Midterm Shenanigans

Trump's constant bluster about voter fraud and rigged elections may be producing a Streisand Effect by having prompted rigorous investigations that always turn up diddly squat.

And given Americans' legendarily short attention span, it kinda looks like people are getting just a little bored with it.

But this is a guy who never gives up - he backs down a lot - but he never admits defeat, and you can bet dollars to dingleberries that he'll keep hammering away.

So IMO it's more than a little probable that this story in WaPo illustrates some of the basic fuckery that I think Trump and Blanche are cooking up.

DOJ seeks to block Alaska Senate result if Republican incumbent narrowly loses In a lawsuit, the Justice Department cited confusion over two similarly named candidates, including Republican Sen. Daniel S. Sullivan.

The Justice Department has moved to preemptively block certification of the results of Alaska’s Senate race if Republican incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan loses his tight race against Democrat Mary Peltola next month, launching an unusual legal battle amid broader concerns over the Trump administration’s willingness to accept the election results.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court Thursday, department officials described the candidacy of a third contender in the race — another Republican named Dan J. Sullivan Jr. — as a bid to mislead supporters of Sen. Sullivan into voting for the wrong candidate.

They asked a federal judge to bar the state from certifying the race’s results should the senator lose by a margin less than the number of votes his same-named challenger receives. In that scenario, the department said, the court should investigate whether that result was tainted by voter confusion.

The move marked a remarkable bid by the Justice Department to potentially intervene in the outcome of a race that could determine control of the Senate before the election has occurred. Just hours before the suit was filed, Attorney General Todd Blanche downplayed the suggestion his agency would seek to interfere with state certified election outcomes outside of what he described as a “doomsday scenario.”

“It is not DOJ’s intention to — and it’s never our intention to — improperly interfere with elections or the state certification process,” Blanche told reporters Thursday. “But, you know, to say there’s no circumstances that we would ever do that, of course, I’m not going to say that.”

As Election Day approaches, Democrats have grown increasingly alarmed by what they view as attempts by the Justice Department to influence the outcome of the vote. The Trump administration has pushed in public and in court to exert greater control over state-run election administration and worked to cast doubt on the integrity of the results.

In Alaska, Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward wrote in the Thursday filing, “the sole purpose of [Dan J. Sullivan’s] candidacy is to benefit the Peltola campaign by reducing the number of votes for Senator Sullivan.”

“Given the substantial likelihood that the inclusion of Dan J. Sullivan will confuse or mislead voters looking to cast a vote for Senator Sullivan and thus distort the will of Alaskan voters, there is a substantial likelihood that a certification of the election will reflect an electoral process that lacked integrity,” Woodward, the Justice Department’s third highest-ranking official, added.

Dan J. Sullivan did not immediately return requests for comment Friday. Spokespeople for Sen. Dan S. Sullivan and Peltola also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The candidacy of Dan J. Sullivan — a retired teacher and a former member of the Alaska Independence Party who registered as a Republican shortly before filing to enter the race this year — has been a source of consternation for Republicans.

Alaska election officials moved in June to boot him from the ballot, agreeing that his entry into the race was meant to confuse voters. But Dan J. Sullivan has repeatedly denied claims that he was trying to confuse, or coordinating with Democrats or Peltola’s campaign. A state court ordered him back on the ballot later that month, a decision later affirmed by the state’s Supreme Court.

He advanced to the general election in the state’s August primary, which selects the top four candidates regardless of party. He received only 2.5 percent of the vote — almost entirely from liberal strongholds in the state.

Name confusion is not new in the state of under 780,000. Dan S. Sullivan, the current senator, was first elected in 2014, the same year the then-Anchorage mayor, also named Dan Sullivan, was running for lieutenant governor.

Jim Lottsfeldt, an Anchorage-based political consultant, said name confusion likely contributed to Dan S. Sullivan’s victory that year. (Former mayor Sullivan endorsed Sen. Sullivan against the teacher Sullivan in this year’s race.)

Lottsfeldt had the idea at the time to recruit more candidates named Dan Sullivan to the Senate ballot to confuse voters, though he declined to actually go through with it. He denied any involvement in Dan J. Sullivan’s candidacy this year.

“I actually looked and saw there were like 14 Dan Sullivans,” Lottsfeldt said in an interview last month.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday called Dan J. Sullivan’s candidacy a “SCAM” and hinted that his administration could soon seek legal intervention in the race.

“We are looking at powerful legal options to remove the fraudulent Dan J. Sullivan Jr. from the Ballot, and holding the Democrats accountable for their Election Interference, in the pursuit of Justice and Fairness,” Trump wrote on social media.

Still, election experts described the legal arguments advanced by the department in the suit Thursday as “absurdly thin” and predicted it would not withstand judicial scrutiny. University of Notre Dame law professor Derek Muller called the department’s suit “one of the worst ones I’ve ever seen.”

“In short, like many Department letters over the last few years, it is designed to win the press release rather than the litigation,” Muller wrote in a blog post.

The suit relies on a novel reading of the National Voter Registration Act -- a broad statute that governs voter registration requirements. Instead, Justice Department lawyers cited a mention in the law’s preamble Thursday to justify its interest in the outcome of the Alaska race, saying it authorized the federal government to “protect the integrity of the electoral process.”

Though the suit called for Alaska’s results to be put on hold in the event of Sen. Sullivan’s narrow loss so an investigation can be conducted to determine voters intended that result, the filing does not explain how such an investigation would be carried out while also protecting the secrecy of voters’ ballot choices.

Trump has spent years questioning election procedures and has fretted in recent months that a Democratic takeover of Congress could lead to his third impeachment. He continues to insist he won the 2020 election, even though recounts and court reviews found he lost, and he regularly complains without evidence that elections are rigged against Republicans.

He and his administration have spent the past two years trying to intervene with how states run elections, but have had little success. Trump tried to limit who received mail ballots but was stopped by the Supreme Court. The Justice Department sued 30 states for their voter rolls but has lost case after case in court. The Department of Homeland Security has prioritized finding noncitizens on voter rolls, but a judge this week restricted how it can conduct its investigations.

Rick Hasen, a UCLA law professor and director of the school’s Safeguarding Democracy Project, told NPR this week he did not believe the Trump administration and its backers would challenge results if Democrats win control of Congress in a blowout.

But Hasen, who spoke before the Justice Department filed its latest lawsuit, named Alaska as a potential legal battleground if Democrats narrowly take control of the Senate. The state uses ranked-choice voting and takes longer than others to tabulate results, heightening the chances of litigation there, he noted.

“If it comes down to one seat, then I think all bets are off. And then I’m very concerned that the Trump administration will try to do things to manipulate the outcome of the elections,” Hasen said.

Just remember that Jan6 was a multi-pronged, multi-phase operation. So taking the states to court is likely just part of the plan.

STAY FROSTY

EYE ON THE BALL

NOSE TO THE WIND

EAR TO THE GROUND

SHOULDER TO THE WHEEL

now try to get

something done

in that position

Billie Nelson

Rich

Voter Beware

Midterm Fuckery

The Trumplefucks continue to stack the shitty things they intend to do, waiting until after the midterms to spring it all on us. And IMHO, a lot of it is going to be blamed on the Democrats.

As soon as the Dems are elected, I expect the gaslighting will reverse.

White House Officials Told the DOJ to Delay Action on Abortion Ahead of the Midterms

Attorney General Todd Blanche has moved slowly in abortion pill litigation and department officials have told advocates to wait until after the election.

The White House has instructed the Justice Department to move slowly on any abortion-related actions ahead of the midterm elections, The Washington Sun has learned.

In a series of discussions, senior White House officials, led by White House chief of staff Susan Wiles, directly delivered the message to Attorney General Todd Blanche, according to a senior administration official not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. Wiles suggested that an aggressive approach on abortion would generate unwanted attention, something the officials worried could alienate voters ahead of the November elections.

“No one wants us taking any real action before the midterms,” the senior administration official said, emphasizing the push came directly from top White House staff.

The White House denied that meetings took place: “This is completely false. These conversations never occurred between White House officials and DOJ officials.”

But administration officials have also informed anti-abortion leaders, who have aggressively pressed the administration to move quickly to restrict abortion access, that any action on abortion would take place after the midterm elections, multiple sources told The Sun.

“Once the midterms are over and it’s truly lame-duck time, we’ve heard the gloves will be off,” one conservative in touch with the administration, granted anonymity to discuss private conversations, said. “We have heard we have friends, and there are definitely people who are staunch pro-lifers.”

The DOJ has consistently asked federal judges to pause ongoing lawsuits that seek to restrict access to the abortion drug mifepristone until the Food and Drug Administration completes a review of the drug’s safety and effectiveness. A departure from that strategy would create unfavorable headlines just before voters head to the polls, the White House officials made clear to Blanche.

The Supreme Court in 2024 dismissed a case that sought to ban the abortion pill mifepristone on procedural grounds. The justices have never taken a position on whether the pills should be available.

Other cases challenging abortion pill access that have emerged since are currently making their way through the federal courts. The Trump administration is defending FDA rules that allow these drugs to be available via mail, but is doing so only on procedural grounds rather than expressly supporting the current regulations. Anti-abortion groups and allies of the movement have urged the DOJ to drop its procedural defense of FDA and, instead, allow courts to rule more quickly on the merits of the cases.

The senior administration official said the White House has made clear to Blanche that it would not support such a strategy.

In response to questions about meetings between Blanche and White House officials, a DOJ spokesperson called President Donald Trump “the most pro-life president in history.” The spokesperson did not answer questions specifically about the meetings or the substance of those meetings.

“The Department of Justice represents [the Food and Drug Administration] in these matters, and FDA is continuing to review the safety data for mifepristone,” the spokesperson said. “We asked the courts to stay these cases while that review is ongoing. Should the Department learn of possible fraud or harm to women involving these drugs, we will investigate those matters.”

Anti-abortion leaders expect post-election action that is not just related to litigation.
A source familiar with the matter said DOJ officials have told some anti-abortion leaders that any action on enforcing the Comstock Act — which would bar the mailing of abortion drugs — would take place after the election.

The DOJ is “actively working on it,” the source said.

Tom McClusky, director of government affairs for CatholicVote, said he has heard “the same thing from every agency I talk to and from members of Congress.” He added, “It’s always that nothing’s going to happen until November.”

Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America, told The Sun in May that she had “encouraging” meetings with a DOJ official, whom she declined to name, on the Comstock Act. Specifically, she said there are discussions around rescinding a 2022 memo from the Office of Legal Counsel issued during the Biden administration that effectively made the law unenforceable.

But when asked whether the DOJ had given the organization an update as to when action would take place, Kristi Hamrick, vice president of media and policy for Students for Life, told The Sun: “Everything but the election is pushed until after the elections.”

Blanche, in his July confirmation hearings, said he opposed abortion pills being available via mail and committed to enforcing the Comstock Act, a series of 1873 federal laws that prohibit the shipment of “every article or thing designed, adapted or intended for producing abortion.” Politico also reported that during an August call with faith leaders, Blanche said the administration was working to ensure abortion was banned “in every single state.”

As a result, some in the anti-abortion camp are holding out hope that Blanche will be an ally to them.

“Based on Attorney General Blanche’s testimony during his confirmation, we have hope and are expecting that swift action will be taken to stop mail-order abortion drugs that are undermining pro-life state laws across the country,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. “Every day that goes by more women are coerced and harmed and more unborn children die. We are past due for action.”

But Blanche has said nothing publicly about abortion since the summer.

A directive from the White House to the DOJ to inject electoral politics into litigation would historically have been seen as highly unusual, at best. In the wake of Watergate, then-Attorney General Benjamin Civiletti issued a memo in 1979 that laid out guidelines to firewall DOJ from White House personnel on certain sensitive matters. That memo, which has become known as the “no contacts” policy, has been updated and strengthened several times in the intervening decades, though Trump loosened it at the start of his current term.

Any action to restrict abortion pills would immediately break Trump’s 2024 campaign pledge that he would “not block” access to the drugs.

The White House first made its intentions for the midterms clear to cabinet members in February, the senior administration official said. Blanche was deputy attorney general at that time but was brought up to speed after he became acting attorney general in April.

The Trump administration’s silence on abortion pills has frustrated even judges overseeing abortion pill cases.

Earlier this month, during oral arguments for Louisiana v. FDA, judges in the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals multiple times pressed DOJ lawyers to state the administration’s perspective on the FDA’s regulations — to no avail.

“The only thing I can say, your honor, is what we’ve said in the briefs, which is that FDA is conducting an ongoing review. It has committed to do this. It’s doing it in an ongoing fashion, so we just haven’t taken a position,” said Daniel Winik, an attorney for the DOJ’s senior counsel.

In response, Judge Stephen Higginson said: “I find that very, very unsatisfactory that the agency won’t give an opinion as to its own regulations.”

Just What We needed

Another Day, Another Dog-Ass Republican

Always. Always. Always. They're always doing what they tell us they hate - or what they accuse others of doing. Like they believe - hard - that if they just stay on the attack, we won't notice what fuckin' dirtbags they are.

Republican Who Backed Death Penalty for Pedophiles Faces Child Sex Charges

Palm Beach County Clerk of Court Michael Caruso, a former Republican state legislator who previously backed the death penalty for adults convicted of sexually battering children under 12, was arrested Tuesday on five felony child sex abuse charges.

The 67-year-old married father of seven who was appointed by Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis faces five felony counts: kidnapping, child molestation, lewd exhibition, luring or enticing a child and child abuse causing mental injury, an arrest affidavit shows.

Investigators in Florida say Caruso violated a child—who is a relative—and allege the abuse occurred multiple times from fall 2024 to August 2025, including on a family cruise, a fishing outing and during a Thanksgiving gathering. The child has been receiving therapeutic services since April 2026, according to the police affidavit.

“Being in a position of public trust provides no shield from accountability,” state Attorney General James Uthmeier said. "This individual will face the full force of the law.”

DeSantis, who named Caruso to serve as court clerk and comptroller in August 2025, immediately suspended him from office Tuesday upon learning of the allegations.

“It was a very easy decision for me to yank him from that position," DeSantis said during a Tuesday news conference.

When asked whether he or anyone in his administration was aware of the allegations against Caruso before his appointment, he answered "of course not.”

“He had a clean vet, he was well-regarded in the community,” DeSantis said, calling the alleged crimes “horrific.”

Florida is the first state to reintroduce the death penalty for convicted pedophiles, DeSantis said, and if Caruso is convicted, "he is going to be in a world of hurt.”

What Bill Did Caruso Support?

While representing District 87 in the Florida House, Caruso backed what is now known as the 2023 Florida Capital Sexual Battery law. The legislation allows prosecutors to seek the death penalty for adults convicted of sexually battering a child under the age of 12. Caruso is listed as a “Yea” in the April 13, 2023, House vote. DeSantis signed the bill in May 2023 and it took effect six months later.

The Republican is up for reelection in November but is not appearing on Tuesday’s primary ballot, as he is running uncontested. The Florida GOP called on Caruso to immediately drop out of the race.

“While this is surprising news for our entire team, it does not change who we are at the Clerk’s Office or our commitment to the community and customers we serve,” the Palm Beach County Clerk of the Circuit Court & Comptroller’s Office said in an email to Newsweek.

Following the arrest, Shannon Ramsey-Chessman was sworn in as clerk ad interim. As of Tuesday afternoon, Caruso’s official page on the clerk's office website was unavailable.

Caruso was booked into the Orange County jail and is being held without bond. The investigation remains ongoing and Uthmeier's office expects more charges.

Hawk

A concentration camp by any other name still stinks of fascism.

Belle

There are 1,461 days in a POTUS term.

1,461

- 564

  897

There's over 60% of Trump's term left to go.

"Trump has been a disaster for the US, and the Republicans in Congress who co-signed for it are to blame."

Review Farms

"You've never wondered why something completely boring - like a bike lock - has like 50,000 reviews?"

I hate this shit. Seems like everything is just so fucking scammy.

Hawk

Stop wondering

The Kids Are Not Alright

Elect Republicans and watch the children suffer.



More Than 770,000 Children Are No Longer Receiving SNAP Benefits After Trump Changes Federal Food Program

Republican backers of Trump’s signature domestic policy bill repeatedly claimed that revisions to the food benefits program wouldn’t affect the most vulnerable. But reports from a dozen states show children are losing access.

As a House committee debated President Donald Trump’s signature domestic policy bill last year, Republican backers repeatedly emphasized that its changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, wouldn’t affect vulnerable people.

SNAP reforms would “restore integrity” to the program and ensure it works for the “most vulnerable among us, including children,” said Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican and chair of the House Agriculture Committee.

Passing the bill would be a “historic accomplishment” that will ensure “those in need can continue to receive the assistance they need,” said Rep. John Rose, a Republican from Tennessee.

And Rep. Dusty Johnson, a South Dakota Republican, said the bill would focus resources on the “neediest” Americans. “If you are a pregnant woman, your benefits are unaffected. If you have young children at home, your benefits are unaffected by this bill. If you are disabled, your benefits are unaffected by this bill.”

But nearly a year after the measure was signed into law, the number of children receiving food assistance has plummeted by at least 776,000, according to a ProPublica analysis. At least 12 states break down program participation by age, and of the 1,670,011 people who are no longer receiving benefits in those states, 776,134, or 46%, were children.

Another analysis reached the same conclusion: Just last month, the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found there were 700,000 fewer children receiving food assistance.

Arizona has seen the nation’s largest percentage decline in SNAP participants; 205,223 children are no longer receiving the benefit since July 2025, a 55% drop. Louisiana had the second largest percent decline among children, 22%.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees SNAP, hasn’t detailed the impact on children aided by the program, but initial figures show that compared to February 2025, 4.3 million fewer people received SNAP nationwide in February 2026, leaving 37.8 million participants.

Although children weren’t the intended targets of the legislation’s changes, they’re increasingly “collateral damage,” said Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

If states are trying to comply with the law’s changes to SNAP, they’re likely not focusing on making the program accessible, Bergh said. Other experts said that people may be pushed off the program because of increased paperwork requirements to remain eligible.

States are required to impose work requirements for most adult recipients, while preparing for two major cost shifts. In October, states will begin covering 75% of the program’s administrative costs. States have been paying 50% of those costs.

In addition, states will have to pay a larger share of SNAP benefits starting in October 2027, based on their error rate. Error rates reflect overpayments or underpayments of SNAP benefits. While sometimes characterized as fraud, such errors are usually the fault of the state agency or the SNAP recipient, according to USDA, which describes them as “largely unintentional.”

If a state agency is facing staffing shortages and struggling to comply with new regulations, it will be harder for low-income families to access the benefits, Bergh said. “Families are falling through the cracks.”

In Massachusetts, for example, the share of SNAP applicants who called an assistance line and couldn’t reach a worker rose from 61% in November to nearly 81% in March, according to the Department of Transitional Assistance, which administers SNAP in the state. The state agency did not respond to a request for comment.

A USDA spokesperson did not address ProPublica’s questions about the number of children who have lost access to SNAP. “There is no shortage of resources for the most vulnerable among us, including children,” the spokesperson said.

Have you lost your benefits? Are you working with those who have? Help ProPublica do more reporting. We need your help understanding what shifting policies actually mean for communities across the country. If your SNAP or Medicaid benefits have been cut or if you work to help people navigate public assistance programs, you can email us at safetynet@propublica.org to share your experience.

The three members of the House Agriculture Committee who defended last year’s bill before its passage — Rose, Thompson and Johnson — did not respond to ProPublica’s questions about their statements now that many children no longer receive SNAP benefits.

Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, asked Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins about her recent comments that it was “good news” that millions of people no longer receive SNAP. If more than 700,000 children have been dropped in the 12 states that report those figures, “that number’s going to be into the millions” when other states are included, he said.

Rollins responded, “The 700,000 number of children is not correct,” contending that most people who were kicked off SNAP were “fraudulent.”

“That is not a nonpartisan group that gave you that number,” she said. (ProPublica independently verified the figures reported by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.)

McGovern said he has talked to people who have lost food assistance. “These are people who actually need and rely on this food assistance to provide basic nutrition for their families,” he said.

Pressure to lower error rates “creates a temptation for the states to bump off working families,” said Parke Wilde, a food economist at Tufts University. Working families may have more volatile incomes, making it harder for state agencies to assess benefits accurately.

“When they say we want to preserve SNAP for those with the greatest need, they’re sort of acknowledging that they want the scale of the SNAP program to be smaller,” he said.

Mariana Chilton, an expert in child hunger at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, said a smaller program won’t save money in the long run. Research shows that children who receive SNAP benefits are healthier, have better academic outcomes, use hospitals less often and have better mental health as teenagers.

She called the situation a “public health crisis” in the making. “When children are not healthy, this affects children today and it affects them throughout their lifetimes,” she said, likening hunger during early childhood to a brain injury.

As Arizona’s SNAP participation drops, nonprofits are feeling the effects. St. Mary’s Food Bank, the largest in the state, has seen a 15% increase in need this year, which translates into 300,000 more visits from people in search of food, said Milt Liu, the chief executive officer.

“It’s important for everyone to realize that policies have implications for people on the edge, and we’re seeing that in our line every day,” he said.

On a recent morning, Ana Alvarez waited in a line of vehicles at a St. Mary’s food bank in Phoenix. Alvarez, a single mother of five who works at a restaurant, started coming to St. Mary’s after she lost her SNAP benefits in September.

She reapplied for SNAP with the Arizona Department of Economic Security in December, but the application is still pending. The department did not respond to questions about its backlog.

She clips coupons and has cut out trips to the zoo and restaurants with her children. The slow season at the restaurant where she works is about to hit. And as summer temperatures rise, Alvarez wonders how she will afford her electric bill, her rent and her car payment.

At least once a week she contacts the agency about her application. The last time she called, a worker told her what others have in the past: She will have to keep waiting.

Belle

IMHO, Republicans go on making a play for Plutocratic rule.

They push radical wackos in their primary elections - people who aren't very likely to win in the general election. And they have to know their wacko candidates don't appeal to most voters.

So it would seem they really are counting on a Jim Crow style scheme to keep people away from the polls.

With all the shit they're trying to pull - the campaign against Mail-In, threatening to order the USPS not to deliver ballots, vote roll purges, closing polling places, threatening to post armed "officers" at polling places, and and and. They're working hard to carve off a few percentage points - votes that would normally go to the Democrats - in order to eke out a few wins here and there.

It's the ugliest kind of politics, and I don't blame anybody for being repulsed by the process, and more than a little reluctant to participate.

But we have to show up for it.

No matter what else, don't stay home. Go vote.

Oy

Trump is doing his damnedest to stay in office.

He's nominated people for the federal bench who refuse to say that a president who has served two terms is not eligible for a third term, according to very plain and obvious language at the beginning of the first section of the 22nd amendment:

No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

 

Why do we have to fuck with this?

Where are the honorable people in government who should be jumping all over this?

Erika

Parasocial Exploitation

Parasocial exploitation is the practice where influencers, content creators, or brands deliberately manufacture an illusion of genuine friendship or intimacy with their audience to maximize financial gain. It turns a fan's natural emotional investment into a transactional commodity, often leading to overspending or psychological harm.

A Reminder

In 1979, Jimmy Carter had solar panels installed on the roof of the White House.

In 1986, Ronald Reagan had them removed.

If we'd listened to Carter, and continued to follow his lead, we wouldn't have to worry about the Strait of Hormuz.

Republicans, on behalf of The Dirty Fuels Cartel, have been fucking us over for a very long time.

How Do I Not Hate These Assholes?

We're living another episode of Classic GOP Proforma Bullshit.

• Completely fuck something up
• Walk away, leaving it for someone else to clean up the mess you've made
• Bitch about the clean up and the people doing the work

I live for the morning I wake up to The Big Beautiful Obituary.

A Death-Of-Stalin Moment

Three main components:

1. Tactical: I have a tank. This is what makes it run, this is what it can kill, and this is what can kill it
2. Operational: I have a battalion of tanks, and a supply train, and air support, and infantry, and field intelligence and and and - this is the hill we want our guys to take, and this is how the other guys could stop us 
3. Strategic - what's the fuckin' point of all that? What have we accomplished in service to our long term interests?

We have the muscle to fuck up the whole day for anybody anywhere in the world.

But what's next? What comes after all that fuck-up-ery? How does all this shit Trump is doing manifest a coherent strategy?

Manufacturing Ignorance

agnotology
noun

The process of intentionally creating or encouraging doubt or ignorance, for example by spreading false information, in order to influence opinion, sell a product, or gain an advantage, or the study of this process.

Iran

The idea that we can topple a government with low-risk airstrikes is pretty dumb.

The idea that if we knock off the Irani government, killing 80 school girls in the process (oops), and then expect the new government to get all chummy with us - well that's just fuckin' stupid.

It's like thinking that once the Russians lose in Ukraine, we can expect Ukrainians to embrace the Russians even though they've outright murdered Ukrainian civilians for years - It's just really really really fuckin' stupid.

And BTW, Trump has blustered, "We can't allow a country to raise up terrorist groups".

So maybe we should stop creating those countries, and giving them reason to do it. We've been fucking with Iran for 75 years. Stop doin' that, you stoopid fuck.

We are not distracted