with a really terrible run government. 

Throwing up your hands won't do. This is the worst moment in American history in many people's lives. The future is unwritten, we can maybe make this not be so bad.

In other news:

Timeline of crash

January 20: FAA director fired

January 21: Air Traffic Controller hiring frozen

January 22: Aviation Safety Advisory Committee disbanded

January 28: Buyout/retirement demand sent to existing employees

January 29: First American mid-air collision in 16 years

January 30: Whitehouse addresses the nation. Donald Trump blames DEI, Joe Biden, and Barack Obama for the tragic accident.

Pete Buttigieg: "Despicable. As families grieve, Trump should be leading, not lying. We put safety first, drove down close calls, grew Air Traffic Control, and had zero commercial airline crash fatalities out of millions of flights on our watch. 

President Trump now oversees the military and the FAA. One of his first acts was to fire and suspend some of the key personnel who helped keep our skies safe. Time for the President to show actual leadership and explain what he will do to prevent this from happening again.”

I’ve been thinking that everyone has two people inside them. One is liberal and one is conservative. What our politics is the one we let out. If you let out the liberal, the caring, then you want to try and do things with the government. If you let the conservative out, you don’t want government, you see it’s influence as negative. 

Libertarians can say they’re liberal, like Chomsky, but it’s a fundamental move to hate government from a conservative perspective. 

You can be a liberal and see unintended consequences of government, and missteps. 

You can be a conservative and want roads and garbage taken away, collectively, for the general good.

We are large, we contain the multitudes.

I think about how upset I am during this time, and I’m going to imagine conservatives who feel that way even though we’ve only had centrist democrats. I think Clinton was a DINO. We need left leaning people infiltrate the republicans and then switch sides when they get in office, like the Republicans are doing.

I think things in politics used to be about limiting action versus greater action, but the current regime is all about putting on an elaborate song and dance for the revival and snake oil. America has become a parody of itself. 

Gish gallop

Seems like Trump is cutting off all government money, and whatever he lets come back, they’ll be relieved, when really he’s just an asshole the whole time. 

Meanwhile he’s trying to sneak through a federal abortion ban. It’s a gish gallop. 

Lefties joke about him playing golf, but I’d like him to take days off from this chaos making. He’s got his minions working anyway.

We've progressed even though we’re going through a fucktastrophy

Few steps forward, a few steps back. 

It's 2025, and in 1954, 71 years ago, Betty White's show was canceled for having black people on it (Wikipedia)(Watch segment). We're bound to take steps back, like maybe for the next 4 years. Trump has taken things away, like the Anti-discrimination act of 1965, and such things. We'll see what pops back right away after he's going. He's talking about trying to erase the 2 term limit, but we'll cross that road if it happens. I'm going to have to assume that they can't get that done. I assumed Trump couldn't win, but he did, and maybe it's good not to close your eyes to prepare for reality, but I think I have to just for sanity sake. 

People who performed at the Inauguration in 2025: Carrie Underwood, Snoop Dogg, Jewel. Jewel apologized for playing at an after party for RFK, she said she just wanted to advocate for mental health (VF).

I'm thinking Trump is very asshole rolled up into one. All the negative traits. All the asshole bosses you've ever had. All the rapey guys you've ever met. All the rich assholes you've ever met. Not a sports jerk, not an intellectual jerk though, so maybe not all, just most of them.